Coxswain? Sculling? Bow? Stern? All of those are terms special to the sport of rowing, also called crew.

Creighton has a Division 1 women’s crew team and a co-ed club team. The last regatta of the women’s crew fall season took place this weekend in Des Moines, Iowa. The Jays finished the regatta with a 1-6 record. The Creightonian sheds light on the teams and terms below.

Terminology

Bow: the front end of the boat

Catch: when the oar first enters the water. Also refers to the position of the rower’s body at the beginning of the stroke.

Crab: When the oar gets caught in the water and is forced from the rower’s hands due to a rower entering the blade into the water without “squaring” it. The blade does not enter the water at a clean 90-degree angle and does not come out of the water until the rower can “square” it and bring the blade to a 90-degree angle to the surface of the water. This unfortunate occurrence can bring a boat to a complete stop in order to get the blade square again and has also thrown rowers completely from the boat due to the amount of force generated by “catching a crab.”

Coxswain: The person responsible for steering the boat, keeping track of the stroke rate, time, rhythm, race strategy, and motivation. This person is smaller in stature than the rowers and does not row.

Port: Facing the bow, “port” is the left side of the boat; usually denoted by the color red.

Sculling: Each person rows with two oars, but this is not a NCAA event.

Head race: This is a race held in the fall and typically lasts about 20-25 minutes over a roughly three-mile course. Each boat starts separately at 10-second intervals, and the winner is determined by the fastest time.

Sprint race: The spring season races, in which the course is 2,000 meters long and the winner is the first to cross the line, unlike the head race.

Starboard: Facing the bow, starboard is the right side of the boat. This is usually noted by the color green for most boaters.