Month: August 2016

Today was the last day of the Concept 2 Rowlympic Challenge and it came and went seemingly unnoticed.

For this last day, I scheduled 3 sessions of 2K each followed by a 15 minute warm down. I intended to race one of the 2K sessions and rank it as my season best time for the 2K.

Nobody joined the first 2K. I used it as initial warm up.

Nobody joined the second 2K. I used it as more warm up.

The third 2K was joined by one other guy, during the last 20 minutes or so before scheduled start time.

By two minutes before start time, I could see him in the main chat room but he hadn’t yet checked in to the session itself so I typed a message in the main chat room asking him if he would need more time but he didn’t respond.  I waited for a little more than one minute after scheduled start time and then started alone.

For that 2K, I thought I’d try to keep a constant pace of 1:50 until the last 500 meters and then try to pick up the pace for the last split.  But … it has been a long time since I’ve tried to row a fast 2K and 1:50 was a bit too fast to maintain so I slowed way down and finished with an average pace of 1:55 instead of something faster than 1:50/500m.

I forgot to click to save the strokes before saving that “fast” 2K and so although it was entered into the Concept 2 online World Rankings, it will show as “unverified”.  RowPro files on this latest Concept2.com website only show as being verified if the strokes are saved before the file is uploaded to your Concept2 log.

Lesson learned and if I try another 2K in the near future I will aim for a constant pace of 1:55 for the first 1,500 meters and then try to go faster during the last 500m.

Happy trails to you.

Today’s rowing session was an online 30 minute piece which I’d originally planned to row at a pace of about 2:09.  But one of the two British fellows who joined the session said that he had just eaten and so he was going to row “slow”.  I asked him what he meant by slow and he said about 2:05.  I consider 2:05  to be fast but doable so I decided to row with him.  It turned out to be a bit faster than 2:05 and was a much more vigorous workout than I would have done alone.

It was followed by a very slow 10 minute warm down which I won’t bother to display.

Happy trails to you.

There are only two more days left in the Concept 2 Rowlympic Challenge.  Yesterday I scheduled an online 30 minute piece for this morning (local time … though it was afternoon or evening in Europe) and nobody else joined in.  So I conclude that most people who were trying to achieve any particular number of hours during the challenge have already done so. As I have.  Which is why the rowing session was only 30 minutes today.

Happy trails to you.

To complete the Concept 2 Rowlympic Challenge of 15 hours rowing, all I needed was another 40 minutes.  So today’s session was an online 7K followed by a 10 minute warm down, all totaling about 40 minutes.

The 7K was done alone because there was also a 30 minute session scheduled at the same time and 30 minutes seems to be a more popular session than a non-standard distance such as 7,000 meters.

Happy trails to you.

 

The Concept 2 Rowlympic Challenge is focused only on time spent rowing.  In order to do an hour of rowing today, I scheduled an online session of 13,000 meters and paced myself so that it would last one hour.

The rowers who joined in the session were in the two countries of Egypt and Spain.

Happy trails to you until we meet again.

For an hour of rowing on day 12 of the Concept 2 Rowlympic Challenge, today’s rowing consisted of a 15 minute warmup, an online 10K and a 10 minute warm down.

There were 8 rowers who joined the 10K, in 5 countries: Denmark, Germany, Great Britain, Spain and the US.

I rowed with an easy target pace of 2:15, so that the sum of the time for the 10K plus the 15 minute warm up would total 1 hour.

Happy trails to you until we meet again.

There is a new gadget in the room where I use the Concept 2 erg.  It displays temperature, in degrees Fahrenheit, and humidity in %. Before today’s rowing session started, the humidity was 46%.  By the time the rowing session was over I’d lost 2 or 3 pounds (1 pound = 1 pint of water). The humidity increased by 10% to help show how much of our water is transferred from body to atmosphere during exercise.

Today is the 11th day of the Concept 2 Rowlympic Challenge.

Today’s rowing was two online sessions of 6K each.  The others who joined in were in the countries of Denmark, Egypt, Germany, Great Britain and Spain.

I did the first 6K at a very easy pace and did the second one a bit faster, just for fun, with three increasing levels of sprint paces during each of the last three splits of 300 meters/split.

Happy trails to you until we meet again.

 

For today’s time toward the Concept 2 Rowlympic Challenge, an online hour was scheduled.  Four rowers in Europe signed up, plus myself and one other rower in the US.  Two of the guys in Europe couldn’t make it in time to sign in, so there were only 4 participants.  One of the 4 got disconnected and did not finish.  Of the three of us who finished, the two in Europe raced, Ireland vs Germany and the guy in Ireland won by about a boat length.

As for me, I rowed the hour very easy so as to continue recovering from the somewhat fast 5K recently, which resulted in a very slight pain in one knee, which is a sign that I need to go easy for a little while.

Happy trails to you until we meet again.

Today’s rowing session was one hour online.  The rowers who participated were in Denmark, England, Germany and the US.

For this hour my plan was to row very easy and use it as a recovery day from yesterday’s season best 5K. The only thing today that wasn’t easy was that I did about 20 power strokes near the end of the hour.

After today’s rowing was completed, the total time I’ve rowed so far during the Concept 2 Rowlympic Challenge adds up to over 10 hours, which qualifies me for a Silver Medal.  (The medals are virtual, not actual medals.) Five more hours between now and the last day, to win a gold medal.  Woo-hoo 🙂

Happy trails to you until we meet again.

For day 8 of the Concept2 Rowlympic Challenge, I scheduled three online 5K pieces, 30 minutes apart. The rowers who joined in were good company and were in the countries of Denmark, Egypt, and England.  I was the only one in the US.

My plan was to row the first 5K as a warm-up, row the second one at something faster than 2:04/500 m in order to make it a season best for 5K and then row the third one as a warm down.

But that plan didn’t work out because after about 2K into the second one there was a small emergency which couldn’t be ignored.  To say more  would probably evoke the response, “that’s more information than I need,” so enough said.  Because of that small emergency, after about 2K I had to stop and get off the erg for a few minutes. After I returned, I finished at a slow pace so as to save energy for the 3rd 5K which would be the attempt at a season best… if there were no more emergency interruptions.

The 3rd 5K went without interruptions.  It was done with a target pace of about 2:00/500m until the last 500 meters and did a moderate sprint to the finish. It became my season’s best 5K time so it was entered into the World Rankings on Concept 2’s website.

Since the 3rd 5K didn’t turn out to be a “warm down” as originally planned, I added a 10 minute warm down afterwards.

Happy trails to you until we meet again.