The Two Biggest Mistakes Beginners Make on a Rowing Machine

When someone experienced uses a rowing machine, it is almost beautiful – a continuous rhythm, their whole body constantly moving back and forth, and the numbers on the screen grow higher and higher. So why, when you sit on it, do you immediately feel unable to use it, and why does your back hurt? Your settings are probably wrong, and your technique probably sucks too. Let’s fix both.

The rowing machine (also called an ergon) has a learning curve, but you can get the hang of it—maybe faster than you think. It is also common to note the damper setting and assume that it works the same as the resistance setting on any other cardio machine, but this is not entirely true. Once you perfect your technique and learn how to set the damper, you’ll soon find yourself sliding rhythmically.

The only “resistance” setting you need is #4.

Other cardio machines usually have controls that make the workout more challenging, such as a resistance dial on a bicycle or speed and incline controls on a treadmill. So you look at a rowing machine, see a damper with settings ranging from 1 to 10, and realize you need to turn it up to get a harder workout. If you consider yourself a cool guy, set the value to 10.

But please don’t. It’s best to set it to number 4 (out of 10) and leave it there, regardless of the workout. This is because damper is not actually a resistance setting, although many people confuse it with one. It makes sense to think of this as water resistance if you were in a real rowboat or rowing shell. You don’t get a harder workout by moving a boat to a lake made of, I don’t know, mercury. You stay on the water and either paddle faster or push harder.

At the highest settings, such as 10, it is difficult to get the flywheel to spin, and also the flywheel slows down even more before the next stroke. Rowing machine maker Concept2 compares rowing at a high damping setting (more than 5 or so) to rowing on a clunky rowboat: you have to push harder, and you can’t easily get into a continuous rhythm. You can do this if you want a more strength-based workout, just as runners can focus on strength when sprinting up a steep hill. But this is not the way you expect to do most of your training.

To prove this, Concept2 surveyed Olympic rowers about what settings they actually use. Instead of the amount of damper, serious rowers tend to look for their “drag factor” (which you can find on the small screen on the rowing machine) and adjust the damper as needed to get the desired drag factor. But the settings they describe usually correspond to a damper setting of 3 to 5, so 4 is a safe choice.

Push with your feet, then pull with your hands

The biggest technical mistake most of us make is to grab a pen and immediately jerk our hands. After all, the point is to refer him to us, right? Not really. The first thing you need to do after you grab the handle is to push with your feet. This is the part of the movement where you need to apply the most force, and conveniently, your legs are home to the largest muscles. You move into the stroke, treating this initial phase almost like a squat.

You can then sink your upper body into it. Once your legs are almost straight, lean back from your hips; Only then should you pull with your hands. So the sequence is like this:

1. Push with your feet

2. Lean back a little

3. Pull with your hands

If you’re used to doing cable rows or barbell rows during your strength training, this rowing movement is similar to the last step here. You can use your usual tips, but only after completing the first two steps.

Once you’ve completed all three parts of the stroke, you’ll lean back with your legs straight and the handle resting on your chest. What now? Just change the direction of movement:

1. Allow your arms to straighten

2. Return your torso to an upright position

3. Bend your legs and return your buttocks to the starting position.

Just repeat to yourself: “Feet-back-arms, arms-back-legs.” Once you’ve mastered the basic rhythm, you can watch videos about the finer points of the technique, such as those from Concept2 .

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