lake

Apr 7 2016

Taper Race Day minus Two

The workout

My plan for today was to do a 50 minute row, and have one “lake” of 30 sec / 60 sec rest at race pace.

Arrived at the club. Had a nice chat with the head coach. He saw the Holland Acht (Dutch 8+) training in Gavirate, and expects them to be very good at the Olympics. Nice. I casually asked him what his guys were doing today. “One lake at 22spm, then one lake 30″/60″ rest”, he answered.

Typical.

So it must be a good training to do two days before the race.

Workout Summary - C:Downloads2016-04-07-1545.CSV --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|04020|18:08.0|02:13.9|28.7|162.9|173.4|09.2 Workout Details #-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS- 01|03008| 13:38 |02:16.1|22.5|160.0|171.0|09.8 | 3km 02|00124| 00:30 |02:00.7|28.0|150.0|165.0|08.9 03|00000| 00:30 |0000:00|30.0|165.0|173.0|00.0 | GPS failure 04|00125| 00:30 |02:00.1|30.0|156.0|171.0|08.3 05|00124| 00:30 |02:01.3|28.0|163.0|174.0|08.9 06|00125| 00:30 |02:00.2|28.0|166.0|175.0|08.9 07|00127| 00:30 |01:58.3|28.1|166.0|174.0|09.1 08|00128| 00:30 |01:57.5|30.0|166.0|175.0|08.5 09|00128| 00:30 |01:57.3|30.0|165.0|176.0|08.5 10|00131| 00:30 |01:54.9|32.0|172.0|180.0|08.2

The lake was super flat. One would think there was no wind. I thought so. I thought so during the warming up, and during the first 3km stretch at 22spm. I was really excited to see my average split drop below 2:20 for that part. (By the way, I rowed this as a CrewNerd set course, with start and finish lines that you can define in Google Earth and then upload to CrewNerd. Nice feature.)

But when I turned, I quickly realized that there had been a very light breeze pushing me.

On to the 30 second intervals. My GPS device stopped during the second interval and I had to reset it. That causes the peaks in the graph and the absence of data in interval #3.

Otherwise, it was nice. I know what to focus on to row my best head race stroke, so I tried to focus on that, and I think it works. Keywords: Length. Reach. The Distance-per-Stroke (DPS) parameter is what I monitor.

Programming fun

Just for fun, I wrote to Concept2 for the API to the Concept2 logbook. I got an answer today with a link to a description and a form to fill out and get an API key. So, in principle it is possible to change my Python code so it uploads much more row data to the Concept2 logbook, including splits, so the logbook can create the nice graphs that you get with ErgData.

I am very unexperienced with HTTPS requests (in any programming language), so I am probably not going to do this.

What it tells me is that C2 logbook integration is doable. Painsled, CrewNerd, NK, others: You can do it! I would love to see this integration, as well as direct upload to Garmin, Strava, SportTracks, and of course CSV and TCX downloads. That would be very cool.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: head race, lake, OTW, rowing, single, taper, training

Apr 5 2016

Taper intervals

With all the python stuff I forgot to spend some time on Sunday to plan this week’s training plan in detail.

So in the morning I drove to the club with only a vague notion. I wanted to test a bit at race pace, but have a short training. One, it’s taper week. Two, I was late and needed to be at work in time. I contemplated 500m intervals at race pace.

At the club I met the head coach, and I asked him what he was planning for his team (the men). They were doing

5x(5min)/R4 at 22/24/26/28/30 spm

That was an interesting session. Good training at race pace, but it starts slower, so you can focus on technique and build up to the race pace. I was sold, but I made it slightly lighter:

4x(4min)/R4 at 22/24/26/28. Last minute in last interval to be at 30spm

Here is how I executed it:

4x4min. Third interval in headwind. Massive wake a few meters into the last interval

Workout Summary - C:Downloads2016-04-05-0730.CSV --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|03727|16:00.0|02:08.8|24.9|165.5|172.2|09.4 Workout Details #-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS- 01|00912| 04:00 |02:11.6|21.5|156.0|161.0|10.6| 22spm, tailwind 02|00950| 04:00 |02:06.3|24.2|166.0|172.0|09.8| 24spm, tailwind 03|00884| 04:00 |02:15.7|25.7|171.0|177.0|08.6| 26spm, headwind 04|00981| 04:00 |02:02.3|28.0|169.0|179.0|08.8| 28spm, tailwind

Actually, the 26spm and 28spm felt more comfortable than the 22spm and the 24spm. I guess that is good. I also used stroke counting on those sessions, so maybe it is just a psychological thing. The 4 minutes seem to pass faster when you count to 100.

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

Apr 1 2016

Long Reach (not Long Beach)

Again a quick row between meetings. Raced to the lake. Rowed. Raced home to dial in to the first call of the afternoon.

The session was again a 10 strokes on/10 strokes off, but I changed it and dialed up an old workout: 3x(5x30sec)/8min with 30 seconds of rest in the first set, 45 seconds in the second set and one minute in the final set. I didn’t go above 30 spm and tried to reach long. I noticed that this has a big influence on my boat speed so I want to ingrain this habit firmly.

It was a choppy business on the lake, so I first rowed up to the castle on the river, to seek quiet water. Did the first two intervals there and the final one on the lake with tailwind and stronger and stronger chop, the closer I got to the bottom of the lake. You can see the “lap” points on this little map:

Here are the pretty plots. I am starting to miss having to mess with excel. Now I have the python command line tool it has become a very quick process. The only hassle is having to email the files to myself to get them off the iphone:

Tomorrow, I will row a “sharp” 6k against some of the junior pairs. Race is in 8 days …

Here are the stats for the intervals:Workout Summary - 2016-04-01-1301.CSV --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|01895|07:30.0|01:58.7|29.5|163.5|170.7|08.6 Workout Details #-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS- 01|00117| 00:30 |02:07.9|28.0|144.0|161.0|08.4 - 30 sec rest & headwind 02|00114| 00:30 |02:11.1|28.0|164.0|169.0|08.1 03|00120| 00:30 |02:04.6|28.1|164.0|170.0|08.6 04|00123| 00:30 |02:02.6|27.9|166.0|172.0|08.8 05|00121| 00:30 |02:03.6|28.1|168.0|173.0|08.6 06|00128| 00:30 |01:57.4|29.9|157.0|167.0|08.5 - 45 sec rest & tailwind 07|00128| 00:30 |01:56.6|30.0|163.0|170.0|08.5 08|00130| 00:30 |01:55.1|30.0|168.0|175.0|08.7 09|00122| 00:30 |02:02.6|30.0|167.0|171.0|08.1 10|00130| 00:30 |01:55.9|29.9|167.0|174.0|08.7 11|00132| 00:30 |01:53.8|29.9|158.0|167.0|08.8 - 60 sec rest, tailwind 12|00133| 00:30 |01:52.9|30.0|166.0|172.0|08.9 13|00132| 00:30 |01:53.6|30.1|164.0|170.0|08.8 - increasing chop from here 14|00133| 00:30 |01:52.3|32.1|167.0|174.0|08.3 15|00132| 00:30 |01:54.0|30.0|169.0|175.0|08.8

Overall summary:

Workout Summary - 2016-04-01-1301_data.CSV --|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg --|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS --|11943|64:34.0|02:42.2|20.0|150.7|176.0|09.2

In the mean time, my PM5 is now unstuck from customs, where it was stuck over the long Easter weekend. The parcel is now traveling to my local post office. Knowing the Czech Post, they will try to deliver on Monday or Tuesday. However, I will not be at home, so they will just drop me a note and then I will pick up the parcel at the post office on Tuesday or Wednesday. I need to be patient.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: intervals, lake, OTW, river, rowing, single, training

Nov 21 2015

OTW Row & First Lactate steps

Lactate fun

The “ding-dong” came just before lunch time on Friday. It was the UPS man ringing the doorbell, delivering my lactate meter. I will write a separate review blog about it tomorrow.

It came with a small lancing device but no lancets. No problem. Richard told me that lancing devices are sold in each pharmacy. As I was working from home, I went to the neighborhood Thai for a quick lunch, and as this is in the Czech Republic, there is a pharmacy on every street corner. I am exaggerating just a little. Tried 3 pharmacies and had to explain what I was looking for. I felt very weird, asking for a device to stab myself to get blood. In the third pharmacy they sent me to a shop selling medical devices in the town center.

There, they sold me the Accu-Chek lancing device but the girl told me that they didn’t have the lancets on stock. I asked if there weren’t any lancets in the package with the device. She checked. Negative. I asked her to order them. Tuesday morning.

A bummer, because of course I was very eager to test my new toy.

I ended up trying to stab myself with a (sterilized) needle. This was very painful and yielded just a minimum of blood, which I used to waste two strips.

This turned out to be harder than I thought.

This morning I finally opened the package with the Accu-Chek for a closer inspection. To my surprise there was a set of lancets packaged with the device.

The manual to the Accu-Chek said to first test at depth setting “2” (out of a max 5.5). I tried that, but apparently have a very thick skin. After a few more stabs I managed to get a reasonable drop at the maximum setting. It took another two stabs (and one wasted strip) until I had my first reading: 1.5. Hurray!

Tomorrow I will do my first test. I will probably miss one or two data points but who cares. I can repeat it next week.

I am going to the “long step test” where I will do a few 10 minute steps around my presumed 2.0 mmol/L intensity.

My club mates did the classical 4 minutes step test and the trainer has determined their training bands from that. Unfortunately I missed this opportunity. I don’t have the raw data but here is what I reconstructed from the training bands published in our club house:

Quite impressive numbers … I am afraid that when I will do this test, I will be somewhere to the left of this graph.

Today’s Row

We still don’t have a winter dock built and the water level is continuously falling. When I arrived at the club, the air temperature was +3 degrees C and the water was colder.

Instead of wading in, I decided to build an improvised dock. Actually, I was quite proud of the end result which was perfectly usable:

vlot 001 — First part of improvised dock

The water next to my improvised dock isn’t very deep, but when I had removed a few big stones, it was deep enough for a single.

Today, I didn’t have a lot of time, so I did one rate ladder, 4-3-2-1-2-3-4 minutes at 18-20-22-24-22-20-18 spm.

| Tstart_ | Tstop__ | Dist_ | Time_ | Pace__ | _SPM | avg HR | max HR | DPS | Remarks | 00:00.0 | 13:09.0 | 02278 | 13:09 | 02:53.2 | 18.9 | 140 | 153 | 09.2 | WU | 13:09.0 | 17:09.0 | 00831 | 04:00 | 02:24.5 | 17.6 | 144 | 152 | 11.8 | 18spm | 17:09.0 | 20:08.0 | 00639 | 02:59 | 02:20.1 | 19.6 | 154 | 161 | 10.9 | 20spm | 20:08.0 | 22:09.0 | 00454 | 02:01 | 02:13.2 | 21.8 | 164 | 167 | 10.3 | 22spm | 22:09.0 | 23:08.0 | 00227 | 00:59 | 02:10.0 | 23.1 | 169 | 171 | 10.0 | 24spm | 23:08.0 | 25:08.0 | 00387 | 02:00 | 02:35.0 | 21.4 | 166 | 171 | 09.0 | 22spm; turn | 25:08.0 | 28:10.0 | 00596 | 03:02 | 02:32.6 | 19.6 | 161 | 165 | 10.1 | 20spm | 28:10.0 | 32:09.0 | 00774 | 03:59 | 02:34.5 | 18.0 | 159 | 165 | 10.8 | 18spm | 32:09.0 | 47:15.0 | 02927 | 15:06 | 02:34.8 | 18.9 | 149 | 162 | 10.2 | CD

dist_____|time_____|_pace___|_HR__|_SPM__|_DPS|comment 2278_____|_13:09____|_2:53.2|140|18.9|9.2|warmup 3907_____|_19:00____|_2:25.9|157|19.4|10.6|Main set 2927_____|_15:06____|_2:34.8|149|18.9|10.2|Cool down 9112____|_47:15____|_2:35.6|150|18.8|10.3|_Total

I still have mixed feelings about the new WordPress.com editor. Today I discovered that I miss the “code" buttons in HTML editing mode.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 6 • Tags: lake, OTW, rowing, single, steady state

Nov 7 2015

Low SPM OTW training

Skipped training on Friday because of work and because the flu shot nurse told me “no exercise, no alcohol”. OK.

The training schedule said running, but I had to bring my sons to the rowing club and the water was mirror flat, so I changed my mind.

It was raining a bit and about 7 degrees C. Not bad weather, actually. I tied an old bicycle inner tube around the shell and started rowing. Perfect exercise for technique. Everything slows down. Pace drops by about 30 seconds per 500m and the run of the boat is nice and slow, so you have enough time to set up each stroke perfectly, especially on this flat water. It’s also good for strength.

| Tstart_ | Tstop__ | Dist_ | Time_ | Pace__ | _SPM | avg HR | max HR | DPS | Remarks | 00:00.0 | 45:00.0 | 07615 | 45:00 | 02:57.3 | 15.7 | 136 | 148 | 10.8 | with band | 45:00.0 | 15:00.0 | 05718 | 30:00 | 02:37.4 | 18.3 | 140 | 153 | 10.4 | normal

After 45 minutes I removed the tube and rowed normally. When I arrived back at the club, the summer dock was being cleared away and the winter dock wasn’t prepared yet, so I had to step into the water. It was quite cold. During the 2 minutes or so that I needed to get out the sculls, my clothes, my phone and the XGPS160, my feet were freezing, almost starting to cramp. A good reminder of how it is when you fall in during a winter row. Unpleasant, to say the least.

The weather forecast for tomorrow is sunny and reaching 17 degrees. The plan is to go in the double with Romana and I almost can’t wait. A nice fast boat after so many kilometers on the erg and the single. It will be a nice training.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 1 • Tags: lake, OTW, rowing, single, steady state, strength, training

Oct 31 2015

Rowing in a Dream

It was misty when I set off but the sun soon cleared the fog. It was beautiful weather. I did a steady state towards the castle and back, interrupted many times because I had to take pictures. The kind of day when you know why you row …

Sunny - canyon towards castle — Sunny – canyon towards castle

When I arrived at Veveří castle I rowed into a mist bank, and I took many pictures. I cannot decide which one is the best, so I show a few of them:

The foot bridge is nice in itself:

Then I rowed back through the canyon:

From Wikipedia:

According to legend, the castle Veveří (“squirrel” in Czech) was founded by Přemyslid DukeConrad of Brno in the middle of the 11th Century, then only as a hunting lodge. Nevertheless, the first credible recorded mention about the castle is from the years 1213 and 1222, when King Přemysl Otakar I used the fortified castle as a prison for rebellious peers. Initially, it was apparently a wooden residence situated near the church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary west of the present compound. In the 1220s a stone castle on the extremity of the rocky promontory behind a deep moat cut out of the rock started to grow. The so-called keep is the only structure which has remained well-preserved from this oldest building stage.

King Jan of Luxembourg pledged the castle to nobleman Jan of Vartemberk in 1311, but his son, Margrave of Moravia Charles (later Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV), received the property as a debt settlement in 1335. Charles´ younger brother, Margrave Jan Jindřich (John Henry), then took a fancy for Veveří Castle. He was responsible for the building of its rear part with two towers and an outer ward. In the central area around the keep, he developed the main palace, which included a large hall and the Chapel of St. Prokop (later of St. Wenceslaus). The present appearance of the compound is the result of these building activities, giving the castle its basic silhouette of a medieval fortress.

And from the Czech Tourism web site:

For several centuries treasure hunters have taken turns in the Moravian castle Veveří near Brno. Legend has it that the Templars of France brought their valuables right there after the liquidation of the order in 1307. The treasure of the guardians of the biggest secrets of human history, however, has not been found to this day. Recent research on Veveří, though, has confirmed the existence of an underground space under the church near the castle and assumes their secret connection.According to mystery experts, there is a cipher of the name Molay, the last Grand Master of the Templar Order, above the entrance to the church.

One of the most important politicians of the 20th century is also connected with the Veveří castle. Winston Churchill stayed there three times with his friend, the former owner of the castle Baron de Foresta.

Quite a good place to row to!

Training wise this was 12km in the UT1 HR band.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 2 • Tags: lake, OTW, river, rowing, single, steady state, training

Oct 17 2015

Saturday: Fartlek in the single

The training plan said “Intensive Steady State”. The original plan was that I would row in the quad with Romana’s girls crew, but in the end there were enough girls. So I took the single.

I rowed next to the girls quad for most of the session, and decided to do a Fartleg at 22spm and higher.

The water was nice. Some chop but today I liked it. There was enough chop to make it a challenge but it was manageable with good technique.

We all went for lunch to a pizzeria close to the lake. Took some pictures on the dam when we returned to the club. The first picture shows the lake (and there is a sailing race going on), the second picture shows the river as it continues after the dam. The concrete construction on the left is a 1940s bridge pillar for a highway the Germans wanted to build across occupied Czechoslovakia:

After that we had the traditional season closing with the club. We determined coxed four crews by a draw and raced against each other. Then we had a few beers and discussed the state of rowing in our town, in the world, and the world in general.

By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: lake, OTW, rowing, single, training

«< 15 16 17 18 19 >»

lake

Taper Race Day minus Two

Taper intervals

Long Reach (not Long Beach)

OTW Row & First Lactate steps

Low SPM OTW training

Rowing in a Dream

Saturday: Fartlek in the single

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