4x2km in interesting conditions

What was interesting about the conditions? It was sunny weather when I departed from home just before 7, and about 3 degrees above the freezing point. By the time I arrived at the lake, it was zero and there was a thick fog. From our dock, I couldn’t see the other bank. Luckily, it cleared up a bit so I could go out.

The planned training was a 4x2km row. Last time I did this was in Racice: See this blog post. Then I managed an average pace of 2:14.9 on two minutes rest. With a sparring partner.

Today I decided that I wanted it to be bit more intense and thus I extended the rest to 5 minutes. Even with the extended rest this session is still “intensive steady state”, or perhaps “threshold”, or “L2” or “endurance power” training, depending on which training paradigm is yours.

Another interesting thing about the conditions: It is funny how it can be foggy but still there is a distinct headwind and tailwind effect at the same time. The water was something between choppy and ripples.

Workout Summary - 2016-04-29-0731.CSV
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|11795|56:31.0|02:22.5|23.5|159.5|171.0|09.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
01|02452| 13:31 |02:45.2|18.9|136.0|163.0|09.6
02|02000| 08:23 |02:05.8|26.1|168.0|175.0|09.1 | tailwind
03|02000| 09:09 |02:17.5|25.6|173.0|177.0|08.5 | headwind
04|02000| 08:32 |02:08.1|26.3|172.0|178.0|08.9 | tailwind
05|02000| 09:09 |02:17.3|26.3|172.0|179.0|08.3 | headwind
06|01343| 07:47 |02:54.0|17.6|136.0|154.0|09.8

So that’s a 2:12.2 average for the 2km intervals. Not bad. The pace variations in the plot are probably more due to the wind variation, but still I think I noticed an effect of focusing on technique. I need to reach long but at the same time sit straight and strong. Then I get the same pace with less effort than when I row sloppily.

It wasn’t easy to do after a business trip. I almost bailed out after three intervals, being just 1km away from the club, but then I decided that training effect is more important than producing “impressive” pace and rowed the final headwind 2km.

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