Time to start believing in myself - am 30r20 HRR 72%

So been a few things going on which have basically disrupted me over the last week or so - came back from the English pretty exhausted - lot's or races which means lots of travelling - and lots of energy expenditure. Still managed a pretty solid week until Friday then a collapse came on a 5k TT - didn't worry me too much - as I said I was pretty tired. Took the weekend of to recharge and then on Monday another collapse (HD) on a 30r20 and that was followed up on Monday evening with a bit of juvenile cyberharrasment pointed in my direction - pretty stupid stuff but a few comments got under my skin and to be honest I thought "what the hell am I doing this for" I started to row to lose weight and found I enjoyed it, I then found a huge amount of supportive people online and made some great friends, I also then found my coach and a team to train and race with, but there are always those elements for whatever reason think they have a right to dictate what I do and who or what I race - no one has that right outside my coach and even he wouldn't dictate to me in such terms. So that led on to a lot of failed rows and beating myself up about my reasons for rowing. Well I remembered my reason this morning and got out of bed at 6am in order to row before I started work. 30r20 capped at 153 (75% HRR) to be fair most of it was under 70% (146) - I enjoyed that - I enjoy rowing - I will continue - if you have anything negative to say, may I suggest you don't.

Nope nadda zilch - 5k fail

50r18 75% HRR (153)

Lunchtime grind - starting the distance meters back in - capped at 75% HRR (153) aimed at trying to sort my stroke out - lapsed now and then - but pleased enough

13,530m - 1:50.8 ave TE 3.2 114 ml/kg 1158kcal - got to about 38min on 1:50.0 pace

3by2k @24 r3

Today's session was set up as 4by2k but in order to fit it in I chopped a rep and started more aggressively than the 30min TT +2 target. I found over the last day or two that a slight tweak in my technique is already paying dividends - so instead of hitting the 1:38 I intended I was sat on 1:37's on the first rep. The second rep I was looking at 1:40 and the final rep 1:42 - all came under target and the tweaked technique felt comfortable and powerfu

30r20 80% HRR - why 2by2k's?

Firstly why do I sometimes row 2 by 2k's at competitions (three times this season, Bristol, British & English Opens and age group) basically I enjoy testing myself and pushing myself - that's why I enjoy the sport so much - it's all about you vs the machine and I like to beat it as many times as possible :lol: (OK so we never truly beat it) another reason which is becoming more apparent to me is the training benefit I get from it - not physical (although there may be some) it's the mental benefit of being able to drive yourself through that pain twice in a day - remember back in the old CRASH-B format they used to row twice and apparently OTW there is something similar going on (I wouldn't know about that) but take Sunday for instance - I finished the race in the morning in absolute bits - crawled of the machine (well fell of) then crawled over to the side for a while (actually I think I rolled) then staggered over to a warm up erg and rolled up and down on that for a few minutes – took myself to the back of the area and just lied down for about 30min waiting for the headache to go and the heart to stop trying to escape my chest eventually I felt able to re-join the human race – Q asked me if I was going to do the second race and by this point I was ready to say yes – but why would I? – only an outside shot of a medal with everyone rowing to form (as it turned out I came 4th) – because I wanted to see what I could do. I can tell you something else – I had more HD thoughts to overcome on that 2k than any other I have ever done – but I beat them – I kept rowing – I even finished with the 5th fastest time of the day (I think) and it’s precisely because of being able to dig in and keep going on that second race that today I was able to force myself through today’s session – and one day when I think I’m going to HD that day will pop in my mind and I will know that not only can I keep going I will and I can even find a little more at the end – so why – well it’s added another link in my armour

 

So todays row – after only getting back home last night after the travels I’m pretty tired – originally I thought about a 30r18 65% HR row – but then looking at the schedule I noticed my old favourite 30r20 TT – I didn’t think I’d have it in my to do that but said I’d start and see what happened – currently have a few tweaks to my stroke and although at the start that seemed to help me after about ten minutes I knew I needed to get a lid on this to make it to the end so capped it at 80% HRR (160bpm) and drove on – like I said getting through that second erg has strengthened my resolve and it certainly helped today.

EIRC - Ouch

Well just got back to my sisters (about half hour ago) and got a few moments so will blog this now while fresh - the main memory from today was pain :lol: - although that is offset with the chance to meet up with so many new and old erging friends - :-D The day started at 6am with a alarm and then a coffee and some porridge - jumped in a taxi at 7:30am and got to the venue about 8 - too early for the doors - apparently they open at 8:30 - oh well - hang around outside then.

Got in registered and then started meeting up with various folk. Eventually it was time for the first warm up - took a while to find a decent machine but got one that wasn't too bad. 5k warm up done and onto the race machine. One thing that I haven't mentioned in the run up was I don't tend to do well in morning rows - I had a disaster of a challenge series row last year on a Saturday morning - I tried not to think about it - Q was also conscious of this and we mentioned it after the race :lol:

The race started and I got off reasonably well and started to look to relax into it - through the first 500m a little slower than I wanted but still working OK - had a little look at the placings but really wanted to concentrate on my splits and calm myself through that middle 1k - I dug in and tried to stay away from anything slower than the 1:32 or lower (I will now admit my target was the English Champ record for the 30-39 which is still 6:03.6) I managed to get myself to about 800m left to go in pretty good condition and then started to look for a lift - not there yet - through 500m to go and again started to lift - hmmm not so much as I wanted - about 100m left to go the wheels started to come off and I had to dig in deep - the last stoke I pulled a 1:39 and collapsed of the erg in absolute bits - early morning erg struck again - 6:05.0 a PB by 1.0 seconds - but not as much as I hoped - screaming headache and legs in pieces struggled out of the race area - fell onto a erg - rowed for about 4 minutes then went off to hide at the back of the velodrome while I recovered the power of speech :lol:

I then had a wee while to wait until the Open 2k - it took a while to decide I was going ahead with it - but figured I had an outside chance of a medal (Figured Andy would come first with between 6:04 and 6:06 - Matt Van I thought would be around 6:10 so depended on who else was there. I warmed up again and got on the erg - plan was to go out about 1:33 and see what happened - it hurt - a lot - it was the closest I have come to HD'ing on a 2k - there was nothing there - and it hurt - a lot - but my sister was stood in front of me - so I couldn't stop - so I didn't - I tried to dig in at the end - there wasn't mush there and it still hurt (did I mention that? :lol: ) so 4th in the end - but not disappointed I think the top three guys deserved the medals)

So then we had the 500m to get through - plan - start and see what the other guys had and is I could find anything to throw at it - not much at the start and hitting 1:22/24's but again dug in - towards the last 100m I was in third - so switched on Beowulf and went through the last split at 1:18 and on that stroke I went from 2nd to 1st and took the Gold - good old Wulfy :-D

Last little bit

In my sisters now just outside Manchester - flew to Liverpool from Cork earlier and bumped into a rower in Cork Airport - sub6 guy - so was pumping him for info :lol: there was also two hen parties there on the way to Liverpool - two of the girls I knew - but was more interested in talking erg! 

Just back from sisters gym that I got in for free to use the erg - 4 in there - I went to use one of the ones upstairs - they where both in need of tlc sprocket or clutch gone by the sounds of it. Still got the race warm up done then a race start - although the first attempt I thought I snapped the chain - I hadn't - think the clutch slipped - so a bit steadier on the second attempt - now eat - sleep - get to the venue :-D 

Spot the problem with the handle?