Since the weather has been less than perfect for rowing during the last three days, I am adding a few notes and pics about my (our) 11 mile morning row from last Saturday in order to remind everyone how wonderful saltwater rowing can be (since it's easy to forget these days). Saturday, 6/20 at 7am my maiden journey with my new orange Echo started at the boat house. Accompanied by Jay P and his wife Carmi in the Alden Double, Paul M. in his Echo and Capt Jack in his Dolphin (who had completed already 8 miles before 7am!), we headed towards Misery Island. The early morning sun was bright and the water was churning up long 3-4' rollers over 7-8 seconds. A wonderful environment for any Echo, but especially good for a maiden voyage.
Slightly over-motivated due to excitement of rowing my own boat and by the fact that this row was supposed to be my first "10 mile - Blackburn training row", I pushed my heartbeat to 90% of my max. training heart rate zone during the first 4.5 miles. Yet, the beautiful waterscapes, high rollers and the spitit of the other team members around me just created a very motivating environment. It was only during a quick water break behind Misery Island (see photos of Jay, Carmi, Jack and Paul) and my conversation with Jay about heart beat rates that I realized that I should take it slower during my way back.
We rowed along the Beverly coast line when the wind picked up a notch and created some additional short wind waves we had to fight against. Jack decided to head back the direct way, Carmi and Jay, who looked great in the Double throughout the whole row, opted for taking a short cut as well. Paul and I continued along the coast passing Red Nun, Beverly Light House and into Salem Harbor before turning back towards Brown Island and the boat house.
At the end, it turned out I (we) had rowed excatly 11 miles in just a bit over 2 hours. I do not know how this compares to other training rows, but it felt pretty good for a maiden journey. "Myjanda" will be the new name of my orange Echo and it appears to be holding some magical powers. The eggs at Driftwood tatsted just wonderful afterwards. There will be more reports to come.
For anyone interested in training with GPS equipment (Paul, as I had mentioned), I am uploading a quick video of my maiden journey. The Garmin Forerunner 405 internet/community tools allow the syncing of my data into a web application. This application lets me read and analyze speed, distance, heart rate and other topics after the whole row. This information can be shared with anyone you wish. It will be interesting to monitor my Blackburn preparation during the coming weeks.
Thank you Jay, Carmi, Paul and Jack for a great row. Very much looking forward to getting out again on the water soon!
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