Lazy Saturday: 4 x 20′ / 3′

January 6, 2018Leave a comment

I got up around 9 and wasted time until around 11. Then I thought it would be a good idea to get my training out of the way. So, down to the basement.

I haven’t been mentioning it, but most days, before I erg I am doing the corrective exercises that my PT prescribed for me. Today that meant.

10 x 10 sec of this…

Screen Shot 2018-01-06 at 4.04.39 PM.png

The this one…

Screen Shot 2018-01-06 at 4.06.04 PM.png

Then this…

Screen Shot 2018-01-06 at 4.06.58 PM.png

Then this…

Screen Shot 2018-01-06 at 4.07.35 PM.png

Then this…but with a 4 pound medicine ball.

Screen Shot 2018-01-06 at 4.08.16 PM

I should have, but didn’t do the exercises for my oblique abdominals. In addition, during the rests between the 20′ pieces, I did 10 reps of an abdominal exercise that he showed me. With feet unstrapped and at the finish, assume a hands away and body over position. Then hinge back at the hips and bring your arms over your head until you feel your feet start to become unweighted. Hold for a second, then bring hands back down and hinge back to body over. It’s a really good way to remind myself of good hip motion and back position during a ling session.

The session itself was not at all notable, and that’s kinda the whole point. Respected a 155 cap all the way along until the last minute when I want to finish with an even 4800m for the piece.

Workout Summary - media/20180106-1745330o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|20505|92:00.0|02:14.6|170.9|17.7|146.0|162.0|12.6
W-|19187|80:00.0|02:05.1|179.1|17.8|147.3|162.0|13.5
R-|01323|12:00.0|04:32.2|072.8|16.5|129.9|162.0|07.3
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|04806|20:00.0|02:04.8|178.8|17.9|137.5|147.0|13.5
01|04794|20:00.0|02:05.1|179.4|17.8|147.3|154.0|13.4
02|04792|20:00.0|02:05.2|179.0|17.8|151.5|157.0|13.5
03|04794|20:00.0|02:05.2|179.0|17.8|152.9|162.0|13.4

One other note, I received a new PM5 from Concept2 as a warranty replacement for the one that was constantly throwing errors. It worked perfectly.

Tomorrow: I’m scared of this session. I haven’t succeeded with it yet.

Session:
1 x 40-60’
Rest between: n/a only briefly to rehydrate
Rating/Pace: Shift every 3’ Cat III; SR 28+/7’ @ Cat VI; SR 18

I’m hoping to do this as 6 x 10′ / 1′ The Cat III is at 1:48 and the Cat VI is at 2:06. Seems like it should be doable, but it really kicked my ass last week.

Wed: Cat V / Cat VI 500s, Thurs: nothing, Fri: 3 x (5 x 500 CatIV/1′)/5′

January 6, 2018Leave a comment

Wednesday:

At work in the gym.

The Plan:

10 x 500 / 2′
Cat V: 22spm, 1:58
I decided to do the “rests” as Cat VI (18, 2:05), and instead of programming rests in the PM, I just set it up for 500m intervals and 0 rests. Then I just changed pace for each interval between 1:58 and 2:05ish.

I thought that this workout would give me a chance to keep working on the modification to my stroke. Specifically row at a slightly higher rate and still keep my knees down until my arms and body had done their thing on the recovery.

It turned out to be a pretty strenuous workout because the 2′ “rests” at 2:05 weren’t all that restful.

Thursday: It was a massive blizzard here in Massachusetts. I worked from home and I was on the phone from 8am to 6pm. I had no time for my session. I should have gotten up extra early to do it before my calls, but I just couldn’t get motivated to do it. I love sleeping during snowstorms, it’s always so quiet and still.

Friday: Back to work. Luckily, lots of people stayed hoe today so the traffic was very light and I had time for my workout when I got to work this morning. A slightly more intense session and a chance to try to hold my new “knees down” form at 24 spm.

The plan:

3 sets of 5 x 500m 1′ rest
5 minutes rest between sets
the 500s to be done at Cat IV (Pace 1:52, rate: 24)
To do the 5 minute rests, I took the normal 1 minute rest, then rowed a 500 as a pause drill (at hands away) to work on arms and body recovery. This took between 2:40 and 3 minutes, then another 1′ rest at a paddle. This added up to about 5 minutes and was easy to program into the PM.

I started with a 2000 meter warmup.

          Workout Summary - media/20180105-1440300o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|01997|08:05.0|02:01.5|200.5|19.1|135.3|151.0|13.0
W-|02000|08:05.0|02:01.3|200.4|19.1|135.3|151.0|13.0
R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|151.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|00489|01:59.5|02:02.1|187.7|17.9|112.3|133.0|13.8
01|00504|02:03.5|02:02.6|194.8|19.2|137.3|139.0|12.7
02|00498|02:01.0|02:01.5|202.7|19.4|143.6|145.0|12.7
03|00509|02:01.3|01:59.2|216.4|19.8|147.7|151.0|12.7

Then the main set.

          Workout Summary - media/20180105-1530320o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|11344|50:18.0|02:13.1|193.3|21.8|147.7|173.0|10.3
W-|07500|27:33.0|01:50.2|262.0|23.4|147.9|173.0|11.6
R-|03853|18:41.0|02:25.5|083.2|19.6|149.3|173.0|08.5
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|00500|01:49.5|01:49.5|255.6|24.0|134.3|153.0|11.4
01|00500|01:52.5|01:52.5|255.9|23.6|144.4|157.0|11.3
02|00500|01:50.7|01:50.7|255.6|23.7|145.6|158.0|11.4
03|00500|01:50.7|01:50.7|257.6|23.5|149.2|160.0|11.5
04|00500|01:50.8|01:50.8|254.1|22.9|150.0|159.0|11.8
05|00500|01:51.7|01:51.7|257.3|23.4|137.8|157.0|11.5
06|00500|01:50.3|01:50.3|259.3|24.2|147.7|159.0|11.2
07|00500|01:50.9|01:50.9|259.1|23.0|149.1|161.0|11.8
08|00500|01:50.4|01:50.4|254.2|22.9|151.2|161.0|11.9
09|00500|01:50.7|01:50.7|255.9|22.8|151.8|162.0|11.9
10|00500|01:51.2|01:51.2|263.5|23.5|141.9|159.0|11.5
11|00500|01:50.0|01:50.0|263.9|23.6|150.1|161.0|11.6
12|00500|01:49.2|01:49.2|263.2|23.8|151.8|164.0|11.6
13|00500|01:50.1|01:50.1|270.8|23.4|155.2|165.0|11.7
14|00500|01:44.4|01:44.4|306.3|23.0|159.4|173.0|12.5

That was fun! I enjoyed it a bunch and I was happy to see my HR recover well in the short rests. I also felt really in control at r24 and 1:50. It was a good session.

Tomorrow: 4 x 20’/3′ Cat VI. Focusing on technique

Tuesday: 4 x 20′ / 1′

January 2, 20181 Comment

Monday: I felt pretty crappy all day long. Might have been a hangover 😉

Tuesday: I got some very specific coaching feedback on my stroke based on the video that I posted. The biggest issue that I have to get fixed in breaking my knees too early, before my arms are extended and my body angle is right. Today, I wanted to focus on that as hard as I could in an easy session.

The plan was

4×20′ / 3′
Cat VI: 2:03 – 2:08 (I was planning to go a bit slower to make sure that I focused on the recovery)
Rate 18

I got started and I was having a lot of trouble getting comfortable with the changed rhythm. I was a bit jerky on recovery, but I was determined to not break my knees until my arms were straight out. I had plenty of mental bandwidth to focus on my stroke because I managed to forget to turn on the podcast I wanted to listen to. This made the first 20 minutes feel like it was about 2 days long. My heart rate climb fast, but stabilized nicely right around 150.

When I finished the rep, I took a few rest strokes and then picked up my phone and started the podcast. When I looked back at the display, it was already counting down in the second interval! I had managed to misprogram the rests to be 1 minute instead of 3 minutes. I resisted the temptation to push too hard to make up for the missing 15 seconds. Of course, the podcast I was listening to finished before the end of my next rep, and I got have another 5 minutes of rowing in studious silence.

In the chart you can see how I got used to the new rhythm by the second 20 minutes and the power and rate both locked in much better.

          Workout Summary - media/20180102-1345320o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|19422|84:00.0|02:09.7|173.8|17.8|146.6|153.0|13.0
W-|19051|79:45.0|02:05.6|176.6|17.8|146.6|153.0|13.4
R-|00375|04:15.0|05:39.8|064.1|13.5|142.1|153.0|08.7
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|04790|20:00.0|02:05.3|177.2|17.4|143.2|151.0|13.8
01|04716|19:45.0|02:05.6|176.5|18.0|145.6|152.0|13.2
02|04775|20:00.0|02:05.6|176.4|17.9|149.2|153.0|13.4
03|04769|20:00.0|02:05.8|176.2|18.0|148.4|152.0|13.3

Tomorrow: Good fun.

Session: 10 x 500m
Rest between: 2’ Rating/Pace: Cat V: SR 22-23

Notes: Medium tempo session. Use the faster end of your Cat V split. Focus on posture, firm core, chin level, breathing.

So, the faster end of my Cat V pace is 1:58. This will be a good chance to keep focusing on keeping my damn knees down at a slightly higher stroke rate.

Tough Session: 4 x (3′ @ 28 + 7′ @ 18)/1′ rest

January 1, 20181 Comment

I thought this would be a challenge. and it was. I also think that I was not in my best form. Not sure why, maybe I’m fighting off a little bug or something.

The original plan was for 6 intervals. I was so done in that I gave up during the fifth one. It was still really hard!

The Plan:

6 x (3′ @ 28, 7′ @ 18) / 1′ rest
r28 section: Cat III, pace 1:48.
r18 section: Cat VI, pace: 2:03 to 2:08

This was my first attempt at this workout with my new faster pace guidelines. Marlene shortened the r28 sections from 5′ to 3′ to make it a bit more doable, and I think it should have been, but I was really struggling from the first interval. My HR took a long time to recover and plateaued higher each time.

warmup: Rowed at 2:06-ish and 10 stroke bursts trying to get r28 and 1:48 dialed in. I was not doing very well.

Then the main event

Next time I will try to get all 6 done. I think on another day, it would have worked out.

Tonight: New Year’s Festivities!

Tomorrow: Atonement…4×20′ / 3′ Cat VI (r18, 2:05)

Saturday: 4 x 20′ / 3′

December 30, 20171 Comment

I missed a couple of days of training. On Thursday, I rented a truck, grabbed one of my sons and drove up to Marblehead to collect my father’s woodworking tools, plus a bunch of his old stuff. The tools included a radial arm saw, a bandsaw and a drill press along with a whole bunch of hand held power tools. Getting the bigger tools out of the basement was a significant strength workout. It took about 6 hours to get the truck, drive up, load up and return home. I had no time to train.

On Friday, I grabbed my other son and we drove the truck down to the house on Cape Cod. We have a big section of unfinished basement and I going to set up a little workshop there. We unloaded the truck and got everything placed approximately right. Another strength session I guess. Then home to Hopkinton, where I unloaded all the non-workshop stuff and then finally returned the truck. This all took the better part of 8 hours, so I had no time or energy to train.

So this morning, I had to atone for this gap. I wanted to try a Cat VI workout at a slightly faster pace (2:05 vs 2:06). I wanted to see what happened with my HR. The good news, it was a little higher, but plateaued nicely.

          Workout Summary - media/df_20171230-194635.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|20547|92:00.0|02:14.3|178.5|17.7|95.0|151.0|12.6
W-|19232|80:00.0|02:04.8|180.4|17.7|100.8|151.0|13.6
R-|01318|12:00.0|04:33.1|156.9|17.2|029.5|151.0|06.6
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|04818|20:00.0|02:04.5|180.4|17.9|094.0|146.0|13.5
01|04799|20:00.0|02:05.0|179.5|17.6|104.1|151.0|13.6
02|04800|20:00.0|02:05.0|180.0|17.7|098.9|151.0|13.6
03|04815|20:00.0|02:04.6|181.5|17.8|106.1|149.0|13.5

I connected PM3 to painsled over usb again. This time I had a bunch of extraneous “session completed” messages while I rowed and my workout ended up in about 5 pieces. Luckily I could glue it back together. This problem combined with the problem with the HR monitor storing a ton of zero values makes this setup pretty impractical. I’m not sure which is the better solution for PM3, ergdata or painsled. Both have issues.

But on the plus side, I reported my error messages on the PM5 to Concept2 and they are going to do a warranty replacement of it, even though the unit is well over a year old. Gotta say, they seem to take good care of customer service issues when you talk to them.

Tomorrow: I will do the session planned for today.

Session:
1 x 60’ (6 x 10’/1′)
Rest between: n/a only briefly to rehydrate
Rating/Pace: Shift every 3’ Cat III; SR 28+/7’ @ Cat VI; SR 18

Cat III Pace: 1:48

Cat VI Pace: 2:03 to 2:08

Erg Technique Video

December 28, 20171 Comment

Slight improvement. More work to do.

Wednesday: 3 x (5 x 500m / 1′) / 5′

December 28, 2017Leave a comment

I was pretty excited to give this workout a try.

3 sets of (5 x 500m)

Rest between: 1’ between each 500m

5’ between each set

Rating/Pace: Cat IV: SR 24 <– 1:52

It should have been quite doable and it was. I had a bit extra left over to put some extra grunt into the last rep of the last two sets, trying to keep the rate at 24.

To make the interval setup easy, I just did it as 500m work and 1′ rest. After each 5 hard 500s, I paddled a 500 really slowly, aiming at a 3′ time. That plus the 1′ before and after gave me a 5 minute break. Since I would dissect the intervals in rowsandall afterward, it worked out fine.

Today, I was using a PM3 with painsled via the usb connection. I was using the OH1 HR sensor connected to the iphone. Painsled seemed a bit unhappy about this and the HR display on the phone danced between the correct reading and 0. As it turns out, that’s also what it logged in the data, so the time in zone data is useless, but you can get the picture from the plot.

There was also a weird occurrence during my warmup. I did 2k with 10 stroke bumps at my target pace every 500m. After my second bump, painsled popped up the completing session message, and then kept going. In the log, there were two files, one for each half of my warmup. No problem, I glued the two pieces of the warmup and the mainset together in rowsandall before doing the plots.

          Workout Summary - media/20171227-2016050o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|12037|53:49.0|02:14.1|232.6|21.5|75.2|178.0|10.4
W-|07500|27:39.0|01:50.7|260.6|23.7|097.5|178.0|11.5
R-|04545|20:10.0|02:13.2|202.8|18.4|042.3|178.0|19.2
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|00500|01:50.6|01:50.6|252.5|23.6|088.0|156.0|11.5
01|00500|01:53.9|01:53.9|252.8|23.5|103.2|161.0|11.2
02|00500|01:51.2|01:51.2|254.9|24.2|080.3|164.0|11.2
03|00500|01:50.6|01:50.6|259.1|24.0|121.9|167.0|11.3
04|00500|01:50.9|01:50.9|258.4|23.3|109.5|166.0|11.6
05|00500|01:51.3|01:51.3|254.2|24.0|090.5|161.0|11.2
06|00500|01:52.0|01:52.0|251.5|23.2|097.4|163.0|11.5
07|00500|01:51.5|01:51.5|260.4|23.7|082.5|165.0|11.3
08|00500|01:50.6|01:50.6|259.7|23.5|106.2|166.0|11.6
09|00500|01:48.1|01:48.1|279.7|23.2|100.5|173.0|12.0
10|00500|01:50.4|01:50.4|260.5|24.3|081.6|163.0|11.2
11|00500|01:51.8|01:51.8|247.9|23.6|097.2|165.0|11.4
12|00500|01:51.2|01:51.2|261.3|23.2|098.8|169.0|11.6
13|00500|01:51.3|01:51.3|255.0|23.6|110.9|172.0|11.4
14|00500|01:44.6|01:44.6|305.2|24.1|094.0|178.0|11.9

It was a reasonably hard session, but definitely not over the top. I enjoyed it.

Tomorrow: I am going up to Marblehead to collect my father’s set of woodworking tools. I plan to move them down to the house on the cape and set up a little workshop in the basement (near the erg!). If I have time in the afternoon, the planned session is a 4 x 20/3′ at r18. My new pace range for these is 2:03 to 2:08. I think I will push from 2:06 to 2:05 as my target.

Tuesday: 10 x 500 / 2′ – Cat V

December 27, 2017December 27, 2017Leave a comment

Well, I have my new paces. And a new workout to try them out with.

The description was pretty simple.

Session: 10 x 500m

Rest between: 2’

Rating/Pace: Cat V: SR 22-23

Notes: Medium tempo session. Use the faster end of your Cat V split. Focus on posture, firm core, chin level, breathing.

So, the pace target was 1:58. This seemed pretty easy to me, so I decided to do the 2′ rests as Cat VI. This was a bit of a challenge since I didn’t get any feedback on pace or rate. As it turned out, my sense of rate and pace is pretty good because I took a total of 354 strokes during the 20 minutes of rest, so 17.7spm. And I did 4661 meters over 20 minutes for a pace of 2:08.7.

Because of the way that the PM3 records strokes in ergdata, the plots are weird. The total distance and heart rate are right, but the power, pace and rate are only accurate during the work intervals

From now on, I will setup this workout as variable intervals and record the rests as if they were work sections.

Tomorrow: Another new session.

3 sets of (5 x 500m)

Rest between: 1’ between each 500m

5’ between each set

Rating/Pace: Cat IV: SR 24 <– 1:52

Merry Christmas: 4 x 12′ / 1’30”

December 26, 20172 Comments

Well, the firmware update did nothing to help solve the PM5 problems. But it sure did change the symptoms. Now, while I am rowing, at random points, the PM5 will throw an error, but it will keep working and talking to painsled. I can push continue, and everything will be fine for a while, and then it will repeat. The time between errors can be just a couple of strokes, or as long as 10 minutes.

I checked the batteries, and they claim to be at 96%, which makes sense since I replaced them last week when this problem started.

I guess it is time to contact Concept2. For now, I think I will swap out the monitor to a PM3 that I have lying around. I’ll see if that works better with a USB cable than the PM5 works via BT.

The session was uneventful. I really like the 4×12′ session. It’s a quick session and the 1:59 pace put me right on the edge of my aerobic HR zone, and a bit over at the end.

On the chart, you can see when I got the screens because it caused the blips in the pace. By my count I had 18 interruptions due to error screens

          Workout Summary - media/20171225-2205320o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|12912|54:00.0|02:05.5|198.3|21.7|146.2|162.0|11.0
W-|12108|48:00.0|01:58.9|208.1|21.9|146.2|162.0|11.5
R-|00808|06:00.0|03:42.9|079.4|18.9|141.8|162.0|09.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|03033|12:00.0|01:58.7|207.6|21.9|134.9|145.0|11.6
01|03027|12:00.0|01:58.9|209.1|21.8|144.8|154.0|11.6
02|03025|12:00.0|01:59.0|207.3|21.9|149.9|158.0|11.5
03|03023|12:00.0|01:59.1|208.2|21.9|155.3|162.0|11.5