Deth

I decided today would be the day that I try something stupid. I’ve been wanting to do it for a while but my rowing sucked and I knew it. I had know I wasn’t finishing the pull for years and that I needed to slow the stroke rate down but just couldn’t seem to figure out how to do that. Having it in the mid 30s just isn’t efficient and kills your ability to keep going. It’s not like I can see the stroke rate on the concept2 screen like most people can.

I fixed both by finally reading about rowing without your feet strapped in. That worked wonders for me because if my form wasn’t proper I was falling off the rower. Now I always row strapless unless it’s a true death sprint.

I started out rowing 1000 5 or 6 times a day without feet strapped in and really trying to focus on lowering the stroke rate. It started to get in to the upper 20s then mid 20s and now my strokes per minute is typically around 20.

After that I started rowing 5ks then 10 ks or a half and hour at a time but never more than that.

On this day I woke up and decided it would be the day I try a half marathon. I put music on and sat two bottles of water next to the rower and went.. and went.. and went. It was long and boring and extremely monotonous but I finished in under 2 hours. I definitely felt I under paced it when I finished but the goal was to get through it without having to quit because I went too hard too early. I have zero interest in endurance stuff but this was a goal I’ve had since starting Crossfit and seeing some other people do it. Now I eventually want to try a full marathon.