been a hell of a day - race starts

up early to drop dogs and do a few chores - then train and pack - all went well till mother nature kicked in - 100mph+ winds caused a few issues - had my left leg caught in the car door that slammed shut on me - dropping the dogs at the kennels I literally got blown across the yard with no control of stopping - tree's down on the roads - car nearly lifting of (and I have a heavy car) the ground - got home to the entrance of our estate having a tree down across it - as it's basically down to the people who live near to clean up I helped out with that for a few hours - then home to hear that flights from Shannon (where I am flying from) are cancelled - possible issues in Boston as well - oh well nothing I can do about it so at about 10pm I went out to train - I can control that and I did - three 2k's with race start and cruise to 1400m - 1650m - 1750m out - job done - midnight here now - suppose I best pack :lol:

Race pace 500's

Simple session 3 by 500m at race pace with 5 min rest – race warm up – HR wasn’t raising as high as usual – still have a few snots and cough – but better than yesterday

Decided to row these with a race start and see how they went –

First one I took a power long stroke then quick half stroke and into “normal” length – didn’t like that

Second one I took a few quick sharp short strokes and then into “normal” length – didn’t like that

Thirdly I took a power stroke then a half-length and then a few over length strokes – I did like that

Still getting that rasping sensation in the chest after about 300m – still more gunk to clear. Have more practice on these tomorrow so will try the last one again and adjust. Felt quite odd leaving the Model C as I won’t be on it again until after the champs – off tomorrow to pack and drop off the hounds – Thursday I travel.

Flight of the phoenix

Q asked me to do a 2k piece - but only the first 1k as "race" practice target 1:32 - warm up was OK but legs felt very tired and sluggish.

Tried to hit the start hard and drop the pace stadily in the 1k - went reasonably well but I had to clear the lungs (cough) three times - felt that "rasping" sensation. If you have seen the film "Flight of the phoenix" - when the pilot tries to clear the engine with the second last shotgun shell - that's how i felt clearing the luns )

Saw too many 1:33's to be delighted - but still happy to be better than I was :o)

200 1:28.0 r36 144HR
400 1:32.2 r32 156HR
600 1:32.5 r32 160HR
800 1:32.2 r33 164HR
10001:31.7 r34 166HR
Total 3:02.7 - 1:31.4 for the 1k

It's funny how before I started I thought this would be reasonably simple - but once I got in it I had an attack of the nerves - especially when the chest kicked up - pretty comfortable still through that 1k mark

Crashing my way into CRASH-B

Well after being off work for the last two weeks sick I am happy to say I rowed :o)

30r20 - but HRR 65% (137bpm)
8102m - 1:51.0
TE 1.7
22ml/kg

I still have more fluids coming out of my nose than is right and a cough to kick to the curb - but after the last two weeks I'm just happy to say that I will be on the start line in Boston and raring to go

2x6x1 [1r] [5r] welcome to lactic hell

I feel very ill now - I felt very  very ill during the 2x6x1 [1r] [5r] - I got into work with a sore throat - this I'm not sure if this is from the all out 2x2 [10] 14 hours ago or if i have picked up the office bug - still got through the session by the skin of my teeth in the first set - second set was a case of pacing it to finish

 

1:24.7 r36

1:24.5 r37

1:24.7 r37

1:24.7 r38

1:27.7 r36

1:29.9 r35

ave 1:25.8 (stand alone PB 1:25.1)

 

set 2

1:29.8 r34

1:30.0 r34

1:30.0 r33

1:30.0 r33

1:30.0 r34

1:29.5 r34

ave 1:29.9 r33

 

tiredness was an issue (5 hours kip at most) found it hard to get rate up which kicked in lactic earlier - rep 5 on first set nearly ended in a HD - as did rep 1 on second set

2by2min 10:30 rest muck up

Evening session 2by2min with 10min rest - in from work - spent a little time with the baby before she went for a snooze - then walked dogs - back and baby was up then out to shed at about 10pm - ooops I forgot to eat - well actually I didn't - I just didn't know what time I would get to train so didn't get a chance - so up to the shed 6 degrees C and 100% humidity - lovely - through the 5k race warm up and set the stop watch going - as it hit 2min I started the first rep - aimed to hit 1:20 and hold it as much as I could all went about as well as it could and then a paddle for 6min - as I paddled I had the splits up from the first rep on the PM (but was also connected to rowpro) as I paddled rowpro kept the split but the monitor stayed on the splits - as I got towards the start for the second I stopped and took a drink - set up the 2min on Rowpro and nothing showed on the PM (well the split still showed) so reset it again - no good - OK was hoping as I started the PM would flick to life - it did - the Rowpro display didn't - feck - so stopped and reset it again and was ready to go on the 10min 30sec and off - no - yes - balls I miss timed the start and hit a 2:36 for the first pull - took forever to get it down and then time to hold on again - think I started to protect the rib pain a little and possibly could of gone harder - but plenty of pain by the end - thanks Q!

3by2k r24 HRR 80% (168) incl sub 6:30 2k

Looking back I completed this row on the 4th October but without the HR cap that day – result was1:39.6 so target for today – well “go hard or go home” 5k race warm up and so I targeted sub 6:30 on the first rep and if I had to back off due to HR cap I would – luckily I didn’t until the last 20 seconds or so but still managed the target – funny thing was on the first rep I was hoping the HR would stay down as I was feeling great – the second rep and it was like the energy had been pulled from me – still head down and maintained a decent split – the third rep I was trying to work out why I hadn’t taken up golf three years ago … still job done and overall 0.3 seconds faster per 500m than Oct and on a HR cap

 

Just want to keep track of current “niggles” as I noticed when I looked back in Octobers entry that I had the issue with my left middle finger back then (this isn’t a moan it’s just for the record) butt blister (left cheek) - right knee clunking - middle finger left hand still giving gip - and possibly most concerning - right lower ribs at the front (first noticed after 750's) will keep an eye on them but this close to crash-b i don't see a point in backing off - worse that happens is it takes longer after to recover