A Guide to Understanding This Crew Thing, in So Many Words

Knowing that the San Diego Crew Classic had competitors entered from 14 foreign countries, including Texas, I was prepared to go to the shores of Mission Bay Friday and find it a veritable Babylon by the Beach.

This, indeed, was by far the most internationally prestigious of the 17 classics thus far, owing to some extent to the fact that the World Cup rowing series would be part of the program. And this is not to ignore the presence of the very finest in collegiate programs.

What I found, to be sure, was that Mission Bay had become a melting pot of muscle.

There was even a high school team from Germany.

What I didn’t expect, however, was that English was among the languages I found a little baffling. Crew, it seems, has a language all its own, some of it purported to be English.

Let’s run through what the enlightened crew fan will have to understand today:

ETES VOUS PRETS?

OK, this was not English. I knew that. It had to be French for “Would you like a pretzel?” Wrong? No, it actually means, “Are you ready?” After watching the program delayed almost interminably by false starts and breakdowns, it occurred to me that the answer was “no.”

PARTEZ!

Pop the cork! Party time! Go for it! I was only partially right. Essentially, it did mean to go for it. It was the command to start the race. You could party later, unless you were entered in the men’s collegiate novice lightweight race. It starts today’s program at 7 a.m., unless they say, “Etes vous prets?” and no one is there.

CATCH

They must have misspelled this one. On Mission Bay, it’s spelled K-E-T-C-H. Of course, there are those who fish on Mission Bay, though it is hard to imagine they would eat their catch. Wait a minute, you say. This is crew, and catch means the instant that the oar blades simultaneously hit the water. (If a shell’s blades consistently hit the water out of unison, it takes a U-turn and ends up in Shamu’s tank.)

SHELL

They were all over the place, stretched out like the world’s longest crab legs. They don’t race in boats. They race in shells. When they are on the water, they look like needles with nine heads and eight legs.

LOVE

This isn’t really in crew’s lexicon, not in the racing sense. But tennis isn’t the only sport with love. It happens. Two rowers were married one year on the shores of Mission Bay on the morning of the regatta. Their version of a honeymoon cruise was a little different than most.

ZLAC

Zea Land Athletic Club? A line from an eye chart? Neither. It’s a San Diego rowing club founded in 1928 by four teen-aged girls named Zulette, Lena, Agnes and Caroline. Get it? If that was how they were going to name the club, it’s a good thing their names were not Sheila, Ursula, Naomi and Kelly.

CLUB 8

Where is it? I don’t know. Check the telephone book. No, really, a club 8 is composed of rowers who are not eligible to participate collegiately. Some say the NCAA basketball championship was won by what should have been a club 5.

COXSWAIN

I knew what a coxswain was. The coxswain is the flea who jumps onto the back of the shell after all the bruisers are ready to row. If a coxswain cannot swim, he or she should be careful to choose a slow crew. Winning coxswains get tossed into the water.

PITCH

Take me out to the ball game! No? No, the pitch is the angle at which the oar blade enters the water. I guess it is a little bit like baseball, in that it’s good to have the right pitch and the right catch.

MASTERS

Jack Nicklaus makes the cut here. Crew’s version of the Masters is a race involving crews 27 and over. There is also an older Masters category for crews averaging 37 years of age. Maybe Jack would like to go against the old-timers in a different game.

DRIVE, STROKE AND SWING

Hello, again, Mr. Nicklaus. These have to do with timing, power, rhythm and body position. Golf must have borrowed them from rowing, because they seem to mean about the same in both sports. Crew does not have putts, though some of the coxswains are about the same size as putters.

CATCHING A CRAB

This always seemed to happen to me when teachers were being assigned. However, in crew, it means the oar gets stuck in the water at the end of the stroke. Catching a shark means the oar comes out of the water without any end on it.

OSNABRUCK

Joe Osnabruck, right? Left-handed hitter. Plays the outfield. Not much power. No? Osnabruck is the high school team from Germany.

HEAVYWEIGHT

Most of these heavyweights stand between 6-feet and 6-2 and weigh between 180 and 200. Crew also has lightweights, but not bantamweights, flyweights, welterweights, middleweights, cruiserweights or paperweights (except the coxswains).

PATHFINDERS

San Diego State’s first varsity sport was women’s crew. Look for this one when you play Trivial Pursuit.

ANONYMOUS

All involved. You can’t tell any of these players with a program. Next to a rower, one of football’s supposedly nameless, faceless offensive linemen is a candidate for the cover of Time magazine.

There you have it. A quick course in understanding the complexities of what seems like a simple sport. Just remember not to raise your glass if you hear someone say, “Partez!”