Tag: atrial fibrillation

It’s been 23 days since the previous blog post, but who’s counting? Between today and 23 days ago, there have been 34 attempts to post spam messages into comments and zero actual comments from real people and that’s the only publicity those spammers will get because their spam goes directly into the trash.

Speaking of trash, there have been a lot of trashy looking heart rate graphs for many of the workout sessions during the past 23 days. But there have also been a few nice looking graphs during that period. One of today’s workouts, a moderate paced 6K rowing session, had one of those nice looking graphs. By “nice looking,” I simply mean that the heart was behaving normally instead of going into atrial fibrillation.

This month is the sixth month of my effort to “detrain” my heart by working out at effort levels that are much lower than I had been doing before the atrial fibrillation started to become a big problem. So far, it seems to be helping and that is a bit surprising because I have no guidelines to follow and don’t really know what I’m doing except that I’m “taking it easy” with regard to using the rowing machine and SkiErg.

One of the workouts done today was a 6K rowing piece with a target pace of something a little faster than 2:20/500m. It went well and a screen shot of the results is below.

If you are curious about any of the other workouts I’ve done in the past 23 days, all data and “live” graphs can be seen via this: link to the online logbook. To see any session’s data and its interactive graph, click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for that session.

The only other news that comes to mind with regard to this blog is that today I decided to add another page to this blog. Its title is “Something Else” and it will be about something else other than rowing. I started it today by giving it a title and writing a couple of sentences but it doesn’t appear on the blog yet because I don’t remember how to make it visible in a tab at the top of the page like the other pages. So the next thing I need to do is consult with my better half for her expertise to help in figuring out how to get that new page to display in a tab at the top of this blog like all the other pages do.

Happy rowing to you!

Today’s main workout was an online session which was maxed out with 16 rowers signed up. Three of the rowers had problems and weren’t able to participate but it was still a very full river with live boat avatars in 13 lanes.

The workout was called “No Drop Intervals” and it was given that name by the guy who posted it because the idea was that there would be more than enough time for each of the ten 500 meter intervals for even the slowest rower to finish each 500 meters in under three minutes. That way, nobody would feel like dropping out because they were so far behind everyone else.

The plan was that each person would sprint or row as fast as he or she felt like during the first part of each 3 minute time slice (interval) and then stop & wait after completing each 500 meter interval distance. At the beginning of each subsequent time slice everyone would start rowing fast or sprinting again and they would stop at the end of each 500 meters and wait for the end of each 3 minute interval until beginning the next one.

If you participated and sprinted at the start of each three minutes, it was sort of like a series of ten “drag races”.

That’s how I treated most of the intervals and when I did so I only sprinted for about 100 meters and then rowed slower for the remainder of each 500 meters. Fortunately there was no atrial fibrillation today because if there had been I would have had to row very slowly like a Model T Ford instead of making fast starts like drag racing cars.

There was a total of five separate sessions today. Screen shots for only today’s main workout are below.

The main workout was recorded and uploaded to YouTube as a silent screen recording. It may be accessed at this link: Indoor Rowing No Drop 500 Meter Intervals 04152020.

All data and live, granular clickable graphs can be seen via this link to the online logbook. To see any session’s data and its interactive graph, click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the relevant session.

Happy rowing to you!

Happy Easter – the day we celebrate Jesus’ return to life. On Easter morning, the tomb in which his body had been buried was found to be empty.

It has been eight days since I’ve posted about any indoor rowing sessions, but those days have not been empty of rowing. I’ve rowed every day since eight days ago.

Today’s main rowing session was 10,000 meters with conservative intervals every 1,000 meters.

There was no atrial fibrillation before I started the 10K and I watched heart rate carefully to keep it low even during the intervals.

All data and live, granular clickable graphs can be seen via this link to the online logbook. To see any session’s data and its interactive graph, click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the relevant session.

Happy rowing to you!

Though I’ve been doing workouts daily, there have been no blog posts for about 5 days, since March 30th.

Today’s main workout was a half marathon done with a 100% full online RowPro session. The maximum capacity for an online session is 16 people and 16 signed up. Four of them had problems and couldn’t start which resulted in a DNF (Did Not Finish) for each of those.

I felt low energy and was having a bit of atrial fibrillation that came and went during the session, so I took it very slow and finished last. By the time I finished, 21 minutes had passed since the last person ahead had finished, so I didn’t expect to find anyone still there after I crossed the finish line. But four of the other rowers were still there in the session chat room and one of them said, “Hey John, welcome to the finish line party.” Another one said, “Ohoo John well done” which was probably referring to the very short sprint I made for the last couple hundred meters to the finish line. Other than that tiny sprint, it was a long, slow slog of a workout at an average pace of 2:37.1/500 meters.

All data and live, granular clickable graphs can be seen via this link to the online logbook. To see any session’s data and its interactive graph, click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the relevant session.

Happy rowing to you!

Yes, today is another bleeping day of quarantine because of the China virus. There have been quite a few more online rowing sessions lately than before the communist government of China gave the rest of the world the “gift” of COVID-19. The RowPro servers have been very busy with the extra numbers of people who are observing quarantine and staying home as part of “social distancing.”

Ordinarily, I’d be inclined to use the medical reference “COVID-19” for the current plague spreading around the world nd that is the term I did use for a while. But because there are China communist propagandists trying to accuse either the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation or the US Army for the bat virus they themselves let loose on the world, I will use the name which refers to where on earth it originated: China. China is the country where it originated.

Just like the 1918 H1N1 influenza virus is also referred to as the Spanish flu, COVID-19 is the China flu because it came from China. A variant of the 1918 H1N1 happened in 2009 and it is called the swine flu because it definitely originated in swine but it hasn’t been ascertained if it first appeared in Asian pigs or pigs in Mexico. S0 the 2009 flu doesn’t get a place name and is simply referred to in connection with swine, the first creatures known to be carriers of it. The China flu first appeared in bats in China but it hasn’t been referred to as bat flu because everyone knows the geographic location where it first appeared: the communist country of China.

A notable number of the recently scheduled online rowing sessions have something in their name that makes reference to the batty necessity to quarantine because communists in China did the first thing they usually do after something bad happens in their country: they try to cover it up to keep it a secret. They punished and threatened the first people who mentioned it to the world.

Today’s main workout was an online 6K race named “Quarantine 6K” and that was one of the nicer session names referring to the necessity to quarantine.

It was a good race with a wide range of paces. I was among the slowest but nonetheless managed to row with enough effort to work up a modicum of healthy sweat. The fastest rowers were pacing at world-class speeds that were inspiring to watch.

Yesterday I did some workouts but didn’t blog about them. There was atrial fibrillation yesterday and those graphs look sloppy and weird.

All data and live, granular clickable graphs can be seen via this link to the online logbook. To see any session’s data and its interactive graph, click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the relevant session.

Today’s 6K race was recorded for any who would like to row along with or race against it. It is uploaded to YouTube at this link: Indoor Rowing 6K race 03212020.

Happy rowing to you!

The main rowing session today was done with a group of 8 virtual people. Real people connected to each rower avatar, a little bit like people were connected to their avatars in the movie Avatar. The real rowers for each boat were located in North America and Europe.

There were nine people to start with but one of them had a technical problem and therefore there were only 8 active participants in the session.

It was done as a sort of game whose guidelines were that the turtle (the slowest rower) would begin rowing immediately at the start signal and everyone else would wait and start later. The turtle would pace himself so that he would cover a distance of 5,000 meters in 27 minutes. Each of the faster rowers individually decided what their pace would be and calculated how much time it would take them to row 5K. Each of the faster rowers would subtract their 5K time from 27 minutes and wait at the starting line for the amount of time equal to the difference. The goal was to give the turtle a head start and then catch up to him by the time he reached 5K in 27 minutes. That would leave 3 of the 30 minutes, which everyone would either use for a warm down or whatever they felt inclined to do. Everyone was free to modify what they did to suit their preferences.

The group of eight session was uploaded to YouTube as a screen recording and is available at this link: Indoor Rowing 5K Handicap 30 min 03192020

There were three other sessions today besides the session with a group of eight participants. All data and live, granular clickable graphs can be seen via this link to the online logbook. To see any session’s data and its interactive graph, click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the relevant session.

Happy rowing to you!

Today started a little early which is always nice. It’s beyond nice, actually, but I usually need a reason to set an alarm to get up a little early.

The day started early because I had to do the once-a-week task of taking the garbage cans from their protected enclosure and placing them at the edge of the street in front of our house. I can’t do that the night before because if they are left unprotected all night, the local wild pigs will overturn them and scatter the trash, naughty piggies that they are.

So after taking care of that task I started the daily rowing sessions and got them done early enough to enjoy some coffee afterward while it was still very much morning time. I make it a rule to try to avoid coffee after noon.

As you might have already guessed if you studied the thoughtfully chosen series of public domain photos at the top of the page, today’s workout time was divided into five sessions.

The pace of each session followed a natural progression related to how warm I was. The first session was 2,000 meters at a snail’s pace because I was not warm at all. Also, one of my knees clicked a bit with each drive stroke and I generally felt a bit sluggish. (Yes, I know a slug isn’t the same as a snail. But sluggish seems to fit better than snailish and I’m not sure if snailish is even a word allowed for usage by anyone without a poetic license whereas I’m absolutely certain that sluggish is a word for which a license is not required.)

The second session was 3,000 meters and a bit faster at perhaps tortoise speed and the clicking knee had lubricated itself and was free from any clicks.

The third session was 5,000 meters and faster yet at what felt sort of like the effort of strolling speed.

The fourth session was 4,000 meters and not fast at all but it was the fastest of all rowing done today and felt like the effort of a slow jogging speed.

The fifth and last session was 1,111 meters. (Trivia: 1,111 is an odd number but it is not a prime number.) That 1,111 meters was done at a pace that felt like the effort of an easy walk.

Good news regarding my personal pest, atrial fibrillation: There was atrial fibrillation all night and it was still ongoing this morning when the rowing began but it fled the scene and heart behavior returned to normal sometime during the 3rd or 4th rowing session today. If you are feeling hippy, you can cheer! Hip, hip hurray! (Have you ever felt a hippy? I have 🙂 )

All today’s data and live, granular clickable graphs can be seen via this link to the online logbook. To see any session’s data and its interactive graph, click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the relevant session.

Happy rowing to you!

P.S.: If this blog post is grammatically correct and all words which do not require a poetic license are spelled correctly, credit is due to the diligent and somewhat perfectionist hippy who proofreads it for me.

Yes there were workout sessions today but their HR graphs are all rather messy because I’ve been having that dratted atrial fibrillation again. So I’m not going to bother showing any screenshots of the workout sessions.

But in case you’ve never seen an ECG of atrial fibrillation, there’s a screen shot of one of those immediately below this paragraph. No two are the same … of course.

All today’s data and live, granular clickable graphs can be seen via this link to the online logbook. To see any session’s data and its interactive graph, click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the relevant session.

Happy rowing to you!

Today’s title refers to today’s main workout. It was 10,000 meters in the virtual company of 15 other rowers in Europe and North America. The maximum number of virtual boats in one session is 16 and it was full. By the time the session was over only 9 remained because of whatever problems or interruptions were experienced by 7 of the rowers. There were multiple problems getting the session started and one of the 16 was not able to rejoin after an alternate session was set up. So… by the time the 16 person session started there were only 15 who tried to start and row the 10K.

I was one of the fortunate ones who was able to start and complete the entire 10K.

I hadn’t recorded a rowing session in quite a while, so I thought this would be a nice one to put on YouTube. It is uploaded as a screen recording with no sound track and it can be found at this link: Indoor Rowing 10K Online 03152020.

There has been no atrial fibrillation today.

All today’s data and live, granular clickable graphs can be seen via this link to the online logbook. To see any session’s data and its interactive graph, click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the relevant session.

Happy rowing to you!

Today I did something similar to yesterday. For inspiration, I looked to see what my training partners had done today. Two of them had done some rowing. I decided to row three sessions: The first would be 2K at the same average pace as the pre-warmdown pace (4:25.0/500m) of the slowest of those two training partners. During that session my heart rate averaged less than 74 beats per minute.

The second session would be 5K at a steady pace averaging the same (2:42.9/500m) as the faster of those two had done. During that session my heart rate averaged 92 beats per minute.

The third session would be 2K at whatever felt good and didn’t raise heart rate so it felt very high. There was no atrial fibrillation today and the theory was that if heart rate wasn’t raised too high (whatever THAT is) it would continue its good behavior.

There were five sessions in all, if the warm up and warm down are counted.

The first two of those three sessions were done at a much slower pace than seemed natural to what my body was inclined to do and that is probably as good an explanation as any for why I had to concentrate so hard during each of those two sessions. The mental focus I had to maintain during each of the first two of those three sessions was similar to the mental focus of holding one’s hand perfectly still after a butterfly has landed on it, so as not to startle it into flying away.

All today’s data and live, granular clickable graphs can be seen via this link to the online logbook. To see any session’s data & clickable interactive graph, click the corresponding “+” sign in the “Action” column for the relevant session.

Happy rowing to you!