The Road To Boston 2008

Rocket Roy · Post by **Rocket Roy** » January 11th, 2008, 3:05 am

Cheers Carla.

Deborah, I don't think they sell it here in the UK, but I'll definately buy some when i come over in Feb, just in case it ever comes back.

tdekoekkoek · Post by **tdekoekkoek** » January 11th, 2008, 2:12 pm

Well I'm starting to get the in the swing of things again (pun intended). Still coughing and have congestion. Yesterday I did my first 2K at 80-90% effort. Rating 25-26 for a 7:03.

Today 2000, 2400 and 2800 at 1:52-1:54 rating 20-22

Hopefully do a little running and/or biking this weekend with some steady state.

Yankeerunner · Post by **Yankeerunner** » January 11th, 2008, 3:01 pm

My Road to Boston has had lengthy border checks that have slowed down progress. Primarily my now-chronic back/rib injury in middle of the left side of my back. After losing another 10 days to sloth I started on December 30th with a gingerly stroked 2km in 10:07, and have been gradually building up from there, keeping my ribs snugly wrapped with what looks to be a massive Ace Bandage (as suggested on this forum by MaryP).

Without enough time to follow a real program I've put together a simple crash training routine to assess just how close I can get to what I used to do in the brief amount of time that I have. It goes like this:

Workout 1, on Day 1 in the am, a 'long row' 1km longer than the previous long row to build endurance.
Workout 2, on Day 1 in the pm, a CTC 250m attempting to be a little faster than the previous attempt to build speed
Workout 3, on Day 2 in the am, a 'recovery' 5km to not mess things up.
Workout 4, on Day 2 in the pm, a 2km attempting to go about 3 seconds faster than the previous 2km to build lactate tolerance.

Then repeat over and over and over.

I should be bumping up against some limits before CRASH-B's roll around and when I do I'll probably tweak the routine a bit, probably resting some sessions or days to attempt to stay reasonably unbroken.

The 250s so far have been 53.8, 51.6, 50.2, 49.4, 48.1. I might be close to reaching my limit there.

The 2kms have been 7:55, 7:50, 7:47, 7:43, 7:39.9. I should have a lot to go there, or at least I hope that I do.

The 'long row' is up to 10km and due to go to 11km tomorrow morning. In trying to avoid going too hard as I build up I've covered the monitor except for the meters box and endeavor to stay relaxed and concentrate on the stroke while maintaing S10MPS. Currently they are being done at around 2:14 pace but are gradually improving. If I could see the pace on the monitor I'm sure that I would subconciously start chasing a faster pace and lose concentration on the stroke and become unbalanced and risk making the back problem worse.. I'll leave that mistake for the 250s and 2kms.

Carla, after our individual heats are over on the 20th we should do an arm-rassaling contest. I used to be prety good for a skinny guy. My sister Tina, who is short but was very strong from banquet waitressing lost several boyfriends when she beat them at arm-wrestling. Their egos couldn't take it. She didn't necessarily want to lose the boyfriend, but couldn't bring herself to cheat by not trying her best.

Rick

Rowmaniac · Post by **Rowmaniac** » January 11th, 2008, 8:09 pm

Now, Tom, see what you've gone and done with all of your arm wrestling talk??? People are getting *distracted* for Pete's sake!

Today was a crazy busy day with the IP workout at 7am, then a 3 hour OTW clinic with the head master women coach at our club (she's hard to book, and is out having a baby next month and will be out for awhile, so it was now or never), then an hour with the trainer. I may never have been so pooped in my life.

Today's workout was 10 x 45s AN. Target for 7:27 is 1:47, but my honest goal was 1:42.

142.2 /37spm
141.8 /40
141.3 /39
140.8 /39
141.8 /37
141.8 /37
142.2 /36
141.3 /37
142.2 /37
142.2 /36

average 141.7

I have decided that I should use race starts on these short intervals (which I did not do today) to quickly bring the monitor down to race pace then hold it. Instead I start with a dead flywheel, and b/c the first few strokes are so high, I spend the entire time trying to bring the cumulative time down to what I want. I ended up rowing most of these at 1:38-1:40 just to get there. Ugh.

I will honestly say that I thought this workout would be easier, but on interval 8 I wished I was finished, and I felt the lactic acid arrive after interval 9. I am told repeatedly how invaluable these speed work intervals are, but I long for a nice long steady row with no breaks. Maybe some nice music instead of the screaming voice inside my own head saying, "You can do it--don't let up!"

Rick, you are one determined guy to put on that ace bandage thingio and stay with it. Good luck on the workouts.

Happy Friday! Time to exercise my right to snack on something yummy. That's about all I'm up for right now!

seat5 · Post by **seat5** » January 11th, 2008, 8:59 pm

Deb you are very fast!!!

Rick--ouch--take care of that! BTW I'm not much good at arm wrestling now. But my "little girl" (you met her last year, she cox'd me at Boston) can almost, but not quite, beat my husband, who is 6'2" and very strong--they can sit for 10 min and neither can get the other one down. Scary.

I was so proud of my workout today--3 x 8 AT, target 1:57--1:58/26 (which I have struggled all season to try to even come near). At the end I was promising myself that if I managed to hold th pace I wouldn't do the lifts (now 3 x 10 squats with 100 lbs). Then I did the squats anyway but boy they were slow and hurt and I only managed to do them because I promised myself Dunkin Donuts...which I DID get, yum yum!

2030 1:58.2/26 (a little slow)
2042 1:57.5/26
2056 1:56.7/26 yippee!

I am really scared of my TR workout next week, it says 4 x 5 TR, no , I can't do that!!! eeek I will puke! and quit! uh oh!

Nosmo · Post by **Nosmo** » January 11th, 2008, 9:31 pm

Yankeerunner wrote:Their egos couldn't take it. She didn't necessarily want to lose the boyfriend, but couldn't bring herself to cheat by not trying her best.
Rick

She's better off without them. Any guy who can't handle that doesn't deserve her.

TomR · Post by **TomR** » January 11th, 2008, 10:43 pm

Carla--When you do that 4x5 TR, you know, don't you, that you're not expected to do it at 2k pace. Start somewhere in the AT/TR overlap zone.

I'm not sure about that Ace bandage, Rick. It gives you a kind of 20s flapper look. But I am impressed with the way you're climbing back into race form.

I did 6x500 TR.

1.50
1.50
1.50
1.49.9
1.49.3
1.48.

Deadlifts at mid-day. To get strong, lift heavy objects off the floor.

Yankeerunner · Post by **Yankeerunner** » January 12th, 2008, 1:09 pm

Last night, right on target with another 3.1 seconds off my 2km. 7:36.8, sandwiched between a 4' warmup and 4' cooldown.

This morning, 11km with the monitor covered except for meters and keeping to S10MPS.
11,000m 47:26.9 2:09.4 23spm

Primed for another CTC attempt after work tonight. May catch up with Tom's 47.4 if I'm tough enough.

Carla, I agree with Tom about the TR paces. It doesn't have to be at the fastest end of the band to be effective, and isn't intended to be for 5' work intervals.

Yankeerunner · Post by **Yankeerunner** » January 13th, 2008, 3:15 pm

Oh crap! Have I destroyed this thread by posting on it? Nothing for more than a day. Harkens back to High School days when I'd sit at a table in the cafeteria and everyone else would get up and leave in disgust.

Whoa! Given the overnight activity I guess this could be used as a classic example of 'Be Careful What You Wish For.

Carla, tough luck with the car. And of the heels of the stolen car not too long ago. Hope that all the bad luck is out of the system. If you haven't done the AN workout yet, 2' rests seem reasonable and recommended, with about 5' between the two sets. Give it Hell.

The snow was late in starting, so it only took about 15' to get Denise's car work-ready. The big load will be later this afternoon. If I was as smart as Tom I'd get a snow blower. But I'm not as smart as Tom.

As such, it turned out to be a benefit for the morning workout instead of a detriment as I got be a bit better warmed up and feeling chipper because of the crisp outside air.

12,000m 51:25.8 2:08.6 23spm

S10MPS with the monitor covered except for the meters. Drag factor of 82, ribs wrapped for support, Temperature 53 degrees F, Classical music blaring in my ear. Felt decent.

Bob S. · Post by **Bob S.** » January 13th, 2008, 3:31 pm

Yankeerunner wrote: Harkens back to High School days when I'd sit at a table in the cafeteria and everyone else would get up and leave in disgust. :oops:

When you have a gym class just before lunch, it is always a good idea to make sure that you have time to shower.

Sorry, Rick. I just couldn't resist that setup.

Bob S.

Rocket Roy · Post by **Rocket Roy** » January 13th, 2008, 4:57 pm

Rick, maybe your son will like to join you. I just wish I were there, I love shovelling now, well I did in 1964 the last time we had enough to shovel.

Will the airport have to shut? Or do they have underground heating to melt the snow on the runways?

Yankeerunner · Post by **Yankeerunner** » January 13th, 2008, 6:17 pm

Bob, good point.

Roy, Pete would not like to join me. And will be back in Boston before then to be sure not to get roped into it.

If the timing is right maybe there will be some for you to shovel in February.

the airport rarely shuts down. Delays maybe, but not many shutdowns. They have experience handling it.

2nd Workout today, after watching The Chargers humble The Colts:

0827m 4:00.0 2:25.0 20spm (warmup)
2000m 7:34.3 1:53.6 31spm
0767m 4:00.0 2:36.3 19spm (cooldown)

Ribs wrapped snugly to protect the injured bits, drag factor at 99, temperature at a comfortable 57 degrees F.
Splits:
0500m 1:54.7 30spm
1000m 1:54.6 30spm
1500m 1:54.7 30spm
2000m 1:50.2 33spm

Another 2.5 seconds off the previous attempt. Satisfied.

TomR · Post by **TomR** » January 13th, 2008, 6:25 pm

Spent about 4-5 hours this weekend cutting, splitting, hauling wood. Not much good as training for a 2k, but left me without the snort to train properly.

Impressive work on the 2ks, Rick.

I try not to shovel snow. If it's not in a spot where the tractor can push it, I generally ignore it. Mostly the wife does the fine work with the shovel.

seat5 · Post by **seat5** » January 13th, 2008, 7:01 pm

Rick, your coming back from injury 2Ks are only a few seconds faster than my best! I agree, the CTC is probably a very good way to trash yourself.

Dave is home, thank goodness, so I guess I will be spared much shoveling--just the walkway probably and he'll use the snowblower on the rest of it. I think I'll have to take my dinner and violin to work and go directly to rehearsal from there--unless they call off the rehearsal.

With any luck at all there will be a horrid blizzard the 19th, resulting in 6 feet of snow and glare ice, thus rendering it impossible to drive to Newburyport...

Tomorrow I have 2 (6 x 1) AN. I guess the rests are supposed to be 2 min? and how long between the two sets? I don't quite get this workout.

This week appears to be a pretty hard week, with Tuesday 2 x 18 UT1 (no big deal) but Wednesday 4 x 5 TR and then 3 X 10 AT. I wonder if I should alter it because of the 2K on Sunday. I guess at the very least I should cut out the 5th optional session and maybe do all 4 workouts in a row leaving Friday and Saturday as rest days. ? Anyone have any ideas?

Rowmaniac · Post by **Rowmaniac** » January 13th, 2008, 9:56 pm

Am I allowed to post if I've never once shoveled snow? It sounds intriguing, but I suspect the novelty wears off quickly. It sure does look beautiful though.

I am so tired that right now holding up a Triscuit to get it to my mouth poses a minor challenge. No one said a middle-aged woman ought to be so bold as to squeeze 8 workouts into 5 days and think there won't be a price. The good news is that I think the extra strength training (4 sessions this week--going every other day) is helping. It better be--it's hard as heck not to worry that my erg performance isn't temporarily compromised somewhat by the fatigue, but I try to focus on long term (or at least 6 weeks from today--yikes, it's coming soon!)

Today I did 1500m piece at my target 2K race pace. I realized going into it that it would be a bit of mind over monitor, given that I sure as heck haven't tapered, and still have some excess arm fatigue from all these strength training sessions. I did my very best to commit to a time and hold it steady:

149.8 at 30 spm

I know I didn't rate this piece as high as I should have. I would think I need to do at least a 32 spm to do my best, but I can honestly say I didn't have it in the arms. They were not able to give me more. I did row very even splits, which was a good sign that I was holding something reasonable.

I then did 2 more TR pieces for some extra intervals:

1000m 149.5 34 spm

I have no idea why my slide speed was so much higher, other than I must have been more tired than I realized from the first one and had to do this to get the pace. I don't know.

500m 146.3 38 spm

Looks like this one ended up being much more of a sprint. I probably should have done another 1000m to compare the two. Doing this now seems senseless.

Tomorrow I am on the bike for an hour to work the legs and give these arms a much needed rest. I have a 2 hour OTW practice and just hope hope hope that it's a lot of drills and not much hard rowing.

I would like to have done 2 x 1500m intervals at race pace today, but just didn't have it in me. Maybe next week. For now, I consider it progress to be able to go to the refrigerator and actually pick up the gallon of milk that I could NOT lift last Sunday b/c my arms were so sore. Baby steps, baby steps. I should have worked on these arms long ago, but I'm hoping it's better late than never.

I hope everyone stays safe with the snow and ice. Personally, I know I would kill myself trying to drive in ice or snow. I think it's safest for everyone if I stay out west.