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The Motivation: If not now, then when? Life is too short to stay inactive.
The Challenge: If you are not willing to suffer, then you shouldn't be racing
The Dream: Staying fit and feeling younger day by day!




Showing posts with label aasport. Show all posts
Showing posts with label aasport. Show all posts

19 December 2012

2012 Greek Indoor Rowing Championship - My road to sub 3 minutes race time

2012          

Video: Mens 30-39 2012 Greek IRC
(Me with white t-shirt, next to me standing my coach, Makis, with red jersey)



If there was just one word I would be allowed to pick up to describe the 2012 Greek indoor rowing national event that would be *exhaustion*. And this description doesn't only apply for the race day, but for the whole training season leading to this event. Below, I expose the training stages that allowed me to break the 3 minutes race time. Hope my story below will motivate all those athletes, new to indoor rowing, expand their ambitions.

Preparation
Indoor rowing requires maximum effort to reach a top level performance. The effort required to achieve even the tiniest improvement is significant. When you watch rowing live on the TV you might have noticed that the whole race lasts only a couple of minutes (less than 7 min for a 2000m race and 3 min for a 1000m race). Believe me, for those athletes who target a medal position, racing those few minutes feels endless until the moment they cross the finish line. Both in physical and mental terms.


17 December 2012

Indoor Rowing energy expenditure: How many calories can you burn while on indoor rower?

An excellent calorie calculator, which estimates the amount of calories burned based on your body weight and activity is provided here: http://concept2.co.uk/training/bmr_calculator.
You will be amazed on how many calories can an indoor rower burn!

This is also an excellent way to find out how much training you need to complete to get rid of unnecessary weight!

Notice that indoor rower is a great calorie-burner! Below I quote the results for my body characteristics inputting 3 indoor rowing sessions (note, that I normally execute separately each of those training sessions, but for illustration purposes I've added them together on a single day to outline their calorie expenditure).

Example - Basal Metabolic Rate Calculator(s) for a 105kg active person


The BMR for a 105 kg Male, 30-59 years old, is 2080.5 kcal.

Your energy expenditure for the day (excluding exercise) is your BMR (2080.5) multipled by your activity level (2.0)2080.5 x 2.0 = 4,161.0

Your hourly metabolic rate (HMR) is 2080.5 divided by 24.HMR = 2080.5/24 = 86.7

The training cost in activity of each exercise is calculated as your HMR multiplied by the Physical Activity Ratio of the exercise multiplied by their time in hours. See the Energy Costs page for a table of the different PARs for each pace.

ROWING SESSIONS considered:
Session 1 = 86.7 x 14.2 x (45/60) = 923 kcals (45min at 2:00/500m)
Session 1 = 86.7 x 21 x (8/60) = 243 kcals (8min at 1:45/500m)
Session 1 = 86.7 x 33.6 x (6/60) = 291 kcals (6min at 1:30/500m)

The total energy cost of your day is, therefore 5,618 (that is to say, your overall BMR plus all your exercise sessions).

 

Food Groups

The process outline here is a guide to your energy output and is a good place to start if you are interested in weight management. The other aspect is knowing the calorie balance. Energy is provided by three food groups, carbohydrates, protein and fats. The relative balance between these groups is 60% carbohydrates, 17% protein and 23% fats. Carbohydrates and protein provide 4.3 calories per gram and fat provides 9 calories.

The dietary requirements for a daily output of 5,618 kcals is therefore:
Carbohydrates = 5618.427 multiplied by (60/100) divided by 4.3 = 784.0 grams
Proteins = 5618.427 multiplied by (17/100) divided by 4.3 = 222.1 grams
Fats = 5618.427 multiplied by (23/100) divided by 9 = 143.6 grams

19 August 2012

My indoor rowing gym - a quick presentation!




Demonstrating a 1000m indoor rowing training session. Pace 1:45/500m, 28s/m.

I'm 1.93m tall, 102 kg, 34 YO. I am into indoor rowing for about 3 years now. On the water rowing for about 3 months.

Personal best times:
- 500m: 1:22.3 (training - March 2012)
- 1000m: 3:00.4 (2011 Greek Indoor Rowing Championship, 30-39)
- 2000m: 6:21.1 (2012 BIRC and Euro Open IRC, 30-34 HWT)

Indoor Rower used: Model E with PM4 monitor.
Equipment: Courtesy of AASports, Greece ( http://www.aasport.gr/main/ )
(background music from www.di.fm )

28 March 2012

7th place - 2012 British and Euro Open Indoor Rowing Championship



Scroll at the end of this article to view the official results of the Mens 30-34 HWT Race

Above: 2012 BIRC in Nottingham. Fun pre-race photo shot. What an amazing feeling to compete on my first ever IRC abroad. My dream came true, same for the race time with a PB.

My history
What a great event to be at! My first ever indoor rowing race abroad is something that will stay happily in my memory forever. An event that has motivated me to train harder and target higher expectations with more confidence.

My rowing background started at the beginning of 2009 when I was mainly using the indoor rower for general fitness and during winter time only. Soon though, I realised that the indoor rower, when utilised properly, can offer the best physical conditioning between other gym facilities, more than weight lifting or treadmill running can offer alone. On December of the same year I finished first on the Greek indoor rowing championship and set a new national record. It was that instance when I realised that indoor rowing matches my body shape well.

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