Tag: concept2

Sunday: 3 x 20′ L4

Leave a comment

We got home around noon.  I had a bunch of errands and other work around the house to do.  I finally had a window to erg around 5:30pm.  I just wanted a easy endurance session to keep things ticking over.

Plan:

  • 3 x 20′ / 1′ rest
  • L4 format, 10W x stroke rate
  • Ease into over the first 10 minutes, starting at 160W
  • Thereafter aim for ~190W (18/19/20/19/18)
  • HR Cap at ~150
  • Lactate test at the end.

2016-10-16-18-46-55

The workout felt good.  Nice low HR, and RPE was fine.  But when I tested Lactate at the end, it was 2.4mmol/l.  A bit too high.  Time to move the training power back to 185W.

 

Sunday: 3 x 20′ L4 w/lactate (morning)

2 Comments

The rest of Saturday was a blur.  We went out shopping, and had a little dinner, then came home and I did laundry, packed and did some paperwork.  Then we watched the season premier of Saturday Night Live.  It is intriguing that it requires nothing more than to repeat exactly what Donald Trump says to effectively parody him.  But enough of that.  On to the training.

I got up around 8:30 and hopped on the erg at 9 for a steady state session

Plan:

  • Just like yesterday
  • 3 x 20′
  • 1′ rests
  • L4 format
  • target power 185
  • HR cap at 150
  • Measure lactate at the end

20:00   4813    181W 18
40:00   4894   190W 19
60:00   4861    186W 19

Basically the same session as yesterday.  I did a different sequence from 40′ to 50′ but otherwise exactly the same.  It felt harder, but the HR stats are very close.

Lactate level was 1.8mmol/l, so 0.4 higher than yesterday.  From yesterday’s results, it would be logical to increase training power a bit.  From today, it’s pretty close to the limit.  I guess I stick with ~185W for now.

For fun I compared yesterday’s session with today’s.  Looks like I had a slightly higher HR in general yesterday.

myimage10-1e.png

I am posting this from the plane.  I’m flying to Taipei and I’ll arrive Monday night local time.  I will be in Asia for through next Thursday, or about 12 days.  It’s a long trip.  I’m going to be trying to follow my training plan roughly but I am sure this is going to impact performance for the HOCR.  I think the most important things to focus on are:

  • Limit drinking
  • get enough sleep
  • avoid getting sick
  • maintain aerobic base.

Saturday: 3 x 20′ L4 w/ lactate

Leave a comment

I ran out of energy in a big way Friday night and crashed around 10pm.  I slept until almost 9am, and then started a day of chores and errands.

Around 3pm, I headed off to do an easy erg session.

Plan:

  • 3 x 20′
  • 1′ rests
  • L4 format
  • start at low power and ramp up to 185avg

I measured lactate at the end…1.4mmol/l.  Nice.  Of course this was an afternoon session.

 

Tuesday: 4 x 20′ L4

1 Comment

It was pouring rain this morning.  I decided to do an erg session instead of heading out to the river.  It’s funny.  I think last year, I probably would have scoffed at the elements and gone out anyway, but this year, I seem to feel a little different.  Less driven perhaps.  More normal perhaps.  Who knows.

So, I got to the gym at work around 7AM and settled in for an endurance workout.

Plan:

  • 4 x 20′
  • 1′ rests
  • L4 format
  • ramp power up from 160W during the first 10 minutes
  • Target power 185W avg
  • HR cap: 155

myimage9-27b

After the sublime 40′ session last night, I was wondering what it would feel like today.  I started even more conservatively than yesterday, with 4′ at 16, then 3′ at 17, etc up to 1′ at 19.  Then I went into 10 minutes of flipping between 18 and 19.  Despite the fact that I was rowing about 12W lower power through the first 20 minutes, my HR response was almost the same as yesterday.  During the second 20 minutes, my session yesterday was 6W higher, but had a marginally lower HR.  My RPE definitely matched the HR data.  I felt like I was working a lot harder for it today.

Here is a graphical comparison (courtesy of rowsandall.com).  The red trace was yesterday, and the blue trace today.

myimage9-27c

I am intrigued by the difference.  I would love to tease apart the causes.  Potential contributors:

  • Incomplete recovery (about 14 hours from yesterday’s session to today’s)
  • Closed to fasted state this morning (just a coffee with some skim milk) vs 3 hours after lunch yesterday
  • Time of day (I always seem to do better in afternoon sessions)
  • Humidity (it was about the same temp, but higher humidity this morning)
  • Socks yesterday, sneakers today

It would take a while to really exercise all of these variables.  But I think this points to a potential issue in many training approaches.  At least for me, I don’t think it is valid to use a power @ 2mmol/l guideline that was measured in the afternoon for morning sessions or visa versa.  Unless I can explain the causes for the difference.

Tomorrow:  Back on Quinsig for another 4 x ( 5 x 2′ / 30″ paddle) / 3′ rest

 

Monday PM: 40′ L4

Leave a comment

Towards the end of the day, I was still feeling a bit unsatisfied by the interrupted morning session.  It provided some HIT, but not nearly as much active time as I had hoped.  I decided to do a shortish L4 session.

Of course I was not entirely prepared to do an erg session at work.  I puyt back on my sweaty clothes from the morning, and rowed in socks, since my sneakers were at home, but it was a wonderful session.  I felt strong.

Plan:

  • L4 format
  • Start at 16spm and 160w and work up to target power over the first 10 minutes.
  • target power 185.  I figured that I would do alternating 2′ sections of 180W and 190W
  • HR cap of 150

SO, I started with 2′ at r16, then 2′ at r17, then r18, then r19.  I was just barely nudging up into the UT2 HR zone, so I pushed on to r20 and 200W for 2 minutes.  The next 10 minutes I flipped back and forth between r19 and r20.  My HR went up into the UT1 zone around the 20 minute mark and I decided to back off the power a bit, so I changed the middle 2 minutes down to a r18 (180W), and my HR came down nicely.  So, for the rest of the workout, I just cycled between r18,r19, and r20.

myimage9-26b

It was a wonderful workout.  I enjoyed every minute of it.

Monday: 40′ steady state

2 Comments

Only had 40 minutes for a quick erg session this morning before my doctor’s appointment this morning.  It was humid as hell and this session was pure misery.  Interestingly, a lactate measurement at the end yielded 1.2mmol/l.

 

Sunday: 4 x 20′ L4

1 Comment

A bit stiff and sore from the race yesterday, but time to get on with life.

Plan:

  • 4 x 20′ / 1′ rest
  • L4 format
    • base: 17 spm and 160W
    • 10W increase for each spm increase
  • HR limit at 155
  • Lactate test at 60′
  • Start low and build through first 10 minutes.

I wanted to do an L4 session because there has been a lot of discussion over on the concept forum about that style of workout.  But from my experience with L4 workouts, they tend to be too intense, so while this workout was in L4 format, it was not a “by the book” L4 workout.  What do I mean by that?  By L4 format, I mean that the workout has specific strokes rate and power defined in intervals and blocks.  But I did not use the tables from the WP to define the paces, instead I used a constant power per stroke.  I also constrained the stroke rates much more than a real L4.  I went in steps of 1 stroke from 17 to 21 strokes per minute.  The 2 spm jumps make the workout a lot more dynamic and tougher in my opinion.

2016-09-18-15-26-07

The stroke sequence I did was

  • First 20′ block
    • 1st 10′:  180 – 4′ @ 17 (160W), 3′ @ 18, 2′ @ 19, 1′ @ 20
    • 2nd 10′: 194 – 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19 (this should be just below 185W)
  • Second 20′ block
    • 3rd 10′: 196 – 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20 (this should be just above 185W)
    • 4th 10′: 194 – 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19
  • Third 20′ block
    • 5th 10′: 198 – 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 21, 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19 (so, just 2′ at 200W in the  middle)
    • 6th 10′:196 – 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20
    • Lactate test here was 2.6 mmol/l
  • Fourth block
    • 7th 10′: 194 – 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 20, 2′ @ 19
    • 8th 10′: 188 – 2′ @ 18, 2′ @ 19, 2′ @20, 2′ @ 19, 2′ @ 18
    • Lactate test here was 2.5mmol/l

So, from a HR perspective, this was right on target.  But from a lactate perspective, it was just a little bit too intense.  I did a lactate test at 60′ and it was 2.6mmol/l.  I repeated it at 80′ and it was 2.5mmol/l.  From an RPE perspective, everything was feeling great, until I did the sequence at the beginning of the third section.  As soon as I did the little chunk at r21 and 200W, I felt like I got behind and never caught up.  Essentially, it felt like I flipped the switch that started to shut down the fat metabolism.

This provides an interesting data point to compare to a session where I start the same way, increasing my power during the first 10 minutes, but then settle on exactly 185 for the rest of the way.  Then repeat the lactate tests.  The theory would be that I would get a lower lactate reading by avoiding the higher powers.

This raises all kinds of interesting questions in my mind.

  • Many sports (like cycling) have intermittent bursts of high intensity, with stretches of lower power stuff.  How long does it take to get fat metabolism going again after you kick in with CHO?
  • Would it be good to try to train the response by doing just what an L4 does?  By dropping in some higher power chunks, will it help you develop the ability to process more lactate, or is it better to just gradually increase the training power?
  • Does it really matter?

Friday: 2 x 500 taper

2 Comments

I got home around 2am.  I slept until around 7:30, did some email and other work, and then around 9:30 went to do a quick session, just to keep from feeling stale tomorrow.

Plan

  • Fletcher warmup
  • 2 x 500
    • 2:30 rest
    • Pace target: <1:40
    • Rate target: >30
  • Easy cool down

First was the warmup.  It felt comfortable and my HR was reasonably low.

myimage

Then into the two 500s.  The first one was pretty comfortable.  The second was a bit more on the edge.

myimage2

Then a 3000m cool down.  I used painsled today and I discovered what causes it to lose a session.  While I was cooling down, I got a phone call (that I ignored).  After that, painsled seemed to lose itself and did not log the session.  I think I’ll stick with ergdata.

Here’s the HR for the whole session from Wahoo Fitness.

Tomorrow is my race, at 10am.

Thursday: 4 x 20′ / 1′ rest

1 Comment

At Crossfit Anaerobic again this morning.  I got there a bit later and there were very few people there.  I dragged an erg over in front of a truly enormous boxed fan.  Really it had to be at least 6 feet in diameter and it was right in front of an open exterior door.  I had the most wonderful breeze for the whole workout.

Plan:

  • 4×20′
  • 1′ rests
  • target power: 185W
  • target rate: 19-20
  • HR cap: 155.  (actually, I was hoping to be at lower numbers at the end of each interval because I know that CV drift will tend to push me up through the whole workout.  So, if I was above 145 at the end of the first interval, I was planning to drop the power down.  Same thing if I was above 150 at the end of the second.

I was dubious about how I would do today because I was out late for a big dinner (beer, wine, grappa, steak, appetizers, dessert).  I felt hot and sweaty all night long as my body tried to metabolize all of that, and I woke up feeling less than my best.  But just the walk from the hotel over to the crossfit box improved my mood and attitude.  It’s a beautiful morning here.

The workout turned out just fine.  I tried to hit 185W as close as I could, and I paid attention to my HR.  It stayed nice and low through the whole workout, rising slowly to a maximum of about 150 by the end of the last interval.  The average power for the session was 186.

screen-shot-2016-09-15-at-11-13-37-am

9-15

This afternoon I am flying back to Boston, arriving after midnight.  I’m planning to sleep in a bit on Friday.  I’ll do a fletcher warmup and a couple of 500s as a partial taper for the race on Saturday.  I’m pretty excited.  I’ve never raced in a double before.  I think it will be a blast!

Wednesday: 15 x 3′ / 1′ rest at Crossfit Anaerobic

2 Comments

I’m here in lovely Orange County, so I dropped in on my favorite Crossfit box.  It’s about half a mile from my hotel, and the walk/jog to and from there makes a good warmup/cooldown.  The place is always hopping, and the people are very nice.  I just go get an erg from the long line of well maintained model d’s that they have along the wall, set it up so I can watch all the people doing their Crossfit thing and do my session.

Today’s session is the last high intensity session before the race this Saturday, and boy was it a doozy.  Here’s the plan:

  • 15 x 3′
  • 1′ rest
  • pace target: 1:52 (Actually 800m per interval was what I wanted to beat in each interval)
  • rate target: 26
  • No HR Cap

This is a classic Wolverine Plan “L3” workout.  The rests are not long enough to come close to fully recover, so you dig yourself in deeper and deeper as the workout progresses.

I attacked this session with vigor.  Maybe a bit too much vigor.  I was able to hold my pace below 1:50 for the first 7 intervals.  But I was in deep trouble by then.  I backed off a bit, but came close to blowing up in the 11th, about 1 minute into it.  I took a few strokes around 2:00, and then slowly brought the pace back down to around 1:54.  I rowed the next couple of intervals more conservatively, but I was running on fumes by the time I got to #14.  I purposely sandbagged that one so that I would have a chance on the last one, which I very much wanted to be ahead of target.  It was.  I was shaking all over and it took me a good couple of minutes before I could get off the erg.  This was a very good workout.

screen-shot-2016-09-14-at-11-07-48-am

9-14

Add in another 10 minutes of LIT for the warmup.  So, 45′ of HIT and 45′ of LIT.  And a whopping 9 minutes of anaerobic.  Ouch.

Tomorrow:  Steady State Session.  4 x 20’/1′ rest at 185W.