glenmbaker wrote:What's obvious to me is that there are as many different goals as there are people (probably even more goals than there are people). I spent way more than 2 hours on the erg on Saturday, but it was because (a) my family was absent, (b) I had the erg in front of the TV and had nothing pressing to do, and (c) I was curious as to just how far I could go.damselfly wrote: So if someone spends 2 or more hours on the erg, it may be a key part of their training for something.
I seem to always want to establish some personal limits for all of my activities. Some of these limits come from years of experience (like skiing where I know precisely where the danger zone starts). Some come from an abundance of caution (like paragliding where the penalty for stupidity can be rather high). For the erging case it was pretty easy to safely find the limit...just sit there and go at it until it starts to hurt somewhere. Stop at that point and pay attention to what the body is saying. I've been bumping my rows up and up, and this weekend found the limit...or at least the limiting factor (tendon at the back of the knee). No problem, just gotta relax a bit and it will be fine, but now I know for certain that a 20k row is absolutely no problem, a 30k row is getting aggressive, and 40k is pushing it and should only be done very carefully.
It also means that I'm not even going to try to catch Tyrone!
Lastly, I discovered that "The Mountain", starring Robert Wagner and Spencer Tracy is a really cheesy movie that makes movies like "K2", "Vertical Limit", and "Cliffhanger" look like accurate portrayals of climbing..
I have read through a bunch of the training forum and the different intervals and even tried a few. I find that the Challenge causes me to look for distance above and beyond everything else. I'll have to see how I feel about Challenges after this one is over. I still feel that I may feel differently if I had a Concept 2 sitting at home in front of a large screen TV.
I don't think that I have read about any competitive water rowers here (or did I miss it)