A week of mostly vacation

July 7, 2019Leave a comment

Friday – June 28 – On the cape – No Training

I arrived at Logan at about 7:30AM. I was in my car and on the way to the cape by 8:00AM. The traffic leaving the city was pretty heavy, but by the time I was down to Weymouth, things were moving better. I got to the house around 11, with donuts!

I had a couple of work calls and hung out. I was massively tired and didn’t feel like working out.

Saturday – June 29 – 3 x 20′ / 2′ (Humon)

Down on the cape, in the basement. Feeling tired from travel.

Humon kept me honest.

I saw that I was dipping into the orange with r20, 180 stuff, so I kept away from any higher power segments.

We headed out late to go home on Saturday night.

Sunday – June 30 – No training

I was feeling lazy, but I managed to head outside and do a few hours of yard work. After that, I wasn’t in the mood for any training.

Monday – July 1 – Steady State with a few higher rate bursts.

I’m not getting to do a lot of rowing in my single these days, so this session was a treat. I decided to do an extensive warmup, all the way to the dam at Waltham center. I did a Rojabo style warmup, with stroke sets of increasing intensity.

I’m thinking that a more intense warmup, even when doing an endurance session “opens up” the circulation in the muscles and raises the smO2.

This certainly seemed to be the case today.

After the warmup, I rowed, focusing on technique. If I dipped into orange, I would ease off the pressure and focus on really easing into the drive from the catch. At the end of the trip back up the river, I saw a guy I knew, so I did a quick segment at higher rate to go say hello. After a quick chat, I did another twenty strokes or so of harder rowing, and then after navigating a set of booms across the cove, I settled back into normal endurance rowing. Something I am noticing is that I am tending to overload at the start of these intervals, notice the sliver of red. I slowed down to fix that , and again focused on form. The rest of the row was unremarkable, but I did another couple of quicker bits right at the end.

It was a really nice session and I managed to find a bit of boat speed in some of the harder bursts.

        Workout Summary - media/20190701-1335500o.csv
--|Total|-Total----|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time-----|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|14790|01:23:57.4|02:50.3|119.5|20.2|136.1|167.0|08.7
W-|12254|00:59:17.2|02:25.1|135.8|20.1|140.6|165.0|10.4
R-|02546|00:24:41.3|04:50.9|080.2|20.4|125.2|165.0|03.8
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
01|00324|01:37.2|02:29.8|135.0|17.8|127.1|135.0|11.2
02|00791|03:46.9|02:23.4|130.5|19.5|134.1|149.0|10.7
03|00853|04:01.0|02:21.2|145.9|22.1|146.7|157.0|09.6
04|00227|00:59.6|02:11.2|190.2|25.1|151.3|162.0|09.1 - 1' at r24
05|00314|01:23.4|02:12.7|182.1|24.2|142.3|164.0|09.3 - 30 strokes @ r24
06|00162|00:36.8|01:53.9|289.7|34.2|150.0|165.0|07.7 - 20 strokes @ max
07|02932|14:25.9|02:27.7|125.3|18.3|144.3|152.0|11.1 - back upriver
08|00165|00:41.7|02:06.1|216.3|27.3|140.2|151.0|08.7 - 20 strokes @ r27
09|00134|00:36.2|02:15.0|194.3|24.9|126.7|140.0|08.9 - 20 strokes @ r25
10|00136|00:37.0|02:15.9|185.6|26.0|114.8|128.0|08.5 - 20 strokes @ r26
11|02583|12:57.1|02:30.4|129.0|19.3|139.6|156.0|10.3 - back down river
12|01508|07:29.2|02:29.0|118.0|18.5|135.8|141.0|10.9 - back upriver
13|01484|07:18.0|02:27.6|124.2|20.0|142.6|154.0|10.2 - part 2
14|00234|00:55.6|01:58.6|241.4|30.3|147.4|163.0|08.4 - cut to turn
15|00406|01:51.6|02:17.6|140.5|24.7|142.6|160.0|08.8 - across lagoon

Tuesday – July 2 – 12 x 3’/1′

I got up early, mainly because I couldn’t sleep. It seems like trips to Asia mess me up for about a week. We were going to be heading down to the cape later in the day, and I wanted to get a session in. I also wanted to get back to some semblance of a training plan, so I decided to make this session a bit more intense.

I used to do this session as 15×3’/1′ Today, since I was pressed for time, I decided to take the first few intervals as warmup.

I wore the Humon, to see what these kind of intervals look like from an smO2 perspective.

So, they look kinda cool! You can see the quick trip into the red in each interval. You can also see the recovery. I was generally flipping from blue to green right when I was starting the next interval. You can also see the effect of cumulative fatigue in the lower peak smO2 as I get deeper into the session. I also slowed down. I was really having issues. I trust the power in the summary more than the pace.

        Workout Summary - media/20190702-1250500o.csv
--|Total|-Total----|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time-----|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|14244|01:04:09.9|02:15.1|168.3|23.4|150.5|178.0|09.5
W-|09284|00:35:53.1|01:56.0|228.5|24.8|156.3|178.0|10.4
R-|04970|00:27:10.0|02:44.0|091.9|21.6|142.6|178.0|11.4
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
01|00791|03:00.0|01:53.8|237.1|25.1|143.2|156.0|10.5
02|00797|03:00.0|01:52.9|240.2|25.1|148.1|160.0|10.6
03|00762|02:53.1|01:53.5|236.7|24.6|148.8|162.0|10.8
04|00794|03:00.0|01:53.4|237.6|24.6|153.8|165.0|10.7
05|00791|03:00.0|01:53.8|238.9|25.3|157.2|168.0|10.4
06|00778|03:00.0|01:55.7|233.0|24.7|157.1|170.0|10.5
07|00768|03:00.0|01:57.2|229.7|25.4|159.3|171.0|10.1
08|00754|03:00.0|01:59.4|217.4|24.6|158.7|170.0|10.2
09|00762|03:00.0|01:58.0|213.9|23.5|159.5|171.0|10.8
10|00766|03:00.0|01:57.5|219.1|24.8|162.2|172.0|10.3
11|00756|03:00.0|01:59.1|213.6|24.8|163.0|172.0|10.2
12|00765|03:00.0|01:57.6|225.0|24.8|164.7|178.0|10.3

I guess that’s why I need a training plan.

Wednesday – July 3 – 16km Coastal

A beautiful, sunny day. Not a lot of wind. A great day for a nice long row. I launched from the beach by Loagy Bay, and headed out to the red buoy. For a change, I decided to row down south a bit along the shore of Lt Island. There are a couple of big rock that are visible almost until high tide, and I could see them clearly, so I rowed down to the big rock to the south of the island. Then I doubled back and rowed on the inside of the other big rock back to the red buoy. Then I set a course for the harbor, basically due north. I threaded my way into the inner harbor and dodged a few power boats. On the way back to the beach, I hugged the shore of Indian Head, mainly to avoid the wakes from the boats in the channel out of the harbor.

It was a nice, low intensity session. No Humon today, but I kept the HR below 150. The pace varied all over the place because of tide (it was coming in) and breeze.

Thursday – 4 July – 4 x 10′ hard rate ladders

In the morning, I went for a low tide walk. I love doing this. I walked a little more than 3 km, and explored the sand flats going south from our house.

I didn’t feel ready to take on full power long intervals, especially in coastal conditions. It was another beautiful sunny day. A bit more wind, and with the holiday, every power boat was on the water and throwing up wakes. To make the session a bit more tolerable, I decided to make them rate ladders.

4′ @ r24
3′ @ r26
2′ @ r28
1′ @ r30

Why I do these intervals in the 1x, I usually aim between 26 and 28. But I usually am doing a 4 x 2K which is a lot closer to 9 minutes. I also have a lot less navigating to do and it’s a lot less choppy.

I rowed out to the red buoy as my warmup. I threw in a couple of hard 20s to get used to the idea. Then I had a drink and got ready. When I was within a minute of starting, I was swamped by a wake, so a quick flip of the autobailer was needed. Then I was off and rowing.

I focused on keeping my stroke light and hitting the rate. This was made challenging by the fact that I was doing the piece close to and parallel to the main channel. Someboats were nice to me and either steered wide, or slowed down a bit to minimize the wake. Others did neither of those things and I ended up with a cockpit full of water. As I got to the r28 and r30 sections, the boat traffic became a bit thicker and the wakes were pretty constant.

The second interval, I decided to row away from the channel. This was a good idea, but didn’t help entirely. I made it through 3 minutes of the first 4′ section and was totally swamped by a huge wake. I dropped a couple strokes and opened the bailer. I rowed the rest of the piece with the bailer open, which slowed me down a bit and made the boat feel a bit heavier, but it was better than sliding the seat through water, since I was flooded all the way to cover the seat deck.

I rowed the rest continuing toward Loagy Bay, and turned the boat in time to start the third interval. I did the usual bargaining with myself, that if I did a good job with this one, I’d stop the workout there. It was a fine interval. Less wakes, but I got swamped again near the end of the r26 section. I flipped the bailer on again and finished it out.

I felt a bit better than I feared I would, so I decided to do the last interval. I needed to get back to the beach anyway. This one went right to plan. No interruptions, no swampings, and no stops for the bailer. I just didn;t have much power left in my legs.

Good workout.

Tough to get a lot of metrics on this one because of the wind, current and waves, but the HR shows pretty consistent effort.

Friday – 5 July – 3 x 20’/2′ on slides

Another walk in the morning. This time going to the north side of the island. This time, about 4km.

Then in the afternoon, my wife and I kayaked around the island. This was huge fun, we saw a bunch of cool birds. We stopped at the bridge and I jumped off into the water. This activity is a summer tradition, as illustrated on the webpage for our residents association.

after that, we paddled back along the south edge of the island, this was a bit of slog into the freshening breeze. Fantastic.

Later in the afternoon, the wind had freshened some more, and I didn’t feel adventurous, so I went and did a 3×20 endurance session in the basement.

The first twenty minutes, I did in warmup format. Again trying to maximize smO2. I was pretty tired after the long walk and kayak adventure. It was interesting watching it climb even through the second 20 minute piece. Heart rate was quite low, but I felt taxed throughout.

Saturday – 6 July – 10K threshold

Another beautiful morning, another walk on the sand flats. I hit it right at low tide and it was a particularly low tide today, so I was able to walk all the way out to the big rock that I rowed around on Thursday.

From out there, the island looks very small.

I was able to walk around both of the rocks that I had rowed around on Thursday.

I lazed around for most of the day, and finally got up the oomph to go erg in the late afternoon. I definitely was not feeling too sharp, and I had a limited time window. I dove into a hard 10K without any real warmup and boy did I struggle at the start. I was having trouble getting into any rhythm and my breathing was all messed up. I stopped a couple times in the first 500m, and then rowed well below target power through 1000m. Then I tried to ramp up the power to target and bailed out again. I sat there for a few seconds and then I just started paddling.

My smO2 started rising. And I started to feel a lot better. I started pulling 200W and it was OK. Then as I went along, I pushed a little harder, and then a bit more. When I first targeted 200W, my projected finish was around 40:30. Then I pulled it down to 40:20. With 3000m to go, I pushed a bit more and saw a projected finish hovering around 40:00. With 1000m to go, I rated up and pushed the power up to around 230W which enabled me to finish in about 39:50.

        Workout Summary - media/20190706-2055480o.csv
--|Total|-Total----|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time-----|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|09997|00:39:48.7|01:59.5|213.2|24.9|153.2|174.0|10.1
W-|10000|00:39:49.2|01:59.5|213.2|24.9|153.2|174.0|10.1
R-|00000|00:00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|174.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|01000|04:15.1|02:07.5|196.7|23.5|123.2|140.0|10.0
01|00973|04:12.9|02:09.9|196.5|24.1|138.4|146.0|09.6
02|01027|04:05.1|01:59.4|206.0|24.3|149.2|151.0|10.3
03|01000|03:57.0|01:58.5|210.5|24.7|152.3|154.0|10.3
04|01000|03:55.8|01:57.9|213.5|24.9|154.1|156.0|10.2
05|01000|03:55.4|01:57.7|214.5|25.0|157.7|159.0|10.2
06|00964|03:46.8|01:57.6|215.1|25.0|159.8|162.0|10.2
07|01036|04:01.9|01:56.8|220.0|25.2|163.4|165.0|10.2
08|00967|03:45.8|01:56.8|220.2|25.4|166.5|168.0|10.1
09|01033|03:53.5|01:53.0|242.9|27.3|172.0|174.0|09.7

The smO2 shows the struggle with lack of a warmup. Once I was past the 10 minute mark and my muscles were actually working well, things were pretty good.

Good lesson to learn about how a warmup affects things.

Today is our last day down on the cape. Hopefully I will get to do another coastal row. Then tomorrow I have an early flight out to San Francisco for a big conference.

12/24 – 12/26 – More online racing.

December 27, 2018Leave a comment

Monday – 12/24 : 10K online race

One of the contributors to rowsandall organized a Christmas 10k. I was a little bummed out because my only option for rowing it was the dynamic, and I knew that I would be a fair amount slower on the dynamic than on the static erg. But, I like the idea of doing the same session as other folks, and I don’t even mind getting beaten (especially when I have an excuse!)

So, I set the conservative target of “faster than 2:00”. I did a 2K warmup to get loose. Starting again with a pick drill.

Then the 10K. I had haunting memories of the 30r22, so I was in no mood to push it too hard. Even with that, I couldn’t have gone a lot faster. My heart rate was up near 180 at the end.

        Workout Summary - media/20181225-0821580o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|10000|39:21.0|01:58.1|212.4|25.4|165.2|179.0|10.0
W-|10000|39:21.0|01:58.1|212.4|25.4|165.2|179.0|10.0
R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|179.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|01000|03:53.4|01:56.7|218.0|24.8|137.7|156.0|10.4
01|01000|03:55.3|01:57.7|214.5|24.6|158.4|160.0|10.4
02|01000|03:56.2|01:58.1|212.5|24.8|161.7|164.0|10.2
03|01000|03:57.3|01:58.6|209.6|24.9|163.1|165.0|10.2
04|01000|03:57.2|01:58.6|209.7|25.1|166.3|167.0|10.1
05|01000|03:56.9|01:58.5|210.4|25.1|168.0|170.0|10.1
06|01000|03:56.5|01:58.3|211.5|25.7|171.3|172.0|09.9
07|01000|03:58.5|01:59.3|206.5|25.4|172.5|175.0|09.9
08|01000|03:57.0|01:58.5|210.3|26.2|174.9|176.0|09.7
09|01000|03:53.1|01:56.5|221.3|26.9|177.3|179.0|09.6

That was good enough to earn me a last place!

But in terms of misery, it looks like I was in second place!

Tuesday – 25 December : 3 x 20′ / 2′ dynamic

Christmas day. Just putting up some meters. HR limited.

        Workout Summary - media/20181225-2221030o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|15009|66:00.0|02:11.9|161.2|20.0|139.5|153.0|11.4
W-|14208|60:00.0|02:06.7|172.0|20.1|140.3|153.0|11.8
R-|00804|06:00.0|03:43.9|053.7|19.3|131.4|153.0|08.2
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|04744|20:00.0|02:06.5|172.4|20.0|132.9|143.0|11.9
01|04727|20:00.0|02:06.9|171.3|20.1|141.5|147.0|11.8
02|04738|20:00.0|02:06.6|172.2|20.1|146.6|153.0|11.8

Wednesday – 26 December – 3 x 20’/2′ dynamic

I probably should have done a interval workout today, but I wasn’t in the mood. So I just did another endurance session.

        Workout Summary - media/20181226-2155350o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|15013|66:00.0|02:11.9|164.0|20.4|139.0|150.0|11.2
W-|14265|60:00.0|02:06.2|174.0|20.2|140.2|150.0|11.8
R-|00750|06:00.0|03:59.8|063.9|22.7|126.8|150.0|08.9
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|04780|20:00.0|02:05.5|176.6|20.2|132.9|143.0|11.8
01|04735|20:00.0|02:06.7|172.0|20.2|140.9|146.0|11.7
02|04750|20:00.0|02:06.3|173.4|20.1|146.9|150.0|11.8

Tomorrow: Interval session – 8 x 2’/2′

Saturday: 10K Threshold on slides

December 16, 2018Leave a comment

Down on the cape.

I had two things on my list of things to to today. The first was to play around some more with the Quiske pod on the erg. I needed to redo an example I am used in a blog post over on the rowsandall analytics site. I had the pod mounted backwards and the plots were inverted, so I wanted to update it with the right data.

That ended up being about 18 minutes of reasonably hard rowing, but it was in short intervals of 1 to 5 minutes. I ended up sweaty but not tired.

After that, I got myself settled to do my hard distance workout for the week. 10K on slides. It’s always a mystery to me how to pace stuff on slides. I am not as fast on slides as on static, but a bit faster than on the dynamic. I decided to try to 1:58. It worked out fine. It was hard, but I was able to hold the pace throughout.

        Workout Summary - media/20181215-2135330o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|10000|39:02.0|01:57.1|214.8|24.9|166.1|180.0|10.3
W-|10000|39:02.0|01:57.1|214.8|24.9|166.1|180.0|10.3
R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|180.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|01000|03:43.5|01:51.7|217.0|24.4|141.3|154.0|11.0
01|01000|03:54.9|01:57.4|216.0|24.8|157.5|159.0|10.3
02|01000|03:55.5|01:57.8|214.6|24.6|161.8|164.0|10.4
03|01000|03:55.8|01:57.9|213.4|24.5|164.6|167.0|10.4
04|01000|03:55.9|01:57.9|213.3|24.8|166.8|168.0|10.2
05|01000|03:55.9|01:57.9|213.6|25.0|169.2|171.0|10.2
06|01000|03:55.7|01:57.9|214.0|25.0|171.5|175.0|10.2
07|01000|03:56.6|01:58.3|211.1|25.1|173.7|176.0|10.1
08|01000|03:57.1|01:58.6|209.8|24.8|175.5|177.0|10.2
09|01000|03:52.0|01:56.0|225.1|25.6|178.1|180.0|10.1

Pretty consistent pacing through the middle section. I struggled a bit with 2000m to go, but rated up a little in the last 1000 and I was fine.

Tomorrow: The plan calls for a long interval session. I will try to do a 3k/2.5k/2k waterfall before we head home. I might substitute a endurance session if I am feeling tired from today’s session.

Saturday: 10K hard on the dynamic

November 4, 2018Leave a comment

The plan calls for a hard distance piece on Saturday, so thats what I did. Even though I wasn’t relishing the idea of doing it on the dynamic, I figured if I just aimed at 2:00 splits, I’d be fine.

It was hard!

        Workout Summary - media/20181103-2120340o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|10000|39:36.0|01:58.8|208.2|25.4|166.0|181.0|09.9
W-|10000|39:36.0|01:58.8|208.2|25.4|166.0|181.0|10.0
R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|181.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|01000|03:55.4|01:57.7|211.3|24.6|135.8|153.0|10.4
01|01000|03:57.9|01:58.9|208.3|24.8|155.9|159.0|10.2
02|01000|03:57.5|01:58.7|209.0|24.8|161.5|164.0|10.2
03|01000|03:57.9|01:59.0|208.0|24.8|164.8|166.0|10.2
04|01000|03:58.3|01:59.1|206.6|25.0|167.4|168.0|10.1
05|01000|03:58.5|01:59.3|206.4|25.1|169.9|172.0|10.0
06|01000|03:58.4|01:59.2|206.4|25.2|172.9|175.0|10.0
07|01000|03:59.0|01:59.5|205.0|25.8|174.6|175.0|09.7
08|01000|03:59.7|01:59.8|203.3|25.6|177.1|179.0|09.8
09|01000|03:54.0|01:57.0|218.5|28.2|179.6|181.0|09.1

Well, a bit better than the last one.

Here is a comparison of 4 10ks on the dynamic. I’ve dialed in my best pace and was able to hold it at slightly higher heart rates today.

Tomorrow: rowing on Quinsig. Free form Sunday….

Just deal with it

September 19, 2018Leave a comment

So, last report was back on Sept 11th when I had a lovely row at Crossfit Del Mar in San Diego.

Wed, Sept 12 – No training:

Early start to fly up to San Jose. Meetings all day, business dinner. No time to train

Thursday, Sept 13 – No Training:

Up early to catch my flight home

Friday, Sept 14 – 20 x 2′ OTW 1x:

In Newton, in my fluid. Very light tailwind going down river. I was able to fit in 5 intervals over the rowable part of the river (just barely).

I pushed the first set a bit too hard and struggled the rest of the workout, but it was pretty good fun.

          Workout Summary - media/20180914-1500310o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|14103|84:15.0|02:59.2|109.8|23.3|150.0|177.0|07.2
W-|08686|38:53.0|02:14.3|170.0|26.2|160.4|176.0|08.5
R-|05437|45:23.0|04:10.5|058.2|20.7|141.0|176.0|06.6
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
01|00107|00:30.2|02:21.1|135.4|19.9|127.1|131.0|10.7 - wu
02|00473|02:02.4|02:09.3|166.1|24.9|140.3|159.0|09.3
03|00492|02:07.3|02:09.4|181.4|25.4|155.7|165.0|09.1
04|00467|02:00.0|02:08.5|159.3|27.0|161.9|169.0|08.6
05|00471|02:02.2|02:09.8|178.8|25.5|162.2|170.0|09.1
06|00242|01:00.4|02:04.9|208.0|28.8|157.0|166.0|08.3 - cut short
07|00447|01:59.2|02:13.3|178.8|26.6|154.5|170.0|08.5
08|00434|02:00.7|02:19.0|162.1|26.3|165.1|171.0|08.2
09|00434|01:58.5|02:16.4|196.6|26.8|166.9|175.0|08.2
10|00435|01:57.9|02:15.5|171.2|27.5|168.6|176.0|08.1
11|00413|01:52.7|02:16.3|177.8|27.1|168.5|174.0|08.1
12|00426|01:54.4|02:14.3|152.3|26.1|152.0|168.0|08.5
13|00449|02:00.0|02:13.6|170.1|26.0|162.6|170.0|08.6
14|00446|02:00.6|02:15.2|137.0|26.9|164.9|171.0|08.2
15|00440|01:58.6|02:14.9|169.5|26.3|165.1|173.0|08.5
16|00416|01:51.3|02:13.7|173.9|25.8|164.5|172.0|08.7
17|00424|01:56.8|02:17.9|156.8|25.6|151.2|167.0|08.5
18|00438|01:59.1|02:16.0|159.4|26.1|162.6|171.0|08.4
19|00406|01:54.0|02:20.3|184.9|25.7|162.7|171.0|08.3
20|00412|01:53.9|02:18.2|157.9|25.8|164.6|172.0|08.4
21|00414|01:52.9|02:16.4|187.0|27.1|165.7|174.0|08.1

Saturday, Sept 15: Failed 10K Dynamic:

I was a it worried about back to back hard workouts, but since I was flying out Sunday morning to Asia, I felt like I had no other option. I was also stuck with doing it on the dynamic erg. But, I figured if I just picked an easy target, I’d be OK. I was wrong.

I started with a 2k warmup. I included some arms and body only and some legs only to see what they felt like on the dynamic. They felt vaguely boat like.

Then into the main event. I made it to 6K and when the going got tough, I gave up. I think it was lack of motivation, but I felt pretty lousy at the time. When I hit 6K, I knew that I had another 16 minutes to go and I didn’t feel like I would be able to deal with the discomfort for that much longer. I tried to get back on track, gave up again, then paddled along at a slower pace until there was 1k to go and then I pulled it back to target. It was ugly.

-|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|10000|40:38.0|02:01.9|193.5|25.5|165.2|184.0|09.7
W-|10000|40:38.0|02:01.9|193.5|25.5|165.2|184.0|09.7
R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|184.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|01000|03:55.6|01:57.8|210.4|24.6|140.0|153.0|10.3
01|01000|03:58.3|01:59.1|206.8|25.1|156.9|159.0|10.0
02|01000|03:59.0|01:59.5|205.3|25.2|161.0|162.0|10.0
03|01000|03:59.8|01:59.9|203.2|25.2|164.6|166.0|09.9
04|01000|04:01.1|02:00.6|199.7|25.7|167.8|170.0|09.7
05|01000|04:03.1|02:01.6|194.7|26.0|170.8|172.0|09.5
06|01000|04:14.5|02:07.2|171.5|25.3|167.9|171.0|09.3 - hd
07|01000|04:17.3|02:08.7|165.5|24.2|167.6|172.0|09.6 - hd
08|01000|04:11.6|02:05.8|175.5|24.4|174.5|176.0|09.8 - paddle
09|01000|03:58.5|01:59.2|207.3|29.2|179.7|184.0|08.6 - rate up

That left me pretty much destroyed.

Sunday, September 16: No Training

Monday, September 17: No Training

I took off at 10:30AM to fly to Cebu in the Philippines. The route was BOS–>YYZ–>ICN–>CEB. Total travel time door to door was 26 hours. I got to my hotel at 12:15am Tuesday morning local time. So effectively, Monday just didn’t exist. I managed to get about 2 hours of sleep on the long leg to ICN, and another 5 hours on the flight to CEB.

Tuesday, September 18th: ~50′ in the fitness center.

I managed to get another 3 hours of sleep at my hotel (after a couple of conference calls) and then got up at 5:30. I was at the fitness center when it opened at 6 am. I felt a bit ragged from the travel, so I didn’t want to do anything too ambitious.

I started with 20 minutes inclined march on the treadmill. The time crawled by painfully slowly. Then I bopped over to the elliptical. I intended to program a 20 minute workout, but somehow ended up with 28 minutes. That actually turned out to be a good thing because it gave me enough time to call home, shower and grab a quick bite to eat before I headed to our facility.

The place I’m staying is very nice. Cebu is quite the vacation destination for Koreans these days.

Wednesday, September 19: It’s a mystery!

I flew out of Cebu at 9 this morning and now I am sitting in the airport in Osaka. I get to Haneda around 7pm tonight and I might try to work out when I get to my hotel, or I might blow that off and get a beer.

10K Threshold

September 29, 2017Leave a comment

The original plan was to do another 30′ piece, but I was looking to change up the workout a little bit. I wanted to challenge myself a bit more and frankly I like distance based pieces than time based ones.

Plan:

10K
Rate: 25-26
Pace: 1:56 (my 30 minutes was at 1:56.2)
Technique: Keep your damn knees together
HR Limit: None

I did 10 minutes on the treadmill to warmup (15% grade, 3.1mph).

These rows are pretty brutal. Just like the 30′ piece that I did last weekend, I started out trying to hold 1:55. I lasted a bit longer today. Out to around 5K versus 3K for the other piece. I had a very brief crisis around the 7000 meter point. I essentially pulled up for two strokes, and then thought better of it and took a minute or so at 2:00 pace. Then pushed the pace slowly back toward target. It was a pretty good save.

I did a slow 1K on the erg for a cool down.

        Workout Summary - media/20170929-1236080o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|10000|38:38.0|01:55.9|224.2|24.7|167.9|180.0|10.5
W-|10000|38:38.0|01:55.9|224.2|24.7|167.8|180.0|10.5
R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|180.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|01000|03:48.6|01:54.3|229.9|23.8|141.8|155.0|11.0
01|01000|03:49.2|01:54.6|232.5|24.5|159.2|162.0|10.7
02|01000|03:49.7|01:54.9|230.9|24.7|164.2|166.0|10.6
03|01000|03:50.0|01:55.0|230.1|24.9|168.1|171.0|10.5
04|01000|03:51.2|01:55.6|226.5|24.9|171.2|173.0|10.4
05|01000|03:52.7|01:56.3|222.5|24.9|172.3|174.0|10.4
06|01000|03:56.7|01:58.3|211.2|24.5|171.6|175.0|10.3
07|01000|03:55.5|01:57.7|214.6|24.6|174.2|176.0|10.4
08|01000|03:54.0|01:57.0|218.4|25.0|176.6|178.0|10.3
09|01000|03:51.2|01:55.6|226.6|25.2|178.4|180.0|10.3

Here is the whole workout from the polar OH1 sensor

I was curious about how this session compared to my 30′ piece. So, I used the nady multicompare features in rowsandall to look.

Pace and power, you can see how I started both pieces at about the same pace, and then faded in the 30′ around 2500m. Then you can see the crisis around 6300m in today’s piece.
I did a better job at keeping the stroke rate up today.
better HR response today.

Tomorrow: I’ve got my new rigger for my boat. I will mount it tonight and hopefully do a nice long and easy technical session tomorrow on Quinsig.

L3 – 10K

August 1, 2017Leave a comment

Restarting on the WP has certainly been a humbling experience. I did my best 10K ever in 2014. It was a 36:33, which is a 1:49.7 pace.

Now today was not intended to be a time trial, but still, it is a little daunting how much work it will take to get back to that level of fitness.

I was pressed for time, so I skipped the warmup.

I set my target pace for this session at 1:57. But I could tell by the time I got to 3000m that I wasn’t going to be able to hold it. My legs and lungs were both complaining and I found myself playing with stroke rate to futilely try to find a groove. I told myself that if I could stick it out to 5K, then it would be OK to slow down to a 2:00 pace.

This took off enough pressure that I could get through the piece, but even at a 2:00 pace, my HR plateaued and then started rising again. It was a struggle, counting strokes all the way to the end. It was 460 strokes by the way.

I skipped the cool down too.

But the session got done, and now I have a marker for next time. That’s the magic of the WP. There is no mystery about your goals for the next work. Just try to do a little better than how you did today. I need that simplicity right now.

So, I finished with a 1:57.9 average pace. I guess I try for 1:57 again next time.

Tomorrow: 60′ L4 before I take off for Tokyo.

El “Dy”ablo – 10K hard

June 7, 2017June 7, 20174 Comments

Monday night: Flew out to San Jose. Arrived around 11. Asleep around 1am

Tuesday: Rest Day. Meetings all day. Caught the red eye home from San Jose.

Wednesday: Arrived at the airport around 5:15am. My original plan was to stop in Newton, do a session on the water, and then continue on to work. But, I felt pretty beat up from the flight and I decided to go home and get some sleep instead. I was in bed by 6:30 and I slept until 10. I had breakfast, did some email, and decided I had time for a quick erg session.

I have a race this Saturday. It’s open water, and 8K long. I’m just getting used to the Aero, and I’m not sure what kind of pace I can hold over 8km. Two weeks ago, in my first row, my “tide adjusted” pace was around 2:55/500. That was basically at a marathon pace, so I think 2:45 might work. 8km at 2:45 would take 44 minutes. So, basically, it’s not that different than a hard 10K on the erg.

So, I haven’t really done any hard distance work, so it seemed like a good idea to do a “dry run” to remind myself that its possible to row above 165bpm for a long time, even though it isn’t very pleasant.

I was at home, and I was using the dynamic. So I had no idea what pace would work. I decided to be conservative and take off at a 2:00 pace, and then speed up once I got calibrated. Based on the 4×15 type sessions I’m doing I figure I am good for 1:55 pace over 10K on a static erg right now.

But on the dynamic, it was impossible for me to hold a 2:00 pace beyond 5km. By that point, my HR was already up around 175 (93% HRR) and I was really struggling. I upped the rate and eased the pace to try to get back in firmer control of the row, just the way i would if I went out too fast in a race. I really didn’t want to give myself permission to give up. That is not the way to prep for a race.

So, I struggled my way through the back half of the session and managed the tiniest of sprints at the very end. I spent 6 minutes above my anaerobic threshold. It hurt. It hurt more that I was only rowing at a 2:00 pace.

So, I am trying to figure out just how much harder it is for me to row the dynamic. On clue could come from the session that I did on Monday. That was a 4×15′ where the first 6′ was at 250W (roughly a 1:50 pace). I compared my HR response over the first 6 minutes of that row and the first 6 minutes of this row.

They are very close to superimposed. So, my guess is that I am 40W “better” on the static than the dynamic, that’s 23% different. For comparison, between the static erg and my fluid, the difference is closer to 11%.

So, I still hate that devil machine. (El Dy-ablo)

Tomorrow:

3 x 20′ / 2′

MP, 10KP, HMP

90.0%

(167)

On the water. I’ll do each interval to the proper distance and do quick turns when required.

target power:

MP: 158-171 (Stroke rate 20)
10KP: 184-197 (stroke rate 24)
HMP: 171-184 (stroke rate 22)

10K – ticking over

April 18, 2017Leave a comment

I spent the morning working on the house down on the cape and then we drove home in the afternoon, arriving home just after 5pm. I had a work call at 7pm, so I squeezed in a quick 10K workout.

I started at about 180-185W and then bled off speed to keep myself at or below a HR cap of 157.

Workout Summary - media/20170418-2300220o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|10000|41:58.0|02:05.9|174.9|20.1|151.1|160.0|11.8
W-|10000|41:59.0|02:06.0|174.8|20.1|151.1|160.0|11.8
R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|160.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|01000|04:05.6|02:02.8|184.2|19.4|131.2|142.0|12.6
01|01000|04:07.7|02:03.8|184.3|20.5|146.9|150.0|11.8
02|01000|04:08.2|02:04.1|183.0|20.4|151.8|154.0|11.9
03|01000|04:11.3|02:05.7|177.0|20.8|150.8|153.0|11.5
04|01000|04:11.8|02:05.9|174.9|20.0|149.7|152.0|11.9
05|01000|04:11.2|02:05.6|176.9|20.1|153.5|156.0|11.9
06|01000|04:13.6|02:06.8|171.7|19.9|155.5|157.0|11.9
07|01000|04:15.7|02:07.9|167.6|19.9|156.7|158.0|11.8
08|01000|04:17.7|02:08.8|163.5|19.9|156.7|158.0|11.7
09|01000|04:16.2|02:08.1|166.4|20.1|157.3|160.0|11.6

Friday: 10K @ MP

February 3, 2017Leave a comment

I didn’t have much time this morning, so I did what I could.

Plan called for 2 x 45′ at marathon pace. I only had about 40 minutes because I had an early meeting I needed to get to, so I subbed in a 10k at the same pace.

These workouts are supposed to be done with a HR cap, and today was no exception. I decided to row against a cap of 150 (80% of HR max). Since I’ve had such great sessions the past couple of days, I decided to start off at 185W and see how long I could hold it before I needed to back off to stay under the cap. Turns out I made it the whole way. It was another good workout. If I was doing another 45 minutes, I would have had to back off, but still. It was better than the HR response I was seeing at 170W just a week ago.