Why So Slow With The Rates?

[old] Fesse-a-l'os · Post by **[old] Fesse-a-l'os** » October 15th, 2004, 10:21 am

Hi, I'm totally new to rowing and will be following some of the training workouts on the concept 2 site. However, here's my question: Why is the stroke per minute rate so slow (at 22-28) in all the programs listed? In the last few weeks, prior to finding this site, I've been using the following routine: 2 minutes at rate of 28-31spm, rate of about 2:30/500m, followed by 1 minute at rate of about 41spm, rate of about 1:55/500m, alternating for anywhere between 25-30 minutes total workout time. Tiring, for me as a beginner, but challenging. What is meant with the intensity guide (one to four dots), at such a slow spm rate? Wouldn't a faster rate be more intense? As you can probably tell, I'm a total beginner, but would really like an honest response to these questions. Thanks!

[old] remador · Post by **[old] remador** » October 15th, 2004, 10:50 am

Well, Fesse-a-l'os, To develop aerobic power and muscular strength/endurance, you will have to do long, long, and hard workouts at slow stroke rate. That's the way it is, since modern rowing exists. If you do so, then you might get to 1:55 or less at 18-20 spm. AM

[old] John Rupp · Post by **[old] John Rupp** » October 15th, 2004, 1:25 pm

</div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td class='genmed'>QUOTE (Fesse-a-l'os @ Oct 15 2004, 07:21 AM)</td></tr><tr><td class='quote'>Wouldn't a faster rate be more intense?  </td></tr></table> Most definitely. Most rowers have historically been preselected to be tall, with long arms and torsos etc, thus are able to get a long drive length per stroke. Shorter (i.e. more normal) rowers need to take more strokes per distance to end up with the same drive length per distance. For example, at the 2004 Crash B's, long time lwt world record holder Eskild Ebbesen averaged 41.3 strokes per minute and 8 meters per stroke. The hwt rower Pavel Shurmei averaged 35 strokes per minute and 9.7 meters per stroke. Since you are just beginning, your times will come down greatly and your power will increase naturally with your training. The performance monitor converts your energy per time into power (watts), which is shown as your Pace. The faster the pace the more power. Any way you can get the pace to go faster over distance is what counts.

[old] dadams · Post by **[old] dadams** » October 15th, 2004, 4:03 pm

</div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td class='genmed'>QUOTE (remador @ Oct 15 2004, 09:50 AM)</td></tr><tr><td class='quote'> Well, Fesse-a-l'os, To develop aerobic power and muscular strength/endurance, you will have to do long, long, and hard workouts at slow stroke rate. That's the way it is, since modern rowing exists. If you do so, then you might get to 1:55 or less at 18-20 spm. AM  </td></tr></table> No offense AM, but I'm not sure if I agree with that 'old school' way of thought. I think it's time to break the mold on that way of thinking. When I first started erging I tried the low rate approach, and found it wanting to say the least. Of course I already had a fair amount of power from my previous athletic experience (i.e. bodybuilding). I personally found that if I erg as I am going to race, then it is more beneficial. I don't know how the rest of the erging community does these long 18 - 24 spm pieces over and over again. Blech!! All of the training that I did for the 2k time I just set a couple of weeks ago (5:47.1) was at or above race pace. If I wanted to gain strength, then I went to the gym and hit the weights. Now rowing on the other hand....I use the low ratings in the boat to help me with my blade work. Dwayne

[old] PaulS · Post by **[old] PaulS** » October 15th, 2004, 6:03 pm

</div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td class='genmed'>QUOTE (dadams @ Oct 15 2004, 08:03 PM)</td></tr><tr><td class='quote'> Now rowing on the other hand....I use the low ratings in the boat to help me with my blade work. Dwayne  </td></tr></table> You're going to have to get that bladework up to speed someday also, a useful drill for this (and kind of fun too) is "reverse ratio, light pressure", where you make the recovery and slide as quick as you can, catch and pull through, all while trying to minimize check. It can teach you a lot about how you approach the catch and maintain control, and poor catch timing can not hide. Erg on, Paul Smith

[old] Carl Henrik · Post by **[old] Carl Henrik** » October 16th, 2004, 7:53 am

Original post based on a misunderstanding. Nice article: <a href='http://home.hia.no/~stephens/interval.htm' target='_blank'>http://home.hia.no/~stephens/interval.htm</a>

[old] Cran · Post by **[old] Cran** » October 16th, 2004, 8:39 am

<table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td class='genmed'>QUOTE </td></tr><tr><td class='quote'>You're going to have to get that bladework up to speed someday also, a useful drill for this (and kind of fun too) is "reverse ratio, light pressure" </td></tr></table> I did a few km at 3/4 pressure 1/2 slide in my scull yesterday for a laugh... high rating, but made me square earlier, which helped when I went back to full length, the I did some alternate 1/2 slide - full slide strokes for a while, which probably looked a bit funny if anyone saw it. No idea if any of that really helped in any particular way, but it made it a bit more interesting than just rowing steady state for 20Km in the rain. I really should try and get some proper coaching sometime...

[old] gorow9 · Post by **[old] gorow9** » October 16th, 2004, 2:46 pm

Well my coach is always saying slow down the slide... slow down the slide... he's made me erg at 16 spm at full preasure if I'm having a bad day... anyway his logic for that: The recovery is actually faster if it is allowed to reach to full potential and the stroke in general better if the recovery is not rushed. It's also important because in a multi-person boat... eight, four, quad... not so much doubles and pairs but if u speed the slide it's like the boat is forced to actually stop momentum as u rush then regain it... look at the cox's head if u don't believe me... and stroke pair 2. I know i've felt the bang... Anyway hope that helps ~*Sara*~ "life's short... row hard" "real athletes row, the rest just play games."

[old] Pete Marston · Post by **[old] Pete Marston** » October 16th, 2004, 4:24 pm

I'm with Dwayne on this. Very occasionally I'll do a 30mins at 20spm as a kind of power test, but in my normal training most distance pieces are done at 27spm+. For a beginner though lower rates I think are good just to learn proper technique so you don't get all out of coordination, which it sounds like you may well be doing to be rowing 1:55 at 41spm... Your coach makes you do sessions at 16spm? I see absolutely no benefit of that at all I have to say. 20spm, maybe, but lower than that, no. Pete

[old] Carl Henrik · Post by **[old] Carl Henrik** » October 16th, 2004, 6:21 pm

Original post based on a misunderstanding.

[old] jamesg · Post by **[old] jamesg** » October 17th, 2004, 4:37 am

CH, If we follow T o'N's rules, we all train at around race pace, in the few weeks before the race. This however after plenty of CV work. You'll have seen DA's aside (..a fair amount of power..) which says it all, tho' some more detail would be interesting. He seems to be a master of irony and understatement, not just iron and ergs. For people who race hard at 40 (presumably with a short but very hard stroke) and get near or below 6', training at 20 would be useless. Without increasing the stroke length, the numbers don't tally. Even UT1 is 70-80% of race Watts, so the rating too will be 70-80%, 28-32 unless the pull length increases. Going back to Fesse-a-l'Os' original question, why low ratings? Because most training plans are written by rowing coaches, and on the water they want to see long hard strokes, for long periods, in the belief that this shifts the boat, helps technique and trains CV wise. As indeed it does, judging by experience.. On the erg any combination of length, pull force and rating, if it keeps us above 200W, will have a training effect. Problem is what do we do if we want to reach 400W? Something has to increase. So most of us train at 20-25, pulling hard and long. Then to go faster, pull equally hard and long, but at a higher rating. There's no other option, because length is a point of technique and pulling substantially harder causes early collapse. In the original question, I saw 1:55@41 mentioned. To do this when I tried, I had to use a very short but quite hard stroke, all arms and no legs. OK if that's what we like. Not in my boat tho'. So my theory of the day is: Legs and Length is All. Maybe explains why oarsmen are faster...

[old] Pete Marston · Post by **[old] Pete Marston** » October 17th, 2004, 7:37 am

</div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td class='genmed'>QUOTE (Carl Henrik @ Oct 16 2004, 10:21 PM)</td></tr><tr><td class='quote'> Pete, Do you agree with Dwayne that you should never train below race _pace_? <table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td class='genmed'>QUOTE </td></tr><tr><td class='quote'>All of the training that I did for the 2k time I just set a couple of weeks ago (5:47.1) was at or above race pace </td></tr></table>  </td></tr></table> Carl, I do tend to do some training below race pace, only once a week though. I don't think it's really necessary, but I have to do 8 x 500m sometimes because I'm not tough enough to do 2k pace workouts (like 4 x 1k) every week.

[old] Pete Marston · Post by **[old] Pete Marston** » October 17th, 2004, 7:44 am

</div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td class='genmed'>QUOTE (jamesg @ Oct 17 2004, 08:37 AM)</td></tr><tr><td class='quote'> So my theory of the day is: Legs and Length is All. Maybe explains why oarsmen are faster...  </td></tr></table> Where are all these oarsmen who are faster on the erg then? There are a few oarsmen who are the fastest on the erg, but only because they have been training for rowing for many years, and dedicated their whole life to it. Then there are indoor rowers who are approaching their times now who've only been using the erg for a year or two on top of full time jobs. Traditionally the open events at the big indoor races like BIRC and Crash B's have been dominated by the water boys, but I think that is changing now. I certainly expect an indoor rower to be among the medals in the open hwt at BIRC this year, if not in the top spot. I don't know whether Dwayne classes himself as an indoor or water rower? But his training certainly isn't traditional water rower training, and he's the fastest ever 40+ erger. I've raced water rowers occasionally in indoor competitions, and in my experience the non-elite, so standard club rowers, are not fast at all. In fact I'm amazed how slow some of them are when they appear to have the right frame to row fast, and have been training for some years.

[old] jamesg · Post by **[old] jamesg** » October 17th, 2004, 12:47 pm

Sorry, it wasn't intended as bait or provocation, it's just a theory; I couldn't add .. on water... that would be cheating, and anyway the main bit is the Legs. My theory of the day or its corollary says if on the erg you use your length and legs like an oarsman, you'll be faster than otherwise. This is just a reaction to a novice saying he pulls 1:55@41. Tomorrow's theory may well be that everyone, as the erg is a single, can pull with the style he likes or suits him best. The existence of this forum seems to say however that we all like to know what people do, under the engineer's rule number one: if you don't know how, watch others. So who do we watch? I think it's a point. There seems to be a growing dicotomy between rowing style (long and hard, ratings low, slow recovery, legs, df relatively high) and novice erg style extending to fast people too (short and rating high, very strong pull, arms and body, df very low). Some have said (I read here) that what they do on the erg they wouldn't do on water. Many ergers use weights, presumably because their style puts a premium on sheer strength. So is a different style, characterised with an axe as above or any other way, needed or useful? Which is best for any particular size and shape? Are the novices right? Usual caveat - the erg is a cv machine and it does wonders if we give it a chance, any chance. Anything else is illusion and courts delusion.

[old] John Rupp · Post by **[old] John Rupp** » October 17th, 2004, 1:54 pm

</div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td class='genmed'>QUOTE (jamesg @ Oct 17 2004, 01:37 AM)</td></tr><tr><td class='quote'> For people who race hard at 40 (presumably with a short but very hard stroke)  </td></tr></table> No -- just the opposite. The stroke is light(er than lower rates) and as long as you wish.

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