A whole new rowing experience

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This article was published 28/04/2015 (4042 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

This story is the second in a two-part series about Calm Waters Rowing in Virginia. You can find the first part here.

Calm Waters Rowing is located near Lancaster, Va. and run by husband/wife team John Dunn and Charlotte Hollings. Collectively, they’ve spent more than 70 years immersed in the sport, winning international medals with their respective U.S. national teams, and working as high-performance coaches. Their coaching paths crossed at Cornell University, and they married soon after. 

It was while coaching together at a sculling camp in Florida that life took an unexpected turn. The rowing couple discovered so much joy and satisfaction out of coaching masters that they set out to open their own sculling camp. They bought an inn and a lake in Virginia, and started Calm Waters Rowing in 2001. 

I flew into Richmond, rented a car, studied Google maps, and set out to find them some 85 miles away.Their home base is an inn called Levelfields, a gorgeous Georgia-style manor house built in 1859 that was once the centre of a sprawling plantation. 

Rowing sessions take place three times daily on their private lake — a pond originally dammed to provide water to a mill – located a short drive away.

Between rowing, they provide demonstrations, analyze videos, and discuss technique. They also videotape participants each morning and review the footage the same day, providing points of focus for the next on-water session.  

Dunn and Hollings have a knack for zeroing in on ways to fine-tune someone’s technique, and relay it in ways that makes sense. During the first part of my stay, I witnessed them coach a mother and daughter who were absolute beginners, progressing them from wide-bottomed singles to narrow racing shells in just four days. Later in the week, I watched them help very experienced rowers make obvious improvements in just a handful of sessions. 

With me, they were able to remove the layers of years of coaching (from many different coaches) and take me back to the basics of the stroke. They had me eliminate all power and effort, row lightly, and just feel the stroke.Feel where the blades want to sit in the water. See the height where my hands want to be. Notice the pressure on the soles of the feet. Feel the connection to the core. Roll the handles away at the finish.Take the weight off the handles at the catch. And on it went. 

During my week with them, I had countless “ah-ha” moments. Strange as it may sound, while I’ve been rowing for 13 years, I don’t thinkI’ve ever really “felt” a stroke before. Not like this. It was a brand-new experience, and so exciting.

Dunn and Hollings share a philosophy that rowing should feel easy. It’s through applying power, speed and acceleration that it becomes more challenging. I believe the challenge is what makes rowing so exhilarating. That thrill of chasing the perfect stroke can be the most difficult thing — and in the same moment, the most satisfying. The most frustrating, and the most fulfilling. That must be the magic that keeps rowers coming back, row after row, for more. More pain, more gain.

I left Calm Waters feeling more competent and more confident — exactly what I set out to do — and came home renewed, rejuvenated, and more in love with the sport than ever before. I’m also more motivated to continue training to achieve my own potential, and get as good as I can. Still hopeful that one day, maybe even sometime soon, it will all click.

RoseAnna Schick is an avid traveller who seeks inspiration wherevershe goes. Email her at rascreative@yahoo.ca

RoseAnna Schick
Travelations

RoseAnna Schick is an avid traveller and music lover who seeks inspiration wherever she goes. Email her at rasinspired@gmail.com

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