On Monday, we just loaded the boats. On Tuesday, we drove to lake Velence in Hungary, which is just a 3.5 hour drive from Brno. Boat trailer density increased steadily on the highway as we got closer to our destination. At Velence, our friends from Ostrava had reserved some nice boat rack space in the small boat peninsula. Our boats are on rack C16 on this photo:

There are many more boats to the right of this. After preparing our boats, Romana and I took our double for a spin:

On Wednesday morning, I managed a short training in the single:

On Thursday, I had no races. Romana and her crew had a fantastic victory in the Women’s D coxless pair:

When I was welcoming them back to the dock after the race, one of the ladies (the second from the left on the picture) was selected for doping test. I went with her, as she doesn’t spea kany other languages than Czech. In the end the whole exercise took more than three hours.

On Friday, it was time for me to race.

I was very nervous of course, but as always the nerves disappear after the first stroke.

I wanted to row around 330 to 350W for this row. Not everything went as planned. I came out of the start pretty well, but there were two guys who just rowed away from me. I was the leader of the rest. Around the 500m mark the others started to fall behind and I ended up rowing in no-man’s land, too far from the leaders, but too far ahead of the rest. Third place. A slow time of 3:59. All times were slow at this lake.

My 2x partner Kazi won his race in 3:56.

On Saturday, Kazi and I rowed a pretty good race. Again, somebody was depressingly fast out of the start and way ahead of us. At the start we were fifth, but we quickly passed some boats and then started to catch up with the second placed boat. We were third in a great time of 3:23, which would have one a few of the other heats.

The first race on Sunday morning was the Mixed 8+.

I really enjoyed racing the eight. It’s nice to sit in a big boat, and even great to sit on 5 seat. You just place your blade and pull, that’s it. We were up against Hodonin, 60 km from Brno, so rowing up to the start we joked with them that we could have done that race at home in Brno or Hodonin.

We were up against a International crew featuring some impressively muscular men. Still, we were one of the few boats being able to keep the pace with them. In the end we were third, 5 seconds behind the winners and 0.05 seconds behind Cambridge. Not bad, given that one of our men, Cenek, wasn’t pulling for the last 300 meters. This being just a spontaneous mixed eight, we had difficulty finding the fourth guy. In the end we got Cenek, who trains regularly, but seldom rows above 18 strokes per minute. Doing 35 and higher for more than three minutes, in combination with him being very nervous and having eaten a bit too much at the breakfast buffet, it killed him after 2 minutes and a bit. We paddled back to the dock and had a medic look at him. Everything was fine. Cenek took a nap under a tree and an hour later he was OK.

The final race of this great regatta was the mixed 2x.

This was our best race of this season. We had a great start and we raced some very good opponents, so again we ended up rowing in the middle of the pack. At every point in the race we were racing some other boat, and in the end we were able to race up pretty high and come in fourth place after a great fight for third place.

After that it was time to load all the boats on the trailer, have a quick lunch and drive home. We arrived home at 7pm, after a great regatta.

Romana had some great races (second place in two quads). The weather was great. We slept in a great hotel with a fantastic restaurant, had some good food and good wine. We met friends, chatted about rowing and other things.

Basically the last full week before the World Rowing Masters Regatta. Also the week in which we would have guests from the USA, Australia and New Zealand for the second Prygl Rowing Camp.

On Monday I did nothing. I think it was a typical long work day Monday. It’s become a habit to have Monday fully dedicated to work and not bother with any exercise.

On Tuesday, I did a 6x250m workout. The bad thing is that I don’t remember if I did it in the single or the double.

It looks like I rowed in the double. Why would I use the rowsandall.com power estimation functionality if I rowed it in the single? But the workout is recorded as a workout done in the single. I do vaguely remember that my Empower Oarlock battery was flat, and I probably also forgot to take the heart rate sensor. The splits do look more like a workout rowed in the single. Let’s assume I rowed this in the single.

On Wednesday, I did the last weights session before WRMR. In the evening, we had our welcome session for the camp.

On Thursday, I did a short paddle in the single, while the camp participants were doing their third session of the day. After the warming up, I did one 2k, starting at 24spm and increasing the stroke rate every 500m.

I had to stop early because I got waked by a coach’s launch. It’s ironic that it was my wife Romana who waked me.

On Friday, I had time for another short paddle with some speed bursts:

For a change, my heart rate sensor failed completely.

On Saturday, I did 2×10 minutes on the erg, as part of an ergometer data instruction session. The first ten minutes we rowed with feet out.

On Sunday, we did our only training in the WRMR mixed eight.

I ran around the world in 65 minutes. More about that later.

My last blog post was on August 17. Nine days ago.

On Sunday, August 18th, we went out in a quad. The session was 750m/4min + 500m/4min + 250m. I forgot to put on my heart rate strap, so I only have stroke rate and pace data:

Here’s the summary:

Workout Summary - media/20190818-0951330o.csv
--|Total|-Total----|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time-----|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|02657|00:14:23.5|02:42.5|000.0|27.3|000.0|000.0|06.8
W-|01500|00:05:23.7|01:47.9|000.0|33.2|000.0|000.0|08.4
R-|01158|00:06:15.4|02:42.0|000.0|24.8|000.0|000.0|00.6
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|00750|02:44.6|01:49.8|000.0|32.3|000.0|0.0|08.5
01|00500|01:46.9|01:46.9|000.0|34.1|000.0|0.0|08.2
02|00250|00:52.2|01:44.4|000.0|34.6|000.0|0.0|08.3


I am omitting a 15 minute warming up and a 25 minute cooling down for a total of 65 minutes of rowing.

On Tuesday, August 20, I had to go extremely early. We have VIP managers in town and were doing full days of reviews. I was happy to be able to get in a workout before work.

The workout was 2x(4x(250m/250m)/5min in the single.

That was a nice and tough workout.

I was especially happy with the second series, into the headwind. I had to work much harder to get the same boat speeds but I was able to do it. Average boat speed 4.29 m/s is a 1:58 split per 500m.

On Wednesday, I did a good weights workout.

On Thursday, I made it to the rowing club, but only in time to put my single on my trailer. Trailer to be towed to Trebon by somebody else.

On Friday, I had a work meeting in Prague, so Romana and I left in the morning and she dropped me off at my destination close to the airport. The D1 highway was benevolent that morning, and we arrived an hour early. The meeting went very well, especially after the small chat brought us to South Bohemia (where I was going to go later that day), then to Trebon, and then to rowing. One of the meeting participants turned out to be a former rower, from Trebon in South Bohemia.

After a business lunch, Romana and I took the road from Prague to Trebon, where we arrived around 4:30pm. Romana drove, because I was doing work related calls in the car. We picked up the keys for the accommodation (for us and for 23 other club members, mostly kids) and headed to the rowing club to attend the team representatives meeting.

Then we had to wait for the trailers and the kids to arrive. They had been stuck in traffic on the D1 and arrived when it was starting to get dark. I managed to prepare my single, and then we headed to our “hotel”, the boarding house of the Trebon Secondary School of Fisheries and Water Management. We had a late dinner in a nearby Italian restaurant and went to bed.

Saturday, regatta day!

My first race of the day was in the single. It was a full race with 6 boats in the C category. They put me nicely in the middle in lane 3. It was challenging weather. Cross/headwind throwing up some chop. Around the 2000m, the lake was wild, with big waves, but from our start at the 1000m down to the finish line it was choppy but rowable.

I had a good start and did 10 power strokes. By the time I checked my position, I was in third place behind my friend Jiri Rysavy and Mr Drnek from Vajgar (from the town of Jindrichuv Hradec).

Knowing that this was going to be a slow race, I lowered my power to a sustainable level, trying to aim at 320W. With the cross wind and chop, I had to pull slightly harder on my non power measuring oarlock, and some strokes were slightly off. Nevertheless, the three of us pulled away from the rest of the field.

With 400m to go I increased pressure, and then the stroke rate.

I was trying to catch up with the two boats in front of me, putting pressure on both of them. I was pretty happy with the stroke rate numbers I saw and I also managed to keep good form.

Unfortunately for me, the only effect of my trying was that all three of us sped up and we arrived at the finish line in the same order, just all three very exhausted. I congratulated Jiri and Tomas and we all paddled back to the boat stands.

An hour after my single, I had a fun race.

My son and I competed in the “Master+Child 2x mix” category, where half of the boat must be older than 27 years and the other half between 12 and 14 years. Also, Macon blades are mandatory.

We managed a blistering 1:49 time in the headwind, finishing third in our heat. We would have won all the other heats.

That was a great race. It was pretty hard to row with the Macon blades. You almost feel no resistance in the water, and it’s very easy to mess up the stroke. I hit a buoy with 200m to go and it took me a few strokes to get the blade right again.

The final race of the day was the Masters 8+. Three boats and we came in third. However, it was a board to board race for the entire 1000m and we were holding very well with the other crews, considering that we were a ad hoc crew that had never trained together. I was very happy about how we performed. I was sitting at bow seat, but the boat was rock stable and I was able to pull very hard.

After this race (at 7:30pm) it became dark fast. We went back to our accomodation and visited the same restaurant as the evening before.

On Sunday, I had only one race, in the mM 4-. I decided to do a little cross training in the morning, so I ran around the world. Literally. The lake in Trebon is called “Svet”, which means world. It’s a very nice run. First it goes over the dam, then through a nice park, then along the lake shore, entering marsh lands at “the end of the world”, back through a litle forest, and then through the spa park.

The 4- race wasn’t very good. We never got good rhythm and our sole opponent gave us almost 20 seconds. On bow seat, I couldn’t pull at full power, because when I did I was turning the boat. As this was the very final race of the regatta, we could at least say that our boat closed the course.

The drive home was uneventful, which is a big plus when you are towing a trailer full of new Wintechs and Fluids (and a few older boats):

Tuesday

I took a rest day on Monday. On Tuesday, Romana and I went out in the double. We did technique and steady state.

Romana and I worked very hard on the technique drills and it really helped. The double now feels rock solid at the tap-down.

Wednesday

Another strength training day. I managed to go to the gym in the morning, during the ideal time when there are very few other gym users. There was a lady doing something awful on the Concept2 ergometer, while I was rowing next to her during the warming up. Stroke rate 40 and pulling 3:30 split. You know the symptoms.

Thursday

My wedding anniversary. I still managed to get out in the morning and do a pretty hard workout. The plan was:

2x(7x1min/1min)/5min

I did pretty much that, with one change. Instead of rowing on the lake, I decided to row up into the gorge. The downside is that you have some turns during the intervals. The upside is mirror flat water. I also needed a change of scene.

I really enjoyed this workout. It wasn’t as hard as I remembered it from last time. Maybe because I really focused on a light catch and a good swing.

Here is the summary:


Workout Summary - media/20190815-0655570o.csv
--|Total|-Total----|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time-----|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|11843|01:01:46.8|02:36.5|176.3|22.6|143.6|181.0|08.5
W-|03436|00:13:22.5|01:56.8|323.8|32.1|166.2|180.0|08.0
R-|08419|00:48:25.5|02:52.5|135.6|20.0|137.4|180.0|09.6
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
01|00256|01:02.6|02:02.3|324.0|30.8|134.7|142.0|08.0
02|00240|00:58.1|02:01.2|275.3|31.1|164.3|172.0|08.0 - turn
03|00233|00:54.7|01:57.3|334.1|31.7|166.8|173.0|08.1
04|00239|00:54.6|01:54.0|352.5|31.9|169.2|177.0|08.2
05|00244|00:56.2|01:55.3|342.3|32.0|170.1|177.0|08.1
06|00251|01:01.6|02:02.8|318.6|31.3|167.9|175.0|07.8
07|00233|00:54.8|01:57.5|296.9|31.9|167.7|175.0|08.0
08|00270|01:01.4|01:53.8|357.7|33.1|160.7|174.0|08.0
09|00232|00:53.0|01:54.1|309.2|32.6|170.6|177.0|08.1
10|00259|00:59.2|01:54.5|333.6|32.4|173.0|180.0|08.1
11|00246|00:56.1|01:53.8|345.6|32.9|172.5|179.0|08.0
12|00233|00:52.6|01:52.8|329.5|32.8|171.4|178.0|08.1
13|00251|00:59.0|01:57.6|329.4|32.5|170.8|178.0|07.8
14|00249|00:58.6|01:57.7|284.5|32.8|170.6|177.0|07.8 - turn


At the end of the workout, when I was turning back on the lake, I saw the little guy on the picture, busy fishing.

It’s an amazing little bird, the common kingfisher. It was very fast, diving into the water from an overhanging branch and then returning, flying up like a very bright blue lightning strike. I stopped rowing momentarily to observe it.

Interestingly, according to the internet it’s quite a common bird. When I went to school in the Netherlands, we learned about it, and if I remember well it was described as a rare bird, only seen in the southern part of the province Limburg, in the south.

It might be more common here. I don’t know. It’s a fascinating little animal, though.

In the evening, we went to have a fancy dinner with my family, and after that Romana and I went to the Czech premiere of the new Quentin Tarantino film. It was a very enjoyable evening.

Friday

I needed some undisturbed study time for work, so I decided to not go to the office, but work from home. I not only managed to read everything I needed to (and make notes) but I also got an enormous number of other things done, so by three o’clock I gave myself permission to head to the lake and row my training session.

3x2km/4min, 2000m rowed as 500@24/500@26/500@28/500@30 spm

It was rough water, so I decided to lower the stroke rates by 2.

It was a pretty exhausting workout. I am not surprised to see my heart rate go so high. Here are the stats. They are not exact, because I rowed this in the SpeedCoach’s “Just Row” mode, just watching the total distance.


Workout Summary - media/20190816-1510550o.csv
--|Total|-Total----|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time-----|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|12074|01:04:52.7|02:41.2|160.8|22.4|144.8|186.0|08.3
W-|06253|00:27:43.4|02:13.0|229.8|25.3|172.6|186.0|08.9
R-|05827|00:37:09.9|03:11.3|109.3|20.2|124.0|186.0|07.4
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
01|00106|00:31.1|02:27.1|221.6|23.1|147.0|151.0|08.8
02|00087|00:29.0|02:46.5|211.3|20.8|145.7|148.0|08.7
03|00080|00:21.6|02:14.8|201.7|22.2|132.2|140.0|10.0
04|01883|07:56.2|02:06.5|235.8|25.5|170.1|181.0|09.3
05|02042|09:31.2|02:19.9|234.3|25.5|175.9|186.0|08.4
06|02056|08:54.3|02:09.9|222.2|25.6|176.0|185.0|09.0


Rowsandall.com has a handy feature to determine intervals automatically by pace, work per stroke or power. Here is how it did on this workout:

That’s pretty good, except that it didn’t catch a few strokes in the beginning of the first 2k, when I was making a turn. In the second interval (in headwind) I was happy that I started passing a group of other rowers (two singles and a pair), which gave me the necessary motivation to keep pushing hard at 26 and 28spm. The 28spm are quite tough and I had to revert to counting strokes on all intervals to manage it. In the final interval, I caught up with Romana in a launch and two of her girls in a double.

Saturday

Another outing in the mix 2x. And again it was steady state and technique. Lots of fun drills.

We had fun doing some of the harder drills. This afternoon, there is going to be a wedding garden party at the club, and the preparations were in full swing:

Tomorrow, we plan to do some intervals in the double.

Another quick week review.

I didn’t do any workout on Monday. Even though my training plan assumes Sunday is a rest day, it usually works out like this. I like to concentrate to work only on Monday, and not being stressed about making it to the lake on time or not.

On Tuesday, I again had the Masters ladies 4x as a sparring partner, so I skipped the steady state planned for Monday and did a 2x(4x250m).

It seems that my heart rate band didn’t register the first 250m set.


Workout Summary - media/df_20190806-190517.csv
--|Total|-Total----|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time-----|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|10117|01:03:04.8|03:07.1|164.4|22.7|144.1|185.0|07.1
W-|01850|00:07:18.6|01:58.5|331.6|32.1|164.6|184.0|07.9
R-|08275|00:55:46.8|03:22.2|142.5|21.5|141.4|184.0|07.6
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
01|00237|00:56.6|01:59.3|324.5|29.7|106.8|112.0|08.5
02|00267|01:03.5|01:59.0|346.3|31.1|176.8|182.0|08.1
03|00249|00:59.1|01:58.9|354.5|32.9|178.6|184.0|07.7
04|00250|01:00.2|02:00.4|347.0|34.2|179.0|184.0|07.3
05|00226|00:54.0|01:59.3|291.1|30.0|150.3|168.0|08.4
06|00247|00:58.0|01:57.2|323.8|32.1|176.2|181.0|08.0
07|00234|00:54.0|01:55.5|335.1|33.7|177.4|182.0|07.7
08|00140|00:33.2|01:58.7|320.7|33.7|171.8|176.0|07.5


I tried to pace the intervals such that I started at lower stroke rate, and then increased. It was extremely humid and warm weather, and this felt like a very tough workout, despite the small amount of work time.

On Wednesday, I did an hour of weights. Pretty heavy on the deadlifts and squats this time.

On Thursday, I didn’t have time for a steady state session. I rode to work on the bike instead, and back home at the end of the day. Ninety minutes of bike riding, in the heat, over a hilly course. After that and Wednesday’s squats and deadlifts, I think the inside of my thighs looked like a mushy mess, incapable of any further exercise.

So on Friday I was sparring with the ladies again. It was pretty rough weather, and we did 6x500m/3min. Actually, we changed it to 6x2min/3min.


Workout Summary - media/mailbox_attachments/2019/08/09/86850914f10a427cbae438ca88fa819b.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|-Avg--|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|-SPM--|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|05738|30:00.0|02:38.4|206.0| 25.5 |163.0|188.0|07.9
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|-SPM--|AvgHR|DPS-
02|00455|02:00.0|02:11.9| 289.0 | 29.5 | 117.0 |07.6
04|00472|02:00.0|02:07.2| 310.0 | 30.5 | 179.0 |07.6
06|00511|02:00.0|01:57.4| 300.0 | 31.5 | 172.0 |08.1
08|00495|02:00.0|02:01.4| 293.0 | 32.5 | 176.0 |07.6
10|00471|02:00.0|02:07.2| 287.0 | 33.0 | 173.0 |07.3
12|00472|02:00.0|02:07.2| 292.0 | 32.5 | 177.0 |07.3


This wasn’t too fast but my excuse was the rough conditions.

On Saturday, I did a very fine steady state / technique workout. The mirror was flat as a lake (or was it the other way round), and I could row an entire 3000m stretch with square blades.

I did lots of other exercises, including some of the balance stuff that should impress the people on the Stand-Up Paddle boards. Sadly, they just continue doing their yoga and are not impressed at all.

At the end of the day, I drove to Vienna to pick up my daughter who arrived on a flight from Amsterdam. On the way back we drove through some very heavy rain. Today, I wanted to go to the lake but it’s very hot and humid weather again, so in the end Romana and I just hiked a bit in the hills around our house.

The hike ended in a garden pub, where I had some soup and a beer. Walking back from the pub to our house, we passed the vegetable garden of a colleague, who promptly handed me lots of green beans, a patty squash, and tomatoes. I am firing up the grill. Some steaks as a side dish to the fresh vegetables.

I came back from Linz with a good feeling and highly motivated to get some good training under my belt.

And I think I did a good series. Just didn’t have time to blog about it.

July 29 to August 4

I didn’t train on Monday. I did go to the rowing club to get our boats off the trailer and into the hangar. On Tuesday, I made it to the rowing club after work, but I realized I had forgotten my rowing club keys in my regatta bag. There were a few people at the club, but they told me they wanted to leave around 8pm. So I did a quick 6k tour.

Better than nothing.

On Wednesday I did a big weights session. On Thursday, August 1, I did a 3x2k, where the 2000m was rowed as 500m at 24spm, 500m at 26spm, 500m at 28spm, and 500m at 30spm. Romana and I did this in the double. After the first 2k, we decided to reduce the stroke rate by 2spm in the second and third interval. It was very warm weather and my heart rate reached crazy heights. We also felt that the first 2k was rushed on the slides, so we wanted to focus a bit on stroke rhythm. I think it was an excellent decision, which helped a lot for our boat speed .


#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
05|01961|08:06.3|02:04.0|000.0|26.6|168.9|184.0|09.1
06|01949|08:42.4|02:14.0|000.0|25.3|172.1|184.0|08.9
07|01980|08:26.8|02:08.0|000.0|25.5|171.1|186.0|09.2


The splits are auto generated by rowsandall.com.

On Friday, August 2, my plan was:

750m @ 32spm / 4 min rest
500m @ 34spm / 4 min rest
250m @ 36spm


Workout Summary - media/mailbox_attachments/2019/08/02/3c221e8a74d449f5a107ff017a78b0cf.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|-Avg--|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|-SPM--|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|02739|14:28.9|02:44.5|213.0| 26.0 |160.0|183.0|08.5
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|-SPM--|AvgHR|DPS-
02|00750|02:51.3|01:54.2| 319.0 | 31.5 | 167.0 |08.3 - tailwind
04|00500|01:59.5|01:59.6| 323.0 | 33.5 | 171.0 |07.5 - headwind
06|00250|00:54.0|01:48.0| 386.0 | 37.0 | 159.0 |07.8 - tailwind


Maximum heart rate 183bpm. I was pretty happy with the pace and power values reached.

On Saturday, I couldn’t train because I was visiting my mother in law in Pardubice. On Sunday, I got out in the single, and Romana was in a Masters ladies quad, so we did some good sparring.

We did a 1000m piece, where I tried to hold 300W as long as possible and got to more than 1200m in stroke rate 30. The quad was slightly faster.

But then we did a 1 minute at max power, and I did outrow the quad (doing stroke rate 38) and averaging 414W over 90 seconds, because I decided to continue after the one minute mark: