Oct 29 2015
Indoor and Outdoor rowing comparison
Wednesday, Indoor
Changed clothes, descended to torture cellar, sat on Concept2 erg. Rowed. Showered
Fun factor: 2 (on a scale from 0-5) – the audio broadcast I listened to was slightly entertaining
Boredom factor: 3 (reach 5 and you fall asleep spontaneously) – Somehow rowing a 10k in 42 minutes is a lot less boring than rowing for 40 minutes
Training effect: 3 – good steady state. Should have rowed a bit longer but it became very sweaty and I was becoming bored
Learning effect: 0 – it was just a 10k OTE
Thursday, Outdoor
Changed to bike/row gear. Rode to rowing club. Launched my single. Rowed. Rode home. Showered.
The Strava status has a nice summary:
It would be fun to do a real mini-triathlon. Ride bike to rowing club, row, run home. Pick up bike another time. Will probably do this one day.
In the single, I did Steady State and used Rowing in Motion to track my strokes. I tried to work on the catch, to see how I could row to produce the famous double acceleration peak that is seen in Olympic crews and not in club crews. I guess I fall strongly in the club category. The pace variations are purely due to the wind strength and direction. I was rowing constant pressure, 19/20spm:
Not sure if I see a difference in the graphs between the first part of the row where I was really focusing on the catch and the second part, where I wasn’t. But catch efficiency and catch duration seem best in the first headwind part.
Apparently, according to this blog post, the so-called “sculler’s catch” is fashionable again, at least on Rowing Illustrated. (By the way, I have a problem with that site because I cannot sign up. Apparently, they think I am a spammer, or another life form that spoils discussions.)
I suspected I row a “sculler’s catch”, which is a catch where you square late and the blade hits the water with a slightly negative angle. You fully square while the blade enters the water. I have been coached this catch when I was 16 and never really got rid of it. I paid attention to what my hands and blade are doing. Yes, I do square late, my blades are very close to the water, and my handle rotates slightly in my hands while I apply pressure. It is a very subtle effect in my case. Not sure by the way how much speed is gained by doing this catch. At least it is a sign that I hold the handle lightly, like one should. (Another sign of that was on Tuesday morning in the sweaty hotel gym, when the Concept2 handle escaped from my sweaty hands during one pull.)
Fun factor: 5 – there was a slight chop. The colored leaves are still partly on the trees so the forests are beautifully gold, yellow and red colored. I passed Lodni Sporty rowing club when a lady in a single had just launched, so I got to pass a young, blonde sculler on a nice Filippi single. Romana and the girls were on the water in a quad. Lodni Sporty had their junior’s quad on the water
Boredom factor: 0 – I rowed the 12k and had the feeling I wanted to add another few kms. A group of about 15 swans have occupied the lake, so I had to be careful at Sirka. I don’t like these agressive birds. During the rides, it was hard to see the rocks during the forest segments, because the path was covered with leaves. A few climbs and descents and some “real” mountain biking
Training effect: 4 – good steady state.
Learning effect: 5 – good to work on the catch
The Verdict
Outdoor sporting wins hands down
Ossenworst, an Amsterdam specialty
Oct 30 2015
Some deliveries, rowing, strength training
Some deliveries
My sportgraphics.com photos arrived and I picked them up yesterday. Last week I received an email from the Czech Post, telling me that my merchandise from the US had arrived and that they could do the customs for me if I mailed them the original invoice. So I did. Due to travel and public holidays, it wasn’t until yesterday that I could pick up the parcel.
It’s a framed picture of Romana and I doing our Mixed 2x in Hazewinkel and it will be a birthday present. The only downside is that Czech Post also charged VAT over the delivery costs … not sure if that is correct. Well, I discovered way to late to protest.
On Wednesday, Romana and I were discussing the resistance bands for strength training and in an impulse I ordered these ones from Amazon.co.uk. The German Amazon appears to have a lower quality German rip-off of the originals, so I ended up going to Amazon.co.uk. While I was there I also threw in the 2nd edition of Rowing Faster and clicked on next day delivery, which seems to be very reasonably priced on the UK Amazon, compared to the German Amazon.
The bands and the book were delivered to our neighbours yesterday. My sons immediately got hold of the bands and started to play/exercise with them. The idea is that I throw one or two bands and a door anchor in my luggage and I can do a hotel room workout. The other use is to have a “home gym” without having to create a weights room. We’ll see how it works out. The price is much more pleasant than the TRX stuff that is popular with the big guys in my rowing club, so the decision wasn’t that hard. I am only regretting a bit that I went for the anti-snap handles, instead of the bands that connect to the handles with carabiners, which seems a bit more foldable and flexible to me, especially if you want to combine two or more bands to one handle.
Wednesday being a public holiday, I am taking Thursday and Friday off to relax. The original plan was to go to the mountains and do some hiking and mountainbiking, but we decided to skip the longish drive and enjoy a few lazy days at home. After writing up this blog, I will relax on the couch and read Rowing Faster.
After breakfast we headed to the rowing club and I did two sessions, a 40 minute extensive row in the single and a strength session.
Row
Perfect conditions:
After the many reactions to yesterday’s blog, I decided to do a few tests, so I added a few 15 stroke pushes at >30spm to the session. I am glad to say that something of a double peak appears on my RIM analyses at higher stroke rates:
Strength Session
Three rounds in the rowing club weights room:
I had to guess the weights a bit, as this was with free weights which is different than the hotel gym system. If I managed less than 10 repeats in the first round, I lowered the weight for round two. If I underestimated my own strength (pah!) and easily managed the 15 repeats, I increased the weight for the second round.
As the girls were still working out, I played a bit with the bodylastics bands and tried to find the equivalent exercises using the bands, and determine which band strength is the one to throw in my travel bag. The exercise were of course slightly different, but I am confident I can create a demanding strength workout using them.
By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: OTW, rowing, single, strength, training