ultimately, races are just time trials for you/almost all runners anyway tho. you're not gonna win Boston so it's all about getting the fastest time you can. it's different because you can't 'race' a marathon every few weeks (I know someone who ran 30 in a year once but he wasn't 'racing' them) but you could find a way to build a number of shorter time trials into your training program without hindering the end goal. it's basically what I do, mainly because I need the regular checks ins on progress to keep me interested and motivated. 0 chance I could commit to a Lozen type 'rinse and repeat' approach and have the mental staying power for it.

I'm hoping to enter a few events later in the year tbh. there is a 2 round Indoor Series for my state and then a state championships towards the end of the year.

no dates announced yet but it'll most likely be after my birthday which will mean I'll be a spring chicken in the 50-59 category

Re: a half marathon time trial, I think something like starting around 2:06 and negative splitting down into the 1:58-2:00 range seems reasonable? My 80' straight of UT2 on my 90' days is reasonably strenuous and ends being in the 2:03.5-2:05 range for average pace (so 19+k meters); feels like shooting for something in the 2:00-2:02 range and rating up a bit would be doable.

yep, although I might even start a little slower and see how it went. your long distance rows would be ahead of mine.

I checked out the profile of the guy who would be my main adversary if I did enter rowing comps later in the year and his half marathon time was 2.07/500.

his stats were interesting actually - he'd crush me on 500 and is currently a way ahead on 1k and 5k but he's slower than me on 2k and I'd guess I could beat the half marathon.

500m 1:25.2 1:25.2 Indoor Rower
1,000m 3:08.6 1:34.3 Indoor Rower
2,000m 6:56.3 1:44.0 Indoor Rower
5,000m 18:11.2 1:49.1 Indoor Rower
21,097m 1:29:44.7 2:07.6 Indoor Rower

Busy day at work and onjy managed to squeeze in 25 mins in the home gym.

5x5 seated barbell press 50kg (backless bench) superset with with 5x12 12.5kg hammer curl

Will do a proper lifting session tomorrow as well as referee two games and then either do a fast 1k or a loco busting long row on Sun

Training today

5x3 Bench 97.5kg (only 2 reps in set 4), superset with 5x6 pull ups

3x8 DB bench 30kg

3x10 Close Grip Bench 70kg tri set with 10 dips and 15 face pulls

Great win for my son’s soccer team. 4-0 against another unbeaten team. We’re now 3-0, scored 17, conceded 2.

Really satisfying when you see the kids putting into practice what you’re coaching into them at training. I thoroughly recommend it to anyone with sporty kids.

Also, have been doing deadhang pull ups for the past few weeks. Not to exhaustion but just getting back in the groove. Have got the gnarly pain in my left elbow that I got a few years back when I was did a 2 month intensive to improve my max pull ups. From memory, it only went away again when I cut down the volume of pull ups I was doing

Anyone else get it?

lifted Monte's recent workout to do today

8x3mins at 20s/r, 1 min rest

6358m total splits ave 1.53.2/500m

777m 1.55.8
783m 1.54.9
787m 1.54.3
791m 1.53.7
796m 1.53.4
802m 1.52.2
810m 1.51.1
812m 1.50.8

was fun. last two splits were definitely a challenge.

took a few intervals to get myself comfortable with the effort needed to maintain/improve the pace while staying consistent on the stroke rate and I can see the value in keeping the stroke at this rate because in the latter 3-4 splits it was forcing me to pull really hard

Monthly review

3 lifetime PRs - Bench press, 100 calories assault bike and 5k row. Very happy with them all, particularly the 5k row, which I always thought was going to be the toughest one to break.

April was my most consistent month

25 training days
I hit 10k + steps all 30 days
21 alcohol free days

I've now broken all the PRs I set out to break at least once. The lifting progress has stalled - I'd like to think I can get another 2.5kg on bench but my main focus the next month is going to be rowing and lifestyle.

I'm planning on doubling day on the cleaner lifestyle and I think I'm in a groove with this now. 20+ alcohol free days is the goal. THis should help me drop a couple of kgs too - I have an outline plan of doing a DEXA in early to mid June and while it isn't my key focus, I'd like a decent results.

I'm planning at least 2 rowing PR attempts in the 1k and 2k and I might also attempt a 5k at the end of the month. In between, I'll be adding a little more volume and focus on the working sessions.

At some point between now and my birthday, I'll attempt a 500m time trial too, albeit I feel it's a little counter productive, because the fast 500s tend to take a huge toll on me and might impact my training for a few days after. I have another 50cal assault bike attempt in me too - I reckon I can take a few seconds out of my time.

Rest day today as I felt like I might be coming down with something, but quite an active one.

Did a 45 min walk early am and then instead of going to the gym this evening when my son was at soccer, I did another hour walk. Am not sure how much ‘fitness’ the walking gives me, but it’s good for me mentally to get outside and moving when I’m stuck at a desk working all day and it must burn a few cals at least

I don't think one single 90s race will wreck anybody.


Half marathon and marathon, yes.

Nice job on the Month

new 1k row PR - 3.13.5, an improvement of 2.4 seconds since the previous time trial 2 months ago.

really happy with this and honestly...it ended up maybe not quite being RPE 10

I wasn't sure about making the attempt today. pro was...coming off a rest day, so potentially some benefit from being 'fresh'. con was...I'm not certain I'm 100% healthy. bad night's sleep last night, all 3 kids and the wife are sick and I thought at times I may be coming down with something.

so I did a 3k warm up and decided I'd make a call on whether to go for it or do a UT1 session. decided to give it a crack but there was some mental 'self talk' about quitting if it didn't feel right.

plan had been to go out in 3.17.5 and then see how it felt at half way. Ended up going out a little quicker than that and went though half way in 1.36.8. I was still kind of waiting to blow up but with about 400 to go I realised I felt fine and decided to turn the screw a little and then as you'll see by the split, I increased the rate quite a lot in the last 200. By the end...having felt I'd gone out too fast, I actually felt like I had a tiny bit more. Or maybe this is a sign of a well paced race?

either way..it's a good and quite substantial PR and I'm really happy with it

ahem....currently ranked 5th in the world for all ages for the 1k. (new rowing season only 4 days old)

That's a huge improvement and you definitely have more to come - congrats! What's your best 500m time? I want to give sub 1:30 a go soon.

thanks!

I did 1.28.8 when I was at crossfit but haven't done one since. All I remember was that we were supposed to do 3 of them with a t5 min break in between and i had the shakes for about half an hour afterwards and was written off for most of the day. So I'm quite cautious about doing one.

I'll do one at some point before my birthday - but guessing I won't get much quicker than 1.28? I was squatting 145/150kg when I did that and I'm not any more so I'd guess my power is way down

what's your best to date?

I have a rule....whenever I’m ranked 5th in the world in something...even when it’s utterly artificial and I’ll be 50th within a few weeks....I’m gonna shamelessly publish the fact

1.33.8, but that was after a metcon. I've done 1 minute at 1:29.0 without feeling like I was going to blow up, so it should be close.

The last 20 secs is the real problem. I think even with my 1.28 I averaged about 1.35 for the last 100.

Fantastic work!

Congrats on your ranking!

Looks like the 1000m is not verified. NO ROW. Sorry bro, back to the drawing board.

Is there any way to cheat on the erg? Why wouldn't that be verified? Obviously on the treadmill, you don't even have to be on it. So easily can cheat. Probably outside too, using strava plus a bike.

Verified means that it's uploaded directly to your log from the PM5 as opposed to being entered in manually, as far as I can tell; given we literally saw a picture of the screen, I think we can safely assume this is more an artifact of him being terrible with technology than anything sinister.

I haven’t even tried to be honest. I know you explained it to me a few months back, so at some point I’ll have a look...albeit I wonder if my old version will allow me to do it.