"But the bed is more comfortable than pain!"

You are warm in your bed, with your body limp and heart beating at 39 beats per minute.  What could possibly make you get out of bed before sunrise (other than work)? For me, it’s pretty obvious… rowingJ.

However, it was incredibly tempting to get back into bed this morning, especially when my location for training was right next door in my living room!  So while my husband continued to sleep, I got up, ate some food and got started with my warm up.  My workout was going to take 2 hours in the morning, so I had to get up early enough so that I had time to get ready for work and then head out to the office.

I knew this was going to be a tough week.  When I got my workout schedule, I noticed that it was DOUBLE the volume of last week.  All the workouts I did last week that I thought were hard on their own (as just one set), were DOUBLED for this week.  So as an example, instead of just doing 1x30minute pyramid, I had to do 2 x 30minute pyramids.  One alone is incredibly intense with the splits I have to hold and at the low stroke rates, so to do two of them made me a little nervous. 

So this morning, my workout was as I expected: tough as nails!  I was halfway through my first one when my husband got up, and he saw that I was already drenched in my own sweat, grunting for every stroke to get the split I needed to hold.  Soon enough, the first set was done…then shortly after, I was off again to start my second set.  Although I didn’t hit my splits, I worked hard for every stroke and stayed true to what I could do (no letting up).  I was excited to have my cold smoothie when I finished, yumJ.

After work, I headed to the rowing club and did my 80 minutes of strength training and then 45 minutes of erging.  To put it simply – I am now wiped out and ready for bed!  That’s why I will have to be very aware of my food intake and sleep this week (aiming to get 8 hours a night – super excited!).

Since I was solo today in my training, I made sure I had my visualization poster and music handy.  I also focused a lot on motivational cues that would help me get through my workouts successfully.

Cues can come in the form of words, phrases, sounds and acronyms.  If you’re an athlete, you most likely have a number of cue words you use in your sport.

Here are some that I have come across:

-          I am strong (this is positive self talk)

-          I am committed to each stride (running), stroke (rowing), etc

-          Drive (common in rowing)

-          Sit up

-          Relax

You can probably find some songs that have great cue words in them too.  Below is an old dance song from the 90’s, as well as some of the lyrics that I focus in on:  “your body is moving you on” and “you know that you gotta go on”.

Night:)

Technique now, Power later.

Some friendly advice:

If you are a very active athlete (men included, but mostly for females), go get a blood test to make sure your iron levels are good.  I found out that the reason I have been so tired is because I have been anemic for the past couple of weeks (level of 4ng/ml).  A lot of athletic women are prone to this.  So just be aware of your body’s needsJ.

http://www.pponline.co.uk/encyc/female-athletes-and-iron-deficiency-anaemia-752

That being said, today is the first day in a while that my energy has been normal and I’ve been able to get through a day without feeling completely exhausted.  It honestly feels like a new life has been given to me – thank you iron pillsJ.  I ended up having so much energy, that I did an hour run, did my erg workout, did a strength training session with my teammate Claire, AND went shopping for 2 hours:S  The last activity was a bit dangerous, but nevertheless…fun!

So today for my erg workout, I did a 3000m distance at stroke rate 20.  My average was 1:59.8/500m and I ended up negative splitting the piece which was nice to see for once.  It’s workouts like these where I see that I’m on the right path to pulling faster scores in the next round of erg testing.  It was a more technical erg, and I focused on keeping my shoulders down (not scrunching them up as I usually do when I get tired).  The technical part needs to be so good that when it comes to testing, one can just focus on pure power applicable and be strong enough to hold good technique for the duration of the test.   So this is why I’m putting such a huge emphasis on strength training and technique, and I know that this is not only for rowing, but can be instrumental for being a successful runner, cyclist, swimmer…and shopperJ.

Sometimes, just being incredibly strong (with terrible technique) can lead to winning races, but as a lightweight sculler, I have the same weight as my competitors, so technique does have more of an affect on how well I can perform.

I want to leave you with these videos that focus in on technique:

The rowing video above shows Katrin Rutschow-Stomporowski (last names sounds familiar because she was married to my coach Bernhard) completely take control of the race after the first 500m.  Since her technique is flawless, she looks like she is easily rowing through her competition.

Sit up, relax, and GO!

Ping pong is NOT the same as Baseball!

That is pretty obvious isn’t it?!  Apparently not to me.

Today was a slower day at the office because of American Thanksgiving, so I actually had a few minutes to spare and took a break to play ping pong (we have a table in our cafeteria).  It was FUN!

But I am clearly not a racket player…I started by treating the ball like it was a baseball!  I’m surprised I didn’t take out my colleague’s eye, even though that could have helped me win (he crushed me all four roundsL).  Crush means the score was 21 (him) to 4 (me).  Even that score is probably being generous.

While playing, I got my adrenalin going, and I was moving left…then right…then back..then forward…then...AHH.  Start again!  It was really great, and not as easy as I assumed.  Never assume because it makes an “assume” out of “assume” and “assume”.

It reminded me of the awesome core workouts I was doing this week – balancing on a piece of thin wood while throwing a medicine ball back and forth with a teammate.  It wasn’t nice throwing, but rather it was aggressive throwing.  Every throw we would try to make the other person fall off their piece of wood.  Since this is an area that I have to develop, I pretty much fell off each time (but not for longJ).

Being able to react effectively in a sport is important: whether it’s ping pong, medicine ball throwing, running, or rowing.

Rowing is sport where I go from point A to point B, so why do I need to learn how to “react effectively”?

It’s because there are factors around me that I can’t control, and they may throw me off balance, challenge my technique, and affect my performance if I am not well equipped.  These factors include wind, waves, BUOYS (they need to be on the course, but it would be great if they could stay away from my oars!), and even rain (makes the handles a little slippery).

When rowing down a race course, I can’t control if there is a cross wind and it throws me off balance (forcing my oar to hit the water earlier than planned).  However, if I am able to maintain my strong rowing position, react with calmness and confidence, then I will win the point of that match – not the wind!

Today I didn’t win any matches, but tomorrow is a new dayJ 

Play Ball!

The beat that keeps me going

Toronto hasn’t been hit with snow (yet), but winter has started in other cities around Canada and people are starting to shovel their driveways!

What does this mean for most athletes (runners, cyclists, rowers)?  It means that cross training has begun!  For a rower, cross training is performed on the erg, tank or rowperfect.  But if you’re lucky, you can fly out to British Columbia to train on the water all year longJ. 

When training indoors, I’ve seen that it’s a common practice to listen to music.  Truthfully I don’t know how I would get through some of my long erg workouts (1 to 2 hour sessions at a time) without listening to music.  Everyone has different taste though, so I’m very lucky that my teammates and I can listen to the same type of music and feel energized by it.  In general, anything with a beat will keep my happy, but I do like it when it’s my specific taste in music.

Even when I used to train for triathlons, I would put my music on loud to help get me through my hours of training on the bike (set up indoors on a bike trainer).  Sometimes it’s hard to get motivated to train in the winter, especially in the evening because there is no sun shining through the windows and it’s already dark by the time I get home after work - I feel like I should be going to sleep already!

So my question today is…can music help performance?  I’ve never seen athletes use their ipod’s during competition. I can see how it can be distracting with breathing – I have developed cramps before from breathing to the rhythm of my music instead of the rhythm of my stroke:S  But it’s a common practice, - I do it, and I know others do it too.  So what are the effects?

I looked at some articles and found this:

-          According to an article from 2008 in the “The Time of London”, music can:

o   Distract an athlete from fatigue

o   Act as a mood altering catalyst

o   Synchronize an athlete’s rhythm

o   Act as a trigger for learning certain motions and aid with muscle memory

-          BBC News (Health) also covered this topic.  See link below (there’s also the image of a rowerJ):

 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-10767128

Here are songs that are found on my playlist:

Levels, by Avicci

C'Mon, by Tiesto ft Busta Rhymes

We're All No One, by Nervo ft Afrojack

Raise Your Weapon, by Deadmau5

So Sick, by Neyo (slower, but I like the beat)

I'm Sexy And I Know It, by LMFAO

We Found Love, Rhianna ft Calvin Harris

Calabria, by Enur ft Natasja

Happy Thanksgiving to those in the US

Well, today I found out that I will not be invited to the development camp or considered for provincial funding - my erg scores are not fast enough yet, regardless of how I did at Nationals and previous time trial regattas.

It is what it is, and I welcome the challenge to put in more quality work into my training so that I can really bring those erg scores down.  So far this week I have started to address this with some really great workouts: a mix of erg sessions and strength training exercises, plus Zumba as a new addition to my routine.  On the erg I am working on power per stroke, so I think this focus will help bring my erging confidence to the next level.

On another note, at work today I came across a number of colleagues who were taking off for the long week-end, since it's American Thanksgiving.  It made me realize that it's important to be thankful for what I have, not just when it's Thanksgiving, but everyday!  It is easy to get caught up in the craziness of life.  Step back for a second and look at your life.  Do you have anything to be thankful for?  I am thankful for so much, but most importantly I am thankful for having such an amazing family, group of friends and husband.  I am also thankful for the opportunities I have been given at work to build my career, and the time I have to row (my secret therapy, haha).

 

Take some time to think about what you're thankful for:)

Long week comes to an end.

Done!  5 erg tests completed. It was a tough week to get through but it is such a great feeling to be done.  I think I felt the pressure of work and training add up the most in this past week, and this is probably why I became so incredibly tired over the week-end…sleeping a lot more than usual and trying to conserve my energy by staying home and resting (sleeping) once I was back from an AMAZING trip to NiagaraJ.

I was reminded of a couple of really important things this week:

-          Warming up and warming down before/after a workout is very important (for example, a warm up can include some general cycling/erging/running, with some bursts of power movements and dynamic movements like squat jumps, carioca, inch warm and more)

-          Core strength is fundamental to proper technique (for various sports!).  I noticed this about myself and also had teammates tell me how terrible I looked when I erged:S  As I got tired, my body started to collapse and I wasn’t breathing efficiently or using my legs as well as I could.  So that’s why I’m excited to get started with this next phase of training.  No more weak core!

-          It is so incredibly hard to do a test on your own.  The mind is so powerful and if it’s not ready to do well, then it can get in the way of what your body wants to do, or CAN do! Having a teammate there to help keep rhythm with and remind you that yes “you can do this” goes a long way!

Today I did the 60 minute erg test at a stroke rate 22. I added the image of my results here (my results should be better) because it shows how much the mind and body can disagree, ha!

As you can see, I clearly went out to hard.  I started at a 2:00-2:01 split, when in fact this is my goal for the end of this year, not for now.  Because I went out harder than I should have, I started to struggle after only 20 minutes.  About 40 minutes into the test, I was ready to quit, and I did slow down significantly (I think I came to a short stop), but I kept going because my two amazing teammates (Kathleen and Claire) were both there with me pushing through the same pain and trying to get through this test.  I pushed my monitor back at this point so that the increasing numbers I was seeing in front of me were gone, and instead I could focus on feeling each stroke and rhythm with my teammates.  It helped a lot and surprisingly I was able to hold a better split without the monitor (reminded me again of the Death Crawl video). With pain and struggle comes grunting - something I’ve become well known for, haha.  For the entire second half, one of my teammates and I sounded like tennis players…grunting with passion and making funny faces.  I know I tend to scrunch my face so I’m working on relaxing those muscles. It’s not a time you try and look pretty, that’s for sure.

So the next race to prepare for is the Canadian Indoor Rowing Championships in February.  This afternoon I met with my coach Stani and strength conditioning coach Rory to prepare.  Training for that shall begin tomorrow (after another long sleep)…welcome back to routineJ

Dealing with stress

This week has flown by. Perhaps because there's been one thing to do after the other!  I wouldn't have it any other way though:)

I had, and continue to have, these erg tests (all to be completed by this Sunday), and at work there's been a lot of prep for a big trade show coming up at the end of this month. It's the biggest Radiology trade show in North America, a really great environment to be in as some of the top and smartest Radiologists/Surgeons are there.

So needless to say, this has been a tough week to really put my energy into these tests.  Yesterday I did the 6000m test and got one score (which was a very slight personal best), and tried it again later in the evening around 6:45pm with my teammate Kathleen to see if I could go faster.  She is such one brave woman!!  She did the 6km test with me after only warming up for 5 minutes.  As much as I am not a fan of warming up, I definitely do not recommend this, but in our case we were limited with time as it was getting later and later in the evening, and I just wanted to get my second attempt over with!  In the end, the difference between both results was only 9 seconds, so that made me feel more positive about my fitness.  It is never easy to do a test, I always find myself closing my eyes and grunting by the second half.  But it's been easier to do tests and hard workout back to back since my recovery time has improved.  It's been great since I started drinking Shaklee Physique right after workouts (insert commercial right here, haha).  However if I want to get faster I'll need to really increase my strength, and no power drink can do that for me!  So on Sunday (once all these tests are done), I will begin with my new phase of weight training and keep you posted on progress.  Watch out, here comes the HulkJ.

But I do wonder, how do people cope with stress?  I know my schedule is quite packed, but there are so many people out there that juggle so much more!  It would be great if there was a magic pill (legal), but there isn’t.  I think it’s just important to be aware of your surroundings and know when you need to back off a bit.  I’m guilty of not always knowing when to back off, but I’m learning.

Here are some tricks I learned to decrease stress:

-          Do physical activity (boxing I’m sure would be great as an outlet for stress, but I chose to row)

-          When you feel anxious, rub your tummy in a circular motion (I see you all trying it…)

-          Listen to music you love, or in my case play the piano

-          Watch a comedy!  Laughter is one of the BEST ways to decrease stress!

So I wonder what I’m going to do to release some stress tonight….I’m going to go to NIAGARA with my mom and sister, and no doubt we will laugh a lot on our tripJ.  Spending time with them and getting out of the city will be a great way to clear the mind and relax before attempting my 2km erg test tomorrow afternoon:S  Wait!  What test do I speak of?  That’s right, I’m not going to think about it yet.  Going to relax and then focus on it (and rub my tummy) when the time comes tomorrow afternoon.

Here are a few facts about laughter and how it affects your health.  Good music too!

Until next time, relax, laugh and enjoy your Friday night…stress-free!