Pain in the backside when sculling

[Henry Law]

The young fellow I have been coaching, who shows exceptional promise,
says that one of the things that's holding him back, and certainly
spoiling his enjoyment, is pain in his backside. This morning's outing
was not long--less than an hour--and he said that he'd had pain for a
fair amount of that time. I've lent him a Godfrey seat pad, which he
says is helping, but not really enough.

Now I know that a tailored seat would probably help (mine is wonderful,
thank you Carl) but for a novice rowing in club boats, and swapping
around among 1x, 2x and 4x of different makes and vintages, having his
own seat really isn't an option.

I guess we've all suffered some discomfort in the posterior at the end
of a longish outing, but this seems to be something more acute. Has
anyone else come across this problem, who could suggest what to do? It
would be a terrible shame if he gives up, such is his promise, but I
could see that he wasn't exaggerating the problem.

--

Henry Law Manchester, England

[carl]

Seat discomfort is a significant problem in rowing &, as you indicate,
Henry, has the potential to drive people out of the sport.

The rump was not designed for sitting upon, even less for sitting on and
then rocking back and forth. Putting it frankly, no 2 arses are alike,
any more than any 2 faces are identical - a plaster cast of your face
would never fit mine, nor anyone else's. The bit that we rowers choose
to make load-bearing is anatomically variable & complex. Under the skin
in the area carrying our weight run muscles, blood vessels, bones and
nerves. The problems which can arise range from excruciating
bone/seat-hole-edge contacts causing bruising & abrasion to problems of
lost circulation in the leg, sciatica, damage to the bursae (internal
protecting pads meant to protect vulnerable structures) & lower back
muscular spasms. Some of what seem like passing problems can even
become lasting disabilities.

Rowing has steadfastly ignored this problem, so people who might have
benefited greatly from rowing, and benefited rowing greatly too, drop
out, some with lasting injuries. As just one simple point: the most
prominent tips of the ischial protuberances (sit-bones) can be as little
as 100mm apart on some men and 165mm apart on some women. And the
shapes and alignments of those structures vary so widely between
individuals that they could probably be used as identification aids,
just like finger prints or iris scans (but rather you than me!).

Our pelvises are often markedly asymmetric - ever wondered why that 1x
seems always to run down on 1 side, or that finish is always harder to
extract? And then there's the problem that some of us are more simian
than others, having a coccyx which gets over-close to the back of the seat.

In short, while a good 90% of rowers will "get by" on average rowing
seats, the reality is that as many as 10% have a miserable time. And
that's not good.

Some 30 years ago a group of boat-builders agreed with the FISA
Materials Commission that to assist equipment interchangeability there
should be only a limited number of seat track separations: 165mm, 230mm
& 280mm. That was yet another agreement on rational standardisation
which was too often ignored & which might have made having your own seat
(as part of your own rowing kit) a more feasible solution.

When we build a boat (& we are largely building for known individuals)
we request their anatomical data - a so-called bum-print - you can find
out all about it on the fittings & resources pages of:
www.carldouglasrowing.com

As Henry kindly says, we create for each person a "custom seat" which
won't press against their sensitive bits, which really will support them
on the bits than can take the load & on which they really will be
comfortable. And there's a hidden advantage - that the seat fits _you_
so well it is less likely to fit anyone else, so only a fool would steal
your seat.

Cheers -
Carl

--
Carl Douglas Racing Shells -
Fine Small-Boats/AeRoWing Low-drag Riggers/Advanced Accessories
Write: Harris Boatyard, Laleham Reach, Chertsey KT16 8RP, UK
Find: tinyurl.com/2tqujf
Email: ca...@carldouglasrowing.com Tel: +44(0)1932-570946 Fax: -563682
URLs: carldouglasrowing.com & now on Facebook @ CarlDouglasRacingShells

[John Mulholland]

Henry, I don't disagree with a word Carl has said, but there are two things I would suggest. First, check that his posture is correct; there is no point modifying a seat if the problem is the way he is sitting. Second, try getting him to sit on some firm polystyrene foam (just as Carl did for me) and see where his sit bones are; then compare the gap on the foam with the hole spacing on the seat. There may be seats in the club that fit him better than others. Also, some people (like me) prefer nearly flat seats; others prefer more sculpted seats, which I find pinch nerves in the back of my legs. Hope this helps keep a promising young recruit stay in our sport.

[Brian Chapman]

Fully agree with Carl, a custom fit is the ideal but unless all the club seats are the same there will be one that is better than the others. I find every seat is slightly different, I have recently changed mine and now find a seat pad makes it more uncomfortable not less. If he is in the 10% he is going to have to experiment with different seats and pads. We have Swift explore boats and they have seats that are very deep and uncomfortable.

[James HS]

Notwithstanding the great advise so far ...... it can be technique and set-up related.

With a bad set up there will be less rock over and part of the 'pain' can be a lack of blood to the relevant parts. To get that circulation happening the setup must allow a rock forward and backward in the stroke.

check his posture, compression and that his feet are low enough in the boat to allow him to keep everything loose.

then technique - proper hands away and rock-over - but also driving off the ties at the end of the stroke - I have notices that this slightly rotates the hips and lifts those joints off the water.

then 'tenseness' and efficiency during the drive - in the early stages of sculling I think I was way more tense than I am now, leading to a degree of clenching :) so I started to so the lifting alternative hands exercises at the beginning of each outing to feel relaxed and remembering to use my buttock muscles

I used to go through this on some sessions where it was extremely painful - and worked through it being a tendon, capsule circulation and posture related thing, as well as trying too hard :)

Nothing would fix it - no cushion and I just wanted to get out of the boat - so I played around with the combination of the above and have not had it for years.

HTH

James

[Chip Johannessen]

Reading Carl's post the correct thing is clearly a properly fitting seat.

Lacking that, which I very much do in my Fluidesign 2x, I found that a seat pad made a highly unpleasant experience comfortable enough. For me, a softer gel pad worked best (a Velpad from JL Racing worked better for me than the harder Skwoosh). Not sure why these seats (made by Dreher) are so uncomfortable for me -- I have no problems with my Filippi single -- but they are really unendurable. The slight squishiness of the pad is not ideal, but you get used to it. And it beats the alternative.

Best

[Henry Law]

On 05/02/16 16:45, Brian Chapman wrote:
> If he is in the 10% he is going to have to experiment with different seats and pads.

A very interesting set of replies; thank you all. I'll explore with him
(a) proper technique (that, of course, we're doing anyway) but making
sure as a priority there's proper rock-over; and (b) different seats,
perhaps with a foam-pad measurement to help us assess which ones to try.
He's probably a lightweight so there is quite a range of boats to
choose among; and if he's being coached off-shift (which his current
hours do permit) then we can spend some time switching seats between
boats where the rail spacing will allow.

Whether that will enable him to row in the crack novice quad that I have
in mind is another matter we'll come to in due course.

[don Vickers]

Butt pain seems to be a fairly common complaint and it is very specific to each person, as is clear based on the posts in this thread. Some people seem to develop butt pain even on a moderately short time while others seem to have no pain except on really long outings. I am fortunate to be latter category but I also use padded rowing shorts.

Are there no longer padded rowing shorts? I have two pair of Aeroskin rowing shorts I bought in the mid-1980s and, fortunately, both are still in good shape after several tens of millions of meters on the water. I have searched, briefly, for padded rowing shorts and cannot seem to find any.

It seems to me that having the padding in the shorts is more effective than having a pad on the seat because the shorts pad provides padding that spreads the pressure of the stern edge of the seat itself.

Something I have noticed is that I do tend to get some butt pain when rowing in boats with deeper seats. I have been able to mitigate this by sitting more to the stern edge to reduce the impact of the seat shape.


don Vickers

[Chip Johannessen]

http://www.jlathletics.com/super-padded-polypro-trou/dp/13783

these are actually not "super padded" trou as they claim, but are pretty padded.

[Jesse]

I made some effort to lose weight over a rowing season, and lost some of my natural padding along with it.

I suffered from pain from a rub at the base of my coccyx. Very specifically I found a gel pad relieved that entirely and I was fine after that; but without it, I found I had a max of 15 or 20 minutes in a boat before having to stop.

So also worth investigating if it is a specific point that hurts, or general soreness. If I'm off my bike for a few months, when I start cycling again it takes a few outings for me to build up some resilience again, but it happens relatively quickly. The problem I had above was never going to be resolved by just waiting a few more outings.

[Henry Law]

On 07/02/16 19:16, Jesse wrote:
> So also worth investigating if it is a specific point that hurts, or general soreness

And still the helpful posts keep coming! That's a good idea. I've
found some flower-arranger's foam which is just about big enough for
making a "tuberositogram" (I claim coiner's rights on the word) and
we'll do some further investigation on the next outing.

[Adirondick]

This may seem a bit off the wall, but I once cured the pain in my left butt cheek by moving my wallet to a front trousers pocket. You never know.

[Henry Law]

On 07/02/16 21:35, Adirondick wrote:
> once cured the pain in my left butt cheek by moving my wallet to a front trousers pocket. You never know.

The guy's a student ... wallet definitely not that big :-)