Some hard training along with some "posture and technic"

On Friday morning I did a gym session and then headed down to the river.  It was a cool 55 degrees Fahrenheit, but warming up toward an afternoon high in the high 60s.  It was cloudy with some intermittent drizzle.  After a 15-minute warmup, I did two sets of eight 10-second sprints, starting at the top of each minute.  Maks told me to use "small resistance" on the boat, so I made it one golf whiffle ball. In between sets I gave myself seven minutes of easy paddling to move some fresh blood into my muscles and smooth my stroke back out.  I felt more fluid and efficient in the second set than in the first.

A decent amount of rain fell overnight and yesterday morning it was cloudy and damp and about 60 degrees.  I got in the boat and did a calm 40-minute paddle--Maks called it a "wake up" session, and that was what I needed because I was feeling pretty lethargic.

The cool, gloomy, rainy-ish weather continued all day yesterday.  I'm not sure I had much more giddy-up in the afternoon than I'd had in the morning, but I had a bigger workout to do regardless.  It was four sets of (3 minutes at 76 strokes per minute/1 minute rest/2 minutes at 80 spm/1 minute rest/1 minute at 84 spm), starting every 12th minute.  For some reason I hadn't thought the session looked like a big deal on paper, but once I was doing it I realized it was a bear.  Maks instructed me to work the 3-minute piece hard and then "try surviving" the higher stroke rates; it hurt a bit, but I did survive.  Maks also reminded me to "maintain the posture and technic."  Posture in the boat is something I've been paying more attention to lately at the behest of the physical therapist who's helping me with my neck ailment.  She said that by rolling my pelvis back a little and sitting more erect, I would encourage more abdominal involvement while paddling and take some stress off my arms and shoulders.  This has of course been known for decades in the sport, but it's an easy thing to slack off on if you're not giving it your specific attention.  My therapist also urged me to keep my neck in a more neutral position, with the ears aligned with the hips, if that makes any sense.  It's another measure to keep stress off my sore trap muscle.

This morning it was warmer and not a cloud in the sky, and I felt more pep in my step.  As usual, Maks gave me a longer, steadier session to do on a Sunday.  It was five sets of (5 minutes at 56 spm/3 minutes at 60 spm/2 minutes at 64 spm).  "Same as always," Maks said, "technic is the first focus during this session!"  So I went out and worked some more on sitting erect and keeping my neck in that neutral position, as well as on the stroke components I need to improve, planting the blade precisely for the catch while my top hand is near my head.  As the session went on I tried to do all those things not so mechanically but more fluidly, so I wasn't bobbing the boat or jerking it around or anything like that.  Whew.  The rest intervals were 1 minute between pieces and 2 minutes between sets, and I think those were mental breaks more than anything else.  Focusing hard on every move the body makes can wear a guy out.

I'm not feeling quite as beat to the socks as I felt this time last week.  Maybe that's because I didn't do some extracurricular surfing like I did last weekend.  Whatever the case, it was a pretty substantial training week and I'll enjoy a rest day tomorrow before getting back at it on Tuesday.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Three days with a little of everything

On Tuesday I did a workout with some pretty extreme stroke rate variation: two sets of four (1 minute at 50 strokes per minute/1 minute at 80 spm/1 minute at 50 spm/1 minute at 70 spm/2 minutes rest) with some extra weight in the boat.  The idea was to put high power into each stroke at 50 spm and then carry that into the higher stroke rates, and somehow I had as good a "feel" for that as I've had all spring.

I paddled in gorgeous weather on Tuesday: sunny skies with the temperature warming up toward an afternoon high of 75 degrees.  It was the sort of day when I didn't want to be anyplace else as I sat in my boat on the water.  Then early Tuesday evening a front came through, bringing gusty north winds and a small amount of rain, and the temperature plummeted some 25 degrees in the space of a half-hour.  It dropped into the 30s overnight, and when I got to the river yesterday morning at was 43 degrees.  Fortunately the sun was out, keeping the day from feeling too miserable.  Actually, once I was up in the north end of the harbor, where there's some shelter from the wind, it was right pleasant, if not as glorious as Tuesday had been.

Yesterday's workout was two sets of three (3 minutes at 76 spm with moderate resistance/2 minutes rest/1 minute at 76 spm without resistance/3 minutes rest).  That 3-minute piece with resistance was hard.  Looking at the workout on paper, I thought the 3-minute rest interval at the end seemed long, but I wanted every second of it once I was in the boat doing the workout.  The fun part was that the 1-minute piece without resistance felt like I was flying.

It got cold again last night, but today the sun was out again and by the time I got to the river this morning it was warming up nicely.  I did another one of those "bread & butter" workouts: three sets of (5 minutes at 60 spm/4 minutes at 64 spm/3 minutes at 68 spm/2 minutes at 72 spm), with a minute rest between pieces and 2 minutes between sets.  As I usually do during this kind of workout, I tried to put solid power into each stroke but also work on mechanics and staying smooth.  There was no barge traffic out on the Mississippi and I enjoyed doing most of the workout out there.

I'm still feeling tired from yesterday's resistance workout.  I hope I can get recovered a bit more for what should be a hefty weekend of work.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Monday photo feature

The selection trials for the U.S. national team in whitewater slalom took place last week at Charlotte, North Carolina.  The team is now set for competition in the 2021 World Cup series.

It is also now known who will represent the U.S. in women's kayak and women's canoe at the Olympic Games in Tokyo this summer.  In both classes it'll be 17-year-old Evy Leibfarth of Bryson City, North Carolina.  The photo above, shot by Wayne Meverden, shows a 10-year-old Evy racing at Wausau, Wisconsin, in 2014.  At that time she was showing all the signs of a child prodigy.  When she reached age 15--the minimum age to compete internationally at the senior level--in 2019, she immediately began winning medals in World Cup competition.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Olympians in men's kayak and men's canoe are yet to be determined, as no athlete has a decisive lead in the points system that the U.S. uses for selection.  These Olympic team spots will be settled at the World Cup event at Prague in June.

As for flatwater sprint racing, my understanding is that the U.S. will have one athlete in the regatta at Tokyo: 18-year-old Nevin Harrison of Gig Harbor, Washington.  Harrison is the reigning world champion in women's 200-meter single canoe.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

A lot of work with a fun-ish moment thrown in

Friday was a day for stressing some muscles.  It started with a gym session, after which I went to the river for a hard resistance workout.  I did six 150-meter pieces in the A3 (more than 90 strokes per minute) zone.  Maks said do them with "big resistance," so I slid all three of my golf whiffle balls under the boat.  The session was hard.  Not lactic-acid hard--each piece took me between 45 and 50 seconds, and starting every sixth minute, I had plenty of time for my body to recover for the next piece--but hard on the muscles.  Maks urged me to look for a stroke rate that struck the right balance among intensity, speed, and power; I did the first several up near 100 spm, while for the second three I tried to ease the rate down below 95.

Yesterday morning I put some extra weight in my boat and commenced paddling.  I did four sets of (3 minutes on/1 minute off) at 48-50 spm, and four sets of (3 minutes on/1 minute off) at 60 spm.  48-50 spm is quite a low stroke rate, and the biggest nuisance is that there's plenty of time between strokes for water to drip off my blade and onto my feet.  I had a nice puddle going after a half-hour or so.  It was cool--around 60 degrees Fahrenheit--but fortunately not freezing cold.  The upside of the low stroke rate is that it gave me a chance to work on my stroke mechanics: I had time to make sure I was immersing my blade while my top hand was near my ear.  Meanwhile, 60 spm is not a very high stroke rate either, but it felt high after paddling at 48-50.

That was just a warmup for a more stark juxtaposition of stroke rates yesterday afternoon.  The workout was four sets of (4 minutes at 60 spm/2 minutes at 80 spm/3 minutes at 64 spm/1 minute at 84 spm/2 minutes rest).

I started the first set in the harbor and continued it as I headed out onto the Mississippi.  There was a barge rig heading upriver and creating some nice-looking waves.  When I finished the first set, I hit "pause" on my workout and ferried out to see what kind of surfing I could do.  The towboat was a fair distance upstream of me and I couldn't get to the best waves, but with a lot of hard sprints I managed a handful of brief rides on the smaller bumps.  I finally tore myself away and returned my attention to the 75 percent of my workout that remained.  I started the second set out on the river but quickly returned to the harbor where I would have no more distractions.  It wasn't until the third set that my body had settled down from the surfing and my head was back into the task at hand.

As the weather and the water both get warmer, those towboat wakes will be more and more tempting.  Oh well... at least today it didn't stop me from completing the assigned workout.  By the time I was back at the dock I had that pleasantly tired feeling after laying down a pile of hard work on the Memphis riverfront.  Supper tasted good last night, and the night's sleep was even better.

I was definitely tired this morning as I settled into the usual Sunday longer paddle.  I did four sets of (6 minutes at 56 spm/4 minutes at 60 spm/3 minutes at 64 spm/2 minutes at 68 spm).  Maks encouraged me to use this session "to 'fix' all the little glitches that have happened to the stroke during an intensive week."  Once again I focused on keeping my top hand near my head at the catch.  The lower the stroke rate, the easier this was to do.  Another thing I spent some time with was trying to move my body fluidly throughout each stroke, and that was harder to do at the lower stroke rates because of the long pause between strokes.

Once again, Friday through Sunday was the part of the week that wore me down.  A gym session and four in-the-boat workouts (and some wake surfing, too!) is a lot to cram into three days, at least for this 53-year-old non-world-class talent.  I'll be savoring tomorrow's day off.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Doing my part to (a) end the pandemic, and (b) make boats go fast

On Monday I received my second of the two Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine shots.  I understand that it'll take a couple more weeks for the concoction to reach its full effect, but it feels good to have jumped through the last hoop en route to "fully vaccinated" status.

The concern now, at least in my country, is the number of people who remain unvaccinated.  If we don't get the critical percentage of the population vaccinated to achieve herd immunity, then viral transmission will continue at a level that facilitates the development of variants that might break through the vaccine.  And that affects me and the millions of others who have done right by their duty as citizens of this nation and this world.  If you're refusing to get vaccinated on the grounds that it's "your right" or "your personal choice" or whatever, stop it.  Seriously.  Your behavior is a very real threat to the health and well-being of others.

I spent the rest of Monday sitting around waiting to see what the after-effects of my shot might be.  I think most people have had no major problems, but I do know a handful of people who felt quite ill for a day or more after that second shot.  It appears that I have gotten off light: all I ended up having was some soreness and some itching in my left deltoid area where I got jabbed.

On Tuesday it was time to get back down to business on the water.  Maks promises that this new training cycle will put an emphasis on power-building.  He started me off with one of his bread-and-butter sessions: three sets of (5 minutes at 60 strokes per minute/4 minutes at 64 spm/3 minutes at 68 spm/2 minutes at 72 spm), with a minute rest between the pieces and 2 minutes between sets.  I felt fresh and ready to go after last week's light training load.

We'd had a few days of deliciously warm weather, but by yesterday morning that was over.  It started raining not long after I woke up, and the temperature didn't rise above 60 degrees Fahrenheit until around lunchtime.  Most of my paddling session would take place in a steady light rain.  The workout was two sets of three times (2 minutes on/2 minutes off) at 76 spm with moderate resistance on the boat, and then two sets of three times (1 minute on/3 minutes off) at 76 spm with heavier resistance.  For moderate resistance I used two golf whiffle balls, and then I slid a third ball down beneath the boat for the heavier resistance.  The pieces were quite taxing, but I recovered quickly from each one and felt reasonably fresh for the next one.

The daily high temperatures are expected to stay in the 60s until the middle of next week.  That's really not bad at all even though it's not quite the beach weather we've been having recently.  This morning was sunny and beautiful despite a stiff wind blowing from the north.  I went out and paddled for 60 minutes in the A1 stroke rate zone.  Maks said to make it a "moderate to strong" session, and I think I did that.  I did a nice loop out on the Mississippi, where you sort of have to paddle strong at times just to get where you want to go.

So far I'm feeling great.  Some heavy-duty work awaits this weekend.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Monday photo feature

Spring has arrived for sure in the Mid South.  Last Tuesday was a day that simply sparkled.  Photo by Joe Royer.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Relaxing a little

I'm nearing the end of a much easier week.  It's given my body a chance to recharge and internalize the benefits of the last several weeks' hard work.  I'm pleased to add that the blister that made me miserable for nearly a week following the Ocean Springs race is doing much better now.

On Tuesday I paddled with Joe for the first time in many weeks.  We did a loop of the harbor.  I used resistance on my boat and aimed to paddle around 56 strokes per minute, and worked on keeping my top hand closer to my head.

On Wednesday I did six sets of (10-second all-out sprint/2 minutes rest/1 minute at 80 spm/3 minutes rest).  I put as much power as I could into the 1-minute pieces, and they were just enough to get me breathing hard.  The idea was to carry the power of the A2 stroke rate into my all-out sprints.

Thursday was a 50-minute "calm" paddle in the A1 stroke rate zone.  Once again I worked on my stroke mechanics.  It's hard to work on your stroke during a hard training week; ideally, overhauling your stroke is something you do in the offseason.  But this easy week is giving me a chance to tweak the small details that have been giving me trouble.

Yesterday all I had was a gym session to do.  I focused on strength work and addressing the ailment I discussed in my last post.

This morning I did two sets of (4 times 1 minute at 60 spm with 1 minute recovery and 5 times 45 seconds at 76 spm with 75 seconds recovery).  It was the latest variation on the sort of "contrast" workout that Maks likes to assign--the idea is to paddle with power and precision at the lower stroke rate, and then carry that into the higher rate.  I did this workout with some extra weight in the boat: Maks specified 5 to 10 kilograms, so I put some barbell plates in the footwell that amounted to 13.75 pounds, or 6.24 kg.  The weight adds to the inertia you have to overcome with your stroke but it also enhances the boat's glide.

I'm out of the boat again tomorrow.  I think Maks sensed that I was ready for a mental break from paddling, and he wasn't wrong about that.  I haven't decided yet what I'm going to do, but it'll be some kind of easy and fun aerobic activity like riding my bike or going for a hike.  Monday will be a day off as usual, and I expect I'll be back to some more substantial training on Tuesday.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

So, what kind of "gym" am I doing these days?

It's been a long time since I've talked about it here, mostly because I just haven't felt like talking about it.  But I'm still having problems with the right trap muscle in my neck that started bothering me last fall.  It doesn't really interfere with my paddling, but it's tight and sore and generally unpleasant to live with.

Back in November and December I spent many sessions with my chiropractor, letting her have at it.  But for whatever reason, the ailment just never got any better.  She told me the next step would be to see an orthopedist and get referred for some physical therapy, and see what good that might do.  So I got in to the doctor about a month ago, and since then I've been visiting a physical therapy clinic that fortuitously is located just a short walk from my house.

My therapist, a young woman named Sharwil, is quite the taskmaster.  She's done some dry-needling and some deep tissue massage, but most of the therapy involves putting me through all kinds of stretches and weight exercises.  I have a list of dynamic stretches that she recommends I do before getting in the boat, and I have several exercises to do at home several times a week that are designed to strengthen the supportive musculature in my neck and shoulders area.  The exercises include a sort of sitting military press with dumbbells, shrugs with dumbbells, and an exercise I do with my arms while lying on my stomach.

Meanwhile, Friday has been my "gym" day since I started working with Maks.  So lately on that day I've been doing my rehab exercises and supplementing them with a couple of core exercises and some lunges to work my legs.

I'm now about four weeks into this rehab effort, and some days my neck feels significantly better while other days it seems as bad as ever.  Meanwhile, the extra work seems like a lot on top of the extra training load I've taken on in Maks's program.  For now I'm just trying to be patient and give all this work a chance to have an effect.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Monday photo feature

The harbor comes to life with critters when springtime rolls around, and it's not unusual for a few waterfowl to take up residence at the marina for a while.  In recent weeks I've been seeing this American coot, a truly winsome bird.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Improving weather and good, honest work

On the race schedule I posted this past Tuesday, there's an event listed for next Saturday, April 10.  I was thinking pretty seriously about attending this race even though it's a longish distance from here, over in South Carolina.  But what I hadn't noticed on the event's website is that there is a cap on the number of people allowed to enter (a COVID-19 protocol), and registration is now full.  I went ahead and put my name on the waiting list, but unless I hear something about that in the next day or so, I'll probably just plan on staying home next weekend because of all the arrangements I need to make to be away.  The next event I'm currently aware of in this part of the country is on Bayou Teche in Louisiana on May 15.

On Friday I did a gym session and then went out and paddled on another chilly, breezy morning.  But the sun was shining bright and the forecast said warmer weather was on the way, and that did a lot to elevate my mood.

After a long warmup paddle to the north end of the harbor, I commenced the workout: two sets of ten 15-second all-out sprints with 45 seconds recovery--"Close to a lactic workout!" said Maks.  I did the first set, rested 5 minutes, and then did the second; indeed I did get "close" to going lactic without quite getting all the way there.  My stroke rate in the first set was in the 110-120 strokes-per-minute range--that's about as high as I can go and still have some control.  For the second set, I made a conscious decision to lower the rate into 100-110 territory and pull as hard on each stroke as I could.  I don't think I sacrificed much speed (it's hard to measure that accurately over such a short sprint), and I was less winded at the end of each sprint.

Yesterday morning it was sunny again, and the wind had shifted to the south, a sign that the day would be warmer.  I did a calm 40-minute paddle that I used to work on my stroke.  The main problem is that I'm still punching too far forward with my top hand, and I need to keep it closer to my head so that I can catch the water at a smaller angle, making the whole working angle of the stroke bigger.  That's how Maks describes it, and I mostly understand what he's telling me, but I could use some kind of diagram to get it fully.  The drill Maks has suggested involves touching my ear with my top hand before each stroke, and yesterday morning it felt slightly less awkward that it had before, but it still didn't seem totally natural.  Improvement to one's stroke is never accomplished in one day.

A bear of a workout was on tap for yesterday afternoon: four timed 1000-meter pieces.  There was a south wind blowing maybe 6 or 7 knots, so as a warmup I paddled to the mouth of the harbor in order to do the 1000s with the wind at my back.  The pieces were to be done in the A2 zone, with a goal "to repeat four similar efforts," so I aimed for a rate in the low 80s; I ended up doing them mostly around 82-86 spm.

I started a new 1000 every 10th minute.  The session turned out to be nowhere near as painful as the two 2000-meter pieces I did back on March 4.  The pieces were hard, sure, but I just knocked them out, and that was that.  My times, along with the 500-meter splits, were as follows: 2:33/5:02, 2:30/4:52, 2:24/4:49, 2:25/4:47.

The weather was lovely yesterday afternoon, and there was more of the same this morning.  I wrapped up the latest training cycle with a "distance trial" of sorts: a "strong" 60-minute paddle in the A1 zone.  Maks made the purpose clear: "How much can you do in 60 minutes?  ...last workout of the harder cycle, you can give it your all!"  So I went out and did just that.  I tried to keep the stroke rate in the 60s, and put as much power as I could into each stroke.  About 15 minutes in I had to stop and back paddle because it felt like something was caught on my rudder; and later on I had to stop briefly several times to wipe sweat out of my eyes.  Besides those little setbacks I kept the boat moving reasonably well.  The last 10 minutes was the toughest, as my power seemed just about depleted.  When an hour had elapsed, my G.P.S. device reported this information:

The time is in the upper left corner (1.00 hour) and the distance is at lower left (10.88 kilometers, or about 6.76 miles).  I don't know why it says I'm moving at 0.1 mile per hour, since I was sitting on the dock when I took this photo.

In any case, I'm probably more tired from this workout than I was after those four 1000s yesterday.  Today's session was a grind.  I'm grateful to have a day off coming tomorrow.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Fighting through some doldrums

Last week I got Joe to shoot some video of me in the harbor so that Maks could have a look at how my stroke is doing these days.  Unfortunately, I seem to be suffering from the same flaws that I was when Maks and I started working together in January.  Maks suggested a drill that promotes the mechanical improvements I need to make, and so it continues... my forward stroke is forever a work in progress.  I really shouldn't let it gnaw at me, but sometimes I do.  If my stroke never gets any better than it is now, at least it'll still be decent.  But I hate this feeling that I've taken a big fat step backward.

By Tuesday the blister at the base of my right thumb had healed some, but remained tender.  Once I was in the boat paddling it was uncomfortable if not as painful as it had been on Sunday.  As I warmed up I tried the stroke drill that Maks had suggested, and it felt flat-out awkward, as though I would have to learn to paddle all over again.

Those issues made Tuesday's workout seem much harder than it should have.  It was four sets of (5 minutes in the A1 stroke rate zone/2 minutes in the A2 zone/4 minutes in the A1 zone/2 minutes in the A2 zone/2 minutes rest).  One of the objectives was to make the lower-intensity efforts seem like recovery intervals even though they weren't.

(Just a reminder to those unfamiliar with Maks's stroke rate zones: A1 is around 60-75 strokes per minute; A2 is around 75 to 90; A3 is over 90.)

It was sunny and lovely when I got to the river Tuesday morning, but it clouded over as I paddled, and by that afternoon there were showers moving through with some heavy rain falling in the evening.  Behind all that, winter was flexing its muscles one last time.  When I got to the river yesterday morning it was overcast and 52 degrees Fahrenheit and the wind was howling out of the north.

For my warmup I paddled to the north end of the harbor so that I could do my workout with the wind at my back.  The assignment was five 500-meter pieces.  The first one was to be done entirely in the A2 zone; the second one, A3 for the first 100 meters and A2 for the rest; the third, A2 for 400 meters and A3 for the last 100; the fourth, A3 for the first and last 100s and A2 for the middle 300; and the fifth, A2 all the way through.

Maks didn't specify a recovery interval, so I started a new 500 every 6th minute.  That gave me a little over three and a half minutes to recover.  I shot for 80-82 spm in the A2 zone and 92-94 spm in the A3 zone.  My times for the pieces, all wind-aided because I was paddling toward the south, were as follows: 2:28, 2:23, 2:24, 2:24, 2:23.  Oddly, the higher-intensity pieces didn't seem to produce any significant improvement in time, but in those blustery conditions there were all kinds of things that could have been speeding me up or slowing me down.

That blister was still bothering me a lot as I paddled yesterday.  With the frustration over my stroke and the unsettled weather piled on top of that irritant, I have spent this week in a lousy mood and feeling like a complete klutz in my boat.

The temperature dropped into the 30s overnight, and this morning it was 48 degrees when I got to the river, made chillier by another stiff north wind.  But the sky was clear and sunny, and while the blister was still causing me some pain, it seemed more bearable today.  I did another of those variable-rate workouts that seem to be the bread and butter of Maks's training program: it was four sets of (4 minutes at 60 spm/2 minutes at 68 spm/3 minutes at 64 spm/1 minute at 72 spm).  There was 1 minute of rest between pieces, and 2 minutes between sets.  I felt about as good in the boat as I have since I raced last Saturday.  Maybe my mojo is back on the upswing.

Maks promises an easier week next week, but first I've got some tough sessions looming this weekend.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Race schedule update

Here's my revised 2021 race schedule.

There's an omission from this schedule that hits me where it hurts: I learned last week that the Outdoors, Inc., Canoe and Kayak Race, scheduled for June 19, will not take place this year.  I understand that when Outdoors put on a bike race last November, four of its staff members contracted COVID-19 while working registration and similar duties.  The company has decided not to put its employees at risk like that again.  I am stunned and saddened to learn that this classic Memphis tradition will not be going forward, but I do admire Outdoors for making the welfare of its staff a top priority.

The schedule currently stands as follows:

April

10  The Paddle Bender.  Murray Reservoir, Prosperity, South Carolina.  An 8-mile (12.8-km) flatwater race.  Register

May

15  Chitimacha Race.  Bayou Teche, Jeanerette to Charenton, Louisiana.  A 10-mile (16-km) race on a Class I river.  Part of the Tour du Teche race series.  Register

June

5  Taylorsville Lake Paddle Battle.  Taylorsville Reservoir, Mount Eden, Kentucky.  A 10-mile (16-km) flatwater race.  Register

July

15-17  Gorge Downwind Championships.  Columbia River, Stevenson, Washington.  A race (course yet to be determined) in the legendary downwind conditions of the Columbia River Gorge on the border between Oregon and Washington.

August

Ohio River Paddlefest.  Ohio River, Cincinnati, Ohio.  A 9-mile (14.5-km) race down this major artery of the Midwest United States.  Register

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Monday photo feature

Jana Lucas, a former Memphian now living in Chattanooga, Tennessee, propels her standup paddleboard toward the finish line of the Battle On The Bayou race at Ocean Springs, Mississippi, on Saturday.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

A specific pain

I slept like a log at Nick's house last night and woke up this morning feeling surprisingly fresh considering the hard race effort yesterday.  Nick and I hung out and had some breakfast, and then we said goodbye as I departed for home.

But first I had some paddling to do.  I had a hankering to check out a part of the Back Bay of Biloxi that I'd never visited before, so I went to a public access that Nick recommended and put my boat in the water.

Maks had told me to paddle for 90 minutes--"Just a stroll around... just paddle and mind the surroundings."  I aimed to do just that.  But after a few minutes in the boat I realized I had a problem.  During the race yesterday I rubbed a nasty blister where the base of my right thumb contacts the paddle shaft.  I drained the fluid from it last night, but it was still very sensitive today and it was quite painful as I paddled.  It forced me to alter my grip on the paddle, and that in turn put some stress on my right wrist, making me stop paddling to rest it every few minutes.  I tried to grin and bear it, but it made an ordeal out of what was supposed to be carefree relaxation on the water.  I endured it for 75 minutes and then called it quits.

I did learn one useful thing: the Back Bay might be fertile ground for some downwind action.  There was a mild but steady breeze blowing from the west-southwest, maybe 10 knots, and I found some borderline-decent runs out in the middle of the bay.  With some stronger wind I think it might have been very good.  The question is how often there is such wind in that area.  It is, of course, the reliability of the wind that makes places like the Miller's Run and the Columbia River Gorge the downwind destinations that they are.

I made the six-hour drive back to Memphis and am wearily readjusting to life at home.  I have a much-needed day off tomorrow, during which I hope my blister will heal up.  I'll be back at it on Tuesday.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

What I hope will be a fuller race season has begun

The Battle On The Bayou canoe and kayak race took place today for the eleventh time in 12 years (last year's event was called off due to COVID-19).  Racers gathered on the waterfront down the hill from the Gulf Hills Hotel and received a few instructions from race director Ed Hornsby before getting in their boats.  Here are a few photos I shot of the pre-race activity:

Wayne Berry (left) and Nick Kinderman prepare the tandem surfski that Nick will be paddling with Wayne's son Jeb.

With husband Dan acting as pit crew, Karen Kesselring of Hot Springs, Arkansas, gets ready to race in the fast touring boat class.

Mike Herbert (right) needs no introduction to anybody who has followed canoe and kayak racing at the highest levels over the last several decades.  His 23-year-old daughter Savanna has put his genes to good use, developing into one of the top women to beat in this part of the country.

The race starts in a cove in the eastern reaches of the Back Bay of Biloxi.  Paddlers proceed up into Old Fort Bayou and follow this waterway some six and a half kilometers to an island at Percy Miller Park.  After rounding this island counterclockwise, they come back down the bayou and finish where they had started.  The entire race distance, as measured by my G.P.S. device, is 13.5 kilometers (8.4 miles).

We organized our boats along an imaginary starting line, and at 9:00 AM we were off.  I had a good start and was in the lead as we approached the left turn up into the bayou, but Mike Herbert of Rogers, Arkansas, was moving up fast on my left.  I moved onto his starboard wake, then onto his stern wake so as not to interfere with his turn.  In the many times I have raced Mike in the past he has pulled away from me quickly, so it was an unfamiliar sensation for me when my bow bumped up against his stern several times. He barked his displeasure at me, and I had to reassure him that they were merely love taps.

As we moved up the bayou toward the Washington Avenue drawbridge, Mike and I found ourselves in a lead pack that also included Roy Roberts of Chattanooga, Tennessee, and a tandem boat paddled by Mississippi Gulf Coast residents Jeb Berry and Nick Kinderman.  I had moved onto Mike's port-side wake, and then moved into the lead.  The 60-year-old Mike might not be the same athlete he was 30 years ago, when he was winning medals at the world championships, but he's still a formidable paddler, and I pondered this unfamiliar position in which I found myself.  Has my new training program already made me that much better?  Is Mike not feeling well?  Or is he just toying with me?

For most of the first half of the race I stayed in first place.  I backed off the pace several times to see if Mike would move up, but for the most part he seemed content to let me lead.  I was feeling good but was wary of working too hard too soon.

There are a couple of spots in the bayou where it's not so obvious which way to go, and the locals Nick and Jeb had to save Mike and me from going the wrong way.   Finally we reached the narrow channel that runs by Percy Miller Park, and Mike sprinted into the lead.  "Here we go," I thought.  I sprinted hard to stay on his stern wake.  He surged a couple more times, and I managed to cover each move, hoping that maybe we could open a gap on the other two boats.

By the time we'd rounded the island and were heading back toward Gulf Hills, I was feeling some fatigue working its way into my body.  It was also a lot warmer because the breeze that had kept us cool in the first half of the race was now at our backs.  I stayed laser-focused on Mike's wake.  We did manage to put some distance on our pursuers, but not enough to give me much of a cushion if Mike dropped me.  As we approached the drawbridge we navigated several tight meanders, and somehow Jeb and Nick managed to pull even with Mike and me in spite of their boat's length.  As we passed beneath the bridge Mike and the tandem threw in a surge and dropped me.

We were now in the race's final 2000 meters, and I was feeling some considerable agony.  It was now a race between Roy and me for third place, and as Old Fort Bayou opened up into the Back Bay, Roy worked his way in front of me.  There was a pesky crosswind blowing and I could feel the last of my energy being sucked away.  Some self-pity creeped in and I had visions of the other three boats pulling farther and farther ahead over the last kilometer.  At the same time, I held out some hope that if I could just survive until the last couple of hundred meters, maybe I could dig deep and surprise myself.  All I could do was take the best strokes I could, and keep the boat moving.

We made the right turn into the final 400-meter stretch.  Mike and the tandem were in a fight for the overall win, while Roy had about a boatlength lead on me.  Somehow I managed to suck up the pain and mount a final attempt to beat Roy.

I thought Mike's world-class background would be enough to carry him to victory, but Jeb and Nick stayed strong and pulled away from Mike at the end.  Their time of one hour, 11 minutes, 6 seconds was six seconds faster than the three-time Olympian's.

Meanwhile, though I knew overtaking Roy was a long shot, I gave it my best.  Inch by painful inch, I moved from a boatlength back to a half-boatlength back to a quarter-boatlength back.  Our battle was exciting enough to elicit a few cheers from the onlookers on the bank, but in the end Roy prevailed, crossing the line less than a full second before I did.  The official times were 1:11:37.4 for Roy and 1:11:38.0 for me.  I take that six tenths of a second with a grain of salt because the finish line wasn't equipped with an electronic eye or anything like that, but suffice it to say it was a close one.

Mike's daughter Savanna Herbert was the fastest female finisher, clocking 1:21:09.  That was good enough for sixth place overall.  The complete results are posted here.

My time was about 13 seconds faster than my previous best time on this course.  My coach has told me that it's not useful to compare times from different days, but considering the wind we had on the course today, I'm pleased with my time.  I'm also pleased with myself for pushing through the pain to finish strong.  That took a lot of the sting out of being fourth-best out of the four boats in the lead pack.  Considering that I'm training through races in this early part of the season, I think I did okay today and hope I can build on this effort as the season moves along.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Getting ready to race

My week began with a significant personal event: I received my first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine Monday morning.  I now have to wait three weeks to get the second dose, so with any luck I'll be checking off that milestone the week of April 12.  I'm getting the Pfizer vaccine, for those of you keeping score on that.

For this first race week of the year, Maks has drawn up a plan that's a little heavy early in the week but then tapers off as Saturday morning approaches.  At this early stage of the year I'm training through the races but I'd still like to be reasonably rested on race day, and hopefully this week's slate of workouts will allow for that.

Some heavy rain moved through early Tuesday morning, behind which there were some strong winds, but when I got to the river the rain was almost over and the wind wasn't too crazy.  I did a set of eight 4-minute pieces at 60-64 strokes per minute with 1 minute recovery in between.  I had some extra weight (5 kg) in the boat to put some emphasis on glide.  I tried to put a lot of power into every stroke, and by the eighth piece I could feel the power fading.

The week's hardest workout was set for Wednesday: eight to ten 250-meter pieces around 85 spm with "a little resistance" (I made it one golf whiffle ball) on the boat.  Maks said "when the power gets smaller/runs out, end the workout," adding that I should only do all ten pieces "if feeling extra great."

I was to start a piece every fifth minute.  My times for the pieces were all between 75 and 80 seconds, so I had about 3:40 to recover.  I actually felt better in the middle pieces than I had in the first several; maybe I needed a bit more warmup, or maybe I was just finding my groove.  After the eighth piece I don't know if I was feeling "extra great," but I felt like I had one more good effort in me, so I went ahead and did the ninth piece before heading back to the dock.

Yesterday morning was another soggy one.  Looking at the Internet radar, I saw very little chance of not paddling in the rain.  And yet chance there was: besides a brief sprinkle I didn't get rained at all.  The weather is funny around here.  The session was a simple one: a strong 50-minute paddle at 68-72 spm.

This morning it was time to head south.  I loaded up the car and took Interstate 55 out of Memphis and down into the state of Mississippi.  After driving for a little over an hour I stopped at Enid Reservoir, which was formed by the construction of a dam on the Yocona River in Yalobusha County.

Why did I stop there?  Because I had paddling to do: Maks had assigned a pre-race workout.  I got in the boat and warmed up, and did three 4-minute pieces around 66 spm with 1 minute recovery; two sets of three 1-minute pieces at 80 spm with 1 minute recovery; and three 30-second pieces at 90-94 spm with 90 seconds recovery.  There was some high intensity, but the pieces were short and the rest intervals were long, so I could rev the engines without wearing myself out.

After a quick lunch at a picnic table by the reservoir, I drove through the afternoon and now I'm staying with my friend Nick in Ocean Springs.  We'll be up bright and early for the race on Old Fort Bayou in the morning.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Monday photo feature

The kind of weather we had over the weekend just makes you want to have a picnic.

That's what I did with my friend Meghan back in 2008.  The Mississippi River was at flood stage, and the bottomland on the Arkansas side across from downtown Memphis was mostly underwater.  But there was a spot of high ground over there, and--if I didn't have this photographic proof you'd think I'm making it up--it had a picnic table on it!  So we paddled our boats over there and savored all the usual picnic delicacies.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Winter says so long

Earlier in the week we'd had a nice run of unseasonably warm weather, but by the end of the week it was clear that winter wasn't quite done yet.  When I got to the river Friday morning it was 46 degrees Fahrenheit with overcast skies, a chilly north breeze, and occasional drizzle.  When the weather gets nice this time of year I'm always tempted to give my pogies and pullover tops and stuff a good washing and put them away for the year, but in fact it won't really be safe to do that for another few weeks, and this was a reminder of that.

As for Friday's workout, Maks hadn't sugarcoated it: "It is supposed to be hard, it is supposed to hurt!"  It was an early-season lactic session: three sets of (6 times 30 seconds on/30 seconds off).  Maks said to take a longer break between sets, so I made that 3 minutes.  The prescribed stroke rate was 90-ish, but I ended up paddling more in the 95-105 range because that's what it takes to make me go lactic.  Maks also reminded me to maintain good technique and mechanics to "stay powerful for as long as possible."  I think I succeeded in that--I was starting to struggle a little bit by the last couple of sprints but I was still taking solid strokes.

While the workout did indeed hurt, it was over quickly and I felt good in the aftermath.  It reminded me of the most intense workout we did at the training camp I attended in Florida in January: my fellow campers gave me some funny looks afterward when I remarked that I was feeling good, and I had to explain that the workout was as painful for me as it was for them, but it didn't last long and it got the endorphins flowing.  In general, a taut, intense workout appeals to me a lot more than a long, drawn-out slogfest.

Spring officially began with the vernal equinox yesterday.  The rumor I'd heard was that there'd be some sunshine, but I sure didn't see any when I went down to the river yesterday morning.  It was cloudy and 48 degrees.  I got in the boat and warmed up, and then did three 5-minute pieces at a "calm" 60 strokes per minute with 1 minute recovery.  Then I did two sets of two 1-minute pieces at 72-76 spm, with a minute recovery.

As I was wrapping up my morning paddle the clouds were finally moving out, and by the time I returned to the river for the afternoon session it was a lovely sunny day with a temperature of 66 degrees.  I did five sets of (2 minutes at 62 spm/1 minute at 80 spm/2 minutes at 64 spm/1 minute at 80 spm/2 minutes at 60 spm/1 minute at 80 spm/2 minutes rest).  It was a chance to sprinkle some explosiveness among lower-intensity endurance efforts.  It wasn't a particularly hard workout but I felt very tired by the end.  I think just getting myself to the river and in the boat twice in one day wears me out.

I still felt a bit weary this morning, but beautiful sunny weather helped motivate me to dive into my last session before a day off tomorrow.  Like most Sundays, today called for a longer endurance paddle: four sets of 6 minutes/4 minutes/3 minutes/2 minutes at 60-62 spm, with a minute rest between pieces and 2 minutes between sets.

Maybe an obvious question is why break an endurance session into pieces like this, as opposed to just doing a 90-minute distance paddle.  My guess is that it's to help me stay focused throughout the session--during a long unstructured paddle it's easy to get distracted and let the intensity and the technique lapse.

I did a loop out on the Mississippi to enjoy the beautiful day at the current high river level (28.3 feet on the Memphis gauge).  The river is of course a less stable environment than the harbor, and it takes some extra concentration and discipline to maintain 60-62 spm and not quicken the stroke rate out there.  The long pauses between strokes adds a balance element to the workout, and I hope that'll pay off when I'm doing some downwind paddling later this year.

Once again I'm grateful to have a break scheduled for tomorrow.  And my first race of the year is next weekend!  I'm not expecting any miracles, but I hope I'll at least get a hint of some gains made as a result of my new training program.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

The power-building continues

On Tuesday I got in the boat and did some more varied-pace work.  It was 3 times 6 minutes on/1 minute off at 60 strokes per minute; 4 times 3 minutes on/2 minutes off at 72 spm; and 3 times 1 minute on/2 minutes off at 85 spm.

I felt like I was moving the boat well at 60 spm, though measuring that has been tricky.  Since I got my Vaaka Cadence Sensor, which communicates with my G.P.S. device via an ANT signal, my speed display has been acting funny: it seems to jump around from 6.7 miles per hour to 7.2 mph to 6.4 mph, stuff like that.  I wonder if the ANT signal is interfering with the communication between the G.P.S. device and the satellite.  Anyway, as I paddled at 60 spm, my speed display went as high as 7.0 or 7.1 mph, which I think is pretty good for me at that stroke rate, but I'm not sure how accurate those speed readings are.  At least I can check my stroke rate readings by counting strokes against the clock, and they do seem accurate.

Anyway, I worked to put a lot of power into every stroke during Tuesday's session, and the pieces felt good.  It wasn't a terribly exhausting workout but it was a solid hard one that made me go home feeling like I'd done some good work that'll pay off down the road.

The biggest challenge of yesterday's session was simply getting it in.  A system of strong thunderstorms was moving across the Mid South with the potential for damaging winds and tornadoes, and I had to watch the Internet radar closely to identify a window for paddling.  I thought I saw one around 9 AM and quickly went down to the river.  There were some lightning flashes as I warmed up, and I eyed my watch closely; it seemed that all the lightning was at least a couple of miles away.  The storms were moving from southwest to northeast, and at that time they were missing the city to the north.  The northern sky was ominously dark while the sky was much brighter to the south and east, and I stayed in the south end of the harbor, as far from the storms as I could get.  As it turned out, I got rained on just a little bit even though it was clearly pouring down rain up north.

The workout was three sets of (3 times 200 meters/2-minute rest/10-second sprint with a flying start/2-minute rest).  Within each set, the 200-meter pieces were to be done at 60 spm, then 70 spm, then 80 spm. Once again the workout turned out to be hard but not super-exhausting.  My 200 times were just over a minute at 60 and 70 spm, while at 80 spm I managed to dip just under a minute.  My 10-second sprints felt a lot smoother than the ones I did last Saturday, but that was partly because of the flying starts.

There was some cooler air behind the storm system, and today's high temperature was only around 51 degrees Fahrenheit.  It was mostly cloudy with the wind blowing hard from the west, making it awfully blustery and cold down on the riverfront.  As I paddled this morning there were patches of blue sky overhead, but the horizon in every direction was lined with dark rain clouds.  Today's workout was a simple one: paddle for 70 minutes at a "moderate to strong" 64-68 spm.

It's definitely a higher training load this week than last, and my body is starting to feel it with a substantial weekend schedule still to come.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Monday photo feature

It was August of 2016, and it was a good day for sailing and paddling on the Ohio River!  I was on my way home from New England, and I stopped in Louisville to paddle on a breezy day under a partly-cloudy sky.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Welcome back, DST

Most of my weekends this year have featured a pretty heavy training load, but since this past week was intended as an easy one, I got a break this weekend.  All I did on Friday was a gym session, and yesterday I had just one in-the-boat session rather than the usual two.

Yesterday's workout was a short-sprint session: three sets of four 10-second sprints, starting from rest at 2-minute intervals.  Paddling for 10 seconds at all-out intensity is a big test of motor skills, balance, and control.  Once in a while everything seems to fall into place and I feel smooth, all my muscles firing in unison and each phase of my stroke making a fluid transition into the next.  But more often it feels like I'm just flailing around.  I hope that at least looking for perfection in these short, intense pieces will help me come closer to achieving it over longer distances at lower intensity.

Daylight Saving Time began early this morning.  In general I like being on DST, but moving the clock forward an hour always throws my body out of whack for a few days.  For a while my body will think it's getting up at 5 AM even though the clock says it's 6 AM.

The workout today was another variable-pace exercise: three sets of (4 minutes at 60 spm/2 minutes at 68 spm/3 minutes at 64 spm/1 minute at 72 spm).  There was a minute of rest between pieces within each set, and 2 minutes between sets.  As usual, I tried to maintain consistent stroke quality at all the different rates.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Learning some new science and navigating an easier week

In last Thursday's post I mentioned that I was a bit frustrated with my 2000-meter results relative to a 5000-meter piece I did last summer.  A day or two later I got an e-mail from my coach, Maks Frančeškin, reminding me that it's not useful to compare times from one session to those from another, especially if the sessions occur at different times of year.  He mentioned how much difference the wind can make, and I was quite aware of that already.  But he also mentioned a factor that had never occurred to me:

The weirdest/most jaw dropping one is the difference in water temperature.  The Germans are saying that 1 degree Celsius higher temperature of the water gives you 0.5 s on 1000m. Slovenian study is 1 degree=1s.

The Mississippi River gets pretty frigid in the wintertime and doesn't really warm up until late May or June.  Each March for years, I've tried to break 50 minutes for a lap of the harbor--a distance of not quite 6 miles.  I've never managed to do it, even though I've done 6-mile/10-kilometer races later in the year (i.e., the summertime, when water is warm) in which I've clocked faster than 48 minutes.  I'd always chalked it up to not being in peak form in March and the fact that it's typically windy in the late winter and early spring.  Now I know another factor that's worked against me.

On Tuesday I did a calm 50-minute paddle.  It was a chance for me to "put back together" some of the technical components that I'd been addressing one by one in painstaking fashion.  Maks told me to look for what I "know and feel is the most effective stroke," and it reaffirmed something I mentioned a week or two ago--that my natural "cruising" stroke rate has dropped a bit since I started this training program.  Two months ago it felt awkward to paddle at 60 strokes per minute, but now it feels quite natural.  When I bothered to look at my cadence sensor's readout on Tuesday, I was paddling mostly at 60-64 spm in the harbor; out on the Mississippi that went up a bit, 64-68 or so.

Yesterday I did a "variable pace" workout: two sets of (3 times 2 minutes on/1 minute off at 66 spm; 3 times 1 minute on/1 minute off at 80 spm; 3 times 30 seconds on/90 seconds off at 90 spm).  I worked to keep my stroke quality the same throughout the different stroke rates.

Today I did three sets of (3 times 3 minutes on/1 minute off at 50 spm and 6 times 30 seconds on/30 seconds off at 76 spm).  My instructions were to do the 50-spm pieces at high power, and then try to bring that power to the short bursts at the higher stroke rate.  I felt like I was doing a good job of that, though as with most of these power-building workouts my power supply ran dry toward the end.

This is an easier week than the last couple, and my body is appreciating that.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

A very tentative 2021 race schedule

In the past I've enthusiastically posted my race schedule for the year in January or February.  But we all know what happened very shortly after I put last year's schedule up.  For that reason I've been hesitant up until now to post a 2021 schedule, and a number of events that have been staples of my schedule in the past have yet to announce their intentions for this year.

However, this year it seems pretty likely that the races listed below will go forward on some level.  To be clear, the threat of COVID-19 is not yet over, but with vaccine distribution underway the future is looking brighter than it has in many, many months.  What's more, race organizers now have a much better idea of what they're dealing with than they did a year ago.  I've heard many of them say that in retrospect they wish they'd gone forward last year, but there was so much uncertainty swirling around that it just didn't seem possible at the time.

It'll probably be another month or two from now that I and my fellow generally-healthy quinquagenarians will be eligible to receive a vaccine in my community.  Regardless of that status, I intend to wear a mask and practice social distancing pre- and post-race for all the events I attend this year, and I encourage all other participants to do the same.

For each event whose registration is live, I have included the link.

Finally, the usual disclaimer: this schedule is a work in progress, even in non-Pandemic Times.  I might not make it to every event that's listed here, and there are events not yet listed here that I might end up going to.

March

27  Battle On The Bayou.  Old Fort Bayou, Ocean Springs, Mississippi.  An 8.5-mile (13-km) race on a flatwater coastal bayou.  Register

April

10  The Paddle Bender.  Murray Reservoir, Prosperity, South Carolina.  An 8-mile (12-km) flatwater race.  Register

June

19  Outdoors, Inc., Canoe and Kayak Race.  Mississippi River, Memphis, Tennessee.  A 5-kilometer race down the largest river in North America.

July

15-17  Gorge Downwind Championships.  Columbia River, Stevenson, Washington.  A race (course yet to be determined) in the legendary downwind conditions of the Columbia River Gorge on the border between Oregon and Washington.

August

Ohio River Paddlefest.  Ohio River, Cincinnati, Ohio.  A 9-mile (13.5-km) race down this major artery of the Midwest United States.  Register

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Monday photo feature

It's the summer of 2017, and I find myself in a tight race with Scott Cummins of Louisville, Kentucky.  The venue is Percy Priest Reservoir, which was created by the construction of a dam on the Stones River at Nashville, Tennessee.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Another weekend of hard work

I started Friday with a gym session and then headed down to the river.

This is the time of year when Mother Nature teases out spring-like weather a little bit at a time.  After gorgeous sunny days Wednesday and Thursday, we were back to the depressing stuff on Friday.  It was around 52 degrees Fahrenheit when I got to the river, and that's not really that cold, but overcast skies and a chilly north breeze made it feel a lot worse.

In the boat I had a sprint-endurance workout to do: three sets of six (10 seconds on, 50 seconds off), all-out with flying starts.  Maks told me to rest longer between the sets, so I started a new set every tenth minute, giving me 4 minutes and 50 seconds between the last sprint of one set and the first sprint of the next set.  I aimed for a stroke rate that was high but controlled, and strove to get all my muscles--arms, legs, torso--firing in unison.  Most of the sprints felt reasonably smooth, but with all kinds of tiny imperfections.

I did my sprints in the northern half of the harbor, and the two pelicans were nowhere to be seen.  I hope they're in good health and they've simply resumed their northward migration.

Yesterday morning it was cool and breezy again, but the sun was out.  Since I began Maks's program the usual pattern has been to have an easy session Saturday morning and a harder one Saturday afternoon, and that was the case once more yesterday.  In the morning I paddled a "calm" 40 minutes.  I paddled to the mouth of the harbor and then up the Mississippi most of the way to the Hernando DeSoto Bridge before coming back.  As always I tried to take good strokes, and I also tried to savor the chance to paddle without a lot of technical stuff to think about.

By yesterday afternoon it had warmed up to around 60 degrees.  The wind was still blowing, but after giving it a minute of thought on the dock I decided to ditch my pogies.  Once I was in the boat, it was time to get down to business.  The workout was two sets of (8 times 1 minute on/1 minute off at 60 strokes per minute and 8 times 1 minute on/2 minutes off at 80 spm).  All pieces were to be done with "high power" on each stroke.  Maks described it as "a technical albeit hard workout designed to make you feel the stroke power more and more."  A few pieces in I was breathing somewhat hard, but it was more a muscle exercise.  I held up pretty well but could feel my power fading by the last two 80 spm pieces.  It was a long session--the workout took 80 minutes, plus 10 minutes for warm-up and 10 minutes for cool-down.  I went home dead-dog tired, and as I fixed supper and wound down for the evening I was feeling huge fatigue in my upper torso.

Mother Nature teased out a little bit more nice weather today with sunshine, a light southerly wind, and a high in the 60s.  This morning I did a "calm" 90-minute paddle during which I visited some parts of the Mississippi River I hadn't been to in a while.  At 27.9 feet on the Memphis gauge the river is the highest it's been since last summer, and over on the Arkansas side it's possible to paddle in areas that were dry for most of the fall and winter.  I crossed the river and paddled up into the lower reaches of the Loosahatchie Chute before heading back.

Maks told me to paddle at 60ish spm, and "just glide and make sure you don't forget about the technical aspects of paddling."  Maintaining a stroke rate around 60 has become easy for me in the harbor, but paddling up the Mississippi I had to concentrate more because I tend to want to up the rate when paddling against the current.  The same was true as I ferried across the river.  In these places those "technical aspects of paddling" were more important than ever to keep the boat gliding and overcome the river's desire to carry me away to the south.

Over on the Arkansas side I was paddling flooded bottomland with less current to fight, but there were areas of squirrelly water where the river flowed over submerged wing dams.  Balance was tricky there during the long pauses between strokes, and I had to draw on my whitewater experience to position my boat so that every stroke counted.

I returned to the harbor and paddled the last 15 minutes back to the dock feeling a deep fatigue from another fairly hefty week of training.  I'm grateful for a day off tomorrow.  Maks promises an easier plan for this coming week.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

A progress check

On Tuesday I did another variable stroke rate workout in the harbor: four sets of (5 minutes at 64 strokes per minute/4 minutes at 68 spm/3 minutes at 72 spm).  There was a 1-minute break between pieces and 2 minutes between sets.  As usual, I tried to make every stroke a solid one with good mechanics.

The week got off to a chilly start to follow the rainy weekend, with overcast skies and Fahrenheit highs in the 40s.  By Tuesday I was plenty weary of the dreariness.  I was very happy to see the return of some sunshine yesterday.  It's remarkable how big a difference it makes in my enthusiasm for getting down to the river.

Yesterday's workout was eight sets of (250 meters at 80-84 spm with resistance on the boat/2-minute rest/50 meters at a flying start without resistance/2-minute rest).  This was "contrast" training, and Maks told me to strive for the same grip and power without the resistance as with it.  While the workout was a hard one, it wasn't the kind that left me exhausted when it was over.

Once I'd finished the workout I went looking for a pair of North American white pelicans I've seen hanging out in the north end of the harbor for the last week.  My friend Joe, who enjoys studying birds as a hobby, tells me this is the largest bird species on this continent, with a wingspan that can reach 9.5 feet.  My Go Pro camera isn't the best for telephoto shots, but with some cropping I have arrived at a low-res photo that at least shows what they look like:

If a super-exhausting workout was what I wanted, then Maks delivered for today with a time-trial session.  One thing I've learned over the years is that time trials always hurt.

At least I had beautiful weather to do it in: sunny and calm with the temperature on its way to a high in the 70s.  Unfortunately, the harbor was sort of a mess: with the Mississippi River rising fast, the harbor had picked up all kinds of sticks, soda bottles, and other debris that had been on the banks.  All this stuff was now floating in the middle, providing me with an obstacle course.

I did a long warmup, including several 8-stroke sprints, from the marina to the harbor's mouth.  The workout was a pair of timed 2000-meter pieces, and once my boat was pointed back north I was off.  Maks had said the pieces should be done in the "A2" (75-90 spm) range.  At first I aimed for 86-88 spm, but after a minute or so I realized that 80-84 spm was more the kind of intensity I could handle for 2000 meters.  I was breathing hard in no time.  As I passed the 1000-meter mark in 5:06, I wondered how anybody in this world is able to cover that distance a minute and a half faster.

I spent the second half of the piece, and especially the last 500 meters, struggling to keep my form together.  I figured I had to be slowing down some, but as it turned out I completed the second half almost exactly as fast as the first: my time was 10:13.  I was in some considerable agony and I wondered if I had a second 2000 meters in me at all.  My instructions were to start the second piece 18 minutes after starting the first, so I had almost eight minutes to settle myself down and wrap my mind around the task in front of me.

During the break I decided to lower my stroke rate a little more, into 76-78 spm territory.  As I started the second piece I resolved to stay relaxed and not try to be a superhero.  It was clear that this second 2000 would be slower when I passed 500 meters in about 2:45, but rather than let it rattle me I tried to stay on the target stroke rate and produce a nice even-paced effort.  My split at 1000 meters was 5:18.  As the piece wore on I was definitely holding up better than I had in the first one, and finished with a time of 10:36.

I guess here in the first week of March I shouldn't be surprised that I have more work to do in the fitness department.  But I was a little disappointed that I couldn't even break 5 minutes per 1000 meters.  Last summer I timed myself over 5000 meters for the "virtual" OICK race, and my time that day was 25:12--just over 5:02 per kilometer.  Even then I was thinking I should have averaged under 5:00.

But there will be more opportunities to chase times later.  For now I'll keep doing my workouts and try to get my body ready for when those opportunities come.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Monday photo feature

Richard Savoie of Bayou Des Allemands, Louisiana, competes in the C1 class at the 2011 "Battle On The Bayou" race at Ocean Springs, Mississippi.  Photo by Robbie Capel.

The 2021 edition of this event is scheduled for March 27, if pandemic circumstances permit it.  That's just three weeks from this Saturday, and it'll be my first race of the season and a welcome diversion after all the solitary training through the winter months.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Paddling easy and hard and everything in between

On Friday morning I did a gym session with a new set of exercises, then headed down to the river.

This weekend has featured weather that's pretty typical of late winter and early spring here: rain. It poured down rain in the early hours of Friday, and when I got to the river there was still a steady drizzle falling and a gusty south wind blowing.  I had a speed workout to do, and it's hard to feel speedy in such conditions.  But the reality of any outdoor sport is that you do the best you can with whatever conditions you have.

However, by the time I finished warming up the rain had moved out.  For the next ten minutes after that the wind swirled around so I couldn't tell what direction it was coming from, and then it died down too.  Just like that, I had ideal conditions for some sprinting.

The workout was two sets of (50-meter sprint/2-minute rest/100m sprint/3-minute rest/150m sprint/5-minute rest/100m sprint/3-minute rest/50m sprint/2-minute rest).  Maks didn't say whether to do flying starts or start from rest, so I made the executive decision to start from rest because I hadn't practiced my starts in a long time.  Maks also didn't specify a stroke rate, so I spent the workout searching for the highest rate at which I could paddle smooth and controlled.  Looking back, I think 100-102 strokes per minute might be what I should shoot for.  Because the ratio of rest to work was high, I was rarely breathing hard; however, my arms were feeling like rubber by the last several sprints in the second set.  The new gym exercises I'd just done were part of the reason, I'm sure.

More rain fell overnight and yesterday morning it was overcast and about 52 degrees Fahrenheit.  Down on the riverfront the harbor was smooth as glass.  I did two sets of 5 x (2 minutes at 56 spm/1 minute at 68 spm/1 minute rest).  This was primarily a technical exercise, not particularly taxing.  The harder workout would come in the afternoon.

Strong thunderstorms were in the forecast for the late afternoon, so I tried to get back to the river sooner rather than later.  Conditions were still calm as I started warming up.  The workout was an imposing one, at least on paper: two sets of four 500-meter pieces at 80-84 spm, starting every sixth minute.  I started each piece from rest.  My times were all in the 2:30-2:40 range, so I had 3:20-3:30 of recovery time; I gave myself an additional two minutes between the sets.

Once I'd gotten over the how-much-is-this-gonna-hurt jitters, the workout turned out to be reasonably enjoyable.  After doing the first couple of 500s around 2:39, I started looking for ways to go faster, which mostly meant putting more power into each stroke while being careful to stay in the specified stroke-rate range.  My last piece was my fastest, at 2:30.

Some thunder and lightning moved in during the break between sets, and I kept an eye on my watch after each lightning flash.  According to the conventional wisdom that thunder travels a mile in five seconds, the lightning was always at least a mile away, though a couple of times it was only just.  I did my last two 500s in a hard drizzle, and by the time I'd finished my cool-down paddle back to the dock it had grown into a downpour.  I was happy to get home and jump in a hot shower.

More thunderstorms were in the forecast for today.  A check of the Internet radar showed that I had time to paddle this morning before they arrived.  I went down to the river and paddled in some intermittent drizzle but nothing too oppressive.  The temperature was around 70 degrees Fahrenheit--warm air ahead of the storm front.  The workout was four sets of (6 minutes at 60 spm/4 minutes at 64 spm/3 minutes at 68 spm/2 minutes at 72 spm).  There was 1 minute recovery between pieces and 2 minutes between sets.  This was a longer endurance session and my biggest challenge was pushing through the muscle fatigue accumulated through the last few days.

And... this long training week has come to an end at last.  I'm beat to the socks and plan to make the most of my day off tomorrow before starting something new on Tuesday.

After flowing below 10 feet on the Memphis gauge for most of the fall and winter, the Mississippi River is on a big rise as a result of all the snow and ice and rain that have fallen in its watershed over the last couple of weeks.  When I paddled Friday morning it was at 11.5 feet, and by this morning it had risen to 15.3.  It's forecast to rise to 30 feet over the next couple of weeks, and I expect that figure to be revised upward once today's storm system moves into the Tennessee and Ohio basins.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

A new gym routine

It's time for something new in the gym (aka my living room).  Here's what I plan to do for the next while:

1.  Ab crunches with a Smart Bell

2.  Combination cleans & military press

3.  Stability ball back extension (demonstrated by Lindsey at 1:15 of this video)

4.  Lunges with dumbbells

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.

Back with a vengeance

I woke up Monday morning feeling some soreness in my arms.  I guess paddling on Sunday caught my body off guard after eight days out of the boat.

The harbor was showing signs of thawing by Monday, but it was still nowhere near paddleable, so again I went up to the north end of Mud Island to find some liquid water.  I paddled up the Wolf River and found it almost completely ice-free.

Monday is usually a day off for me, but this week Maks gave me a Monday workout to make up for the long break.  He made it a hard one, too--you might even say it was 90-proof!  It was three sets of four 90-second pieces at 90 strokes per minute with 90 seconds recovery.  The middle set was to be done with "little resistance" (I made it a single golf whiffle ball tied to the hull), the first and third sets with no resistance.

After so many low-stroke-rate workouts, 90 spm was a shock to the system.  It was downright brutal with the resistance on my boat; one thing I've noticed about paddling with resistance is that it's hard not to paddle with a low stroke rate.  I sort of wondered whether my one whiffle ball was more than what Maks considers "little resistance," especially in combination with the snowmelt-swollen Wolf River current I was paddling against.  I did the last three pieces coming back down the Wolf, and they were noticeably less stressful than the previous nine had been.

Tuesday morning I was expecting to do another session at the alternate training site, but when I got downtown I was pleasantly surprised to find the harbor nearly ice-free.  While it was fun to paddle in a different place for a couple of days, the novelty was wearing off fast, due largely to the hassle of moving my boat on and off the car and not having the familiar environs of the dock as my staging area.  I'm quite aware that I'm spoiled--many paddlers do all their workouts transporting the boat to and from the water, after all.  But I was very happy to return to my cushy home base just the same.  And of course I am paying for the privilege.

Tuesday's workout was less intense than Monday's in terms of stroke rate, but I thought it was ultimately just as tiring.  I did four sets of (5 minutes at 64 spm/2 minutes at 76 spm/3 minutes at 64 spm/2 minutes at 76 spm).  It was quite an endurance session to do on top of Monday's hard workout.

Yesterday's workout was six sets of (4 minutes at 72 spm with resistance on the boat/3 minutes rest/2 minutes at 56 spm without resistance, but at maximum power/3 minutes rest).  Maks said to "feel the power on the blade with resistance, and try feeling the same power without it while on a lower stroke rate."  I did indeed notice the power in both cases.  The workout turned out to be not as taxing as the previous couple, though fatigue was setting in by the fifth set.  I could feel my power leaving me in the final 56-spm piece, just like Superman feels when he opens a package of Kryptonite that Lex Luthor has sent him in the mail.

The weather for the first half of the week was a very nice change from the ten straight days of sub-freezing temperatures we'd had.  The skies were mostly sunny and the temperature rose into the mid 60s on the Fahrenheit thermometer.  A front came though last night and today was not so lovely--mostly cloudy with a north wind and a high in the 50s.  But it's still a lot nicer than what we had last week.

Today's session was a "strong" 60 minutes in what Maks calls the "A1" stroke-rate range (less than 75 spm, more or less).  Maks added a note that this was "to clear your head and make those lungs work a bit ;)."  Of course, Maks well knew that my lungs had been working plenty... hence the little "winky face."  Anyway, it felt good just to go out and paddle without any intervals or any technical stuff to think about beyond general stroke form.  I believe that my stroke rate for my normal cruising pace has gone down a bit: back in December I measured it at about 72 spm, but today it rarely exceeded 68 spm, and today's paddle was a bit harder than a casual cruise.

Whew... this is a long week.  And the weekend promises more exhaustion, with five sessions (gym session included) in three days.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.