Garmin Heart Strap Is OK

Today was a good day for doing another test with the Garmin heart strap because there was no atrial fibrillation to mess with it’s heart rate tracking algorithm. Before wrapping on the heart strap I did a 25 minute warm up session. After that warm up session, the surface of the skin was conductive enough that no additional moisture was needed for the heart strap.

Atrial fibrillation seemed to be trying to kick in now and then during some of the other sessions. Altogether there were eight sessions done today including the one for which screen shots are displayed in this blog post.

Data and graphs can be seen for any of them, if interested, via this link to my online logbook. They are the log entries with the date of the respective sessions. To see a session’s data & graphs click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the session you want to see.

Finish screen for a 30 minute online session. This was one of two online sessions rowed today.
Report for a 30 minute online session.
Graphs for a 30 minute online session.

Happy rowing to you!

Finished Before Sunset

These primitive boats don’t have anything to do with today’s workouts but I thought they looked cool.

Today’s rowing was done in the late afternoon. There were three rowing sessions. The one with the best HR graph will be shown here. All the rest can be seen, if interested, via this link to my online logbook. They are the log entries with the date of the respective sessions. To see their data & graphs click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the session you want to see.

Today’s blog post is not very exciting. Not that any of them are… but I just now nodded off while sitting in the chair prepared to type. 🙂

Finish screen view for one of the rowing sessions done today, a 5K.
Report for one of the rowing sessions done today, a 5K.
Graphs for one of the rowing sessions done today, a 5K.

Happy rowing to you!

4

Actually… I meant Four!

Today’s main session was a 10K piece done at steady pace with the goal of averaging 2:33.2/500m. There were three other sessions also done today. Altogether, a total of fore four sessions today. Only the 10K is shown here but that and all session graphs and data are available via this link to my online logbook. They are the log entries with the date of the respective sessions. To see their data & graphs click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the session you want to see.

Because I’ve been getting so many “impossibly low” heart rate graphs recently from the Garmin heart strap worn on the chest, I was thinking about discarding it. But I decided to first try and see how a different chest heart strap would work. So I used a Polar chest heart strap instead of the Garmin today.

The results from the reliable Polar heart strap were just as nutty as from the nutty Garmin heart strap. So maybe the Garmin heart strap isn’t nutty, after all. I hereby apologize to Garmin for that mistaken jump to a conclusion. Average heart rate for data logged with each of the 1,438 strokes of today’s 10K was 28.8059805285118 (to the nearest trillionth or so). . . . according to the average generated by the spreadsheet. Of course, some of the heart rate data logged for each stroke of the 10K was when my heart (according to the heart strap) was flat-lining at 0. I don’t think it was really zero because I don’t remember any out-of-body, feel-sort-of-dead moments during the 10K. So the weird heart rate displays from Garmin AND Polar heart straps must be due to a heart that is weird and/or nutty. I’ve been having atrial fibrillation today. Call it weird, nutty or whatever you like but you can’t call atrial fibrillation “normal”. Guess the Afib has the heart-strap algorithm flummoxed.

There were two heart straps worn today, as I’ve been doing for a while. The other one was the Scosche with its optical sensor. Usually, the Scoshe heart strap gives a sensible reading. But today, though the Scoshe heart strap never displayed “zero” heart rate, it did consistently display “impossibly” low heart rate, except right at the beginning of the 10K. At the very beginning of the 10K before I started rowing, the Scosche displayed a heart rate of 113 BPM. That was my resting heart rate with atrial fibrillation. But right after I started rowing, the Scosche acted the same as the chest heart strap and displayed heart rate that was about normal resting rate or even lower.

I’m not going to even pretend that I understand the why for the strange heart rate readings, except I’m fairly sure it has something to do with atrial fibrillation.

Finish screen view for today’s 10K rowing session.
Report for today’s 10K rowing session.
Graphs for today’s 10K rowing session.
Scosche heart strap data graphed for today’s 10K rowing session.

Happy rowing to you!

Over-Hydrated

Before today’s main workout session I drank about three pints of water in the form of protein drinks and water to rinse the remnants of protein drinks out of the protein drink-shaker. There was also a pint or more of coffee. And some dry cereal with a bowlful of milk. Lots of water.

Oh yes, there was also about 8 ounces of water in a chia drink. A few rowing sessions before and after coffee and cereal. Then the protein drink and then a half marathon rowing. I must have made six nature calls during the half marathon in order to deal with the excess liquid. But that was okay because I was going for the distance, not speed.

There was on-and-off atrial fibrillation during the half marathon so don’t pay too much attention to the crazy heart rate graph that resulted from the confusing signals the heart strap had trouble sorting out.

Only screenshots for the half marathon will be posted here. That and all session graphs and data are available via this link to my online logbook. They will be the log entries with the date of the respective sessions. To see their data & graphs you click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the session you want to see.

Finish screen view for today’s half marathon distance.
Report for today’s half marathon distance.
RowPro graphs for today’s half marathon distance.

Happy rowing to you!

Eight Pieces

Today’s main rowing was a 30 minute session. There were seven other sessions today also, thus today’s title. But this blog post will only feature screenshots for the “main” session of the day, which was the one with the most meters.

All session graphs and data are available at this link to my online logbook. They will be the log entries with the date of the respective sessions. To see their data & graphs you click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the session you want to see.

Finish screen for today’s 6,105 meter 30 minute rowing session.
Report for today’s 6,105 meter 30 minute rowing session.
Graphs for today’s 6,105 meter 30 minute rowing session.

Happy rowing to you!

A Longish Day

Today was longish in meters rowed and Skied. Mostly rowing was the longest, with a marathon distance being done today in the leisurely time of about 4 hours. Rowing was followed with a 50 Calorie warm down session on the SkiErg.

Finish screen view for today’s marathon rowing session.

Their graphs and data are available at this link to my online logbook. They will be the log entries with the date of today’s sessions. To see their data & graphs you click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the session you want to see.

RowPro report for today’s marathon rowing session.
RowPro graophs for today’s marathon rowing session. The Garmin heart strap was acting strangely again today.

Happy rowing to you!

Keep Plugging Along

Though there was nothing posted yesterday there were eight sessions done on the 14th. They were all on the rowing machine. Today there were five sessions done and they were likewise all on the rowing machine. Their graphs and data are available at this link to my online logbook. They will be the log entries with the date of the day’s sessions you wish to look at. See their data & graphs by clicking the corresponding “+” signs in the “Action” column.

There was atrial fibrillation yesterday and there has been all day today. That was one reason why I only used the rowing machine: because I can log more meters in less time at a lower heart rate by rowing than by using the SkiErg. The SkiErg has not been abandoned – just omitted for a little while.

Happy rowing to you!

Keeping Circulation Going

Altogether there were sixteen mostly short sessions done today. Their graphs and data are available at this link to my online logbook. They will be the log entries with today’s date. See their data & graphs by clicking the corresponding “+” signs in the “Action” column.

There was no atrial fibrillation detected after mid-morning today – hooray!

Happy rowing to you!

Urge To Emerge

On Tuesday, February 11th, I did relatively little on the ergs and on Tuesday I also “went into hiding” from the blogosphere and didn’t post anything to this blog.

It didn’t help that there was atrial fibrillation all day yesterday. And all last night. And all day today.

But today I felt the urge to emerge, so here is a blog post.

Altogether there was 28,802 meters in the sessions done yesterday and today. Their graphs and data are available at this link to my online logbook. They will be the log entries with yesterday or today’s date. See their data & graphs by clicking the corresponding “+” signs in the “Action” column.

Today’s main workout session was a slow 10K done on the rowing machine, with many interruptions.

Finish screen view for today’s 10K rowing session.
Report for today’s 10K rowing session.
RowPro graphs for today’s 10K rowing session.
Since the Garmin chest strap supplied mostly a flat line for the RowPro heart rate graph, here is the heart rate graph from the other heart strap (A Scosche optical strap).

Happy rowing to you!

A Bit Shy

This cat must have gotten a good workout because it’s sleeping well.

Today I was shy. The original goal was to do a total distance of 42,195 meters by breaking it up into shorter distances. But after rowing 10,000 meters shy of marathon distance it felt like I’d done more than enough to sleep well tonight so I called it quits for the day.

Altogether there was 32,195 meters in 8 sessions done today. Their graphs and data are available at this link to my online logbook. They will be the log entries with today’s date. See their data & graphs by clicking the corresponding “+” signs in the “Action” column.

Screenshot of a list of today’s workout sessions.

Happy rowing and good sleeping to you!