Mistakes are in the past, move on.

Another beautiful day - but this time I stayed indoors.  Fortunately this cold is under control but I can definitely feel the drop in my energy.  During my warm up, my heart rate was higher than it should have been - a sign that I should have listened to my body and stayed in bed a bit longer to rest.  By the time I realized this, it was too late and I was ready to attack the workout with one of my partners in crime, Claire.  Regardless of how I felt physically, it was just so much fun to have someone there to train with meJ.  After the erg we did weights, and from there I chose to take the afternoon off to rest.  Appetite is down, but I know it’ll come back soon – you know how much I love to eat!

It was good timing to take an afternoon off too.  Last night, my cousin from Chile (Maxi) asked me to record a piano song for him and my family down south.  I started playing when I was 6 years old, and since I stopped practicing back in high school I  have played very randomly.  In recent years I have played at my wedding, at a good friend’s wedding, when I have an extra 10 minutes in my week, etc..

As I was practicing for a bit this afternoon, I came to see a very close relationship between rowing and music (and dance too).  There is a beautiful rhythm that you see with rowing (just watch the video below and see how the rowers push with acceleration and come up the slide to prepare for the next stroke in a very melodic way).  And it is no question that rhythm is a critical component of music.

Aside from rhythm, rowing and music are similar in that “mistakes made should be left in the past”.  What I mean by this is the following:

Music: Depending on how skilled you are, when you play a song, you may make an error and play the wrong note…

Rowing: Again, it depends on how skilled you are, but during a race you may catch a small crab or lose balance…

Both of these situations affect the performance, but if it happens, then let it be and move on!  During set practices where you work on skills, you can perfect your technique, but in a race, I know that I am working on just focusing on the present, and if a bad stroke is taken, then let it go and move onto the next one.

You will find many mistakes in my song below (because I am no longer a piano player and am very rough right now), BUT, I keep going.  I will be applying this to my rowingJ.