Since I had my boat on my car from my Charles River adventure, I decided to bring it out to Worcester to do my weekly hard distance piece in my own boat. I think I will do it again this week. It was much better rowing in my own boat. And just as importantly, it takes away one set of excuses for going slow.
The plan was:
- Warmup: 3.5km of bungee rowing working on stroke sequence
- 5.5km at r26. Aim at better than 2:15 pace.
- drills and stuff back to the dock.
The bungee row was great. I took it pretty easy and just tried to work on not opening my back early. There were various interruptions, but it was a nice change in warmup routine.
Then I turned and got myself ready for the piece. I was aiming at keeping the pace between 2:10 and 2:15. And this actually felt pretty good through the first 1000m or so. Then, I got hit by the first wake. As I recovered from the wake, the pace on the speedcoach did not budge. Weeds! I just maintained the stroke rate and tried to ignore the erroneous pace readings. After about 15 or so strokes, the pace popped back to a reasonable number.
I was starting to feel a bit overcooked, so I eased up the pressure a little bit as I approached the narrows. Right after the narrows, I was hit by two wakes in reasonably close succession. At this point I was about 500m from the Rt 9 Bridge, so I just tried to settle into a sustainable pace and rate. This hovered around 2:15. Sometimes a bit slower, sometimes a bit faster. Generally dependent upon the water state. There was a bit of slop from all the boats and even though it wasn’t seriously disruptie, it kept me from getting really good balance.
I passed under the bridge and at that point I know there is a bit more than 2k left to go, so I tried to up the pressure a bit. My HR started to creep up to the top of my TR band, but I didn’t feel like I was in much distress. Around 1000m left to go, I got waked again. This time was closer and bigger than the others and it took a couple strokes to try to get back on track. Now, I was past the Gazebo and getting closer to the Donahue Rowing Center, and since I knew there would be people there, I had some motivation to try to look better than I felt. I tried to row clean and hard and the pace sped up a little bit as I approached the rt 290 bridge. Last Saturday, I stopped at the bridge. Today, I wanted to push a bit further, so I rowed under the bridge plus another 40 strokes. That put me close enough to the north end of the lake that I needed to check it down to keep from running into the docks.
Including all disruptions, including the weeds, my pace was 2:19.8. But if you cut out the weed section, the avg pace was 2:14.7, including being waked 4 times. I want to be much better than that, but I’m pleased with making some progress.
After that I did a bit of feet out rowing, and then strapped back in and did 500m of square blades, then 500m of slow roll ups, then 500m of square, then to finish it all off, I did 500m of r28 full pressure rowing. It felt very good. Well balanced, good stroke mechanics.
A good day on the water.
Start_|_Dist_|_Split_|_Pace_|_Strks__|_Rate_|_DPS_|_AvgHR_|_Remarks
00020_|_3480_|_21:24_|_3:04.5_|_341___|_15.9_|_10.2_|_130___|_warmup
03500_|_1440_|_06:17_|_2:11.0_|_165___|_26.2_|_08.7_|_159___|_start of piece
04940_|_0120_|_01:29_|_6:09.2_|_037___|_25.1_|_03.2_|_167___|_weeds!
05060_|_4040_|_18:19_|_2:16.1_|_478___|_26.1_|_08.5_|_174___|_rest of piece
09100_|_2400_|_14:54_|_3:06.4_|_261___|_17.5_|_09.2_|_132___|_feet out, sbr, sru
11540_|_0440_|_01:51_|_2:06.1_|_051___|_27.6_|_08.6_|_163___|_500m hard
11980_|_0180_|_01:17_|_3:34.4_|_021___|_16.3_|_08.6_|_135___|_back to dock
Dist__|_Time__|_Pace___|_Strks_|_SPM__|_DPS__|_AvgHR_|_Remarks
03480_|_21:24_|_3:04.5_|_341___|_15.9_|_10.2_|_130___|_warmup
05480_|_24:37_|_2:14.7_|_643___|_26.1_|_08.5_|_170___|_Main set
02520_|_16:23_|_3:15.1_|_298___|_18.2_|_08.5_|_135___|_rest meters
00440_|_01:51_|_2:06.1_|_051___|_27.6_|_08.6_|_163___|_500m @ r28
00180_|_01:17_|_3:34.4_|_021___|_16.3_|_08.6_|_135___|_cool down
Quantified Rowing 