Lower s/m and exertion

[solidpebble]

I have access to a Concept 2 rower and am a beginner (only a week in). I keep the damper on 5 which gives a coefficient of about 120.

I am 178 cm. Mid 20s. 72 kg. My current rowing goal is to sustain 2:00/500m split for an hour. My overall fitness goals prioritizes weightlifting, but I want to supplement with indoor rowing to keep my heart healthy.

Yesterday I did an hour rowing session with the following statistics:
12231m --- 2:27/500m avg --- 16 s/m avg. (I do not have wattage data)

Today I did a 30 minute rowing session:
6070m --- 2:28/500m avg --- 14 s/m avg. (Again, no wattage)

My assessment: the 30 minute row felt much harder than the 60 minute row. The difference in my 500m split is marginal for the sessions, but my s/m is (I feel) different enough to be significant. My crude explanation for why the 30 minute session had higher perceived exertion is because I literally had to exert more force per stroke - in other words, more intense.

My questions:
(1) Is my stroke rate too low for practicing technique? I really felt the strength dependency for the 14 s/m avg but I see a lot of people recommending 18-22 s/m for beginners. My problem is, I feel like my technique starts to breakdown at this rate.

(2) Will training slow and intense help me when I start upping the stroke rate? Am I training my muscles more than my cardiovascular endurance? (I'm not sure if I'm using the right terminology here so bear with me)

(3) I am lifting four days a week and rowing for 30 minutes afterwards. (Lifting is my priority). I prefer one long continuous session rather than HIIT styles, but I am open to any suggestion that will help me reach my goal of a one hour 15k. How should I structure my 30 minutes?

Please let me know if there are any general statistics I should be providing. I understand that I am a beginner with very little knowledge, and since this is my first post here your patience with me is much appreciated! Thank you for your time and attention.

[MPx]

Welcome and well done for getting started. Its definitely worth spending time getting the stroke/form right before you get too focussed on performance so I wouldn't worry too much about the scores just yet. However, you may be better served by perfecting form via various drills and then do an erg session at a more normal rate so that you get used to that too. r14 is really very low and seems likley to hamper keeping the stroke smooth and flowing - you really dont want to be pausing anywhere. I find even 18-22 slow enough to cause a pause at the finish if I'm not careful. So my take on your Qs (others will no doubt suggest different!)
1.Yes - rate is too low
2. You certainly want to develop a strong stroke and doing less strokes per minute will allow you to do more of them before you're tired out. But that's not the only thing to learn/get used to/and train so I dont think you should focus on that solely to the detriment of everything else.
3. Doing lots of 30 mins sessions will allow you to improve but will be very steady and probably boring - you may give up! Eventually you'll need to get used to going at 2:00 pace (or faster). At this stage you'll only be able to do that for a short time. So doing what you call HIIT intervals will be useful in getting used to the feel of the faster pace. Most training plans offer a variety of sessions to train different elements of performance. Have a look at the PetePlan5k to get some ideas on different sessions and what they're aimed at achieving. https://thepeteplan.wordpress.com/5k-training/

[Ombrax]

I do not have wattage data

Welcome to the forum!

Re: Power

C2 has a handy calculator here: https://www.concept2.com/training/watts-calculator

It will allow you to convert from pace to watts (or the reverse). If you're into Excel they also provide the equations, which you can plug into a spreadsheet and create whatever sort of table or graph you like.

As you'll see, the power required is proportional to 1 / pace^3, which means that getting from 2:27 to 2:00 will be a challenge. The good news is that you're just beginning, so at the start you should show significant improvement over time, but the bad news is that it will taper off as you get better and better.

Edit: Regarding stroke rate, you are indeed at a very low stroke rate, and increasing that should help quite a bit. With effort and keeping track of the various parts of the rowing motion should be able to bring that up to ~20 spm without too much trouble, assuming your technique is good. If you can't, that's probably a sign that something's not right.

Have fun!

[jamesg]

A 15km/h target is roughly 200Watt. There are not many lightweights (<75kg) who can do that. If you use the C2 logbook, you can see how your data compares with others' in your cohort.

Your C2 ergometer measures Power and will show it if you press the right button (Units).

Your work as described (6070m pace 2:28/500m at 14 s/m) is at 112 W.

112W at rate 14 indicates that each stroke was worth 112/14 = 8 Watt-minutes; and not bad at all. 2:27@16 is a 7W-min stroke, so easier, as you found.

The C2 site shows the technique needed and also daily workouts (WOD).

You can adjust drag if this helps. The stroke needs to be quick, but not so quick that you can't pull as hard as you want.


NB Today's WOD is 12 x 250m with 45s rest. Very useful for exploring possibilities.


It's possible that four days lifting plus five/six days rowing are too much for one week.

[Sakly]

72kg at 178cm is very light, especially when lifting is your priority. Did you start lifting recently or doing it for longer already?
Putting on some muscle weight will help enormously to get that goal. If you want to stay lightweight, you need to have a tight look on your gains, but it doesn't sound like that to me, as you're prioritizing lifting (what I link to strength/muscle/weight gain).

[Joebasscat]

As a lightweight similarly sized I will add this as encouragement. To hit your goal for an hour is a daunting task. I’d suggest many things but in relation to your initial goal, I’d first focus on your pace goal for 30’ sessions. Rate 20. My best was 2 yrs ago 2:03.9/500 for 30’. But I’m from a different era than you. This to say you have youth on your side, so it’s likely achievable. Just take it slow and enjoy the process. But hey an hour at that pace at rate 20 would be a significant achievement for a lightweight at any age I would think. I just can’t remember mid 20’s but pretty sure it felt different. Good luck.

[p_b82]

Hi and welcome.

I'll echo the other comments - rate 14-16 is probably too low when starting out. It's really difficult to slow the rate down without putting a pause in the start or end when going that low. which is why 18-22 is recommended when starting to avoid baking in that bad habit into the muscle memory.
ideally, you want to be driving with the legs, hip hinge and arms at the same speed, and slowing the recovery down back to the catch to alter the rate.

that way you are able to train the muscles to get used to doing the same work per stroke - and then it's up to the cardio to keep up (or not in my case).

As a lightweight, it's typical/generalisation that you will probably find that rating higher is a little more comfortable compared to some of of us larger folks.

2:00/500m is 200W as pointed out - so 80% more power than you are generating at the moment; if you use the same effort per stroke as you did for the 30min piece (8Wmin) you'd have to rate at 25spm to reach your target pace/power. If you go at 7Wmin it would be 28.5.

lower rates generally = more effort needed per stroke, but a longer recovery between each one. Strength being more important
higher rates tend to point towards less effort per stroke, with more emphasis on the cardio.

You'll eventually find your sweetspot rate- typically where a given pace "feels easier" if going by perceived effort, and if you've got a Hr monitor, you'll see slightly lower peak Hr - if going slow enough it's plateaued.

You'll also have to get your breath sorted for whatever rate you're going at - I'd image that's going to be 2 breaths per stroke for your hour target pace.

I find efforts below 130W I can do one breath per stroke (20-22spm); 140-150w (22-25spm) I settle around 3 breaths every 2 strokes & 160W+ I'm at 2 breaths regardless of the rate.

The furthest I've gone at ~200W is 2500m (@r27) with my Hr 97% max at the end, I have done a 200w 2k@r20 with 92%max hr.... so all I can do is wish you luck on your endeavour, as I don't think it's something I'm likely to achieve for 15k, so can't really give any other comments/advice on how best to get there.

[iain]

Great to have a long term goal, but that what 2:00 paced hour is! I suggest that you

1) concentrate on developing a good technique. Ideally post a video from the side on this forum so that you can get a second opinion once you are happy with it. Many set as there initial goal doing a 2k in 8 min (as the alternative initial "duration" goals have been achieved. Alternatively slowly increase the pace, so say 2:25 target for an hour might help you stay focussed.
2) set a shorter term goal that you can realistically work towards (the best we could say for your current one is "get fitter and faster" that really isn't too helpful.
3) find what you enjoy doing on the erg as you need to enjoy training as a vague notion to "look after your heart" is unlikely to be enough to push you to work hard / often enough to continuously improve for long enough for your long term goal to become a short term one! I appreciate that weights are your priority, but do you just want a cardio exercise to add to your program, or are you willing to integrate some rowing focussed sessions that will enable you to improve quicker? Some people are happy to plod along and get slowly faster, while others are competitive and want to see clear improvement and to feel challenged, different programs suit these different types.

Ultimately to do a good hour you will need to both row for >45mins regularly, pull strokes with a similar amount of work to your recent 30' and do this at 25/6 S/M. As for stroke rates, this will depend upon your underlying fitness/strength relationship. Personally I find 20 Strokes/min is challenging, but some others struggle to hit a rhythm below 24 S/Min. Also many find 20 min rowing daunting at first. As you have already done an hour, unless this left you washed out, I would start at 18 strokes per min for the full 30 min and build up from there.

Great start, let us know how you get on.

[RolandG]

Welcome and to hopefully many years of successful training.

My current rowing goal is to sustain 2:00/500m split for an hour.

Why? Not only is that a quite ambitious goal, but why did you choose it?

I am lifting four days a week and rowing for 30 minutes afterwards. (Lifting is my priority).

Then you’re compromising both due to the interference effect. While that may not be as bad as it is sometimes made out to be, it would be better to separate resistance and endurance training by a few hours, if possible.

[Sakly]

I am lifting four days a week and rowing for 30 minutes afterwards. (Lifting is my priority).

Then you’re compromising both due to the interference effect. While that may not be as bad as it is sometimes made out to be, it would be better to separate resistance and endurance training by a few hours, if possible.

You may be right on this topic, but there's other life ongoing, so I often combine my gym session with intervals at the end due to optimized time usage. It helps and is better than not doing them at all. Sure, if done in an individual session, the outcome and benefit would be higher, but planning of training and daily life would get harder.
So there is always a trade-off for each decision.

[RolandG]

You may be right on this topic, but there's other life ongoing, so I often combine my gym session with intervals at the end due to optimized time usage. It helps and is better than not doing them at all. Sure, if done in an individual session, the outcome and benefit would be higher, but planning of training and daily life would get harder.
So there is always a trade-off for each decision.

Hence the "if possible". We don’t know the time constraints of the OP. Maybe he can train separately. If not, the sky won’t fall and it won’t be killing his gains completely.

[Sakly]

You may be right on this topic, but there's other life ongoing, so I often combine my gym session with intervals at the end due to optimized time usage. It helps and is better than not doing them at all. Sure, if done in an individual session, the outcome and benefit would be higher, but planning of training and daily life would get harder.
So there is always a trade-off for each decision.

Hence the "if possible". We don’t know the time constraints of the OP. Maybe he can train separately. If not, the sky won’t fall and it won’t be killing his gains completely.

Sure, we fully agree on that. Only wanted to point out, exactly what you wrote, gains won't be lost or very small, if you do combined sessions. I cannot say how much better single sessions would be, as I have no comparison, but I feel that these intervals after gym sessions help a lot and I can progress in my exercises as well (but surely not as much I would, if I wouldn't do any rowing at all).