Conditioning with the Rower
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Evan gets to work with some 1-minute intervals.
(This article is a Blast from the Past article originally posted on 04/23/21.)
The rower (AKA rowing machine, ergometer, or erg) is a great conditioning tool. It uses primarily concentric movement and thus doesn’t cause a lot of unnecessary soreness. As a result, you can get some effective conditioning from rowing, and if approached in an intelligent fashion, this conditioning should not get in the way of your strength training.
With this in mind, we’re going to take a look at a few sample rower workouts that you can implement in your training, and as you become better conditioned over time, you can modify these workouts to increase the stress.
Workout #1
5, 7, or 9 rounds of:
Row 1 minute
Rest 1 minute
For this workout, you’ll simply row for one minute, rest one minute, and then repeat this process until you’ve accumulated the desired number of rounds. You can use the rower’s timer (if it has one), you can use a continuously running stopwatch, or you can set a programmable timer to repeat one one minute intervals.
Over time, you can increase the conditioning stress by adding rounds (e.g., going from 5 rounds to 7 rounds) or increasing the distance rowed. You can record the distance for each individual round, or for ease of recording, you can simply record and score yourself on the shortest distance you rowed in any round.
Workout #2
6, 8, or 10 rounds of
Row 30 seconds
Rest 2 minutes
For this workout, row for thirty seconds, then rest two minutes, and then repeat until you’ve completed the prescribed number of rounds. The goal is to cover the maximum distance in each round, so as with Workout #1, you can record and score yourself on each round, or you can simply record and score yourself on your slowest round (i.e., the shortest distance rowed).
Likewise, over time, the goal would be to increase the number of rounds or the distance rowed. An approach that combines these goals would be to perform six rounds one week, eight rounds the next week, and then ten rounds the third week - all while holding approximately the same pace (i.e., covering the same distance) - and then resetting back down to six rounds the following week and starting the process again but covering more distance.
Workout #3
5, 10, 15, or 20 minute time trial
This one is simple - set a timer for five, ten, fifteen, or twenty minutes, and then row as far as possible within the specified time. Over time, your goal would be to increase the distance rowed for a given time.
Have fun with these conditioning workouts, and a word to the wise - start conservatively with the first few sessions. You don’t want your conditioning to interfere with your strength training, and you’ve got plenty of time to increase the conditioning stress in later sessions.
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