September 2019 – Page 3 – Ethereal Rowing

Pac Man Motivation

Glutathione in your body acts like many little Pac Men working on your behalf to gobble up toxins.

Detours and excuses abound, to avoid working out.

Entertain some rational consideration of any one of the benefits of working out, however, and you can gain some motivation to detour the detours.

Today’s featured motivation is something you can either pay about $20 an ounce for or which you can get for free if you workout. It is called glutathione.

One doctor whom I heard mention glutathione recently said that glutathione in your body acts like a Pac Man which gobbles up toxins.

Xlnt! A new motivation to add to the list of good reasons for working out!

In other words (if you don’t know what “xlnt” means), “Excellent!”

Funny that I’ve never before thought of Pac Man as anything other than one of the first and most wildly popular of early video games.

You can buy glutathione supplement at places like Results RNA website which features bottles of it like the one pictured below, for either about $40 or $75 for the 2 or 4 ounce bottles. But why buy it? How do you know that spraying it in the mouth is an effective way to boost glutathione? I’d rather have it made “in-house” in my own body. Of course for some people who are perhaps bedridden or for some other reason not able to workout, it might be worth considering. My personal opinion is that personally manufactured glutathione probably works best of all. (I have no affiliation with the “Results RNA” website and can’t say anything pro or con regarding their products.)

Today’s workouts were hampered to a degree by annoying heart behavior. They consisted of a 200 Calorie SkiErg session and a 10K rowing session. Each of the workouts caused some sweating and generated new Pac-Men to gobble up toxins.

The heart rate graphs for the 10K rowing are very messy looking because heart rate was so irregular that the Polar Heart Strap transmitter and Concept 2 PM3-mounted heart rate signal receiver had a difficult time figuring out what to display. Heart straps on the chest tend to be more accurate than wrist-mounted heart rate detectors but the Apple Watch seemed to have an easier time keeping track of heart rate than the Polar Heart Strap did today. Perhaps it was something to do with the irregular heartbeat.

RowPro graphs for today’s 10K rowing. It didn’t seem to matter what effort level I rowed. If I rowed moderately or a lot easier, heart rate remained in the 140 to 150 BPM range which was too high for either effort level.

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

Screen shot of Apple Watch’s heart rate graph display for 10K rowing session.

Happy rowing to you!

Sweating Is Another Of Many Good Reasons

When I looked for confirmation about sweating removing toxins, I found something about it on this website at mindbodygreen.com

Sweating is very helpful in removing toxins from the human body. Cool. Another good reason to row.

While I didn’t first learn about sweat removing toxins from the mindbodygreen.com article or the doctor pictured above, it was another doctor from whom I first heard it.

Enduring exercise at a level that will promote at least a little bit of sweating is easier if a person is aware of the immediate benefits.

A verse in the Bible says “In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread.” I’m paraphrasing it. That’s not an exact quote from any particular translation of the Bible.

The particular verse, if you’d like to look it up in your favorite translation of the Bible, is Genesis 3:19.

It (Genesis 3:19) seemed like it might be a curse or punishment, the first time I read it. But I changed my mind about it a long time ago and decided it was just a health and lifestyle recommendation from the Good Doctor of doctors.

The fact that sweating removes nasty toxins like heavy metals from our bodies is more confirmation that it is good advice from our Creator.

Of course if sweat removes toxins then it follows that taking a shower after sweating is a good thing to do, to help wash the toxins off the body.

Unless you are allergic to water.

That would be a serious problem, to have an allergy to water.

Today’s sweat-generating workouts each produced a little sweat. First there was a 200 Calorie SkiErg session. That was followed by setting up the rowing machine for 10,000 meters and rowing 1,022 meters and stopping. I stopped, because that annoying heart behavior was happening again. Heart rate irregular and much too fast for the effort level. So I took an aspirin break, ate something & drank water, then returned and rowed a 9,000 meter session. That was all for today.

Yes, I took a shower afterward. 🙂

Heart strangeness first appeared in the last part of the SkiErg session.

Report for what was supposed to be 10,000 meters but which was only 1,022 meters due to an aspirin break.

Report for the 9,000 meter session. Notice that heart rate is abnormally high at the end of each of the nine splits.

RowPro graph for the 9,000 meter session.

Concept 2 online logbook chart for the 9,000 meter session.

During the 9,000 meter session when heart rate was visible it reached 210 BPM a few times on the RowPro display. This Apple Watch view of its independent record of heart rate during the 9K confirms the new high of 210 BPM.

Happy rowing to you.

Persistence Pays Off

Or was it the salad?

First impression from today’s first few minutes on the SkiErg were slight amazement. Heart rate remained low, even though I was starting out faster than the two previous sessions (Sept 2nd and Sept 4th) when heart rate was irregular and also insisted on being way too high for the pace / effort level.

Not sure if I should believe that it would continue normally, I watched it closely with every stroke. The heart can be tricky and deceptive, you know. But it continued to behave well on the SkiErg. In fact, it behaved very well and its average rate was less than 100 BPM during the first 100 Calories. During the second 100 Calories I added 5 intervals of 10 Calories each and heart behavior remained very good. The overall effort for today’s SkiErg session was RPE Level 2.

Once the SkiErg session was over, I wondered if the heart’s good behavior would continue through the rowing session. RowPro was set to 10,000 meters and I decided to row a bit faster than either of the previous two 10K rowing sessions to put the heart to a little test.

The results were about as good as I could have hoped for. Heart rate disappeared momentarily, nine times during the session. But I didn’t feel any fluttery feeling of irregular heart beat. The rowing session was done at RPE Level 4. For a bit more more motivation during the rowing session, I played the screen recording of a 10K session done in July 2018. It had been done at a pace of 2:17.5 and I prodded myself to stay ahead of it. It’s link is Indoor Rowing 10K 07062018 .

Eager to attribute today’s heart behavior to some cause, however illogical that is, I first decided that today’s good heart behavior was due to persisting in doing workouts during the previous sessions, even though the heart had acted cantankerously irregular and its rate was much too high during those two sessions.

But then I remembered something said by the doctor who had talked about microbiomes and the diet and how some of our most beneficial microbiomes thrive on an abundance of fiber in our food. They actually digest it and get nourishment for their little microbiome bodies from fiber in our food.

So it’s equally if not more likely that today’s good heart behavior is attributable largely to the gigantic salad which was the main course for last night’s dinner. To paraphrase something the doctor said about how fruits and vegetables are so amazingly good for us: It’s almost as if they are designed to be beneficial to us.

Heart strangeness was notable for its absence.

Finish screen for today’s 10K rowing session.

RowPro report for 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!

Coffee Lover Sidestepped

Patience is a virtue. The part of my mind that likes coffee the most is not patient. As I changed into workout clothes, it tried to strike a bargain to delay the start of the workout for the sake of making a pot of coffee so that coffee would be ready already afterwards.

As if simply making a pot of coffee was all it wanted. After coffee was made, it would want just a little sip, etc., and it would try to arrange for something else with the ultimate objective of avoiding doing any workout whatsoever.

Tabling its suggestion of making a cup of coffee, I sidestepped whatever other suggestions for further delay it had in its subliminal mind.

I was inspired to go directly to the workout this morning because heart rate had been irregular and too high since sometime between 8 and 9 PM last night.

Eating a tiny bit later than usual late-ish evening eating might have had something to do with it. At least that was a speculation that crossed my mind this afternoon when I listened to part of a talk given by a doctor whose specialty includes special attention to the microbiomes in the human body and when he mentioned that they all have their own circadian rhythms.

Not that there couldn’t be other reasons for my heart to have been persistently irregular and too fast since yesterday evening, but that reason sounded as good as any of the other unproved possibilities.

Clinging to the hope that if I changed into workout clothes and “just did it” there would be a repeat of the sudden return to normal as had happened during the rowing workout of September 2nd, I started without further delay. The SkiErg session was first. Two hundred Calories was burned on the SkiErg but heart rate remained too high and fluttery-feeling, irregular from start to finish.

Easy-going, slow skiing was done for most of the SkiErg session with the exception of three tiny increases of pace near the end. But on September 2nd, the heart had remained stubbornly irregular during all the time on the SkiErg also.

So I held out hope that heart behavior would return to normal during the rowing session and set up RowPro for 10,000 meters. As a rowing “companion” and additional motivation I used another monitor to play a YouTube video of a 10,000 meter session I’d rowed in 2018. That session had been done at an average pace of about 2:20/500 meters, which was slower than I wanted to row today. Its name on YouTube is Indoor Rowing 10K constant pace 04302018 .

My rowing goal was to stay ahead of the 10K on the YouTube video by rowing a pace averaging at least 2:15/500 meters. The pace goal was satisfied but heart did not return to normal behavior. Bad heart!

Heart behavior did eventually return to normal rate and regular rhythm but not until after I had breakfast and coffee. Go figure.

Should I have listened to the wily subconscious voice when it tried to delay and divert me? I believe I made the right choice because its delays and other subterfuge would have probably led to doing a workout late in the afternoon, if at all.

Chart and data for today’s SkiErg session.

RowPro graph for today’s 10K rowing session.

Happy rowing to you!

Coffee Compromise

It would be nice if coffee could be counted among medical expenses.

Java is best in the morning, but experience tends to indicate that it’s better to do a daily workout first.

One reason (and probably the main one) it’s better to do the workout first is because the time it takes to consume morning coffee can stretch out to a long time and usually includes food. I can row on a full stomach but prefer otherwise.

Eagerness to immediately commence today’s workout was hampered by a desire for coffee before too much more time passed in the morning. A compromise was reached, which involved a reduction of total workout time.

The first session was on the SkiErg and the compromise was to ski only 200 Calories instead of 250. The other session was on the rowing machine. The rowing machine compromise was to limit the distance to 5,000 meters instead of 10,000.

The first half of the SkiErg countdown was done at a leisurely warm up pace. The second 100 Calories of the SkiErg session included intervals to make it a bit more fascinating.

For the 5K rowing session, I did something similar to yesterday and played a YouTube rowing video to race against. The video was titled Indoor Rowing 5K and 5K and WarmDown 04112018. It consisted of two 5Ks and a warmdown as the title implies. I raced against the first of the two 5Ks, because it was the slowest and would be easy to beat. Lazy John!

But even though I chose the slowest of the two 5Ks to race against, I wasn’t too awfully lazy about it and finished about 1,000 meters ahead of it. Hurray for John! 🙂

The SkiErg session was first today. You can easily spot the intervals which were done during the last 100 Calories.

Concept 2 online logbook chart for today’s 5K rowing.

Happy rowing to you!

Enlightninged Workout

If you were wearing a heart strap and it momentarily became electrified, it might feel like a tiny, lightning bolt.

If you are one of those people who are observant and knowledgeable about the correct spelling of words, you might have a problem with the first word in today’s title.

Nice of you to notice and I compliment you on your observational powers if you saw and concluded that the word was either misspelled and/or that there is no such word.

Some people, however, have poetic licenses. I am one of those people who is poetically licensed and today I exercised that license to make up a word. It is a combination of the words enlightened and lightning.

Perchance you recall from yesterday’s blog post that I had heart annoyances yesterday throughout all three installments of yesterday’s SkiErg workout and during the rowing workout until I’d rowed 4,001 meters.

In addition to what I reported yesterday as happening at about 4,001 meters and 18 minutes 24 seconds into the rowing session (“…heart rate suddenly became normal and dropped down into a normal, totally appropriate range for the effort level….”) there was something else. It felt like an electric shock across my chest beneath the area where the heart strap was worn.

Reluctance which amounted to total absence of its mention yesterday was because I just didn’t know what to think of it. But after sleeping on it and turning it over in my mind, I’ve concluded that it is in the same category of some other non-explainable things which have happened to me.

A medical/physiological explanation could be assigned to it, of course.

The trite (in my opinion) term with which it might be labeled and simultaneously explained would be the ominous term “chest pain.” But it wasn’t painful at all. It felt electric, definitely. And perhaps if it lingered a while instead of being so very brief, it might have been classified as pain. But it was very brief and although it felt very electric, like some mild electric shocks I experienced many decades ago when as a boy I deliberately put my fingers into sockets meant to hold the ends of fluorescent light bulbs, to see what it felt like – the electric sensation in my chest yesterday sort of tickled, which is not exactly how I’d describe the self-induced electric shocks I experienced as a boy.

I put the sensation, along with the eventual outcome of all of yesterday’s wrestling match of trying to do the workout and shake off heart rate irregularity, into a category that includes an incident once upon a time decades ago when a radio turned on without human intervention and the voice on the radio spoke a message consisting of three brief sentences which I was primed and ready to hear.

Objectively and plainly speaking, I have opted to classify it as a miracle that the heart irregularity suddenly just stopped and the “electric shock” as a symptom of whatever transpired with that miracle inside my chest.

Naive I may be, but that’s how I’m taking it and filing it away in my memories.

At any rate and no matter what you or anyone else chooses to opine or believe about it, the totality of yesterday’s experience was fresh in my mind this morning and was more than enough motivation to get me to the ergs and start today’s workout without any undue delay. I have been struggling with motivation for workouts recently so I was “primed and ready” for motivation from the ethereal realm today.

The totality of today’s workout consisted of two sessions. The first session was 250 Calories on the SkiErg. At the start of the SkiErg session, I wondered if I could remain focused enough to count every stroke so that my stroke count would agree with what the monitor reported after the results were uploaded to the Concept 2 logbook. I counted 593 strokes. After downloading the CSV file for the session, examination showed the final stroke count was 593. Hurray for John’s brain! It remained focused for 24 minutes and 45.8 seconds!

The second session today was 10,000 meters rowing. To turn the rowing session into a sort of friendly “race,” I played a YouTube video of a moderate 10K rowing session and made it my goal to finish about 500 meters ahead of that 10K screen recording. The particular YouTube indoor rowing screen recording I watched while rowing was Indoor Rowing 10K 07122018. Though I watched it for the sake of the “race,” I muted it for the sake of keeping the noise down to normal levels of only the actual live sounds in the room.

The first 150 Calories of the session was very leisurely. The last 100 Calories included a few intervals.

The number for the final stroke count of today’s SkiErg session can be seen in the bottom left corner of this screenshot of the last part of the CSV file for the session.

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

Happy rowing to you!

Fourth Time Was The Charm

Today I experienced a little amelioration. Isaiah 53:6 speaks of the best amelioration of all.

At around 3 AM this morning after I woke and then returned to bed, heart rate became irregular.

Mostly it was annoying but it happens so often that I didn’t lose any sleep over it.

Early in mid morning I started doing the daily workout by setting the SkiErg for a 250 Calorie countdown.

Leisure skiing should have resulted in a low heart rate of around 100 BPM but it was still irregular and heart rate immediately went much higher than normal for that low effort level.

Instead of skiing for the entire 250 Calories, I quit after 50 Calories and took a break for water and 80 mg of aspirin.

Ordinarily, if there is such as thing as ordinary with irregular heartbeat, it has been my experience that it is inclined to become regular after taking an aspirin.

Returning to the SkiErg after waiting more than 30 minutes for the aspirin to circulate, I set up a session to count down 200 Calories, which was the remainder of the original 250 Calorie session.

After skiing for 100 Calories, heart rate was still irregular and much too high for the effort level so I cut the session short and took another break for more aspirin and water.

Taking that much time to do so few Calories on the SkiErg is very unusual. After another 30 minutes to allow the second 80 mg dose of aspirin to enter the system, I returned to the SkiErg and setup a session for the last remaining 100 Calories.

Even though I started out easy in the third installment of the SkiErg session, heart rate continued to be irregular and too high. So I increased the pace a bit to see if perhaps going a bit faster would nudge the heart into normal behavior. But it remained irregular and too high for the effort from start to finish of the third piece of the total time on the SkiErg.

Determined to do a total daily workout of 250 Calories on the SkiErg and 10,000 meters on the rowing machine, I kept my workout clothes on and took a long break before going to the rowing machine.

During that long break I had a substantial breakfast and about 12 ounces of home-brewed Starbucks coffee. By the time I was about half way through the coffee, more than four hours had passed since I’d taken the last portion of aspirin. So I took some more aspirin with a bowl of cereal and followed it with the remainder of the coffee.

The rowing session would be the 4th workout session of the day. When the 10,000 meter rowing session started, heart rate was still irregular and too high. Heart rate got as high as 192 BPM. There are two screenshots, below, which illustrate that heart rate reached 192 during the rowing session. There were two separate heart rate monitors worn during the session. One was on the chest and the other on the wrist. Each of them recorded high heart rate before heart rate behavior was ameliorated, but the Apple Watch shows that heart rate went even higher than 192 and reached as high as 202 BPM. I wouldn’t have known it, without the chest strap or the Apple Watch on the wrist. It just felt a bit fluttery, with no other symptoms.

I wasn’t rowing especially easy, but wasn’t rowing hard either. It was probably RPE Level 1 or Level 2 at the very most. Breathing easy, but rowing at a sufficient level to have a nice little bit of sweat.

After 4,001 meters of rowing, which took about 18 minutes and 24 seconds, heart rate suddenly became normal and dropped down into a normal, totally appropriate range for the effort level. It remained regular and at a normal rate for the remaining 5,999 meters of the rowing session.

Happy endings are nice. 🙂

Report for today’s 10,000 meter rowing session.

RowPro graphs for today’s 10,000 meter rowing session.

Concept 2 logbook chart for today’s 10,000 meter rowing session.

The point highlighted on the Concept 2 chart shows where heart rate reached 192 according to the signal from the Polar chest mounted heart strap.

Screen shot of the rowing session heart rate graph from the 2nd heart rate detector, a wrist-mounted smart watch.

Happy rowing to you!