01.05.08
Alden Rowing Shell with Peaches
[I'm finding this nice to remember in the middle of winter...!]
The Alden Rowing Shell is an ocean-going flat-bottom (read that stable) scull which gives me a ton of enjoyable exercise out on Lake Winnipesaukee in the summertime. We have a double (would accept two rowers/seats but we only have one seat) which is almost 20 years old– it is made of fiberglass, 18 feet long, with a sliding seat, outriggers, and 9-foot 6 inch wooden oars. The Alden, from Kittery, Maine, was originally designed by Arthur Martin for racing off the coast, around the Isles of Shoals.
That little lump in front of me is Peaches’ head!
I consider this the best all-around, least stressful (to any individual body part) exercise I have ever done, and that’s saying a lot! Rowing a shell of couse is cardio, it exercises your legs and abdomen, plus your shoulders and back. By increasing your pace you can make it as cardio as you can stand; by increasing your distance you improve your stamina. AND you are out on the water in the fresh air. PLUS you can combine it with fishing– what could be nicer??!
I’ll be the first to admit that learning to row a sliding-seat shell, crossing your hands at every stroke, pushing with your legs for the power stroke, tightening your abdominal muscles, and co-ordinating your arms and wrists and body angle, has a fairly steep learning curve. I don’t claim to be any expert, but I can get around pretty fast and go a long ways, and my technique is good enough not to injure or strain myself.
Peaches with me in our Alden ocean rowing shell…
Peaches hates to be left behind so if I’m not fishing I take her along– she has to sit or lie quietly in the stern in front of me. She jumps in from the dock and gets out onto the rocks at shore. I am careful never to let her swim out to me when I’m in the shell, which she has tried to do a couple of times… !
Horse Gal said,
January 7, 2008 at 2:34 pm
Peaches looks like your coxswain! I can just hear her saying “PULL!!!!”