Rowing Video Of The Week: Training with the Canadian Men's Heavyweight Squad

Hanging loose on the water (Screen capture)

This week's video comes to us thanks to Julien Bahain of Rowing Canada Aviron, and features a behind-the-scenes look at some of the training the Canadian heavyweights have been up to in 2015.

If there's one thing these guys aren't afraid of, it's hard work. The clips below offer a peek into their training regimen, which incorporates a series of land-based cross-training exercises, as well as some high-rate work when messing about in boats.



Looking back to Aiguebelette, the Canadian men had mixed results: While the quad (Rob Gibson, Will Dean, Juilen Bahain, Matt Buie) got off to a great start in the A/B semifinal and were in qualifying position through the 1,500m mark, they couldn't quite hold onto the field, and finished 11th overall, meaning that they will be facing the Final Olympic Qualification Regatta in Lucerne in 2016; meanwhile, the men's four (Conlin McCabe, Kai Langerfled, Tim Schrijver, Will Crothers) survived a crab to qualify for the A Final of their event, and narrowly missed out on the podium in the medal round, taking fourth just 1.12 seconds back of Great Britain. While the talk of the town heading into the world championships this year was the U.S. men's four, illness prevented Charlie Cole from racing the semi—Grant James did yeoman's duty filling in for him in the semifinal, but the U.S. missed the A Final by less than a second in a tightly packed race.

With the U.S. continuing to prioritize the four for Rio, as well as Josh Dunkley-Smith's return to the men's four shortly before Aiguebelette (filling in for his teammate Alexander Lloyd—injured in an unfortunate bike accident during a training ride prior to worlds), and Canada's emphasis on the men's four, it will certainly be an event to watch in 2016 as Italy, Germany, Great Britain, and the Netherlands have also posted solid results this quadrennium—and don't count out Greece either, led by double Olympian Ioannis Christou (in case you need a refresher, Greece placed fourth in the M4- in London).



Adding further intrigue to the event, both JDS and McCabe (the latter of whom is certainly competing for best profile photo on worldrowing.com) recorded sub-5:40 2ks in 2015. So, there's plenty of horsepower to go around.

All the more reason we're looking forward to an Olympic year.

-RR

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