Mentally absorbing workout – Page 7

Workout At Your Computer?

Need a polynomial function solution? Get cranking!

A computer like the one in the photo above might give you a good workout, if you had a lot of polynomial functions to solve. (The above image was found in a Wikipedia article titled: Computing). But I think I will keep my Mac as main computer and use the Concept 2 ergs for my main calorie burning, heart-rate elevating workouts.

Today’s heart rate variability analysis by the EliteHRV app is as green as a green light can get.

Today I decided to get an early start on making a blog entry, so the paragraph, title and two above images are being posted before I’ve done any workout. There will be an update later today, after the workout(s) are completed.

At the moment, the plan is to do a 30 minute series of intervals on the rowing machine and about 130 calories on the SkiErg.

It is now later in the day and some time was spent on both rowing machine and SkiErg. The main session was the rowing, which was six sets of 2 minute work/1 minute rest intervals. After that, I did a 30 second sprint on the SkiErg and then a 130 Calorie set of work/rest intervals on the SkiErg.

The rowing session was recorded and uploaded to YouTube for anyone who would like to row-along with it. It is available at this link: Indoor Rowing Six 2-Minute Intervals 05032019

Finish screen for today’s rowing workout.

RowPro graphs for today’s rowing workout.

Chart and data for the SkiErg 130 calorie session.

Happy rowing to you!

Sitting and Thinking

While I was changing from rowing clothes back into jeans and t-shirt, my better half walked into the room and remarked, “You worked out for a long time! Are you making up for some missed workouts?” I gazed at her and gathered my thoughts for a moment before responding, “No. It wasn’t a long workout, but I spent a lot of time sitting and thinking.”

Today’s EliteHRV heart rate variability analysis wasn’t quite low enough to give me a reason for a day off.

Today’s rowing workout was 5,000 meters rowing at specific target stroke rates for each of the five 1K splits. The rating targets were 26-24-22- 24-26 Strokes Per Minute. It took a lot of mental focus. I had a dreamy attitude but the wandering thoughts and daydreaming were done before and after the 5K with its targeted strokes-per-minute for each 1K split.

After the rowing, I did a 129 Calorie session on the SkiErg, arranged in alternating splits of 10 calories work/10 calories rest.

Report for today’s 5K piece. Notice the circled column headed “Avg SPM”. The targets were met for each split except for the 4th split, which was too high at 25 instead of the target of 24 SPM.

Concept 2 logbook chart for today’s 5K piece.

Chart and data for today’s 129 calories on the SkiErg.

Happy rowing to you!

Tingling Afterglow

Cactus blossoms were glowing with sunlight this morning.

There were two workouts today. They were both interval sessions. One on the rowing machine and the other on the SkiErg. Afterwards, and now while this is being typed, I feel like I’m tingling all over with the afterglow of the intervals.

Today’s EliteHRV heart rate variability analysis gave permission for any level of effort.

Today’s rowing workout was selected from Concept 2’s suggestions for “workout of the day”. It was called “2 x 10 min short intervals” and the instructive description was: “Pre-set the monitor for a work time of 10:00 and a rest time of 4:00. Each interval alternate between 40 seconds fast rowing and 20 seconds easy rowing. During the rest time continue rowing at light pressure.”

Finish screen after today’s rowing workout.

Data and chart for today’s SkiErg workout.

Happy rowing to you!

Some Kind of Inertia

The above photo is a display of one result of Einstein’s formulation of the Theory of Relativity… or his contributions to quantum physics… or both. At any rate, it is showing some of the effects of converting the mass of a few ounces of uranium into energy.

After 8 days without working out, today I finally managed to do a workout on both the rowing machine and SkiErg. There was no earth-shaking result, but it seemed like there was a huge amount of some kind of inertia to overcome when I first started pulling the handle on the rowing machine. The result of today’s workout was to convert about 2 1/2 ounces of my body’s mass into a modest 552 calories of kinetic energy. There was additional energy conversion resulting in heat and myriads of other changes in the body, but those were not measured by the ergometers.

The two ergometers, rowing machine and SkiErg, only measured the kinetic energy required to operate them and that totaled to about 552 Calories. *

Today’s heart rate variability analysis by the EliteHRV app gave a green light for doing a workout.

Today’s workout was once again strictly aerobic. I need to start incorporating resistance/anabolic activity into a few days of each week’s workouts. How do I cultivate that as a habit?

The above question will have to remain unanswered for the moment. Screenshots of today’s workout reports are below. They were a series of 4 minute hard/3 minute easy rowing intervals followed by a series of 10 Calories hard/10 Calories easy cross-country SkiErg intervals:

Graphs and data for the SkiErg intervals.

Happy rowing to you!

*If you are a physicist and want to get technical, it totaled to 552 kilo calories.

A Half Marathon For Good Sleep

The green light means its okay to go row.

The night before last I had a poor night’s sleep. Yesterday the EliteHRV analysis was a red “STOP LIGHT”. So I didn’t row yesterday.

But as you can see above, today’s HRV analysis was a “green light” which I take as permission to workout as hard as I want. I decided to do a long workout instead of a hard workout and rowed a half marathon. Half marathons usually result in a good night’s sleep.

Finish screen for today’s half marathon. Though the session was online, there was no company to inspire me. I do better with company. You can see that I got a bit sloppy toward the end.

Happy rowing to you!

Begone, Valerian! A Half Marathon Works Better!

Today’s HRV analysis score is better than yesterday’s, despite having rowed a half marathon yesterday.

If any of you have been reading every word of these blog posts you will know that I’ve been having a lot of trouble sleeping. I’ve had many middle-of-the-night periods of being wide-awake insomnia.

But more important: if any of you have been reading every word of my blog posts: How do you manage to do that? I’ve been told in no uncertain terms that this blog is exceedingly boring and I totally agree. There’s no plot, etc. Just a daily splattering of bits mostly about what indoor rowing was done. To read every word of these blog posts would be an exceptional, amazing task.

Anyway… with regard to the SLEEP issues, I was somewhat amazed to have had a “perfect” night’s sleep. Deep, restful and only interrupted very briefly once, for a call of nature. Below you can see a chart of last night’s sleep. It’s actually a chart of heart rate and activity levels (movement detected by Apple Watch) during last night’s sleep. But you can see from the chart that there was only one brief interruption between 1 and 2 AM. The recent doses of Valerian to help with sleep did nothing, compared to positive after-effect of rowing the half-marathon.

This was the best night’s sleep in a long time. Do I have to row a half-marathon, to get a good night’s sleep?

Today’s workout consisted of a 30 minute online session, 2K warm down and 126 Calories burned on the SkiErg.

The 30 minute online session was recorded and uploaded to YouTube and it can be found at this link: Indoor rowing 30 minutes online 04192019

Finish screen view for today’s 30 minute online session.

Report for today’s 30 minute online rowing session.

Graphs for today’s 30 minute online rowing session.

Data for today’s 126 Calorie SkiErg workout.

Happy rowing to you!

A HM To Get Things Humming

Today’s EliteHRV readiness score was adequate for a half marathon.

Today’s main and only workout was a half marathon rowed online with two other guys. My approach was to row easy at an average pace of about 2:20 except for 8 intervals of 30 strokes each, which were done at a pace of about 2:00.

RowPro graphs for today’s half marathon.

Concept 2 online logbook chart for today’s half marathon.

Happy rowing to you!

A Mostly Lazy 30 Minutes

Though today’s heart rate variability Readiness was a green light for any effort level, I mostly took it easy when doing other than intervals.

Today’s workout was 30 minutes rowing and 125 Calories on SkiErg.

The rowing session was done online with 3 other guys who were located an average of thousands of miles away. (Two were in Europe and one was less than 200 miles away in the US).

The SkiErg session was done with intervals.

Finish screen for today’s 30 minute rowing session.

Report for today’s 30 minute rowing session.

Graphs for today’s 30 minute rowing session.

Happy rowing to you!

Can Valerian Induce Heart Strangeness?

This morning’s favorable Readiness score from the EliteHRV app left me looking forward to some energetic intervals.

Today’s workout consisted of a 10K rowing session online, with a 10 minute warm down. The 10K was originally planned to be a series of intervals of 30 strokes each and spaced to each start about 1,000 meters apart.

During the first part of the 10K, heart rate was too irregular to display. When It finally became regular enough to display, it was way too high for the effort level, so I slowed to an extremely slow pace. After about 2,000 meters, heart rate settled down to where it should be and the remainder of the 10K was somewhat normal. But I decided to skip using the SkiErg for today.

Last night, I took another dose of Valerian as a sleep aid. I suspect that it may have been at least a partial cause of the irregular and excessively high heart rate. The Valerian did help me sleep through the night, but it seemed to cause strange dreams.

Graphs of 10K rowing session as displayed on RowPro finish screen.

Report for today’s 10K rowing session. Notice splits 4, 5, 6 and 7 where heart rate is way too high for the low effort level.

Happy rowing to you!

Valerian Skewed HRV?

I was skeptical of this morning’s Readiness score by EliteHRV app.

I don’t know for certain why the Readiness score and resulting “advice” from EliteHRV app’s heart rate variability analysis was so poor this morning but I suspected Valerian. The reason I suspected it is because last night I took a dose of Valerian before bed and again in the middle of the night, to aid sleep.

The Valerian made me feel very relaxed or tired. I don’t know if it influenced my heart rate to slow down, but I did notice that heart rate dropped as low as 44 BPM during the morning. (See screen shot below)

I was surprised to see the Apple Watch display heart rate as low as 44 during the day when I was awake and moving around. Was this an aftereffect of the Valerian?

Other than feeling exorbitantly relaxed (I know… “exorbitant’ isn’t an appropriate adjective here, but I’m using sloppy poetic license and will use it anyway)… I felt okay.

So I ignored the recommendation of EliteHRV and rowed the way I normally would. And “skied” the way I normally would, on the SkiErg after rowing.

Speaking of rowing and skiing, those were today’s workouts in that order: 10K of rowing with intervals every 1K, followed by 10 minute rowing warm down, followed by 124 Calories of alternating 10 calorie intervals on the SkiErg.

Finish screen for today’s 10K rowing session. Did I mention that it was done online, in the good company of another rower who was a few thousand miles away on the East Coast of USA?

Some data and a chart for today’s 124 Calorie SkiErg session.

Happy rowing to you!