Are C2 Comps Out?

[FullSend]

I would guess pretty much every sculling crew in A finals has tried comp vs smoothie and made their choice on a combination of data, feel, confidence, etc.

At the end of the day, you are still doing 80% of the race at base pace, and I would highly doubt GB or anyone else is making their decision for the comp blade on sprintability.

GB definitely seemed to be the bigger more powerful crew, so I would guess the extra grab/stability of the comp in general played into their decision, but that's as important with 700 to go as with 100.

[SwissSculler]

My point was different, and I'm guessing their equipment choice was very data driven, re effectiveness at high rate.

Very unlikely. The complete lack of sophistication in that area in the sport as a whole, but also at the top, is astonishing. There is more data available today than 10 years ago, but that does not mean decisions are based on it.

[Stelph]

Hard to say, but IIRC most of Kleshnev's testing with different blades shows "efficiency" (however he determines it) is better with the fat2smoothie or the vortex-edged blades but "boat speed" is better with straight edge smoothie blades. I'm not going to dive into the archives on that.

One aspect of the dreher r’s that I used to have was that the shape seemed to make rich cleaner at the finish, which makes me think efficiency in the drive is only part of the potential benefits the shape could bring

Conversely depending on technique the shape may also bring drawbacks, the only negative that I’ve heard of them is people struggling with hitting the water on the recovery, something I didn’t find when I hired some in Turin and really liked them