MRRA Thoroughbred (blog)

April 14th, day two of a national holiday known as Club Day (ok… it’s not a holiday), where Eastern Mountain Sports offers discounts and events for those involved in outdoor clubs in New England. MRRA is a club, and our activities happen outdoors. So club day really upgrades our apps… if you will. Get it? High tech, interweb age metaphor. Anyways, I digress.

If you were omniscient, you would have known that EMS in Peterborough was having a 5k (or… in some cases, maybe even 11 mile?) run, an erg-a-thon/erg race (complete with Concept2′s big screen race software), and the Shoot the Loop bicycle time trial on the 14th. With none of us, unfortunately, being omniscient, we learned about the erg race and decided it was worth a trip … and the deal was sweetened when we found out that there would be a bicycle time trial shortly thereafter. Had we known about the run in the morning, as well, we would have made it a full day of suffering.

We showed up with a plan to race twice on the erg – an individual event, and a 4 man 2000m relay. When we arrived, we realized that it wasn’t going to be as densely populated with competitors as we thought. We learned this when we witnessed a very enthusiastic member of Lake Sunappee rowing club recruiting, with some success, passerby to learn how to row so that they could race 4 minutes later. Initial game plan was for Jason to race and win the Masters 1k, for me to race and win the Open 1k, and for Mike to race and win the 2500m EXTREME CHALLENGE. Scott’s plan was to save his sapling legs for the time trial, but to join our relay team if a relay race materialized.

The Masters event went first, and Jason drilled a 1:33.2 pace for a 1k – winning by a good 40 seconds. After bathing himself in lactate he wasn’t all that keen on doing the relay race. I would later see the wisdom in his thinking.

Mike and I, realizing that there was nobody around to really race, decided to go head to head for 1k – while enthusiastic lady recruited two runners (one of whom was 12 years old) who just finished the 5k.. (the 12 year old may have, accidentally or consciously run 11 miles… making Mike and I feel soft) to join us. I was viewing this as my opportunity to stick one to Mike, after the winter that he just spent nursing his delicate flower of a spine (while I nourished my cyborg-trebuchet spine and my trash compactor legs, for the record). Also, before the race, I paid Julie to comment on how thin Mike was looking – to get into his head a bit. She called him lean, but unfortunately stopped short of asking him to maybe go see a doctor. It may have worked, though, because immediately following the comment Mike started started changing his strategy from 1:30 pace to maybe 1:32s.

Attention, go… blah blah blah — Mike and I are trading blows, and the runners quickly fell back. For about 750 meters, the computer racing system couldn’t register more than a meter between Mike and I. It looked alot like this (only we were way more powerful looking than whoever these jokers are*):

I started to lose my grip on the pace, with about 150 meters to go. The lactate beginning to bathe over my muscles, I found myself locking up. Meanwhile, Mike’s strategy of tapering all winter for this – the world championships of 1k erging – seemed to be paying off. 1 meter, then 2 meters… then 6 meters. I was locking up and praying for the finish line, doing damage control with my split in the last 40 meters. In the end, Mike ended up with 1:32.7 for his average pace, while mine ballooned up with a 1:33.4. Turns out Mike may have taught his legs to compact some trash during the winter months, himself.

I will say that I was absolutely trashed from this effort. Mike looked a bit fresher than I did, I would say. Having turned my circulatory system into a superhighway for metabolic waste, I was wondering whose idea it was to do a time trial in less than two hours. In addition, I wondered how Scott’s legs made it through the morning without rowing a single stroke. The self-pity went away as enthusiastic lady showed up with fruit and water for Mike and I to drink.

Blah blah blah — Jokes about Scott hopefully getting the chance to beat someone today —- and we are lining up for the time trial. Scott registered us, and made the mistake of writing my name down third – which meant that I would have Scott and Mike (and one other guy, separating us) on the road ahead of me. I was feeling confident, having won this time trial last year, but was a little nervous about how sharp and aero the guy’s bike in front of me. He also didn’t look like his legs were swimming with metabolic byproduct a little while ago.

Riders were being sent off one by one, and it was windy — with a solid cross wind on the opening straight. It was my turn to go, and I went. I had my eye on the guy in front of me doing the opening hill and could see him not really gaining any ground inside of the first 45 seconds – minute. Then we went around a turn, and he was gone – which was sort of demoralizing.

I am learning that time trials are boring to describe, so to cut to the chase – Mike decided to wear a bright orange, carrot colored Jersey. He also doesn’t own any aero gear for his bike (Scott and I have aerobars and aero helmets) … so he was racing “Gonzo” style, to use a term coined by the non-aero event at the Waterville Valley Time Trial. After about 15 minutes, the Gonzo Carrot was on the radar screen – but we were in hills. Mike’s lean frame and trash compactors were neutralizing my aero advantage for the time being, as I was either pacing or slightly gaining on him through the hills. Finally, the hills were done and we were on the headwind section, and I passed Mike. I kept looking up the road to see if I could spot some kit that looked like Scott’s, but to no avail.

So I finished the race. Because of the headwind, and probably also due to having taken the edge of my sword by pulling a 1k, I didn’t feel as trashed after the TT as I typically do. Scott thought I might have caught him, based on how long it took me to hit the finish line after he did. Turns out nobody really caught my time, but I was able to pull it off my Garmin +/- a few seconds. And here are the results:

1. Mark Miller (sharp bike guy…may or may not have been a motorcycle) 33:09
2. Dan Levesque 34:11
3. William Craig 35:23
4. Tim Cotreau 36:05
5. Scott MacLellan 36:28
6. Owen Travers 36:39
7. Jack Bell 37:33
8. Mike Poreba 38:05
…
Of 24 riders.

After some web searching, I found that I went about a minute faster last year (35:15) while Mike went 12 seconds faster last year (37:53). I also found that Mike beat this Owen character last year (39:33). Of course there are a lot of variables, like maybe this guy went Gonzo last year but didn’t this year…or maybe he’s been riding his bike alot. But I think that, also, the 1k probably dulled the sword a bit more than we might have thought.

All in all, great training day and I wish more guys from the club would have come out for the erg or to ride.

Cheers.

Just to clarify, that should be pronounced in the British way — sheszh-yule.

So the horses have been released from their barns, and allowed to roam in the paddock like domesticated stallions — yet we yearn to be free to roam the countryside like the wild mustangs we know ourselves to be in our hearts. Translation: The water is not 50 degrees yet, so while we can row – the launch needs to keep us on a tight leash and we can’t be in a boat smaller than a 4. So it will be a week or two until we can launch our small boat assault on the Merrimac(k) River. At that point, we will battle paddle ourselves into oblivion in 1x’s, 2-s, 2x’s and 4+s (mostly 2-s and 4+s, I’d imagine) until the end of May – then we will begin our showdown to select boats for our summer racing sheszh-yule.

Here are the competitive marks on our calendar:

April 14th: EMS Erg-a-Thon at the Eastern Mountain Sports in Peterborough, NH
May 5th: Waterville Valley Time Trial (cycling)
May 12th: Mayor’s Cup Regatta … Maybe?
June 27th – 29th: US Rowing Elite Nationals
June 29 – July 2: Independence Day Regatta
July 11-15th: US Rowing Club Nationals
August 7-12th: Canadian Henley

[ Mayor's Cup is the same weekend as ECACs, and with 5 UMass Amherst alumni actively rowing with MRRA it might be hard to resist grabbing 3 more to round out an alumni 8 if they have the event. ]

But I digress. Murrah has been hard at work through these winter months preparing for the race season. Rich posted a time, at Crash B’s, that was 2 seconds faster (6:07) than the time he rowed last year – which is, indeed, good form for February. Jason also dropped 8 seconds off his season best from last year, going 6:27 at the B’s. Rich and Mike also set big PRs for the 6k in the fall at the fall Speed Order. In fact, Mike pulled so hard that his entire spine disintegrated and he’s been walking around like a noodle-backed salamander ever since.

Scott also began a project that combined being a noodle-back with weighing 168 lbs. This has thus far contributed to him going uphill quicker than ever on the bike. Now that his noodle-back is becoming a little bit more al dente (if you aren’t following this analogy… read: as his back injury clears up), it will be important to see if he can make his bike wattage come through on the erg.

We have some new and returning rowers on the men’s team, as well. James Duguay returns after a hiatus, bringing with him Harry Campbell – another UMass Amherst Alumni. We have John Rath, a Worcester sculler who was recruited by Paul Berube to take up a single oar with the horsemen of the MRRA. I’d make a Star Trek reference (The Rath of John) if I thought anyone would pick up on it. Too late, just made it. Daniel Brooks is a question mark for the season as he continues to focus on the job search – in the meantime, he hopes he catches a giant tuna off the coast of Gloucester that he can sell to support his rowing habit. We may see some returners, or new faces, once the college season ends later this spring – but as of right now, this is the cast of characters.

A final note: In the coming weeks, please be aware of the new “Doom Den Wall” – where photos of athletes (MRRA or otherwise) that wander into the doom den as a result of a thoroughbred related workout will be posted.

Cheers, and stay tuned for more.

Yeesh, growing a child is tough and time consuming… I have several choices for how I can spend my time that include raising a baby, training, getting things done for work and writing on the interwebs. Unfortunately, I can only choose three of these things – so the ol’ blog has been taking a backseat ride.

There have been some happenings. DTF training sessions are in full effect. We had a nice light one (sarcasm) a few weeks ago. We did a warm up run, a body circuit and an erg. After getting slightly lost on the warm up run, our elapsed running time was 75+ minutes. I was feeling pretty warm. Additionally, I was absolutely suffering from Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS) from a circuit 3 days prior, so I was sloowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww. The circuit and erg were a welcome respite from the pounding on my sore legs.

There was another DTF sesh this past weekend that I did not attend, but my understanding is that it included 4 x 15 minutes on the erg at low ratings.

Next weekend we will have an erg test.

But, anyways, the real reason I wanted to log on here is to bring some new phrases to the vernacular of those that might stumble across the site. They are as follows:

RTSB – When one has a bit of race tummy, due to nerves or some bad meal they ate, and they need to take a very particular type of break from the action. Usually occurs pre-race. If it occurs during race, then it is no longer RTSB… it becomes….

Bunny Tail – When race tummy becomes insurmountable, and a break is not an option, the spandex come to resemble a bunny’s tail.

I’m not really going to go into any further detail about that (use your imagination), but I wanted to record it here in case the term ‘Bunny Tail’ comes into common usage so that I can collect royalties. Actually, Scott will collect them, as I think he coined the term.

*Note: No MRRA sweep oarsman, to my knowledge, has experienced the bunny tail phenomenon. Yet…

Well, racing season is over – sort of.  With today’s 20k ‘Row Down’/'Smack Down’ (depending on who you’re talking to), we won’t be rowing out of the MRRA boathouse anymore this fall.  Richard and Michael will be going to the East Coast Fall Speed Order in the 2- in a few days, so they’ll spend a bit more time on the water this season.  But for most of us, it is now winter training time.  Which is great, because I know that means I’ll spend alot of time training – or at least thinking about training while I type away on this here blog.

The Head of the Charles went pretty well.  We placed 7th in the Championship 4+, ahead of summer rivals Penn AC and NYAC and within striking distance of some of the crews we really wanted to upend.  In fact, 10 seconds separated us from second place and a medal – which was a bit of a disappointment.  We’d been training since last fall with our minds set on winning, despite having absolutely no frame of reference as to what that would require.  We’ll definitely need bigger pistons for our trash compactors to squeak out that 25 seconds that we would need to pull off the W, but that is what winter training is for.

We had a video camera in the boat during the race, and were hoping to post that but it turns out it was pointed at the gray skies until it essentially fell off of Sarah’s head – so we won’t be looking at that.  Fortunately, Carl P – one of the Masters rowers from our club – had our back, and slapped together some footage, which saves me from posting a text only blog entry.

Sarah also has an mp3 of her coxing the race, which I’ll have to get from her and scan for pottymouth.  It might be good to have on the internet so some youngster coxswains can hear how to cox the Charles course like a boss.  It will also be really good to have so that I can put it through autotune, match it up with some Justice techno beats (or the Imperial March from Star Wars) and make some dope remixes.

Look at that determination on our faces.  We were determined to not have a photo on row2k that looked like we just consumed a gross protein shake (or worse) that was now coming out of our nose (see: Stanford).

We were also disappointed that our B four did not get an entry for the Club four at the Charles this year.  We raced the weekend before at the NH Championships (which I believe I wrote about), and we were the bread to an Australian University sandwich in the Men’s open 4+ event.  It had taken us all fall to determine what the fastest B four (and really, A four) lineups were and that was our second four’s first outing in their lineup.  They placed third, 10 seconds behind MacQuarie University – and we finished 40 seconds up on them to place first.  Turned out, MacQuarie University ended up pulling off 6th place in the club four (eighth originally, then the top 2 crews were DQ’d for eligibility violations).  I think with a little bit more time on the water, it would have been reasonable to expect our B four could have placed top 7 in that event as well – and top 5 would not have been a stretch.

MRRA’s Women’s four had a strong showing in the club event, placing 15th and earning an automatic reentry for next year.  We also earned an automatic reentry for the Champ 4 next year.

Well, I really should be working on other things right now.  Stay tuned for shenanigans from our top secret training camp known as DTF.

-tc

We’ve had a bit of a wonky (technical term, meaning ‘full of wonk’) lead up to the Head of the Charles.  First, I caught the sniffles after doing an immunity depleting workout that Jeff concocted.  That was the Monday before last.  We practiced that Tuesday.  Thursday’s practice fell through due to lack of coxswains.  Meanwhile, Richard was taking ill with a case of the sniffles.

So one might think that our spirits may have been down because two of us got sick, but one would be incorrect.  It would be better to describe it as “sick got us”, because the virus that I had has never felt so miserable as it did when it was with me.  I destroyed that virus, and Richard destroyed his too.  I saw Rich, one time, literally chewing something up and spitting it out.  It was green, and by my estimation, it was virus.  I’d imagine he also ate some for breakfast that morning, too.  When the virus had us, it had to call in sick to work and stay in bed because it couldn’t handle how awful we were making it feel.  It wanted soup, but nobody was around to make it – so what ultimately happened is that the virus died.  And I don’t even feel bad about it.  Survival of the fittest.  Darwin, right?  High five, Rich.

Anyways, last weekend we were fortunate enough to go to the Quinsigamond Snake Regatta in Worcester.  WPI was kind enough to loan us a boat.  We raced as an exhibition entry in the 8, because we were disappointed in the low turnout to the NH Championships Regatta in the Men’s Open events (the Open 8 was scratched, as we were the only entry).  As an exhibition entry, and probably the last boat to enter the race, we were rightly given the last bow number – starting after some of the colleges’ novice crews.  We didn’t care – we were only an exhibition entry anyway and were just glad to line eight of our guys up against some of the fastest crews we’ve probably been able to race as MRRA.  So we were content to play Pac Man from the back of the field.

We proceeded to have a pretty terrible-feeling row.  The conditions were tricky – a screaming cross tail that turned into a direct cross inside of the last 2000 meters.  We passed about 6 or 7 boats of 23.  After the race was over, we learned Jason (who was in 5 seat) ripped one of his shoes from his footboard with about 1000 meters to race.  With all of the ballyhoo, we were taking wagers as to how we placed after we got off the water.  I had my money on 6th, while other popular guesses were 5th and 8th.  Turns out we came in 2nd, 16 seconds behind Holy Cross A and 3 seconds ahead of Bates.  Also worth note, 50% of Pornell (the nell) was unable to race due to sniffles, race day tum and some silly thing he calls “work obligations”.

Sunday we raced at the New Hampshire Championships.  The turnout, as mentioned, was disappointing in the open men’s events.  The regatta has an entry cap, and rather than cap events the organizers choose to just let the entries land where they may until the regatta is full.  This year, that meant close to 40 entries in some of the junior events, and like 3 in everything else.  I doubt the men’s sweep program will return to this regatta next year.  We raced our Head of the Charles lineup in the four, and also our B four.  We wanted to place top 2, but the wildcard was an Australian crew from Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia.  They raced the masters event a few events prior, and returned for round two – and looked like they knew their way around an oar.  There was a strong tailwind most of the day, but was dying out by the time our event (the last one of the day) got on the course – and was virtually gone by the end of the race.  Long story short, we placed 1st and 3rd in the open four.  Pretty solid showing, and our B four certainly gained a considerable amount of speed since the Textile to finish 6% off of our time as opposed to 10%.

Tuesday, we rowed in Boston in the morning in a Hudson, wing-rigger four that UMass Amherst is willing to let us borrow for the Head of the Charles.  The row started good, and ended great.  Usually I am not a guy to comment on things that are impossible to feel (like the difference in stiffness of most bike frames, and between some boats), but with the wing there is a marked difference in the feel of the Hudson vs. the decade+ year old Vespoli that we train in.  We did a piece between Weld and Cambridge Boat Club in 4:06, and that was the extent of the hard strokes we took that morning.  We practiced again Tuesday evening, also taking a limited number of hard strokes (which I will not disclose, as it is a secret formula).

Practiced again Thursday.  The row started sort of poorly, as I didn’t look at my oarlock height for about the first 15 minutes of the row and was suffering badly trying to keep my oar off the water.  Saying that I was suffering badly seems to downplay it – I was getting PISSED back there in the bow seat.  I was holding it in, but when we finally stopped to spin I gave myself a choice – look at my rig, or swim back to the dock.  Turns out, I was two spacers lower than normal.  It made a significant difference after I changed it, and the row made the progression to great within the next 5 minutes that passed.

Swing row tomorrow in pairs, and the Head of the Charles on Sunday.  Let’s see if this bold strategy of rowing 2, sometimes 3 days a week will pay dividends in the Championship four event at the Carlos.

-Lesstosterone

After many years of attempting to win the Textile River Regatta, and one silver and two bronze medals to my credit, I finally chalked one up in the ol’ W column.  It didn’t help that Dan Brooks and Mighty Mike Poreba were both much shorter than I was on the day.  But their height notwithstanding, we won the open four – with our teammates in the second boat placing 14th.

Since the Textile, we’ve been busy preparing for the Head of the Charles.  The preparation is going pretty well.  Below you will find a video of a recent training session.  It may not look most rowing training that you’ve ever seen, so let me explain.  In the center of the screen, on the mountain bike, you will find the Championship Four event at the Head of the Charles peacefully pedaling along.  Shortly after the video begins, you will see us (MRRA) approach from the right side of the screen.  I think this is a good approximation of what we intend to do to the event on the day of the race, as well.

That’s it for now.  Leaving for practice.

Sport Graphics: 2011-TX002-706.

Daniel “Blowfish” Brooks