Improve My Rowing Times

[Bill Moore]

Don't beat yourself up too much. It's tough to read something and then go out and do it perfectly the first time. Your body will catch up to your brain soon enough, and you'll have a good feel and confidence in what you can actually do.

You describe negative splits correctly. It's having something in the tank for the finish vs. gasping for air and feeling the pain with 1,000m to go.

For this workout, however, I'd try to keep your pace consistent at or just below your goal pace. You will eventually be able to find a pace that's tough, and you will be very challenged to finish the last rep at the goal pace. You're not there yet, but it will come. It's OK to finish the set at goal pace, and then lower the pace for the next workout. Establishing a strong base of training will help you with a significant amount of speed, strength, endurance, and confidence. I know it's hard to hold back right now, but it's not really going to hold you back in the long run if you concentrate on establishing the base right now. (I'm going through the same thing and will detail it on the WP thread).

Put your blog in your signature, and you'll get more views. Rowers are a helpful and opinionated bunch, so you are sure to get feedback.

[iain]

Iain had recommended starting with a target of 1:58 for this workout (see above). My average time for the 8 was 1:55 which means next week that should be my target for the first 7 intervals. Am I interpreting the PP incorrectly?

Way too conservative. Since you were able to do the last interval at 1:40.8, a pace of 1:55 kind of defeats the purpose of 500m intervals. They should be hard work. I'm not going to suggest a target pace, because it's probably good for you to find your own at this point. It will take you a very long time if you increase by 1/7 of the improvement in the 8th interval. You'll get there a lot sooner by estimating how many times you could have repeated that 1:40.8 interval, even if you attempt a pace that turns out to be a little faster than you can hold for 8 reps.

This all depends upon your intention. Most people using the PP are coming back to it to sharpen up for competitions. They probably have very good endurance. My suggested approach & Pete's is designed for people who struggle with the distance. (which your report of 27/11 suggested may be appropriate) with a good warm up and warm down all sessions will be 10k+, so if 10k is a struggle, doing a significant portion of that distance at 15S/500m faster than you managed it without rests may be a big ask. The first couple of cycles done in the conservative manner gets you used to the format and used to the regular exercise required as well as exploring a significantly faster pace on the last reps. Have you managed the 8-12k intermediate days? These are strongly advised by most coaches if you are going to maintain yor progress.

Jumping in at or close to your maximum pace for the session is just too much for many people who become demotivated as a result. If you are happy with the pace and can sustain it, great. I had little data to suggest paces from. I did suggest tht in the 8 x 500 you amend the adice and speed up in the 7th as well as the 8th as I agree that a conservative starting pace would persist for too long for this session alone.

Kind regards

Iain

[M. Podolsky]

This all depends upon your intention.

Ballgame's stated goal is to hit sub 7 by February. Doing 500m intervals at 1:58 isn't going to help him get down below 1:45 within 8 weeks. Since he can already do 500m in ~1:40, he has a decent shot at achieving his goal. He'll have to discover what he's capable of training at soon. Slow and steady may get him there eventually, but probably not by February.

[Ballgame]

Iain, I really appreciate your input so far as it has helped me get my head around the PP and encouraged that sub-7 territory is not impossible. Hopefully, you didn't get the impression that I was blaming you for why my times were too conservative.

I actually think that starting with the 1:58 was a good suggestion mainly because it gave me a point of reference to start with. I think the first several weeks are going to involve a lot of trial and error because I'm not quite sure what my body can and cannot handle yet. I didn't expect there to be an 18s gap between my first 7 intervals and my last one (even though I felt like I should have gone a little quicker after the fact).

I generally build fitness and endurance at a pretty quick level and each time I row I feel stronger than my previous time, regardless of what type of workout I am doing. At some point before too long I will start to plateau and make smaller strides but I am trying to pull hard when I am doing it. With a goal of sub-7 by February 7th I think I need to get after hard in the next couple of months. Agree or disagree?

[Bill Moore]

If sub-7 is the goal, you may want to concentrate on the 4x1k. There is a strong correlation between this and 2k PB efforts. My guess is that you'd need to be doing this at 1:48 right now in order to make it to sub-7 in 8 weeks. (Which is still pushing the progress big time!!!)

I recall that Mike Caviston did the 4x1k each week before one of his races. That may be what you want to do. I'm not sure what pace you'd want to start at for this one. 1:48 might be a stretch right now, but you may want to try it and give yourself some slack if you can't finish (and lots of praise if you do!) Try 1, see how it feels, try another, and then see if you can make it or if you have to drop back on the pace. The next time you try it, you can speed up if you've made it, or drop back until you can finish it.

This is going to be tough, but the 2k isn't exactly an easy test.

[jamesg]

With a goal of sub-7 by February 7th I think I need to get after hard in the next couple of months. Agree or disagree?

Agree. To do so, suggest you take a week or so to work on technique, improving your stroke. The index of stroke quality is the ratio Watts/rating. You need to get to around 10. It's mainly a question of stroke length, strong posture, speed of action. Try 200W at 20; if I can do it (which means you don't need to pull very hard) so can you.

The 1500m pieces you did show good overall power, but roughly 7W'/stroke, which indicates short rushed strokes. This puts a cap on your total power, so it's not what you want to train to do. Give yourself a chance to work hard: relax, lengthen out and take your time. The only advantage us oarmen have is that the boat goes much further when we're not pulling, so let her go.

One easy routine that you can also use for warm-up is to start arms only on the backstop, then add swing, then knees, until you reach full length with your shins vertical, weight on your feet and hands at the chainguard. Always relaxed, low drag, smooth but fast strokes, slow recovery, back straight. As the rate drops, you'll see the power increase. When you can't go any faster, you're doing what you need. Then back off slightly but keep going.

Once your stroke is in place, you have content. Think of the workout as the container, the stroke as what's in it.

[Ballgame]

Just finished my 5th workout of the Pete Plan. Tonight’s workout consisted of a “hard” 5,000m. I was shooting for an aggressive target of 1:55 500m splits. Unfortunately, I couldn’t hit the target. However, I did manage 1:58.4 pace for a total time of 19:44.3 @ 28 SPM. Considering I rowed a 7:57 on 11/17/2008 and was totally wiped out, I am pretty pleased with my progress in a little over two weeks. My splits tonight were:

1:55.5 @ 31 SPM

1:55.9 @ 29 SPM

1:57.6 @ 27 SPM

1:58.9 @ 28 SPM

2:00.6 @ 28 SPM

2:00.7 @ 27 SPM

2:00.7 @ 28 SPM

2:01.6 @ 28 SPM

2:00.7 @ 28 SPM

1:52.2 @ 29 SPM

According to Paul’s Law (in reverse), this should put me at a 2,000m pace of roughly 7:27. That would also be 10 seconds faster than my fastest (and only second) 2,000 of 7:37 on 11/22/2008. Any thoughts on that as well as an assessment of my progress so far?

[M. Podolsky]

That's not a bad time at all, so you can be pleased with your progress.

The story your splits tell is that you started too fast and couldn't hold the pace, but then didn't give yourself enough credit, as you slowed down too much. You should not have had enough left in the tank to do the last 500m at a pace 8 seconds faster than the previous 3000m. I think that in addition to physical training, you're going to have to work on a better mental approach.

Once you have a better idea of realistic target paces, using negative splits really helps. For example, if you want to target 1:58 as the average pace for your next 5000m attempt, figure out ahead of time a set of splits that will start slow and improve steadily, but average out to 1:58. For example, your first 500m might be at 2:00, and then you can increase the pace by half a second every 500m or 1000m. Figure out the splits so that the last interval, if done with the steady increase, will produce the target average, but during that last interval give it all you've got. If you stick with the plan, you hit the target, and if you've got anything extra left, you improve on it.

When you start too quickly, you reach a point where you realize you can't maintain that pace to the end, so you slow down too much. I think this is what happened in your 5000m. However, if you've set up a negative split plan, you're always working towards intermediate targets, which means you don't have to think about the fact that you've got 3000m to go.

Another thing I do that helps me focus on the current split (and therefore ignore to some extent that I've still got say 35% of the piece ahead of me) is count down to the end of each 500m interval. Once I reach 250m I know that 5 strokes will get me to 300m, so I count them down, and after that it's only two sets of 10 strokes to get to the end of the interval, so I count those down too. Once I hit the end of the interval, I stop counting strokes for a bit, and start adjusting the pace for the next target. By the time I hit 700m, I know that in 5 strokes I'll start counting the 5 strokes before the 2 sets of 10, and at that point the interval is almost done. I don't start counting at 700m - I just get ready to start counting once I hit 750m. I'm sure other people do different things, and you might not find my counting strategy useful, but breaking the piece into easily achievable chunks with a lot of intermediate targets can be very helpful.

[Ballgame]

The story your splits tell is that you started too fast and couldn't hold the pace, but then didn't give yourself enough credit, as you slowed down too much. You should not have had enough left in the tank to do the last 500m at a pace 8 seconds faster than the previous 3000m. I think that in addition to physical training, you're going to have to work on a better mental approach.

Thanks for the suggestions. Yeah, I am still having a hard time learning what my limits and capabilities are. A lot of it is mental and I agree that having some sort of game plan ahead of time makes sense. Interestingly, I count strokes in a similar fashion and find breaking the row up into smaller mental chunks helps, especially when I hit the halfway mark of any row. In any endurance event, I have always been a much stronger finisher than starter.

In fact, in my (long ago) cross country days i would also start slow, get well behind, and then catch most everybody on the back stretch. The problem was I often had trouble timing when to start making a move. When I timed it right I would usually win but more often than not I would come in second or third because I would run out of race to catch the winner. If I would have had an extra 1/2 mile to mile I would usually have caught and passed the leader. Even now when I'm rowing, I'm having a having a hard time convincing myself to increase the pace earlier and row more consistently throughout the piece as you suggest.

I will start trying to map out a game plan ahead of time and stick to it as opposed to what I have been doing so far which is more trial and error. 1:55 was just too aggressive at this point.

[iain]

Tonight’s workout consisted of a “hard” 5,000m. I did manage 1:58.4 pace for a total time of 19:44.3 @ 28 SPM.

According to Paul’s Law (in reverse), this should put me at a 2,000m pace of roughly 7:27. That would also be 10 seconds faster than my fastest (and only second) 2,000 of 7:37 on 11/22/2008. Any thoughts on that as well as an assessment of my progress so far?

Well done on toughing out the 5k the hard way. I can't add much to the comments above on the importance of pacing, I imagine the way it felt will have hammered home that lesson. teh amount of neg. split is a matter of taste. An all out 5k is slightly faster than your aerobic system can sustain leading to a slow accumulation of an oxygen debt and making it a very tough distance. Ideally you should settle no slower than your sustainable aerobic maximum once your aerobic system is fully geared up. i.e. after 500m or so (possibly a little more to allow any residual oxygen debt from the start being reduced). I thus try and settle only a little below target (maybe 1-1.5S) and hold this to halfway. This then gives you the option of beating target if it is too low, while a 1S/1000m neg split means you have a tough pace in the second half anyway and need to go to unsustainable levels to substantially beat the target.

I also like to have 2 targets and pace strategies in mind. A primary target and then a more optimistic one that diverges as the piece progresses. This means that I have an achievable target and get "bonus points" for approaching my optimistic paces. Psychologically this helps you continue as it gives you a boost to be ahead. I always go significantly faster over the last 300m as you I can find an anaerobic gear at a much higher rating when the line is in sight. If feeling good I will be pushing on with 1k and 500m before. As a result, 5S/500m quicker on the last 500m is reasonable. Theoretically a flatter pacing strategy is better, but while times are improving significantly it is better to have the confidence of finishing with a PB than an outside chance of a better time but a worry that you will need to slow down. The body plays tricks and will want to stop, confidence in your ability allows you to not give in, while you can push to your absolute limits in the last 500 as you aren't going to give up then. When PBs are harder to come by then you need to optimise, but I don't worry about a couple of seconds difference at the moment.

Your overall pace was quicker than your recent 5x1500 which is done maximally at about the same pace, so a successful piece. Settling to 1:59 or 1:58 would have been more sensible, next time you will probably be quicker still, so will need to take your time from recent long intervals.

Paul's Law is not a good predictor of pace. As originally expounded it was to determine whether the rower needed to concentrate on pace & strength (times dropped off at >5S/doubling) or endurance (times dropped off by <5S per doubling). The drop off per doubling varies regularly between 3S & 7S (hence difference in pace between 2k & 5k is 4-10S) and wider still for some. Generally starters find pace drops off more rapidly, but as you come from an endurance sport this might not apply to you. So it is difficult to extrapolate from a single distance. Much better to assess 2k from the short intervals. The average pace of the speed pyramid is a predictor for a 2k. This is much tougher than the 8x500 and will be a real test. You should accelerate on the final 3 intervals so have the option to reduce your average a lot over this. As such, you might like to use 1:52 or 1:53 as your starting pace for the first 3 intervals (the 250m should be easy if you have warmed up properly and is more to get used to the required pace). You should be pretty pressed at the end of each of the intervals from 1k onwards as the rests are very long. I would hold off on a final sprint until the 500, but otherwise you can really push the pace from the second half of the 1k onwards.

The 5k shows a great improvement in distances.

Sorry this is so verbose.

- Iain

[Ballgame]

Iain,

On the speed pyramid, I understand the rest periods on the way up but am unclear on the way down. After the second 750m, do I rest for 7:30 or 4:30? On the second 500m, do I rest for 9:00 or 3:00? See my example below:

250m - rest 1:30
500m - rest 3:00
750m - rest 4:30
1000m - rest 6:00
750m - rest ??
500m - rest ??
250m

Thanks.

[iain]

On the speed pyramid, I understand the rest periods on the way up but am unclear on the way down. After the second 750m, do I rest for 7:30 or 4:30?

1:30 for each 250 of the interval just finished =750/250*1:30 = 4:30

On the second 500m, do I rest for 9:00 or 3:00?.

As above, 500/250x1:30 = 3:00.

Enjoy

- Iain

[Ballgame]

Surely I experienced some kind of rite of passage on the erg after my last row. I did the pyramid intervals of the PP and I tried to target 1:52 on my first 3 intervals, 1:50 on my 4th and everything I had left on my last 3. My splits were:

250m = 1:52.8 pace
500m = 1:51.9 pace
750m = 1:51.9 pace
1000m = 1:49.7 pace
750m = 1:46.9 pace
500m = 1:47.7 pace
250m = 1:51.4 pace

And afterward, I promptly went into my backyard and puked for 5 minutes!

Anyone else ever do something similar??

[iain]

250m = 1:52.8 pace
500m = 1:51.9 pace
750m = 1:51.9 pace
1000m = 1:49.7 pace
750m = 1:46.9 pace
500m = 1:47.7 pace
250m = 1:51.4 pace

And afterward, I promptly went into my backyard and puked for 5 minutes!

Impressive performance, I have never lost more than a mouthful of my precious food. But more amazingly, I have seen many results of the pyramid, but to date yours is unique. Firstly, I have never seen anyone target the 1k at a faster pace, the rest of us just try and get through at target. Secondly, that is an impressive second 750, this is normally the one people wobble on. Finally, I don't think I have ever seen anyone slower on the last 250. I'm surprised you didn't peruse your horticultural achievements after the 500!

Enjoy the 1:49.9 target next time

- Iain

[Ballgame]

So I calculated my average 500m pace @ 1:50.3. Pete's guidance in his pacing recommendations are:

1. Row this session at your 2k PB. My 2k PB was 1:54.3 on 11/22/2008. I've been trying to pull harder during my interval sessions so I am assuming it's ok (and a good thing) that my pace was quite a bit quicker than my 2k PB.

2. Pete also says to go at a constant pace for the 250m up to the 1k, and then speed up from there if you can. I suppose that means I shouldn't have tried to increase my pace to 1:50 on the 1k and instead stuck with the 1:52 pace through the 1k as well?

Still having a bit of a hard time figuring out the pacing for this training plan but I'll get there.

To your point about the slow 250 - I easily could have gone in the backyard and let it go after the second 500m. In fact, as I got back on for my last 250m I was just hoping I wouldn't have to jump off mid-row - however, it was really important for me to finish that workout. It was all I could do at that point to finish, even if it was sadly slow.

Looking at this session, it doesn't seem like it would be that difficult, especially with all the rest. But boy looks can definitely be deceiving!