Rowsandall

Jun 18 2016

4x1km – good enough

So today was a 4x1km with 5 minutes rest. On the water. In the single. Target pace 2:01 in “neutral” weather, or the equivalent of that in whatever weather I would get.

There was a light SouthEast wind. Enough to reach great paces during the tailwind warming up. Enough to slow me down to 2:04 in the first headwind 1000m effort.

But I would have 2 headwind and 2 tailwind 1000m intervals, right? Well, no. During the third interval the wind turned and the final interval was with some headwind as well.

It’s funny. No chop, but still a significant slowing down. Here’s the video.

Even though I row on our lake regularly, I still find it very beautiful. Now with dark green leaves. Also watch my newly painted blades!

Workout Summary - media/20160618-131748-2016-06-18-0906.CSV --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|08793|44:33.0|02:16.1|25.5|161.0|174.2|09.0 Workout Details #-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS- 01|02858| 16:32 |02:52.2|18.2|143.0|171.0|09.6 02|01000| 04:09 |02:04.6|28.9|171.0|178.0|08.3 03|01000| 03:54 |01:57.1|29.4|170.0|180.0|08.7 04|01000| 04:12 |02:06.0|29.5|171.0|179.0|08.1 05|01000| 04:01 |02:00.6|29.6|169.0|181.0|08.4 06|01935| 11:45 |03:02.2|17.5|142.0|156.0|09.4

So 2:04.6, 1:57.1, 2:06.0, 2:00.6, that’s a 2:02.8 average pace. Not 2:01, but not bad.

Looking at the video, I should do two things:

Not dig too deep at the catch
Row a longer stroke. Get length

It was beautiful weather. Nice little clouds. Here’s a few pics I took after the row:

And here is the entire row in graphs:

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 1 • Tags: 4x1km, lake, OTW, rowing, single, training

Jun 17 2016

Travel = Bad Training

Wednesday, Thursday

I wanted to go running but I didn’t manage to. On Wednesday I woke up with a headache and feeling an upcoming cold, as well as tired from the long day at the conference the day before, which ended with a welcome cocktail. I remained in bed long enough to pass the last moment to get up and get a decent training in before having to go to the venue.

Same thing on Thursday. Then it was even harder, because this was the morning after the VIP dinner. I left very early (some were still sending pictures to social media at 4am … not really pictures you want to spread by the way, but who am I to comment), but still reached bed way after midnight.

A conference is hard work. There were fun parts too:

Fun part 1: Overflying the conference venue during one of our test/demo flights. Conference venue = the green building.

Fun part 2: Me explaining something important to a government official — Fun part 2: Me explaining something important to a government VIP

Being back in Amsterdam was fun as well. Even though I didn’t have time to visit my family, being back in the place where I was born and spent a large part of my adolescent years was fun. Nostalgic fun.

So a lot of eating and drinking, socializing, talking, explaining, listening, etc. The good thing was that the temperatures in the auditorium were so high that my suit doubled as a wearable sauna and I actually lost weight during these few days. :-/

Friday

So today I was going to do my fun OTW training, 16×45″/60″R at 1000m race pace.

It wasn’t to be. The wind was so strong I didn’t even have to drive to the lake. No way I would be able to row a decent workout on the water.

So back to the erg.

Not fun. I did a 2k warming up, then dialed up a 45″/60″ rest workout and started doing it. I do these workouts at 1k pace, which means just under 1:40/500m. Every fourth interval I go full out to prove that the 1k pace is slower than max. Slow down if the “full out” interval turns out not to be faster than the last few intervals. I guess my explanation is confusing … please comment if you don’t get it but are interested to know.

After 8 intervals I comforted myself with the thought of being half way.

Then in the 9th interval I handed down. Just like that.

My “inner coach” (see this comment) talked to me during the rest period but couldn’t convince me to get rowing and finish the workout.

So I dialed up a 4k and rowed that one out, starting at 2:00 pace and slowly slowing down:

Tomorrow: 4x1k on the water and I should really video it.

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

Jun 14 2016

Vondelpark run

My hotel is next to the Vondelpark, one of the best running spots in Amsterdam, so I had to run there this morning.

Decided to do three loops, which would amount to about 10km of running. Leaving the hotel, I switched on the Garmin Forerunner 220, didn’t wait for the GPS fix but started the run immediately. Normally this works. You get a zig-zag course for the first few minutes, but then it’s OK.

This time it didn’t work. I didn’t know during the run because the Garmin normally showed heart rate, pace, total time and total distance. But when I arrived and synced, looking forward to see how I ranked on Strava on the multiple Strava segments that must be prepared in that park, nothing.

I tried TCXConverter and a few other tools to read the FIT file directly from the device, but nothing. Looking at a CSV export, it seems that the Garmin managed to get the fix only after 7.8km of running.

https://www.strava.com/activities/608674211

A plot of heart rate vs time, which I did manage to get out of SportTracks:

So tomorrow I will have to spend some time at the park entrance to wait for the GPS fix.

The following segment covers quite well what I actually ran (3 loops):

https://www.strava.com/segments/1624225

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: running, training, vondelpark

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Jun 13 2016

Under and on the Eight

Saturday

Heats day of the Morava races, which are regional races. These races are quite important as they are qualifying races for the National Championships for the 11 to 18 year olds. The races are being held on our lake, so no transport needed this time.

We headed for the lake in the morning. As we were going to sleep at the club and stay for the whole weekend, it took some time to get everything in and on the car, including two bicycles and a lot of food.

I spent the morning preparing my blades for a paint job. There is the new pair of sculls which must be in club colors before the Masters Nationals. Also, one of my old pairs were painted in a rush. By yours truly, I have to confess. I didn’t sand and clean them throroughly before painting, with the result that that paint gradually begins to peel off. This time I was prepared to do the job thoroughly. So I spent more than an hour getting the old paint off those blades, then sanding and cleaning them. Then I discovered that the club was out of the blue paint so I had to hop on the bike to get some new paint. I am happy to report that at the end of the afternoon I had two pairs of nicely painted blades. The only thing is that the paint slightly darkens when it ages, so my third pair is a slightly darker tint. It is either the darkening effect, or the fact that our club is not entirely sure about the right shade of blue that is our club colors.

We do have it specified, mind you, but in a pre-WWII paint numbering standard which is not used any more, and nobody is able to convert it for us. So RAL 5015 it shall be for me.

By then it was time to fire on the barbecue. The girls were out in a quad and I wanted to go for a short row in the single, but my blades were drying and I was responsible for providing dinner.

After dinner, we made a camp fire and had a good time sitting around the fire and chatting. I had no heats, but the kids had done well. My son Dominik had managed to get into the A final on the single (which meant he was qualified for the Nationals) and daughter Lenka and her double partner Iva had done the same in the double.

At 10:30pm it was time for the fireworks.

There is this fireworks contest in Brno. It’s held every year in June and the fireworks are done from a big pontoon in the middle of the lake. From the dock of our rowing club you have the best view of the show.

So we tuned the radio to the station that broadcasted the music to the fireworks show and watched. This year it was really great.

Sunday

Woke up to the sound of birds singing. Breakfast at the rowing club. In the morning I spent some time doing work, but then it was time to get ready for action.

My first race would be at 15:18, so around 1pm I hopped on the bike and cycled around the lake to the Lodni Sporty rowing club for the weigh in. I made 72.2kg with shoes on so no problem there.

The problem was that there were only four LW 1x rowers in that final. Three of them aged 18 to 25 and fast scullers. And me. From our club there was Lubos, who I have occasionally been a sparring partner to, who is trying to get to the U23 Worlds in Rotterdam in the LW2x. Then two guys from Breclav, a Mr Susky who has aspirations as well, and a Mr Rampula, who is unpredictable but can be fast.

Trying to relax before the race, I decided to take it as a time trial and just row a good time. During the day, the light tailwind had turned into a light headwind, so I wasn’t sure what to aim for. Kleshnev predicts a 7:40 2k in neutral weather based on my erg results, but I take that as the ultimate achievable, not as the mean for 7:40 scullers. Based on recent trainings, I thought that under 8 minutes would be a good target. Actually, I have never rowed under 8 minutes on this lake.

In hindsight, I think that the most important decision was to take it as a time trial and ignore the other rowers.

Arrived at the start. Light headwind, still. Set CrewNerd to 2000m and Auto-Start and prepared.

I started off well, but of course started to fall behind the young guys already in the first 500m. But I kept going at 30spm, trying to focus on technique, and getting over the waves as well as possible. When I say waves, I am not talking about chop. I am talking about long standing waves caused by the boat traffic on the lake. These waves really have the ability to throw your balance off, so it is important to stay relaxed and react to the movements of the boat.

By the 1k mark I was rowing about 3 lengths behind the number three, Mr Rampula. I was hoping that Lubos was taking over the lead from Mr Susky by then but I didn’t know. Three singles lengths behind. That didn’t really bothered me, because I noticed on CrewNerd that I was rowing under a 2:00 pace per 500m and I knew the first 500m had been really fast.

The third 500m wasn’t the best. I saw a couple of strokes at a 2:06 pace, but I managed to get back to 2:02 and lower. Then, with 600m to go, I noticed that I was closer to Mr Rampula than I thought. I rated up slightly and started to chase him.

Probably Rampula had gone out too fast, wanting to play with the big boys, and was now paying for it. Anyway, I gradually managed to close the gap and with 250m to go I was half a length behind him.

By now I was really in problems. I was breathing very heavily. Counting strokes. But the fact that I was on Rampula’s tail kept me going.

He managed to stay in front of me. I passed the finish and collapsed, just barely noticing that CrewNerd was still counting down and only stopped 20 m after the real finish line. I guess that’s the problem with GPS measured distances.

CrewNerd stopped counting at 8:06 but I hung around in the finish area and listened to the announced official times. I had managed 7:59.06 and I was very happy with that. Actually made a proud fist punch gesture to celebrate. That must have seemed strange from the grandstands. Comes in last. Is happy. 🙂

And here is how I suffered to achieve this. I am not 100% sure about the immedate jump to “red” heart rate values after the start. The data seem to have a strange plateau there. Need to look into that. Otherwise, though, the picture is true.

After that, I had about 2 hours to recover and get ready for the eight. Of course that wasn’t to be. And worse, there were more rowers in our Masters eight who had done one or two races before that day, so we ended up in third place, beaten by our Elite crew and by a mix of Juniors/Masters/Elite from Lodni Sporty. We managed to leave our club’s historical eight behind us. 🙂

And here are the pictures …

Tailwind changed into headwind. Some of us changed gear

Our head coach sending a pair to the start

The Author almost ready to row to the start

The Author's son rowing to his start — The Author’s son rowing to his start

Group picture of the three eights of our club

Lenka and Dominik did well in their respective races. Lenka was third in the double and Dominik came in fifth in the single. Both in the A final.

The races ended, it was time to enjoy our club house’s brand new beer tap:

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 1 • Tags: eight, lake, OTW, race, rowing, single

Jun 13 2016

Friday – 8×15 strokes – speed work

First time I did a stroke based workout in CrewNerd. This workout idea came from our club’s official Masters rowers training plan. I don’t follow that plan, which is assuming 4 sessions/week, but I receive it in my Inbox and sometimes pick an interesting looking session from it.

This was 6-8x 15 strokes at 38 spm, 2-3 minutes rest between sets. Two sets from standing start. A race prep session.

http://rowsandall.com/rowers/workout/315

Workout Data

Rower:  Sander Roosendaal
Name:   8x15 strokes/2min
Date:   10 juni 2016
Time:   16:03
Distance:   10248m
Duration:   00:57:12.0
Type:   water
Weight Category:    lwt
Workout Summary

Workout Summary - media/20160610-193012-2016-06-10-1702.CSV
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|07674|40:04.0|01:55.3|33.5|148.8|169.1|08.6
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
01|02280| 13:09 |02:52.9|19.6|135.0|164.0|08.9
02|00111| 00:23 |01:46.5|38.1|131.0|163.0|07.4
03|00113| 00:22 |01:38.0|40.5|156.0|171.0|07.5
04|00121| 00:24 |01:40.3|37.2|165.0|173.0|08.1
05|00113| 00:23 |01:44.7|38.0|144.0|166.0|07.5
06|00121| 00:24 |01:40.7|36.9|160.0|173.0|08.1
07|00117| 00:24 |01:43.9|37.0|161.0|174.0|07.8
08|00107| 00:23 |01:48.9|38.6|150.0|169.0|07.1
09|00098| 00:23 |02:01.1|38.0|143.0|167.0|06.5
10|02579| 14:37 |02:49.5|21.8|147.0|168.0|08.1
11|00250| 00:52 |01:44.3|36.8|154.0|176.0|07.8
12|01664| 08:20 |02:30.2|20.0|140.0|165.0|10.0

I really went up high in spm and tried to achieve a good pace. The first 6 intervals were in tailwind. The two final one in headwind. Some steering was required around sailing boats and swimmers.

At the end of the workout I added a 250m full speed from a standing start. Just for fun.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 3 • Tags: lake, OTW, race prep, rowing, single, training

Jun 9 2016

Hill / Random / Heart Rate / Manual

Wednesday – traveled to Brussels.

Going through the Vienna train station I noticed there was a wifi network called “refugees”. It’s easy to be cynical about it. But it shows how important access to information is nowadays, for everybody.

At Vienna airport I saw a Boeing 787 Dreamliner from Ethiopian Airlines. It was a nice sight between all the Austrian Airbuses and Fokkers.

This morning, I found my regular hotel’s fitness room completely revamped. Wow!

The cycling machines were now wall-facing. Apparently pedalists were staring too much at the other users of the fitness room. 🙁
The water fountain had been moved by 1.5 meters to the left and around the corner.

The LifeFitness equipment still offered the usual menu:

Hill
Random
Heart Rate
Manual

I usually choose Random but today I felt adventurous, so I did treadmill on Hill, elliptical on Manual / Intervals and the cycling on Manual / Watts. It was a completely new experience! Still the same old track/hill/map/bar chart choice though:

Ergometer Physics

On the train and during the flight, I have been playing a bit with my physics of rowing toybox. I never really looked at the erg model, so when a discussion was stimulated recently on rec.sport.rowing about the part of the power that is not captured by the PM, I started improving my erg model.

As a result, I have two erg models now. Both have their weaknesses, but they seem to agree on the important bit.

I apologize for the color inconsistency between the two graphs (this was done on an airplane!) and clearly there is a lot to improve, but here are the topics of discussion.

During the drive (first 0.8 seconds of this graph), leg power is used to accelerate the rower’s body and to accelerate the flywheel. The acceleration of the flywheel is done by the force on the handle. That is the red curve in both graphs.
Half way during the drive, the rower’s body starts to slow down. There has to be a negative force on the rower’s body. There are two sources of this, one is the handle force and the other is the leg force. By pushing less hard on the legs and starting to swing the back, the rower slows down. In the top graph, you can see “leg power” go negative. This is where the rower is actually hanging/pulling in the footstretcher in order to stop. If he had rown strapless, he would shoot off the slide.
During the recovery, the rower has to accelerate, then break. One is a positive power (force and velocity have the same direction), the other negative.

The discussion is about how to count these negative lobes. Clearly, they are not measured on the PM. The human leg is not a spring, so you cannot store energy for reuse during the drive, so this negative power has to be accounted somehow. In my model, I just take the absolute value of this power and add it to the total power balance.

It is also clear that the bulk of this extra power is generated during the recovery. During the drive phase, a large part of the kinetic energy in the rower’s body can be transferred to the handle effectively.

Don’t catch me on the numbers and exact shapes of the graphs. It was really toying around trying to explain the principles.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: concept2, ergometer, hotel fitness, OTE, training

Jun 7 2016

Tuesday – 8x500m in the single

Last time I did this (on the water) was in July 2015. Then, I averaged 1:59.3 for pace at 28.5 spm. The training plan prescribed shorter sprint intervals, but I thought it would be interesting to do this standard row as a benchmark.

Today I arrived at the lake after another really busy day at work. We have a VP over from the US so lots of time spent in preparing presentations, then waiting for the vice president to arrive, presenting, etc.

When I launched, the lake was calm, but there was a southeast wind that gained strength during the row. This was a head/cross wind in intervals 1,2, 5 and 6 and a tailwind in intervals 3, 4, 7 and 8.

I tried to focus on technique and hold 30spm, irrespective of pace. I did the 500s like this:

10 strokes focus on “soft catch”
10 strokes focus on strong finish
10 strokes focus on the recovery (not too fast, not too slow, reach far enough)
repeat

Interactive plot here: http://rowsandall.com/rowers/workout/306/interactiveplot
Workout Summary - 2016-06-07-1750.CSV --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|09654|45:17.0|02:03.7|28.3|163.5|175.7|09.1 Workout Details #-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS- 01|02854| 14:42 |02:34.6|19.8|140.0|164.0|09.8 - WU 02|00500| 01:55 |01:55.1|30.7|164.0|180.0|08.5 - headwind 03|00500| 01:59 |01:59.8|30.0|168.0|179.0|08.3 04|00500| 01:54 |01:54.2|30.5|170.0|180.0|08.6 - tailwind 05|00500| 01:58 |01:58.7|29.8|172.0|179.0|08.5 06|00500| 01:59 |01:59.5|30.6|166.0|179.0|08.2 - headwind 07|00500| 02:03 |02:03.7|30.6|171.0|180.0|07.9 08|00500| 01:55 |01:55.5|29.1|169.0|178.0|08.9 - tailwind 09|00500| 01:53 |01:53.0|32.4|171.0|181.0|08.2 10|02800| 14:59 |02:40.6|19.8|144.0|157.0|09.5 - CD

The first and fifth interval were from a standing start. The last interval was an attempt to empty the tanks by rowing the first 30 strokes at the usual 30spm, then increasing to 34spm.

Looks like a 1:58 average over the 500s to me, at a stroke rate of 30spm average. So not much better, not much worse than last year. Actually, my average heart rate seems to be higher. Not sure how happy I am with this benchmark.

Tomorrow: Flying to Brussels & rest day.

Thursday: Hotel gym

Friday: steady state

Saturday: Race heats or start practice

Sunday: Races (2km in single & eight)

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 6 • Tags: 8x500, lake, OTW, rowing, single, training

«< 75 76 77 78 79 >»

4x1km – good enough

Travel = Bad Training

Vondelpark run

Under and on the Eight

Friday – 8×15 strokes – speed work

Hill / Random / Heart Rate / Manual

Tuesday – 8x500m in the single

Calendar

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