Week 23 :)

The last full week before the 100k was dominated by one thing - RowPro! (www.therowingcompany.com/rower/rowpro)

I decided to purchase a PM3 Monitor for our Model C C2 rower as both a training aid and for the 100k itself. Our online affiliation (C2TweetCrew) have a few people joining us for the row next Saturday, and the aforementioned RowPro allows us to all row online together.

I received the PM3 monitor on Monday, and after hacksawing a bolt off to get the old PM2+ (Slipped thread) and putting the new monitor on it was time to purchase a RowPro licence - and away we went :)

Anita did a 20' set piece at 2:11 (4593) and I did a little 500m test (1:28.2 SB) - Anita was very very strong and she is coming up to a peak at the perfect time.

Tuesday - The horrible C2CTC - This month a 5',4',3',2',1',2',3',4',5', all with 30" rest, but the tweak was a 20 strokes per minute (r20) cap - The whole piece had to have a 20spm average or less.

I went first, and ended up doing 7830m @ 1:51.1 average. I was moderately happy with this, and I think a little bit of better pacing and this would be below 1:50 average. r20 is tough on the arms, and can be tough on the back, but the trick is to not up the drag too much. In fact sometimes it is best to leave the drag as is and work on explosive power in the legs and arms.

Anita did a very creditable 6752m (2:08.9) - This is about 3s below her 30' PB (29' total tonight) which is very strong!!!

Wednesday - a set 1hr piece. 15083 for me, 12418 for Anita. Slow and steady and just enough to keep the cobwebs at bay.

Friday - Cross-Training - 20' Row ('Power 10' - Ten hard strokes every 2 minutes, at 18', 16', 14' etc.), 25' Treadmill, 6km/hr walk at 9% elevation max, 15' Cross-Trainer, HR 150 for me, 143 for Anita.

The row was quite tough - Anita Low-Pulled (Fastest split on the monitor) a 1:39, me a 1:16 (Which I think is the lowest I've done) but the repeated 20" of sprints every two minutes (Punctuated by 'Steady State' rowing at 2:25 Anita/2:00 Me) gets tough after a while - Good training for sprints :) The treadmill was OK except for tight calves for us both, but the Cross-Trainer was very interesting.

Anita's Cardio target was 143bpm, and got and held that at 60rpm. This would have had her in the 160's before the start of training, so about a 20bpm fall in relative heart rate (Same power output, lower heart rate - a sure sign of an improvement in cardiovascular fitness). For me (150bpm target) I really struggled to keep the rate at 150, and had to go > 90rpm to keep and hold. This would have been Max output for me 6 months ago, at over 180bpm, so an improvement of 30bpm for the same power output. Anita and I have both increased our heart rate ranges considerably, and it's in the main down to the C2 rower :)

Lastly the weekend.

Saturday - 2 x 21097m, Anita first at 8:30am with 14 other international rowers on RowPro - her and our first row with other rowers online. She did a very commendable 1:38:35 (2:20.2) in her 3rd HM ever. I joined our friend Wim, who rowed with Anita at 2:15 pace in the first HM for a 2:00 pace HM 20 minutes after the end of the first. He did brilliantly after some difficulty around half way, and with a < 1:41 pace last 1k got the average down to 2:00 for Wim and 1:59.9 for me (1:24:20). We cooled down with a 4-mile walk around the local countryside, and ended the day with a quiz night (we came 3rd!!)

Sunday - After a photoshoot with the local paper (Colchester Gazette) at our gym (Topnotch Health Club) Anita's two sons came over and we all did 2k's!!!! Me first, where I helped provide a pace boat for a couple of our C2TweetCrew friends, Borut and Bill, both who did superb PB's, next Tyler did an amazing 7:17 @ 20 years old - he's been doing a bit of rowing recently and this was a very strong row. Ben next, who had no experience, and as such no baseline but persevered through the very worst erging has to offer and didn't handle down, which is very commendable. Lastly Anita lowered her PB from 8:23 to 8:07!!!!! A very busy weekend done!!!

1 week left :)

Anita & Andy

www.justgiving.com/Anita-Wells