Oct 18 2015
Four coxed fours,rowed in old boats with wooden oars. Crews determined by random draw. First the four strokes were drawn, then the four #3, etc until the four coxes. It was not allowed to sit on a different position than the one determined by random draw. Big fun. Followed by crew of the year awards and a lot of beer drinking:
Oct 18 2015
Slept in, had a family brunch, then coffee, and then I went for a little run. Not a planned course, but making it up during the run. It was supposed to be a recovery run so I made sure I ran slowly.
Even though it was supposed to be a recovery run, I had to take a pretty steep climb that I call “killer climb”. It was either that or a detour of 4 km. This climb is about 4 minutes of steep uphill running, 600m with an average grade of 12%. Quite a good rowing spring race simulation.
Had to turn back at one point. I was following a new path created by forest workers, descending down a steep hill. It turned out to be a dead end.
Uploading the run to Strava reveals interesting facts. My “killer climb” turns out to be a “segment” so I can compare my results with other people who run this climb. Not many, it turns out:
Also, I can compare my own efforts:
Apparently, I have ran this stretch only 5 times. I believe I have done more of them.
https://www.strava.com/activities/415421037
Oct 17 2015
The training plan said “Intensive Steady State”. The original plan was that I would row in the quad with Romana’s girls crew, but in the end there were enough girls. So I took the single.
I rowed next to the girls quad for most of the session, and decided to do a Fartleg at 22spm and higher.
The water was nice. Some chop but today I liked it. There was enough chop to make it a challenge but it was manageable with good technique.
We all went for lunch to a pizzeria close to the lake. Took some pictures on the dam when we returned to the club. The first picture shows the lake (and there is a sailing race going on), the second picture shows the river as it continues after the dam. The concrete construction on the left is a 1940s bridge pillar for a highway the Germans wanted to build across occupied Czechoslovakia:
After that we had the traditional season closing with the club. We determined coxed four crews by a draw and raced against each other. Then we had a few beers and discussed the state of rowing in our town, in the world, and the world in general.
Oct 16 2015
Woke up too late to do a session in the hotel. Flight from Brussels to Vienna was delayed by 20 minutes, so I missed the RailJet direct train. Arrived home around 4:30pm.
Dialed up a 3×20 minutes (with 2 minute active breaks) and decided to try out the Greg protocol, i.e. start slowly, then accelerate. To break the boredom, I varied stroke rates between 18, 19 and 20spm and power between 160, 170 and 180W. Looking at the HR plot, I might go a little faster on these sessions.
Listened to a local radio station during the row. They announced that the police has removed another corpse from our lake today. They found the body of a dead man near Rokle, with a sports bag filled with stones tied to his body. The police announced that they think the man died at the end of September.
Tomorrow:
If the weather is good, a “intensive steady state” row OTW. If the weather doesn’t allow OTW rowing, it will be my debut as running trainer for our club’s girls group. Still have to think about a nice running session. I don’t usually run from the rowing club.
Oct 15 2015
Wednesday
Worked from home in the morning, then took the train to Vienna. First time I saw the real refugees/migrants from Syria, Afghanistan, and other places. About a hundred of them in the Vienna Hauptbahnhof hall. Young families with small children (babies to 6 year olds), and groups of young men (in their twenties). They looked tired. They probably still believed what the smugglers have told them. Didn’t know what to think about it. In the media these people are either described as bloodthirsty jihadist, or, on the other end of the spectrum, as piece loving engineers and scientists. I was glad I saw the real people and not just the media image.
Then on to the airport and a plane to Brussels. No exercise.
Thursday
Woke up quite well rested and headed for the hotel gym. The meetings don’t start until 10:30 so I had some time. I am 75% through reading the book that Boris recommended, “Muskelrevolution” by Marco Toigo. Apart from learning very interesting things about how the little muscle engines work, here are a few things I grasped (hopefully correctly) so far:
So after about 30 minutes of threadmill, cycle and elliptical (10 minutes each) I headed for this monster:
Actually, I quickly returned to my hotel room to get a pen and my notebook, and determined as well as I could my max for bench press, leg extension, leg curl, lat pulldown, biceps curl, bench pull and shoulder press. Then did a little circuit where I worked at 60% of the max, and just did as many repeats as I could until failure (or until 20 repeats, whichever came first). I also added situps, pushups, back and squat with weights into the mix. Actually, I added the squat later, when I started to realize that I was mostly working my upper body … I guess that is what fitness rats like to work…
I did the circuit 2 times. One hour and fifteen minutes including the 30 minutes extensive steady state and the quick determination of 1RM maxima.
Looking forward to how my body will feel tomorrow.
Oct 13 2015
How much force of will does one have on an average day?
Here’s a sample of the stuff I did today:
Anyway, I still thought I could do a full erg workout, did a warming up and dialed up the 4x2km. I did have a modest target pace, 1:53. First 2km in 1:52.7 in 25spm. Still OK although a little high on the heart rate.
Five hundred meter into interval #2 I stopped. I was doing solid 1:52 pace at the time but I just didn’t feel like completing the workout. Actually, it felt like I was looking at the entire amount of workout work I have to/want to do in the coming winter.
Somehow I have a feeling that a person can be limited in the amount of force of will he can use on a day, and perhaps this is something that needs to be trained as well. Researching this a bit, I actually found an article about it. Key sentence from the abstract: “mentally fatigued subjects reached their maximal level of perceived exertion and disengaged from the physical task earlier than in the control condition. In conclusion, our study provides experimental evidence that mental fatigue limits exercise tolerance in humans through higher perception of effort rather than cardiorespiratory and musculoenergetic mechanisms.”
Will do some easy stretching this evening and that’s it. Tomorrow’s another day. A travel day, actually.
My morning ride:
Oct 20 2015
Monday-Tuesday: Steady State and CTC
Monday
Wanted to row OTW but I had to finish something at work. It was raining hard when I had to drive to the club, and I was late already, would have to shorten the row because of the early darkness … so I did an OTE session.
Warming up, then a 30 minute rowpro session, then a cooling down. A bit under an hour in total. Time pressed.
Workout Summary - Oct 20, 2015
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|Watts|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS|-SPI
--|07255|30:00.0|02:04.0|183.4|22.1|156.4|167.0|11.0|08.3
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|Watts|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-|-SPI|Comments
01|01205|05:00.0|02:04.5|181.6|21.6|136.1|147.0|11.2|08.4|
02|01226|05:00.0|02:02.3|191.2|22.4|156.0|161.0|10.9|08.5|
03|01216|05:00.0|02:03.4|186.4|22.0|160.0|164.0|11.1|08.5|
04|01207|05:00.0|02:04.3|182.2|22.2|160.1|164.0|10.9|08.2|
05|01206|05:00.0|02:04.4|182.0|22.0|163.6|166.0|11.0|08.3|
06|01195|05:00.0|02:05.5|177.1|22.2|162.2|167.0|10.8|08.0|
I did the 30 minutes at slightly higher power than the Friday session.
Tuesday – CTC
Again working late. I started this session close to 9pm. 15×1 minute on 1 minute rest, and actually quite enjoyed it. Targeted 1:45 which is around my 2k pace. It was nice to do some sprinty stuff after many steady state and distance sessions. Counted to 30 strokes. A sip of water after every 3 sets. Final three sets with closed eyes and imagining rowing the final 300m of a sprint race.
I did wear the heart rate belt but forgot to clip on the heart rate unit. 🙁
Tomorrow: Cycling and steady state.
Thursday: Fly to Brussels/Amsterdam
Friday: Short hotel fitness triathlon + weights
By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: ctc, OTE, rowing, steady state, training