Nov 6 2016
Velká Baba Run
The title of this post, “Velká Baba Run”, can be translated in many ways. The Czech “Velká Baba” is, depending on the context, either a big old lady or a (slang) “big babe”. Velká Baba is also the name of a big hill close to my house.
Today’s run was not a loop, because I had to run to the rowing club to pick up my car. Yesterday night I was not legally fit to drive, so the car remained parked at the rowing club.
I put car keys, cell phone, rowing club keys in a little waist belt and took off. The climb of the “big babe” hill is quite steep.
After that climb it went downhill along the golf course and into the village of Jinačovice. After Jinačovice there is a nice part where you run through the fields.
Unfortunately, the best hiking trail marking system in the world turned out to have a weak spot at the right turn of the “red” trail. That, or I failed to see one of the markers.
Here is the part where I went straight (faint red line) instead of turning right with the red trail. I realized this pretty soon and had to consult the map on my phone. It was immediately clear to me that running back 100m and continuing on the red trail would have been the sensible thing to do, but that’s not how I am wired. I was running alone, so I was free to follow my twisted personality and try to run across the forest to pick up the red trail. That’s where you see my right turn. First, I ran across some wet and muddy fields. At a few points, I was afraid that my running shoe would stick to the mud, stay stuck, and I would find myself running on socks, but that didn’t happen, luckily.
The part through the forest was wild. There was no path, and it was uphill, so it was more hiking or climbing than running. I found back the red trail, but had to consult the map a few more times to determine the nicest way to run to the rowing club.
A nice 75 minutes of running/hiking.
Nov 13 2016
Some Meditation on a 6k, and a run
Some Meditation on a 6k
This first plot is a comparison (made on rowsandall.com) between Friday’s 6k and the PB I set in February, which was 7 seconds faster. You can clearly see that on Friday my heart rate rose faster than on that PB. Actually, on Friday I was rowing faster than my PB schedule for the first 4 km. Just slightly, but looking at the February row, I allowed myself to pull more 1:52 strokes than I did last Friday. The difference is very very small, just 0.2 seconds in average.
But it’s interesting to look at “the scribbles”. The plot below looks like something your 1 year old daughter might draw, but it’s actually quite interesting. At least for me.
The red scribble is Friday’s row. The blue one is my PB. You can clearly see that the bulk of the row (the first 4 to 5km) is very similar. The difference is that in February I didn’t drop the stroke rate so low. I must have rowed more forceful strokes last Friday, and I wonder if that wore me out somehow.
After 4.5km it starts to become really interesting. In February I managed to climb to the top right of the graph (high watts at high stroke rate), while last Friday I climbed just a little and dropped the watts.
It’s a pity I didn’t have Painsled back then. If I had, I could have compared the average drive force for the two rows.
Instead of comparing with my PB row, I should perhaps compare with the row I did on November 11, 2015, exactly a year before Friday’s row.
In 2015, I rowed a 22:28, 8 seconds slower than on Friday, but it looks like the whole graph is shifted to the left by 1spm. In other words, a year ago, I rowed a higher stroke rate to achieve the same watt number.
In terms of heart rate, the numbers are very similar. An interesting drop in heart rate after about 1500m is present in both rows. I wonder what that is.
Saturday’s run
Headed to the lake in the morning. There was a big lactate testing going on. All rowers who are in selections for national teams need to do a lactate step test. The protocol was prescribed by the national rowing federation. Interestingly, it was 5 minutes with 2 minutes rest, 5 steps at prescribed watts. The watts were given by a table for sex and age category. Also, they had to be rowed on ergs on sliders.
The tests were combined with the other rowing club, so the locker room and erg room was full. We cannot row OTW because our summer dock is about 1m above the water level and nobody bothered to put out a winter dock.
I decided to go for a run.
I ran along the lake, then along the river, towards the castle. Just before the castle, I turned right on the blue trail. I was wondering if I could make a loop, but was afraid that that would make the run too long.
Here is my run overlaid on a tourist map of the region. The colored lines are hiking/running trails. My run is the thick light blue line starting on the lake shore in the bottom right corner. Here’s is what I should try and run next time:
Continue on the blue trail, run around the hill, pass Trnůvka, take the green trail at Rozdrojovice and get back to the lake at restaurant Princezna. But I guess it would be a bit longer than the 12km that I ran this time.
Here’s the run on Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/773028819
It was a nice, slow recovery run.
By sanderroosendaal • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: recovery, rowing, running, trail, trail running, training