Apr 21 2019
A week in Phoenix
Sunday
Just a mish mash workout in the hotel gym in Atlanta. They had new technogym equipment with virtual runs/hikes/rides. So I rode a bike for 10 minutes “in the Provence”, then I hiked “in Utah” and then I ran “in Tibet”. It’s actually much more pleasant to have the video of an outdoor ride/run/hike in front of you. Makes those long indoor running minutes go by much faster. After that I played with the weights. I think I got a good workout in, judging by the muscle soreness the next day.
I spent the rest of the morning working from my hotel room, then had lunch in central Atlanta before I drove to the rental car return, took the train to the airport and took a flight to Phoenix.
Monday
A long day full of meetings. I did not work out.
Tuesday
The Desert Vista trail head, which had been in reconstruction the last time I was in Phoenix, was open again, so before dawn I hopped in the car, drove the five minute drive to the trail head and did a nice run in the desert. Much better than Technogym virtual runs.
I always wonder what the story is behind the rusty car.
Wednesday
See Tuesday. It’s great to run outdoors. It’s even greater to see the sunrise in the desert. And the best bit is that it’s good to be out in the nature when the rest of the working day is spent in windowless meeting rooms.
The Strava title of my run, is a Dutch word play. Skip the followin paragraph if you’re not interested in an incredibly boring explanation of my word play.
“Wadlopen” is best translated as mud flat hiking. Wikipedia: “Mudflat hikers are people who, with the aid of a tide table, use a period of low water to walk and wade on the watershed of the mudflats, especially from the Frisian mainland coast to the Frisian islands.” And “de hei” is “the heathland”. So literally the title is “mud flat hiking on the heathlands”, but when you say it, it sounds like “Wat lopen op de hei”, which means “a bit of running on the heathlands”. I guess I found it funny to call a desert run like that.
You can start reading again.
Well, actually, my meeting room on Wednesday did have windows. I joined my team doing flight testing. It was great. We flew to Winslow for some testing of traffic alerts, so the tests involved both the Dassault Falcon as well as a King Air. After Winslow, we went to Wickenburg (which had fewer clouds) to do some testing of a new function that is active during the descent phase. Did four go arounds. I love it, but it’s not for everyone.
The picture above is taken during one of those go-arounds above Wickenburg. After all the tests were done, Petr, our flight test engineer, went to the back of the plane and I got to sit on his place in the cockpit during the approach and landing at Deer Valley airport in Phoenix.
I took my team out for dinner in the evening. I am really proud of them. They have done a five week campaign here in Arizona, with excellent and important results.
Thursday
A long day in the office, and this time it started really early, so I had to skip the morning run.
Friday
My final morning run, and because I wanted some change. and because it was my birthday, I drove a little further. The Apache Wash Trail Head is a fifteen minute drive from the hotel. The loop there is nice because it’s flat.
It was a beautiful full moon, and at the end of the run I witnessed the launching of more than 15 hot air balloons:
Then, work in the office and in the afternoon I headed to the Phoenix Sky Harbor airport. British Airways brought us to London in probably their oldest Boeing 747 (I slept most of the time, so I wasn’t too upset that my little screen didn’t function). We camped for about an hour at Heathrow Terminal 3, and then we took the BA flight to Vienna, where the company driver was waiting for us. At home at 9:30 pm. Spent a few hours chatting with Romana and the kids, then went to bed.
Sunday
Garden work. Then two hours of light cycling. Romana, Robin and I rode to Bilovice nad Svitavou, where we had a lemonade, and then back. This evening, we’re going out to Koishi, one of the best restaurants in this country, to celebrate the birthday of my daughter Lenka, as well as my own birthday.
Apr 27 2019
A week of doubles
Monday
Romana and I went out in the double. We did steady state with a 10 stroke race pace interval roughly every kilometer. A very nice row. After we finished, the wind started to increase and the lake showed its ugly face, but we had a nice row.
Wednesday
No row on Tuesday. First day back in the office after my trip to the US. Lots of debriefs to do and some unpleasant meetings as well.
In the evening I drove to the rowing club for a short meeting with the Masters men. We discussed the upcoming season, mainly which races to row in the club eight, and also which disciplines we will start at the Masters Worlds in Hungary.
After the meeting, Tomas, Ondrej and I went to the weights room and did the following simple but killing workout. Five rounds of:
Including erg warming up (10 min) and spinning cooling down, the workout lasted only 50 minutes, but my muscles hurt for three days after.
Friday
Thursday: Another long day. Spent most of it in two very long calls that I took instead of my boss, who is on vacation. I think this was the first day without feeling the jet lag.
On Friday, I decided to leave work early to be in time to say goodbye to Romana, Robin and Dominik who were going to races in Prague, together with the juniors 15/16 and boys and girls 11/12 and 13/14 of the club. After that, I took a rowing related call from the club house and then did a longish workout in the single:
I left out the bungee cord. It was windy and choppy but I didn’t mind. I was happy to be out in the single again.
I really enjoyed this workout. Each series lasted about the length of our lake. Good training programming by our head coach. In the third interval I was catching up with a launch and a pair from the rowing club from the opposite shore. That gave me some motivation to push a little harder. Even though I rowed without bungee, I did rate down to 16/17spm and rowed at a much higher Work per Stroke (WpS) than normal. I pushed at around 620 Joules per stroke, 170 Watt. Heart rate remaind low, of course, at these low stroke rates.
Saturday
Today was a mini training camp. My rowing buddy Kazimir came over from Hodonin to Brno and we did our first sessions in the double of this season. We intend to race the World Rowing Masters together (and a few local races as preparation).
The morning training was a 3x2km at 24-26spm. I arrived at the club at 9am, just in time to have a little chat with our Masters Eduard and Ludek before they launched for the same training in the double.
By the time Kazi and I had warmed up, Ludek & Eduard were about to start their third 2km interval. So naturally we rowed besides and in front of them. Ludek & Eduard go out in the double several times a week, but despite the choppy water and us being together for the first time in 2020, we managed to get in front and create some clear water. Well, admittedly, it was our first interval and their last one.
We stayed on the north end of the lake to avoid the worst chop on the south end. As you can see, the Albano buoys are out again, making it much easier to row a straight line in our 2k course.
Power values by estimation (using rowsandall.com power estimation).
Workout Summary - media/20190427-0920420o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|12259|71:53.0|02:55.9|000.0|24.0|142.7|181.0|07.1
W-|06837|28:34.0|02:05.4|000.0|24.9|167.1|181.0|09.6
R-|05428|43:18.0|03:59.4|000.0|23.4|126.5|181.0|06.1
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
01|02026|07:58.4|01:58.1|000.0|25.5|169.6|177.0|10.0
02|02016|08:59.3|02:13.8|000.0|25.5|173.9|181.0|08.8
03|01991|07:57.0|01:59.8|000.0|25.8|167.1|176.0|09.7
04|00361|01:37.6|02:15.1|000.0|20.9|145.7|152.0|10.6
05|00443|02:02.6|02:18.3|000.0|20.1|144.8|149.0|10.8
After the 2k intervals we rowed back up to the start of the 2k course. I had the impression we were rowing light, but somehow pace values were very fast. I think it was the strong wind pushing us.
We had a shower and then walked to the “At the lion” pub for a lunch. We were joined by our U23 national squad member Lubos, so we discussed last weekend’s selection races. Kazi’s brother-in-law was part of the same light weights group as Lubos, and there had been some drama around the selection, leaving Kazi’s brother-in-law on the shore, and Lubos and one other member of our club in the national U23 LW quad. All three were trained on our club under our head coach Adam, even though two of them are now rowing in Prague at the national center at Dukla. We seem to have quality lightweights, and our club is supplying many of them.
After lunch, we had coffee in the club house and looked at the metrics for the first workout. Then we launched for what we intended to be a short (10k) technique row.
However, because it was still windy, we decided to row into the gorge to seek shelter, and the rowing was fun, so we turned no earlier than 7.5km from our club house:
It was a very good training. We did some technique drills and we spent the bulk of the row trying to find a light stroke, with some emphasis on the second half of the drive. I did a few pieces at 24spm, 28spm and 32spm (but light pressure) to check how the boat runs.
The charts above were measured with the Quiske pod under my (stroke) seat for the 24spm (blue), 28spm (green) and 32spm (red) intervals.
This was a very important workout. I think we really came together here.
By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: 2x, double, intervals, Kazi, lake, OTW, river, river lake, rowing, technique