Rating Up Question

[Jules]

This topic is simply bizarre. It's like asking, "I'm not necessarily interested in running faster, but how do I make my legs go faster?" I make the assumption that something more serious is being asked other than literally going up and down the slide faster. That's easy enough to do - just cut down length of slide and adjust exertion to keep the pace constant. Nothing hard about that, though who would want to.

The question deals with the non-linear relationship between "power" as expressed in watts or pace and stroke rate, taking in to account heart rate.

You touched on this a little in another thread..

Not sure how "levels" is being defined. I'll just assume all speeds for 2K, until the point of breakdown. You're looking at 2:00/20SPM, 1:55/23SPM, 1:50/26SPM, 1:45/30SPM, 1:40/35SPM. I don't think you'll find these kinds of ratios in rowers in late 50s and 60s much.

Given that relationship, I was asking if there was a guide out there that might help me establish target paces at higher stroke rates over longer distances.

With all due respect, that may seem like a bizarre question to someone who has been doing this for a while (not just rowing, but intense aerobic / anaerobic training), but I am still relatively new to both and I am trying to learn. If the advice is "just learn by doing," that is a perfectly acceptable answer (although not what I was expecting and not what some other posters have provided).

[jackarabit]

Did Deb say what you just said, Jim? I think she did. Jack

[Bob S.]

Sorry I don't mean to be pedantic or augmentative but watts don't work like that.

If you are doing 200 watts at 20 spm you are not doing 10 watts per stroke, you are doing 200 watts per stroke.

If you reduce or increase the stroke rate, but hold 200 watts, the force per stroke increases or decreases but you are still doing 200 watts per stroke.

It is a matter of carelessness. If you divide the average watts reading by the average stroke rate you get the average work done per stroke. Unfortunately a lot of people just call this "watts per stroke," ignoring the fact that the stroke rate is in strokes per minute. Somehow the minute part gets lost along the way.

The result of dividing watts by strokes/minute comes out in watt-minutes/stroke. A watt-minute is a unit of work equal to 60 joules. An odd ball unit perhaps, but there are precedents like kilowatt-hours for car batteries and milliwatt-hours for small power cells. jamesq uses the abbreviation, W'. I like that, but the little apostrophe used to denote minutes can easily get lost in translation and is often ignored on this forum.

An erger putting out 200 watts at 20 strokes per minute is averaging 10W'/stroke (or 600 joules per stroke, if you prefer the more conventional unit of work). If he/she can do the same stroke at 30spm, he/she would be putting out 300 watts. For a lot of people there is not much variation in the stroke, so they increase their speed by raising the rate.

Here is an example of training row that I did some time ago, 40' that included a gradually increasing rate and intensity warm up, a steady state middle core, and a decreasing rate and intensity cool down. the last column shows the average work done per stroke in watt-mimutes/stroke. 5 W'/stroke is obviously very weak, but I am many decades past the 10W'/stroke days, so don't expect much.

Date Ended @ Time Meters SPM HR /500m Cal/hr Watts W'/S
40' aio @ UT1
12/15/14 16:59 40:00.0 7678 18 116 02:36.2 615 92 5.11
Split or work interval results
12/15/14 16:59 02:00.0 338 12 84 02:57.5 515 63 5.25
12/15/14 16:59 04:00.0 346 13 91 02:53.4 530 67 5.15
12/15/14 16:59 06:00.0 372 16 100 02:41.2 587 83 5.19
12/15/14 16:59 08:00.0 397 20 107 02:31.1 648 101 5.05
12/15/14 16:59 10:00.0 397 20 119 02:31.1 648 101 5.05
12/15/14 16:59 12:00.0 394 20 114 02:32.2 641 99 4.95
12/15/14 16:59 14:00.0 393 20 120 02:32.6 638 98 4.90
12/15/14 16:59 16:00.0 395 20 123 02:31.8 643 100 5.00
12/15/14 16:59 18:00.0 392 20 127 02:33.0 635 98 4.90
12/15/14 16:59 20:00.0 394 20 127 02:32.2 641 99 4.95
12/15/14 16:59 22:00.0 395 20 123 02:31.8 643 100 5.00
12/15/14 16:59 24:00.0 398 20 123 02:30.7 651 102 5.10
12/15/14 16:59 26:00.0 399 20 124 02:30.3 654 103 5.15
12/15/14 16:59 28:00.0 398 20 124 02:30.7 651 102 5.10
12/15/14 16:59 30:00.0 401 20 128 02:29.6 659 104 5.20
12/15/14 16:59 32:00.0 404 20 129 02:28.5 667 107 5.35
12/15/14 16:59 34:00.0 405 21 130 02:28.1 670 108 5.14
12/15/14 16:59 36:00.0 374 17 120 02:40.4 591 85 5.00
12/15/14 16:59 38:00.0 350 13 114 02:51.4 539 69 5.31
12/15/14 16:59 40:00.0 334 12 107 02:59.6 507 60 5.00

B.

[Trev]

Thanks, I'm feeling better about it now. I'm hopeless at maths so I just look at the watts and spm on the monitor. I see going up and down the slide much as wasted energy so try to work on generating as much power per stroke as possible rather than high rate.

[Cyclingman1]

Did Deb say what you just said, Jim?

This question still perplexes me as well as the response by OP.

I would like to start increasing my rates, but I am wondering how to adjust my pacing to accommodate the additional strokes per minute.
If I want add some 10K rows at 24 or 26 spm, what should my target wattage or target pace be?

The question deals with the non-linear relationship between "power" as expressed in watts or pace and stroke rate, taking in to account heart rate.

Really? I tried to address the original question, but ....

[hjs]

Did Deb say what you just said, Jim?

This question still perplexes me as well as the response by OP.

I would like to start increasing my rates, but I am wondering how to adjust my pacing to accommodate the additional strokes per minute.
If I want add some 10K rows at 24 or 26 spm, what should my target wattage or target pace be?

The question deals with the non-linear relationship between "power" as expressed in watts or pace and stroke rate, taking in to account heart rate.

Really? I tried to address the original question, but ....

I always, if you walk, swim, skate, bike etc... And you go faster, how do you do that? Do you wonder how you need to move your arms and legs or just go faster on feel. I know what I do.

[Trev]

When the stroke rate increases the flywheel does not slow down as much, you also tend to pull faster as well as return faster, but you are not necessarily pulling with as much force - because the flywheel is being accelerated from a faster speed at the start of the pull.

So you need to make sure the increased rate has actually resulted in an increased power / pace. Increased rate does not necessarily mean an increase in power.

Increasing the rate also uses energy in more journeys up and down the slide - these watts are not measured at the flywheel.
So an increase in wattage of 10 watts derived from increased stroke rate will cost you more than 10 watts physiologically which over time will limit power output. But increase power per stroke and you will not waste energy just going up and down the slide so it is more efficient.

Has anyone ever calculated the power output from just going up and down the slide? If you move up and down the slide at 30 spm without pulling the chain you get a good few heart beats above resting, that must give some idea as to the energy requirement.

It would be interesting to know what sort of wattage is not measured at the flywheel at say 200 watts.

[Bob S.]

Has anyone ever calculated the power output from just going up and down the slide? If you move up and down the slide at 30 spm without pulling the chain you get a good few heart beats above resting, that must give some idea as to the energy requirement.

It would be interesting to know what sort of wattage is not measured at the flywheel at say 200 watts.

C2 already has that included for the Calorie reading. That also has a factor of 4, which assumes that the human body, as a machine, works at 25% efficiency. For the energy not measured by the monitor, it adds 300 Calories per hour. I assume that the same 25% applies there, so it would mean 75 Calories worth of non-measured work done per hour. I'll leave it to you to do the conversion to watts. Of course, the 300 Calories per hour has to be based on some standard individual. I think that the choice was a 180# rower. It also varies with spm, of course, but I have never seen what spm that 300 was based on.

B.

[dblinden]

BobS says: "For a lot of people there is not much variation in the stroke, so they increase their speed by raising the rate."

For individuals new to the activity, I think this simple statement adds a lot of clarity. What it also implies is that for others, their speed may not be increased (especially for those with little experience and/or undeveloped technique). In running and cycling (assuming same gear in the latter), faster legs will necessarily mean faster speed. However, with the erg, faster rate does not always mean faster speed (and for many newcomers it may mean much less). It is not that apparent a concept for individuals new to this activity so some courtesy in the responses may be helpful unless this should just be a conversation for experts.

Dennis L

[Trev]

BobS says: "For a lot of people there is not much variation in the stroke, so they increase their speed by raising the rate."

For individuals new to the activity, I think this simple statement adds a lot of clarity. What it also implies is that for others, their speed may not be increased (especially for those with little experience and/or undeveloped technique). In running and cycling (assuming same gear in the latter), faster legs will necessarily mean faster speed. However, with the erg, faster rate does not always mean faster speed (and for many newcomers it may mean much less). It is not that apparent a concept for individuals new to this activity so some courtesy in the responses may be helpful unless this should just be a conversation for experts.

Dennis L

I wasn't aware anyone was being discourtesious. I hope I wasn't. It certainly wasn't my intent. Perhaps I didn't make it clear I'm asking questions rather than making statements of fact.

[jamesg]

Has anyone ever calculated the power output from just going up and down the slide?

Dudhia on http://www.atm.ox.ac.uk/rowing/physics/index.html

He estimated the inertial work we do on fixed and dynamic ergs in Item 12. He puts mass 75kg and speed 1 m/s. His calculated fixed erg loss is 37.5 J (37.5W at rating 30). As kE depends on the square of speed, at 20 (so 2/3 speed) losses would be less than half. It's all exercise anyway.

[Bob S.]

BobS says: "For a lot of people there is not much variation in the stroke, so they increase their speed by raising the rate."

For individuals new to the activity, I think this simple statement adds a lot of clarity. What it also implies is that for others, their speed may not be increased (especially for those with little experience and/or undeveloped technique). In running and cycling (assuming same gear in the latter), faster legs will necessarily mean faster speed. However, with the erg, faster rate does not always mean faster speed (and for many newcomers it may mean much less). It is not that apparent a concept for individuals new to this activity so some courtesy in the responses may be helpful unless this should just be a conversation for experts.

Dennis L

I had not intended any discourtesy. I am one of those that strives to do the same amount of work per stroke at all rates. I used the term "a lot of people" to imply that I am not alone in this. The purpose of the spread sheet at the end of the message was to to give an example showing how I held fairly close to 5 watt-minutes per stroke for a range of stroke rates from12-20.

If you felt that there was some discourtesy involved, I apologize. But I must admit that I can't understand how it was interpreted that way.

B.

[dblinden]

I just think that a lot of folks new to rowing will not immediately grasp the concepts related to power and strokes unless they have a cycling background. I don't know of runners thinking in watts. Given how many times something like damper setting has to be explained to newcomers, I would think that joules and watt minutes will be a little more unwieldy to some and may actually be counter-intuitive at first. For me, it was after a few months of rowing that I slowed my rate to @20 spm and saw that I could increase my pace because I had such poor form at the faster rate I had been using. Now, when I increase rate, my pace really ramps up. But that took a bit of training to get there.
Not to make things personal, but I had no issues with any comments by Trev or BobS. Now, back to our regular programing.

Dennis L

[Trev]

Sometimes though watts is simpler than pace.

For example it's easy to see improvements or increases in power in percentage terms. But with pace it isn't easy because a 10% increase in power does not result in a 10% increase in speed and the faster you go,the more power required per second improvememt in time.

So I look at watts because I'm not good at maths and find it really difficult working out things in minutes and seconds and meters.

[Jules]

Did Deb say what you just said, Jim?

This question still perplexes me as well as the response by OP.

I would like to start increasing my rates, but I am wondering how to adjust my pacing to accommodate the additional strokes per minute.
If I want add some 10K rows at 24 or 26 spm, what should my target wattage or target pace be?

The question deals with the non-linear relationship between "power" as expressed in watts or pace and stroke rate, taking in to account heart rate.

Really? I tried to address the original question, but ....

Jim:

I will try to clarify what I was asking for.

I prefaced my first post by saying most of the rowing I have done to date has been at lower strokes per minute. I know the rates I am currently training at are far below what would be "normal" for time trials at various distances. For example, as you know, a typical time trial 2k would be somewhere around 30 spm. I haven't done any work to date at anywhere near that high of a stroke rate, so I would like to start working on translating my lower spm technique to those higher rates (while continuing to improve my fitness level). "Translating my lower spm technique to those higher rates" involves, for example, adjusting my breathing (as I found out in my first row at 25 spm).

Given that goal of getting more accustomed to doing higher rate work, including over longer distances, I am trying to figure out target pacing for higher rate work over those distances. Extending the example which I provided in the first post, I can currently do a 10K at an average of about 145 watts at around 22 spm at UT1. If I rate up to 26 spm for a 10K, the "linear" answer to the question of "what should my target pacing be" would be as Greg noted in the first reply in this thread. That is, I am currently doing 6.6 watts per stroke over that distance, so add 6.6 watts for each additional stroke I do. In reality, we all know the relationship is not strictly linear. Adding strokes at the same level of power over the same distance will tax the heart more, causing fatigue / failure earlier, which is why Greg indicated his recommendation was just a starting point, and that I should "give it a try and then adjust based on how you feel."

Greg's initial answer was one approach to establishing a target pace at a higher stroke rate. In other words, he suggested an initial target could be to keep watts per stroke constant, and adjust as necessary. Another approach may have been, "if you can currently do a 10K at 145 watts in your UT1 zone, then it doesn't matter if your stroke rate is 20 or 25 or 30. Stick with 145 watts." This would obviously mean watts per stroke wouldn't remain constant, but would drop from 6.6 to 5.6 at 26 spm. To me, that would seem a little too slow of a pace at that rate. Yes, there is reduced rest time between strokes (as you noted) and there is some additional energy expended by moving up and down the slide more frequently (which Trev, Bob and jamesg highlighted), but I would guess those losses of energy would be more than offset by the reduced power per stroke in terms of muscle fatigue.

In the end, I would expect a reasonable target pace would be somewhere between maintaining the same watts per stroke and maintaining the same total watts. Given all of the "calculators" out there, I assumed someone has already "done the math" on this.

Obviously, I can work by trial and error as I did yesterday. That is, I can pick a target spm and pace and see how long I can maintain it for. Yesterday, I missed the target. Rather than doing this by trial and error, I thought I would take advantage of a "calculator" out there if such a thing already exists. That said, I know everyone is different and "my mileage may vary." But it might give me better starting targets for the various distances and stroke rates compared to the not-so-educated guess I took yesterday. Again, I'm relatively new at this. I don't have the experience yet to know how to adjust my pacing at various stroke rates over various distances within the various HR training bands.

That's was asking for. There have been a few links provided that I need to and will spend more time going through. The answer I anticipated may well be in one of those links.

Hopefully, that clarifies it, and thanks again to everyone who replied.