Dec 24 2018
The session was warming up 3000m, then 2x17min at 20-21 SPM.
It was a nice Sunday afternoon. Most of our male Masters were ill or unable to attend, but the girls and I were there to erg.
I made my warming up a bit longer (5km) and I also did a bit longer cooling down. Ended up doing a training rScore of more than 90, where 70 was required.
Just an ordinary pre Christmas erg session.
Dec 23 2018
Tuesday
A nice swimming session. Since I added swimming to my winter cross-training about a year ago, I’ve never looked back. One could of course question whether it is an effective way to cross-train but here are my observations:
So, enough reasons to be happy with the swimming sessions.
Wednesday
This was an interesting session by our coach. I am not sure what to think about it. The instructions were:
Warming up 3000m.
19 minutes as 4min/3min/2min/1min/2min/3min/4min at 20/22/24/26/24/22/20 spm
4 minutes rest
6 minutes as 1min/1min/1min/1min/1min/1min at 20/22/24/26/24/22 spm
The additional instruction was to row as many meters as possible in the pieces.
I am not sure I really maximized the meters. Perhaps I should have pulled harder in this session. The 6 minute interval was much less hard than I expected. This workout also scored 20 points lower in terms of TSS than I had anticipated.
This was the first full session with the new handle (and new shock cord), and I did get some blisters. The new Concept2 handle is a bit rougher than I am used to, and apparently my fingers are moving more. Not sure I liked it … It’s interesting how I don’t have this problem with identical handles at the rowing club ergs. Perhaps it’s just the newness factor.
Friday
The dreaded 30 minutes at 22 spm. First, I did a nice long (15 minutes) warming up. Then I set out to row the 30 minutes. I had taken a conservative target of 1:58, allowing myself to row 1:59 split for the first 12 minutes, then accelerate.
The plan failed. I didn’t stick to 1:59 but pulled 1:58 and 1:57 in the first 10 minutes “because it feels good” and I expected naively to be ahead of the plan. Then, when it was time to stick to 1:58 or faster, suddenly that became harder, and when it was time to speed up (at 10 minutes to go), I actually slowed down and had difficulty keeping my splits under 2:00. I did manage to speed up to 1:55 – 1:54 eventually, but only in the final minute.
Workout Summary - media/20181221-1136030o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|07600|29:58.0|01:58.3|211.2|22.0|177.3|183.0|11.5
W-|07602|29:59.0|01:58.3|211.2|22.0|177.3|183.0|11.5
R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|183.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|01514|05:55.7|01:57.4|213.7|21.9|164.1|177.0|11.7
01|01522|05:58.7|01:57.9|214.1|22.0|178.8|181.0|11.6
02|01539|06:02.9|01:57.9|214.0|22.1|181.5|182.0|11.5
03|01500|05:58.8|01:59.6|205.1|22.0|181.3|183.0|11.4
04|01527|06:03.0|01:58.8|209.0|22.1|180.8|183.0|11.4
My handle issues continued. Actually, a blister burst around 10 minutes into the row. Here’s how my hand looked immediately after the 30 minute (I’ll make that a medium sized picture):
I finished with a very slow 15 minute cooling down.
I made this row part of an on-line indoor rowing challenge, where you can sign up on rowsandall.com and compare the results. Here is the comparison with Greg Smith, who struggled through this workout as well:
So even though he HD’ed twice, he still was faster than I. It’s not fair! At least I beat him in the heart rate comparison.
The fixed stroke rate sessions are also interesting from a rowing data perspective. It enables you to look at how work per stroke is affected by fatigue. Normally, as we get tired, we rate up to compensate for that, but this is not possible in a fixed rate row.
So when I dropped my pace, I got a bit shorter on the drive length and work per stroke droppped, but what surprised me was the change in the Average/Peak force ratio. Here is a look at average and peak force:
So peak force remains pretty constant, but the average force drops. Two things could cause this:
Both are about keeping form and sitting strong. I don’t have video evidence but I do believe this is what I need to work on, keeping a strong position even when fatigue sets in. I could have gained a few meters with that.
Saturday
Two sessions in series. First, a nice 40 minute run. I ran with Dominik, my son who is 14 year. It was great fun, because he is now a faster runner than I, so we were both enjoying that. He liked to be faster and be asked to slow down a bit, and I liked how he enjoyed being faster than his father.
Unfortunately, the GPS recording of this run was crazy. I am using Polar Beat on the Android phone and it takes ages to lock into a GPS position. When I start running before it locks the position, it never catches up. According to Polar Beat, we ran 49 kilometers in 45 minutes. Unbelievable!
The funny thing is that the same phone has no trouble locking the GPS position when I use any other app, be it Google Maps or their local equivalents or a route planning app like Waze. I should make a note to stop using Polar Beat. It’s no use.
Average heart rate 149 beats per minute (mostly between 145 and 160).
After the run, I did a 30 minute “CORE exercises” session with my wife Romana. Given my remarks above about erg posture, paying attention to core strength is not a nice-to-have but a real need. Romana’s core session is tough, but it’s a really good strength session for arms, shoulders, and especially core muscles.
5x1min PLANK / 30 sec
5×40 sec Side Plank / 20 sec
5x 40 sec Sit-Ups / 20 sec
5x 40 sec deep, slow squats / 20 sec
5x 40 sec Push-ups with legs on Pezzi ball
5x 40 sec/20 sec of something we call “Torch” and it really “torchures” your belly.
Dec 17 2018
Another long bout of silence on this training blog. I was busy with work priorities, as well as finishing the new Indoor Virtual Racing functionality on rowsandall.com. Here’s the overview:
So the rest of the week of December 3 was weak in terms of training. I was at a conference in Salzburg and there was too much going on to get in the training. So the first session I did was a steady state of 4×12’/3′, which I replaced with a solid hour of rowing on the erg.
Then, on Sunday, we did another group row at the rowing club. Again 2x(8x500m/70″)/5min. A bit shorter rest intervals. I tried to hold the same split as in the week before, but failed dramatically in the second series. Here are the intervals for that second series:
You can see how I crashed both in terms of pace and Work per Stroke. Not nice.
On Monday December 10th, I was supposed to do steady state, prescribed as warming up, 2x25min, cooling down. Because we were testing the indoor virtual regattas, I did 2x6km and a whole lot of shorter rows. Almost 16k of steady state.
On Tuesday, I had a delightful 50 minute swim. I love these workouts.
Then, on Thursday I had the 2x500m revanche.
What a relief to set a good performance on this workout.
On Saturday, I did a running session followed by a body weight strength workout. The run was quite frustrating because there were some issues with the GPS signal in the Polar Beat app. The app talks to me, reporting average heart rate and split every kilometer. But because of the GPS issues it was shouting reports every few seconds. At one point it reported 42 kilometers in 20 minutes!
Otherwise the run was lovely. On fresh snow, along the river.
Quite nice, isn’t it? Apart from the fact that it is unrowable.
After that, I went to our club’s weights room for the second half of the session:
The weight room is small but complete. Here was my workout:
5 series of:
It was quite intensive, I must say. Took me about 30 minutes.
On Saturday evening, we had a nice Christmas party at the club house, including a 6x300m relay race. (I rowed a time of 54 seconds which brought my team in leading position with two rounds to go. Unfortunately, I was followed by two non-rowing mothers of athletes, so we ended up 2nd place.)
On Sunday, I did a full out 500m to participate in a Virtual Online Challenge. After that, I did the regular workout of 2x(6x300m/90sec)/5min. This is a nice sprinterval workout.
Overall not bad.
Dec 4 2018
Although I make training plans for others and I have made training plans for myself, I am really happy to train a plan designed by our club’s head coach. There is something that makes executing someone else’s plan so much more rewarding. There is the feeling that somebody is willing to help you. It creates some extra commitment. And last but not least, you get to do some new sessions.
For the same reason I love our Sunday erg training group. This Sunday we were two men and two women, all Masters rowers. We put up some good music and set out to erg in our “lake view” erg room.
The session was 3km warming up followed by 2x(8x500m/80”)/6min. At 26spm. We changed it to 1’50 intervals which was about 500m for me (503 to 505), about 520m for Martin and a little less for the ladies, but at least we could start at the same times.
It was a hard but not impossible session and I managed to empty the tank with one minute to go doing 40spm and 1:35 pace. I need to ask the coach about this session. I guess it is typical threshold work.
On Monday I drove to Salzburg, participated in a workshop in the afternoon and had some social events in the evening.
This morning I did the following session:
40 minute running, followed by
5 series of 20 pushups, 40 squats and 30 sit-ups
The run was great. I am staying in a hotel close to the Congress center and right next to the river. So I woke up early and found a great foot/bicycle path with street lighting along the river.
I had some issue with my right calf after 4km, so the run back was a bit slower than the run there. But it was a great run with the view on the castle, the river, and the old town of Salzburg.
Dec 2 2018
I didn’t have time to update this training diary blog for a long time, so here are the summaries. On the last week, I still have a session to go, so I think I will hit the mark. I think I should be pretty happy about hitting the target. The truth is that I am planning a slightly more realistic number of sessions. That, and I didn’t have a lot of business travel lately. Here is how the sessions looked in detail:
The color coding indicates doing less (light green) or more (purple) or hitting the target (green). The white dot is today;s session which I still have to execute. I am afraid that 2x(8x500m) is going to be a tough one.
So overall a pretty good run, I think.
Saturday’s training was also a pretty good run, especially given the circumstances.
I am doing weights sessions prescribed by my club’s coach. They are fun to do because he mixes the exercises quite frequently, so there is almost always a new thing each week. So you always end up with DOMS for two days.
Actually, while writing this blog I have to admit that I mixed up the Czech instructions the trainer gave us. I now know I was supposed to do this:
Instead I did a barbell lift from the floor to the chin, 4×15, and I am still feeling it. Legs. Shoulders. Arms. It’s a damn good exercise. Although I am sure that the original exercise was a tough one too.
So on Saturday I did a slow run, on the first snow of the winter season. It was great. I ran for an hour and 10 minutes. The Polar Beat app recorded it as 15km, but it certainly was less. Nice slow, hilly, snow run. I really enjoyed it.
Finally, here are two 3×15 minute sessions from the past two weeks combined. They are twelve days apart, and I think it shows pretty good consistency. I may be fooling myself, but holding 190 – 195W in steady state on the erg seems to feel easier than a month ago.
.
Nov 23 2018
Lactate Step Test Results
I received the Lactate Step test results. Here’s a chart comparing them with results from the 2017 test:
So my 2.0 mmol/L level is fitted to be at 202W (HR 164) and my 4.0 mmol/L level is fitted to be at 237W (HR 174). A year ago, the results were 212W (HR 164) and 247W (HR 178) respectively. Here’s the fit curve from this year’s measurement report:
Here’s 2017 for comparison:
So, did my fitness decrease or is this identical within the measurement error?
It’s actually not so important. A year ago, I concluded that 211W was a high value and I decided to do my steady state rows below 200W. This year I will draw a similar conclusion: Steady state not above 200W.
From data on rowsandall.com, I estimate I can hold a pace of 1:55 to 1:57 for one hour (220 to 230 W):
On Rowsandall.com, I will lower my FTP value to 220W. At this point in my training, a 1:57 pace for an hour feels more realistic (and was what I achieved when I last did it, but that was almost a year ago).
Dec 27 2018
Limping home
Monday – 24/12/2018
Romana and I went swimming. Forgot to charge my heart rate belt so I swam without recording heart rate. No big deal as I roughly know what the values are. I swam 2km.
In the evening we had a traditional Christmas dinner and then some presents. It was a very nice evening.
Tuesday – 25/12/2018
Christmas!
I did manage, however, to get in a 10k row. We have a Indoor Rowing Christmas Challenge on rowsandall.com and I had to do a 10k either on Tuesday or Wednesday.
We went to a nearby Chateau that always puts up special Christmas decorations. The tour of the chateau is very nice, but the chateau is not heated, so we were all pretty cold when we came back home. There was a two hour gap before I had to help prepare the Christmas dinner, so I grabbed the opportunity to row the 10k. First, I did a 2k warming up, and then I did the main event:
I set out quite conservative, basically because I wasn’t sure about my fitness level, but also because I was still pretty cold after the warming up. For the first 4000m, I didn’t push any further than needed to hold at least 220W. That was quite easy, so with 6k to go I pushed it up a little, and then very carefully kept adding watts. Then, when I sensed that I could equal or even better my last year’s effort of 229W, I started to push it real hard, ending at 231W and a time of 38:16.8.
Happy with the result, although I am wondering how much faster I could have gone with a bit more aggression in the first half. This row really started to hurt only when there weren’t too many meters left, and I knew I could limp home and still post a reasonably good result. Good baseline though for the 10k race in February.
Thursday – 27/12/2018
Talking about limping home … This was one of the worst training experiences of the year.
The idea was a 45 minute run followed by a 30 minute core strength workout.
First, there was the drama with the apps. I have started using the Polar Beat app to record my runs, but recently it has been giving strange GPS results. My theory was that it didn’t find the satellites and then just never caught up. So today I made a point of checking Google Maps and other map apps on the phone to see that the GPS was receiving well. Then I started up Polar Beat and waited until it confirmed that the GPS signal was OK.
I started running and after about 1.5km it started to fail. The app would report a completed 1k lap every few seconds.
Disgusted, I stopped the app and started the Strava app instead. I thought I was recording, but as I found out after the run, I had recorded only 5 seconds. Apparently hit the stop button before I managed to lock the screen of the phone.
Then, about half way, I started to feel pain in my right calf. I continued to run, perhaps slowing down a little. At a point about 3km from home, when I was running on a slightly muddy trail, I felt a sharp pain and I had to stop running.
I walked for about 10 minutes, then did some running again, then walked again, and this is how I limped home. Not amused.
I know this will heal by itself, just by not running for a few days, but it didn’t improve my mood.
(Oh – I did complete the Core Strength session though. Glad I did.)
By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0