October 2016

Oct 30 2016

The Octuple

Saturday

A rest day after a quite intensive week. We visited one of the caves in the Moravian Karst (basically the hills starting at the end of our street, where I do most of my running). The Moravian Karst, a small region of 25x4km, has more than 1100 caves, of which 5 are accessible for non-speleologists. The others are either closed for humans or only accessible for professional speleologists.

This was one of those easy and comfortable cave visits with a guide. Still it was impressive.

cla-417-1306829094 — Inside Katerinska Cave

Sunday

The training plan called for running, and I really should start to do more running. There is a 10k on 17th November that I want to participate in.

But today there was a better idea. We managed to get eight people together to row in our club’s Octuple, a sculling eight. There was strong wind and quite a bit of chop, so despite the fact that our coxswain didn’t show up, we decided to go into the gorge towards the castle and back. We fixated the rudder and took off without a coxswain, turning the boat into a coxless octuple, or, in rowers’ shorthand: the “8x-“.

It was an interesting experience. Of course the maneuvering of the boat was difficult, and in a few of the river’s sharp turns we had to row half slide strokes and even stop to turn the boat.

I stroked the beast, so my view was not very different from rowing in the single.

https://www.strava.com/activities/760435132/segments/18626169771

Somebody took a picture, but he hasn’t posted it yet, so I have no images of this fun outing, except for the heart rate plot from rowsandall.com:

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: octuple, OTW, rowing, steady state, training

20161028-110433-sanders-speedcoach-20161028-1005amo20161028-111631

Oct 28 2016

Technique row in the single

Enough ladies turned up to fill the eight, so I was thrown out, unfortunately. I was looking forward to rowing in the eight.

So it was an outing in the single. The lake was mirror flat, but we were all rowing in our little armada of four pairs, three singles and one eight, so I got my share of rowing in other boats’ puddles. Still it was a perfect day to work on technique.

I did few drills, but tried to row at 18spm with attention to making the boat run.

The high SPM stuff was drills at the turning points.

Workout Summary - media/20161028-110433-Sanders SpeedCoach 20161028 1005amo.csv --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|11404|61:26.0|02:41.6|18.3|150.3|169.0|10.1 W-|10819|53:45.0|02:29.1|17.9|152.0|169.0|11.3 R-|00590|07:41.0|06:30.9|09.5|055.5|169.0|00.0 Workout Details #-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS- 01|00918|04:33.0|02:28.7|16.9|127.2|137.0|12.0 02|02572|12:26.8|02:25.2|17.5|149.1|159.0|11.8 03|02686|13:07.4|02:26.6|18.3|159.8|169.0|11.2 04|02704|13:12.8|02:26.6|18.2|157.5|166.0|11.3 05|01939|10:25.8|02:41.4|17.8|149.5|156.0|10.4

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By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: lake, OTW, rowing, single, steady state, technique, training

Oct 27 2016

Some cycling

One of the fall/winter/spring cross training activities on my training plan is cycling. I have a mountain bike that I use to ride to work, or just ride through the hills surrounding Brno. I usually plan the week such that I cycle to work on one day, and ride home on the other day. I don’t need the car to go to work, because Brno has excellent public transport, so if you plan well, it is very doable, and to me it is “free” training time. Given the heart rates involved, I take this as light recovery training.

Tomorrow is Czechoslovak Independence Day, a holiday, so today was a bit like a Friday. I had no meetings, so I could leave work early.

Instead of riding home directly, I had to go to Modřice, to the DHL office, to pick up a parcel that they couldn’t deliver yesterday. That added another 18km to my ride.

It was fun to ride in the flatter land to the South, as opposed to the hilly country starting in the North.

https://www.strava.com/activities/757477678

Tomorrow: A fun row in the eight, on the National Holiday.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: bike, DHL, recovery, training

Oct 26 2016

4x2km – threshold workout

The classical 4x2km/5min rest workout has been problematic for me. The last time I did it, on August 31, I managed 1:54.3 with an average heart rate of 164bpm.

There was also a workout in the fall of 2015 which was done after a similar day as today. A bike ride to work in the morning, a long day at work, and then sit down to do a 4x2km.

So, today I set off at a conservative 1:54 target pace. Here is the comparison chart. Today is the blue line, August 31 is the red line:

A huge difference in heart rate. Here are today’s stats:

Workout Summary - media/20161026-191009o.csv --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|10867|46:07.0|02:07.4|24.9|155.4|182.0|09.5 W-|08000|30:08.0|01:52.9|25.8|164.3|182.0|10.3 R-|02866|16:00.0|02:47.5|22.3|142.6|182.0|06.8 Workout Details #-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS- 01|02000|07:35.1|01:53.7|25.3|158.1|167.0|10.4 02|02000|07:36.6|01:54.1|25.2|162.5|170.0|10.4 03|02000|07:33.2|01:53.3|25.8|167.4|175.0|10.3 04|02000|07:23.2|01:50.7|27.0|169.4|182.0|10.0

Just for fun, I created a few other plots:

Power and heart rate vs stroke rate. The stroke clouds around 21spm is from the rest periods.

This next plot is work per stroke vs SPM. This time I have removed the strokes taken during the rest periods. You can see my usual 640J per stroke. Only the strokes from the final 300m of the last interval are significantly higher. Let’s say I was “driving home”. I was wondering if the work per stroke came from a longer stroke length or a more forceful stroke:

Looks like it’s both. A bit of drive length and a bit of force. Driving home. I was glad this workout worked out.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 2 • Tags: 4x2km, concept2, erg, OTE, rowing, training

Oct 25 2016

Two times 30 minutes a day keeps the doctor away

Maybe it does. But not the ophthalmologist.

I had noticed that I had difficulties reading the small print, especially after a long day and in bad light, so I visited her a week ago, literally for the first time in my life. She measured my eyes and confirmed my suspicion. +0.75 on both eyes.

Today I got a message from the optician that I could pick up my reading glasses. I guess I may finally start to look intelligent. Perhaps I should a picture of myself on my rowing data site and change the slogan to “Recommended by the leading rowing data miners”. :-/

Anyway, because I had to go to town to pick up my glasses and run some other errands, I came home early, and managed to squeeze in a 2x30min Steady State session before dinner.

A bit lower on power than yesterday, but about the same on the Borg scale of perceived exertion. Probably the result of going a bit harder yesterday. It’s a fine balance with these steady state rows.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: concept2, erg, OTE, rowing, steady state, training

Oct 25 2016

Meta Analysis of Concept2 Erg Data

At rowsandall.com, I and a few other rowing data enthusiasts are building a platform for analyzing rowing (OTW & OTE) data. This all started back in May when Greg Smith (Quantified Rowing) developed a Python script to work with the Painsled iOS exported stroke data. I added a TCX parser and then quickly expanded the toolbox with a few other rowing data formats. The next stage was to develop a simple Python driven web site for users without Python knowledge. It took a few months to make something usable, but even though we’re still in beta mode, the current pages are pretty usable.

We’re currently supporting CrewNerd, Rowing in Motion, Ergdata, Ergstick, NK SpeedCoach, RowPro and Painsled. Also, you can import data from Strava, SportTracks and the Concept 2 logbook, so it should be easy to get your data in the tool. Also, we will be ready for Power data from the Empower Oarlock once it’s shipped.

The user interface of the pages is not the prettiest, but there are some YouTube videos to get you started.

On top of the basic plotting of your workout, we are starting to add some Meta Analysis features, where you can look at your accumulated data (all workouts in a certain date range, for example). We’re really just starting to explore the possibilities, so here are a few teaser plots. The data are my erg rows, between August and today.

Here is the Power Histogram. It shows you the percentage of strokes at a given Power. So, for example, you can see that I have been doing most of my strokes just below 200W, which is my steady state power. Still, about 30% of my strokes are actually below 150W. Those are warming up and cooling down strokes, mainly. Then there is a second, wider peak around 245W, which is my “hard distance” or “threshold” power.

This next plot is simply the Power vs Stroke Rate. There is a funny loop up to 40SPM and 600W, which is from my “one minute full out” effort. What I find interesting to see is that there are two distinct groups of power/SPM data points. The group starting at 23SPM and higher is completely separate from the group between 18SPM and 24SPM. Would that suggest that I row a different stroke for Steady State vs Threshold rowing?

Here is a different look at the same data. Instead of Power, I plot the Work per Stroke (the infamous SPI which you basically get by dividing the power by the stroke rate). So it looks like in Steady State, I ease up on the strokes going to higher SPM, while in Threshold Rows, I keep the Work per Stroke around 600-625 Joule.

A quick look at the drive length to see if there is anything interesting here. The “data excursions” are probably start sequences. For the rest it seems I am pretty constant at 1.4m, but there is a significant amount of slightly longer strokes.

Finally, drive speed goes up with stroke rate. That seems logical. To keep the pressure on at higher flywheel speeds, you need to drive faster.

Currently, we are working on adding ways to slice the data in such a plot, and some other bells and whistles. If you’re interested, drop me a line in the comments, or just register for free at rowsandall.com, start uploading your erg data and play with them.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 2 • Tags: analysis, concept2, erg, meta, rowing

Oct 24 2016

2x(rest of my life)/2 minutes rest

A year ago I churned out 3x20min and 4x2omin without problems. This year I find I have to “Just Row” or alternate the formats in order to keep it interesting. Actually, a “just row” seems to suit me best recently. The 3x20min just feels to much like 3x”the rest of my life”.

Today it was 2x6km with 2 minutes rest. Added a warming up and a cooling down to bring the total to 14km and the total time to about an hour. Turns out the 6km worked wonders to my motivation. I chopped off the distance in 600m intervals and just kept going.

Here’s the summary:

Workout Summary - media/20161024-185508o.csv --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|12325|52:44.0|02:08.4|22.8|158.1|172.0|10.2 W-|12000|48:44.0|02:01.8|22.9|158.9|172.0|10.8 R-|00326|04:00.0|06:08.5|20.1|164.8|172.0|01.1 Workout Details #-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS- 01|06000|24:25.1|02:02.1|22.7|153.6|166.0|10.8 02|06000|24:19.2|02:01.6|23.1|164.3|172.0|10.7

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: concept2, erg, OTE, rowing, steady state, training

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October 2016

The Octuple

Technique row in the single

Some cycling

4x2km – threshold workout

Two times 30 minutes a day keeps the doctor away

Meta Analysis of Concept2 Erg Data

2x(rest of my life)/2 minutes rest

Calendar

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