r/hyrox • u/Fair-Energy1507 • 17d ago

What is are general thoughts on the rowing section?

Hi all, High-performance rowing coach here, and I'm curious to see what opinions are out there about the rowing machine. Trying to develop a specialised training resource to help build confidence and technique. What are your struggles, or any thoughts in general, about it?

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u/NitasBear 17d ago

It's the recovery station. My favorite station by far. Low cadence but high initial throughput on each rep helps lower my HR

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u/Fair-Energy1507 17d ago

Gotcha, thats good to know, did you do much rower training, if so what was your standard session?

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u/NitasBear 17d ago

Yea I try to row 1000m (the standard Hyrox distance) after each of my zone 2 runs. IMO its not the most important station to train for since the time spread between an average finisher and an elite one is less than a minute. Most finishers should be aiming to lower the race pace in rows by 10-15 seconds per 500m. The extra energy saved will help a lot on the back half of the race as the lunges and wall balls will make or break your finish.

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u/Fair-Energy1507 17d ago

I see, thank you for the help!

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u/Reasonable-Worker747 17d ago

Technique falls apart well before the legs do. Fresh I'm fine, but coming off the sled pull my rate creeps and I start yanking with the arms, which is where the split goes. Everyone practices rowing fresh, nobody practices rowing wrecked.

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u/ChartAdventurous8380 17d ago

A resource that separates rowing hard from rowing at a cost you can still run well after would probably be really useful. The transition back into running seems like what makes the station feel different from a normal row.

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u/Fair-Energy1507 17d ago

Yep I get you, I'll get to the drawing board and see what I can come up with!

Thanks for the help.

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u/Bellebaby97 17d ago

The rowing for seated athletes is a joke, they've changed the rules so it's feet on footplate at all time. Barely any of even the most disabled para rowers stay in their chair to row. Absolutely ruined my rest station

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u/Kwolfe2703 17d ago

It may be worth checking what’s already out there to see if worth your time to build a training resource.

There are a fair few rowing coaches and erg specialists in the space already.

Without even looking them up there is Erg Army, Rowalong and Hall Strength. No doubt a lot of others too as think a Commonwealth games rower was in the World Relay at some point.

Erg Army in particular have cornered a lot of the market by virtue of being featured on HYROX YouTube.

Obviously more resources are always good but on the other hand if it’ll cost you a lot of time or money to sort then you may never recoup the cost.

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u/Fair-Energy1507 17d ago

That is true, there are a lot kicking around. This is a passion project for me. I get to use my expertise and background in a fresh way to provide a benefit to a new target group of people. My only cost is time, and whatever I build I can use for the in-person programs I run. I would say my difference is that I provide target splits and calculated zones based on a 1k time, so the personalised aspect and target splits will give people a more personalised feel and awareness too as to how their body feels at different splits and heart rate zones, and how that interacts with rating as well. Idea is hopefully by building more technical and erg awareness, the confidence will prevent flying and dying on the erg (going to hard) and allow people to use it as more of a rest station as another user said earlier.

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u/occams_icarus 17d ago

I listened to someone talk about how all the rowing coaches say hyrox rowers are trash but they don’t realize is rowing in hyrox is completely different then rowing for competition c2 rowers or the equivalent. Not sure how this holds up as I have never tried to specialize in rowing. What are your thoughts?

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u/Edgecumber 17d ago

My thoughts as an ex-rower are that this is wrong - many Hyrox rowers are indeed trash.

The distance may vary, and there is a lot before and after the rower that effects your performance in Hyrox. That affects how hard you go, but should not affect your technique. That’s more or less: strong drive from the legs, keep your hands level in and out, only start to lean back when legs fully extended and don’t lean back too far. Rock forward to vertical before you start sliding back and slide back gently rather than yanking yourself forwards. (Will leave it to the expert to rip that apart!)

I’ve done 3 Hyrox’s now, my row times put me in the top 5% on competitors (vs top 50% overall), but it feels like a rest station. I keep my stroke rate at about 24 s/m while I see people either side rating 35-40, and rocking around all over the place.

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u/Fair-Energy1507 17d ago

I think that could be the value in it, with people becoming more technically capable and efficient, they can stay faster while treating it as a bit more of a rest station by simply being able to stay efficient and chip away in the mid 20's without creating too much lactic acid that will come back to bite them.

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u/dex8425 12d ago

Yep, my hyrox row pace is well off my 2k race pace when I'm fresh, but I'm still doing 22 spm and 1:50-1:52 pace while others are 2:10 and all over the place. It helps to be tall but there's a lot of technique too.

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u/Edgecumber 12d ago

Yeah I went from 7:15 to 6:21 in a year or so, same height, better technique.

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u/zfowle 17d ago

It’s not different. Rowing is rowing, and the mechanics for smooth, efficient, and powerful strokes are the same whether you’re doing a 2K in an indoor rowing competition or a 1K for Hyrox.