Category: Rowing

Aikido · Crossfit · cycling · Dancing · fitness · Rowing · sailing · Sat with Nat

Memories of my best fitness times and planning my fitness future

Sam B2 Comments

In thinking about life after knee replacement and planning my fitness life for my sixties, I’m trying to remember my happiest active times.  I’m wondering what aspects of those times it makes sense to think about getting back, as well as what new stuff I want to add.

Sam testing for 5th kyu in Aikido

And, of course, what old stuff I’m ready to give away. I mean, some things are right out of the picture.  That’s running and all sports that involve it,  like soccer.  Other things are back in,  for sure,  like recreational cycling.

But what form does this take in my ideal life?

I’m still reflecting on Tracy’s piece about how turning 60 feels different than turning 50. And part of that,  for Tracy,  seemed to be giving up on a bunch of external fitness should talk. Her interests also changed, and she’s approaching sixty with a more integrated and sustainable approach to fitness.

Writes Tracy,  “When I was approaching my fifties, I had an intensity and focus around my fitness activities that was extremely goal-oriented. I had an eye on one thing and one thing only: the Olympic distance triathlon. Though of course the goal yielded some internal change (mostly in the form of perseverance), the goal itself was external.”

Truth be told,  Tracy’s approach differed in that she had a much more ambitious goal. And she took up more new things than me.  So it’s not a surprise that our attitudes about the difference between 50 and 60 are different.

Me,  I want to get back to some aspects of the life I created leading up to 50. I loved it.  I loved the biking,  the rowing, Aikido,  and CrossFit. By the end of the challenge, I wasn’t so focused on an external goal.  Rather, the fittest by fifty challenge helped me appreciate how much physical activity matters to me and how much it’s part of my version of a good life. I might have started with an external goal–fittest by fifty–but it ended with a real love and appreciation of sport, physical activity, and joyful movement. I knew it was an important part of my life, going into the challenge, but the fittest by fifty challenge helped me appreciate how much it mattered.

My goal for the challenge was the Friends for Life Bike Rally, which I did as part of our challenge, but I did it again in August of 2022, right before my first knee replacement surgery. I don’t think I’ll manage it this year, the year I’m turning 60, but I’ve got 2025 in my sights.  I’d like to do it in my 50th and my 60th year and I’ll still be 60 then.

Fit at Midlife the book on the left,  Tracy and Sam in a publicity photo on the right

So I did keep some of my cycling fitness after the fittest by fifty challenge, and I hope to keep that up for a very long time yet.  So what’s missing for me?

There are four themes that keep coming up when I think about the fitness future I want.

First,  it’s community.  When I think back over my various fitness pursuits,  the best times involve working out with other people.  I think about bike clubs and teams,  my soccer team,  the Aikido dojo,  the rowing club,  and so on.  Even CrossFit’s appeal lay mainly in the community. Soccer, Aikido, rowing, and bike clubs are all team efforts where you work with others. I like that a lot. They’re also all community associations where people are drawn from all walks of life and from all corners of the community. It’s what I like about the Guelph Community Boating Club.

Sam and Sarah racing the snipe at Guelph Lake

Second,  it’s active, outdoor adventure. I love being outside.  I love moving my body.  The combo is perfect.

Two photos of Sam in red shirts in her canoe

Third, it’s intensity. I do my best work in teams and there’s something about the group effort that makes me work harder. Team time trials are one of my favourite kinds of bike races and they’re intense, co-operative efforts. Of course, that’s also true of rowing. I like sports that have intensity built in. I’m not sure what form that will take as I get older, but I still think about one of our earlier blog posts, about aging as a choice. Is Aging a Lifestyle Choice? I talked about Gretchen Reynold’s book on exercise science, The First Twenty Minutes: Surprising Science Reveals How We Can: Exercise Better, Train Smarter, Live Longer, where I was particularly taken with her chapter on aging,

I wrote: “The old view was that muscle loss and a decline in aerobic  capacity were inevitable with old age. We slow down with age and become more frail, starting in our 40s, it seemed. But new research suggests the connections may run the other way. We become slower and more frail because we stop moving. Older athletes get slower and less strong, not because they’re older, but rather because they train less than younger athletes.”

Sam’s bike rally team 2022

Fourth, they’ve involved some element of competition. I’ve never been a serious racer but I like club level competition, in most physical activity that I do. (Obviously that’s lacking in yoga and hiking.) It provides some benchmarking and gives a purpose to training.

So, purposeful training, outdoors, in a community, with intensity, and some competition…that’s where we are so far!

Canberra’s Vikings above,  Dunedin’s Women on Wheels below

What happened to my fitness community? Where did it go?

Well, my knees for one thing. Knee pain led to saying goodbye to running,  soccer,  Aikido and CrossFit. My big move was another. Bye-bye cycling coach and the community of cyclists I rode with in London. And then there was my big new job. That’s a lot.

Also there’s age. In Canada it’s harder to find groups that include older adults. I often think back fondly to my racing days in Australia where the master’s cycling group had an active over-80 group. You needed a doctors note to race after 80. It’s hard to imagine an active group of seniors racing bikes in Canada.

As I try to construct a ‘fitness after sixty’ plan, I’m thinking about activities in three groups–things I’m saying goodbye to, things I’m keeping and new things I want to add.

And I also want to recognize the pieces of the plan that are already in place.  Zwift hits both the community and competition buttons. The Guelph Community Boating Club is very much of the volunteer association model I like.

On the bye list are running,  soccer,  Aikido.

On the keep list are hiking,  cycling,  sailboat racing, yoga, paddling, and weightlifting.

And on the new list are bike packing and dancing. I’m not sure where to put swimming but it’s in there.

Oh, there’s also a fourth category–to pick again after retirement–rowing for sure!

Sled pushing at the gym

Look this is obviously very much a work in progress. Stay tuned!

Also, I’ve been trying for better blog post titles.

Here’s some AI suggested:

1. “Rediscovering Joy: Embracing Fitness After Knee Replacement”

2. “Creating a Vibrant Future: Planning Fitness in Your Sixties”

3. “Reflecting on Active Happiness: Reimagining Fitness After Knee Replacement”

4. “The Next Chapter: Designing a Fulfilling Fitness Journey in Your Sixties”

5. “From Recovery to Revival: Crafting a Dynamic Fitness Routine After Knee Replacement”

Let me know what you think!

cycling · Rowing · running · yoga

What sports do you pair?

Sam B

For Catherine, it’s cycling and kayaking. I’m also a fan of this combo.

Cycling and Kayaking– The Case for Them as Companion Sports
The case for cycling and kayaking as companion sports

In general, I think a number of us on the blog are fans of water based sports. When I first started the fittest-by-fifty challenge, one of my goals was to take up something new and I went for rowing. In this older post I talked about the skills overlap between rowing and cycling.

Row, row, row your boat! (Trying something new)

Kim Solga is another fan of the rowing/cycling combo.

These days for me, during the summer months, there’s a lot of boating and biking–Snipe racing and road bike riding.

Sam and Sarah Race in Snipe Nationals

For many of the bloggers, I think it’s running and yoga that are their favourite pairing.

Yoga for Runners?

How about you? Of all the sports and physical activities that bring you joy, which is your favourite pairing? Let us know in the comments.

Yoga in the park, Scopio
Row, Row, Row My Machine…
ADHD · Rowing

Row, Row, Row My Machine…

Christine Hennebury2 Comments

Gently in the basement. Merrily, merrily, merrily…something that rhymes with basement.

In one of my recent Go Team! posts ‘Make some tweaks‘ I said that I was planning to move my rowing machine up to the living room because my mid-decluttering basement was too distracting. However, soon after I posted it, I realized that there was a more direct way to fix the problem – I shifted the stuff from directly in front of the machine so I didn’t have to see it while I rowed.

A GIF of someone ‘cleaning’ their room by tossing their stuff to one side and then pulling a curtain with an image of a perfectly tidy room ​across in front of the messy pile.
Yeah, kind of like this. Image description: A GIF of someone ‘cleaning’ their room by tossing their stuff to one side and then pulling a curtain with an image of a perfectly tidy room across in front of the messy pile.

It instantly helped.

In fact, as soon as I move the stuff, I hopped on the machine and rowed for a few minutes.

That in itself was a victory and I added to that triumph by deciding to sign up for my free trial of Apple Fitness + that I have been getting reminders of for months.

I watched my first video and rowed along on Monday morning and I LOVED it.

a GIF of cartoon character Bart Simpson single-handedly trying to row a rowboat in a lake. He is only using the oar on one side of the boat while the other oar trails in the water so the boat is just turning in a circle.​
My rowing also didn’t result in a lot of forward movement but I was having a lot more fun than Bart is having here. Image description: a GIF of cartoon character Bart Simpson single-handedly trying to row a rowboat in a lake. He is only using the oar on one side of the boat while the other oar trails in the water so the boat is just turning in a circle.

The instructions were clear, the leader was enthusiastic but not overbearing, and I could easily see (and match) the pace of the rowers in the video, and I felt encouraged to work a little harder than I probably would have on my own.

It gave me a lot of the benefits of being in a group class without actually having to be in a group class – I felt like I had company, the structure was clear and once I had decided on a workout, I didn’t have any more decisions to make during the session. (Unless I had decided not to finish it, of course!)

Of course, I could get a lot of those same things from YouTube videos but going to an exercise-specific app and choosing from a single category felt a lot different than going to YouTube and searching past – and getting distracted by – all kinds of other interesting things to find a video to exercise with.

a GIF of a comic from Slothilda.com - a creature (a sloth perhaps?) wearing a large pink bow and glasses is sitting at a table writing in a notebook while a corgi hops around behind her saying ‘Love me.’ over and over.
All the other videos on YouTube when I am trying to pick a workout video. Image description: a GIF of a comic from Slothilda.com – a creature (a sloth perhaps?) wearing a large pink bow and glasses is sitting at a table writing in a notebook while a corgi hops around behind her saying ‘Love me.’ over and over.

Anything that removes obstacles and reduces my distractions on the way to exercising is a good thing.

And the video itself felt different, even though it was a pre-recorded thing made for a mass audience, it felt much more like a Zoom class or something else that I could join/be part of than just something I was watching and doing on my own. I don’t know what about the video made it feel like that but I liked it.

Yes, I know that I have done this exactly once and I may or may not continue to enjoy it but the fact that my first experience with the program was overwhelmingly positive means I feel drawn to try it again.

And that is definitely a good thing.

And I’m awarding myself a gold star for my efforts.

Feel free to award yourself this gold star for your efforts today, too.

a drawing of a happy-faced​ gold star outlined in green surrounded by green and gold dots.
Image description: a drawing of a happy-faced gold star outlined in green surrounded by green and gold dots.

Blog Interview with Tori Murden McClure (author, athlete, adventurer, and administrator!)
Book Club · Book Reviews · fitness · interview · Rowing

Blog Interview with Tori Murden McClure (author, athlete, adventurer, and administrator!)

Sam B

Tori Murden McClure is an amazing woman.

She was the first woman and the first American to row solo across the Atlantic Ocean, which she did in 1999. She was also the first woman and first American to ski to the South Pole and the first woman to climb the Lewis Nunatak in the Antarctic. (See Wikipedia for more.)

McClure is a university president (Spalding University in Louisville, Kentucky) and the author of A Pearl in the Storm: How I Found My Heart in the Middle of the Ocean.

Here at the blog, we’re in awe. We read the book. We asked for your questions.

And then I got to interview McClure, courtesy of a blog connection. (Thanks Lauren!)

There’s way too much of me audibly agreeing with McClure in this interview. But it’s the blog’s first video interview. We’ll get better. I promise I’ll never say “right” again.

Enjoy!

Book Club · Book Reviews · Rowing

We’re interviewing Tori Murden McClure: Send us your questions!

Sam B

Awhile back I posted about an amazing book I was reading A Pearl in the Storm. It’s a memoir (the subtitle is “How I found my heart in the middle of an ocean”) and an adventure story about rowing solo across the Atlantic. Lots of themes in the book about growing up as young athletic woman in a country and at a time when that wasn’t allowed or encouraged will resonate with readers.

Two updates:

The musical version of the book just opened this summer: “Tori Murden McClure was the first woman – and the first American – to successfully row across the Atlantic Ocean. She succeeded in 1999 after an attempt in 1998 was foiled by a hurricane. Her vessel? A 23 foot rowboat she had built and named the “American Pearl.” The story of her accomplishment has inspired the new musical “Row” – with a book by Daniel Goldstein and music and lyrics by singer-songwriter, Dawn Landes.”

And, drumroll please, Tori Murden McClure has agreed to a blog interview! I’ll be interviewing her at the end of September.

SEND ME YOUR QUESTIONS! I have lots of my own, but I’m also collecting questions for the author (now President of Spalding University). We connected through blog guest and fellow feminist philosopher Lauren Freeman who it turns out is a neighbour of the author. Thanks Lauren!

A Pearl in the Storm: How I Found My Heart in the Middle of the Ocean
A Pearl in the Storm cover
Book Reviews · fitness · Rowing

A Pearl in the Storm, #CurrentlyReading

Sam B1 Comment

In a Pearl in the Storm: How I Found My Heart in the Middle of the Ocean Tori Murden McClure tells the story of rowing across the Atlantic ocean, solo, with no motor and no sail.

I loved her story and I recently found out that she’s the neighbour of a feminist philosopher who reads the blog. I’m going to interview her email and post here so if you have any questions for this remarkable woman, pls send them my way.

There’s a lot to love about the book. I’ve been reading it pretty much non-stop. I love the way she weaves in her life story with her harrowing journey in a very small boat amid some intense weather and big waves. Early chapters also tell the story of McClure’s earlier adventures. She was also the first woman to ski to the South Pole.

Also of note, especially for the academics out there. You might relate to McClure’s discussion of her decision to swap her life boat for books to take on the journey. I also loved the food recommendations she received. If you’re starting in good health, it’s okay to eat like a teenager for 3 months. The peanut M and Ms came on the trip.

I found Tori Murden McClure’s story of growing up defending her disabled brother from abuse at school more harrowing than the tale of rowing across the Atlantic. Parts of that story needed a content warning in a way the rowing adventure did not. The assualt story in Chapter 6 was especially difficult to read.

In a different way it was also hard to read the author’s account of the conflict between her early athleticism and being a girl. I suspect many blog readers will relate.

The book is also soon to be a musical!

See ‘ROW’: A Musical Odyssey Of One Woman’s Solo Boat Trip Across The Atlantic.

Tori Murden McClure, A Pearl in the Storm

You might also enjoy watching the TED talk A song for my hero, the woman who rowed into a hurricane: “Singer-songwriter Dawn Landes tells the story of Tori Murden McClure, who dreamed of rowing across the Atlantic in a small boat — but whose dream was almost capsized by waves the size of a seven-story building. Through video, story and song, Landes imagines the mindset of a woman alone in the midst of the vast ocean. “

Aikido · cycling · fitness · Rowing

The joy of synchronous movement

Sam B1 Comment

I’ve been thinking lately about what I miss most about working out with other people. I mean there’s the obvious social interaction and pleasure in seeing friendly familiar faces. Working out has also been for me one of the places where my life crosses work and educational lines. Aikido was the best for that. But cycling too. And the Y, of course. I got to chat with city bus drivers, emergency service workers, car mechanics, teachers, cooks, and working at home parents. There are more people in the world than university professors! It got me off campus, placed me in a context where I’m not an expert, and I get to chat with people about non-academic stuff. See, I can learn things too. I like connecting with the student side of myself.

Okay, so there’s all that and it’s important.

But there is another thing that I miss and that’s the pure physical pleasure of moving in time with other people.

Aikido is all about moving in harmony with other people. We do basic movements together as warm up, each person doing the same movement at the same time. We also match our movement to our training partners in a way that can feel at its best more like dance than martial arts.

It’s also one of the things I love about rowing. When I rowed outside, on the lake, I rowed in a four person boat, in the third spot. I followed the women ahead of me, matched my stroke to theirs. It’s a lot harder and more technical than that but it also just comes down to working together. When we were perfectly synced, we moved quickly and smoothly through the water. Indoors, on the erg, it was a similar thing. We worked on drills together and it was always easier for me if I focused on keeping pace with the other rowers.

It’s true too in cycling. If you’re riding behind someone the easiest thing to do is find a gear that allows you to match their cadence. It’s the best way to ride in group, close behind other people, and avoid running into them without using your brakes.

I’ve been missing that in my Zwift team time trials because you don’t know the other riders’ cadence.

But yesterday I did a YouTube rowing workout and while keeping pace with the workout leader I noticed I was smiling. It makes it easier somehow and more pleasurable.

The pleasure of synchronized activities with other people isn’t just found in sports.

It’s true too in music. That’s part of why singing with other people makes us happy.

Synchronous movements is known to form social bonds across divides. See Moving in sync creates surprisingly social bonds among people. It also just plain and simple makes us feel good. “Many group activities boost our sense of belonging, but research shows that doing things synchronously can build even stronger social ties and create a greater sense of well-being. Crew rowing, line dancing, choir singing or simply tapping fingers in sync increases generosity, trust and tolerance toward others, often beyond effects seen in more disorderly doings. It can even increase people’s threshold for pain.”

When people ask what I miss being physically distant from others, this is one of the things. It took a rowing workout to get me to realize that. Who knows what’s next? Maybe I’ll see if there are any good Aikido basic movement follow along tutorials on YouTube.

People in martial arts wear kneeling outside. Photo by Thao Le Hoang on Unsplash. I can’t kneel any more but I still appreciate the harmony.
equipment · fitness · flexibility · fun · gear · martial arts · Rowing

Rowing, Multitasking, and Positive Side Effects.

Christine Hennebury1 Comment

After years of planning to buy a rowing machine, I finally got one a couple of months back and I am thoroughly enjoying using it. 

I love that I don’t have to put much thought into the how and the what of exercising with the rowing machine.  I can use it at any time without having to put on specific clothes and I can choose to have a harder workout or an easier one without having to make a specific plan. 

It’s a kind of automatic exercise for me which is really good for my ADHD brain – there are few, if any, choices to make in advance and that means there are very few potential obstacles between me and my workout.

Plus, I like the very nature of the movement back and forth, the repetition has a soothing element to it.

A person in an inflatable T-Rex costume is using a rowing machine in a small living room.
This does NOT look soothing. I hope I look a little smoother than this when I row. Image description: a GIF of a person in an inflatable T-Rex costume is using a rowing machine in a small living room with potted plants all around. Because the head of the costume is so far above the person’s head, their movements look very jerky.

And, I like that I can do a very specific type of multi-tasking – watching YouTube videos – while I row.

I enjoy learning by video but I don’t often make time to do so. Combining my exercise with videos is a win-win situation – I am doing two enjoyable things at once and my brain and body are both busy so I don’t get any of my usual feeling that I should probably be doing something else. 

I even pick out my videos the night before so there is little between my pyjama-clad self and my exercise session in the mornings. I can get up, let the dog out (and back in!), grab some water, take my meds,  and then head to the basement to row. It’s all part of my waking up routine and it really feels great. 

Speaking of feeling great, my rowing has brought me an unexpected positive side-effect – my hips have loosened up considerably.

A GIF of a cartoon duck spinning his hips in a circle while standing in the spotlight.
Maybe they aren’t quite *this* loose but they do feel good. Image description: GIF of cartoon character Daffy Duck standing in a spotlight with his wings up behind his head, his hips are moving in a very loose circle.

Because of long-ago sessions at the gym, I knew that my arms, back, and legs were going to benefit from using the machine but I hadn’t really thought about how the set  of movements required to row would help my hips, too.  

I sort of have a ‘trick’ hip. It’s mostly fine but every now and then I’ll do something that will wonk it out and it will take me a few days to get it to calm down again.

Practicing kicks at taekwon-do has often triggered my hip in that way but I only realize it *after* I have done it. I’ve done a variety of things to work on it (with various degrees of consistency – I’m still me after all) but nothing has been especially helpful. Until now.

About three weeks after starting regular rowing sessions, our Thursday night TKD class was all about practicing sidekicks and angle kicks. Normally, with a night full of those kicks, my hip would wonk out at some point during the evening and I’d either have to reduce my movements or do something else entirely.

This time, however, I was tired but my hip was completely fine. I was puzzled at first but as I was pulling my leg up and back into position for one of the kicks, I realized that the motion was familiar. It’s not exactly like the position of my leg as I pull all the way forward on the machine but it’s similar. 

I didn’t have any trouble with my hips that night. And, more importantly, I didn’t wake up stiff or in pain the next morning. In fact, I rowed for a bit longer than I had the day before. 

It turns out that my rowing was setting me up for new success with taekwon-do. 

A person rotates on one foot while holding the other leg in the air before doing a high kick.
Okay, this is just straight-up wishful thinking on my part. Image description: GIF of a person standing on one foot, spinning in a circle and then executing a very high kick. Their hair is in a ponytail, and they are wearing a pink shirt and black leggings.

That’s a pretty good side-effect for an activity I was enjoying already. 

Have you ever had one type of exercise ‘accidentally’ help you in another like that?

Tell me about it in the comments! (Pretty please.)

Zoom ergo time!
fitness · Rowing

Zoom ergo time!

Sam B1 Comment

The saga behind the arrival of our pandemic erg is here. It has since arrived, been set up, and even used.

The new erg, Soul on the TV, and Sam with increasingly long, curly, grey hair

It continues with me refreshing myself on rowing basics, the parts of the stroke and all that.

And then a member of the 221 workouts in 2021 group asked if I know about Zoom ergo! I did not. But I Googled and see that it’s free and that it involves zooming with world champions and working out together.

“Erg together! Getting on the ergo can be a lot more fun if you row alongside someone else. Zoom Ergos has live workouts every day which you can join for as long or as little as you want alongside dozens of others, hosted by Olympic champions, World Champions, professional instructors and clubs.”

I’ll try it out and report back. I might also start doing a monthly 2k erg test again. We’ll see.

Do you have an erg? Do you workout alone at home during that pandemic? What’s your plan? What are you up to? We’d like to know.

Crossfit · cycling · fitness · fitness classes · Rowing

Sam Tries Orange Theory Fitness

Sam B4 Comments

It’s January. It’s cold and grey and I’ve been feeling in a bit of a fitness rut. Besides the campus gym I haven’t really stepped out into the fitness world in Guelph. But my options are limited here. There’s less going on than in Toronto where I spent sabbatical and even less going on than in London.

Sarah and I tried out Zwift at the Bike Shed on Saturday and on my own I went and tried out Orange Theory.

I’ve always been a bit of an attention deficit disorder exerciser. I like to have lots of options. And lately it’s been feeling like it’s just a matter of giving things up: running, soccer, Aikido and CrossFit.

Snipe racing is new but it’s winter.

Enter Orange Theory. I first noticed them in London and there’s one in Guelph. I knew the format. Like CrossFit it’s a group workout, a mix of cardio and strength training. I have friends who go and think it’s fun.

I stopped in on Friday for a demo class. I was equipped with a heart rate monitor and my name and heart rate appeared on a screen in the gym. The instructor asked about my fitness background and got points for not even once mentioning weight loss.

As for the class itself, there was a nice gender mix, mostly women but some men. I used the rowing machine and the spin bike instead of running on the treadmill for the cardio bit. I alternated 400 m segments of rowing with 1 mile efforts on the bike as prescribed by the workout of the day. The classes are 1 hour long and that felt just right.

The strength training was mostly chest and triceps using the bench, dumbbells, and the TRX. Each person got their own station. Unlike CrossFit there was no competition and no team efforts. There was no measuring or comparing. I have mixed feelings about that but right now, that works for me.

The instructor also got points for showing me where the heavier dumbbells live!

What did I like? As with personal training it feels good just to show up and have some one else plan the workout. I liked that about CrossFit too. I like the cardio and strength training mix, again like CrossFit. The group vibe works for me. I like that it’s month by month so I could sign up for the worst of winter, say January through March, and then say goodbye and head outside again. It also works with my limitations right now.

I could do without the calorie counts. Yawn.

Have you ever tried Orange Theory Fitness? Love it? Hate it? Tell us your story!

Here’s the results of my workout emailed to me after the class. Lots of time in the green cardio zone but also I was just learning my way around.