New Britain herald., 1923-03-19
MUCH IS EXPECTED
 l FROM YALE'S CREW
Hope Ed; Leader Will Return It
 to Supremacy

New Haven, March 19,-The Yale
 crews that take the water this spring under the direction of Coach Ed
 Leader will be more like the famous
 Bob Cook crews of a quarter of a
 century ago than any at Yale since
 the Cook stroke was abandoned ir |190S.
 This is the belief of the men whc
 have been following rowing at Yale for more than 30 years, who have
 seen Cook crews row to many a brilliant victory, who have watched
 coaches at Yale come and go with an infinite variety of strokes and theories. who have seen Yale vainly trying to settle down" with defi- mite rowing policy, and who now be- lieve that they have in Coach Leader a man who more closely approaches the methods of Cook than any one who has taught at Yale in recent years.
 Hope for Return of Power. Whether return to the Cook stroke means return to the era of Yale supremacy on the water is a question that is arousing keen inter- est and many hopes in the Blue boat house this year.
 Just what significance return to the methods of Cook can have at Yale would be hard to realize were it not for an understanding of what his name represents in the rowing his tory of the Blue.
 To all Yale men Bob Cook is a tradition. His age was the Golden Age" of rowing at Yale, when the Blue crews took the water year after year with confidence that was un- beatable. That age has long since passed, but the Bulldog ever looks forward with grim hope to a renais- sance. Whether this year will bring even the beginning of stability to Yale rowing is something that is be- ing eagerly watched.
 Stroke Like That of Cook.
 The stroke that is being taught at Yale today is essentially the same stroke that Cook brought back from England after his now historic trip there in 1873. It may differ in some slight details, as in the finish, but fundamentally it has the same char acteristics. It is the same adaptation of the English stroke that Cook de- veloped, and which was later dropped when Yale's succession of English coaches introduced the genuine Eng fish stroke that in some way never quite seemed to fit American oars- men.
 One of the first steps that Leader has taken at Yale is to restore the old indoor rowing tank that for sew eral years had been fioored over for the use of the wrestling team. Then he sat the oarsmen in a straight line over the keel as Cook had done, in- stead of seating them in the zig-zag English fashion. He reqested swivel oarlocks instead of the English thole- pin model, though the thole-pin is highly rated by the English because its click at the end of each stroke is a mechanical aid to precision.
 He has brought his own boat build CT with him, discarding the type of shell imported by the English coaches. His model seats the oarsmen higher above the water. All these features of his mechanical equipment were of Cooks era.
 But the parallel does not end here. In his demands on the oarsmen them selves Leader has followed Cook. He urges the necessity of a greater per- lection of inboard work, and preci- sion of the bodies throughout the stroke. distinct difference from the English coaches who paid more at- tention to watermanship.