Sunday: Failed L3 – A bit breezy on Lake Quinsigamond

August 20, 20172 Comments

Weather: Sunny, low 70s. Brisk wind from the NNW. Quite gusty. I launched at about 7:15. So, the wind got a little gentler as I rowed down to the south end, and then picked up again as I rowed north.

Plan:

I have been taking more rest days than planned recently, so I am behind on the training plan. So, even though I had a tough L2 yesterday, I decided to do an L3 session this morning. The lake is much better for hard distance because you can get nearly 6K in without turning around.

L3 – hard distance
5.5km from south end of the lake to the north end
stroke rate: 25
effective length target: > 75 deg
WPS target: > 450

I rowed to the south end of the lake as a long warmup. I did a couple of rate ladders. The whole way south, I debated just doing ladders for the whole workout instead of doing the L3. Clearly, my head was not really in the game today. My back was acting up as well. I was hoping it would settle down like it did yesterday, but I was getting a twinge on each stroke.

Anyway, I turned north and started up. I got about 20 strokes into it and a big splash sent the RIM app to some setup screen and I no longer had any stroke rate information. (I had the speedcoach set up to show pace, HR, Eff Len and work per stroke). I stopped and quit out of RIM and started Crewnerd which has a much more effective screen lock mechanism. Then I started up again.

I was trying to row clean against the gusty headwind and I was making very slow progress. I would do OK when I got into the wind shadow of islands or headlands, but in the gusts, I was having some trouble getting to my target length in the chop and with the wind pushing around my oars.

I plugged along, but by the 1500m mark, I was losing hope. I rowed through the narrows and eased up the pressure a bit. I just tried to row clean. I figured I could at least make it to the bridge and I was almost there when I was massively waked by a waterskiing boat towing a skier. The wakes hit me at the same time as a big gust of wind and it was a little bit too much for me to handle. I stopped rowing after about 2600, about 400m short of the bridge.

What to do now. My back hurt, I was tired, and I wasn’t having much fun. I decided to turn around and go find the double that was a ways behind me, and just row with them for a while. I rowed back to the narrows and saw them coming through. I turned and just rowed easy with them all the way up to the bridge. By then I was feeling a bit better. More importantly, I saw a double from the other club about 100m north of the bridge. Ah ha, a target. I brought the rate back up to 25 and tried to row a lightly and cleanly as I could with the head wind. I slowly reeled them in, and passed them about 1000m north of the bridge. Now, I was motivated to get to the end. But there were more challenges to confront. Another massive waking, and then a fishing boat trolling along very slowly right in my way. I basically needed to stop to get through that mess. But I spooled back up to my target rate and pushed through the last couple hundred strokes to the north end of the lake.

I was toast. I basically square bladed the whole way back to the club. The western edge of the lake was reasonably well sheltered from the wind and what there was of it was coming from behind, so it was nice easy rowing.

        Workout Summary - media/20170820-144123-Greg Smith 20170820 0715amo.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|13568|80:52.0|02:58.8|140.2|21.8|143.8|176.0|07.7
W-|11728|62:16.0|02:39.3|150.4|21.5|144.9|176.0|08.9
R-|01847|18:35.0|05:02.1|066.3|20.5|127.2|176.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|00700|04:00.0|02:51.5|120.6|16.7|113.2|129.0|10.5 - 4' @ 16
01|00598|03:00.0|02:30.5|145.3|17.8|132.3|139.0|11.2 - 3' @ 18
02|00402|02:00.0|02:29.2|152.3|20.1|141.7|144.0|10.0 - 2' @ 20
03|00204|01:00.0|02:26.8|172.9|22.0|146.2|148.0|09.3 - 1' @ 22
04|00770|04:00.0|02:35.8|127.1|16.8|139.1|148.0|11.5 - 4' @ 16
05|00600|03:00.0|02:29.9|145.7|18.4|142.6|145.0|10.9 - 3' @ 18
06|00203|01:00.0|02:27.9|168.6|20.0|146.5|150.0|10.1 - 1' @ 20
07|02648|13:07.8|02:28.8|191.9|25.3|160.3|171.0|08.0 - 1st hard piece
08|00701|03:58.8|02:50.3|135.9|19.1|138.0|143.0|09.2 - loop around
09|01659|08:28.2|02:33.1|176.8|24.2|156.1|169.0|08.1 - 2nd hard piece
10|01050|05:19.8|02:32.3|189.3|25.7|167.7|176.0|07.6 - bit after wake
11|02192|13:22.2|03:02.9|096.7|19.8|130.6|152.0|08.3 - SBR drills

A few stroke metrics

Tomorrow: Recovery session on the Charles. HR limit at 150.

Monday: 15 x 3′ / 1′ Rest (Open Water L3)

August 15, 2017August 15, 2017Leave a comment

Weather: I launched in the late afternoon. There was a light wind from the southwest which was kicking up some chop.

Plan:

L3: 15 x 3′ / 1′ rest
Stroke rate: 25 spm
pace: Good question
Heart rate: Maximize time in Threshold.

        Workout Summary - media/20170815-210759-Greg Smith 20170814 0356pmo.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|14357|83:02.0|02:53.5|000.0|23.5|156.2|178.0|07.4
W-|08712|44:47.0|02:34.2|000.0|25.3|162.4|177.0|07.7
R-|05659|36:32.0|03:13.7|000.0|20.5|145.8|177.0|07.6
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
01|00562|03:00.0|02:40.1|000.0|25.4|154.8|163.0|07.4
02|00578|03:00.0|02:35.6|000.0|25.4|160.7|166.0|07.6
03|00612|03:00.0|02:26.9|000.0|25.1|159.7|167.0|08.1
04|00606|03:00.0|02:28.5|000.0|24.6|160.5|168.0|08.2
05|00603|03:00.0|02:29.3|000.0|24.9|160.2|170.0|08.1
06|00556|02:53.3|02:35.9|000.0|25.5|162.7|169.0|07.5
07|00585|03:00.0|02:33.9|000.0|26.0|164.6|172.0|07.5
08|00576|03:00.0|02:36.3|000.0|25.1|161.5|169.0|07.6
09|00595|03:00.0|02:31.2|000.0|25.3|162.3|169.0|07.8
10|00575|03:00.0|02:36.5|000.0|24.9|166.1|173.0|07.7
11|00563|02:53.9|02:34.5|000.0|25.7|162.8|169.0|07.5
12|00585|03:00.0|02:33.7|000.0|25.2|162.8|172.0|07.7
13|00586|03:00.0|02:33.6|000.0|26.1|165.8|173.0|07.5
14|00532|03:00.0|02:49.2|000.0|24.9|162.8|169.0|07.1
15|00598|03:00.0|02:30.6|000.0|25.9|169.0|177.0|07.7

I launched from the bottom of our stairs. This was a bit of a challenge, but I managed to get both oars in, and backed away from the steps without flipping. I warmed up rowing up toward Wellfleet. When I turned around, I noticd just how bumpy it was. The head wind was a bit annoying too. I decided to row into the lee of the Island and do the intervals back and forth there. I could do 3 intervals in a dog leg around the island, and only the end of the last interval would be exposed to the chop.

This workout is one of my very favorites. You end up digging deeper and deeper as the intervals keep going. By the time you get to the tenth interval, you tend to start them with very light pressure. In that way, it’s good head race practice where you want to use a reasonably high stroke rate and light, consistent pressure.

Even in the lee of the island, it was a lot easier rowing with the wind that against it. I noticed it most when I was rowing into Loagy Bay.

When I finished, I was totally spent. I was trembling. It was pretty awesome.

Today: A rest day! Finally, I feel like I deserve a rest day instead of being forced into it by circumstances.

I sure missed this. 14km 2x

August 6, 20171 Comment

I got home at 2:15am on Saturday morning. It was pure bliss getting back into my own bed. I slept like a log. I was stunned to see it was 11am when I finally woke up.

I spent the day just puttering around the house. I did some grocery shopping and laundry. I didn’t feel like training, so I didn’t. I got to bed around midnight. Even though I didn’t feel that sleepy, I fell asleep quickly and slept until 5. I woke up and I knew instantly that I was done sleeping. I tried to sleep a bit more, but a thought crept into my head. If I’m awake anyway, maybe I should head out to Worcester and go rowing. This seemed like a much better thing to do than to toss and turn in bed not sleeping.

So, I did. I got up, put my name on the sign up list, got my stuff together and headed out to Quinsigamond. When I got there, I was delighted to see Joe and Bob. Bob suggested we take out the Wintech. I thought that was a great idea. I haven’t been in a boat since July 16th. A nice stable double sounded perfect. I could let him steer and I could just focus on trying to remember how to row.

It came back quickly.

I didn’t have much of a plan. I ultimately decided that I should do some kind of an approximation of the L3 workout that was scheduled for Yesterday. But mostly, I was just really enjoying the feeling of being in the boat. The feeling of connection. The sound of the bubbles running along the hull.

We headed south and I fell into a groove at around 23 SPM. I just went with it. We had a bit of a tail wind and the pace was generally between 2:10 and 2:15. I was working pretty hard, and by the sound of Bob’s breathing, he was working pretty hard too. We got waked a couple of times by waterskiing boats, but generally it was just a nice hard row all the way down lake.

We turned to go north, and I suggested we take it down a bit and do some easy rate ladders. This plan didn’t last all that long though. As we were coming out of the cove at the south end of the lake, we saw the quad from our club going the other way, so we looped around the little island and followed them back into the cove.

We stopped and chatted for a few minutes and then we both started up again. Bob said he would feel ore comfortable ahead of them than behind them, and the rest, as they say, is history. I brought the rate back up to about a 24 and decided that we would “do the lake”. This is a nice 5+km piece. Basically a perfect head race distance.

Now I didn’t push it as hard as a full on head race simulation, but I wanted it to be a good threshold L3 training piece. Now the wind was ahead of us and it was building. We launched at about 7:10 and we would have started up lake around 7:40.

The row was close to uneventful. One or two wakings, but generally we just clicked along. The wind got a bit gusty once we were north of the Rt 9 bridge, but the water was flat. Bob asked for a hard twenty at the end, and then tacked on another 10 for fun. We were both puffing hard by the time we finished.

Then we turned around and took it easy almost all the way back. Bob asked for 50 hard strokes at the end. It was a good way to finish.

Today made it easy to remember why I really like this sport. Pushing hard is easy on a crisp, sunny morning like today.

Tomorrow: Schedule calls for a rest day, but I did that yesterday. I think I will try to do an L4 OTW in Newton.

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.

My favorite L3 and a morning run

April 23, 2017Leave a comment

Saturday: I briefly debated going rowing on Saturday morning, but between a forecast for rain, and the need for sleep, I decided against it. It was a good decision. I slept 10 hours and woke up feeling good! My wife and I had some errands to do, and we had a late lunch. By the time I had digested lunch and finished some grocery shopping, it was around 7pm before I got around to working out.

I wanted to do a workout with a bit more intensity, so I opted for my favorite wolverine plan L3 workout.

15 x 3′ / 1′ rest
Target pace: 1:55

I have managed to do this workout sub-1:50 when I am in really good shape. I am not in really good shape. I am also not sure how well I do on faster workouts on the dynamic rower. Anyway, it was a target.

It started off OK, but by the time I got deep into the workout, I realized that I had started too fast. The wheels started to come off after the 10th interval and I just did the best I could the rest of the way. No handle downs, or form breaks, just slower and slower splits.

PM version of power

PM version of pace, considerably more generous than the interval summary below.

Workout Summary - media/20170423-0010230o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|13682|60:00.0|02:11.6|192.1|25.1|163.4|181.0|09.1
W-|11661|45:00.0|01:55.8|227.4|24.9|163.2|180.0|10.4
R-|02040|15:00.0|03:40.6|068.5|26.1|164.3|180.0|02.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|00795|03:00.0|01:53.2|233.2|23.6|140.4|155.0|11.2
01|00792|03:00.0|01:53.7|236.9|24.1|150.6|160.0|11.0
02|00790|03:00.0|01:53.9|235.3|24.0|154.2|164.0|11.0
03|00792|03:00.0|01:53.7|233.8|24.2|157.5|167.0|10.9
04|00788|03:00.0|01:54.2|237.2|24.5|160.6|170.0|10.7
05|00790|03:00.0|01:53.9|234.5|25.5|162.8|172.0|10.3
06|00788|03:00.0|01:54.2|232.4|24.9|164.5|172.0|10.6
07|00784|03:00.0|01:54.8|233.1|24.7|166.8|176.0|10.6
08|00784|03:00.0|01:54.9|233.6|25.3|168.8|178.0|10.3
09|00772|03:00.0|01:56.6|228.1|25.9|170.8|179.0|09.9
10|00766|03:00.0|01:57.5|221.1|25.5|170.5|180.0|10.0
11|00758|03:00.0|01:58.7|209.4|24.8|169.5|177.0|10.2
12|00749|03:00.0|02:00.2|207.6|24.4|169.3|177.0|10.2
13|00762|03:00.0|01:58.1|224.0|27.0|171.5|179.0|09.4
14|00752|03:00.0|01:59.6|210.2|24.8|170.2|180.0|10.1

That was really hard! Glad I did it though.

Sunday: Up around 8 after a good nights sleep. Felt a bit stiff and sore from the workout the evening before, but I wanted to get a quick workout in before I hopped a plane to go to Seoul. I wasn’t really in the mood for an erg workout, and it was a nice day out, so I decided to go for a run. Nothing fast or fancy.

I did a loop that was about 7km. It took about 37 minutes. It’s been a long time since I’ve run outside. It felt very awkward at first, but I settled in after a few minutes. My knees started to complain a bit after about 4km, and the irresistible lure of home home made me speed up a bit at the end. My legs are nice and sore now.

I don’t think my knees could hold up to running on a regular basis, but I think I should try to do it a couple times a month. I really enjoy it and it’s great cross training.

Now I’m over northern Canada somewhere, with 8 hours or so until I get to Tokyo. I change planes and continue to Seoul.

I get in at 10:30PM local time. I will try to grab a short workout before I leave the hotel at 8am on Tuesday morning.

Hard Half Marathon

November 21, 2016November 21, 20165 Comments

Continuing with the Crazy Bear Challenge. Today was a bit spicier.

Plan:

Half Marathon
Free Rate
Pace: 1:57.5
No HR Cap

Last weekend, I did a 1:58.5 and I was sure I could do better. I was thinking I’d aim to slice a second off the pace. I didn’t bother to warmup, I just sat on the machine and started going. I settled in at 1:55 and even though I was worried that I’d burn out, I just kept going and let the pace bleed off and the rate creep up over the row. I was never in any serious distress, but I sure felt pretty awful after I finished.

End result: 1:21:38.8 (1:56.1)

That’s good enough to be ranked 14 of 474 on the concept2 rankings of 50-60 hwts. So, I’m pretty happy with that.

It was a hard row, about an hour above AT. The last 4 minutes in AN. I might be able to squeeze a bit more out with a slower start, but I’m not sure. I’m still a ways off of my PB (1:19:55.4), that’s a 1:53.6 pace. Maybe after 25 more HMs?

Workout Summary - media/20161120-222121-sled_2016-11-20T15-12-43ZEST.strokes.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|21097|81:36.0|01:56.0|223.7|23.6|166.7|181.0|11.0
W-|21097|81:37.0|01:56.1|223.7|23.5|166.4|181.0|11.0
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-
01|01000|03:49.2|01:54.6|227.7|22.2|132.9|143.0|11.8
02|01000|03:51.2|01:55.6|226.5|22.4|147.9|152.0|11.6
03|01000|03:50.8|01:55.4|227.6|22.8|153.5|155.0|11.4
04|01000|03:50.6|01:55.3|228.3|22.9|156.5|158.0|11.3
05|01000|03:50.5|01:55.2|228.6|23.2|160.0|161.0|11.2
06|01000|03:50.8|01:55.4|227.7|23.4|162.3|164.0|11.1
07|01000|03:51.7|01:55.8|225.1|23.2|164.7|165.0|11.2
08|01000|03:51.5|01:55.8|225.6|23.4|165.3|167.0|11.1
09|01000|03:51.9|01:55.9|224.8|23.3|167.6|168.0|11.1
10|01000|03:52.2|01:56.1|223.3|23.4|168.1|170.0|11.0
11|01000|03:52.9|01:56.4|221.7|23.1|170.2|171.0|11.2
12|01000|03:53.1|01:56.5|221.1|23.4|170.9|171.0|11.0
13|01000|03:53.9|01:57.0|218.9|23.5|171.1|172.0|10.9
14|01000|03:54.0|01:57.0|218.1|23.7|171.8|172.0|10.8
15|01000|03:54.2|01:57.1|218.3|23.7|173.6|174.0|10.8
16|01000|03:54.2|01:57.1|217.5|23.6|173.7|174.0|10.8
17|01000|03:53.7|01:56.9|219.3|24.1|175.1|176.0|10.7
18|01000|03:54.7|01:57.3|216.7|24.0|175.8|176.0|10.6
19|01000|03:54.7|01:57.4|216.6|24.2|175.4|176.0|10.6
20|01000|03:52.4|01:56.2|223.2|24.7|177.3|178.0|10.5
21|01000|03:48.9|01:54.5|234.0|25.6|178.9|181.0|10.2
22|00097|00:20.2|01:44.2|304.6|29.5|181.0|181.0|09.8

With the tools on rowsandall.com, I can get a good look at how I traded rate for power as the row went on. You can see my weakest part, from about 7k down to 2k, where my strokes got shorter and the work per stroke went down.

Tomorrow: HM L4. Interested to see how much oomph I have after this workout.

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

September 14, 20162 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.