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Dragon Boat Canada


IDBF


Canoe Kayak Canada

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[brainiac]

Saw a discussion on the Ontario dragon boat forum about different types of strokes:

http://www.network54.com/Forum/135730/thread/1158716170/

Thought it would be interesting to see what type of stroke people think they use. Are you a "stabber" (drive the blade into the water with a lot of force) or a "glider" (glide the blade in then apply power) or something else?

I'd also like to know what people think of the curved spines, shoulder stacking, elbow flexing and 45 degree forward leans that I've seen quite frequently. Are they legit expressions of different "styles" or bad habits instilled by a lack of proper coaching?

At Kelowna, the German team (Red Devils) had a very unusual style and, given their failure to medal, perhaps they'll be rethinking it.

[Colossus]

"different strokes for different folks".  some strokes work better for some people, and other strokes work better for others.  as was seen in the NTTs, the stroke used by Toronto was unlike our stroke, and they beat us.  their rate was lower, stroke was longer and ended further back, and they beat us by whatever fraction of a second it was.  we used our same stroke in the club crews, and did extremely well, beating out that same style used by multiple teams. 

[paddleboy]

The germans stroke was good ,lots of power and they did a kneeling start just like the Australians .I noticed the Sloths used this start at the worlds and a dead give away for this german team was they were wearing knee pads on 1 knee .

 The germans problem was their crew was 12 women and 8 men .I don't think they did too bad considering ...if it was 12 men they would have more than likely won.

[glowing_ice]

yeah but those german women were pretty big... and intimidating.  from what i saw average was about 5'7" to 5'9" in height... they could probably kick the crap out of half the men on our team.

as one of my teammates commented:  i demand they get tested! *j/k*

[rightarm]

yeah but those german women were pretty big... and intimidating.  from what i saw average was about 5'7" to 5'9" in height... they could probably kick the crap out of half the men on our team.

speak for yourself little man! 

[Rossifumi]

"as was seen in the NTTs, the stroke used by Toronto was unlike our stroke, and they beat us.  their rate was lower, stroke was longer and ended further back, and they beat us by whatever fraction of a second it was.  we used our same stroke in the club crews, and did extremely well, beating out that same style used by multiple teams."

Just a passing thought on this.  One variable to keep in mind is that crew"B", could have finished off their stroke to the exit point better than crew "G" to the point where one may not be able to tell if it was due to technique difference, or simply a better performance.


"I'd also like to know what people think of the curved spines, shoulder stacking, elbow flexing and 45 degree forward leans that I've seen quite frequently. Are they legit expressions of different "styles" or bad habits instilled by a lack of proper coaching?"
It could be one, the other, or both depending on your coach.
Sounds like what you want to know is, what constitutes style, and where does style end and bad technique begin?

Might help to talk to your coach and ask them specifics.  "Why do you (or don't) like the elbow to flex in this fashion?"
If they can explain it well, how it benefits your stroke etc.. ok then. 
If the answers,"because it is"...it could be that it's right, the coach just doesn't know why, or it could be wrong, and the coach doesn't know why either.


With regards to all the styles out there, there's a few defining (major) elements which differentiate them.
There's also happens to be a lot they share in common, things you want to do, as well as things you don't wan't to do.
With the examples you mentioned, I personally wouldn't chalk those one's up to differing styles of technique though.  They are important, but smaller details.


As an aside, there's a couple ways to think about style.  A team can be taken in the direction of being taught a certain stroke, or a team can have it's 'style' adjusted to capitalize on it's strengths. 

Here's a great example.  Take a long-running team like say, the Waverunners for instance.  Been around for awhile now, doing ok, and they have certain style elements you don't generally see in other boats.  But it's something that could be capitalized on to develop a very strong stroke.  So a coach could walk in and teach them one way, or imo, get better results by coming in and making adjustments to capitilize on said strengths.