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.
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.
Report for today’s half marathon.
RowPro graphs for today’s half marathon.
Concept 2 online logbook chart for today’s half marathon.
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.
This morning’s cautionary recommendation from EliteHRV Readiness analysis.
This morning’s score of YELLOW / 5 from the EliteHRV heart rate variability analysis app indicated that I should take it easy. So my interpretation of that was to only do what felt good with regard to rowing and avoid any effort that felt painful. That seemed to be the most logical approach, since I don’t know what the definition is of the term “active recovery”. But I do know what the word “active” means.
It seemed to work okay.
So the workouts today consisted of the following, in chronological order: A 3 minute rowing warmup, a 10K rowing session online with 3 other guys, a 30 minute rowing session online with 12 other guys, a 10 minute rowing warm down and finally a 123 Calorie SkiErg workout of moderate alternating 10 calorie intervals.
Below, I’ll show screenshots for everything except warmup and warmdown.
Finish screen view for today’s 10K rowing.
Report for today’s 10K rowing.
Graphs for today’s 10K rowing.
Finish screen view for today’s 30 minute rowing.
Report for today’s 30 minute rowing.
Graphs for today’s 30 minute rowing.
Data and chart for today’s 123 Calorie SkiErg session.
This guy was knocked out of a race in the 2016 Olympics by an obstacle. At least he didn’t have Afib…
Today’s rowing session was a 30 minute online race. There was a total of 14 people in the race. After the race began and I watched everyone’s paces for a few minutes I decided that I could finish in 9th or 10th place, if I aimed for a pace of about 2:07.
That was working out well until about halfway through the half hour, when heart rhythm went into its Afib nutso-mode and I had to slow down. So I slowed, picked up the pace, slowed again and repeated that several times, but couldn’t shake the Afib. The result was that I finished last place. At least I finished. 🙂
Perhaps I should have warmed up a bit first?
A screen recording was made of the online race and is available for those who’d like to row-along with it. It’s YouTube link is: Indoor Rowing 30 Minutes with Afib 02242019
Today started out with a good reading from EliteHRV.
SleepWatch app recorded a good night’s sleep at 8 hours 10 minutes.
Finish screen for today’s 30 minute online session.
Report for today’s 30 minute online session.
RowPro graphs for today’s 30 minute online session.Concept 2 online logbook chart for today’s 30 minute online session.
Plenty of sleep last night, at 8 hours 15 minutes.
Today’s main workout was 6,000 meters on the rowing machine. During the last half of the 6K, heart rate became irregular and too high, so I slowed down to let it return to normal. It returned to normal, but not until after the rowing session was finished.
Report for today’s 6,000 meters.
RowPro graphs for today’s 6,000 meters.
Concept 2 online logbook chart for today’s 6,000 meters.
There was a wide-awake-in-the night sleep interruption, but I was able to get back to sleep, sleep in late and make up for accumulated sleep debt with 9 hours 5 minutes sleep.
Today’s workout started as a speculative half marathon rowing session. After 30 minutes I decided that 40 minutes would be enough. The session was done at RPE Level 3 but if the entire half marathon had been done, it might have been a level 4 or 5 by the finish. It was preceded by a SkiErg warm up and followed by 109 Calories on the SkiErg.
A screen recording is available of the 40 minute rowing session, for those who’d like to row along: Indoor Rowing 40 minutes 01302019
Finish screen for today’s 40 minutes.
Report for today’s 40 minutes.
RowPro graphs for today’s 40 minutes.
Concept 2 online logbook chart for today’s 40 minutes.
Today’s sleep was good quality but a bit short again at 6 hours 35 minutes.
Today’s aerobic workout was limited to less than 40 minutes. It consisted of 2 sessions done on the SkiErg. First was a 5K at RPE Level 3. Next, was 5 minutes at RPE Level 5.
The 5K SkiErg session was done without connecting to RowPro so there are not the usual screen shots. Above is a summary of the session.
Today’s EliteHRV Morning Readiness analysis was very low. But I had problems going to sleep and staying that way last night which resulted in staying in bed until a little past NOON(!) today. Therefore, the EliteHRV reading was several hours late. The readings are supposed to be taken about the same time every day. I decided to disregard today’s reading, since it was taken much later than it should have been.Last night’s sleep was more than enough at 9hours 10minutes but it was poor quality due to an interruption of wide-awakeness and some Atrial fibrillation.
Today’s main rowing session was 30 minutes online. It wasn’t a race, because there was an agreement between the other guy and me that we’d aim for a pace of 2:10 and I would pace him. I enjoy pacing another rower. I also enjoy racing, which might be why thoughts, cognition and imaginations of racing came to mind during the session. In the midst of that cloud of race-themed neuron activity, entered the thought that both the other guy and me are each in a race against the fictional figure, “Father Time”. We row daily and do other workouts, to avoid being ravaged by some of the effects of passing time which can be mitigated or avoided through aerobic activity.
The 30 minute online session was done at RPE Level 5 and it’s available as a screen recording for those who’d like to row-along. It’s link is: Indoor Rowing Online 30 mins 01252018
Like last night’s sleep was bothered by atrial fibrillation, today’s 30 minute session was also visited by Afib. However it wasn’t the kind of Afib that changes into tachycardia – it just manifested itself with occasional feelings of fluttering and causing the heart strap to lose track of its count which caused the heart rate display to go blank. After about 15 minutes it settled down and went steady again.
The Afib did not reappear after that first 30 minute session. I did 8 more sessions after the 30 minute piece, some on the rowing machine and the rest of them on the SkiErg and there was no more Afib with any of those.
The RPE Levels for the sessions after the 30 minute session were: RPE Level 2 for the 2K warm down, RPE Level 3 for the 3,000 meter piece, RPE Level 10 for the 100 meter sprint and all the rest of them were done at RPE Level 4.
Finish screen for the main 30 minute session.
Report for the main 30 minute session.
The atrial fibrillation was during the first part of the 30 minutes, where heart rate kept disappearing.
Concept 2 online logbook chart for the main 30 minute session.
Chart of the session following the 30 minutes – a 2K warm down with no Atrial fibrillation.
Chart of the 3rd of nine sessions today. This was a 3K and there was no atrial fibrillation.
This is a listing of all nine of today’s sessions on rowing machine and SkiErg. The one that was the most fun was also the shortest – the 100 meter sprint on SkiErg.
This is a graph of this morning’s heart rate samples, taken every few minutes by the Apple Watch. You can see that at about 5 AM heart rate spiked a bit and stayed elevated from 5 AM until this screenshot was taken at about 9 AM. HR returned to normal sometime before noon.
There is no HRV analysis reading for this morning because I was having a bit of Afib at the time the HRV reading should have been taken. Afib during an HRV reading skews the reading and basically makes it worthless. So the EliteHRV app was skipped for today and instead I savored and drank black coffee.
The Afib started early this morning after I woke for a bathroom call at about 0500 and returned to bed. So… rather than lay awake, I got up. Sleep had been good until then but total sleep was a little short, at 5 hours 50 minutes.
Sleep was good and without interruptions from about 11 PM to 5 AM.
I felt okay, so I assumed the HRV reading would have been a “GO” for doing any workout. The goal for today’s aerobic activity was to burn 800 calories. The goal was reached with 3 sessions on the SkiErg and one on the rowing machine.
From first to last they were (1st): A 99 calorie warmup on SkiErg at RPE Level 3, (2nd): 1K on SkiErg at RPE Level 5 (3rd): 2K on SkiErg at RPE Level 6, (4th) 540 calories in 8,995 meters on rowing machine at RPE Level 5.
A screen recording for those who’d like to row-along was made of the rowing session and it is available at this link: Indoor Rowing 540 Calories 01232019
Summary data and chart for the SkiErg warmup.
Summary data and chart for the 1,000 meter session on SkiErg
Summary data and chart for 2,000 meter session on SkiErg
Finish screen for 540 Calorie session on rowing machine.Report for main calorie session on rowing machine.RowPro graphs for main calorie session on rowing machine.Concept 2 online logbook chart for main calorie session on rowing machine.
