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This is a hard sports to take pics..my first attempt. Do you do close up, the whole boat?

Do you do close up, the whole boat?

on the first, I would consider going tighter, just outside the blue oar supports. IMO its gotta be either the whole boat or the person.

With the whole boat images I would look to compose with the boat (length ways) across the diagonal of the frame, obviously this can be impossible given your location and the way the boats are rowing.. I think the second image captures this idea the best and would be the winner out of the 3 for me

Youre right, its a hard choice with rowing. especially those 8 person boats. I generally found, if youre going to get the oars and boat in, its only really worthwhile if you get them doing something, as in, the oars splashing in the water, or the boat lifting out of it. If youre not aiming to capture that, then i tended to zoom just for the people.
I like number 2

I agree with what's already been said, but with the crops you already have made make sure you get rid of distractions (eh the foreground bush in #1 and the slice of background top of frame pic #2)

thanks guys. next time I will try to get into the coaches tinny