Crazy new 2k erg strategy - what do you think? Share yours.

[jackarabit]

Hbaker writes:

Sorry, but positive splits win the day.

You have an example of this “winning” 2K execution in a major indoor rowing comp or the line is merely an attention getter? The French Protocol race strategy features positive splitting but not on the order of +5”/split from 500 to 1500m. Categorically a no-hoper fade imo and certain to be If the final split is even slower than the third. An abrupt reduction of pace between 500m and 1k is occasionably survivable but this front-loaded sufferfest does not commonly produce a competitive time or a mark in the win column.

[hbaker]

Hbaker writes:

Sorry, but positive splits win the day.

You have an example of this “winning” 2K execution in a major indoor rowing comp or the line is merely an attention getter? The French Protocol race strategy features positive splitting but not on the order of +5”/split.

I'm not certain what you mean by "major indoor rowing comp", but I can give you several personal data points, all of which used similar positive splits:

(I'm a lightweight male, b.1947)

* I was 3rd at the 2006 CrashB's (Light age group); my qualifying time for the CrashB's that year was 6:49.1 (LBRA Beach Sprints). I don't think that LBRA published the splits that year, but my first 500m was <1:35.

* I rowed a 2:53:54.8 marathon (ranked) on Boston Marathon day in 2010. My first 2K was ~1:52 pace; my first 10K was sub-40:00; I subsequently stopped every 5k for water, so I may have lost ~2 minutes on water stops.

* In Feb'18, I did a 19:33 5km (ranked age 70L); my first 500m was 1:47.5.

It helps enormously to *train* with gradually increasing positive splits; I've now been doing this for ~12 years. My current training row is 10K, with first 500m split pace of ~1:50 (first 100m < 1:45), and last split pace of ~2:15, totaling 42:50 - 42:58.

I get strength training from the first several splits; build up a significant oxygen debt in the next several splits; and then gradually work off this oxygen debt in the last half. No "cool down" needed!

See my recent posting in "SDK Questions" for more info on how I use the "rerow" feature of the PM5/PM4 for training.

[NavigationHazard]

Here's a rather radical approach that won me the 60-64 MHW gold at last February's World Indoor Championships in Virginia:

Jonathan Bone
DISTANCE TIME 500M PACE STROKE RATE
500m 1:39.2 1:39.2 25
1,000m 3:20.0 1:40.8 25
1,500m 5:01.3 1:41.3 24
2,000m 6:34.9 1:33.6 31

The split times and stroke rate don't do justice to the finish, which was more like 1:40 pace r24 from 1500m to 1750m and 1:26 pace r38 over the last 250m. I am dealing with severe steroid-induced type II diabetes, and find it difficult to handle the sustained carb demands associated with higher stroke rates. My solution, at least for the British Indoor Championships (where I also won the age group) and the above-mentioned race, was to play up the strength side of things and save the stored carbs for a big sprint finish. I wouldn't recommend this for everyone, mind.....

[Cyclingman1]

Jonathan Bone
DISTANCE TIME 500M PACE STROKE RATE
500m 1:39.2 1:39.2 25
1,000m 3:20.0 1:40.8 25
1,500m 5:01.3 1:41.3 24
2,000m 6:34.9 1:33.6 31

Really strange. I'm thinking there must be a better split strategy even given medical issues. Next up: 6:39.5 for 65+.

[NavigationHazard]

Not at all strange from a competitive point of view. It was the rowing equivalent of hanging around the pack in a mile race in track, and kicking in the last half of the last lap. If what you're doing is trying to win a race, and know you have a big kick, it's a sensible strategy. As to whether there's some 'better' approach, given that my goal was to win and that I did, it's hard to see how I could have done better. Could I have achieved a faster time with some other approach? Maybe. But that's not what I was aiming for on the day.

What's novel about the splits from a rowing point of view is the rating. By way of illustration, here's the Open MHW winner:

Jakub Podrazil
DISTANCE TIME 500M PACE STROKE RATE
500m 1:24.6 1:24.6 36
1,000m 2:51.6 1:27.0 34
1,500m 4:18.8 1:27.2 34
2,000m 5:44.8 1:26.0 37

He rated an average 9 strokes/minute higher overall than I did, and for most of the race was 10 or 11 spm higher.

[Remo]

A couple of thoughts:

1. Small changes of pace are more disruptive physiologically and psychologically then physically. Using the C2 pace/Watt calculator a 1:45 pace burns 302.3 Watts whereas 1:50 paces burns 263 Watts and a 1:40 pace burns 350 Watts. This means that if you did 1000m at 1:50 and 1000m at 1:40 your average watts would be 304.4 Watts [ (263W* 220 seconds + 350W * 200seconds) / 420 seconds) = 304.4 W]

The physiological problem is that your body can only handle so much oxygen debt before your body will start shutting down. Your heart rate starts to drop as well your VO2. This is the "die" part of fly and die. There is also a good argument that in these hypo oxygen states your body becomes less efficient.

2. The French strategy (Fast, Slow, Slow, Fast) raised by JimG has been around since at least 2000. My understanding is that it is based on how the French want to race at the Rowing World Championships and at the Olympics. There is some support for this physiologically in that a bit of early Oxygen debt will trigger the body to reach max hr and VO2 max sooner. The guy (whose name I forgot) who set the new 2k record employed a faster start for this reason. (A good warm-up is the best thing you can do to prime your body to reach max HR and VO2 as soon as possible, but a quick start may add a little extra).

3. Chris Cooper set his M65 2k record 2 years ago doing negative splits and this year J Bone, aka NavigationHazard, took the M60 IRC with a formidable last 500.

4. I don't think negative splits work for anything 1k or less. These events rely to much on the anaerobic systems.

5. Personally, I start just a little slow (1 sec off my pace), put in a good middle 1k, and then learn in the last 500 whether my strategy is fly and die or negative splits. I like it when I realize I am going to do negative splits.

[Hillclimber]

What's novel about the splits from a rowing point of view is the rating.

NavigationHazard, we know you practice a fast last in interval training (as Caviston and Marston both advocate), so doing so in your 2k makes sense. But that rate (as you point out being so so different than a younger champion)...

Can you help us understand the advantage? Do you low-rate your 30’ x dozens 30’rest?

[NavigationHazard]

The basic idea was to lessen the demand on my fast-twitch muscle fibres, making the slow-twitch cells do a larger share of the work in getting me close enough to the finish that I could trigger/exhaust their fast-twitch counterparts w/o running into particularly debilitating consequences.

To make this sort of thing work, (among other things) you have to be able to switch relatively seamlessly from moderate ratings to sprinting. If this isn't done smoothly, you can waste energy biomechanically. You also need to have the right mixture of muscle fibres to draw on. Some of that can be fine-tuned, as it were, by training. But a good deal of it is genetic and subject to the limitations of the potential your parents endowed you with. And you also need a pretty good sense of what both you and also your competition are capable of....

With regard to the short-duration sprintervals I sometimes do: rating depends a lot on what I'm trying to accomplish in any given workout. I can say that I can and do frequently rate as low as 18 in 30"/30" workouts and the like. There's nothing writ in stone that says they have to be done flat out at warp-speed ratings. In passing, there's a good case to be made for doing them at variable ratings, such that you get used to 'carrying up' the power and connection you achieve at low ratings. My last CTC attempt was along these lines: 6 x 1' r20/22/24/26/28/30 on 1'. I averaged 1:35.2 pace r25.

[Hillclimber]

The basic idea was to lessen the demand on my fast-twitch muscle fibres, making the slow-twitch cells do a larger share of the work in getting me close enough to the finish that I could trigger/exhaust their fast-twitch counterparts w/o running into particularly debilitating consequences.

To make this sort of thing work, (among other things) you have to be able to switch relatively seamlessly from moderate ratings to sprinting. . . .

NavigationHazard, thank you for taking the time to offer a detailed response. Much appreciated.

[johnlvs2run]

It helps enormously to *train* with gradually increasing positive splits; I've now been doing this for ~12 years. My current training row is 10K, with first 500m split pace of ~1:50 (first 100m < 1:45), and last split pace of ~2:15, totaling 42:50 - 42:58.

That's quite interesting that you apparently train quite often in that manner. Do you actually do that with no warmup? Vladimir Kuts tried a theory that came from studies of speed skaters, that the most favorable energy distribution over distance was a very fast start, with a subsequent decrease of speed, and a renewed speed increase up to the planned speed. I did try that with time trials and races around age 20 for a short time period, but eventually felt that starting so fast was not as efficient. However, training in that manner appears to be working quite well for you.