Monitoring HRV to understand how you are responding to stress.

I have in the past experimented with monitoring HRV to understand both how I’m responding to training (stress) and recovery (rest) to optimise my training response and avoid overtraining. So far, I’m still learning and building up a baseline. I’m researching different sources of information and will share these with you. Sharing original article found…

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Optimised Tapering for Your Target Race

FAQs for Rowers Over 30. Premium subscriber content. Tapering is a crucial part of preparing for your target race. As experienced rowers over 30, you might have unique concerns and questions about how to optimize your performance during the taper. Here are some frequently asked questions tailored to your needs. What should I eat during…

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Training intensity for Masters Rowing with Dr Charlie Simpson

Excited to share this episode of the Faster Podcast, this time with Dr Charlie Simpson. Charlie is a Senior Lecturer in Sport and Exercise Science at Oxford Brookes University and well known for his publications. The Complete Guide to Indoor Rowing and Advanced Rowing. In this episode, Charlie and I cover the following topics and…

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Are you getting enough?

Recovery Through Sleep Sharing an article I came across whilst researching approaches to recovery. Original article on Training Peaks and by Simon Wegerif, 2020 Simon Wegerif explains how proper sleep habits affects training and recovery, and how to make the most of your sleep. Sleep is one of the main mechanism by which the body…

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Recovery Techniques For Athletes (Masters Rowers)

Original article written by Dr Shona L Halson, Department of Physiology, Australian Institute of Sport, and re-posted with permission. Image, Mark Sisson 2020. High performance sport and the importance of successful performances have led athletes and coaches to continually seek any advantage or edge that may improve performance. It follows that the rate and quality of recovery is…

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How Alcohol Impacts Your Sleep

One of the things I’ve been experimenting with, over the last 8-weeks, is measuring and tracking my Heart Rate Variability (HRV) and Morning Resting Heart Rate (MRHR). I’m doing this to understand how I am recovering from training and day-to-day stress. I’ve been really surprised at the impact of a couple of glasses of wine…

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What is Heart Rate Variability (HRV)?

Sharing exerts from original articles on HRV, published on Harvard University Health Blog (2017) and Oura website 2020. What is HRV? As popular as the metaphor may be, a healthy heart doesn’t beat as regularly as a metronome—it actually changes its rhythm with each beat. This constant variation in milliseconds between your heartbeats is known…

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How to avoid making season killing mistakes

Sharing some of the common mistakes and lessons learnt so that you can prepare for your best season ever in 2023. Always training in the middle is a common mistake A common mistake many Masters Rowers (and other age groups) make, is training with a “no pain, no gain” mentality. This always on, high intensity training…

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