6:28 2K

[Byron Drachman]

Hi Mike,
I agree about leaving this thread. Maybe we can form a support group and send each other a nutty message about natural stroking power, etc. when we need a fix. I'll probably come back to see the excuse for either not going to Indianapolis or else for the less than stellar performance if he does go.
Byron

[ranger]

Hi Mike,
I agree about leaving this thread. Maybe we can form a support group and send each other a nutty message about natural stroking power, etc. when we need a fix. I'll probably come back to see the excuse for either not going to Indianapolis or else for the less than stellar performance if he does go.
Byron

Byron--

So I will see _you_ there in Indianapolis?

Easy to talk about "stellar" performances and the like.

Not as easy to do them.

Sure, you win some and you lose some.

You sometimes do well.

You sometimes don't.

Shall we drive down to Indianapolis together?

It would be nice to talk.

I'll be your cox in your race, if you want.

When should I pick you up?

You are right on the way.

Are you registered yet?

Are you going to Cincinnati, Boston, and Chicago, too?

If your 2K is under the qualifying time, you can get a free plane ticket, round-trip, to Boston.

ranger

[ranger]

OK: My turn to brag:

Look at these performances (brag, brag: MY performances) OTW at 1k for our age group at Masters Nationals:

55-59 Heavyweight Championship

55-59 Lightweight Championship

Wonderful results, Mike.

Many congratulations.

1:55 pace for 1K is great.

We are all scrambling to try to keep up (or catch up) with you OTW.

I think I need at least a couple more years OTW before I can do 1:55 for 1K.

But I will be working on it as hard as I can.

See you in Boston this winter, and perhaps soon at some OTW regattas.

ranger

[ranger]

a 1:30/r.30 500 meter piece by a lightweight is a huge performance. Hats off!!

Were you a weighed in lightweight at the time? If not, how much did you weigh? ...and what about 2k races?

Not to detract: Even if you were a hwt, such a 500m time for a 55-59er is excellent... I could not manage that. It's just that I do remember hearing something about how each extra pound makes a difference on the erg.... (mass times acceleration, and all that)

I've always wondered about the form need for such a performance. My operating premise these days is that it's a form that I don't want to practice such form because it would slow a boat down.

What about the 1K, 1:38 @ 24 spm?

I think that is comparable to the 500m @ 1:30.

Both are 15-16 SPI.

No, the stroke I need to use in this rowing is not standard; it is oversized.

But it makes a certain sort of point.

My rowing is now more effective.

I have learned how to leverage with my legs in proper rhythm and sequencing with my other levers.

I couldn't do this before.

No, I didn't officially weigh in as a lightweight for these rows, but I can certainly make weight.

The fat I lose to make weight doesn't make any difference in my rowing.

When I have been fully trained, albeit rowing poorly, my lwt pb is 6:28; my hwt pb is 6:27.5.

That's pretty much a wash.

In my distance rowing, I also won't use a 2K stroke, either, but when I do distance trials and show a similar improvement, these distance trials will also make a point.

I now have learned how to relax, raise the rate, and be efficient with my legs, holding my technique steady while working at my anaerobic threshold for sustained distances.

This is also an essential part of what you need to do a quality 2K.

To do your best 2K, you need to be both effective and efficient.

And then you need to use this effectiveness and efficiency when you sharpen to get maximally fast.

ranger

[ranger]

What scientific study produced that finding?

The reference was cited on the British forum.

Look it up, if you're interested.

Maybe someone listening in here remembers the exact citation.

I don't.

The claim sounds entirely reasonable to me, though.

For instance, Paul Hendershott actually rowed slightly faster at 60 than he did at 55, even though he had been rowing at high levels (6:11 at his best, I think) for a long time before that.

He just decided to work hard and so got faster.

ranger

[ranger]

For you to claim that times will only drop .3 sec per year due to 'loss of aerobic capacity' MAY be technically correct (although I have to see the source) but that's like saying a race car will only slow down .3 sec per lap due to tire wear, when it is also running out of gas and low on oil and has lost sixth gear and is overheating - factors which will slow it down MUCH MORE than .3 sec per lap.

So, "economy of exercise" does not decline with age.

For me personally, full-body strength has not declined with age.

What else am I missing that declines with age?

My flexibility has not declined with age.

I can still touch my palms to the floor easily.

My balance and coordination are still good.

My weight is exactly the same.

I assume that, as far as rowing is concerned, it is only my aerobic capacity that is declining with age, and I assume that this is happening minimally.

My resting HR is 40; on the other end of the scale, I saw 186 bpm on the HR monitor last winter after a hard 500m, and without even working maximally.

I also assume that there are probably hundreds, if not thousands, of people just like me.

So I assume that, sure, at some point, a 60s lwt will pull (at least) 6:10.

I assume that 60s lwts are not inevitably slow, but just slow from various sorts of neglect.

60s lwts tend to row poorly, train infrequently and lightly, and have only severely diminished physical resources to draw on due to a lifetime of physical neglect.

There is also a very small pool of quality rowers in the higher age brackets and this might account for unnaturally depressed times.

I broke the 50s lwt WR three times, lowering it four seconds overall, without even knowing how to row, and when I was just shy of 53 rather than just 50.

Even though I am 59, I am much better than that now.

I now row well.

ranger

[PaulH]

To prepare for a quality 2K, the most essential things that you need to do are hard distance rowing and sharpening, given some foundational base.

I don't know about you, but I get about a dozen seconds over 2K from each.

You mean you *got* about a dozen seconds from each, the last time you did this, over half a decade ago, with a completely different stroke. Whereas now you are the only person of anything like your age and ability who has ever rowed with this stroke. So why would you think the same rule applies now?

btw, you lied earlier about C2's approach to censorship. Have you decided to retract that yet?

[ranger]

My distance pbs from back in 2003, when I rowed poorly, are these.

HM 1:49
10K 1:46
5K 1:43

These are right on "double the d, add 3."

Now that I row well, I think I am four seconds per 500m better than this.

FM 1:48
HM 1:45
10K 1:42
5K 1:39

We'll soon see.

ranger

[ranger]

You mean you *got* about a dozen seconds from each, the last time you did this, over half a decade ago, with a completely different stroke.

True.

But that's not all I have to go on.

For instance, as I have been saying, I now do 1:48 @ 25 spm (or whatever) with a low UT1 HR, about 150 bpm.

So I should be able to do a FM @ 1:48.

Back in 2003, I pulled 1:48 at my anaerobic threshold, 172 bpm.

Another good bit of news is that my rung on the 10 MPS ladder for this distance rowing is now 1:43 @ 29 spm.

I now pull right around that when my HR is at my anaerobic threshold.

This means that I am naturally pulling 11 SPI in this distance rowing--at substantial and maximally efficient ratios and rates.

I didn't do anything like that back in 2003.

I pulled 10 SPI in my 2K racing.

I suspect I pulled 8-9 SPI in my distance rowing.

I also have the 6:29 2K that I did at 12 SPI at Baltimore in 2006, just on the basis of foundational training.

So I keep working on it.

I suppose we'll just have to wait and see how this all turns out.

These technical things are somewhat different from physiological things.

They can't be rushed.

They need to be coaxed along.

You don't improve technically by straining and pulling your guts out.

Just the opposite.

You improve by relaxing and making the technical improvements permanent, unconscious habits.

ranger

[leadville]

Byron and Mike

If you are still out there, farewell. I'll leave r. to his autodidactery, altho I do reserve the right to check back in on occasion when i need a fix ''

If a ranger trains in the basement and no one reads his posts, does he exist? ':?'

[kini62]

Byron and Mike


If a ranger trains in the basement and no one reads his posts, does he exist? ':?'

We can only hope he doesn't.

Seemingly his SPM refers to nothing more than his ego.

Gene

[ranger]

If a ranger trains in the basement and no one reads his posts, does he exist?

Because I haven't been racing in my basement, but traininig, my training doesn't exist for this forum.

This forum is all about racing training, an entirely unproductive, if not dangerously destructive, practice.

As I mentioned, I don't just train, though.

I race about five times as often as my immediate competition.

In fact, this year, my immediate competition (the WR-holder in my age and weight division, Rocket Roy) isn't racing at all.

My other main competitor, Mike VB, I assume, will just race once--at WIRC.

So my racing is entirely public, much more public than the racing of my major competitors.

Those who race their training also don't exist, as far as training goes, either in their talk or in their practice. They just race; they don't train.

Furthermore, as it is impossible not to notice, many of those who race their training get sick, injured, stale, or discouraged, and when the time comes to race, they can't and so don't. Many quit the sport entirely.

So they don't race, either.

I both train and race.

Those who race their training often do neither--permanently.

Last year, in my public racing, I had the best 2K in my age and weight division without even preparing for it, just on the basis of foundational rowing, without distance rowing or sharpening.

You can't argue results or be better than the best.

Enough said.

Because I both race and train, last year, and for several years before that, I raced, but without breaking the flow and order of my training.

I am happy with these results.

This year I have added distance rowing.

Over the next two months I will sharpen.

So I am now preparing to race.

Because of this, I expect my racing this year to be quite a bit better.

We'll soon see how much.

It is _very_ hard to race a quality 2K without preparing for it, just by doing foundational rowing at low rates, without getting the rate and HR up with hard distance rowing and sharpening.

ranger

[ranger]

BTW, lore has it that if your distance rowing is going well, at some point, you arrive at a very brisk but comfortable pace that is in and around your anaerobic threshold.

This is your "base pace" for distance rowing.

I would guess that this pace depends pretty heavily on your age and talent for rowing, that is, your aerobic capacity and anaerobic threshold, and therefore with your experience in endurance sports, but lore has it again that this pace is usually in and around your 6K pb pace.

This happened to me quite a while ago, but now this pace is getting easier and easier from day to day, and in the course of long row, pretty inevitable. I just keep trying to relax, keep the rate up, and work as hard as I can without becoming uncomfortable, and there it is, it pops up by intself, without any attempt to force it.

If you row well and have some talent for rowing, perhaps a _lot_ of talent, you can row at your anaerobic threshold and your base pace for an hour, perhaps longer, a HM or even 30K, although doing base pace for a FM would probably by too much for anyone.

My 6K pb is 1:44.

The standard rate at 6K is 27 spm.

So this is happening now:

Again and again when I am on long rows, I inevitably settle into 1:44 @ 27 spm, base pace.

Delighted about this.

This means that I have been patient with my distance rowing, patient enough to let it grow back naturally.

It is now coming back gangbusters.

Before the winter is over, I think I will probably row 60min, 1:44 @ 27 spm.

Base pace.

This is "threhold" rwing.

Base pace for an hour.

Great stuff.

Once you row well. if you c an hack it, I think that this is the sort of rowing that it is best to do every day, year round, both OTW and off.

A moderate rates and brisk pace over long distances.

This sort of rowing is neither the boring, heave-ho truding you have to do to learn to row with foundational rowing nor the eye-popping anaerobic stress that you have to enture to make it through sharpening.

It is just vigorous, but comfortable, rowing.

ranger

P.S. The 50s hwt WR for 60min is 1:46/17K.

[PaulH]

I suppose we'll just have to wait and see how this all turns out.

Well we could wait, but why don't we try speculating endlessly instead? You go first...

[ranger]

I suppose we'll just have to wait and see how this all turns out.

Well we could wait, but why don't we try speculating endlessly instead? You go first...

I am not just speculating, I am rowing--

doing it.

Training is coming along _great_.

I am now rowing right on my targets.

ranger