New starter

[Rspushbike]

Hello,
I'm new to rowing, 67 years old in November. Had the concept2 for about 2 months. I'm rowing 20 minutes almost every day at the moment. I'm very skinny (61kg on a good day) and 5ft 10 in tall. I'm steadily improving my distance with an intense effort (for me) in the last 3 minutes. Currently at 4370m. I want to maintain strength so I row on the 10 setting. I also cycle do some kettle bell stuff (not at the same time as rowing). What I like about rowing is there is no left knee pain which I do feel on the bike and with KB lunge exercises at the start of the movement. I dislocated my patella in my youth and I suspect there is some arthritis developed as I become older.
Any tips would be appreciated.
Thanks,
Richard

[Citroen]

DON'T row with the damper lever on ten, any technique you've got will go out of the window.

Get the PM5 to tell you the "drag factor" (which should be around 210 at damper 10), drop the drag to around 110-130 (damper lever on 5) and learn to row correctly. Rowing is a legs sport, it isn't hauling anchor with your arms/upper body.

Take a look at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zWu1yuJ0_g and you'll notice the fluidity of rowing from the catch to backstops with NO pauses.

[Sakly]

Hi,

First: what Citroen wrote ^^!
Even if rowing is a more strength related sport compared to running, it is not meant to be used to maintain strength and muscle. A specific strength training will always outperform rowing for this goal. A proper damper setting and a good technique will give you the best benefit for the rowing exercise, which will keep/make you fit from cardio vascular point of view and also muscular level, but other than strength training.

For your knees: I would try to strengthen with negative single leg movements. Starting with low height "touchdowns" - standing on a slightly higher surface, ~2 inch at the beginning, you start a squat movement with your standing leg: hip hinge, start bending the knee to bring it forward - same movement as a usual Squat until your heel of the passive leg hits the ground (touchdown). Then go back up and repeat. Lowering should be slow and very controlled. Increase hight over time to increase ROM and intensity based on how your knee feels.

[Dangerscouse]

Yeah, echoing Citreon, don't row on '10'.

I row, almost always, at a drag factor of circa 120, which is probably around about '3/4' on your erg, assuming it's been bought as new?

[MPx]

And another vote to say don't do it at 10. Your reason to do so probably comes from the misnomer that the lever adds "resistance" - it doesn't. What it does is makes the flywheel slow down quicker so its more of a heave to get it going again. BUT - the resistence you feel is all about how fast you accelerate the flywheel - and you wont be able to accelerate it very fast if its slowed down a lot - unless you're a World's strongest man type. With a lower drag factor (lower lever number) you can still generate real leg strength by pushing very hard and very fast with the legs like doing a standing jump backwards. And that will lead to a better stroke and allow you to become a better rower over time.

[JaapvanE]

I want to maintain strength so I row on the 10 setting.

This is the same as saying you want to ride uphill on Alpe d'Huez on a bike, in 21st gear. Of course you don't do that, that is what your 1st gear is made for. Same goes for drag factor, the setting that makes you most effective is the one you need to use.

Using such a high dragfactor, similar like using a much too high bicycle gear, is a recipe for injury. Either you overload your joints or hurt your back.

The machine will provide ample of resistance when you go faster. No need to change dragfactor for that.

My practical tip: look at video's from Dark Horse rowing and RowAlong. Improve your technique by following them, and then start to think about adding distance and speed.

[gvcormac]

If you want to do strength training on the rower, pull absolutely as hard as you can for 10-20 strokes. Then rest, and do it again. Rinse and repeat a few times. It makes almost no difference what the damper setting is, unless it is so low that you can't move fast enough to pull as hard as you can.

Any row lasting longer than about half a minute will build endurance, but not strength.

Don't forget to do some push-ups to balance your "push" and "pull" strength training.

[iain]

While I agree with the above that weights will increase / maintain strength more effectively than rowing, rowing will help to reduce muscle loss and even build some muscle. If you would rather not increase your strength exercises for rowing, then I recommend doing shorter rows at a faster pace in intervals once or twice a week. However, you need to warm up substantially first. I find 1 min on and 1-2 min rest between is the sweetpoint for speed without risking back injury.

[Rspushbike]

Thanks to all of you for the advice.
Was I doing it wrong! Thankfully, not injured yet , bit tired though
Thanks for the video link. The lady rowing on that leans back more than me I think at the end of the stroke. So I'll bear that in mind

Regarding the other points:
It is a new rower.
I do do push ups although sometimes on knuckles to avoid wrist pain.
One legged lowers/touchdowns or squats are very tough I find. I do try them but I'm somewhat limited on depth especially on the left leg.

Ok, so what I'll try is level 5 and try some intervals as advised. I'm curious about "minutes per 500m" versus "strokes per minute". I row on "just row" to see these two parameters. I think I've noticed that it's not always the case that I get a lower "minutes per 500m" correlating to a higher "strokes per minute". I would appreciate comments regarding that please.

[Ombrax]

I'm curious about "minutes per 500m" versus "strokes per minute". I row on "just row" to see these two parameters. I think I've noticed that it's not always the case that I get a lower "minutes per 500m" correlating to a higher "strokes per minute". I would appreciate comments regarding that please.

100% different things.

Here's a somewhat related post from a different thread:

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=207621#p573022

Be sure you understand why the two are different, because that's critical to understanding how you're doing on the erg.

Bottom line: Pace (minutes / 500m) is a true measure of how hard you're rowing. The lower the number the better. (or Watts - in which case the higher the better)

Stroke rate (strokes / minute) is simply a fall-out of how you're achieving a given pace. High stroke rate doesn't necessarily correlate with generating a lot of power. I sometimes see numbers on the PM history at my gym of 35 spm (very, very high) with an average pace of 3:45 (very, very slow). That's horrible, and you don't want to be doing that.

[Sakly]

To understand it even better you can calculate a metric called SPI (stroke power index) - divide your watts by stroke rate.
Examples:
200W at 20spm = 10 -> low rate with high work in each stroke
150W at 25spm = 6 -> higher rate with much less work in each stroke.
On low rate training you can focus on a good catch, good overall posture and get your technique on point to create huge amounts of power each stroke. By rating up the stroke power should nearly stay the same as the stroke itself shouldn't change (except short sprints), only the recovery (time) gets shorter.

One legged lowers/touchdowns or squats are very tough I find. I do try them but I'm somewhat limited on depth especially on the left leg.

This probably shows that you need to do it. You seem to have disbalanced legs in terms of power or stability or both. Probably it's also related to your movement quality/pattern.
I absolutely recommend to view some videos of squat university, very good channel.

[iain]

In some cheap rowers, the distance the handle is pulled is scaled directly to the distance travelled, so the faster the rating (for the same length strokes), the faster you are adjudged to be rowing. The C2 includes the concept of the "run of the boat". While a given length stroke (ie the time the oar is in the water) will indeed (ignoring the slip of the oar through the water) will indeed move the boat the same distance, the boat keeps moving while you recover ready for the next stroke. If the stroke is quicker, the boat will be moving faster (same distance in less time) and this will continue while you recover. Therefore the first of 2 oarsmen pulling the same length strokes at the same rating where the first pulls a fast stroke with a slower recovery while the second pulls a slow stroke with a faster recovery will row faster. As a result optimum rowing (ignoring sprints) is to mimic the first of these to produce a fast stroke and then allow the muscles to recover by recovering slowly. Looked at another way, it takes energy to go back up the slide to the catch and this increases with the cube of the speed of the recovery (broadly proportional to the stroke rate). However only the work extending the chain is recorded by the monitor so this energy is "wasted" and so should be minimised. Many beginners row with a fairly constant effort. As there is no resistance to the recovery, this leads to a slow drive and fast recovery and hence a lot of wasted effort.

[JaapvanE]

Bottom line: Pace (minutes / 500m) is a true measure of how hard you're rowing. The lower the number the better. (or Watts - in which case the higher the better)

Stroke rate (strokes / minute) is simply a fall-out of how you're achieving a given pace. High stroke rate doesn't necessarily correlate with generating a lot of power. I sometimes see numbers on the PM history at my gym of 35 spm (very, very high) with an average pace of 3:45 (very, very slow). That's horrible, and you don't want to be doing that.

The factor between those two is "distance per stroke", which essentially determines how many meters you travel per stroke. A high strokerate and slow pace generally indicates that the distance per stroke isn't optimal. Please note, Olympic Rowers deliberatly sacrifice a bit of distance per stroke in order to increase overall pace by increasing strokerate much further. Energetically it is a sane approach, but requires strokerates most of us can't reach without sacrificing technique.

[JaapvanE]

Many beginners row with a fairly constant effort. As there is no resistance to the recovery, this leads to a slow drive and fast recovery and hence a lot of wasted effort.

And, as the boat/flywheel is still fast, also a lot of missed catches.

Oddly, you can directly see when people have been trained well: they let the boat/flywheel run if they can, and will not rush a recovery. Getting a good smooth effective catch is what they aim for. Not the cavemen approach most crossfit gyms teach people.

[iain]

high strokerate and slow pace generally indicates that the distance per stroke isn't optimal. Please note, Olympic Rowers deliberatly sacrifice a bit of distance per stroke in order to increase overall pace by increasing strokerate much further. Energetically it is a sane approach, but requires strokerates most of us can't reach without sacrificing technique.

OTW there are additional factors to static ergs. The recovery movement OTW does accelerate the boat forwards and so there is less of a penalty for a fast recovery. As a result generally lower ratings are used OTE than OTW.