U.K. Forum

[Bob S.]

Oh sh*t Dougie. Look what you have done!

Bob S.

[Micromonkey]

Oh sh*t Dougie. Look what you have done!

Bob S.

About time you had him back, you'll notice the mental state has deteriorated somewhat with trying to convince us all in the UK that he's "so much better now" without actually showing anything to substantiate that claim.

So over to you to finish the job
He is one of yours after all, you can deliver the final coup de grâce

[Bob S.]

So over to you to finish the job
He is one of yours after all, you can deliver the final coup de grâce

MM,

Sorry, I'm staying out of it, thank you. I got into it recently only because one of his major detractors started tarring me with the same brush just because I had used a training program that he claims he is planning to do. I am still a bit steamed over mikvan52s snide remarks, but I didn't respond on the UK forum because I would just have come out with a lot of invective comments and I didn't feel in the mood to start a flame war.

Bob S.

[ranger]

Sorry, I'm staying out of it, thank you. I got into it recently only because one of his major detractors started tarring me with the same brush just because I had used a training program that he claims he is planning to do. I am still a bit steamed over mikvan52s snide remarks, but I didn't respond on the UK forum because I would just have come out with a lot of invective comments and I didn't feel in the mood to start a flame war.

Bob S.

No, Mike wasn't objecting to your association with me.

Mike was objecting to your training program--doing trials, proceeding from the top down, FM to 2K.

Mike thinks this is just a dodge from just having at a 5K or 2K more directly, given that they are the most highly contested races.

Mike sees no (dramatic? competitive? public?) value in doing trials at the less contested distances and therefore no reason for doing them.

He also sees no benefit in terms of training from working long races to short. To him, this is just arbitrary.

ranger

[Bob S.]

No, Mike wasn't objecting to your association with me.
Mike was objecting to your training program--doing trials, proceeding from the top down, FM to 2K.
ranger

Yes, yes, I understood that. I admit that my first response to him was not very diplomatic (i.e. use of the term "Buddy" is sort of derogatory), but it was his response that p*ssed me off, i.e. the implication that it was a crazy training program.

As I see it, the problem is that most ergers are so hooked on the 2k that they are interested only on those things that will improve their 2k times. As I have mentioned before, I have disliked the 2k ever since my first intercollegiate race in 1946. As far as the erg 2k is concerned, I still regard it as new. My first erg race, in 1994, was a 2.5k and I qualified even though, at 69, I was at the upper end of my bracket. But I saw no point to making a winter trip to Boston, even though the flight was free. It did get me hooked however, and the next year I lost 7 pounds, qualified on the 2.5k as a lwt and set a WR. The next year was the first year of the 2k erg racing. I qualified at one of the satellite regattas (missed making weight by a half pound at the second one) with a time that was a new WR for a few months. The 2.5k record lasted much longer because it wasn't being done any longer. Then the Brits revived it about 3 years ago and Geoffrey Knight clobbered it. In 1995, I got a hammer with negligible competition. But, in 1996, they gave out only a maximum of 4 hammers (M HWT, M LWT, W HWT, and W LWT) for everyone 50 and up based on a handicap system. I got a medal for first place in 70-79 LWT men, but no hammer. Again, the competition in that category (70-79) was negligible. The men's LWT 50 and up was a different matter. I did much better in the informal ranking system of those days, with some top distances for the 30' and 60' times, even beating the distances of the HWTs who bested me in the 2.5k and 2k. I did no training for these things. As you once pointed out, I was a casual erger. I was doing some work on the water, but was working out only 3-4 times a week total, OTW and OTE.

After that, a failing aortic valve put me out of it until it was replaced in 2003. Since the operation, mine main focus has been rehab and erging was one part of that. My first competition, 18 months later was another qualification, so I got hooked again and even did some deliberate training, which paid off better than I expected.

That being said, I still don't have any real motivation to work on the 2k. I know that you stress working on one's weaknesses, but I am a lazy guy and prefer to do the long distance stuff where I have always done better. The FM to 500m concept fulfilled my goals for last season, so I was happy with it no matter how looney MVB thinks it is. I didn't really spend much time training to prepare for it — six weeks max with 2-3 workouts per week.

Bob S.

[ausrwr]

I'll leap to Bob's defense here, not to Ranger's.

Working down from longer to shorter distances is pretty accepted - I'd look at Derek Clayton's work with Arthur Lydiard as an example, and I'd have no issue with it.

[Micromonkey]

So over to you to finish the job
He is one of yours after all, you can deliver the final coup de grâce

MM,

Sorry, I'm staying out of it, thank you. I got into it recently only because one of his major detractors started tarring me with the same brush just because I had used a training program that he claims he is planning to do. I am still a bit steamed over mikvan52s snide remarks, but I didn't respond on the UK forum because I would just have come out with a lot of invective comments and I didn't feel in the mood to start a flame war.

Bob S.

Sorry Bob, I was addressing the US forum generally, anything to keep him back over here where he belongs, we're all sick and tired of him across the pond.
Unfortunately that comment, with his mentality, will be music to his ears

[mikvan52]

Bob:

Sorry to hear that you feel I'm being snide.

My attitude toward maxing-out at longer distances is that it detracts from one's ability to max-out at shorter ones.
Do you feel the same way?

I have nothing but respect for people who like longer distances and train for them.... What I'm suspicious of is the ones who treat training as if it were something akin to filling in a table of all distances.

... and after all... you, me, ranger and others are members of an older set who have different physiological/biomechanical concerns than a Redgrave or a Henry Rono or an Elskid Ebbensen or a Bill Rogers....

Please keep in mind that the quote(s) of mine which bother you were in response to a raft of posts that concern ranger only and not you. ranger is trying to stir up a problem between you and me above...

Let's keep any problems that may exist between the two of us de_ranger_ed....

[mikvan52]

Mike was objecting to your training program--doing trials, proceeding from the top down, FM to 2K.

Mike thinks this is just a dodge from just having at a 5K or 2K more directly, given that they are the most highly contested races.

Mike sees no (dramatic? competitive? public?) value in doing trials at the less contested distances and therefore no reason for doing them.

He also sees no benefit in terms of training from working long races to short. To him, this is just arbitrary.

ranger

Rich:

I don't think I fully understand what you're saying here.

Are trials simply 1) rowing the distance or
2) training for a distance and rowing them as fast as one can?

I've been assuming that you've meant #2 (in response to your April-May campaign for a FM record)

My feeling is that it's fair to point out that many reputable training programs for the 2 to 5k range omit the need to row 20-50k AS FAST AS ONE CAN

I've had considerable experience through the years of training long distance:

vis. running ... a pair of 2:26 marathons
vis. erging ... a sub-3hr marathon
vis. 24 relay = 26 x 1 mile in one day at 5:07 avg
vis. multiple 12 mile rowing contests
vis. a 16,000(+) one hour piece
vis. a 31:45 10k (running)
vis. head racing in a 1x and 2x

all as a lightweight (and not a "weigh_in_able" one. I train and race as a lightweight)

I now steadfastly believe after nearly 40 years of staying in shape that many, many people overtrain volume rather than quality and that they do not rest enough on "off/easy" days.

You feel otherwise yet you have a paucity of results recently.
I look forward to what you may eventually "put on the boards"

Perhaps this will vindicate your form of training - the details of which no one knows but yourself. (You exclude time and distance elapsed in all your training posts)

[PaulS]

I now steadfastly believe after nearly 40 years of staying in shape that many, many people overtrain volume rather than quality and that they do not rest enough on "off/easy" days.

Welcome!

[Nosmo]

I now steadfastly believe after nearly 40 years of staying in shape that many, many people overtrain volume rather than quality and that they do not rest enough on "off/easy" days.

Welcome!

Do either of you (or anyone else for that matter) believe the Wolverine plan over trains volume?

I've certainly seen a lot of not rest enough. I think I've seen runners doing volume rather then quality more then anyone. I've seen rowers under do volume though. Among cyclists, at least those who ride in groups, is often too much hard riding and not enough rest.

[mikvan52]

Do either of you (or anyone else for that matter) believe the Wolverine plan over trains volume?

... I've seen rowers under do volume though. ....

I can't speak in an informed way about the Wolverine.
It's credentials are the best (Mike Caviston)

Indoor rowers under-do volume because of the boring nature of the erg.

Do you think OTW rowers under-do volume? I don't have enough knowledge of training volume in respect to that group.

[Nosmo]

Do you think OTW rowers under-do volume? I don't have enough knowledge of training volume in respect to that group.

In college I don't think we did. People in my club seem to under volume. But it is mostly masters on a moderately small lake so that may be why.

Another point about volume training, is that endurance is the most difficult to get but it is the easiest to maintain. Once one has a good base it is not as necessary to do as large a volume.

[Marius]

I dug up this article I read a couple of years ago about two germans rowing for Cambridge in the boat race. It talks a little about their training, noting that it was a lot "harder" as what they were used to in germany (it says an am training of 19k on the erg and a pm training of 22k otw consisted of a normal training day.

The interesting part was this:


"The training is harder than the one they were used to from Germany, both in volume and intensity. Engelmann recently improved is 2k pb on the erg to 5:48,9. 'By 2.4 seconds', as he emphasized. After 4 years training in Dortmund [homebase of the german national team afaik] he wouldn't have thought such an improvment to be possible."

Interesting, as far as anecdotical evidence goes, is that he already was a highly trained semi-professional, meaning that the improvment most likely was due to different training. Secondly, you'd expect their [Cambridge's] training to be geared at 6k.

/edit

The article (beware, machine translated )

http://translate.google.de/translate?u= ... 2Fdokument
%2F25%2F51%2Fdokument.html%3Ftitel%3DHellblaue%2BHelden%26id%3D46421552%26top%3DSPIEGEL
%26suchbegriff%3Drudern%2Boxford%26quellen%3D%26vl%3D0&sl=de&tl=en&hl=de&ie=UTF-8

[mikvan52]

Do you think OTW rowers under-do volume? I don't have enough knowledge of training volume in respect to that group.

In college I don't think we did. People in my club seem to under volume. But it is mostly masters on a moderately small lake so that may be why.

Another point about volume training, is that endurance is the most difficult to get but it is the easiest to maintain. Once one has a good base it is not as necessary to do as large a volume.

Thanks for reminding us of that (base building vs. base maintenance).

I also operate under an assumption (not scientific) that age and CV-system development plays a huge role in what training is appropriate.

-Mike vB
BTW- I pulled a 60' piece yesterday evening just to 'think' about this issue some more and got over 16k one more time.... good for a 55-59 lwt male.