https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5_4upqhYeQ

I enjoyed this....quite dorky and detailed but very instructive guide to approaching and racing a 2k

it's 25 mins in length and finishes with him doing a 2k and talking through his strat as he goes.

beautiful technique and he's clearly a weapon...also 6-6/220 ish which helps

extra session UT2

4600m in 20 mins at 2.10.3/500

5x5 Bench Press - 92.5kg 5,4,4,4,4 reps
3x8 Incline DB Press 30kg
3x11 Close Grip Bench 70kg

2k row time trial tomorrow....so long as I can stay off the drink tonight

I have decided that you're going to start out at 1:42.5 for the first 500, settle into a smooth 1:43-1:43.5 for the middle 1000, and then sprint in at sub 1:42 for a smooth sub 6:50. Hopefully having that fleshed out eases any pre-race jitters.

Lol

That won’t be happening - I think it would be suicidal to start out that fast. I think adding 1 sec to each of those splits would be a dram scenario

Also...I’m still in bed this morning and reading this and thinking about it has given me butterflies!

You just did 1:40 flat for 6x500; I think you'll surprise yourself. Good luck.

Awesome! Looking forward to the memory screen with the splits and a write up (once your heart stops pounding).

write up incoming...you forget I'm a techno idiot, so I've got no idea about memory screens and things like that.

well....the goal was sub 6.55

the plan was to be at 1.43.9/500 at 500 and 1k, but be in a rhythm on 1.44/500 pace from 200-1300 tighten it up slightly from 1300-1700 and then go balls out for the final 30 strokes

I kind of hit those target splits, but in a way that probably wasn't ideal.

My fast first 10 strokes was really fast and at 200 I was at 1.32/500 average.
i got onto race pace but my split at 500 was still way too quick at 1.40.2.
I relaxed a little more but started fighting fatigue a lot from 700.
Went through 1k in 1.43.7/500 average but felt really tired and couldn't even keep my speed on race pace
went through 1500 in 1.44.3/500 average and then just made a commitment to not see slower than 1.42/500 on the speed and managed to finish it off for a 2.6 sec PR

to be honest, sub 6.55 was my goal so I'm happy with the result, even if it might not have been quite as efficient as it could have been

it wasn't pretty either - I was screaming for the last 300 to the extent that the lady from across the road came to my home gym door, saw my flat on my back afterwards and thought I'd broken my leg!

Pretty cool! It sounds like it was a true 100% effort. There was definitely some screaming by me in my last 2k.

I have never agreed with the school of thought that the first 10 strokes are "free" and to go harder then. It doesn't make any sense and seems to be up for debate.

Top kek indeed

The memory screen is the one on your C2 screen that shows your splits for your individual session: Memory->By date->Select the piece in question

Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt!

I honestly don’t know what happened. I saw 1.24/500 on about stroke 5

Not smart

Thanks for the info - I’ll have a look the next time I row.

Impressive

rest day for me today. First beer at 1.30 pm, last scotch 1am. Also some PEDs

Plan from here...lifting as usual but I might go for a bench max effort next week

Rowing wise I’m gonna do some longer distances and do two longer interval sessions before going for a 5k PR attempt over Easter weekend

Was drinking most of the weekend and felt quite seedy today so didn’t want to risk training hard. So I basically did an active recovery day

30 mins stationary bike
15 mins row at 2.08/500

Got a good, easy sweat on and felt better afterwards

Back on the horse tomorrow

With these biblical floods we’ve been getting, all I want to do is stay in bed and eat biscuits so...

Prob not Lololololoco approved

One day man...I can only hope

Training

5x3 Bench Press @ 97.5kg. (3,3,3,2,3). First time at this weight after moving up 2.5kg..would have managed the 3rd rep of set 4 but unfortunately some saliva escaped as I was breathing out went vertical and came down in my eye!

3x7 DB Bench 32kg DB

4x12 bar dips

I may do a light row session later as well - it's so wet outside that I've got no chance of being able to do my late afternoon walk, so I may get on the erg instead.

first training session in 5 days due to illness - think it's the first time I've been sick in 18 months....nothing too bad, just had a temperature and was achy/had no energy at all. managed to get out for a light, very slow walk for an hour each day still, so got my 10k steps in each day

5x5 Press - 55kg
3x8 seated DB Press - 24kg DB
3x8/7 super set, 45kg Preacher Curl, 16kg DB Hammer Curl

Does anyone else get soreness in their shoulder joint while pressing? it feels like it's right in the joint...almost on the bone. I get it in both shoulders, almost all the time. I also get it when I bench and also when doing dips...albeit not quite as bad

it's painful, but not enough to stop training and I don't think it impacts my lifts...so long as I have my head into my training session and am focused and aggressive. it doesn't seem to get worse and it doesn't impact my life....but it's really annoying.

I feel like I've had it for ages..definitely 6 months and maybe more

Did an extra session today, just to get a sweat on before I go aggressively into next week

5k row - 2.13,7/500m

UT2, nice and chill...happy I did it.

I’ve been reading up a lot on rowing programming...particularly for someone like me that wants to get faster only rowing 4 times a week.

Unlike for someone training 6 or 7 times per week, where the sessions are more often UT2, It seems I need to do three of the four sessions either at UT1 or AT..makes sense I guess to have more intensity to make up for fewer sessions. But I do need the sessions to cover more metres than I’ve previously been doing.

So I think broadly what I’ll be doing is one longer UT2 session ..40 mins at least, then two UT1 sessions of approx 30 mins and then one AT session, alternating an interval session with a time trial

Tbh I might start doing two weeks with the AT being an interval for every 1 week of a time trial...we’ll see.

I want to continue doing three upper body lifting days per week if possible and also add on a lower body and pulling session once per week.

Given I think it’s important to have a total rest day once a week at my age, this means I’ll need two days where I’m doing a double day.

Re: shoulder pain, that's not something I ever experienced.

Re: rowing programming, I'd be interested to see what you've read on the subject; my guess is that you should be able to recover from what you describe, but I have no idea whether or not it's optimal. You also may want to mix in some TR work too.

Sounds like a shoulder impingement, which I’ve had before. It is irritating and feels like a pinch but not painful enough to prevent you from lifting.

I looked back at your last few workouts. Are you only doing push exercises and no pulling? I know you do rowing for cardio but I think you need to balance your strength training so you aren’t just doing push exercises. I would add things like facepulls, rows, pull-ups/pull downs, rear delt flyes and build up your upper back. Aside from adding pull exercises I would try to stretch/release your pecs often and make sure your shoulder blades are pulled back and down when benching or pressing