Late Sept. In VT

The last week of September in northern Vermont is probably my favorite time of year. A typical morning starts with a chilly fog that is burnt off by 8 am to unveil the glassy lake. Gradually as the fog lifts above the tree line the colors of the changing leaves reflect onto the mirror beneath it creating the most colorful Hosmer we ever see. I spend the first 4-5k of my row looking around admiring the fullness of the trees, the richness of the green grass, and the thin layer of fog that now only exists just above the surface of the water. Soon, leaves will trickle down, grass will turn brown, and the water will cool to close to air temperature. Many notice when this week has past and appreciate in past tense, few appreciate it when it's here. This week typically falls right before the Green Mountain Head and probably contributes significantly to my great love for that regatta. The GMH is, in fact, this Sunday and I couldn't be more excited to see old friends, eat cider doughnuts, and do some racing, too. Since I last posted, my fitness has continued to trend positively mostly just by merit of excercising consistently, eating great food at the Center, and getting quality sleep. I would say objectively I am where I want to be with regards to my goal of being fast in third week of October, but its clear erg, weight room, and water numbers still have a ways to go. The objective markers that I'm referring to are my maximum aerobic speed on the water, on the erg, and then front squat and deadlift numbers. I pay attention to two different levels of aerobic speed. One is a recovery pace, or around 1 mmol lactate, the other is closer to 2 mmol. For me this is 140 HR and 156 HR. On Tuesday and Thursday I put in a decent amount of mileage at 150-156 HR pushing at around 20-22 spm.. I have been splitting these workouts up between the single and the erg to get a better idea of where my fitness is and how much of my speed is coming from my technique or my fitness. Based on my recent numbers I would say I'm moving the boat fine but just need a little more time to get my aerobic capacity back up. An example of one of these staple workouts would be 2 X 50 min( 50' water, 50' erg). Right now I am about a split off of my best numbers on the erg and in the single. In the weight room, I'm doing OK. I haven't lost too much. That being said, it's an area that I am really motivated to improve in this year, so I'm hoping use this as a jumping off point. For pieces, I have mostly been doing 20'-30' pieces at lower rate, but yesterday I decided to do some 6k pace work to remind myself how to row 28-30 spm before heading down to Putney this weekend. I did 10 X 3' / :30 rest at 28-30. This was hard from piece 1 and I am very proud to report that I finished the workout. This is a workout that makes sure you don't forget about the worst parts of a 6k. The pain that it induces from pieces 6-10 makes you think long and hard about why you are doing this and whether or not you  actually want to be the fastest version of yourself. We spend so much time doing low intensity work and the question of "How bad do I really want this?" rarely comes up because of the nature of that type of work. It's well documented that type of work excites physiological gains more consistently and effectively than AT work does, but it also may be more effective at drawing an athlete further away from the certain truth of a maximal effort: there exists a pain that questions you on every level and attempts relentlessly to detour you from your task. There is a question that only the well prepared have an answer for. So perhaps the training effect of a workout like this is purely mental, but it teaches me to be the man I want to be no matter the pain and if that's the only thing I learn from pursuing rowing for the last six years then that's OK with me. It's not totally binary, I believe a well balanced training plan can effeftively blend the Athenian and Spartan training philosophies, it doesn't have to be one or the other, but it occurred to be yesterday that I often sway to far to the Athenian camp.

Here is a clip of one of the tailwind stretches from yesterday. 10 X 3'/:30 at 28-30


Really looking forward to racing this weekend and seeing friends in Putney. There will be a lot of speed down there including former GRP athlete Erik Frid who is now training out of Penn AC in Philly. Erik is a really talented guy and has a really bright future in sculling. Erik is nicknamed Fridnami for the massive wake he can put out. I won't be surprised to see Erik making his way through the field this weekend.