The damp area on the towel is about a pint of sweat lost during today’s SkiErg 5K session.
Today’s main erg workout was the shortest of two. It was a 5K done as a time trial on the SkiErg. To intercept the sweat, there is an old towel covering the SkiErg platform. In the photo above, you can see the damp area where the towel caught the rain of perspiration.
After the 5K SkiErg, I did 30 minutes on the rowing machine. The rowing session was done as a series of eight 2 minute work/1 minute rest intervals. Though I worked harder on the rowing machine, my legs did most of the work and the rowing wasn’t enough effort on the legs, to cause much sweat at all. Just a few scattered droplets near the end of the 30 minutes rowing, instead of a rainstorm as happened with the shorter SkiErg session.
Chart and some data for today’s 5K time trial on the SkiErg.
The SkiErg session was done first today. This is a screenshot of its chart and some of its datat. The area circled on the heart rate graph is where heart rate was too high for the effort.
Today’s erg workouts in the order in which they were done were: SkiErg workout of 139 Calories and rowing erg workout structured as 12X1minuteR45seconds within a continuous 30 minute session.
There was one software glitch with RowPro during the 3rd split of the 30 minute session. It is circled on the rowing session report. There were two heartware glitches, one during the SkiErg session and the other during the rowing session. They are circled on their respective graphs.
Another interesting thing in regard to the heart today was that in the moments while I was standing on the SkiErg before starting today’s 139 Calorie SkiErg workout, heart rate was unusually low, at about 50 BPM. Its usually in the 60’s or higher when I’m standing like that. (see screenshot immediately below).
Surprisingly low heart rate while I was standing on the SkiErg before starting work on today’s 139 Calorie session.
Finish screen view of the rowing session.
Report for rowing session. The circles in three of the columns are errors by RowPro 5.0 for the Mac. The bottom line summaries are correct, however.
Graphs of today’s rowing session. The circled areas are where heart rate was too high and also irregular.
Today’s workouts consisted of, in chronological order: Two 2K distances at moderate pace, each with 3 moderate “power 10s” every 500 meters. Heart rate acted up by being too highand/or irregular during portions of each 2K. I will only show screenshots for one of the two 2Ks. Next, was a 139 calorie session on the SkiErg. But I felt low-energy/tired and cut that short after 59 calories. Heart rate was a bit too high for the effort, during the shortened SkiErg session. Finally, there was a 5 minute warm down. Heart rate was mostly regular but too high during the warm down – it should have been in the 90s or less but it was over 100. There is no screenshot of the warm down.
The “heart strangeness” was also accompanied by irregular heartbeat. Some evidence of the “strangeness” of the heart behavior can be seen in the graph for the report, below. Also, it can be seen in the report, if you look in the right hand column which displays “End HR”. On the graph, you can see that though I slowed down and greatly reduced my effort from the 15th split to the 20th split at the end, heart rate didn’t slow down like it normally does. Instead, it was sort of fluttery and too high. On the report it shows that it was measured as high as 194, which is higher than I’ve ever seen it when it is acting normally.
When my heart acts normally, it has only climbed as high as 191 with regular heart rate, in all the time I’ve been observing it. When my heart gets irregular, I’ve seen it as high as somewhere a few beats above 200. Today it was irregular and didn’t quite reach 200 BPM.
The strange heart behavior today is also visible on the chart for the SkiErg workout today. I cut that workout short because I felt a bit tired. But looking closely at the shortened SkiErg workout chart (it is the bottom-most screenshot in today’s posted screenshots) you can see that after the 2nd work interval, continued increasing as though I was continuing to work. Heart rate got as high as about 130 during that second work interval but it kept increasing after that second work interval ended, and it peaked at about 161, about the middle of the rest interval, before it started slowing down again like it normally does. That was strange. After the third work interval in that same SkiErg workout which was cut short, heart rate acted strange again and remained high for a lot longer than it should have, while I was gently resting. That was when I decided to cut the session short – I hadn’t really noticed the strange heart behavior, but I felt low-energy tired, as today’s blog post title, A Low Energy Day, says.
Report for one of today’s 2K sessions.
Graphs for one of today’s 2K sessions.
Chart and some data for today’s abbreviated SkiErg session.
The top screenshot today is of the SkiErg workout, because it was done before anything else today (that’s the reverse order from how I’ve been doing it in the past, with rowing first).
The thing on my mind before starting today’s workouts was recent bouts of heart strangeness during recent rowing sessions. So as a result, today I decided to experiment by reversing the order in which I do the workouts on rowing machine and SkiErg. Instead of rowing first, I did a SkiErg workout first.
The one and only reason for making that change was because I wondered if my heart rate would become irregular again during the first workout of the day, if I did that workout on SkiErg instead of rowing machine.
For the recent few days, heart rate has had fits of irregularity and other strangeness during the first workout of the day, which was rowing. But it has behaved normally during the second workout on the SkiErg, immediately following the rowing.
Interestingly enough, heart behaved normally during the first workout today on the SkiErg. During the second workout, on the rowing machine, it also behaved normally.
Actually it behaved ever-so-slightly abnormally during the SkiErg workout, and what I’m referring to by that is visible in the heart rate graph after the 2nd of 8 intervals on the SkiErg – in the space of graph between 2nd and third intervals. Heart rate stayed regular, but it went way too high, then recovered and behaved very normally after that.
Was it a coincidence or is there something about using the SkiErg, which is done standing UPRIGHT/100% VERTICAL instead of sitting (with the lower half of the body extended horizontally) and which (SkiErg) mostly uses the arms instead of the legs… which is more agreeable to the heart? Or at least, which is more agreeable if it is done as the first workout before doing any hard rowing?
Finish screen view of today’s rowing session.
Report for today’s rowing session.
RowPro graph for today’s rowing session. Notice the CLEAN heart rate graph! No dropouts to zero, which happens with irregular heartbeat. Heart rate was in normal range for the effort, all through the workout.
Another view of today’s rowing workout, with the Concept 2 online logbook chart.
Finish screen view of today’s intervals within a 6K piece.
Today’s rowing session was better than the sloppiness of yesterday’s, because HR was better behaved. It was a little bit confused, as can be readily seen from the rowing session graphs of HR and correlating pace, but overall was definitely better than yesterday.
The rowing session was a continuous 6K which contained a set of 4 moderate intervals of 750 meters each. The first 1,000 meters was warmup, then there were four sets of 750 meter intervals alternated with 2 minutes rest and the remainder of the distance was a warm down.
Today’s SkiErg session, like yesterday’s, had zero HR irregularities. It seems that if there is going to be any heart rate irregularity, it is more likely to show up during a rowing session. Go figure (as I also said yesterday…).
Report for today’s intervals within a 6K piece.
RowPro graph of today’s intervals within a 6K piece.
In this Concept 2 online logbook chart, the odd behavior of heart rate during today’s 6K seems more obvious than in the RowPro graph.
Heart rate was PERFECTLY well-behaved during the SkiErg session.
Finish screen view of today’s 30 minute session with its 7 sloppy sprints.
Today’s main erg workout was a set of 7 one-minute sprints. They were done within a 30 minute continuous session. The first 10 minutes was warmup, then the intervals (one minute sprints) began. Each interval was followed with 30 seconds of easy/rest rowing.
My preference is to have a uniform, crisp-looking graph but today’s wasn’t. It was sloppy. The reason it was sloppy is because after the first or second interval, heart rate started being too high and also irregular.
After the rowing session I did a session on the SkiErg which also included sprints. It included 8 sprints, each of which were done at a higher power level than the rowing sprints. Interestingly, heart rate remained 100% regular and in a normal range for the entire workout on the SkiErg. Go figure.
Report for today’s 30 minute rowing session.
RowPro graphs for today’s 30 minute rowing session.
Though my heart rate took off like a rocket during today’s SkiErg session, I didn’t notice it until the session was over and I examined the data.
Today’s main workout session was a 2K time trial on the SkiErg. There was also a 30 minute rowing session today which was quite a bit longer, but the rowing session didn’t achieve the spectacular heart rate of the short 2K on the SkiErg.
I was too busy during the SkiErg 2K exercising “mindfulness” by focusing on the pace and the details of the level of pain, to notice heart rate. Also…. one big difference in personal perspective when using the SkiErg, compared to the rowing machine, is on the rowing machine, the person’s head is constantly in the same horizontal plane with respect to the monitor. But when a person is working hard on the SkiErg, the body is doing a series of alternating squatting and standing with each stroke in order to get maximum effort with each stroke. So its not as easy/natural to keep the monitor display in view because it is seeming to move up and down, in relation to the person’s head and its harder to focus on the monitor.
Afterwards when looking at the results, I noticed that heart rate had spiked surprisingly high during the last 500 meters of the SkiErg 2K and topped out at a whopping 201 BPM. It stayed at 201 for several consecutive strokes. I double-checked, by downloading all the data in CSV format for examination in a spreadsheet.
Perhaps a better title for today’s blog post would be, “Heart frolics when not watched closely!” If heart rate had acted that way when I was using the rowing machine, I would have slowed the pace immediately and drastically. But I didn’t notice it, didn’t feel any different and kept on aiming for a target pace in the SkiErg 2K time trial of something faster than the “pace boat” skier. (The pace skier is something you can set up on the SkiErg monitor). I set the pace skier to a pace of 2:12.9 and did glance at it now and then, to make sure I was staying ahead of it.
But I was paying virtually no attention to heart rate, since I felt normal and the result was that the heart got to rev itself up and frolic a bit at 201 beats per minute.
A close-up view of details of heart rate at 7 minutes 22 seconds into the SkiErg 2K. Notice HR = 201.
Finish screen view after today’s rowing session.
RowPro report for today’s rowing session.
RowPro graphs for today’s rowing session.
Concept 2 online logbook chart for today’s rowing session.
Charts and some data for today’s 2K time trial on the SkiErg.
Finish screen after today’s five 750 meter intervals.
Today’s title is shorthand for today’s main workout: Five intervals of 750 meters each, with 250 meters of rest after each of those five intervals.
The rowing session was uploaded to YouTube as a screen recording, for those of you who’d like to row-along with it. It is available at this link: Indoor Rowing 5X750metersR250meters 05102019
There was also a SkiErg session of 1,000 meters. Data for the SkiErg session won’t be posted here, but you can see it on the Concept2.com website if you are logged in and view my rowing sessions.
I didn’t believe today’s HRV analysis should be taken seriously, but it seems to have been correct.
Today’s workout was short but more vigorous than recommended by today’s Morning Readiness score from the EliteHRV app.
Perhaps it was just a coincidence or perhaps EliteHRV was right. In either case, an episode of atrial fibrillation happened, which put a damper on things.
So the only workout done was a 20 minute rowing session which included 4 “bursts” of a dozen or so hard strokes. The “bursts” were spaced about 4 minutes apart. The session was uploaded to YouTube, for those of you who’d like to row along with it and is available at this link: Indoor Rowing 20 minutes with 4 bursts 05092019
Finish screen for today’s 20 minute rowing session.
Report for today’s 20 minute rowing session.
RowPro graph for today’s 20 minute rowing session.
