Free Online Tools for Rowing Club Management II

This month we’ve added to the scheduling tools, and we\’ll keep updating this list as we discover more management tools for rowers and coaches. Have any to add?

With technology’s exponential growth rate, it’s no surprise that you can find almost anything online these days. As a rower, club manager, coach, or cox, this can be used to your advantage.  We’ve compiled a list of free online tools that can assist rowers with training sessions, recording ergo scores and creating email group listings for coaches, coxes and the crew.

Scheduling

A handy tool for getting the team together is a simple online scheduling system, doodle, where you create an event, set the location and date, and doodle allows a series of time slots which your group members can then vote on a ‘poll’ the best time on that date for everyone to get together. This saves you the hassle of making a million phone calls, having one person say they can’t make it, calling everyone back to reschedule and find the same problem with another crew member.  Doodle is a free online scheduling site – easy to sign up and easy to use.

A similar tool for sharing information is Google docs.  This is associated with Google and Gmail (your email account).  Also a user-friendly system, you can create a spreadsheet of team names and suggested meet times.  Next all you have to do is share it with the members of your group by adding their email addresses to the ‘share’ feature. From there everyone is able to contribute to/edit the document, putting a yes or no in the suggested time slots and then you can collaborate the time that suits the majority best.  This is also a great way to share ideas with the whole crew.

Another option is Google Calendar. While google docs are great for management, google calendar keeps individual rowers on the same page, with reminders in place. A club can reserve a google login for rowers when they sign up (e.g. mail.cambridgerowing.com) and this syncs everyone\’s calendars allowing them to see what activities each rower is up to exclusively within the club. Coaches can create team meet ups, invite everyone to it and each rower can agree to come (or not) by clicking ‘accept’ to the event invitation. They’ll get a reminder in their inbox before practice starts. Helps keep everyone on time!

This tool from Sportlyser is designed to enable whole crews to collectively track planned vs. actual training – a great tool to keep everyone motivated toward your training goals.

Recording

ITunes has stepped into the world of free applications as well – there are numerous apps that can record ergo scores for you, which go on your iPhone or iPad.

Email Lists

Using Outlook, you can create group email lists.  We suggest making one for crews, one for coxswains, one for coaches.  This saves you the hassle of having to type each individual email address every time you send an update.

Similarly, the Gmail feelers seem to be constantly crawling your emails, and you’ll find that after you send an email to the same list once or twice, it will ‘suggest’ people when you start typing the first email on your list.  It also auto-fills as you type the first letters of each new email address.

Informational resources

Sometimes, as a coach or Captain you just need some ideas for training sessions or technique drills or fund raising ideas.  There are some good websites with deep content available for you to use.

• The concept2 site has lots of information about indoor rowing. They have a great discussion forum for you to converse with rowing coaches and athletes alike.
• A further helpful site for getting useful information is Rowperfect.  They wrote a useful article about boat booking reservation software.
• Rowing Training 4 Life is quite obviously, the place to go for training insights. It offers a ‘complete solution for achieving the highest levels of successes.’ It is also free to sign up for your custom training plans.
• And of course our own Space Saver Rowing Systems is focused on club management and has the inspiration, insights and answers for all  your rowing club management needs.