Word: crews
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1940-1949
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Crew Second...
...secret" of Bert Haines' work with the 150-pounders can be simply put: he is in love with rowing; the Freshman learns quickly through hearsay and demonstration that for him one's rowing is the thing that there are no other criteria. This fact is a big one in crew, where men are jumped from beat to boat daily, and where they row as one, without resentments, or collapse halfway down the course...
Another aspect of Bert's effectiveness is the lifetime of technical perfection that he can bring to bear on the small problems that matter in crew. The "lifetime" is almost literal, for when he was born in Winsor, England, his father and three uncles, all champion punters, were waiting to impart to him all their love. Bert's father impressed the principles of coxing on him at nine by cracking his knuckles when he made a miscalculation. This is one teaching device that Bert has not found it expedient to carry over to the Harvard scene...
...coaching. This requires not scorn, or a drive-drive-drive psychology, but rather an incalculable patience and humor with green men who shoot their seat-slide forward too soon, fail to use leg-drive, or put a foot through the bottom of the shell. He will tell a crew whimsically, "You had two speeds today--dead slow, and stop." And then go on, "You have to keep limber in the hips--it's like sitting on a rolling...
Swathed in sweaters and towels, and wearing a white umpire's cap over bristling white hair, Haines is a striking sight, and seems almost functionally adapted to leaning into stiff breezes with overtones of cold spray to catch the fleeting error that can throw a whole crew off. When approached about the present write-up, he looked hesitant and said dubiously, "You know, I don't want there to be too much of this 'Bert Haines' business." Every man is, of course, entitled to his opinion about this...