May 2017 – Page 3 – Ethereal Rowing

Do What The Other Rower Does

do-what-that-rower-does — A pace boat like this one might inspire more than a few short daydreams.

Today was a rest day from the strength-training/pushups program and so the only thing I did in the way of exercise was rowing. And trimming a little bit of a cactus.

The rowing today was 11K done with RowPro and in the accompaniment of a single pace boat. It was done offline, because RowPro pace boats can only be generated when you row offline. If you want a pace boat when you are rowing online, you have to rely on another person who is also online and who is in the same session with you.

The pace boat was set to a pace of 2:20/500m and a rating (strokes per minute) of 25. I tried to focus on the pace of 2:20 and let the rating be whatever it would be.

For anyone who is not acquainted with indoor rowing in the company of a pace boat, that’s one significance in the title of today’s post: reference to the fact that I was using a pace boat. The other significance, of course, was humor, which is one of the little angels usually present on one of my shoulders. I shouldn’t have to explain these things, but Diane has told me more than once that my humor is not obvious. So I guess Diane thinks humor should be obvious but in my opinion, humor is better when it is not obvious.

A couple times or more during the session, I went off on daydreams and got separated from the pace boat by a few meters before I noticed what was happening, but most of the time we were side by side within less than one meter difference.

AF-May-11th-11K-finish AF-May-11th-11K-rpt AF-May-11th-11K-gph

Happy rowing alongside a pace boat to you.

Fitness Is Good

fitwit-blog

The above indoor rowing photo was found on a website called FitWit, whose site is at THIS LINK. The particular page where the photo was found was called “5 Reasons to Try an Indoor Rowing Class” located at this particular link. The physical location of the facilities seems to be in the Atlanta area, but you might find the website is interesting even if you don’t live near Atlanta.

Today’s session was strength-training/pushups and 11K of rowing during warmup/down & rests between sets for the strength training:

AEe-May-10th-11K-finish AEe-May-10th-11K-rpt AEe-May-10th-11K-gph pu-wk-9-session-2

May you have a happy journey rowing to fitness and health.

No Flared Nostrils Today

Today was not a day for me to enjoy the phenomena of flared nostrils. I didn’t row hard enough…. I’m still in the groove (or perhaps stuck in the rut?) of rowing easy and rather intermittently while multitasking with other activities. But … when you are rowing at an effort level which causes your nostrils to flare and requires your mouth to be open so that you can get a larger volume of oxygen-loaded air into your lungs with each inhalation… that’s when it is the most invigorating.

Today’s session was 11K while watching a mostly boring attempt at sci-fi in a Netflix video. Still a bit sore from the strength-training session yesterday. That soreness from strength-training seems to be a daily presence, but it is resulting in better and longer sleep most nights, which is an excellent benefit.

Notice that there is a slight glitch with the session report generated by RowPro 5 for the Mac for this session, evident in some of the columns of split number 4.

AE-May-9th-11K-finish AE-May-9th-11K-rpt AE-May-9th-11K-gph

Happy nostril-flaring to you. closeup-of-flared-nostrils

Row Push Up Row Etc

smiling-faces — They are smiling because rowing is fun.

The above photo was found at THIS LINK. And that link is just one of many pages on an excellent British rowing website called British Rowing, which you can find at THIS link. I say the site is “excellent,” because it looks nice … I haven’t really explored it or spent much time there at all. I did try exploring what it had to say about doing online challenges but ended up just going in circles, so the website might need a little bit of refining at least in that particular area.

Today was a day to do another strength-training session. Since I also wanted to log at least 10,500 meters, it was made more efficient by combining the two activities and doing the rowing in bits and pieces during times for warmup/down and rests associated with the strength training.

AD-May-8th-10500-finish AD-May-8th-10500-rpt AD-May-8th-10500-gph

The strength-training results:

pu-wk-9-session-1

Smiley rowing to you.

Just Keep Rowing

Just-keep-rowing-book

The title for today’s post is also the title of a book about rowing. I’m wondering whether it would be a good read but haven’t learned enough about it yet, to decide whether to get the book. If you have read it and want to share your opinion, your comments are welcome.

Today’s rowing session was another 10,500 m, done at a mostly very easy pace except for a little pickup toward the end. I’m still slightly sore from the strength-training/pushups session two days ago, so the main thing was to stimulate more blood circulation, to help boost that repair & recovery. The graph of heart rate is very spotty, because it has a low battery and I’m waiting for it to totally quit before replacing the battery.

Considered doing an online session today but when I looked at what was scheduled online, saw nothing before 0400 GMT tomorrow (which would be 9 pm tonight, local time).

May-7-online-view

There were 8 others logged in online besides myself. One of them was already rowing. The other 7 weren’t doing anything or even chatting, so I assumed they were logged in with RowPro but not actively present at their computer keyboards. (See the above screenshot, to understand what I saw when I looked online)

So I opted for another offline solo session, whose screenshots are below.

ACc-May-7th-10500-finish ACc-May-7th-10500-rpt ACc-May-7th-10500-gphs

Happy rowing to you.

Rowing Lightly In The Light Of Netflix

row-in-the-light — The light and scenery outdoors is much more fantastic than anything I’ve experienced with indoor rowing. When I see photos like this one, I vicariously enjoy the experience of the rowers in the photo.

For quite a few rowing sessions now, I’ve only felt inclined to row easy or mostly easy. While I ponder various things, including whether I want to do a marathon this season and do it at any sort of competitive pace.

Today’s rowing was set to a distance of 10,500 meters and was done while alternating between rowing easy and switching from one Netflix video to another, until finally settling on one that held my interest, though just barely. Some parts of it were so predictable that I’d grab the remote and fast-forward through the predictable and boring parts.

I’m still sore from the strength-training/pushups session yesterday. In addition to the pushups recorded in the log whose image is displayed in yesterday’s post, I did more sets after the 7th set and total of 70 shown in the pushups log entry for yesterday. The actual total was 164 pushups yesterday, during an elapsed time of about 90 minutes for all the sets and rest times. The motivation for doing more was to enhance sleep quality last night and it worked. Slept soundly and longly. Longly is not a word, according to the spell checker. Actually, I knew that but it’s okay to be loose with the language as long as the writer has the proper license, which I do. Its called a poetic license.

Anyway – here are the relevant screenshots for today’s bit of indoor rowing:

AC-May-6th-10500-finish AC-May-6th-10500-rpt AC-May-6th-10500-gph

Happy rowing to you.

Happy Cinco De Mayo 2017

happy-cinco-de-mayo-17

Today is a special day of celebration for everyone of Mexican heritage and which happiness they share with their friends and neighbors, no matter what their heritage.

Today for me was a strength-training/pushups session day. It was the 3rd session of the 8th week since starting strength-training with pushups. I did it like it was done the day before yesterday, and only did rowing as warmup for strength training and as a gentle activity while resting between sets.

ABb-May-5th-15K-st-resting-finish ABb-May-5th-15K-st-resting-rpt pu-wk-8-session-no-3

Happy rowing to you.

May The 4th Be With You

may-4th-2017

Though it’s not my custom to celebrate Star Wars Day, this morning I was reminded about it and thus the title of this post. The above image was found at THIS SITE.

Today’s rowing was scheduled online less than 20 minutes before its scheduled start time, so it was no surprise that nobody noticed it and joined in.

It was a distance of 10,500m at a very leisurely pace.

AB-May-4th-10500-online-finish AB-May-4th-10500-online-rpt AB-May-4th-10500-online-gphs

Happy rowing to you.

Rowing As A Way To Rest

resting-from-rowing-in-this-case — These rowers are resting from rowing hard. I rowed easy, while resting from pushups.

Today’s rowing session was only done during times for either warmup before or rest between pushups sets. The reason for doing so was to keep the total time required to do both pushups and rowing down to a minimum. Previously, I had spent the time by walking for rest between pushups sets. By rowing instead, I got the same number of pushups and overall rowing meters for the day, but saved at least an hour of total time to do both.