A crew that only practices on calm water struggles in chop. Practice in the mess, too.

Skill built in ideal conditions is narrower than it feels. On flat water everything works, so you never find out which parts of your technique quietly depend on the water staying flat. Rough conditions do not create that weakness, they reveal one that was already there. Much better to meet it in training, where the only cost is a bad practice.

Put yourself in the worse version of your conditions once this week on purpose. Study somewhere noisy, take the hilly route, run the drill when you are already tired. Notice what falls apart first, because that is the thing actually worth working on.