Round Connect Rowing · for indoor rowing classes
Technique on every rower. One rhythm for the crew.
The rowing monitor already sends every stroke — rate, power, length, drive and recovery, drag. Round Connect Rowing turns it into a short hint on each rower’s tile and — in development — a quiet signal on the instructor’s watch when a stroke starts to fall apart. Then the whole class rows in time. No new hardware.
Free for small studios · Works with the rowers you have · Members never pay
In the room today
Rowers in every gym. Hardly anyone rows in a group.
People aren’t sure of their technique and worry about their back — so the rowers stand idle. Newcomers set the damper to 10 because harder must be better. From behind a row of twenty people, an instructor sees backs, not strokes. And many classes are taught by fitness instructors who never rowed themselves.
The monitor knows a lot about each stroke. What it doesn’t know is who is rowing, and what is normal for them.
How it works
A check before the first tired stroke
In the first strokes, Round Connect sees the drag. Too heavy for a newcomer or for someone with a lower-back note, and their tile says “lower the damper to 4–5”.
Compared with their own stroke
Each stroke is compared with that person’s usual one — length, drive and recovery, the shape of the force curve. Rushing up the slide gets “slower up the slide”. A stroke that keeps changing under fatigue sends the instructor a signal.
One rhythm
In crew mode the screen shows a boat and how well the class rows in time with the stroke. A newcomer in time is as good as the strongest rower in the room.
For the instructor
A technique assistant, even if you never rowed.
The brief has newcomers, back and knee notes, limits you set and who said “it hurts” last time — by rower number. During class your watch vibrates (in development) when a stroke has changed for several minutes, or a rower stops mid-piece. You walk over early.
- Signals compared with each person’s usual stroke, not an “ideal” one
- Only signals that need you
- Your limits — say, shorter at the catch — remembered for every class
Who to watch
For the rower
Something learned in every class.
The card after class is about technique, not metres: a calmer ratio, a longer stroke that held to the end, a record. The next day: how is your back? Anything that isn’t right goes into the instructor’s next brief.
No leaderboard of metres. Big tiles for older groups.
Stroke length +4 cm, and it held in the last piece.
You found the rhythm.
One class, step by step
Chloe’s first class
| Moment | What happens |
|---|---|
| At reception | Chloe scans the QR code: first time, rower 3. |
| Setting up | She sets the damper to 10. After a few strokes her tile says “lower the damper to 4–5”; the instructor gets a quiet signal. Harder isn’t better. |
| Technique | The focus is legs, body, arms. Her tile shows she rushes up the slide — the instructor knows who to tell “slower up the slide” without walking the whole room. |
| The piece | The class rows at 20–24. Chloe stays in her own range while her friend rows faster. |
| After | The card shows how her ratio changed from start to finish: “your stroke got steadier”. |
| That week | The owner sees how many newcomers came back after the intro class. |
An illustration built from typical studios — not a real member.
Made for every place with rowers
Boutiques and gyms
Rowers that stood idle sell classes. Newcomers come back after the intro.
Rowing clubs
An erg room that earns in the daytime and brings in new members — run by coaches and volunteers with a simple brief.
Instructors
A technique assistant at your side — useful most of all if you never rowed.
Rowers
Technique over metres. Your own range, your own progress, a crew to row with.
Honest about the data
The monitor sees the stroke. Not the back.
Stroke data is an indirect sign of technique. Round Connect can’t see anyone’s spine — it shows the instructor that a stroke has changed and that it’s worth a look. It doesn’t diagnose anything.
Works with what you already have
No new hardware.
Concept2 rowers with the PM5 monitor send their data over Bluetooth and ANT+; the computer behind the studio screen receives it — or the instructor’s phone, on a gym floor without a screen. Older monitors and other brands work through adapters, or without live data with the brief and the cards.
Plans
The brief, notes and limits, the after-class card and the safety log are in every plan.
Basic
Free for small studios; more locations — the first is free, €149 for each other one. Before and after class. Nothing to install.
Digital
€199 per location a month. Live stroke data, the damper check, technique signals, the instructor’s watch (in development), crew mode and online classes. The main plan.
Round Connect Rowing starts with partner sites: a rowing boutique, a club with classes on the gym floor and a rowing club with public classes. Technique thresholds are tuned with rowing coaches and a physiotherapist. It runs on Round Connect, with the other six products of the platform.