Rowsandall

Oct 27 2017

A lot going on actually

#Wednesday

Body weight exercises. Several iterations of the Wahoo Tickr 7 minute set. I am going to do these ones more often. A short session but still feeling DOMS on Friday.

#Thursday

Erg session. 2 kilometers warming up. Then a 10k row. I tried to hold 180W and stay below 165bpm heart rate at the same time. Ended up at 178 Watts. Towards the end I ignored the heart rate cap and tried to get back to 180W average power.

I tried a 2x1min intensive bit before the cooling down.

#Friday

A busy day. In the afternoon, my sons visited me at work. We had organized a little event for kids where they could fly our airplane and helicopter simulators.

Then we headed to the rowing club. Dominik did an erg session and a circuit training. I went out in the single despite severe conditions on the lake. There was a lot of chop but when I reached the gorge it was just windy. It wasn’t sunny, unfortunately, it even rained a bit. Still, I took some pictures of Veveri Castle and the woods around it.

The row was a light steady state session. Not too hard because of tomorrow’s race. Unfortunately, I forgot the heart rate belt at home, so no heart rate values. The headwind section:

The tailwind section:

I was running a Beta version of BoatCoach in parallel with the SpeedCoach. Dan Eiref of BoatCoach prepared a beta based on some tests I did for him. I am happy to report that Stroke Rate and Pace are now very close to the values of the SpeedCoach.

The comparisons were done on rowsandall.com.

On top of that I did a few good changes to the Critical Power parts of the rowsandall.com site. More about that another time.

By sanderroosendaal • rowing • 0 • Tags: Comcept2, erg, OTE, OTW, rowing, steady state, training

Oct 24 2017

The Power of Habit

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Now, at the start of the winter off season, the most important thing is to keep working out regularly, keep sticking to the plan and building the habit. Coming back from illness, this is hard. On Monday, I actually decided to take a rest day to finish some fine tuning of a new feature on rowsandall.com. My plan allows for this sort of flexibility. I simply took the rest day on Monday instead of Wednesday.

Today, I listened to this Rowperfect rowing chat with Charlie Simpson and Jim Flood who have published a new book on rowing coaching. At the end of the podcast, they come to talk about Rowing Data. What they said made a lot of sense and I am excited to see that rowing data starts to be discussed more and more frequently.

The session was the usual 2 stretches of 30 minutes. In the first set, I rowed Wolverine plan rate ladders. I started doing the same in the second set, but noticed my heart rate rising to above 170 bests per minute, so I took down the power to stay under 165 beats per minute.

First 30 minutes:

Workout Summary - media/20171024-1835500o.csv --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|07232|30:04.0|02:04.7|180.6|19.9|157.7|172.0|12.1 W-|07233|30:04.0|02:04.7|180.6|19.9|157.5|172.0|12.1 R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|172.0|00.0 Workout Details #-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS- 00|02399|10:00.0|02:05.0|177.4|19.3|144.8|161.0|12.4 01|02421|10:00.0|02:03.9|182.4|19.8|160.3|167.0|12.2 02|02413|10:04.2|02:05.2|181.9|20.6|167.2|172.0|11.7

Second 30 minutes:

Workout Summary - media/20171024-1835500o.csv --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|07224|30:04.0|02:04.9|180.6|19.9|157.7|172.0|12.1 W-|07226|30:04.0|02:04.8|180.6|19.9|157.5|172.0|12.1 R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|172.0|00.0 Workout Details #-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS- 00|02395|10:00.0|02:05.2|177.4|19.3|144.8|161.0|12.4 01|02413|10:00.0|02:04.3|182.4|19.8|160.3|167.0|12.2 02|02417|10:04.2|02:05.0|181.9|20.6|167.2|172.0|11.7

Heart rate drift was 8% in the first interval (warming up effect) and 2% in the second one. I am not 100% sure how relevant this metric is, but rowsandall.com reports it, as it was requested by a user, so I take note of the values.

Before the session, I visited an exhibition of art work made by my daughter and her classmates.

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

Oct 22 2017

Training for Red Bull Head of Prague – turning an eight

So we signed up for this race, to be held next weekend.

The course is interesting:

Four kilometers downstream towards the center of Prague, then a U turn (in the eight) and finally two kilometers against the stream.

They also have a fun video with beautiful shots of eights racing into the great Prague skyline:

We will compete in the Mixed category. So on today’s session we decided to

Row a 3k at head race pace
Work on our turning technique

First, we did a 2k warming up:

Then on to the 3k:

Workout Summary – media/20171022-1625510o.csv
–|Total|-Total-|–Avg–|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
–|Dist-|-Time–|-Pace–|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR–|-HR–|-DPS
–|03166|12:47.0|02:01.2|000.0|27.9|173.3|185.0|08.9
W-|03000|11:08.0|01:51.5|000.0|28.0|173.5|185.0|09.6
R-|00166|01:38.0|04:57.7|000.0|26.5|167.7|185.0|03.8
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|00500|01:50.6|01:50.6|000.0|27.2|150.4|169.0|10.0
01|00500|01:51.5|01:51.5|000.0|26.6|171.7|174.0|10.1
02|00500|01:50.0|01:50.0|000.0|27.3|175.3|178.0|10.0
03|00500|01:51.8|01:51.8|000.0|27.9|178.7|181.0|09.6
04|00500|01:52.2|01:52.2|000.0|28.9|181.1|183.0|09.2
05|00500|01:52.7|01:52.7|000.0|30.2|183.1|185.0|08.8

That was a good workout, and I think we found a sustainable pace for the 6k, especially given that we have some team members who are significantly older than I.

The next part was trying out the turns, which looked pretty spectacular as a few times we came quite close to one of the big tourist boats, our cox demanded a turn in three, two, one, and we did a water splashing turn. Quite a few of the tourists took pictures. Here is our course:

We had the feeling that we were improving, but looking at the close-up charts, the turn took us around 30 seconds every time. In the first one, we started going straight too early, though.

That was fun! Doing the turn, we have to remember to lean on stroke side so that the bow side can take quick strokes and actually turn the boat, while we on stroke side are trying to keep our blades and oarshaft under water and help. Big risk of ejection crabs for us on stroke side.

There was another fun aspect of this row. I recorded it with my NK SpeedCoach, then used the NK Android app to download the data to the phone and send it to rowsandall.com by email. By the time I was showered, I had the workouts on the site, including the charts, and I have been able to write this blog including the charts on the iPad, without the need to boot up the computer to run the LiNK PC software. There had been a NK app for over a year, but it didn’t export the Empower metrics, nor did it export coordinates. I like a little map with my Row, and I like to look at Empower data (although today they weren’t there, as the eight is not equipped with Empower oarlocks). The export worked like a charm. I find that very cool, although I must say that the user interface in the app is not the most intuitive. (Which may be a case of the pot telling the kettle it’s black, as the rowsandall.com user interface has been criticized as well.)

By sanderroosendaal • rowing • 0 • Tags: eight, lake, NK, OTW, rowing, training

Oct 21 2017

Recovery Row in the Double

I haven’t exercised in a while.

Sigh.

I returned from my business trip to Egypt feeling well and happy that I didn’t get the food poisoning that they had warned me about. On the evening of my return trip, I did a steady state row on the erg, but I stopped after 30 minutes, because Romana came home and I wanted to greet her more than I wanted to exercise.

Then the misery started. The next day, on Friday, I am having lunch with my team and all is well. An hour later, I visit the bathroom and get a nasty surprise. Another hour later, I am not feeling well. Feeling feverish. I decide that I need to drive home as soon as possible. I spend the rest of the day at home, on the couch, under a blanket, feeling miserable. Terrible headache, belly not good, and fever. I did manage to drink 2 liters of disgusting salt/sugar water mix that I made for myself.

Over the course of the weekend there are ups and downs. I am now eating only light food. After every meal I have to lie down for an hour because of belly cramps. I start taking activated charcoal pills. It seems to slowly get better. On Monday, I work from home. On Tuesday, I feel strong enough to go to work. All seems well.

On Wednesday, I am packing to go to Sofia, Bulgaria, but I am on a 45 minutes fine, 15 minutes of terrible cramps interval session. That lasts the entire morning, and I decide to take the chlorine containing pills that claim to clean my intestines leaving the good gut flora alive.

I depart to the airport, telling myself that if things get worse, I can always turn around before boarding and just go home. But this is an important trip.

My situation improves and I make the trip fine.

Friday, I am back, and it’s ups and downs again, but more ups than downs.

Today, Saturday, I even dared to take out a boat and row. I took our double together with my daughter Lenka.

It was a nice autumn morning. I took some pictures:

And the map:

It is good to be back among the living. Now I urgently need to review my training plans because ten days of travel and being sick does have an impact, and I think I should ramp up slowly and carefully.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: double, illness, OTW, rowing, training

Oct 11 2017

Pyramid Session

No, not the Pete Plan Pyramid (250/590/750/1000/750/500/250m), although I believe I have that one scheduled for later this week.

On a business trip to Cairo. No training, this pyramid session was just about visiting the pyramids and enjoying these amazing ancient monuments.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0

Oct 10 2017

Monday – a good old. 4x2km

Originally, I wanted to go out in my single, but I had an interview candidate at 4pm, and it gets dark early. Also, the weather was quite windy.

So I decided for an erg workout. A pretty hard one as well, because I am entering a training cycle with a few intense sessions. My legs were still not recovered from Saturday’s race, but I will be traveling without exercise for two days, so I am postponing my “rest”. The normal training plan adjustments that you need to do if you want to combine training with work and family.

I did a 2km warming up, selected a good rowing music list on SoundCloud, put the speaker on loud and started off.

         Workout Summary - media/20171009-1901270o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|10810|50:03.0|02:18.9|205.1|24.6|156.1|181.0|08.8
W-|08000|30:01.0|01:52.6|245.7|26.0|165.8|181.0|10.2
R-|02813|20:02.0|03:33.7|095.4|21.7|141.3|181.0|00.4
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|02000|07:31.7|01:52.9|241.2|25.2|157.9|169.0|10.5
01|02000|07:33.2|01:53.3|242.3|25.9|166.1|174.0|10.2
02|02000|07:31.2|01:52.8|244.2|26.2|168.7|176.0|10.2
03|02000|07:25.5|01:51.4|255.4|26.9|170.5|181.0|10.0

As usual, the first interval was a bit harder than the second, but they were all pretty hard. I was targeting a 1:53.2 average pace, just because that was the winter season opening pace from the last year I did the Pete Plan session. I still have a piece of paper pinned to a piece of wood (an old door, in fact) next to the erg. So, you could say I was aiming for the score on the door.

Even though the second interval was easier, I went slightly above the target. The way I row this, I row target split plus one second for 800m, then target split, and then accelerate or back down depending on the average, to hit my target split.

In the third interval, I didn’t back down.

In the fourth one, I tried to row the final bit full out. The playlist had ended but SoundCloud followed up automatically with something pretty good. I wonder what algorithm they are using.

Stroke length was pretty consistent.

The work per stroke is an interesting one. On the erg, I pull lower stroke rate and higher work per stroke than on the water. This is a static erg. I guess it is natural.

What intrigues me though is that I currently have the feeling that the power I can hold OTW in steady state or in hard distance workouts is higher than what I can do on the erg. My race of Saturday was at 260W, or 1:50.4 pace, which is pretty close to my best 6k efforts of last winter. When I started using the NK Empower Oarlock, I was pulling significantly lower Watts on the water.

There is a psychological effect as well, in that pulling on the boring erg is harder mentally than zipping around on the lake.

It will be interesting to see how this reverses during the winter.

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

Oct 10 2017

in the eight

Still tired from Saturday’s race. I guess a rest day would have been more appropriate, but we rarely have enough people to row in the eight, and also I would have two travel (“rest”) days in the coming week.

It was good weather to go out in the eight. Very choppy.

The SpeedCoach didn’t record the first two kilometers of warming up, even though it was set to Ready and reading stroke rates. This is apparently a known bug. A reset or power cycle fixes that, but that is hard to do when you are six seat in the eight and you are doing drills under the coxswain’s command. So I missed 2k. Too bad.

We plan to race a 6k race end of October, in the mixed category, so we did a few sets of strokes at race pace.

By sanderroosendaal • OTW • 0 • Tags: eight, OTW, rowing, training

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A lot going on actually

The Power of Habit

Training for Red Bull Head of Prague – turning an eight

Recovery Row in the Double

Pyramid Session

Monday – a good old. 4x2km

in the eight

Calendar

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