I was out late with a customer late on Thursday night, and so I decided to sleep in and take rest day Friday.  I was due.  I had worked out 7 days straight prior to Friday.

Saturday’s objective was a 5K threshold piece.  I really wanted to go for a good time, maybe even a PB, but my workouts during the week had been disappointingly difficult.  Nonetheless, with a rest day, and doing the row in the afternoon instead of first thing, I thought I might give it a shot.

My previous PB was 17:46.1 (1:46.6 pace) set in 2014, during my magical first experience with lactate based training.

Today, I did a 2K warmup.  Nothing fancy, but I did do it strapless.  Makes strapping in feel good.  As soon as I finished and setup my 5k piece, rowpro decided to crash.  Getting it back involved rebooting the PC, so I did another 500m or so to keep warm while the hard disk grinded away.

I started rowpro again with the PC isolated from the network and all was well.

Workout Summary – Jan 09, 2016
–_|_Total_|_-Total-_|_–Avg–_|_-Avg-_|_Avg-_|_-Max-_|_–Max–_|_-Avg_|_-Avg
–_|_Dist-_|_-Time–_|_-Pace–_|_Watts_|_SPM-_|_-HR–_|_-%HRR–_|_-DPS_|_-SPI
–_|_02000_|_07:42.1_|_01:55.5_|_227.1_|_20.8_|_162.0_|_ 83.7% _|_12.5_|_10.9

Into the main event.  I decided to set out at a 1:46 pace and evaluate at the end of each 1000m split.  In the first 1000m, I tried to get comfortable with a stroke rate.  I tried to rate up and row a little lighter around 500, but my splits dropped too much and I knew I would torch myself, so I dropped it back.  Through 1000m, I felt OK, but not that OK, I decided to let the split drift up to 1:47, and counted out the next 100 strokes.  At 2000m, I was started hurt pretty bad, but I decided to keep trying to hold the 1:47 for the next 100 strokes.  That was a long 100 strokes!

There were two real crisis points in the row.  The first was around 3000m when I saw my HR cross over to the anaerobic zone.  I have held my HR up in the red for 2000 meters before, but it is something that is really nasty to experience, and I needed to do a gut check to see if I was willing to go there.  I gave myself permission to let the splits drift up to 1:48 and if I didn’t get the PB, that would be OK.  I did want to stay as far under 18 minutes as I could, though.  Another very long 100 stroke counted out (well actually, each 1000m was about 96 strokes).

When I got to 4000, my average split had drifted up to 1:46.7.  I will often lose hope when I slip behind my target, but today, I just plugged along.  I drifted even further up seeing more 1:48s.  By the time I got to 500 left, my average was up to 1:46.8.  I tried to rate up to start sprinting, but I almos instantly regretted it and almost stopped.  I saw one stroke at 1:50, and then one at 1:56, and I got myself back under control and just tried to hold the 1:48s.  When I got down to 200m left, I did start to sprint while I counted down the last 20 strokes.  I held 1:40 splits for 100m, and really cranked up for the last ten strokes sprinting it home at 1:36.

All this I figured out after the fact because I had my eyes closed for just about the whole last 200m.  When I opened them, I had 10m left, and my avg split was down to 1:46.5.  As I pulled the last stroke, it flipped to a 1:46.4.  I was done, and I had a new PB, 17:44.3, a 1.8 second improvement over the one from just about 2 years ago (17:46.1).

Tough row.

Workout Summary – Jan 09, 2016
–_|_Total_|_-Total-_|_–Avg–_|_-Avg-_|_Avg-_|_-Max-_|_–Max–_|_-Avg_|_-Avg
–_|_Dist-_|_-Time–_|_-Pace–_|_Watts_|_SPM-_|_-HR–_|_-%HRR–_|_-DPS_|_-SPI
–_|_05000_|_17:44.3_|_01:46.4_|_290.3_|_27.1_|_184.0_|_ 99.3% _|_10.4_|_10.7
Workout Details
#-_|_SDist_|_-Split-_|_-SPace-_|_Watts_|_SPM-_|_MaxHR_|_Max%HRR_|_DPS-_|_-SPI
01_|_00500_|_01:45.5_|_01:45.5_|_298.0_|_26.7_|_159.0_|_ 81.6% _|_10.6_|_11.1
02_|_00500_|_01:45.7_|_01:45.7_|_296.7_|_26.7_|_166.0_|_ 86.5% _|_10.6_|_11.1
03_|_00500_|_01:46.9_|_01:46.9_|_286.4_|_26.4_|_168.0_|_ 87.9% _|_10.6_|_10.9
04_|_00500_|_01:46.6_|_01:46.6_|_288.7_|_27.0_|_172.0_|_ 90.8% _|_10.4_|_10.7
05_|_00500_|_01:47.1_|_01:47.1_|_285.2_|_26.9_|_175.0_|_ 92.9% _|_10.4_|_10.6
06_|_00500_|_01:46.9_|_01:46.9_|_286.2_|_26.9_|_177.0_|_ 94.3% _|_10.4_|_10.6
07_|_00500_|_01:47.3_|_01:47.3_|_283.6_|_27.4_|_179.0_|_ 95.7% _|_10.2_|_10.3
08_|_00500_|_01:47.5_|_01:47.5_|_281.4_|_26.8_|_180.0_|_ 96.5% _|_10.4_|_10.5
09_|_00500_|_01:47.3_|_01:47.3_|_282.9_|_26.8_|_181.0_|_ 97.2% _|_10.4_|_10.5
10_|_00500_|_01:43.4_|_01:43.4_|_316.5_|_29.0_|_184.0_|_ 99.3% _|_10.0_|_10.9

After that, I did what felt like the world’s longest cool down.  Another 5K, starting at 1:55 and slowing down by 3 seconds every 500m.

Workout Summary – Jan 09, 2016
–_|_Total_|_-Total-_|_–Avg–_|_-Avg-_|_Avg-_|_-Max-_|_–Max–_|_-Avg_|_-Avg
–_|_Dist-_|_-Time–_|_-Pace–_|_Watts_|_SPM-_|_-HR–_|_-%HRR–_|_-DPS_|_-SPI
–_|_05000_|_21:18.3_|_02:07.8_|_167.5_|_18.9_|_163.0_|_ 84.4% _|_12.4_|_08.9

Tomorrow:  4 x 20′ / 1′ rest L4