Travel = Bad Training

Wednesday, Thursday

I wanted to go running but I didn’t manage to. On Wednesday I woke up with a headache and feeling an upcoming cold, as well as tired from the long day at the conference the day before, which ended with a welcome cocktail. I remained in bed long enough to pass the last moment to get up and get a decent training in before having to go to the venue.

Same thing on Thursday. Then it was even harder, because this was the morning after the VIP dinner. I left very early (some were still sending pictures to social media at 4am … not really pictures you want to spread by the way, but who am I to comment), but still reached bed way after midnight.

A conference is hard work. There were fun parts too:

Fun part 1: Overflying the conference venue during one of our test/demo flights
Fun part 1: Overflying the conference venue during one of our test/demo flights. Conference venue = the green building.
Fun part 2: Me explaining something important to a government official
Fun part 2: Me explaining something important to a government VIP

Being back in Amsterdam was fun as well. Even though I didn’t have time to visit my family, being back in the place where I was born and spent a large part of my adolescent years was fun. Nostalgic fun.

So a lot of eating and drinking, socializing, talking, explaining, listening, etc. The good thing was that the temperatures in the auditorium were so high that my suit doubled as a wearable sauna and I actually lost weight during these few days. :-/

Friday

So today I was going to do my fun OTW training, 16×45″/60″R at 1000m race pace.

It wasn’t to be. The wind was so strong I didn’t even have to drive to the lake. No way I would be able to row a decent workout on the water.

So back to the erg.

Not fun. I did a 2k warming up, then dialed up a 45″/60″ rest workout and started doing it. I do these workouts at 1k pace, which means just under 1:40/500m. Every fourth interval I go full out to prove that the 1k pace is slower than max. Slow down if the “full out” interval turns out not to be faster than the last few intervals. I guess my explanation is confusing … please comment if you don’t get it but are interested to know.

After 8 intervals I comforted  myself with the thought of being half way.

Then in the 9th interval I handed down. Just like that.

My “inner coach” (see this comment) talked to me during the rest period but couldn’t convince me to get rowing and finish the workout.

So I dialed up a 4k and rowed that one out, starting at 2:00 pace and slowly slowing down:

Tomorrow: 4x1k on the water and I should really video it.