I am not a machine? 3 x 20′ + 2 x 1′

November 9, 2017November 9, 20171 Comment

In California. At Precision Crossfit in Agoura Hills. Once again, I was delighted by the experience dropping into a crossfit box. The ergs work, there are lots of people around, and everyone is really friendly.

I picked my erg and set it up off to the side so I wouldn’t get in the way. I didn’t have time for a full 80 minute session because I needed to be in a meeting by 8:15 and the box opened at 6am. So, I decided on 3 x 20′ + 2 x 1′.

I could tell almost from the first pull that today was not going to be a good day. There didn’t seem to be anything wrong with the erg, but it seemed to take a LOT of effort to pull 180W. Sitting on the erg, my HR was normal before I started, but it climbed fast, and it didn’t stop. I hung in with 180W through the first interval. I brought it down to 175W in the second interval, but it didn’t help. Then in the third, I decided to go as slowly as I needed to so I could keep my HR below 157bpm. Strangely enough this was 157W. 30W lower than I could hold at this HR yesterday.

Then I setup for the 2 x 1’/1′. This was equally ugly. I pushed the first minute hard, but this was still a lot more feeble than the hard minute I did a week ago (319m vs 330m). And I was pretty shattered. I tried to do the second rep, but I bailed out about halfway through. I paddled out the rest of that rep, took another minute rest, and then did a less aggressive minute (304m).

Bad days happen, my wife has a pretty nasty cold. In the past I have seen cases where I have lousy training results before I show any illness symptoms, so that might be it. It could also be jetlag, or some other mysterious reason.

Tomorrow, I fly back home during the day. I guess we’ll call it a rest day.

Edit: I just did a quick check of my training log. This is the first week after my the fitness tests, and it represented a strong shift toward long duration, low intensity work. The volume increase was pretty dramatic.

Maybe I’m just tired!

4 x 20′ / 1′ @ 186W

November 8, 2017Leave a comment

Back at base building. The mission today was to hold exactly 185W and measure lactate after 80 work minutes. I want to have a consistent training power that will yield 2.0 mmol/ml lactate readings at the end of a session.

It appears that lactate levels over time during endurance training can be different from person to person. What I have seen is that mine tend to stay at a reasonable constant level below 2.0mmol/ml for about 60 minutes, and then as I get fatigued, they start to rise. My Rate of Perceived Exertion (RPE) follows. I start to breath more heavily, and it feels like a lot more work in that last 20 minutes.

So, I aimed for 185W and I got 186W. In terms of my HR limits, it was right on. I measured lactate at the end…2.7mmol/ml. So, I need to back off the power, just a little bit.

I plan to aim at 180W for the next session and see what that gets me.

I’m at the airport now heading for LA. We’ll see if I can find a crossfit gym to drop into tomorrow, or else I will crosstrain in the fitness center.

4 x 20′ / 1′

November 6, 20176 Comments

Same plan as the past couple of days.

4 x 20′ / 1′ rest
rate: 19-21
power: 182W target
HR limit:
- 0-20′: 145
- 20′-40′: 150
- 40′-80′: 155

Last two days were in the afternoon in a nice cool basement down on the cape. Today was in the fitness center at work. I was a bit concerned since Monday morning workouts tend to be a bit worse than others.

Started with my PT exercises (you can follow the link to the full list)

I started with the most important corrective exercise, Isometric correction for SIJ. In this exercise you basically push you leg out while you hold it back with your arms. It pushes the head of the femur back in it’s socket to get things aligned. This addresses my big issue which is weak left glute. Because of this weakness, other muscles are firing when I bend over for the catch and this is pulling the joint out of alignment. After I do that, then I foam roller my quads and IT bands, do a diabolical thing called a hip flexor release which is bascially rolling around on a lacrosse ball looking for places that hurt. Then I do a glute exercise which is like a bridge on a exercise ball, and then an exercise to strength my obliques.

It takes about 5 minutes and I think it is helping a lot. I am noticing that it is way easier to keep my knees together at the catch, and my hips are rocking over in a much smoother way than before. I suspect that it might have something to do with the increase in steady power that I am getting, but there isn’t a lot of evidence supporting that, other than the fact that I started doing PT and my steady state power got better.

At any rate, it isn’t hurting anything, so I’m all for it.

The session went better than I hoped. I aimed at 182W, but 185W felt fine and my HR stayed nice and low, so I went with it. I kept going at that through 3 20′ pieces and then pushed a bit more in the fourth. holding 190 was a bit too much and I needed to back off to 185W to stay under the 155bpm cap. It was great that my HR came down nicely when I reduced the power from 190 to 185.

I thought it would interesting to look back over the summer to see if this feeling of getting better was actually accurate. It is. You can see power going up and down, and then recently getting much better and more consistent (narrower range). On the right, you can see avgHR around the same and the upper HR a bit lower, but a nice downward trend over the past few days.

Tomorrow: I it is time for a bit more intensity and a bit more testing. I think I will do a lactate step test using the AIS protocol.

The power levels for this test are supposed to be based on the prior years best 2k test. I will estimate 2k power based on the 1K and 20 minute tests from last week. Using the Free Spirits Pace Predictor, I get an estimated 2K time of 6:59.0. Using the CP Curve from Rowsandall, I get a range of 280W to 326W (1:47.7 to 1:42.4), right in the middle of that would be 1:45.

So, here are my targets…

The protocol is row for 4 minutes, take a minute to do a lactate, then do it a 6 more times.

4 x 20′ / 1′ + 2 x 1’/1′

November 6, 20173 Comments

Same session as yesterday. Same rules.

4 x 20′ / 1′ rests
rate: 19-20
power target: 180W
HR limit: 145 after 20′, 150 after 40′, 155 after 60′

I felt great in this session. My stroke felt stronger everything just felt easier. Not sure why, but I sure liked it.

       Workout Summary - media/20171105-1840300o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|19814|84:00.0|02:07.2|180.9|19.8|142.6|154.0|11.9
W-|19383|80:00.0|02:03.8|184.5|19.8|142.7|154.0|12.3
R-|00434|04:00.0|04:36.4|070.7|20.6|137.7|154.0|06.3
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|04826|20:00.0|02:04.3|181.6|19.1|136.8|145.0|12.7
01|04825|20:00.0|02:04.3|182.0|19.6|142.9|147.0|12.3
02|04837|20:00.0|02:04.0|183.8|20.0|144.8|148.0|12.1
03|04894|20:00.0|02:02.6|190.5|20.4|146.2|154.0|12.0

I was under my HR limit after 40′, so I nudged the power up just a couple of watts. My HR stayed nice and low through the third piece. So, in the last piece, nudged it up more for the first 10 minutes of so, and my HR was still ice and low, so I decided to push even harder to see what it would take to get up to the 155 HR limit. I needed to hold about 195 watts to slowly get up to the limit by the end.

I am more than ever convinced that I need to start low and push up over a session. Some people are able to start hard, and then ease off. That never seems to work for me. I will stick with 182W as a starting power, and stick with that through the first 40 minutes. If I am well under the cap, I will push harder in the second half.

After I finished the main course, I had some dessert.

I went all out in the first one, but with low drag and tired legs. I expect that I could squeeze out a bit more distance if I did it fresh and set myself up for a proper sprint. Considering my best 500m was 1:28.4, I hope I can improve this as I go along.

Tomorrow: Another base builder session.

4×20’/1′

November 4, 2017Leave a comment

Base building now. Waiting until I get a plan from Marlene.

          Workout Summary - media/20171104-1805300o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|19507|84:00.0|02:09.2|176.7|19.4|145.5|154.0|12.0
W-|19192|80:00.0|02:05.1|179.0|19.4|145.4|154.0|12.4
R-|00319|04:00.0|06:16.0|070.0|19.1|141.5|154.0|05.4
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|04787|20:00.0|02:05.3|177.2|19.0|137.4|146.0|12.6
01|04776|20:00.0|02:05.6|176.8|19.0|145.5|151.0|12.6
02|04805|20:00.0|02:04.9|180.2|19.8|148.0|153.0|12.2
03|04825|20:00.0|02:04.4|181.8|20.0|150.9|154.0|12.1

That went very well. Initial power target was 175W, but 177 felt good. I was under the HR limits at the end of 40 minutes so I decided to inch up the power a little. Then a bit more in the last 20 minutes. I felt relaxed and good through the session.

Taipei / Shanghai – Ticking Along

October 26, 20176 Comments

After the race on Saturday, we had lunch in Cambridge, and then headed home. I had some organizing to do since I was heading off to Taiwan. My flight was scheduled to depart at 1:45AM Sunday morning, and my wife and I had a nice afternoon and evening.

I headed off to the airport around 11pm, and got on the plane, and waited. We taxied out from the gate, and then the pilot came on and said that there was a problem with one of the engines so he was heading back to gate to wait for maintenance to come deal with it. After about an hour parked at the gate, the call came over the PA asking if there was a doctor on board. Apparently, someone on board had had a heart attack. Now it seemed to me that the engine trouble was a real blessing for both the heart attack victim and the rest of us on the plane. He was wisked off the plane within minutes. If we had been in flight, they would have had to divert the flight and that would have taken a lot more time. And I bet it would have delayed the rest a lot too.

We didn’t get going until after 4AM. Then it was fifteen hours and 30 minutes of flight time to Hong Kong. Then a quick shuffle through the airport to catch the next flight to Taipei. I was in Taiwan by 11am on Monday morning, and at the hotel by 12:30. I made it just in time to shower and change before the event I was going to. I slept pretty well on the flight, getting maybe 8 hours of sleep total, but in short segments.

The work event lasted from 1:30 until 10:30PM. I crashed hard as soon as I got back to my room.

So, I guess that means:

Sunday: Travel Day – No training.

Monday: Rest day?

Tuesday:

I had a flight Shanghai in the early afternoon so I planned to sleep in, but I woke up around 5am, and couldn’t get back to sleep. Eventually, I made my way down to the fitness center. I had plenty of time, so I did a long fitness center triathlon.

30 minutes: Treadmill death march, 15% grade, 5km/h
30 minutes: Elliptical, level 14, random
30 minutes: Stationary bike, level 14, “Hills”

It was sweaty. It was boring.

Then I headed to the airport and flew off to Shanghai. I had a customer dinner in the evening and some conference calls after that. I got to bed around 1AM.

Wednesday:

I got up at 6 and headed straight to the fitness center. I was staying at the Kerry Hotel in Pudong, which has the one of the finest fitness centers I’ve ever seen. They have two Model D ergs. Mechanically they are both fine, but one of them has a display problem so you can’t see the time remaining. The good rower was being used, so I grabbed the one with the display issue.

Plan:

3 x 20′ / 1′
rate: ~20
power: 175W
HR limit: 145/150/155

I noticed that my heart rate took off like a rocket from the start and by the time I got through the first 20 minutes, I knew I had to ease up. Even then, I was really struggling.

After 40 minutes, the other erg was free so I swapped over to continue. I basically gave up after 3 minutes in the last piece and just paddled the rest of it out.

Lack of fitness? Lack of Sleep? Who knows. Anyway, time to reset my power target lower for the next session.

After my workout, I headed to the office for some internal meetings, a customer lunch, more meetings, and a customer dinner. I got back to the hotel around 10, and had a beer with a colleague. I was in bed by 11.

Thursday:

I was up at 5:30 to fit in my workout. Back to the fitness center for some more rowing.

Plan:

3 x 20′ / 2′ (longer rest to allow stretching between piecese
- rate: 20
- power: 165
- HR limit: 145/150/155
2 x 1′ / 1′ (I see Paul Buchanan doing these at the end of aerobic sessions and I’ve read that it’s has a beneficial training effect. It’s also an energizing way to finish the workout – In theory)
- rate: >32
- power: >360W

This was much better. Based on my HR, the power was pretty close to right on for base training. I could probably push a couple more watts, but not much. My HR plateaued nicely right around 149 and stuck there for most of the second and third interval.

And the 1′ sprints were a blast. I think I will make them a regular part of my routine.

And I left a nice sweat pattern on the floor.

After that, I packed up, had a work breakfast, then headed to the airport. I’m now in Narita in transit back to Boston. I will get home around 7:30pm Thursday night.

I’ve decided to start working with a coach, Marlene Royle. Next week I have a bunch of erg tests to do. I may start them this weekend, but only if I am not having jetlag issues.

Late night in the fitness center

October 14, 2017Leave a comment

Wednesday: No time to work out in the morning. I was finally able to get to the gym very late Wednesday night, actually just into Thursday morning.

20 minutes treadmill (15% grade, 3.3 mph)
20 minutes elliptical (level 17, hill profile)
20 minutes stationary bike (level 16, random profile)

All were slightly harder than the day before, my HR response was correspondingly a bit higher too.

Thursday: I finished around 1:15am, then made a couple of calls. I got to be at about 2:30am and needed to get up at 4:30am. I had a 7:25am departure from Munich to Lyon. So, walk to the ostbanhof train station, catch the 5:24am train to the airport, arrive at around 6:00. Plenty of time.

I slept a bit on the flight from Munich to Lyon, and a bit more in the 90 minute cab ride from Lyon to Grenoble. Then I had an internal meeting, business lunch, two customer meetings, and a business dinner. I got back to my room around 10:15pm and immediately crashed.

Friday: My alarm was set for 5:30. We were out on the road to Milan by 6:00. We got to Milan around 10:30, and straight to a customer meeting at 11. This wrapped up after 12. Then a lunch with my colleagues, and straight to the airport. My flight was at 3:50pm to London, and then 6:50 departure to Boston. I landed around 8:30 local time, was home by 9:30 and in bed by 10:30. I slept for nearly 11 hours.

Not the way I wanted to spend the last real prep week before the HOCR, but needs must.

40 minutes with bumps

September 26, 2017Leave a comment

I slept badly last night, so I didn’t get up until 6:30. That compressed the time available for a workout to my lunch hour. So, an easy 80 minute session wasn’t going to fit.

I had about an hour. Allowing for time to change and shower afterwards, that left about 40 minutes for an actual workout. I decided to trade time for intensity today. I also wanted to do something a bit different, to keep things interesting.

The Plan

40 minutes
8 x 5 minutes
- 4 minutes at 2:05/r20
- 1 minute at 1:54/r24

I don’t have any research to back this up, but I suspect that workouts where you go from a faster pace to a steady state pace help you develop the ability to process lactate. These bump based workouts are a big part of some workout plans (especially the 10 meters per stroke strapless plans). They are also fun to do because you are always counting down to the next bump.

Workout Summary - media/20170926-1700550o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|09821|40:00.0|02:02.2|194.5|21.0|152.5|172.0|11.7
W-|09827|40:00.0|02:02.1|192.9|20.8|152.2|172.0|11.8
R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|172.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|00972|04:00.0|02:03.5|181.1|19.4|112.9|134.0|12.5
01|00268|01:00.0|01:52.1|247.5|24.0|140.0|147.0|11.2
02|00964|04:00.0|02:04.5|181.7|19.5|143.5|149.0|12.3
03|00265|01:00.0|01:53.1|240.1|23.9|149.0|155.0|11.1
04|00965|04:00.0|02:04.4|182.2|19.6|149.7|155.0|12.3
05|00264|01:00.0|01:53.8|236.3|24.0|152.1|157.0|11.0
06|00962|04:00.0|02:04.7|181.0|19.9|154.0|159.0|12.1
07|00262|01:00.0|01:54.4|230.7|23.7|157.2|162.0|11.1
08|00962|04:00.0|02:04.8|181.0|20.4|157.7|161.0|11.8
09|00263|01:00.0|01:54.2|234.9|23.9|160.3|163.0|11.0
10|00962|04:00.0|02:04.7|181.8|20.0|160.0|163.0|12.0
11|00264|01:00.0|01:53.5|233.8|23.9|162.6|166.0|11.1
12|00963|04:00.0|02:04.6|181.9|20.8|163.1|166.0|11.6
13|00263|01:00.0|01:53.9|236.2|24.0|165.7|169.0|11.0
14|00964|04:00.0|02:04.5|182.0|20.7|166.9|170.0|11.6
15|00265|01:00.0|01:53.2|243.7|24.2|169.8|172.0|10.9

I was thinking that my HR would have been a bit lower from this, but I don’t really know. It was good fun anyway.

Tomorrow: L2 Waterfall: 3k/2.5k/2K on 5′ rest. Target pace 1:54.

12km coastal row in Wellfleet

September 25, 2017Leave a comment

Oh, what a beautiful morning! It was in the mid 60s, very little wind, flat water and bright sunshine. It was just after low tide, and there was just enough water depth to launch and row out. The seabirds were wheeling around my boat as I started out, and I could see the bottom. Schools of striped bass swam under my boat chasing after smaller fish.

The Plan:

60-80 minutes of easy rowing
HR cap: ~150
rate: ~20
Technique: Work on keeping my knees together and tapping down cleaning without a lot of layback. Get those blades off the water!

I followed the Lt Island shoreline out toward deeper water. My path out is the more northerly one in the map below. Once I was clear of the projecting point of the shoal, I turned west and headed toward the red buoy, but I couldn’t pick it up over my shoulder yet. I was heading out and the tide was coming in, so the pace in this section was a bit slow. After about 2000m, I did a more purposeful scan and found is bit to the south, so I turned and headed towards it. I did a u-turn around the buoy and headed north to Wellfleet inner harbor, now with the tide behind me and the pace improved by at least 30 seconds per 500. I rowed to the green buoy and then continued past two more marks around the tip of the breakwater. I decided to turn at 6000m. I stopped and had a drink of water.

I turned around and headed back the way I came. I seemed to weave around a bit more on the way back. I suspect that the tide was setting me east or west depending on my direction relative to flow. The last 1000m of the row back to the red buoy was a bit sloppy. A little bit of wind from the east had sprung up and there was a bit of cross chop that was making it hard to keep a good rhythm. Once I turned into the wind at the buoy, the boat felt a bit heavier, but it was easier to hold a rate.

As I got closer to the end, I pushed the rate and pressure up a bit just for fun.

A fantastic outing.

        Workout Summary - media/20170924-160226-Greg Smith 20170924 0910amo.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|12101|72:55.0|03:00.8|000.0|19.6|142.2|160.0|08.4
W-|11831|69:55.0|02:57.3|000.0|19.7|142.4|160.0|08.6
R-|00273|03:00.0|05:29.5|000.0|18.1|126.4|160.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|02397|15:30.0|03:14.0|000.0|19.3|134.2|147.0|08.0 - a/ tide
01|03610|19:30.0|02:42.0|000.0|19.3|144.4|148.0|09.6 - w/ tide
02|03643|23:00.0|03:09.4|000.0|19.6|142.8|150.0|08.1 - a/ tide
03|02180|11:55.3|02:44.0|000.0|20.8|149.0|160.0|08.8 - w/ tide

Tomorrow: Short interval/Short rest on the erg. 15 x 3’/1′

Forced back indoors

September 20, 2017September 20, 2017Leave a comment

Up at 5:15. Felt pretty tired. Ramping back up to normal training volumes is a bit of a shock to my system, I guess.

Downstairs and straight into the core workout. I still hate it, but doing the 10 jumping jacks between each set of each exercise breaks it up and makes it a bit more tolerable. It takes about 12 minutes, and I just start to break a sweat by the end.

Then I drove to the river. On the way, there was a bit more drizzle than yesterday, but it seemed OK. When I got there, I grabbed my broom to sweep the goose poop off the dock. While I walked to the dock, I noticed 2 things. First, it was raining harder. It was still very fine mist, but at a higher volume. Kinda like a shower in a cheap motel. And the wind was pretty strong, around 10mph with gusts to 20. There is a tropical storm about 150 miles offshore and the wind field is overspreading eastern Massachusetts.

Anyway, just the walk to the dock was enough to convince me slogging into a headwind with a soaking rain would not provide a magically rewarding fitness experience. So I walked back to the car, drove to work and headed to the fitness center.

The Plan:

15′ warmup – treadmill death march (15% grade, 3mph)
3 x 15′ static erg
- 20 spm
- 2:08
- HR limit: 155 (hopefully lower)
- Work on knees together

Workout Summary - media/20170920-1231170o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|11018|51:00.0|02:18.9|160.6|19.5|143.5|154.0|11.1
W-|10548|45:00.0|02:08.0|166.5|19.6|144.3|154.0|12.0
R-|00473|06:00.0|06:20.5|057.3|17.9|125.7|154.0|06.4
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|03518|15:00.0|02:07.9|166.0|19.2|139.3|147.0|12.2
01|03517|15:00.0|02:08.0|166.4|19.7|144.8|152.0|11.9
02|03514|15:00.0|02:08.1|167.1|19.8|148.8|154.0|11.8

So far, my back is holding up well. I still feel a bit of pain first thing in the morning and I get some warning twinges if I take a bad stroke, but it is tolerating the increased volume without any more pain or stiffness.

It’s time to take stock of where I am and what to do now. The first and most pressing decision is what to do about the HOCR, which is on the morning October 21st. 32 days from now. Seeing where I am now, versus where I was last time I rowed the HOCR, I would certainly do a lot worse. Back then, my 2.0 mmol power was around 185W on the erg. Right now, I would bet that it’s around 165W. So, my guess is that I would be about 5 sec/500 slower than last time. So, tack another 50 seconds on my finish time. So, I’d go from a 22:15 to a 23:15, dropping from 25th place to 37th place (out of 58).

I wouldn’t be delighted with that, but its better than DFL. I sure love rowing in this race. I think I want to do it, even though I would not be at my best. The question is: What is the best way to prepare for it? I’m obviously not going to improve my aerobic fitness much over 32 days. I will get some of that fitness back quickly just by regaining some blood volume. But the main focus has to be on head race pace rowing. Actually the main focus has to be on injury prevention. After that I can focus on head race prep.

So, the mini plan is.

2 UT2 sessions per week 60 to 80 minutes of work per session. Interval based. No longer than 15 minutes continuous on the erg with stretching

1 UT1 session per week 60 minutes of work hopefully on the water

1 head race simulation per week. Starting at r24 and moving up in rate.

1 long interval session per week. basically 4×2000 type stuff with nice long rests

1 short interval/short rest per week. concentrate on technique at r26 and r28

Daily core exercises (ugh)

In all sessions work on keeping knees together, limiting layback, and keeping my spine straight.

Tomorrow: Hopefully back on the water. Long intervals. 4 x 2k. Should be a disaster.

Quantified Rowing

Measure – Adjust – Improve

Tag: endurance