Tuesday: 5 x 2000 / 5′ rest – That stung

August 18, 20152 Comments

Weather: Hot as hell. Upper 70s and humid. Light, flukey headwind heading up river, maybe 2 to 4 mph.

Plan:

5 x 2000m / 5′ rest
rate: r26
pace: better than 2:15

Start_|_Dist_|_Split_|_Pace_|_Strks__|_Rate_|_DPS_|_AvgHR_|_Remarks
00020_|_0980_|_05:59_|_3:03.0_|_111___|_18.6_|_08.8_|_117___|_warmup
01000_|_2000_|_08:33_|_2:08.2_|_218___|_25.5_|_09.2_|_162___|_Interval #1
03000_|_0500_|_03:24_|_3:23.6_|_059___|_17.4_|_08.5_|_120___|_rest
03500_|_2000_|_08:47_|_2:11.6_|_235___|_26.8_|_08.5_|_169___|_Interval #2
05500_|_0500_|_03:35_|_3:35.0_|_067___|_18.7_|_07.5_|_131___|_rest
06000_|_2000_|_08:47_|_2:11.8_|_231___|_26.3_|_08.7_|_172___|_Interval #3
08000_|_0500_|_03:42_|_3:42.3_|_068___|_18.4_|_07.4_|_131___|_rest
08500_|_2000_|_09:03_|_2:15.7_|_239___|_26.4_|_08.4_|_172___|_Interval #4
10500_|_0500_|_03:51_|_3:51.0_|_074___|_19.2_|_06.8_|_134___|_rest
11000_|_2000_|_09:08_|_2:17.1_|_226___|_24.7_|_08.8_|_171___|_Interval #5
13000_|_3320_|_19:50_|_2:59.3_|_377___|_19.0_|_08.8_|_141___|_fo,sbr,sru

Dist__|_Time__|_Pace___|_Strks_|_SPM__|_DPS__|_AvgHR_|_Remarks
00980_|_05:59_|_3:03.0_|_111___|_18.6_|_08.8_|_117___|_warmup
10000_|_44:18_|_2:12.9_|_1149___|_25.9_|_08.7_|_169___|_Main set
02000_|_14:32_|_3:38.0_|_268___|_18.4_|_07.5_|_129___|_rest meters
03320_|_19:50_|_2:59.3_|_377___|_19.0_|_08.8_|_141___|_cool down
16300_|_24:39_|_2:35.8_|_1905___|_22.5_|_08.6_|_152___|_Total

Between the slight tail wind and fresh legs, the first 500m of the first rep felt so easy that I thought the speedcoach was broken!* I was pulling under a 2:10 split without any trouble. I just kept pushing along and sure enough around 1000m mark, it really started to bite. That’s when I went into the s-turn. I cut the corners of the turn which puts me into the up river lane coming out the turn. Unfortunately, this morning this lane happened by occupied by another sculler. To add to the problem going through the turn down river you are basically rowing right to the east, so there was a ton of solar glare looking over my shoulder and I missed him until I was only about a boat length away. I was about half an oar length off of his path, and we ended up just touching oars.

It was totally my fault and I have to be more careful through that turn when I’m rowing into the sun. I apologize profusely by email afterwards and he seems to hold no real ill will, but he would have every right to.

After that setback, I spun back up to speed and hammered through the rest of the rep. I finished with an average pace of about 2:08, which is damn fast for me.

After I finished, I noticed I was tired and regretted my exuberance.

The other reps passed painfully and uneventfully. In each of them, I would try to row to a level of effort, not a specific pace, so the ones with a headwind were a little slower. At the end of the fourth interval, I lied to myself and told me that I could stop after the 4th interval and just go home. Then after the rest, I betrayed myself and made me do the last rep as planned. I reminded myself that the HOCR was coming and it would be better to fail today than to fail then.

So, to give myself a little break, I decided to target r24 for the last rep and let the pace settle between 2:15 and 2:20. That was plenty hard enough.

I finished the 5th rep at the far end of the river, about 3K from the dock. So I rowed 1K with feet out trying to use RIM to see how clean I could get get my finishes. Then I put back on the shoes and did 500m on the square, then 500m with slow roll ups. Then I basically just limped the rest of the way home. Between the intense session and the heat, I was totally spent. I basically crawled out of the boat at the dock.

Tomorrow: 4 x 3000m / 2′ rest, r20, HR limit at 80% HRR (157)

I didn’t believe it until I got onto the computer and compared the pace from the speedcoach with the pace from the GPS and they lined up pretty much perfectly.

Monday: Steady State Rate Ladders

August 17, 2015Leave a comment

Sunny and hot. Very light wind. Head wind heading up river.

Plan:

4 x rate ladders (1000m @ r16, 1000m @ r18, 750m @ r20)
2′ rest
HR cap at 155.

Not much to talk about. A nice session focused on technique.

Tomorrow: 5x2K / 5′ rest. rate target: r28, pace target: 2:15.

Sunday: 40km Bike ride

August 17, 2015Leave a comment

I took Thursday off, so no need for a rest day on Sunday. It was a hot sunny day, and I elected to go give my new bike shoes and clips a try. I wanted an aerobic session, so I set a HR cap at 155.

Here are the details on Strava.

Just about the same speed as I have done a very similar course and distance, but with a lower overall heart rate.

I like the shoes. It’s a lot easier to maintain a good cadence and I felt plenty secure. Stopping and getting my feet out is going to require a bit more practice. I was generally OK, but once I toppled over at an intersection. I have also not completely mastered the method to get my foot back in the clips. It took me a couple of trie each time to get the toe lined up right.

Saturday: 5.5km Threshold on Quinsig

August 17, 2015Leave a comment

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

Friday: 20km on the Charles River Basin

August 17, 20152 Comments

Thursday: I was too tired at 4am to get up and workout before my flight. So I didn’t.

I got home from the airport around 7pm and had a nice relaxed evening.

Friday: Since I will be rowing in the HOCR, I need to learn the river. This session was the first step towards doing that. The plan was for two hours of steady state down the whole HOCR course and into the basin, then turn and row up the course in the direction of the race. There are lots of bridges and turns, so there is a lot to learn.

I launched at a public boat ramp next to Community Rowing in Brighton.

I managed to knock my seat off the rails while doing my beach launch, so I scooted over to their docks and got myself fixed up. Then I proceeded down river.

I had spent a little time looking at the Charles River Rowing Map. But I certainly had not memorized it. I began to regret this almost immediately. After heading downstream from the CRI docks, you pass under the North Beacon Street Bridge. About 500m past that bridge, there is a sandbar that extends more than halfway across the river. It is well marked, but I misjudged how close I could cut it and ended up dragging my fin and speedcoach impeller through the sand and needed to gingerly turn to escape. It didn’t really occur to me that it could be as shallow as it was, but I looked off to the side of my boat and about 20 feet away from me downriver, I saw a goose standing on the sandbar, and his body wasn’t even touching the surface. It must have only been about an inch deep there!

Having extricated myself, I then continued downstream through the Arsenal Bridge, and past the Northeastern boathouse. Just downstream from there is where the HOCR finish is. Along this part, I also managed to get some weeds entangled in my impeller, so the pace was wrong on my speedcoach. It took a bit of time to realize this and I really raised the pressure to get back to sub-2:30 splits.

I continued down river through the Eliot Bridge turn. This turn is HUGE. It’s about 1 km around the bend and now I can see why it so hard to keep a good line in the race. It just keeps going and going. Finally you straighten out and hit the Anderson Bridge. This was the warmup area for the Cromwell, so I rowed up and down the section from the Anderson Bridge to the Weeks footbridge a number of times that morning. Today, I just went straight through the Weeks foot bridge and onto the 1km straight section called the Powerhouse Stretch. There are two bridges in this section, the Western Avenue Bridge and the River Street bridge.

I had rowed 5.5km by the time I hit the Powerhouse stretch, and nearly 7km by the time I entered the broad turn toward the BU Bridge. I was starting to feel a bit tired. I had been rowing a lot harder than I had intended. Mainly because I wanted to see faster splits, but I think also because there were other folks on the river and I didn’t want to be a slowpoke.

After going through the BU Bridge, I passed in front of BU’s DeWolfe Boathouse, which is the HOCR starting line. This is also the finish of the 2K course in the basin. So I lined up on one of the lanes and continued rowing down stream under the Harvard Bridge, and nearly all the way to the Longfellow Bridge.

At the point where the speedcoach told me I had done 10K, I turned around and had a drink. I’d been rowing for a bit more than an hour. I then set myself up and got going in the other direction. I discovered that I had a bit of a headwind to contend with, and I was getting a pretty tired. I rowed upstream over the HOCR course and tried to pick out useful landmarks to use for different sections of the river. After I passed the finish of the HOCR I slowed down and paddled through the narrow bit of the river. Through the last 2 km or so I was gaining on a women sculling ahead of me. I pushed the pace to cleanly pass her before we got to the North Beacon Bridge.

I had such a good time! It is a remarkable place to row. Some nice straight sections, broad turns in both directions. Tons of bridges.

Certainly keeps you alert.

I think I might try to do this again a few more times. It was really information overload this time.

Wednesday: Fitness Center bi-athlon

August 12, 20154 Comments

30 minutes on the elliptical trainer, aiming to keep my HR between 137 and 143. Then 40 minutes on the inclined treadmill aiming to keep my HR below 157.

So. Very. Boring.

Tomorrow: Same thing, but much earlier in the morning. I have an 8:30 flight out of San Diego.

Tuesday: August CTC – 3 x 9′ / 3′

August 11, 2015Leave a comment

This week, it has been tough to get into any kind of a routine. My two sons are in the final stages of moving out into apartments in Cambridge, and so the house is in a state of chaos. They also keep radically different hours than I do, going to bed around the time I usually get up. At any rate, I stayed up way too late again last night. I’m glad I did because it was good to spend a bit more time with them before they disappear into grad school.

But it meant that I faced a choice. Get up at my normal time and try to do a tough workout on too little sleep, or sleep in and try to grab a similar workout on the erg at work. I opted for the latter.

I was scheduled for a waterfall workout on the water (3K/2.5K/2K on 5′ rest), and my first thought was to just do that on the erg. That flowed pretty naturally into the idea of changing it to the time that it would take me to do those distances on the water (roughly 13.5′, 11.25′, 9′). When I did that and realized that this months Cross Team Challenge is 3 x 9′ on 3′ rest, I opted for that. It’s been tough enough to find a time to do the CTC, and to have a CTC that looks like a great threshold workout fall on threshold workout day when I’m stuck on an erg anyway. It seemed like an opportunity too good to pass up.

I started with a 9 minute warmup. Basically rowed at 2:00 pace with 4 power bursts.

As always, the challenge is pacing. I’m not doing enough erg sessions to know where I am, but my default for these long interval sessions is about 1:50, so I went with that. It felt pretty good in interval number 1, and I ended up a second faster than target. Then the shorter rests started to catch up with me. Second interval was tough and I ended up around 1:49.7, and I was pretty much toast at the end of it. I knew that I wasn’t going to be able to hold onto the pace in the third interval, so I started out aiming at 1:51, then had to slow down to 1:52, then 1:53. In the 7th minute, I was looking at 1:55s, which honestly wasn’t that much faster than my warmup! I sped up a bit in the last minute and finished with a 1:53.3 avg. Overall, this gave me a 1:50.6 avg for the whole workout, a total of 7323 meters for the challenge and (for now) a seat in Free Spirits Boat 1.

I think that I should be able to improve on this if I do it again. I might be able to sneak below 1:50 if I am not on slides, not erging in socks, and more careful in the first rep.

Looking at the heart rates, I pushed it pretty hard. I finished the third interval with my HR at my maximum, 185. I haven’t seen that in a workout for a while. Nice to know I can still go there. I just wish I was going faster when I did!

It was a pretty taxing workout. Over 9 minutes “in the red” and another 14 minutes above my Anaerobic Threshold. I think tomorrow I will have to careful to keep it below 155.

In terms of results, here are the stats. You can see the huge drop off in the third interval.

Now I am off to the airport for a quick trip to San Diego. I will be in the fitness center for the next 2 mornings. Then hopefully on Friday, I will do a long row exploring the HOCR course.

Monday: 4 x 20′ /1′ rest on slides

August 10, 2015August 10, 2015Leave a comment

I slept in. Long day yesterday and got to bed too late. Went to the gym at work around 3:00 in the afternoon.

Plan for today was supposed to be rate ladders OTW, instead I just did a bread and butter steady state session on slides. Trying to see how long I could go at 195W until I had to slow down to stay under the top of my UT1 HR band. I hit the cap about halfway through my last 20′ piece. I’m pretty happy with that.

Tomorrow: On the water waterfall workout. 3K / 2.5K / 2K on 5′ rest. Rate r26. Pace Target ~ 2:15

Saturday: 5.4km Threshold Piece

August 8, 2015Leave a comment

Sunny, cool ~ 60F, wind from the NE about 8mph with gusts to 10. This was a head wind for the main piece. It also kicked up a bit of chop, especially at the south end of long fetches. The only parts where the water was pretty good was directly south of the narrows, the 250m of so south of the rt 9 bridge, and then the last 500m or so before the rt 290 bridge. There was still a head wind, but at least the water was flat.

The plan was a hard 5.5km at 26 spm. I was torn between doing the piece with a tail wind or a head wind. I asked the other folks which way they wanted to go and they all wanted to go south first. Head wind, then.

I took it easy during the warm up, started with a pick drill, including some legs only. This was pretty important to get used to the feel of the club boat I was using. Then just easy steady state with 2 1′ minute chunks at r26 and full pressure.

I turned and psyched myself up. I knew that my pace would be slow with the chop and the head wind, but I wasn’t sure how slow. I decided to try to keep my HR around 170 until I had less than 1000m left and then crank it up. I also wanted to try to focus on keeping the rate up at 26. I tend to slow the rate down in a head wind. I guess the pace was less important to me than trying to manage the conditions.

|Dist_|Time_|_Pace__|_SPM__|avg HR|max HR|DPS_|Remarks
|00253|05:31|10:54.0| 23.0 | 096 | 106 |02.0|drills
|03302|17:08|02:35.7| 20.2 | 141 | 162 |09.5|warm up
|00193|04:29|11:35.3| 19.7 | 108 | 135 |02.2|rest
|05388|27:31|02:33.2| 26.3 | 170 | 180 |07.4|5.4km Threshold (head wind)
|01359|12:41|04:40.0| 21.9 | 134 | 179 |04.9|rest
|01819|09:54|02:43.3| 23.0 | 154 | 166 |08.0|feet out

dist_____|_time_____|_pace___|_HR__|_SPM__|_DPS_|_comment
3555_____|_22:39____|_3:11.1_|_130_|_20.9_|_7.7_|_warmup
5388_____|_27:31____|_2:33.2_|_170_|_26.3_|_7.4_|_Main set
1819_____|_09:54____|_2:43.3_|_154_|_23.0_|_8.0_|_Cool down
1552_____|_17:10____|_5:31.8_|_127_|_21.3_|_4.2_|_rest meters
12314____|_17:14____|_3:08.2_|_150_|_21.8_|_7.3_|_Total

So, it was pretty damn slow. 2:33 pace. Based on the biorow graphs, I guess that’s about a 2:15 with no wind. It sure was hard work, and it took a long time! I’m not happy with the pace, but it was good practice and I hit the right training zone.

After I finished, I tooled around a bit until the other boats got up to the end of the lake. Then I popped my feet out of my shoes and started to head back to the boat house with the tail wind.

As I passed back out under the rt 290 bridge, 2 singles started a rate limited piece right behind me and one of them was gaining. He was rowing about r24 or so, I matched his rate and started to push the pace a bit to keep ahead of him. This went on for most of the way back to the dock until they stopped and turned around. I guess I really don’t like getting passed.

Tomorrow: Off to Tanglewood for the day. No training.

Friday: 14K of Technique

August 7, 20154 Comments

Beautiful morning! Cooler, around 65F. Sunny. Light NNE wind 0-4mph. This was a headwind going downriver. It was a non-factor in the first 2 intervals, but was a little head wind in the third and a little tail wind in the fourth.

Today was my first experiment rowing with a bungee. I have seen this referred to in a number of sources (Marlene Royale’s book, “Rowing Faster”, and other articles, like this one, in of all places the new york times) A google search turned up a variety of opinions about the efficacy of using a bungee or other device to increase the drag of the boat. This thread on rec.sport.rowing was particularly vituperative about it.

I fashioned my bungee out of a 12 foot long piece of 1/4″ diameter shock cord wrapped around the boat 4 times right at the foot stretcher and hooked end to end. This created quite a dramatic amount of turbulence and a rather impressive, splashy wake as I pushed the pace. Here is a youtube video I found of an 8+ doing some starts with bungees on the hull, you can get the idea of what it look like.

This flowed up the gunwales of the boat, and squirted through the footstretcher mounting holes. By the time I did about 7K of rowing with the bungee, I had a few inches of water sloshing around in the bottom of the boat.

Note to self: Next time put the bungee on right at the stern end of the cockpit so the wake will not put water in the cockpit!.

The intent, as I understand it, is to add drag to the boat, which decreases the run and therefore the boat speed at the catch. This higher drag also increases the drive time, unless a hugely higher amount of handle force is applied. This has the effect of slowing down the whole stroke sequence. I found it made it a lot easier to focus on isolating my leg drive and delayed opening my back. This helped to work on one of the areas that I want to improve in my stroke. So, I guess for me, it’s a good thing.

Plan:

(With bungee)

pick drill: arms only, arms and body, 1/2 slide
full slide warm up at r16
2 x low rate ladders (1000m at r16, 1000m @ 18, 750m @ 20) / 1′ rest
remove bungee, 2 min rest
2 x low rate ladders (1000m at r16, 1000m @ 18, 750m @ 20) / 1′ rest
1K square blade rowing

Start_|_Dist_|_Split_|_Pace_|_Strks__|_Rate_|_DPS_|_AvgHR_|_Remarks
00020_|_0980_|_05:47_|_2:57.0_|_095___|_16.4_|_10.3_|_119___|_warmup
01000_|_1000_|_05:20_|_2:39.8_|_086___|_16.1_|_11.6_|_135___|_r16 w/ bungee
02000_|_1000_|_05:12_|_2:36.2_|_094___|_18.1_|_10.6_|_145___|_r18 w/ bungee
03000_|_0750_|_03:46_|_2:30.9_|_076___|_20.1_|_09.9_|_152___|_r20 w/ bungee
03750_|_0250_|_01:25_|_2:49.6_|_023___|_16.3_|_10.9_|_133___|_r
04000_|_1000_|_05:20_|_2:39.8_|_089___|_16.7_|_11.2_|_145___|_r16 w/ bungee
05000_|_1000_|_05:16_|_2:37.8_|_096___|_18.3_|_10.4_|_152___|_r18 w/ bungee
06000_|_0750_|_03:50_|_2:33.3_|_077___|_20.1_|_09.7_|_157___|_r20 w/ bungee
06750_|_0250_|_01:25_|_2:49.6_|_022___|_15.6_|_11.4_|_131___|_r
07000_|_1000_|_05:04_|_2:32.0_|_083___|_16.4_|_12.0_|_146___|_r16
08000_|_1000_|_05:03_|_2:31.3_|_094___|_18.6_|_10.6_|_150___|_r18
09000_|_0750_|_03:39_|_2:25.7_|_075___|_20.6_|_10.0_|_154___|_r20
09750_|_0250_|_01:22_|_2:44.0_|_021___|_15.4_|_11.9_|_132___|_r
10000_|_1000_|_04:57_|_2:28.5_|_082___|_16.6_|_12.2_|_145___|_r16
11000_|_1000_|_04:55_|_2:27.3_|_090___|_18.3_|_11.1_|_149___|_r18
12000_|_0750_|_03:30_|_2:20.3_|_072___|_20.5_|_10.4_|_156___|_r20
12750_|_1090_|_06:35_|_3:01.2_|_129___|_19.6_|_08.4_|_131___|_square blades

Dist__|_Time__|_Pace___|_Strks_|_SPM__|_DPS__|_AvgHR_|_Remarks
00980_|_05:47_|_2:57.0_|_095___|_16.4_|_10.3_|_119___|_warmup
04000_|_20:40_|_2:35.0_|_340___|_16.4_|_11.8_|_143___|_r16
04000_|_20:25_|_2:33.2_|_374___|_18.3_|_10.7_|_149___|_r18
03000_|_14:45_|_2:27.6_|_300___|_20.3_|_10.0_|_155___|_r20
11000_|_55:51_|_2:32.3_|_1014___|_18.2_|_10.8_|_148___|_Main set
00750_|_04:12_|_2:47.7_|_066___|_15.7_|_11.4_|_132___|_rest meters
01090_|_06:35_|_3:01.2_|_129___|_19.6_|_08.4_|_131___|_cool down

So, the bungee slowed down splits by about 7 to 9 seconds at similar rates and effort levels. The boat certainly felt light after I took it off. I was very happy that I was able to establish a nice rhythm at r16. I don’t I’ve ever done that before.

I think I will do a bit of bungee rowing on Fridays for the next few weeks as a way to work on stroke mechanics.

Tomorrow: 5.5K hard distance on quinsig at r26

Found a set of very pretty images of the river that I row on…Here

This one is the view from the prospect bridge towards the moody street dam. On the left is Nova Pharmaceutical. They are the folks that the lactate meter that I use. I may have to stop in to see if they’ll give me some strips!

Quantified Rowing

Measure – Adjust – Improve

Category: Training Journal

Tuesday: 5 x 2000 / 5′ rest – That stung

Monday: Steady State Rate Ladders

Sunday: 40km Bike ride

Saturday: 5.5km Threshold on Quinsig

Friday: 20km on the Charles River Basin

Wednesday: Fitness Center bi-athlon

Tuesday: August CTC – 3 x 9′ / 3′

Monday: 4 x 20′ /1′ rest on slides

Saturday: 5.4km Threshold Piece

Friday: 14K of Technique