Weight Adjustment - how much meaning should I make of it?

[rowmania]

Hello! It has been a while since I posted on here (my last post was about if I could improve a lot). I lost a lot of motivation after hitting 8:40 (nearly threw up afterwards and could barely walk for nearly half an hour afterwards — I guess I burned myself out mentally a little bit!!! ). Anyway, I have been looking at the weight adjusted calculator and it puts my 8:40 time at 7:01 for a 2k at 105 pounds. I am female, 21 years old, 5’3”.

Here is a little information about my PR:
500m 2:08.0 26 s/m
1000m 2:10.8 25 s/m
1500m 2:11.3 25 s/m
2000m 2:10.9 26 s/m
Total Time 8:40.9

I’m curious to know how much I should make of this. I’m not sure if either one is a good time considering I’m pretty small, or if the adjusted time really matters since it is weight adjusted. I stopped erging for a while after the burnout but am getting back on track again and am doing about 8:50 after about 4 2k tries. I’ve found that I have little mental energy to do more than 2k, so if anyone has advice/tips on how I can push through this mental block I’d love that. Thanks!

[OtwSL]

Hello! It has been a while since I posted on here (my last post was about if I could improve a lot). I lost a lot of motivation after hitting 8:40 (nearly threw up afterwards and could barely walk for nearly half an hour afterwards — I guess I burned myself out mentally a little bit!!! ). Anyway, I have been looking at the weight adjusted calculator and it puts my 8:40 time at 7:01 for a 2k at 105 pounds. I am female, 21 years old, 5’3”.

Here is a little information about my PR:
500m 2:08.0 26 s/m
1000m 2:10.8 25 s/m
1500m 2:11.3 25 s/m
2000m 2:10.9 26 s/m
Total Time 8:40.9

I’m curious to know how much I should make of this. I’m not sure if either one is a good time considering I’m pretty small, or if the adjusted time really matters since it is weight adjusted. I stopped erging for a while after the burnout but am getting back on track again and am doing about 8:50 after about 4 2k tries. I’ve found that I have little mental energy to do more than 2k, so if anyone has advice/tips on how I can push through this mental block I’d love that. Thanks!

Weight adjustment is used to try and compare erg time to potentially how fast you can move a single on the water. If you are lighter then the single will move faster so it is trying to correlate what you pull on the ergo with this. Obviously technique plays a major part in what times you can get, and also how much effort you put down. I'd say your 2k time considering your weight and height is pretty darned good. I'm sure someone like Henry could probably give you a better answer, but I hope it was helpful.

[RWAGR]

I actually have a related question. I am at the opposite end of the spectrum to OP- in that I weigh too much (6'1'' and 233 lbs). I have always understood the weight adjustment to, as Scott says, approximate OTW performance and boost lighter rowers' performances on the erg as they would be boosted OTW. Nevertheless, my own weight adjusted times go down rather than up as well. For example, my 5x1500/5 this morning was at an average pace of 1.49.8 but, according to ErgData, a weight adjusted pace of 1.46.2.

All this to say I basically now have no idea how weight adjustment works given that both OP and I seem to benefit from it (I realize that the real time is all that *really* counts).

[hjs]

Hello! It has been a while since I posted on here (my last post was about if I could improve a lot). I lost a lot of motivation after hitting 8:40 (nearly threw up afterwards and could barely walk for nearly half an hour afterwards — I guess I burned myself out mentally a little bit!!! ). Anyway, I have been looking at the weight adjusted calculator and it puts my 8:40 time at 7:01 for a 2k at 105 pounds. I am female, 21 years old, 5’3”.

Here is a little information about my PR:
500m 2:08.0 26 s/m
1000m 2:10.8 25 s/m
1500m 2:11.3 25 s/m
2000m 2:10.9 26 s/m
Total Time 8:40.9

I’m curious to know how much I should make of this. I’m not sure if either one is a good time considering I’m pretty small, or if the adjusted time really matters since it is weight adjusted. I stopped erging for a while after the burnout but am getting back on track again and am doing about 8:50 after about 4 2k tries. I’ve found that I have little mental energy to do more than 2k, so if anyone has advice/tips on how I can push through this mental block I’d love that. Thanks!

Height and weight matter a lot on the erg. Otw also but a bit less.

Sports in the end are about absolute performance, not relative ones (weightadjusted), for yourself its mostly about how fun it brings you. Given your build mayby, but thats really up to you another sport, running/cycling could give you better results.

Looking at your 2k and the way you felt, you rated way to low, spm should be a good bit higher. And your fitness needs work, you should not feel so bad for so long. Getting better at 2k s is not doing a lot of 2k s, most sessions should be longer and slower, think 2k plus 20 seconds. Start with 5k and work up to 30min 10k. If you can do a 2k will feel getter and will be faster.

Just my thoughts, in the end its up to you!

[hjs]

I actually have a related question. I am at the opposite end of the spectrum to OP- in that I weigh too much (6'1'' and 233 lbs). I have always understood the weight adjustment to, as Scott says, approximate OTW performance and boost lighter rowers' performances on the erg as they would be boosted OTW. Nevertheless, my own weight adjusted times go down rather than up as well. For example, my 5x1500/5 this morning was at an average pace of 1.49.8 but, according to ErgData, a weight adjusted pace of 1.46.2.

All this to say I basically now have no idea how weight adjustment works given that both OP and I seem to benefit from it (I realize that the real time is all that *really* counts).

Its about lean weight dead weight fat or wrong muscle only slows us down

[RWAGR]

Its about lean weight dead weight fat or wrong muscle only slows us down

Yes, I'm well aware that I am fat! But my question was on the physics- given that I am too heavy, why does my weight adjustment score improve? Why would I be faster on the water than on land?

[rowmania]

Thank you everyone for the replies! I actually have an injury (chronic exertional compartment syndrome, have had surgery that was partially successful and Botox injections that were also relatively successful — but not quite enough for me to run long distances) in my calves. Running is not much of an option, so the doing the elliptical and erging are the main forms of cardio I can do. I definitely would like to improve and go under 8:40 to start, so I guess it’s probably a good idea to go for longer distances and slower (probably wouldn’t burn me out as much too) as you recommended. I’ll try to start with like 15 minutes and add 2 minutes every time, I think that seems reasonable. I am a very competitive person so I love beating my times and that is one of my main motivations, but also I’d like to improve my fitness because I used to be a pretty fast runner in high school before my injury.

[Erik A]

I looked at my weight adjustment for the first time last night and it added time. Didn't like that. Lol.
I also have head issues when rowing. All the usual.
Am I going too fast
Am I going too slow
Is my form ok etc etc
As my fitness increases and I can do longer distances easier I hope my inner voice will shut up . As with most things. Practice makes perfect. One thing I try and stick to is
Train hard. Play easy.

[hjs]

Its about lean weight dead weight fat or wrong muscle only slows us down

Yes, I'm well aware that I am fat! But my question was on the physics- given that I am too heavy, why does my weight adjustment score improve? Why would I be faster on the water than on land?

Think they use an optimal weight for a given height, above or below is both making us slower

[RWAGR]

Think they use an optimal weight for a given height, above or below is both making us slower

I see. So the point is that being OTW mitigates the effect of weight (high or low) meaning that weight adjusted scores reflect potential performance if the water is "adding" to your weight like OP or cutting out your fat (like me)?

[rowmania]

Update: went to the gym and did 30 min (!), 6140m total starting at 2:30 pace and working down to the last 500 in 2:23. Each 500m was a little faster than the next. I’m really happy, I didn’t think I could do it. So thanks everyone, it really motivated me to get it there and work harder.

[Erik A]

congratz Rowmania good work

[rowmania]

Hello! It has been a while since I posted on here (my last post was about if I could improve a lot). I lost a lot of motivation after hitting 8:40 (nearly threw up afterwards and could barely walk for nearly half an hour afterwards — I guess I burned myself out mentally a little bit!!! ). Anyway, I have been looking at the weight adjusted calculator and it puts my 8:40 time at 7:01 for a 2k at 105 pounds. I am female, 21 years old, 5’3”.

Here is a little information about my PR:
500m 2:08.0 26 s/m
1000m 2:10.8 25 s/m
1500m 2:11.3 25 s/m
2000m 2:10.9 26 s/m
Total Time 8:40.9

I’m curious to know how much I should make of this. I’m not sure if either one is a good time considering I’m pretty small, or if the adjusted time really matters since it is weight adjusted. I stopped erging for a while after the burnout but am getting back on track again and am doing about 8:50 after about 4 2k tries. I’ve found that I have little mental energy to do more than 2k, so if anyone has advice/tips on how I can push through this mental block I’d love that. Thanks!

Height and weight matter a lot on the erg. Otw also but a bit less.

Sports in the end are about absolute performance, not relative ones (weightadjusted), for yourself its mostly about how fun it brings you. Given your build mayby, but thats really up to you another sport, running/cycling could give you better results.

Looking at your 2k and the way you felt, you rated way to low, spm should be a good bit higher. And your fitness needs work, you should not feel so bad for so long. Getting better at 2k s is not doing a lot of 2k s, most sessions should be longer and slower, think 2k plus 20 seconds. Start with 5k and work up to 30min 10k. If you can do a 2k will feel getter and will be faster.

Just my thoughts, in the end its up to you!

For 30 minute 10k, that’s super fast. Did you mean some other distance or time? Just wondering what I could aim for other than the 30 minutes 6.1k that I just did.

[Erik A]

i think he means work up to a 30 min row then up to a 10k row.
looking at your 30 min row your distance puts you in the top 20 of the ranked rows so well done again.
i would just look at doing meters and possibly look at the beginner Pete Plan
the BPP is a 24 week program and is a structured program to increase fitness and distances etc

[JerekKruger]

Think they use an optimal weight for a given height, above or below is both making us slower

Assuming we're talking about the Concept 2 calculator then they never have you enter your height so this can't be the case. Here's the blurb from the FAQ at the bottom of the page:

Originally, we used 170 to normalize the weight adjusted scores because 170 was approximately the average weight of all rowers. But about a year ago we realized that by using a different number to normalize the weight adjusted score we could give the adjusted score more meaning. By using 270, the weight adjusted score becomes a pretty good estimate of a person’s potential speed in an eight. To put it another way, if the average adjusted score using this formula of the 8 rowers in an eight is 6:00, then that boat should be capable of a 6:00 2k race on the water—given perfect conditions and near perfect rowing effectiveness (nobody rows perfectly). We believe that this will be approximately true for all types of crews.

So to answer Rob's question: any weight below 270lbs/122.5kg will be assigned a faster score. Note that the adjusted score is for an eight, the fastest boat, whereas I believe Concept 2 set up their computer to estimate a four (someone might correct me on this) which is slower. As such it's not surprising your score would improve, since it's also "upgrading" you to a faster boat.