What Was Your Work Out Today?

Walking - gravel, hilly, and swimming laps.

5k on the elliptical, followed by a full-body lifting day (deadlifts, hack squats, DB press & row, front/side/rear lateral lifts, curls & skullcrushers).

Three days off to travel to a family wedding at Cape Cod. Got back to it today. Basic run progression of ten rounds of 1min jog: 1 min walk. Very hot and humid so I was sweating as if I'd done a 5k threshold run.

Hoping to get in 2 swims, 2 bikes, 2 runs this week, assuming my PT gives me the ok.

Started doing DDP yoga a few weeks ago. I'm so out of shape, every session kicks my butt! Things are coming along, but I'll be glad to get to the point where I have more strength and endurance, lol.

Another Monday Leg person!

Squats, step-ups, leg press, glute press, calf extend

Unexpected cardio in the form of a long hike from parking lot to office, as construction has closed half the normal parking lot so lots of people are being shunted to another location a half mile further away.

Yesterday we went shopping so it was mostly walking. I tried to rest my knee as well as I could and the pain lessened enormously. Today's regular workout consisted solely of stuff I couldn't do because of my back or ankle so I decided to skip it. Apparently everyone was feeling exhausted from saturday's competition.

I did do the gymnastics workout. We did a bunch of beatswings and practiced kipping. While I was physically quite capable of doing it and perfectly understood what I had to do mentally, my heart rate spiked a lot (I don't wear a heart rate monitor but it started beating so fast I felt it) so I came to the conclusion that I'm scared of the movement. It isn't that hard but in my head I can't comprehend how I can do this movement at my weight at all. I'm more scared of breaking my neck falling from the rack than I am at risk of injuring myself beyond a few blisters.
Then I did 12 min of as many quality reps as possible of 5 negative 5-second trx "ring" rows, 10 deadbugs and 7 db bent over row per arm with a 5kg db. The trx is really soft on my hands compared to the bar.

There was one guy there who I hope never to see again. There's one spot on the whole rack that's taped and it's the most coveted spot because it's less harsh on your hands than the other spot. He immediately claimed it for the warming up, which I can respect and accept, I don't own the spot. But he put his band there and did his banded lat pull down and rows (with terrible technique, if I'm being petty) and then for the part where he actually had to hang from the bar, HE WENT TO A DIFFERENT SPOT!! As if that wasn't enough of a slap in the face to everyone there, I was working out next to him and midway through the warmup he stopped doing the pull up stuff from the other spot and went between the tape spot and my spot, essentially taking up 2 spaces ánd still not using the tape! I hate this guy. It has to be either malice or selfish, entitled blindness. Ughhhhhh. Finally after the warmup he went to a different spot and I took the tape spot.

I would never take the tape spot from someone who needs it, though I've taken it from men who are perfectly capable of doing a chest to bar pull up without the tape (after asking first!!!) but th8s guy's behaviour was so bad, I'd rather give the tape spot to the coach who can do several bar muscle ups in a row than let this guy have it. For me the tape makes a huge difference. I can have the best technique in the world, I'm over 120kg so if I don't use the tape my hands will be blistered all over. I really don't think a skinny dude who can do pull ups and WHO ISN'T USING THE SPOT FOR PULL UPS ANYWAY deserves to use it. Our gym is usually really good about excluding people who do more harm than good, there was a guy who got kicked out for telling someone else they were lifting too light, so why is this guy still allowed in?

@MikePfirrman yikes, that's awful. Just takes away any desire to go back to the place or at the very least sparks the impulse to check the schedule every few hours to make sure he didn't sign up for the same class. Definitely good idea to report, I will do that if this happens again.

Most of the guys at our gym are more a danger to themselves because they need to be faster and stronger and fitter than the other guys in the class so they injure themselves more often but 99% of them are totally decent towards everyone else.

It's so cool you get to watch such a great rower!

mtaratoot wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

The terminology is a little squishy around the edges in usage, and maybe a little regional. In the "two oars per person" version, the oars are called "sculls" for sure (in addition to being called "oars", which some would apply more strictly to the "one oar per person" type).

When I row my raft, and if I had a driftboat, I would be the only person rowing, and I would for sure have two OARS. I think the term sculls is associated distinctly with shells, not other kinds of boats that use single bladed propulsion devices with an oarlock as a fulcrum.

mtaratoot wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

The terminology is a little squishy around the edges in usage, and maybe a little regional. In the "two oars per person" version, the oars are called "sculls" for sure (in addition to being called "oars", which some would apply more strictly to the "one oar per person" type).

When I row my raft, and if I had a driftboat, I would be the only person rowing, and I would for sure have two OARS. I think the term sculls is associated distinctly with shells, not other kinds of boats that use single bladed propulsion devices with an oarlock as a fulcrum.

Sure, seems like a reasonable distinction. In context, Mike's clearly talking about the terminology for the kind of rowing I do, though. 🤷‍♀️ I wouldn't undertake to speak for other types unfamiliar to me.

AnnPT77 wrote: »

As a completely irrelevant aside, I joined MFP on 7/25/2015, so it's my 7-year MFP-iversary, I guess. So far, I've logged in every day, which shocks me.

I don't think it's irrelevent. Happy Anniversary! I've logged in everyday since I started 5/14/21 but your really dedicated Ann!!!!

AnnPT77 wrote: »

mtaratoot wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

The terminology is a little squishy around the edges in usage, and maybe a little regional. In the "two oars per person" version, the oars are called "sculls" for sure (in addition to being called "oars", which some would apply more strictly to the "one oar per person" type).

When I row my raft, and if I had a driftboat, I would be the only person rowing, and I would for sure have two OARS. I think the term sculls is associated distinctly with shells, not other kinds of boats that use single bladed propulsion devices with an oarlock as a fulcrum.

Sure, seems like a reasonable distinction. In context, Mike's clearly talking about the terminology for the kind of rowing I do, though. 🤷‍♀️ I wouldn't undertake to speak for other types unfamiliar to me.

Ah. Context! So, perhaps, a scull is a sub-category of oar in the context of rowing those boats that go so fast I really want to get on one.

I presume the shafts on sculls (and oars in the context of rowing shells) are counter-balanced at the handle end. There's so much more length outboard than inboard. Or perhaps the blades and shafts are super light. The sticks I'm used to using are pretty beefy. Some people even use counterweights on those oars. For a couple reasons, I do not. If a counter-balanced oar escapes and either isn't tethered or breaks its tether, the blade might float for a while, but they tend to go away. Also, if an oar comes flying at you, it has more mass and can do more damage. Some people actually want the tethers to break fairly easily. An oar on a tether can catch on rocks and hold a capsized raft so that it can't be recovered easily. Mostly if you pop an oar on a rock, the tether just keeps it near the boat so you can grab it and jam it back in.

mtaratoot wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

mtaratoot wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

The terminology is a little squishy around the edges in usage, and maybe a little regional. In the "two oars per person" version, the oars are called "sculls" for sure (in addition to being called "oars", which some would apply more strictly to the "one oar per person" type).

When I row my raft, and if I had a driftboat, I would be the only person rowing, and I would for sure have two OARS. I think the term sculls is associated distinctly with shells, not other kinds of boats that use single bladed propulsion devices with an oarlock as a fulcrum.

Sure, seems like a reasonable distinction. In context, Mike's clearly talking about the terminology for the kind of rowing I do, though. 🤷‍♀️ I wouldn't undertake to speak for other types unfamiliar to me.

Ah. Context! So, perhaps, a scull is a sub-category of oar in the context of rowing those boats that go so fast I really want to get on one.

I presume the shafts on sculls (and oars in the context of rowing shells) are counter-balanced at the handle end. There's so much more length outboard than inboard. Or perhaps the blades and shafts are super light. The sticks I'm used to using are pretty beefy. Some people even use counterweights on those oars. For a couple reasons, I do not. If a counter-balanced oar escapes and either isn't tethered or breaks its tether, the blade might float for a while, but they tend to go away. Also, if an oar comes flying at you, it has more mass and can do more damage. Some people actually want the tethers to break fairly easily. An oar on a tether can catch on rocks and hold a capsized raft so that it can't be recovered easily. Mostly if you pop an oar on a rock, the tether just keeps it near the boat so you can grab it and jam it back in.

I don't know enough about oar design to say smart things, honestly. The modern oars (in my sport) are very light for their size, much of them made of carbon fiber. If you want to geek out on technical details, the Concept 2 site is bonzer:

https://www.concept2.com/oars

They're one of the top oar manufacturers, not just a rowing machine manufacturer. (I'm not affiliated with them, except as a consumer.)

The newer sculls can weight around 3 pounds each. Length varies a bit, maybe 9 feet. Sweeps (the one oar per person variant) are longer by a couple feet, so a little heavier. They sculls are designed so that when the oar is in the oarlock, properly positioned, properly rigged boat, the blade sits with its top edge just at the water's surface, and the left handle is very slightly higher than the right (US). (Sweeps sit similarly automatically through engineering, but of course no "left over right" thing going on.)

On rowing shells (of this type), the oarlock is pretty solidly locked. There's a gate at the top of the oarlock that fits into place, then there's a knurled, threaded knob that screws down to encircle a collar-ish piece and hold the oar in place. They can come out during flips or whatever, but it takes a lot. (One of my friends broke a rib catching a crab in bow of an 8, a sweep boat. Crabs also literally eject rowers from the boat sometimes, depending on the angles of occurrence (rare, but often enough to be well known. The oar generally stays attached to the oarlock, through all of that.)

For non-rowers, "catching a crab" is a thing where the oar blade gets sucked into the water when the boat is moving; the boat's momentum carries the blade under the boat and away from the rower, the shaft/handle drives back toward the rower with the force of the boat's momentum. Most crabs are minor, just disruptive to rhythm . . . but sometimes the rower must/can duck under the shaft with a quick layback, sometimes it hits the body and causes injuries, sometimes it hits at a rising angle and ejects the rower into the air/water (yes, depending on where they are in the boat, they're then at risk in the water of other rowers' blades hitting them). There are various things that can trigger a crab, but it's usually some (geometrically minor) problem in bladework, such as not having the blade fully squared up when it goes into the water. There are videos of "ejector crabs" on YouTube if anyone thinks I'm making this up. I saw one happen at Big Ten Championships one year, even.

To the bolded: Mine doesn't go very fast, though admittedly much faster than I could go in a fast canoe or kayak via only self-power. One needs to reach a certain level of technique before reaching even one's own personal level of "fast", of course. Like your water-sports, it's pretty technical. I'd say more technical, just to do the basic thing in easy conditions, as compared with canoeing/kayaking in easy conditions. (You know, others may not, that I also canoe and kayak, just not much of either in recent years.)

AnnPT77 wrote: »

The newer sculls can weight around 3 pounds each. Length varies a bit, maybe 9 feet. Sweeps (the one oar per person variant) are longer by a couple feet, so a little heavier. They sculls are designed so that when the oar is in the oarlock, properly positioned, properly rigged boat, the blade sits with its top edge just at the water's surface, and the left handle is very slightly higher than the right (US). (Sweeps sit similarly automatically through engineering, but of course no "left over right" thing going on.)

On rowing shells (of this type), the oarlock is pretty solidly locked. There's a gate at the top of the oarlock that fits into place, then there's a knurled, threaded knob that screws down to encircle a collar-ish piece and hold the oar in place. They can come out during flips or whatever, but it takes a lot. (One of my friends broke a rib catching a crab in bow of an 8, a sweep boat. Crabs also literally eject rowers from the boat sometimes, depending on the angles of occurrence (rare, but often enough to be well known. The oar generally stays attached to the oarlock, through all of that.)

My 9.5' oar shafts weigh four pounds or so, and the blades weigh another 3.5 pounds. They are glass/carbon composite.

If ordered with counterweights, the counterweight is four pounds. I think that's too much. The idea is to have them balanced at the oarlock. We set oar length up depending on boat width, seat height, and oar tower height/angle. Folks try to set up so about 2/3 of the oar is outboard of the tubes and 1/3 inside. Some people use pins and clips rather than oarlocks. Advantage is you always know where your blade angle is. You will never "miss" a stroke. Some people call them "training wheels," but the Class V catarafters in Idaho tend towards pins and clips. I like open oars so I can feather and I can pull the oar in if I have to. I WANT them to pop out if I hit something hard because the other option is that they break.

I think my bent-shaft flatwater canoe paddle weights 13 ounces. My whitewater canoe paddle is twice that. My whitewater kayak paddle is about three times the weight of that little bent shaft.

@mtaratoot, I'm going to stop here with this subthread, since it's off-topic to this thread pretty big time.

Last comment: If you've never seen a forcola, the oarlock-equivalent on a gondola and like craft, you should Google it. (Yes, gondolas are rowed, not poled.) A member used to keep a sandolo (similar boat type, smaller than gondola) in our boathouse, and I was able to row it a couple of times. It. is. not. easy. . . . and part of the difficulty is the open nature of the forcola (which also looks like a beautiful abstract sculpture!).

Brief (because I have a call planned shortly), did supersets in the AM again and then 8 X 500m row w/ one minute recovery (very hard with that short of recovery). 1:58.0 average, a .5 second improvement from last week, but this was MUCH cooler today so that was to be expected. Last week was like 102 at lunch and today was 85. Like night and day.