Wednesday: 8 x 750 buried in a half marathon

November 23, 2016November 23, 20166 Comments

First thing in the morning, fasted. It was the only time I had to get any training in today. All my kids are coming home (with a couple of significant others) for Thanksgiving and the rest of the day is a blur of driving, baking and talking. It might be one of my favorite days of the year.

Today’s challenge was to massage a sprint workout into a half marathon. I want to stick to a polarized workout plan, and I also want to keep working on the Crazy Bear Challenge. So here is today’s workout plan:

Fletcher warmup. 20 minutes, usually comes in just over 5000m. This gets me to ~16070m.
paddle until I get to 15750
8 x 750m/750m rest. so, 15×750 is 11250 (leaving off the last rest), which takes me down to 4500m
paddle down to 4000m
happy ending cool down. 1000m at 2:00, then 2:05, then 2:10, then 2:15

It worked out fine. I didn’t lose any intervals or miss any transitions. The cool down was a bit long, but I was entertained by the fact that I could aim for exactly 1:30:00 by a coincidence. This kept me very focused as I tried to keep the projected finish 10 seconds ahead during the 2:10 and right on 1:30:00 during the 2:15 bit.

The intervals themselves were perfectly miserable. I would have expected to be able to do these below 1:45. But my legs were completely trashed from my strength session last night. They felt empty at the beginning and were burning in the second half of each interval. I really felt like I was working with a lot less power today.

But, I’m pretty happy that I stuck it out. I experimented with different stroke rates and ended up feeling most comfortable at 26/27 and I worked to lengthen my stroke after the first three intervals. You can see that in the drive length plot.

Heart rate was not that high, but I was pushing about as hard as I could. The rests were nice and long.

A few metrics. First the drive length. On the left, showing it versus time, on the right versus stroke rate. You can see the change in the fourth interval when I settled into a longer stroke at r26. You can also see that the drive length is definitely getting shorter with higher stroke rates. Interesting because it gets longer from 18 up to about 24spm.

Here is the work per stroke. The notable thing here is the increased stroke power in the fourth interval when I consciously pulled down the rate. It’s also interesting (at least to me) that the work per stroke is pretty constant versus stroke rate through this range of rates.

Finally, here is a view of peak and average force, and the ratio of these values. It seems logical that the higher the ratio, the more efficient the stroke. But I gotta say, there is really no trend in the intervals or relationship with stroke rate across this workout.

And finally, just because I like the way it looks. Here’s the power versus stroke rate.

Here are the splits:

Workout Summary - media/20161123-205340-sled_2016-11-23T08-50-06ZEST.strokes.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|12000|51:20.0|02:08.4|195.5|22.4|149.1|176.0|10.4
W-|06000|21:17.0|01:46.5|289.1|26.9|156.8|176.0|10.5
R-|15097|68:40.0|02:16.5|155.7|20.5|145.8|176.0|11.3
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
02|00750|02:43.8|01:49.2|267.8|25.2|149.8|161.0|10.9
03|00750|02:39.7|01:46.5|288.0|27.0|155.5|166.0|10.5
04|00750|02:38.3|01:45.5|296.7|27.7|156.5|168.0|10.3
05|00750|02:39.3|01:46.2|292.0|26.7|157.6|170.0|10.6
06|00750|02:41.2|01:47.5|281.1|26.3|156.5|169.0|10.6
07|00750|02:40.8|01:47.2|282.6|26.7|157.6|169.0|10.5
08|00750|02:40.9|01:47.3|282.0|26.3|157.7|170.0|10.6
09|00750|02:33.7|01:42.4|325.0|29.7|163.5|176.0|09.9

Tomorrow: Thanksgiving. I’m giving thanks by taking a rest day!

Sunday: 6 x 750 / 4′ rest on Quinsig

June 26, 2016June 26, 20163 Comments

It was a lovely morning. Temperature started around 65F and was 75F by the time we finished. Wind was light from the south, about 2mph with gusts to 5 mph. It seemed to be strongest during the first 3 intervals (2 with head wind and 1 with tail wind) and then died down. Very sunny, I was glad I wore a hat.

The plan for today was hard intervals.

6 x 750
4 minute rests
standing starts
rate: original plan was to start at 26 and work my way up. But I changed my plan when I was able to tempt Bob from my club to do the 750s with me. So, no rate cap.
pace: As close to 2:00 as I could manage without dying
technique: Work on getting a clean start, and rowing clean and light. Try to keep the blades off the water.

When I launched, the HR was working on CrewNerd, but not the Speedcoach. Then the Crewnerd HR blinked out. Time for a new battery.

We started with a warmup for about 1500 meters or so. Some 10 strokes bursts, and then a few practice starts. Once we were past the narrows, We set up for the first interval. I setup Crewnerd for the workout. I guess I must of splashed a bit in my start, because a drop of water strategically hit the crewnerd screen right in the right place to take me to the “Live Tracking” screen. So, I didn’t have a view of how many meters remained. Since I was responsible for the interval distance for both me and Bob, I counted out strokes, and when I got to 95, I called it done. Turns out I stopped about 10 meters short.

Looking at the weather data, it seemed like the wind was very light, but it was hard to get down to target pace. A 2 mph wind is about 1m/s. This will add about 3 seconds onto the split. It felt more like a 6 second adder.

The second interval was unremarkable. Still the light but pernicious headwind. And it really hurt! If the goal of this workout is to provoke the lactate wave, it was certainly doing it’s job. I felt like I was going to shit myself after this interval.

Now we turned and headed up lake. By now we had calibrated how much time to leave between us starting so that we would finish just about even. This ramped up the level of intensity. The third interval was nice and fast with a bit of tail wind.

The fourth was interrupted at 400m by a gigantic, boat stopping wake. We picked it back up and did 250m to finish it off after the wake had rolled through.

The fifth and sixth were just damn painful, which was the point. To provoke the lactate wave, and push through it. In each of the last two, the wave hit at about 400m, and I just counted down the strokes to the end. Each of them took 91 strokes.

From there, we paddled to the north end of the lake, with square blades. Then we spun, I took my feet out of the shoes and worked on nice clean finishes for the 2500m back to the boathouse. I was really tired.

The whole workout, pace and rate, from the speedcoach.

The fifth and sixth intervals. I need to remember that the pace gets messed up at 10m per point and use strokes for hard workouts.

Tomorrow: Steady State rate ladders

Crushed by the lactate wave. 750m intervals

June 16, 2016June 16, 2016Leave a comment

Weather: sunny, warm mid-70s, basically no wind. A great day for rowing.

Pity it was such a shitty workout.

Plan:

8×750 / 4′ rest
Rate: 28-32
Pace: 2:00
Standing starts
Paddle in the rests

I am feeling the effects of a big increase in Volume. I got my boat back last week and I’ve rowed everyday since last Friday. I’ve also done longer sessions this week. Last night, I got enough sleep, but I woke up feeling very sore and lethargic. I also had stomach issues which forced me stop for an unscheduled pit stop on my way to the boathouse.

By the time I got on the water, it was nearly 7am, and I had less than an hour for the workout. I did a quick warmup and then attempted to start the first interval. I got 5 strokes in and noticed that I hadn’t pushed start on CrewNerd. The second attempt at the start actually worked and off I went. I took a little too long to settle down to a realistic pace, and I felt the familiar “Lactate Wave”. Nausea, feeling like I’m drowning. This is a feeling I hate, but I need to get used to in order to well in sprint races. It’s kind of the whole point of this workout.

The problem is that I was not mentally prepared for what this workout demanded. I made it through the wave in the first interval by slowing down. The second interval, I powered through it and was happy that I hit the target pace, even while steering to the bridge. This one really hurt after I finished. I nearly puked, but by the end of the rest I thought I was better.

Twenty strokes into the next interval, I discovered that I wasn’t. I bailed out the interval approaching the bridge, and then slowly picked back up to a reasonable pace for about the last 400m. I was pretty annoyed with myself.

I paddled through the s-curve during the rest and decided to hold the rate a bit lower during the next interval. The result was a slower split and a more manageable wave.

I quit on the next interval and frankly, I’m not even sure why. It was after about 20 strokes, and this time I picked back up pretty quickly and pushed through the rest of the piece. This was not going well.

I was running out of time and so I decided to make the next one my last. No quitting allowed on this one. I managed the wave and finished reasonably well.

I rowed feet out back to the dock. I have to come back and do this workout again soon.

Workout Summary – media/20160616-173853-2016-06-16-0646.CSV–|Total|-Total-|–Avg–|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg

–|Dist-|-Time–|-Pace–|SPM-|-HR–|-HR–|-DPS

–|07319|36:50.0|02:37.1|22.6|134.1|145.2|08.5

Workout Details

01|01240| 07:56 |03:11.9|16.4|117.0|132.0|09.5

02|00000| 00:10 |0000:00|00.0|0.0|0.0|0nan

03|00750| 03:07 |02:05.1|28.1|154.0|165.0|08.5

04|00750| 03:00 |02:00.6|30.2|164.0|174.0|08.2

05|00750| 03:41 |02:27.7|23.8|146.0|161.0|08.5

06|00750| 03:09 |02:06.2|28.8|165.0|176.0|08.2

07|00750| 03:15 |02:10.4|27.0|158.0|174.0|08.5

08|00750| 03:11 |02:07.7|29.1|165.0|178.0|08.1

09|01579| 09:21 |02:57.7|20.1|138.0|147.0|08.4

Tomorrow: “rest day”. I’m flying to sandiego in the morning and back on the redeye. Some rest day.

6 x 750 / 4′ rest (post red eye)

January 28, 20161 Comment

Plan:

Arrive in Boston at 6AM from LAX
Drive to work
Change into workout clothes
Fletcher 20′ warm up
6 x 750 / 4′ rest
- Pace Target: <1:41 (last time 1:41.1, thanks to a blistering last interval)
- Rate: 30
2K cool down

Low expectations would be an adequate description of my attitude going into this session. I felt tired and a bit queasy after the flight. I must have slept a fair amount, I don’t remember taking off and I don’t remember much from the flight itself, but I didn’t feel very rested.

The warmup was awful. I thought it would be pretty humiliating to HD in the warmup, so I kept going. The speedy bits actually were not so bad toward the end.

The main set. I decided to try to go out at a 1:40 pace. I was ahead of the target through the first 500m of the first interval and I started to feel less than ideal. I slowed a bit and let the pace drift up. Rep 2, I decided to stick to my 1:41 plan. It still sucked. I decided that 1:42 might be a wiser choice. It was. The next rep went a bit better. I got cocky. I decided to try to focus on rate and stick with 30 and see what happened. Well, I was faster, but I wanted to die at the end of the rep. So, Rep 5 was just about surviving at 1:42. Then rep 6, I actually tried to lay down a faster last, but with 250m to go, I nearly lost gastro-intestinal control and I barely made to the end in one piece.

End result: 1:40.8. Way too much drama for a 0.3 sec improvement. But I didn’t bail on any reps. I was annoyed by the intermittent and laggy HR data on the PM5. I’m not sure if it’s the PM5 or the strap. I suspect the former, since I’ve never seen this with the strap connected by BT to my phone.

Finally, I struggled through a 2K cool down

Tomorrow: 3 x 20′ / 1′ plus peak power

Thursday: 6 x 750 / 4′ rest

January 21, 2016Leave a comment

Plan:

Fletcher warmup
6 x 750m
- 4 min rest
- pace target: < 1:42
- rate target: 30
2K cool down

Warmup felt a bit tougher than on Tuesday, and the reps seemed to be a bit more taxing. But I managed to hold on to the splits and put in a faster last. Weird HR readings in the last 2 reps.

The last rep was at roughly my target pace for a 2K race. Holding it for the last 1250 meters is the challenge.

Warm up

Main Set

Cool down

Tomorrow: 4×20′ / 1′

Tuesday: 8 x 750 / 1′ rest – December CTC

December 9, 2015December 9, 2015Leave a comment

Ouch.

This is a tough session. I’ve done a 15×3’/1′ which obviously is done at a much slower pace. This one has a nasty combination of fast pacing and short rests, so you are digging yourself into a hole pretty quickly. I’ve been doing a lot of distance and threshold work lately, so this was a bit of a shock to the system. I was on slides. Not sure if it helped or hurt. Well, I know it hurt, it hurt a lot. I just don’t know if it would hurt more or less off of slides.

Quantified Rowing

Measure – Adjust – Improve

Tag: 750s

Wednesday: 8 x 750 buried in a half marathon

Sunday: 6 x 750 / 4′ rest on Quinsig

Crushed by the lactate wave. 750m intervals

6 x 750 / 4′ rest (post red eye)

Thursday: 6 x 750 / 4′ rest

Tuesday: 8 x 750 / 1′ rest – December CTC