Some deliveries, rowing, strength training

Some deliveries

My sportgraphics.com photos arrived and I picked them up yesterday. Last week I received an email from the Czech Post, telling me that my merchandise from the US had arrived and that they could do the customs for me if I mailed them the original invoice. So I did. Due to travel and public holidays, it wasn’t until yesterday that I could pick up the parcel.

It’s a framed picture of Romana and I doing our Mixed 2x in Hazewinkel and it will be a birthday present. The only downside is that Czech Post also charged VAT over the delivery costs … not sure if that is correct. Well, I discovered way to late to protest.

On Wednesday, Romana and I were discussing the resistance bands for strength training and in an impulse I ordered these ones from Amazon.co.uk. The German Amazon appears to have a lower quality German rip-off of the originals, so I ended up going to Amazon.co.uk. While I was there I also threw in the 2nd edition of Rowing Faster and clicked on next day delivery, which seems to be very reasonably priced on the UK Amazon, compared to the German Amazon.

The bands and the book were delivered to our neighbours yesterday. My sons immediately got hold of the bands and started to play/exercise with them. The idea is that I throw one or two bands and a door anchor in my luggage and I can do a hotel room workout. The other use is to have a “home gym” without having to create a weights room. We’ll see how it works out. The price is much more pleasant than the TRX stuff that is popular with the big guys in my rowing club, so the decision wasn’t that hard. I am only regretting a bit that I went for the anti-snap handles, instead of the bands that connect to the handles with carabiners, which seems a bit more foldable and flexible to me, especially if you want to combine two or more bands to one handle.

Wednesday being a public holiday, I am taking Thursday and Friday off to relax. The original plan was to go to the mountains and do some hiking and mountainbiking, but we decided to skip the longish drive and enjoy a few lazy days at home. After writing up this blog, I will relax on the couch and read Rowing Faster.

After breakfast we headed to the rowing club and I did two sessions, a 40 minute extensive row in the single and a strength session.

Row

Perfect conditions:

prehrada 001

prehrada 003

After the many reactions to yesterday’s blog, I decided to do a few tests, so I added a few 15 stroke pushes at >30spm to the session. I am glad to say that something of a double peak appears on my RIM analyses at higher stroke rates:

hurastroke

Strength Session

Three rounds in the rowing club weights room:

  1. Lat pull
  2. Bench press
  3. Row
  4. Back
  5. Sit ups
  6. Bench Press
  7. Biceps curl
  8. Bench pull
  9. Squat
  10. Push ups

I had to guess the weights a bit, as this was with free weights which is different than the hotel gym system. If I managed less than 10 repeats in the first round, I lowered the weight for round two. If I underestimated my own strength (pah!) and easily managed the 15 repeats, I increased the weight for the second round.

As the girls were still working out, I played a bit with the bodylastics bands and tried to find the equivalent exercises using the bands, and determine which band strength is the one to throw in my travel bag. The exercise were of course slightly different, but I am confident I can create a demanding strength workout using them.