Jacking the erg - Effective training?

[Carl Henrik]

Jacking the erg - Effective training?
Contrary to what the subject line might indicate, this is meant as serious discussion concerning an alternative training method. In case there are still doubts I solemly swear that I am not John Rupp, having gained access to Carl Henrik's account.

Consider an erg tilted so that the flywheel and display end of the erg is lifted about 10 to 15 cm:s or 4 to 6 inches. This is known as "erg jacking" and the example is a rather large such.

A resonable assumption is that erging in this way will detract from the energy used driving with the legs, very slightly in that of driving with the back, and not notably in the arms, perhaps it even increases.

There are two (2) hypotheses I now present.

1) The negative effects
As a consequence of the balance shift in where energy is being used, people with different builds will perform differently. People built like canoers for example will be greatly aided. This type of training will not be very helpful in developing the ability to apply stroke power in an unjacked erg where legdrive is more important.

2) The positive effects
Since you have to work quite a bit to get your body weight up to the catch you will spread the energy consumption both over time and muscle volume. This in term will lead to that you can maintain over time a larger average whole body energy consumption because there are less phyologically deterrent consumption peaks, this allows your heart to be more challenged over a longer period of time and as a result your central fitness will develop more than with an unjacked erg. For crosstraining purposes this is therefore a great training method. In particular you can even use this as crosstraining for erging and rowing! It also better mimics on water rowing/sculling because of this higher load on the recovery.

I hold a reservation for not having been to detailed in the description of my reasoning. If you feel there is an obvious error based on an assumption you have made about how I thought, please ask me to express that part with more detail.

Let the discussion begin

[Bob S.]

Jacking the erg - Effective training?
A resonable assumption is that erging in this way will detract from the energy used driving with the legs, very slightly in that of driving with the back, and not notably in the arms, perhaps it even increases.

Interesting idea, Carl. I don't consider doing it myself, but I can see that it would have advantages for someone with different goals. In a sense it is the counterpart to a recent suggestion by Paul S. to raise the other end of the erg. In that case, it was a recommendation to someone for increasing his leg drive. These two alternative approaches complement one another.

How either of them work out in practice is another matter, but perhaps some folks will be tempted to try them out and report back on their results.

Bob S.

P.S. A quick edit of a message already sent. A wild thought just occured to me - slides. I have a pair, but haven't done the necessary garage cleaning to try them out yet. But it just struck me that raising and lowering the slides should have the opposite effect, since body movement is minimal. With the wheel end slide raised, you would be pushing the erg uphill and working the legs harder on the drive. There is less moving weight on the slides, so the effect wouldn't be as great.

[zenpharaohs]

In that case, it was a recommendation to someone for increasing his leg drive.

Actually in that case the recommendation was so I could stay closer to the footboard when out of the straps. The problem is sort of like too much leg drive in too short a distance. I haven't had a chance to try it yet.

I'm wondering about how much progress I'm likely to make at the moment though. I went to a web site that converts 2K time into VO2max, and sure enough, my 6:51.2 translated into a VO2max of just about 55 ml/kg/min, which is my current VO2max estimate. Now I got that up to 55 over the past two years of relatively hard training and it's not going up so fast these days as when I started. If I have to increase VO2max a lot to get a much better time it's not going to be easy.

[PaulS]

A quick edit of a message already sent. A wild thought just occured to me - slides. I have a pair, but haven't done the necessary garage cleaning to try them out yet. But it just struck me that raising and lowering the slides should have the opposite effect, since body movement is minimal. With the wheel end slide raised, you would be pushing the erg uphill and working the legs harder on the drive. There is less moving weight on the slides, so the effect wouldn't be as great.

Bob S.

Hi Bob,

In fact it's not so much the body weight being shifted fore and afte that this works on, but the body being lifted through whatever distance the incline provides. For a whole season, I had the slide under the back foot of the Erg on a thick rug that made it about 1 inch higher than the other slide, each individual slide unit was level of course. The difference was enough to be noticable, in that earlier performed paces inexplicably got a bit more difficult for a period of time and then normal progress continued. When I went back to a a standard Erg on the floor is when I finally realized that something had been amiss and that workout was one of those where you plan on a particular pace for the day and simply can't manage to go that slowly, resulting in an unplanned Seasonal best.

The idea of "jacked Erg training" was discussed quite long ago by Paul Flack (Canoeist), though he put it in the context of "Turning your Erg into a sit-up machine", and creating a situation where you end up doing say 1000 'mini sit-ups in a 10k session.

[Yankeerunner]

I remember Canoeist starting the Erg Jacking as an attempt to test the limits of performance, with the hope of bringing 2" X 4's" to the race venue to squeeze out a few more seconds from his 2km. He was mercilessly lambasted for this by many (including me ).

Unfortunately this probably distracted us all from exploring Erg Jacking as a training tool a bit more thoroughly, as Carl has suggested. Paul has alreadly done extensive experimentation on this but, unfortunately again, the postings have disappeared with the hacking of the forums.

I wonder if there are still postings on the UK forum from that far back. He was living in the UK then and posting on that forum more. It would have been during the summer of 2001.

Rick

[Yankeerunner]

Posted: Mon Jul 09, 2001 12:23 pm Post subject: rules

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I would like to know if rowing on a slight incline is against the rules. I like to row outside because I enjoy the fresh air and the scenery is much better than the blank wall in my living room. I also change the direction of the rower outside to get different scenery. But over time, I noticed that rowing was easier facing the house than away from the house. I think that this occurs because there is a slight slope on the patio away from the house to cause water to run off away from the house foundation during a heavy rain. When facing the house, my body is going slightly downhill during the power stroke. When facing the garden, the opposite occurs. I have not seen anything in the rules prohibiting changing the angle of the machine and was wondering if I could raise the front of the machine slightly for competitions. Or would this be considered not competing on a level playing field?

If a level machine is required for racing, how about for posting? Would I need to level the machine to post a best time? And to what degree of non-levelness would be allowed? Just some things to think about.

This was the original post. Do a search on the UK forum for posts by Paul Flack.

Rick

[johnlvs2run]

I went to a web site that converts 2K time into VO2max, and sure enough, my 6:51.2 translated into a VO2max of just about 55 ml/kg/min, which is my current VO2max estimate. Now I got that up to 55 over the past two years of relatively hard training and it's not going up so fast these days as when I started. If I have to increase VO2max a lot to get a much better time it's not going to be easy.

Do you have a link for the site?

Remember vo2 max is a result of work output though, and not a good predictor of performance.

You can keep improving your performance, by increasing your efficiency, though your vo2 max stays the same.

[krisi]

http://www.brianmac.demon.co.uk/vo2race.htm

I don't think it's that adequate for rowers, since is to general. VO2 max depends also on body type.

[NavigationHazard]

Remember vo2 max is a result of work output though, and not a good predictor of performance.

I disagree, and so does most (if not all) of the sport science community. It's not a perfect predictor, especially when considered in isolation, but it's a strong predictor.

To quote from a recent article on physiological predictors of elite rowing performance,

Kramer et al. (1994) compared several parameters measured in the laboratory and in the field with performance and found that VO2max was the strongest correlate (r=0.71). Cosgrove et al. (1999) examined the relationships between ergometer performance over 2,000 m of rowing and selected physiological variables in club level rowers and reported that VO2max and lean body mass demonstrated the highest correlation with average velocity. Stepwise multiple regression analyses demonstrated VO2max to be the best single predictor of performance, explaining 72% of the variability.

Ingham and his colleagues recently measured physiological characteristics of 41 finalists in FISA World Championship events, both sweep and scull, across all gender and weight categories. They found the correlation between VO2max and a 2k erg performance for these rowers to be quite high -- 0.88 (P<0.001).

The importance of VO2max in rowing makes sense, if you consider that a 2k piece is reckoned to be about 70-80% aerobic as opposed to anaerobic.

See S. A. Ingham et al., "Determnants of 2000 m rowing ergometer performance in elite rowers," in Eur J Appl Physiol (2002) 88: 243–246.

[johnlvs2run]

You disagree, and then you agree with me, make up your mind.

You can't have it both ways.

Either it's a good predictor or it isn't.

A high correlation doesn't mean a good predictor.

If you predict a 4:00 mile and someone runs 4:00 / .88 = 4:33 then do you consider that a good predictor.

vo2 max is a very weak predictor of performance.

[johnlvs2run]

This is total BS.

Stepwise multiple regression analyses demonstrated VO2max to be the best single predictor of performance, explaining 72% of the variability.

[NavigationHazard]

Tell you what. You write to the refereed journals, asking that the articles be retracted on the grounds that you think they're "bs."

Let us know how they respond.

[johnlvs2run]

Why would I write to BS journals. That would be silly.

[NavigationHazard]

A high correlation doesn't mean a good predictor.

If you predict a 4:00 mile and someone runs 4:00 / .88 = 4:33 then do you consider that a good predictor.

I agree: since you apparently think this is how correlation works, it would be frightfully silly of you to suggest corrections to a scientific journal.

To the initial poster in this thread: I apologize for assisting a digression and will butt out with this post. I hope you get back on topic. If you haven't PMd Paul Flack (Canoeist) about ergjacking you should.

[johnlvs2run]

A high correlation doesn't mean a good predictor.

I agree: since you apparently think this is how correlation works, it would be frightfully silly of you to suggest corrections to a scientific journal.

I am glad you finally agree with me, and your apology is accepted.