Coach Thrasher

We've got coxswain mp3s!

I've successfully used my coxbox recorder harness to capture coxswain audio. The next step is to capture my communication with our coxswain. I'd also like to transmit the coxswain's voice back to my launch so I can provide immediate feedback on her calls.

I frequently take video of rowers on the water and in the erg room. I've found that I get the best training with video by doing a recording, and then immediately reviewing the video with each athlete. This is really easy in the erg room because we can look at the video within seconds of taking footage. It's harder on the water because I can't easily approach the crew with my coaching launch to show them the 2 inch screen on my camcorder.

Here's the first audio file of our coxswain, Meredith Bohling, coxing our men's varsity 8+: Coxswain MP3 (35 MB). You may want to jump to some interesting parts of the audio, in particular:

• 6:10 : Pick Drill begins
• 15:50 - 27:25 : 24-34 Rate Ramp (2 min at each 2-spm step)
• 28:40 - humming starts! or is that my launch?
• 32:30 - humming analysis - Meredith is trying to find the cause.
• 35:00 - Start main piece (1 min @ 24, 1 min @ 30, 1 min @ 32)x5
• 40:10 - turn around (past the green bouy)
• 48:00 - first coxbox battery goes empty (note: this doesn't affect the recording)
• 50:05 - 54:00 - who cut the cheese?

Throughout the practice you can hear what sounds like my launch's motor running in the background, and sometimes you can here me talking to the crew.

I'm pretty floored to have this recording working. Hopefully we can use coxswain audio recordings with coxswains in the same way that we use video footage with rowers.

Posted at 02:35PM Feb 02, 2006 by jason in Rowing  |  Comments[2]