Ethereal Rowing

Today’s rowing session was done a little too late in the day, in Diane’s opinion.  Because today was our day to go out to eat and I made her wait about 20 minutes or more, in order to finish the 10K that I got a late start on.

We sat at a table with another couple because the little restaurant was so crowded this evening that there was a shortage of tables. We had a pleasant conversation with them, which included a little bit (very little) talk about indoor rowing.  But – just as a little exercise is better than none – a little bit of talk about indoor rowing is better than none (in my opinion) (which opinion is not necessarily always shared by Diane) (on the topic of rowing).

Before I write any more, I’m going to pause and admire the little train of parentheses in the preceding sentence.  Nice!

So … when I sat to write this blog post, talking was on my mind.  And also rowing.  Thus the search terms, “talking indoor rowing”

Sometimes, talking about rowing leads to more inspiration for rowing.  We shall see if I feel more inspired to row tomorrow, if and when I recall the brief conversation in the restaurant.

The above photo is from a Wikipedia article on the topic of indoor rowing.

Now for the data relating to today’s rowing.  It was offline and correspondingly uninspired.  I watched parts of two movies and operated the remote control many times while rowing.  So the rowing wasn’t especially energetic etc.

Happy trails to you.

 

Today’s 10K rowing session was anything but a mad dash or a fast pace.

Happy trails to you.

When I plugged the title of today’s post into a search engine and looked at the resulting selection of creative commons licensed images, this image was among the multitude.  According to its associated description, it is a “10 km day walk from Southease to Seaford,” wherever those two places are located on earth.

My 10 km was not quite so picturesque as the 10 km traversed for the above photo and it was done without any canine or bovine company. But it was healthy and invigorating even at the leisurely pace of a stroll at which it was made.

Happy trails to you.

Today’s session was 5K easy.  I burned more calories working in the yard today, than rowing.

Happy trails to you.

Today’s rowing was different from the past few days’ rowing sessions in that it was started before noon. The distance was 15K and the effort level was easy.

Afterwards, Diane and I worked together to relieve a nearby mesquite tree of its burden of hemiparasitic plant invasion.

Happy trails to you.

Today’s session was a rest day easy row of 15K distance.  It worked out that there was no need to take a break and there were no interruptions, which is always nice.

Happy trails to you.

Though I haven’t yet returned to the Pete Plan or any particular training plan, one of the features of the Pete Plan that I’m continuing to observe now that my back is 99.98% pain free is the concept of alternating recovery days with hard days.  The current “hard days” aren’t very hard – they are simply long distance with the inclusion of variable paces and a little time spent doing moderate sprinting.  Enough to get the engine of the heart a bit revved up but not for too long.

So today was a recovery day.  15K easy pace.  Watched part of the inauguration ceremonies while rowing.  Wonderful prayers by the 7 or more pastors and rabbis who spoke and prayed. Felt hopeful.

Since the new president’s motto is to make America great again and I agree that would be a good thing, I pondered for a bit on what is greatness.  The included images are some food for thought.

Happy trails to you.

For something to occupy my attention while rowing 10K+ meters today (17,240 meters, to be exact) I watched the pre – inauguration event on 3 news channels:  CNN, FOX and MSNBC.  Mostly on the first two.  So tomorrow will probably be a long-distance rowing session also, since there should be constant coverage of the historical event all day.

Today’s rowing session was variable paced with a few breaks.  A little bit of sprinting at moderate sprint effort but mostly easy rowing.

Happy trails to you.

Today’s rowing session was a bit different than the past few weeks or months in that 30 minutes of it was done online.  There was a 15 minute offline warmup followed by the main session online and then a 1K warmdown.

First, the warm-up:

Next, the main session of 30 minutes:

As for the 1K warmdown, I’m not going to bother to process that for display.  If you really want to see it, say so in the comments and I will add it.

Happy trails to you.

Today’s session was 17,234 meters.  There was not an iota of back pain but I didn’t feel inspired to return to Pete Plan yet.  However, I did feel inspired to work a little harder than during the recent few days which have consisted entirely of easy distance rowing.

The inspiration came from a chance conversation I had with a senior citizen bicyclist while I was in a nearby grocery store parking lot.  He looked trim and fit, so I asked him how many hours per week he spent bike riding.  He said “about 10 to 12 hours,” and when I thought about that and compared it to my recent average of maybe 7 or 8 hours per week of low-effort rowing, I thought I’d keep today’s time about the same, but increase the effort a little.

So the session was divided into 14 splits and I did every other split at a higher effort level and alternated that way between hard and easy for 14 splits, with only one necessary break during the session.

Happy trails to you.