Jim Buckley (I think) had a formula something like “if the air temperature with wind chill, plus water temperature is less than x, it’s too cold to row.” I just can’t remember the exact details. The total that sticks in my head is 100—but that can’t be right, since our water temperature this time of year is around 50 or so—maybe it’s 90. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have been rowing for the last month!
Anyway, the Nails have rarely gone out with the air temperature much below 40, though I can think of a few times when it has been exceptionally sunny and exceptionally calm that we have rowed in the 30’s. I occasionally see Jim Buckley and Steve Chapin out on calm days when it is in the 30’s, but they are both seasoned rowers with only themselves to be responsible for.
Crews in Seattle train all year, but they are close to warm clubhouses, with lots of launches and highly experienced coaches, on lakes that aren’t as cold and unpredictably rough as Admiralty Inlet. Even so, I don’t think many of them go out when the temperature is in the 30’s.
My personal opinion is that, with relatively novice crews and launches that are not capable of rescuing an entire crew from the water, the danger of hypothermia and frostbite is too grave to risk being out in club boats with the temperature much below 40. As someone who has experienced both hypothermia and frostbite, I can tell you neither are fun. Even without capsizing, it would be quite easy to get frostbitten fingers or toes out there, and if a boat did go over, it wouldn’t do much good to climb up on the hull in 40-degree weather to try to stay warm while waiting for rescue—you’d be hypothermic in very few minutes.
Also, when people are cold they don’t make good decisions and they don’t row very well, which increases the likelihood of disaster.
The rowers who went out on Monday morning were VERY cold when they got back in.
Bottom line is, yes, I think it would be a very good idea for the club to establish a threshold rule/formula for air temperature, and maybe also establish clothing requirements (or at least suggestions) for cold weather rowing. Maybe checking with some of the Seattle area clubs on their policies would be a good place to start. Also, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to get a big outdoor thermometer to hang on the oarhouse—I’m sure Henery’s probably has one for $10 or so.
