Rowing at Elevation

[Grotegut]

New to the forum. New to rowing. Got my C2 about a month ago and just started to post on the online log and check my rankings. What a kick. I look forward to years of work and play. I live in Boulder, CO at a mile high or so. I have a question regarding rowing at elevation. Anyone with personal experience of rowing at different elevations? Is there any 'handicapping' for us poor souls in thinner air? One can always hope I suppose. Thanks. Glad to have stumbled into the Concept2 rowing community.

Stan Grotegut

[jliddil]

New to the forum. New to rowing. Got my C2 about a month ago and just started to post on the online log and check my rankings. What a kick. I look forward to years of work and play. I live in Boulder, CO at a mile high or so. I have a question regarding rowing at elevation. Anyone with personal experience of rowing at different elevations? Is there any 'handicapping' for us poor souls in thinner air? One can always hope I suppose. Thanks. Glad to have stumbled into the Concept2 rowing community.

Stan Grotegut

I don't think so but like runners and cyclist who train at altitude you should then have an advantage if you race elsewhere like at the CRASH-B in Boston which is pretty close to sea level. We don't handicap Sherpas either.

[Bob S.]

New to the forum. New to rowing. Got my C2 about a month ago and just started to post on the online log and check my rankings. What a kick. I look forward to years of work and play. I live in Boulder, CO at a mile high or so. I have a question regarding rowing at elevation. Anyone with personal experience of rowing at different elevations? Is there any 'handicapping' for us poor souls in thinner air? One can always hope I suppose. Thanks. Glad to have stumbled into the Concept2 rowing community.

Stan Grotegut

Yes, there is a handicap system. If you compete in the CRASH-B satellite regatta in Denver next year, you can qualify for the free trip to Boston with a longer 2K time than is required at sea level:

http://www.concept2.com/us/racing/crash ... b_qual.asp

For anything else, you are SOL.

Bob S., @ 4,000' in the Owens Valley.

[Grotegut]

Thanks for the replies. I'll try to remember the advantages of altitude as I gasp for breathe. I'll look into involvement with the Denver Regatta and the Rocky Mt. Rowing Club. That's a great lead. Thanks Bob. At this point I feel like a baby rower, only a month old at this. Far from any regatta qualification. Not sure that's even a goal. I do enjoy the on-line rankings. That's a comfortable level of competition for now, with self and others. I'm sure I'd be twice as fast at sea level. Row on!
Stan

[jsharpe]

I'd like to resurrect this rather old thread and hopefully spark a new conversation.

I purchased my model E a little less than a year ago and have so far logged a bit over 6.4M meters as a nube. I live at an elevation of 9600' (2926m) and while I am certainly aware of the aspects of altitude training, since I have only worked out here and had no reference point, it didn't really sink in. However, recently I had the chance to use another model E while traveling to a lower elevation (Houston, TX, USA) and the difference hit me like a brick wall!

With exactly the same drag setting of 110 that I use at home, I was amazed at how easy it was to break all my personal bests. In many cases without even breathing hard enough to have to open my mouth. By every measure I could get out of the PM4 (split times, total times, average watts, etc) I was way over anything I could hope to do back home. Furthermore it was all at a heart rate much lower than even just casually rowing at my native elevation and I could row much longer and harder without even really trying hard. In fact I had to go completely nuts to even begin to approach my max heart rate which is trivially easy to do at home.

I guess the point I'm trying to make is that I always understood that people rowing at lower elevations had a competitive advantage, but it didn't sink in as to how substantial it actually was. Now my eyes are open and I'll never look at any online competition or challenge in quite the same way.

I think it's unfortunate that there isn't some form of elevation handicap for things like the annual honor board or distance challenges. BTW if any of you happen to be in the Crested Butte area and want to experience this in person, PM me and I'd be happy to set you up to "row a mile in my shoes". I think you'll gain a new perspective as well.

p.s. As bad as the handicap is for me, I'm guessing there are a few people that have it much worse. Are any of you located in places like Peru, Bolivia, or Tibet that have to deal with seriously high elevations?

[Bob S.]

I live at 4000' and have just under 90% of sea level pressure. I have found that my 2k improves by anywhere from 10-30 seconds when I go to a sea level competition. At almost 10000' you have less than 70% as much air as at sea level, so it is not surprising that you found it a lot easier at low altitude.

Bob S.

[eliotsmith]

The scientific evidence for better results at sea level from training at high altitude is seriously lacking. Consider doing some research of journal articles to see the variety of conclusions. I have heard of the "live high, train low" theory. The basis is that you cannot train at optimal level at altitude and thus should do your intense training at sea level while still gaining some of the benefits of altitude by living there. This is impractical for most athletes, however. One more sure piece of the puzzle is that anaerobic exercise, like sprints, is unaffected by altitude change since the oxygen levels at different altitudes are the cause of differing results.

I live at 5600' but do not have any experience with varying my altitude while training. I have never competed in rowing. Like many things, much of the improvement that people experience probably has to do with their expectations.

Cheers,
Eliot

[jsharpe]

Although training at elevation is IMO an interesting topic in and of itself, my point does not center around that. Instead I intended to point out how unfair is is to have people actually competing at different altitudes in the same "event". I put the word event in quotes because I think this topic applies not just to timed competitions, but also to things like distance challenges. In most other situations all the competitors are competing at the same location, and therefore the same elevation(s) regardless of where they might have trained. Now with the advent of online competitions you have some of the participants at sea level in precisely the same event as others who are rowing at 5,000ft, 10,000ft, or I suppose even higher.

Although I always knew in the back of my mind that I probably had it a bit harder where I live than those at lower elevations, it just didn't sink in just how huge the disadvantage actually is. The reason I made my initial post in this thread is that after around 5M meters of rowing this year at my elevation of 9600' (2926m) I have a pretty good feel for my abilities (at this location). When I had the opportunity to row on another model E at nearly sea level I was completely amazed at how much easier everything was. I felt like the 6 million dollar man. I could break all my best times without hardly even trying and my distance rows were almost effortless at a pace much higher than I normally do.

After seeing just how big the disadvantage due to elevation actually is I will think long and hard before deciding to "compete" in any online challenges. It would be a lesson in futility as I would have to kill myself to do what others with similar levels of fitness could do with much less effort.

[Cyclist2]

The C2 on-line challenges (distance challenges) can be done at any pace. There are lots of people that can, and do, sit there and row for hours at a time at a 2:30 or slower pace. So, they aren't really "competitions". There are other on-line events that take pace into account (C2 on-line rankings, Nonathlon, C2 UK Challenge Series, to name some that I do) but again, all you're really competing against is yourself. For those actual competitions like the CRASH-B or satellite regattas, everyone is at the same location, and the Denver one is handicapped. So, don't worry, just have fun. See how far you can move up the lists for entertainment value, and tracking your own progress.

[jsharpe]

The C2 on-line challenges (distance challenges) can be done at any pace. There are lots of people that can, and do, sit there and row for hours at a time at a 2:30 or slower pace. So, they aren't really "competitions". There are other on-line events that take pace into account (C2 on-line rankings, Nonathlon, C2 UK Challenge Series, to name some that I do) but again, all you're really competing against is yourself. For those actual competitions like the CRASH-B or satellite regattas, everyone is at the same location, and the Denver one is handicapped. So, don't worry, just have fun. See how far you can move up the lists for entertainment value, and tracking your own progress.

Setting aside your not so subtle dig at those of us who row for longer periods at a slower pace (not everyone has the option of pulling hard, and I personally find it to be good alternative to other exercise options) you seem to be trying to say that a difference in elevation doesn't really make much of difference. The point of my earlier post wast that I was somewhat surprised to experience first hand just how large of a difference it really does make.

What I discovered is that over a 10k row at sea level I could do a rate of 2:06/500 at the same level of exertion that I row a 2:30 at my home elevation at 9600'. While I agree that things like the honor board and mileage challenges are not true competitions, many do take pride in seeing how well they can do and I believe the elevation handicap makes them inherently "unfair" for those who happen to live at higher elevations.

As an example, for someone rowing around 25,000 meters a day (fairly typical for the 1st page of the 10k honor board), the difference is over 1.7 million meters a year assuming they rowed the same length of time each day. That amounts to around 30 places at the top of the leader board (e.g., 20th place rather than 50th) and the difference would be even greater for those rowing more than 25K/day. While I wouldn't mind spotting other participants a bit of an edge, these numbers are large enough that people living at higher elevations should think twice before engaging in events where they are going against those at lower elevations.

Furthermore, for all those on the first couple pages of the honor board I would submit than any one of us could easily row many more meters than we do except for the time it takes, we simply don't have the option to allocate more than a certain amount of time each day to spend on the erg. So for a given length of workout, someone at sea level could crank out a bunch more meters over the same period e.g., a 2 hr workout at the same level of exertion.

Your point that those of us at higher elevations should simply not take it seriously and enjoy the workouts is a good one and without some kind of handicap system, the only viable suggestion. My point is that the elevation disadvantage is so substantial that it's foolish to even bother with any kind of "comparison" (I won't call it a competition) for either speed or distance. For that reason, while I will continue to track my workouts privately, it simply doesn't make sense to participate in things like the honor board or distance challenges.

[wsmith]

train hard for 6 months and our elevation will feel normal...when you go to sea level you will be faster for the first few days...nothing like rowing in the rocky mountains. i think boulder has the highest concentration of elite distance runners in the USA for the same reasons. mostly train in denver but train some at steamboat lake (9k altitude)..yes its much harder and the times slow, but after a few weeks they equalize. have fun as we are lucky to sleep and train at altitude. no real downside, and a few upsides, as long as your heart is healthy. wsmith/denver