Working in higher-intensity paddling, but trying to be smart about it

It's been sort of a busy week, I guess.  A few little nuisance things I had to take care of and some not-so-fun chores.  But still I paddle my boat.

I went to the river on Tuesday and, after a set of rubber band exercises on the dock, paddled for 60 minutes.  After a ten-minute warmup, I did three ten-minute pieces at race pace with five minutes rest in between.  It was not so different from the 30-minute higher-intensity periods I've been including in many of my sessions; just breaking up the monotony a little.

It seems we're going back and forth between cold days and mild days right now.  I paddled in mild weather (Fahrenheit temperature in the 50s) Tuesday, but today it was cold (30s) with a chilly breeze blowing from west-northwest.  After another set of rubber band exercises on the dock, I got in the boat and warmed up for ten minutes, and then did eight 6-stroke sprints, one at the top of each minute.  A little while later I started into five long sprints--each one was between 45 and 90 seconds.  I just made it up as I went, each time picking out two landmarks in the harbor and paddling at sub-max intensity from one to the other.  I gave myself a good long rest in between each two sprints, because at this early stage of the season I want to keep my workouts aerobic as much as I can.