Cross Training

Each year about this time, folks start pondering cross-training ideas for rowers. The usual suggestions include weight-training, biking, xc skiing, and rowing on the Ugh!ometer. I'm an avid cross-trainer myself. In fact, in the past 30 days I have:
xc skied, road biked, mt biked, rode on the trainer, kayaked, rowed on the Ugh!ometer, swam, ice skated, and run. You might guess that I'm a big believer in cross training to improve my rowing.

You'd be wrong. 

If I were just going to compete in rowing, I would stick to rowing and the rowing Ugh!ometer. 

The more I switch sports, the more I realize how little each sport prepares me for any other one. I can be in my best rowing fitness and I will absolutely suck at riding a bike or running or cross country skiing. It really depresses me that there doesn't seem to be more overlap physiologically. My own experience--repeated too often-- suggests strongly that fitness is highly sport-specific. 

Some sports--like rowing and biking--would seem to involve closely related use of the quadriceps. Apparently not, because when I start riding after having rowed for a long time, I feel like I am starting cycling from complete scratch: I am easily winded, I ride slowly and I am really tired afterwards. I may as well have been lying on the couch.

Each year I spend an inordinate amount of time just getting past the seemingly steep slope of initial sport-specific fitness. Imagine, if you will, Sisyphus pushing up the boulder. He gets near the top (fitness) in rowing, but switches to cycling, whereupon he has to start at the bottom with the boulder. Nearing the top again, he switches to running. Back to the bottom. You get the picture. In case you don't, here it is:

Exercise Specificity Principle

Ok, that's my own experience. What does science say?

Most exercise physiology books cite the specificity principle, e.g.,: "specific exercise elicits specific adaptations creating specific training effects" (McArdle, Katch and Katch). In other words, what you do in one sport has little bearing on what you do in another (unless they are really similar). The text cites a variety of studies to back this up (and thanks to the wonders of the Internet, you too can read some of these by clicking on that link. Of course, you could buy the book like I did.).

Rowing Research

Ok, in general, most exercise physiologists seem to accept the specificity principle. But, how about for rowing. The most common form of cross-training for rowers (outside of the rowing Ugh!ometer) seems to be weight- or resistance training. So, what does research tell us about that?

In Exercise and sport science, William E. Garrett and Donald T. Kirkendall describe a Hagerman and Staron study of off-season (OS) and in-season (IS) training for nine members of the US Rowing Team. The results suggested that: 

"during the OS, rowers should deemphasize resistance training at low velocities (i.e., train more specifically for the types and velocities of movements used in the rowing technique and at speeds necessary to mimic the competitive pace)."

The authors go on to describe subsquent research by Hagerman and Staron which compared normal off-season weight training of rowers and no weight training on the following measurements:

• muscular strength and power
• muscle fiber proportions and cross-sectional areas
• ergometric power
• metabolic response

The result is astounding for those who spend much time weight training in the off season:

The rowers who underwent OS weight training significantly reduced their aerobic capacity and did not improve ergometer performance; more important, the OS weight training may have detracted from IS rowing performance. Accordingly, it appears that the elite rowers would benefit more from performing only simulated or actual rowing training during the OS rather than including resistance training during this period. These specific training recommendations were substantiated by not only significantly better IS competitive performance by the OS non-weight-training group, but this group also showed no differences in specific fiber types and diameters or muscular strength and power when compared with the OS weight-training-only group. It appears that task-specificity training has the greatest influence on important physiological responses of elite rowers. (underline is mine)

In another interesting study of weight training, The effect of velocity-specific strength training on peak torque and anaerobic rowing power J Sports Sci. 1989 Winter;7(3):205-14., researchers tried to choose muscle training highly specific to rowing. They studied 18 varsity rowers at the University of Victoria. Two groups performed either high-velocity repetition training or low-velocity repetition training. A control group did neither. A very accessible review of this study found that:

There was no change in either training group in peak power output or lactic acid levels. This finding was surprising because the strength program was specifically designed to enhance the strength of the muscle groups involved in rowing...The lack of improvement contradicts the recommendations of many coaches and the content emphases of many rowing training programs. This negative finding might be explained by the fact that the movement patterns involved in rowing are very complex and require a high degree of skill. The training effects that were observed in this study were specific to the resistance-training mode and did not transfer to the more complex action involved in the sport. This restriction supports the training principle that training effects achieved on simple activities (such as specific resistance exercises) do not transfer to complex activities.

Neither modern training theory nor the mounting evidence of the ineffectiveness of specific resistance training programs supports the continued emphasis on this type of training as a means of generating performance improvements in high-caliber athletes.  

Implication. Traditional use of resistance training programs that are "meant" to improve performance should be questioned...

Tell us what you really think.

Now, I have done a fair amount of work in the weight room and for almost 4 decades. I find this information a bit discouraging. It's water under the bridge, I suppose...

I'm guessing that if highly specific weight training doesn't help rowing performance, then considerably less specific exercise like swimming, running and xc skiing are not going to help my rowing.

Will I stop cross-training? Well, no. I'm a masters athlete who enjoys participating in a lot of different sports and activities and my enjoyment of these different activities may exceed that of just training and racing in rowing. Again, if I were just competing in rowing and I wanted to perform at my optimum in rowing, I think I would focus fairly exclusively on rowing. The evidence--personal anecdotal and research--seems to be there for specificity.