CRASH-Bs 2016 (At Least Some Of It)

[Yankeerunner]

It was not a dark and stormy night. It was actually a sunny, beautiful morning for the one-hour drive from the ManCave to Boston for the World Championships of Indoor Rowing, aka CRASH-Bs. After checking in and being warned sternly to “NOT LOSE THIS YELLOW CARD” I meandered about to see who was there. First ran into Jon Williams and Peter Dreissigacker of C2. Jon and I talked NE2KC for a bit and he offered to send us some swag next year (Yes!). I enthusiastically accepted. Saw the Knights, Frank & Yvette, setting up their RowPro booth, and contracted some running shoe business with Barbara Grandberg, exchanging two pairs of shoes from my store for one check from her wallet. Yes, I can make house calls.

Headed for the Weigh-In area, and fully clothed and jacketed and carrying a full gym bag, tipped the scales at 156.2 lbs, 8.8 lbs under the limit (Lightweight, lightweight, short and tall. Who's the lightest weight of all? Could be me.).

Continued circulating and chatted a bit with mon ami Alain Mangin of France, and Lisa Doucett, and Fish and her husband Gregory Cook. Spotted Navigation Hazard at the other end of the arena sitting with the Brits (yes, he's that big to be seen from that far away), so I wandered that way, said Hi, and got drafted to cox his race an hour after mine. Headed to the warmup area and passed Anne Hird, who gave me her cox ticket in order to abuse her as well in the race immediately following mine, both contingent upon my still being alive and lucid.

Did some warming up, then chatted with multiple hammer winners Carie Graves and Luane Mills. The subject of He-who-shall-not-be-named (the self-proclaimed greatest-erger-in-the-history-of-the-sport) came up, and while I was expressing dismay concerning him Luane lowered her voice to ask, “Isn't that him behind you?” It was! (I am NOT making this up!) He sat on the erg behind me and began warming up. Strolled some more, hit the men's room, crossed paths with Eric Jones (Sub-7), Damien Roohr (fellow Forum Flyer), Carla Stein (Taff Attack Racing), Ed Peterson, Mary White, et. al.

And then, SHOWTIME. Sat on Erg #55, beside 3-time and defending World Champion Alain Mangin on #54. Adjusted the foot-stretchers to 2 holes showing and the drag factor to 120. Erg #53 was supposed to have He-who-shall-not-be-named on it, but it was empty. Shocking (NOT!) Apparently his warmup didn't go as well as planned. In the past, before being banned from both forums, when confronted with criticism for similar incidents he always professed to be “delighted with his progress.” So one might be forgiven for assuming that he was similarly delighted about yesterday's Did Not Start.

As for the rest of us stiffs, it was Sit Ready, Attention, ROW! and were off and racing. Two strokes into it I realized that “Oh Crap! My foot straps aren't tight enough!” Either the 'force' of my first stroke loosened them, or I didn't remember to tighten them. No time to dwell on it, just suck it up Princess. The Viking (Tor Arne Simonsen) was off like a scalded cat and quickly into a big lead. I was hoping for 1:52s through the first 500m but only getting 1:53s for the effort. Once settled, the monitor showed me to be 4th, some 9 meters behind William Stross of Cleveland and a similar amount ahead of Eric Peltosalo of Annapolis. At our pace we were covering roughly 4.4 meters per second, so I was already some 2 seconds out of medal contention only a tenth of the way into the race. Hit 500m at 1:52.7 instead of the 1:52 that I wanted, which shouldn't be a big deal, but 0.7 can be a lot in an erg race. Drat! Still 9m behind 3rd at that point, so at least I wasn't losing more ground. Racheted the pace to try for 1:51s but only got 1:52s for it. Hit halfway holding onto the 9m gap to Bronze, who was behind the Frenchman Mangin, with The Viking already beyond the horizon and still pulling away.

Into the third 500m I began calling myself horrible names that don't bear repeating here, and finally began seeing 1:51s , although not nearly enough of them and only because I was trying to hit 1:50s. Still made no headway on Stross. (Donde est mi Cojones?) With 500m to go Paul Flack was trying his best to will me faster with supportive, encouraging yelling, and the monitor finally showed some results with 1:49 flashing on the instant split. But WTF? I was actually LOSING ground to Stross and found mysrlf 11m behind (Give me a friggin' break!). Got mad, hit 1:48 then 1:47, and Flack said that I was making up ground and sure enough I had cut the gap to 8m. Couldn't hold the pace though, and as it drifted back up to 1:50 I was 10m behind. Another big push and I had it down to 6m, then he answered and it was up to 8m. Punch and counterpunch, 5m, 7m, 4m, 6m. Down to the last 150m and I'd built up such a massive Oxygen Debt that Mother Nature wouldn't lend me any more. Nothing left, short-stroking at well over 40spm just to keep the wheel turning until the meters ran out. Finally! Done! 7:25.5 for me, 7:25.4 for Stross. Bugger! I'd known for weeks before that he was good and a contender, but I figured that on a good day I could take him. I figured wrong. Still, 13 seconds faster than last year, fastest 2K in three years, and fastest WIRC in five years, shouldn't leave me whining. Must train harder for next year. The Viking won in a world-record 6:51.7, Mangin took the silver in 7:12.8 after winning Gold during his three most recent attempts in 2012, 2014, and 2015. And Stross the Bronze.

There was no time to wallow in self-pity as I was still alive and lucid, and Anne Hird was counting on me to cox her race. She settled into her seat, got the straps right, and set the drag to about 104. Gave instructions, “I want to go out in 2:05 and try to hold it.” “You looking to break 8:20?” (Current PB of 8:22) “Yeah.” OK, dammit! Let's light this candle! At ROW! she belted out several hard strokes and got the pace quickly down to 2:04. I basically told her she was doing great and she kept stroking 2:04s. When the pace lagged up to 2:06 once in a while I tried to tell her not to worry because she had built up a big margin, but before I had the words out she was back to 2:04. With a big kick down the homestretch and 1:58s showing here and there she finished with a massive new PB of 8:12.7. It was an honor to be part of it.

Hit the cooldown ergs and saw more familiar faces, Adam Rosenthal, Fred Dickie, C.c. Stockly, Scott Hornney, Winnie Stopps, and Erin McKenna to name a few. Refreshed, it was time to go to the Large Men area to cox for Jon Bone. The plan was for 1:41s, and he got out fine with a first 500m of 1:40.4, but any magic I might have had was apparently already expended on Anne Hird and the next two 500s were 1:43.8 and 1:43.6, causing him to languish in 4th place. Luckily the Navigation Hazard came back to life in the final 300m meters just as Richie Travers was struggling and swept by for the Bronze medal in 6:48.6.. Down the front line Steve Krum added another hammer to his sizeable toolbox with a 6:33.1, Stan Vegar took Silver at 6:40.4, and locals Rick Martin and Fred Dickie placed 6th and 7th in 6:56.6 and 6:59.5. On the way out of the competition area Paul Flack was finishing up his race with Fred Dickie doing some impromptu coxing on his way out, so I stopped to yell at him too. Managed to get him under his goal of 7:04 with 7:00.7.

Hit the locker room and caught up with Damien Roohr (a bit bummed to do 6:45.7), and overheard Peter Dreissigacker telling Bob Spousta that his goals every year, in order, are to row faster than his brother Dick (the two inventors of the Erg), to beat his time goal, and to medal if possible. He achieved Goal #1 this year and was satisfied. Moved around a bit to catch up with others and found that Graham Benton rocked joint with a super 5:48.3 world record in the 40-49 division, Scott Hornney had a good SB of 6:27.0, Anne Bourlioux broke her own world record to add to her already prolific portfolio, Carla Stein had joined me in the Bob Dylan class (Positively 4th Street “.....now I know you're dissatisfied, with your position and your place....”), Luane Mills continued her hammer streak, as did Carie Graves (Sharing it this year with Ann Wopat who rowed the same time down to the tenth). Eric Jones made lightweight and did a season best. Adam Rosenthal nipped my time by 0.3 second to maintain his current bragging rights over me until at least next season. Mary White rowed 8:13.8. Fish (Arlene Wade) scored another Bronze to add to her collection of medals. Gregory Cook placed 4th in 6:41.4.

Watched some hammers and medals being awarded, picked up one of last year's t-shirts at a bargain $5, and bought one of Brad Lewis's other books ( I already have the excellent Assault on Lake Casitas) for $10. Then I began crashing. A mere 7:25.5 of effort shouldn't leave a guy wasted, but it did me, so I headed back North. Until next year.

I know that in the grand scheme of things that Indoor Rowing doesn't amount to a hill of beans. But as Lt. Frank Drebin so eloquently put it, “....this is our hill, and these are our beans!” Hope to see y'all again next year.

Renegade Rick Bayko,
Cub Reporter

[Bob S.]

Really enjoyed that one, Rick. Damn, it sure makes me sorry that I couldn't be there. That sprint by Jonathon is pure NavHaz. I remember one race where he came from quite a bit behind to steal the hammer from Steve in the last few seconds. Then he struggled out of his straps and collapsed on the floor. Turned out later that he wasn't at his best! He was suffering from the effects of a cold at that long ago event. It is good to see that he has recovered enough from his more recent back problems to get back into the game and do as well as he did.

Bob S.

[Yankeerunner]

Really enjoyed that one, Rick. Damn, it sure makes me sorry that I couldn't be there. That sprint by Jonathon is pure NavHaz. I remember one race where he came from quite a bit behind to steal the hammer from Steve in the last few seconds. Then he struggled out of his straps and collapsed on the floor. Turned out later that he wasn't at his best! He was suffering from the effects of a cold at that long ago event. It is good to see that he has recovered enough from his more recent back problems to get back into the game and do as well as he did.

Bob S.

In addition to the back problem I believe that he has also had some major shoulder issues, and currently is on antibiotics for an infection of some sort. I tried to tell that I've had worse but I don't think he believed me. And besides, he seemed to be drawing inspiration from the Adaptive Rowers, for whom he has the utmost respect.

[hjs]

Nice one Rick, sounded like it was good fun.

Ps if you spot the mad hatter again next year, maybe you can ask him when he will pay his dept to me Money can,t be the point, after all he keeps on traveling around for nothing

[Yankeerunner]

Nice one Rick, sounded like it was good fun.

Ps if you spot the mad hatter again next year, maybe you can ask him when he will pay his dept to me Money can,t be the point, after all he keeps on traveling around for nothing

Haha. He's probably still intending to pay it, just as he's still intending to row 6:16.

[Edward4492]

Great report as always Rick! I was sure I saw "the C --------" right across from me; was beginning to think it was a mirage.Really nice piece; showing some form!

[joe80]

You've brought down that 2km time impressively during the past month or so. Great going Rick. After his terrible bike accident a few years back, it was great to see Tor Arne in such great form; you've had your own problems in that respect. I think his row brings the 65-69 WR to at least the same relative level as Brian Bailey's 6:42 in the 60-64 category.

Great account of the event; I was more than usually riveted to the webstream this year.

Regards,

Joe

[Yankeerunner]

Thanks Ed!

Joe, I wasn't aware of The Viking's bike accident. I was impressed that he was only 0.7 seconds slower than five years ago when he turned 60 and crushed the field with 6:51. And I agree that it's the first thing to be in the ballpark with Brian Bailey's record. Haven't heard anything of Bailey since he won the 2008 WIRC.

[joe80]

Terrible accident
by The Viking on Sun Apr 22, 2012 11:41 am
Came home last night from GC on a strecher.

Had a terrible accident down there on the 2nd of April with 3 weeks in hospital.

4 broken ribs with a lounge puncture, broken pelvis, broken sholder and all ligaments gone (operated on GC), broken right hand (is to be operated in Norway) + a lot of deep cuts.

I'll keep you updated on my recovery 

congratulations to Mike
by The Viking on Sat Apr 06, 2013 5:16 pm
Havn't visited this side for a very long time. Not capable to row because of a bad hand and shoulder. My focus has been on doctors and insurance companies. Hope to be able to row again. Have done some sessions, and my "personal best" after the accident is 7.28 on the 2k. 
My congratualations to Mike with a new WR. 1.52.1 ave for 60 min is strong for a 61 ltw:)

Tor Arne had a chute when he was training on the bike in Gran Canaria. The quotes are from his blog on the UK site.

To come back as strongly as he has is a testament to his spirit. 'Inspirational' doesn't cover it.

Regards,

Joe

[Yankeerunner]

Wow! I had no idea. Some impressive things just get more impressive when the whole story comes out.

[Hillclimber]

Terrific report as always, Rick. Congrats on the SB!
Damien

[Edward4492]

Jumping ahead and pre-supposing; I think the next big masters LWT record to fall will be Roy Brook's 6:38 when Mike Smith turns 55 in about 15 months. And I suspect it will stand for a long time. Of course, said with no dis respect towards Roy, a true beast in his own right.

[Cyclingman1]

Even a year can make a big difference in 2K performance, especially in the over-50 crowd. It's nice to predict, but looking at the past, one can see several cases where something did not go right.

For example, Paul Siebach did 6:25 at age 50, yet he did not get the 55+ LWt WR of 6:38 held by Brook. Smith is at 6:28 at age 53. He has to hold up for two yrs, but it is not a given.
Brian Bailey did 6:42 at age 60 in 60+ LWt but did not get the 65+ WR, which was only 6:57 until this last Crash-B. That's a head scratcher without more info.
Paul Hendershott was a beast at age 60 with his 60+ HWt WR of 6:23. Yet the 65+ WR is still only 6:40. Many in 2004 wouldn't believe how this has gone.

[Citroen]

Thanks for the write-up Rick, it sounds like you had the usual amount of pain flavoured fun gettting your 2K finished.

No surprises that the special one failed again, he failed at the Brits as well.

[ArmandoChavezUNC]

Even a year can make a big difference in 2K performance, especially in the over-50 crowd. It's nice to predict, but looking at the past, one can see several cases where something did not go right.

This is a very good point. As you get older, even a year can make huge difference, and not necessarily due to injury or illness - sometimes it just happens. I've seen it with my dad and his times from one year to the next even after following the almost exact training plan both years.