Boats: Sculling Boats

Sculling Boats

Sculling generally refers to a method of using oars to propel watercraft in which the oar or oars touch the water on both the port and starboard sides of the craft, or over the stern. By extension, the oars themselves are also often referred to as sculls when used in this manner, and the boat itself may be referred to as a scull.

Two-oared sculling is a form of rowing—both competitive and recreational—in which a boat is propelled by one or more rowers, each of whom operates two oars, one held in the fingers of each hand. This contrasts with the other common method of rowing, sweep rowing, in which each rower may use both hands to operate a single oar on either the port or starboard side of the boat.

Sculling forms one of the two major divisions of crew, or competitive rowing, involving races between small, sculled boats with various numbers of rowers. Generally, one, two, or four rowers row these shells, which are classified according to the number of rowers that they can hold: singles have one seat, doubles have two seats, and quads have four seats. In keeping with this pattern, quads rowed by three people (due, for instance, to a temporary shortage of rowers) are often colloquially referred to as "triples."

Competitive crew requires an efficient stroke with all rowers matching the cadence and movements of the stroke seat, the rower closest to the shell's stern. The shell may have a coxswain, or "cox," to steer the boat, encourage the crew, and monitor the rate, though coxswains are highly uncommon in sculling shells.

A key, and often overlooked, technical difference between sculling and sweeping in crew is that the sculling oar handles overlap twice during the stroke, while sweep oar handles never overlap during normal rowing (because each sweeper usually holds only one oar). The overlap occurs at the midpoint of the drive and again during the recovery; because of this, scullers must either hold one hand higher than the other at the point of overlap, or they must rig one oarlock higher than the other prior to rowing. This prevents the oar handles from colliding with one another and causing a crab or other problems.