The rowers of Nebraska Crew practiced six days a week.  Being with out shells at first, they were forced to perform workouts off the water.  They ran three or four miles and climbed the stairs of Memorial Stadium over and over again.  They lifted weights they had constructed themselves, setting pipes into coffee cans filled with cement.

In order to practice their technique on days when the weather did not permit rowing, the rowers would practice their technique in an old shell suspended over the Abel/Sandoz pool.  In 1976, though, construction on the tank in the boathouse was completed.  The tank is a large indoor pool with a platform suspended over it.  The platform is mounted with actual sliding seats, riggers, and oars, so that the movements of rowing may be replicated indoors in real water.  After the tank was built, up to sixteen rowers at a time could practice their technique no matter what the weather was like.  At the time, Nebraska was only on of eleven schools in the country with such a facility (Parker, 1976).  Such a facility would have cost $35,000 if it had been paid for outright.  Showing their trademark do-it-yourself attitude however, the team got local contractors to donate nearly all of the materials and did all of the work themselves, resulting in a much smaller $2000 overall cost.

Once the shells were acquired, it was possible to practice on the water. At the time of founding, only one person actually had experience in a boat, or knew how to row at all for that matter; Coach Bill Brush had to start from the ground up and teach the fundamentals of the sport to the new team.  Due to the age of the equipment however, problems were ever present.  Often after twenty or so strokes the oarsmen had to stop and bail water that had leaked into the shell (Porter, 1994).  Equipment was constantly breaking or malfunctioning as well, adding additional delays.  Despite all of this interruptions however, practices went on and the dedication of the rowers saw them through to the end.