Welcome to /r/Rowing!

Hi. Complete beginner here. I am currently three weeks out from a 2k test. I have been erging twice a week for the past three/four weeks. One session is a Zone 2/low intensity 2 x 20 min. The other is a Zone 4/high intensity either 4 x 4 min, 3 x 6 min or 4 x 6 min. I am looking to add two more sessions a week to be in the best shape possible for my test. What should they look like? Thanks.

Does anyone has experience with the selling unis 2024 page on Instagram?

I bought a Concept2 in February and completed my first 1 million meters last week (the day before my 42nd birthday). I've mostly been rowing steady state, 8 or 10k at a time without rests, and sprinting the final 1k. Five days per week has been easy to manage (aside from finding the time.) But I'm not especially fast, nor has that been my focus. (I'm the lightest I've been in years, though.)

I'm trying to stay motivated for the next million meters and discovered Pete's Plan(s). Between the standard and beginner plans, what's recommended if I want to get stronger/faster without burning out? My job is already mentally demanding, so sustainability is most important.

I'm leaning toward the beginner plan, but want opinions on if this is just for absolute beginners, and whether people who've tried it were able to stay motivated, stick with it, and get faster.

And let me know if there are other plans you would recommend.

mainly looking at school age rowing

So I joined my schools rowing team this year. I’m a freshman who has been lifting weights on my own for about 2 years now. I currently stand at around 5’9 with a weight of 175Lbs. 5k season just ended and 2K season is up next. I went ahead and did my first 2K today on my own. Here was my finishing time. I ended the 2K at around 7:20. Again, I have only been rowing for a half a semester. Any tips or workouts anyone recommends? How’d I do for my first 2K? Feedback is greatly appreciated!!

20M 6ft 174lbs novice

Fastest 2k 7:36.4 @189lbs (rate cap 28 first 1500, open final 500) Most recent 2k 7:55.6 @174lbs (absolutely terrible. Worst 2k ever pulled. Need to work on pacing, staying focused, and pulling harder).

I have around 8mo to a year to meet my goals (Sub 6:30 by next year) and I’ve been a rower for about 2 months now. I’m not sure how realistic my goals are, but if it’s possible, I’m willing to put in the work.

I know I need to work on:

• Getting my weight back up (lost 15lbs unintentionally in a little over a month)
• Increasing cardio & endurance (steady state)
• Strength training
• Diet & recovery

Any specifics though? Any tips that helped you all improve?

More context: I take concerta daily to help with my adhd. Quit smoking since starting to row. Resting HR went from 80/90 on average to 50/60. I’ve made pretty good progress I feel, but I want to keep on going.

Anybody know what speed or pace differences can be expected between rowing a top end racing shell versus some of these recreational or trainer shells/boats, or a coastal rowing boats? Looking for ball park numbers, so like if someone could row a real 2:00 min/500 m pace in a racing shell what might that translate to pace in a more recreational style shell or coastal rower, all things being equal.

I've had this several times on different concept 2 rowers. How do people ruin them so fast?

Hello. I am new to rowing. It is currently autumn where I live, about 14 Celsius degrees outside. What should I be wearing for rowing on the water? I am scared to be cold but I also don’t want to sweat too much because of heat.

Ive recently turned towards rowing as an alternative cardio to diversify my fitness and I'm really beginning to enjoy it and am incredibly happy and proud of the progress I've made. Yesterday I rowed on an erg for 50 minutes (12.5k!) and only stopped due to running out of time. However, I've lost a lot of weight since the last time I used an ERG and this time I wound up with a pressure sore over my tail bone.

What am I doing wrong? I was on a gym machine, do I need a different seat or something like biking shorts? Am I just destined for gluteal discomfort?

With the fall coming to a close, what are we expecting for spring? I think it looks pretty static at the top of D1 this year, but looks like there could be some shakeups after about 9th place.

Darkhorse team for me is Miami, some impressive results at Alabama.

Any early reads on first year head coaches?

I plan on getting a whoop for my birthday in a week and am wondering if it’s worth it for rowing, would I need to keep using my polar belt and does it accurately record recovery etc etc, any advice or experience is appreciated

Need to cut 1 min off 2k by the summer, novice rower. 6ft 145lbs Female 8:45 2k

Rocked up to cross training twenty minutes late this morning, getting yelled at by my parents for 2 hours. I couldn't breathe and was trying to keep the tears in but my coach and me made eye contact and I just broke into a complete panic attack. I ran to the bathroom before she could react, I hope she didn't notice. Any way to escape this situation without bring it to their attention?

Lately I’ve been really interested in rowing and I’ve been getting better. I’m not sure about it but I saw that RowAmerica Rye is located near me so maybe I can join it. Then I realised that it’s 6 practices a week, 2.25 hours each. I don’t know about you but I can barely go on the machine for 20 minutes straight, so how am I going to do 2.25 hours?! Also, I heard that of the 30 people on the team you have to beat ~23 others to earn your spot with the team for the tournaments, meaning that all that practice can go to waste if you don’t get the chance to participate in a tournament. I have never been part of a rowing team before so can someone clear up some of my expectations and such, I just want to know what’s going on and if it’s what are the pros and cons so I can know if it is worth doing.

6’9 250lb monster I feel like he could go at least sub 6 depending on how good he could get his cardio.

Hi everyone,

I'm a novice rower(14f, 5'4, 120) whos just completed their first fall season and I've done a 2k erg test(9:43) and a 4k test(19:18) both w average splits of 2:25. Im a little concerned about my status on the team as my technique is good on water(I've been told im the perfect bow lol), but my erg scores aren't very strong. To row/be considered for the 2v boats next yr I need at least a sub 8:10 2k and sub 22 5k. So I need to drop major time by then.

Im gonna be doing winter training with my team(mostly captain run). We will be training 5/week and the plan is 2 days of erging, 2 days of strength training, and 1 day of recovery(stretching, yoga, etc). I will also probably try to do some extra cardio on the weekends too. I want to be at least sub 9 by the spring(best case scenario somewhere in between 8:20-8:35) but ik dropping 43 seconds is not easy at all. The spring season should also bring some improvements so hopefully by the beggining of the summer im looking at sub 8:30 2k times. In the summer I can't rlly afford the time(or money) for a rowing camp so I will probably sign up for a gym that has a c2 erg. I am kinda confused on what workouts Im gonna do in the summer cause I know theres like steadystate and also sprints and stuff but i'll hopefully figure that out by then.

Im just wondering what the best way to cut this much time is. Like, what should I eat? Should I lose some weight? Bulk up? Summer plan? One thing I've noticed is my mental state during erg tests isn't helping me push to my max so ways to become stronger mentally? Anyways really anything helps.

At my team we have an end of the season race for fun where captains coach the boats and they have themes. What do you think would be a funny theme duo for 2 eights? They don’t have to be related but it would be better if they were.

The temperature is dropping and I was wondering if I need to/what jacket to invest in? I don't necessarily need anything crazy as I row in Cali and was thinking of possibly investing in an Arcteryx shell jacket. Budget isn't necessarily an issue and I would be open to better alternatives/what Arcteryx jacket to even purchase. Thanks!

Hi all! I want to improve my technique on the erg to get more leverage with each stroke, but I'm not sure what to think about to do this. As a drill at my old club, we used to go to the catch and stand up off the footplate to simulate suspension, but I could never do it. I have gotten better about hanging off the handle and pushing down through the footplate through the entire stroke (and already feel like I'm erging more efficiently), but I'm not sure if I'm still missing something since I still can't do the drill. Would appreciate any tips.

Hello! 22F. I recently signed up for rowing classes, my first class will be this Saturday. It is a sport I have always loved looking at and wanted to try for long, so I’m happy to begin soon. I’m just very scared because I am not a very fit person, like I don’t do any cardio nor train at a gym, I only play tennis sometimes for fun with friends.

So I wanted to ask for recommendations of what should I be training besides rowing, so that I can keep up with the classes. I am assuming something cardio-related (running?) and also something to build strength? I don’t want to be a professional athlete, but I’d like to enjoy the sport without running out of breath every 5 minutes, etc. What are your recommendations? Do you have any other general recommendations that you think can be useful for beginners?

Does anyone know roughly how fast you have to be for U23 HP this winter? Just wondering what those athletes are like.

There’s a program I attempted to get into last summer, I needed to get a 7:10 2k by last May. I got 7:09 end of February then got injured a week later, torn meniscus. I was completely out of any exercise until around June, then couldn’t row again until start of August.

I just did my first off the water 2k test since my injury and I got 7:58. During my injury I lost 20 pounds, so my new time goal to qualify for the program is 7:20 if I maintain this weight (which is my goal). It seems that my biggest weakness for this last 2k was my power, my stroke rate averaged 31 (goal is to get back to 33 which is easy by May).

Do you think 7:20 is possible by the start of May? Any tips?

F, 5’11”, 180 pounds

Hi all,

I have been an utterly zealous disciple of the PT4000 stairmaster for basically the last 20 years. I am a "has been" avid skier now husky weekend warrior who wants to make the most of my ski days (including some w my 4 y/o son), so I have naturally focused on a lower extremity heavy workout.

More recently I have started my career in orthopedic surgery and noted an embarrassing deemphasis on the upper body strength that would be very helpful in my career--General shoulder strength particularly deltoid/abduction and particularly endurance.

What I have loved about the stairmaster is putting on ski movies and just zoning out/zoning in. I have tried all sorts of circuit training, multiuse dumbbell weights, sit ups, etc. and I found that anything that stresses my attention span before work and requires me to do anything but "get on and stay on" just plain doesn't happen.

About two weeks ago I was forced to get a budget stair stepper for a different property that requires more user input to motivate higher caloric usage. I've really liked that and naturally the next step toward upper body endurance/fitness useful for orthopedic surgery as well as just some degree of variety that would allow me to get aerobic exercise six or seven days a week (pretty hard to do more than 2 to 3 days in a row on the stairmaster) is a budget (magnetic??) rowing machine.

That said, I have been perusing these forums looking at some ideas to get a 200 or $300 super beginner Magnetic Ergometer/rower Basically to complement use of the stairmaster. I say budget to avoid a huge investment until I'm sure I like the motion, fitness benefit yield, time management aspects, etc. and then consider months down the line maybe upgrading to the unanimous recommendation for a concept-II.

I looked at the forums largely to figure out how to progress in terms of quantitative goals for strokes per minute, duration of workouts, starting resistance, etc. and have found a lot of solid recommendations for mixing up steady state versus interval training. BUT they seem to center around the assumption that users will row five or six days per week, possibly at the expense of things like resistance spaced lower extremity aerobic exercise (e.g. stairmaster). I wonder then if 2-3d/wk is enough to justify getting going in this and if so do I look more toward longer duration steady state or high intensity bursts? (FWIW, likelihood of stairmaster and rower on same day likely near zero honestly...)

All that verbal diarrhea said, can other weekend warrior types (with no aspirations for actually rowing on the water or obsessing over split times) who use an ergometer/rower two or three times per week as a secondary form of exercise to build strength and endurance of the shoulder girdle and upper extremities To complement progressive intensity and duration of stairmaster usage comment on the most effective/efficient suggested resistance/intensity/combination of steady state and sprinting type intervals, both for just starting out and as a goal 6 to 12 weeks down the line?

One thing I haven't really seen despite looking is a suggestion on how to "progress" through durations and intensities over the course of weeks, to safely transition for being a complete novice to a reasonably consistent intermediately skilled weekend warrior type.

So in short: If your goals were to be basically not limited by fitness on a pretty finite number of days per year skiing aggressively inbounds and to be in good cardiac shape with strong high endurance shoulders for being a good orthopedic surgeon, what sort of settings would you start at on a magnetic rower and what would you aspire toward on the rower (2-3 days per week only) to complement getting after it on the stairmaster about three to four days per week?

Or is it unrealistic to think that 2 or 3D/wk is enough to considerably improve upper body/core strength and endurance regardless of settings/how you utilize the machine?

(Physical attributes since it seems from other threads some might ask: I am 37 yo male, 5'8, about 215, desperately trying to eat better--less carbs, more green stuff--and get my ass in gear on the stairmaster to get under 190 for the long haul, intermittently successful maintaining more than 2 to 3 days a week on the stairmaster, currently at about 20-25 minutes at medium settings ~3d/wk on said stairmaster, looking to get toward 30 to 35 minutes on medium to high as a reasonable sustainable workout in conjunction with a rowing program on alternate days).

Thanks in advance!