June 2019 – Ethereal Rowing

Heart Strangeness Leads To A Long Break

Chart and data for today’s 96 Watt SkiErg workout. Heart rate (red graph line circled in green) was much too high for the low effort level.

There was a long break between today’s two main workouts. The first of the two workouts was 168 Calories on the SkiErg, at a constant pace averaging 2:34/500 meters, which was a mere 96 Watts average power. But though it was low power, heart rate immediately catapulted too high for the effort by quite a bit. So I took a break afterwards, waiting for the heart strangeness to subside before doing today’s rowing. A few hours passed and it persisted, so I took an aspirin (325 grams), drank a lot of water with it, then ran a couple of errands to nearby stores.

Within a short time of perhaps about 30 minutes after taking aspirin, HR returned to normal. I finished the errands and then did the rowing. The break time between the two workouts was about five hours.

The 10K rowing workout was sixth in a series of seven, each with the goal of constant pace averaging 2:16/500 meters, which pace is an effort of about 139 Watts. Though the 139 Watt rowing work was about 45% harder and lasted about three times longer than the 96 Watt session on the SkiErg, heart rate was a whole lot lower and normal through the rowing session, compared to how it had acted during the easier SkiErg session.

The rowing session was uploaded to YouTube as a screen recording at: Indoor Rowing ASMR 10K at 216 pace 6th of seven 06302019

Finish screenfor today’s 10K rowing session.

RowPro graphs for today’s 10K rowing session.

Concept 2 online logbook chart for today’s 10K rowing session.

Happy rowing to you!

Smooth Running Saturday

Today’s first workout was this 167 Calorie SkiErg session.

Today’s workouts were once again free from heart strangeness. The first workout was a constant paced single calorie target session on the SkiErg: 167 Calories at 2:35 pace. That was followed by 10K rowing at 2:16 pace.

The rowing session was uploaded to YouTube as a screen recording at: Indoor Rowing 10K ASMR 5th of 7 at 216 pace 06292019

Finish screen for the 10K rowing session.

RowPro graphs for the 10K rowing session.

Concept 2 online logbook chart for the 10K rowing session.

Happy rowing to you!

Overdosed On Intervals?

Today the SkiErg workout was done first. Chart and data for today’s time on SkiErg.

Since I’ve been refraining from doing intervals, heart strangeness (episodes of atrial fibrillation, etc) seem to have greatly decreased and almost disappeared. Is is a coincidence or had I been overdoing it with the intervals?

I will give this approach a bit more time, before indulging in intervals again. The current approach is of aiming for a constant workout pace and gradually notching up pace and effort from one workout to the next.

Today’s first workout was on the SkiErg. It was followed by 10K rowing. The rowing workout was uploaded to YouTube as a screen recording and is available at this link: Indoor Rowing 10K ASMR at 216 pace 06282019

Happy rowing to you!

AM and PM

Today’s workouts were spread out from morning to evening. The first workout was 10K rowing in the morning. There was no time for anything else after the rowing session, but a SkiErg session was done in early evening.

Chart and some data for today’s SkiErg session.

Happy rowing to you!

Adjusting For Earlier

Though I haven’t mentioned insomnia / sleep problems lately, it was sleep issues that factored the most into missing three days of rowing recently. And skipping rowing led to more sleep issues. But yesterday I managed to get in some rowing and also the SkiErg – but just barely managed to do those workouts, before dinner yesterday evening. But they were done! And they were probably the main reason I slept very well last night.

As a result, I managed to wake earlier today, a little after seven a.m. Today’s workouts were adjusted for earlier and finished in the morning.

The first workout today was 10K rowing with the goal of rowing as constant a pace as possible, targeting an average pace of 2:16/500 meters at a target stroke rate of 28 spm. After the rowing, a SkiErg session of 164 Calories was done.

The rowing session was uploaded to YouTube as a screen recording, at this link: Indoor Rowing 10K ASMR 2min16sec pace 06262019

Happy rowing to you!

Stepping Up The 10K Pace One Second

Finish screen view for 10K rowing session.

Today’s workout was a rowing 10K done targeting a constant pace like the previous seven 10Ks, but this one was done one second faster, 2:16/500 meters instead of 2:17. It made an incremental difference, but a difference in the right direction.

The rowing was followed by a constant-paced session of 163 Calories on the SkiErg.

Concept 2 online logbook chart for 10K rowing session.

Chart and some data for today’s 163 Calorie SkiErg session.

Happy rowing to you!

The Seventh Time Was A Charm

Finish screen view for today’s 10K rowing session.

Today’s 10K was the 7th of 7 with goal of: Rating 28, constant pace and average pace of 2:17. Heart rate behaved normally during both rowing and its sister-workout of 162 calories on the SkiErg. Tomorrow’s 10K will have goal of everything the same except average pace of 2:16 instead of 2:17.

The SkiErg session today was similar, with a goal of: No particular stroke rate, constant pace and average pace of 2:40. Tomorrow’s will be targeting average pace of 2:39.

The rowing session was uploaded and is accessible at this link on YouTube: Indoor Rowing ASMR 10K 06212019

Chart and data for today’s SkiErg workout.

Happy rowing to you!

9.4% Normal

Today’s total workout time was one hour, 4 minutes and 1.5 seconds, including a 2 minute warmdown which will not be shown here. For all but the last 5 minutes 44.5 seconds, heart rate was too high for the effort level, based on past experience. Then it became normal and remained normal, for those final 5 mins 44.5 seconds, which was about 9.4% of today’s total workout time.

That qualified as strange behavior on the part of the heart and therefore the category tag, “heart strangeness” is added for today’s blog post.

The first portion of today’s workout was 10,000 meters rowing, aiming for an average pace of 2:17 and a rating of 28. Heart rate was about 10 BPM too high for the effort, all the way through the rowing session, based on a lot of past experience. The rowing session was screen-recorded and is available on YouTube at: Indoor Rowing ASMR 10K 06202019

The next portion of today’s workout was 161 Calories on the SkiErg. Heart rate immediately climbed to be too high for the effort and remained too high until after 12 minutes and 40 seconds, then it went down into its normal BPM range for that effort level. You can see what I’m referring to, on the chart for today’s SkiErg session, where I circled the too-high HR area.

Concept 2 online logbook chart for today’s 10K rowing.

Chart and data for today’s 161 Calorie SkiErg session.

Happy rowing to you!

Avoiding Intervals

Although intervals are something I like a lot, today I decided to completely avoid them. The reason I avoided doing any intervals is because they are possibly correlated with episodes of strange heart behavior such as arrhythmia or heart rate elevated too high. Coincidentally or not, heart strangeness was absent today.

The workouts today were: first, another 10K rowing session at the constant pace of about 2:17/500m. That was followed by a 160 Calorie SkiErg session also done at a constant pace. The target pace for the SkiErg session was chosen to be about the same as the average pace of the most recent SkiErg session which had both included hard intervals and also had completely normal heart behavior. That most recent session was the one done on June 16th at an average pace of 2:42.4. Today’s SkiErg session was done at a constant average pace of about 2:42.0 and heart behaved normally in the absence of any intervals.

Normal heart behavior during today’s boring interval-free SkiErg session.

Happy rowing to you!

Drifting Too High

Finish screen for today’s 10,000 meter rowing.

Today’s workouts started out normal with everything okay through the first session of two. The first session was 10K rowing.

The second session was 159 Calories on the SkiErg. It was going to be another alternation of 10 Calories work, 10 Calories rest. But after less than 3 minutes, during the second rest interval, heart rate turned around and spiked up. It stayed too high for all the remainder of the Skierg session.

The rowing session, though very similar to yesterday’s, was recorded and uploaded to YouTube at: Indoor Rowing ASMR 10000 meters 06182019

Chart and data for today’s 159 Calorie SkiErg session.

Enlargement of SkiErg chart, showing point where heart rate stopped going down during a rest interval and went up instead.

Happy rowing to you!