One of the cool things about indoor rowing is the opportunity for casual competition.  I really enjoy the monthly Cross Team Challenges.  To participate in these, you join a rowing team (virtual, or ummm, non-virtual), and then do a specific rowing challenge for each month of the year.  Teams take turns choosing the challenge based upon a remarkably complex formula that rewards participation and performance in the challeges.

The fun thing is that it is both an individual competition, and also a team competition.  The team aspect is based on “boats”.  Each boat has slots for 3 Male HWT rowers, 1 male LWT, and 1 female rower.  Teams try to build the fastest boats, and also try to float the greatest number of boats, so the is motivation for folks at all levels to do the challenge.

I will never be fast enough (or young enough, or big enough, or strong enough) to play in the upper echelons of the folks participating, but it is a blast to see where you end up compared to other folks that you typically are similar to.  It’s a great motivator to really put everything into a workout session, and it certainly adds variety.

I will look at the specific CTC and decide whether it looks most like a short interval session, a long interval session, or a hard continuous row, and then substitute it in for that “slot” in my workout plan.  This all works fine in the winter.  It’s more of a challenge when I can row on the water, but we’ll row under that bridge when we come to it.

Enough background, on to the rowing!  This month’s challenge is

1000m + 4x300m + 1000m / 2′ rest

To me that looked like a pretty good short interval workout.  So, I slotted it in this week in place of the usual type of session.  I think I was due to do the 4×1000.  I did this one at Crossfit Carbon in Vernon Hills, IL because I’m on the road for business.

Warmup was 20 minutes steady state.  I intended to do it at 190W, but I was all excited for things to come and ended up at 197W.  For such a big increase in watts, my HR was nicely in control.  Although you can see the big variations as I was mentally rehearsing the CTC.  I was basically rowing the same pace throughout.

Then, into the main event.  I was hoping I could do about a 1:40 avg pace for the whole thing, so I though getting the first rep done with a 1:41 or better pace would be a good start.  I think I picked the right pace for the first rep, because I was shivering all over and nearly threw up when I finished it.

By the end of the 2  minute rest, I was good as new and targeted 1:36 for the first 300.  All the 300s were really no problem.  I might be able to squeeze another second or so of pace, but I was pretty close to the edge on them.  The 2 minute rests started to feel a lot shorter.

I was worried about the last 1000m.  I decided to target a 1:42 pace to make sure that I didn’t blow up.  These felt pretty good and I was actually able to do a little bit better.  I was struggling a bit by the time I had 500m to go, but there was no way I was going to let all that work go to waste by stopping now.  I closed my eyes, tried to keep the rate up and counted strokes down to the end.  It turned out that I held very close to the same pace on the last as the first, and I felt physically better after the last than the first.

I finished with a 2K cool down, starting at 2:00 pace and slowing by 5 seconds every 500.  I was aiming at 8:30.0, and I hit 8:30.0.  Yesssss.

Tomorrow:  Not quite sure what will be happening.  I am scheduled to fly home in the morning, but I may need to extend here longer.  If I stay here, it will be a 4×20′ on the erg.  If I get home, roughly the same thing on the water.