MaxDev's Erging (and other things) Blog
My training using the Concept 2 indoor rower, and other subjects of interest to me.
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Man and superman
After feeling like Superman with my sub 2:00 split marathon on Friday, today I had a rude awakening and was made to realise I'm only human after all.
I'd skipped a couple of meals yesterday and today (dinner last night and breakfast this morning... not for any particular reason - just that I happened to be travelling yesterday, and had a lie-in today). While I didn't feel any different during the day particularly, when I headed for the gym after work there was obviously going to be a difference.
I'd planned to do a first attempt at the April CTC challenge - a straight 12km row. Based on recent performances and extrapolating some further improvements, I was expecting to be able to do this in somewhere between 43:30 and 44:00 (although I'd erred on the side of caution, and only announced my target as 44:00 at best).
My next mistake was to blitz out a 3k 'warm-up' in just over 11 minutes, at a 1:51 split. By any standards, this is ridiculously fast for a warm-up - closer to 13 minutes would have been more sensible. Recently, I've been getting into the habit of warming up too fast - normally I do 5k in around 19:20 (1:56 split), though even 18:40 has been recorded for this (1:52). I think I need a big sign to hang in front of the erg that says 'I will NOT warm up faster than a 2:06 split'. Given that today I was planning a fairly long hard piece to follow, I should probably have been doing an ever slower warm-up than normal, though possibly longer - maybe 6k at 2:10.
When I started the race piece, I realised straight away that things felt all wrong. I hit the right pace or even a fraction inside it for the first 2k (1:48.7), but with my HR already up at 180, and my legs and arms feeling really heavy, I just couldn't maintain it. Successive 2ks got slower and slower, all the way down to 1:58 by 8k (and even the odd stroke over 2:00 - shocking), before I found the energy to drag it down to 1:55, and finally 1:49 for the final 2k. By my recent standards, a very disappointing 45:25.5 (1:53.7 split) for the distance.
I'd skipped a couple of meals yesterday and today (dinner last night and breakfast this morning... not for any particular reason - just that I happened to be travelling yesterday, and had a lie-in today). While I didn't feel any different during the day particularly, when I headed for the gym after work there was obviously going to be a difference.
I'd planned to do a first attempt at the April CTC challenge - a straight 12km row. Based on recent performances and extrapolating some further improvements, I was expecting to be able to do this in somewhere between 43:30 and 44:00 (although I'd erred on the side of caution, and only announced my target as 44:00 at best).
My next mistake was to blitz out a 3k 'warm-up' in just over 11 minutes, at a 1:51 split. By any standards, this is ridiculously fast for a warm-up - closer to 13 minutes would have been more sensible. Recently, I've been getting into the habit of warming up too fast - normally I do 5k in around 19:20 (1:56 split), though even 18:40 has been recorded for this (1:52). I think I need a big sign to hang in front of the erg that says 'I will NOT warm up faster than a 2:06 split'. Given that today I was planning a fairly long hard piece to follow, I should probably have been doing an ever slower warm-up than normal, though possibly longer - maybe 6k at 2:10.
When I started the race piece, I realised straight away that things felt all wrong. I hit the right pace or even a fraction inside it for the first 2k (1:48.7), but with my HR already up at 180, and my legs and arms feeling really heavy, I just couldn't maintain it. Successive 2ks got slower and slower, all the way down to 1:58 by 8k (and even the odd stroke over 2:00 - shocking), before I found the energy to drag it down to 1:55, and finally 1:49 for the final 2k. By my recent standards, a very disappointing 45:25.5 (1:53.7 split) for the distance.
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