Ranger's training thread

[Byron Drachman]

Nov 28, 2006: My technique problems are now solved. I am now doing full sharpening and distance rowing.

Jam 16, 2007: I have now sorted out my technique, and I am doing both free rate distance rowing and full sharpening.

Jan 21, 2007: Over the next month, then, as I do full sharpening, I will try to hold the stroking power and lift the rate slowly to 34 spm.

Jan 23, 2007: I am just starting to sharpen --snip--

January 19, 2009: I am only in my first week of sharpening.

January 22, 2009: I have only been sharpening for three days.

February 2, 2009: Haven't really done any sharpening yet.

February 5, 2009: Sharpening is coming along perfectly.

February 8, 2009: I have just started to sharpen.

February 9, 2009: What sharpening? I haven't done any yet.

Jan 25, 2010: I am just beginning to sharpen.

Jan 27: 2010: I now have seven weeks of sharpening.

Feb 2, 2010: I have just begun my sharpening

March 4, 2010: I am now sharpening hard.

March 5, 2010: I haven't even done any distance trials or hard sharpening yet.

March 8, 2010: I am just starting to sharpen.

March 26, 2010: I haven't even done distance trials or sharpening yet.

July 21, 2010: I will start sharpening for BIRC 2010 on September 1st.

August 9, 2010: For the six months of this next indoor racing season (September, October, November, December, January, February), I will indeed be sharpening hard.

September 19, 2010: I am now sharpening, preparing to race, both OTW and OTErg.

October 11, 2010: I haven't sharpened since EIRC 2003.

[mikvan52]

"sharpen" your red pencil, ranger... It's time for another edit!

...on second thought: Stay away from anything "sharp". You might hurt yourself...
Particularly if it's too early for you, as you claim, to take that heart of yours to max rate...

You see red. I see yellow.... all the way from 2003 to 2010.

http://static.panoramio.com/photos/orig ... 899343.jpg

Unwilling to train and put it all on the line.... unless it's double yellow

BTW: You still haven't answered: "What pace are you going to go out at ?... Re: Head of the Grand. You said 2:05.
Please confirm."

[NavigationHazard]

Byron, you forgot:

My interval workouts (and distance trials) from now until then should show pretty clearly where I am and how I might do. I _thought_ I was ready to row 6:24 last year, but (I think) my poor technique held me back. These problems with technique are now fixed. At BIRC, I will row at 105 drag, with proper timing, and with full use of the slide. If my sharpening goes well, my plan is set the dial at 1:36 and hold it steady until the kick.

Sharpening for BIRC now in full swing...

I'll check it out again over the next month as I do my sharpening for the CRASH-Bs.

[ranger]

Byron, you forgot:

My interval workouts (and distance trials) from now until then should show pretty clearly where I am and how I might do. I _thought_ I was ready to row 6:24 last year, but (I think) my poor technique held me back. These problems with technique are now fixed. At BIRC, I will row at 105 drag, with proper timing, and with full use of the slide. If my sharpening goes well, my plan is set the dial at 1:36 and hold it steady until the kick.

Sharpening for BIRC now in full swing...

I'll check it out again over the next month as I do my sharpening for the CRASH-Bs.

Sure, I started sharpening each of these years, time after time, but it became quickly clear, each time, that I hadn't sorted my technique out yet, at least entirely, and still needed to keep training in order to get this done.

So full sharpening--repeatedly--did not get done.

I raced, year after year, but unprepared, and (in different ways each year) still struggling with aspects of technique.

I haven't done 8 x 500m, 4 x 1K, 4 x 2K, 5K trials, 6K trials, 30min trials, 10K trials, 60min trials, 20 x 500m, Zatopek 250s, Zatopek 1Ks, etc., anything and everything that should be included in a good bout of hard sharpening, since EIRC 2003.

Over these years, I did a bit of 1' on, 1' off, just to get used to higher ratings.

But that's about it.

ranger

[snowleopard]

Byron, you forgot:

My interval workouts (and distance trials) from now until then should show pretty clearly where I am and how I might do. I _thought_ I was ready to row 6:24 last year, but (I think) my poor technique held me back. These problems with technique are now fixed. At BIRC, I will row at 105 drag, with proper timing, and with full use of the slide. If my sharpening goes well, my plan is set the dial at 1:36 and hold it steady until the kick.

Sharpening for BIRC now in full swing...

I'll check it out again over the next month as I do my sharpening for the CRASH-Bs.

Sure, I started sharpening each of these years, time after time, but it became quickly clear, each time, that I hadn't sorted my technique out yet, at least entirely, and still needed to keep training in order to get this done.

So full sharpening--repeatedly--did not get done.

I raced, year after year, but unprepared, and (in different ways each year) still struggling with aspects of technique.

I haven't done 8 x 500m, 4 x 1K, 4 x 2K, 5K trials, 6K trials, 30min trials, 10K trials, 60min trials, 20 x 500m, Zatopek 250s, Zatopek 1Ks, etc., anything and everything that should be included in a good bout of hard sharpening, since EIRC 2003.

Over these years, I did a bit of 1' on, 1' off, just to get used to higher ratings.

But that's about it.

ranger

To translate: "My RWB just never produced the sharpening results I was looking for. I tried a few exploratory 8 x 500s but they always pointed to a 6:40ish lwt 2K, never to a 6:16. Dang! Technique _must_ be the problem. So I went back to the drawing board and tried every stroke variation I could think of while all the while neglecting sensible, progressive training. I tried: high drag, low drag; short slide, long slide; sprackback and brokeback; and all to no avail. And after seven, long, tedious years I am still none the wiser."

[ranger]

Unwilling to train and put it all on the line

Nope, just the opposite.

More than willing to train (in order to get better).

Unwilling to sharpen, if my training is not yet complete.

You don't put it all on the line when you race, Mike.

You put it all on the line in your (UT) training.

Races are won in (UT) training.

Both sharpening and races are entirely redundant, predictable.

They are just a reflex of your training (and by that, I don't mean your sharpening).

ranger

[hjs]

Sure, I started sharpening each of these years, time after time, but it became quickly clear, each time, that I hadn't sorted my technique out yet, at least entirely, and still needed to keep training in order to get this done.

So full sharpening--repeatedly--did not get done.

I raced, year after year, but unprepared, and (in different ways each year) still struggling with aspects of technique.

I haven't done 8 x 500m, 4 x 1K, 4 x 2K, 5K trials, 6K trials, 30min trials, 10K trials, 60min trials, 20 x 500m, Zatopek 250s, Zatopek 1Ks, etc., anything and everything that should be included in a good bout of hard sharpening, since EIRC 2003.

Over these years, I did a bit of 1' on, 1' off, just to get used to higher ratings.

But that's about it.

ranger

So this year won't be any different, you simply will never be able to crack 6.40 anymore, you 60 year old moter is simply become to small, so you will never "sharpen" again.

BTW, If we use your criteria, almost nobody "shaperens" I for one never have met your criteria.... Does that mean that I can substract 12 second from al my racing results? after all "everybody sharpens the same way "

[ranger]

Does that mean that I can substract 12 second from al my racing results?

Sure, if you never sharpen.

Sharpening can improve your 2K a _ton_.

A 2K is significantly anaerobic.

A 2K is done at top-end UT1 - 10.

ranger

[ranger]

So this year won't be any different

Nothing to say on that score yet, except that I don't have any more problems with technique, even though I am rowing at low drag.

Think what you want, though.

I am certainly not very sharp yet.

So no fait accompli to this point.

I will be sharpening for the next six months.

As far as I can tell, everything else seems to be in place.

ranger

[whp4]

So this year won't be any different

Nothing to say on that score yet, except that I don't have any more problems with technique, even though I am rowing at low drag.

how does that appreciably differ from the yearly claim that your stroke is fixed, usually made just before your failures to come anywhere near your predictions send you back to the drawing board again and again?

I am certainly not very sharp yet.

you have a gift for understatement!

[jliddil]

BTW, it seems to me that one of the best tests imaginable for a maxHR would be to find, incidentally, that when riding along for a couple of hours on your bike (or rowing along for a couple of hours OTErg), your HR was riding comfortably at 175 bpm when you were doing 320 watts.

ranger

OK so now besides being the best coach in the world he is now an expert exercise physiologist. I don't think so.

[ranger]

To translate: "My RWB just never produced the sharpening results I was looking for. I tried a few exploratory 8 x 500s but they always pointed to a 6:40ish lwt 2K, never to a 6:16. Dang! Technique _must_ be the problem. So I went back to the drawing board and tried every stroke variation I could think of while all the while neglecting sensible, progressive training. I tried: high drag, low drag; short slide, long slide; sprackback and brokeback; and all to no avail. And after seven, long, tedious years I am still none the wiser."

No, technique was the problem from the beginning.

My training since 2003 has been an attempt to improve my technique.

In 2003, my fitness was maximal, so my 2K times plateaued.

Clearly, continuing down the path of "sensible, progressive training" was futile.

"Sensible, progressive" training plans for rowing try to improve fitness.

They say nothing about technique.

Since 2003, I have made steady progress with technique, but my advances have come piecemeal.

I have improved this, then that, then this other thing, etc.

The rowing stroke is a pretty integrated affair, though, so this piecemeal progress has been difficult to extend, consolidate, and use in any fully productive way until it was all in place.

I think the stroke is all in place now.

At least, it sure feels like it is.

At low rates, I am rowing very easily at 13 SPI, and at higher rates, I am losing almost none of this power, while maintaining a very high, comfortable ratio (2-to-1).

_Very_ elegant, compared to what I have done in the past at all stages in my training.

ranger

[ranger]

how does that appreciably differ from the yearly claim that your stroke is fixed, usually made just before your failures to come anywhere near your predictions send you back to the drawing board again and again?

How does what I am saying now differ from what I said repeatedly before?

Not at all, except that I have figured some more things out (i.e., in particular, relaxed shoulders at the catch and low drag) and these things seem to be the last things I needed to make the stroke complete.

ranger

[DUThomas]

I think the stroke is all in place now.
At least, it sure feels like it is.

Excellent! Why don't you post a video of your all-in-place stroke?

It would be very instructive for ergers who came to this thread for enlightenment. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034583/quotes?qt0429951

[hjs]

So this year won't be any different

Nothing to say on that score yet, except that I don't have any more problems with technique, even though I am rowing at low drag.

Think what you want, though.

I am certainly not very sharp yet.

So no fait accompli to this point.

I will be sharpening for the next six months.

ranger

You are finally making some sence......... I am almost a bit impressed.

Only the last line is strange, sharpening or what would be a much better way of putting it, getting "race ready" will take 6/10 weeks.

I will predict the outcome for you, you be trying to get the 60 s lightweight Wr. If you get everything just right that is possible, albleit 25/28 seconds above 6.16.....................
Birc will come to soon, I don't think you will row there.