row

On Pace

Went in to CFi around 12:30 or so.

Warm-up

3 Rounds NFT

8 Reverse Hyper (210#)
5 Back Squats (45#)

Strength: Pause Back Squats

E2M with 3 second pause in the hole

5×135#
5×185#
5×225#
5x3x255#

After the first set with 255# I had some negative thoughts of getting hurt and went to my bag to get out the belt. But I was able to switch gears and told myself not to be afraid; I’d be ok as long as I concentrated on good positions each rep. So no belt and Nanos all the way today.

Row: Engine

3 Sets

4,000m
4:30 Rest

Prescribed stroke rates:

2,000m at rate 19, 2,000m at rate 20
2,000m at rate 20, 2,000m at rate 21
2,000m at rate 21, 2,000m at rate 22

With no pacing recommendations I’m still just making shit up for these longer slower sessions. I looked back and saw that I did about 2:00/500m at 19s/m for a straight 2k with resting last week, so I added 10 seconds and went from there. Wrote it all on the board before starting.

The pacing I picked worked out really well. It was by no means easy, but I wasn’t falling down exhausted when I was done either. Tough session though.

Rest Smarter

Feeling it from the weekend, but went in after 3 anyways to get in the first rowing session of the week. When I planned out my week yesterday I fit it to the week instead of paying more attention to my body. Bad idea.

Row – 2k Pacing

3x1250m (5:00 rest)
- Set 1: 1250m at 5 splits slower than 2k pace (1:46)
- Set 2: 1250m at 4 splits slower than 2k pace (1:45)
- Set 3: 1250m at 3 splits slower than 2k pace (1:44)
12:00 Rest
600m for time (first 200m at 2k pace – 1:41)

It was a battle even get keep that first 1,250 meters on pace with a needed push at the end. I was able to get the second one close somehow, but it all fell apart in the third. My legs were smoked.

We could take 8-12 minutes of rest so I took full advantage because I was a bit out of it. Not too bad on the 600 but I had no more to give. Took me a long time to be able to leave the gym after that. I thought I might squat after rowing, but there was no way in hell.

I definitely should have rested today. Now I need to rest tomorrow so I don’t overreach after this lousy performance. Listen to your body!

Almost 40 Minutes in the Seat

Still sore and even more sore from yesterday’s workout. In to the gym around 12:30.

Warm-up

3 Rounds

10 Reverse Hyper (210#)
1:00 Air Dyne

Row: Engine

5 Sets

2,000m
2:30 Rest

Programmed rates and my own pace goals…

20 s/m (2:00/500m)
21 (1:59)
22 (1:58)
21 (1:58)
20 (1:59)

The paces are a split faster than last week for the respective rates, with the slightly higher rates this week as well. Oh and 30 seconds less rest made a big difference! In the 3rd interval I was really having to concentrate on keeping up my pace to stay on track. Hit all my goals, so it was a good session.

Legs were pretty tired after that and my low back was getting pumped up after the 3rd round. I used a pre-workout sample before going to the gym and it’s always the same for me. I regret taking it. How does anyone enjoy drinking those? Always feels like my face is going to peel off. Not worth it. I’ll stick to drinking aminos.

If I had to bet, I’m thinking next week will be 4x2k at 21-22-23-22 with 2 minutes rest between.

Back to Pausing

Thought maybe I’d get up early to squat and do some accessory work and then head to the gym for rowing later. But it was not to be. So went to the gym before 4pm. Joining in on the gym’s challenge for the next 6 weeks so weighed in before I got going. Was 208.8# and 20% body fat using the normal setting (17.7% on athlete) since Kevin wants to standardize it instead of having to switch between normal and athlete for everyone.

Warm-up

2 Rounds

10 Reverse Hyper (210#)
Bottom Squat Hold
20 Walking Lunges

Strength: Back Squats with 3 second pause

5×45#
5×135#
4×205#
3×225#
2×245#
2×265#
2×275#
2×285#
2×295#

I was feeling really good when I was doing a lot of pause squats, so back to it. Last 2 sets were a grind, mostly from not being under much weight lately. Felt good though.

Row: 2k Pacing

4 Rounds
- 1,000m
- 4:00 rest
Rest 8:00
2 Rounds
- 350m
- 30s rest

Assigned pace for the first two 1k rows was 6 splits slower than 2k pace. I’m hoping to be able to set a big PR, so I went aggressive with my estimate and ended up at 1:47. Then it was 5 splits slower for the other 2, so 1:46. I was able to hit the target for all 4 rounds. My stroke rates were all over the place and lower at the higher paces. Not great with that.

Could rest 8-12 minutes so I went with the low end. The first 350m was at the 2k pace (1:41) and then flat-out on the second one, where I probably could have pushed harder.

12k

Feeling good after yesterday. Got a good sleep in. Got to the gym around noon. Didn’t really need any kind of warm-up for this.

Row: Engine

6 Rounds

2000m Row
3:00 Rest

Stroke rates were in 2 waves of 19-20-21. I wrote my goals of 2:02-2:01-2:00-2:00-1:59-1:58 on the board before I started and stuck to them.

Never rowed even close to that much in one day before. I think I’ve done just a little over 8k. Wonder how I’ll feel tomorrow.

Wall Meet Face

Didn’t feel like a very good night of sleep again, probably something to do with the change it diet yesterday. Made it to the gym early to get in the first rowing session of the week before 9am. Didn’t have time for a warm-up though.

500m
1:00 Rest

This is supposed to be a good estimation of 2k potential by adding up the row time plus another 10-15 seconds. With that in mind, I set an aggressive goal of 1:37. Made the first two intervals at 1:36.4 but hit the wall hard at the end of the 3rd, and then had nothing left in the 4th. Averaged a 1:38.7 which would still work out to a solid potential PR. Rank of 95 on BTWB for this workout so good shit.

Update: I actually forgot that I tried an increased drag factor. I can’t remember exactly what it was, but pretty sure it was something between 135-140. I’m sure that had something to do with how much I was destroyed by the end. Going to try sticking around 132-133 for this next phase and see how it goes.

My legs were smoked and I was out of it for the entire class. Tried to get in some solid work though.

Strength: 3 Shoulder Press + 3 Push Press

45#
65#
95#
105#
115#
125#
135#

Took it slow and easy.

Accessory

4 Sets

5 Good Mornings
5 Pendlay Rows (Supinated Grip)

Went with 115-135-155-155# for the good mornings and 135-155-165-175# for the rows.

Conditioning

5 Rounds

5 Curtis P (45#)
10 Wall Ball (14#, 10′)
75 Jump Rope

Scale city! My goal was to just move because I knew I didn’t have any intensity left in my tank. Yep, those are singles on the jump rope, which are not easy. Can’t keep a rhythm at fatigue. I had to break them up into a lot of sets after the first round. Went unbroken on the other two movements though and just tried to keep moving even though it was slow. Took me 14:34.

Team Series Week 1

Got in the final two workouts in the evening.

Warm-up

3×10 Reverse Hyper (210#)
Bottom Squat Holds
Shoulder Stretching

Team Series Event 1

Females complete:
- 100 double-unders, each
- 75-calorie row, total
- 50 dumbbell step-ups, total (30# DBs, 20″)
Then, males complete the same with (45# DBs, 24″)

I went unbroken on my dubs, pulled 40 cals at about 1,800 cal/hr, and we alternated in the step-ups with 8-10-7 each. Michelle and Jess finished at 11:11 and we were done at 18:34.

Team Series Event 3

42-30-18 (30:00 time cap)

Muscle-ups, with static deadlift hold
350-lb. partner deadlifts

* The 45-lb. barbell must be loaded with 135 lb. on one side and 170 lb. on the other side.

* Each person must complete a rep during each round

Jess and I paired up on the bar. Brian and I did 10 rounds on the muscle-ups, each doing a double, then Michelle or Jess would make an attempt if they wanted to. They didn’t get any muscle-ups so we finished with 40 reps well before the time cap.

Week 1 in the books. Next one in about a month. It’s been something different and fun to do these workouts.

Testing Twenty

Slept in this morning after getting up in the middle of the night to order my iPhone 6s. Headed to CFi just before noon.

Warm-up

Easy 3:00 on the Air Dyne for 61 calories.

Row

20:00 for max meters

In the first week test I was not happy with my performance of 5,150 meters at an average pace of 1:56.5 because in my recent 5k PR I averaged 1:53.8 in just under 19 minutes. World’s apart. In that first test I started out at a good pace but couldn’t hold and just kept drifting away.

Today I followed the plan set out in the program and set my target at a 1:54 average, knowing I shouldn’t have much of a problem beating it and getting near or under the pace I did for the 5k. Having to hold back in the first 10 minutes was tough but I trusted in the plan. If you notice the pace of the first 2:00 split is low that’s because of going hard for the first 10 strokes and then settling in around 1:57.

Between 5 and 6 minutes the average was right an 1:56.0, and I held exact there until around 9 minutes in, when it started to creep down. From there it kept getting lower each minute. When I passed 5,000 meters it wasn’t off a PR time by more than 5 seconds and I was just starting my kick going into the final stretch, so I could have easily beat it. Averaged a 1:53.6 or .7, depending on if you’re looking at the ending screen or the splits, to beat my goal pace. Total of 5,278 meters for a 128 meter jump over week 1. I think I could have done a better job from about 8 minutes left to 4 minutes left, which I’ll have to remember the next time I do a 5k test.

Happy with the progress and the things I’ve learned about the erg so far, but still a lot of room for improvement. Excited for the next phase.

I don’t know why I didn’t take my shirt off today. It got very uncomfortable after about 5 minutes when the sweat started pouring out.

Accessory

5 Sets

8/8 Single Leg RDL (115#)
15 Decline DB Bench (45# DBs)
5 Supinated Pendlay Rows (135-145-145-155-155#)

Gradually going up on the RDLs each week. My posterior chain felt a lot tighter when I was standing on my right leg. The bench was easy even at 15 reps. First time trying Pendlay Rows with the reverse grip; definitely a different feel to it.

Team Series Event 2

More team series tonight.

Warm-up

3×8 Reverse Hyper (210#)
Bottom Squat Hold
5 Shoulder Press (45#)
5 C&J (95#)

Team Series Event 2

As FF and MM pairs, 20:00 AMRAP

30 C&J (females)
30 C&J (males)
30 C&J (females)
30 C&J (males)
Etc.

Switch athletes after every 5 reps and increase the weight of the barbell after each set of 30 reps.

Females use 95, 105, 125, 145, 155, 165#

Males use 135, 155, 185, 225, 245, 265#

We were flying through until Jess tweaked her back when the girls were 8 reps into 125#. She’s coming back from a pretty scary tweak so smart to stop before really getting hurt. So our score was a 128 with a tiebreak of 8:39. There was still 9:53 on the clock when we stopped. Bryan and I flew through those first two Graces in 1:41 and 1:51.

After making sure Jess was ok, Michelle, Bryan, and I continued on alternating sets of 5 with our 125# and 185# bars. Then I think Michelle went with 135#. We put ours up to 225# and I knocked out 5 singles. Have never tried that and really needed to think about what I was doing after the first rep or two, but continued doing power clean & push jerks. Got in one more rep after they did some.

Team of 3

The 3 of use decided to whip up a version of Event 1 to try out.

100 DU (each, going one at a time)
150 Row calories (total, doing 25 at a time)
105 Weighted Step-ups (total, 5 at a time with 30/45# DBs and 20/24″ box)

Took us 15:13 I think. Was a really good workout. Michelle started, getting 100 unbroken dubs for the first time, Bryan went next and got in a PR of 80-some unbroken during his hundy, then I went 3rd and got mine unbroken too. Kept the same order throughout.

Legs are going to feel tired tomorrow.

Rowing Retests

Got in to the gym before the 9am class started to get going on my rowing for the day.

Warm-up

3 Rounds NFT

8 Reverse Hyper (160#)
1:00 Air Dyne

Row

3:00 for distance
10:00 Rest
250m for time
Rest as needed (about 6:00)
20:00 at low intensity

I just didn’t have the juice for the 3 minute test. Beat the first week, but that was limited by 24 s/m so can’t really compare. I did 904 meters, but was thinking maybe I could get close to a 1k. Legs just didn’t have any go.

Felt like I recovered well in the 10 minutes. Took me what seemed like a long time to get going (under 1:20/500m pace) on the 250 but when I got there I was able to hold on. My PR was a 40.4 and I was thinking sub 40 might be possible. Got close with 40.1. My first 100m was in 16.6 compared to my PR of 16.0, so just need to start better and I’ll have it.

I actually wasn’t as out of breath after this as I’ve been in the past. Those power intervals must be working. Took about 6 minutes and then got in on the easy row. Tried to stay around a 2:14-2:15 pace and 24 s/m. Ended up with 4,465 meters and a 2:14.3/500m average.

Can’t wait to see the Team Series workouts released tonight!