Mental Toughness

Monday:  A huge congratulations to Kristin Hedstrom and her doubles partner in winning the Lightweight Women's Double at World Cup II in Hamburg, Germany this past weekend!!  Watch the racing here!

Last week was a whirlwind of traveling, friends visiting from out-of-town, and Princess milestones.  I was lucky to have Amber, a close rowing friend from college, visit me this weekend.  She even came to practice on Saturday morning and did 3x1000m race pieces!

Me, Amber, and of course, the Princess

As for the Princess, she finally decided to walk!  Instead of a crawling baby, we now have a walking, laughing, crying toddler.

My last post, which was about the Bathroom Guy, was over a week ago.  Between then and now with all those distractions from life, I have been somewhat at a loss and I have found myself lacking a bit of mental toughness like my mind is not in the game.

What comes to mind when you think about mental toughness?  For many people, mental toughness is about determination, pushing yourself to win, doing what it takes to get the job done, leaving everything on the water on race day.  I actually think that there are four types of mental toughness:

1. Hunger
2. Consistency
3. Focus/concentration
4. Tenacity

Hunger.  This is what usually comes to mind when you think about mental toughness.
It is race day and you are in the third 500m in your 2,000m race.  Are you hungry for more?  Can you push yourself to the limit?  Can you do what it takes to win?  Can you put everything on the line?

Consistency.  This usually comes with practice, experience, and maturity.
Each time you do a long steady state piece, are you consistent in your power, technique, rhythm, rate?  Are you disciplined?  Can you hold your own?  Can you keep your head in the game?


Focus and concentration.  This is connected to consistency.
You need to have focus and to be able to concentrate in order to be consistent in your rowing.  Can you block out all the distractions whether they be other boats, other rowers, or all the other demands in life?  But there is another aspect of focus that is often overlooked.  When the coach tells you to make a correction, e.g. no lunging, control your slide, do you have the focus to make that change?  Do you have the patience to concentrate on a specific part of your stroke for a long period of time?  Because that is how you make a permanent change in technique.

Tenacity.  This is about how much beating can your self-confidence take.
At camp, an assistance coach who rowed on the national team told me, "When you row on the national team or on that high level, it's all about being tenacious.  Nothing is ever set in stone.  One day, you could lose your seat race and be in the doghouse, but the next day, you could win your time trial and be in the penthouse."  Some days, no matter what you do or how hard you try, you will feel like crap and you will think, "This is it.  I am done rowing."  Then, some days, you will be flying down the course and you will think, "I love rowing.  I want to do this forever."

From the doghouse to the penthouse and back.  That is a lot of stress for the mind to take.  Can you handle it?  Can your self-esteem, self-confidence, ego handle it?

The Bathroom Guy

Friday morning:  This morning, we had 1 four, 2 mixed doubles, and 1 single (me) out on the water.  The workout was 3x10 minutes, but I just rowed steady state. 

No coach today.  Believe it or not, Chris has other obligations besides the Lake Merritt Masters Women’s team.  He is the head coach for the Berkeley High School (BHS) crew team and also coaches at Open Water Rowing Club in Sausalito.  This weekend, he is in Oak Ridge, Tennessee with his BHS boy’s lightweight four.  Follow them here at USRowing Youth Nationals Championships!

Ready for a really embarrassing story that will make your Friday?

If you hang out with me long enough, you will discover another amazing ability that I have—I always have to go to the bathroom!  Part of it is from constantly drinking water.  Part of it is probably from having a small bladder.  And part of it is probably that I am conditioned by now to make a beeline to the bathroom whenever we get to a restaurant, make a gas stop on a road trip, or are about to get hands-on the boat. 

If you do not row for Lake Merritt, you probably do not know that we are blessed to have a men’s and a women’s bathroom behind our boat bay.  These bathrooms are by no means clean or pristine, but they do have running water and flushing toilets and are a step above port-a-potties. 

If you do row for Lake Merritt, but for whatever reason do not get up to row at the early hour of 5 in the morning, you probably do not know that these bathrooms are locked until the Bathroom Guy from East Bay Parks comes at 6ish to clean and unlock them.  For this reason, our club does hold a key to the bathrooms.

A few summers ago, my doubles partner and I would meet at the boathouse at 5 on mornings that we did not have team practices.  We would try to get in an extra practice, lifting weights or erging. 

One morning, my doubles partner and I were the only people at the boathouse, and we were doing a hard weight circuit.  In the middle of the workout, I had to go to the bathroom.  I looked in the boathouse and the bathroom key was gone!  Someone had misplaced it, left it in the bathroom, or maybe accidentally taken it home with them.  I thought that maybe I could just wait a little longer until the Bathroom Guy shows up and unlocks the bathrooms.

On this particular morning, the Bathroom Guy must have overslept or been on vacation because he FAILED to come!  Believe it or not, there are some people—not just me, think of all the runners around the lake—who do need to use the bathroom in the early hours of the morning.  At some point, I turned to my doubles partner and said, “I have to go now!”

Both the men’s and women’s bathroom have a window that is permanently cracked open.  The women’s bathroom has a railing outside that if you were small enough, you could potentially use to climb into the bathroom.  Thus, there is a bar in the middle of the women’s bathroom window that prevents you from climbing in (remember we live in Oakland and there are scary and homeless people around the lake). 

The men’s bathroom window, however, does not have a railing outside and now bar in the window.  You would need to get a boost or have incredible upper body strength to pull yourself up through the window. 

I was desperate for a bathroom.  I would have died for a port-a-potty.  The only way I would get to a bathroom was climbing through the window of the men’s bathroom.  (Trust me, there are no bushes around the boathouse that are good for bathroom use.  We checked.) 

My dear doubles partner took pity on me and agreed to be my partner-in-crime.  We stood outside of the men’s bathroom and double checked that no one was around to gawk at us or to call the cops on us.  Then, my doubles partner gave me a lift and I grabbed the top of the window.  I pulled my upper body through and had to maneuver my lower body a few times before fitting all the way through.  The whole time, both of us were cracking up, trying not to think about how ridiculous this must look and how much worse it would be if I got stuck in the window. 

Luckily, I made it through the window, went to the bathroom, was able to unlock the bathroom door from the inside, and hence, did not have to repeat the window climbing.  And this is the story of how I know that there is only one big stall in the men’s bathroom (the women’s bathroom has two stalls).  

Never put too much faith in the Bathroom Guy because one day, he might not be there for you!

Dogfight Tuesday

Tuesday evening:  We had 1 eight, 1 mixed quad, and 1 men’s single out on the water.  The Bay Blades also had 1 men’s quad and 3 men’s singles out.  I sat bow in the quad.

The workout was 6x3minutes pieces with starts and at full pressure.

The first piece was actually meant to be at 90% pressure to ease us into the rest of the workout, but from the first few strokes, it became very clear that this was going to be a dogfight.  The eight and the quad were very close in speed, making it difficult to tell which boat came out on top and pushing us to give more.  After the first piece, I could feel the burn in my legs and I wondered how three minutes could seem like such a long time.

Meanwhile, Chris was probably congratulating himself.  You can tell when a coach really knows his crew when he can put together two equally fast line-ups.  On high intensity days where the workout is intervals or race pieces, it is helpful to have a boat constantly next to you, challenging you.

In the quad, the effort was in the boat, but for whatever reason—new line-up or differences in technique, we were not able to “find another speed” and make a decisive move on the eight.  We had to fight for ever inch, but that’s what made it a dogfight.  The moment that you let up just a little bit is the moment that you lose ground.  With the two boats so close in speed, it would be almost impossible to recover that ground.

Several years ago, there was a blog that followed women’s lightweight rowing.  The blog was titled, “Fight in the Dog.”  Because…

“It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog.” –Mark Twain

These are My Confessions

These are my confessions...

Sunday:  After a crazy Saturday, Sunday did not start out much better.  I got up to go to practice, drove to the lake, and drove right back.  These are my Sunday confessions:

1. I got up this morning and went to practice because I felt guilty.  In college, you learn that you have to do everything humanly possible to make practice.
2. I came home without rowing because I did not feel well.
3. I did not feel well because well, I was operating on three hours of sleep.  
4. I had three hours of sleep because we were up until 3 in the morning.
5. We were up until 3 because we were at a party.
6. Before you think that we are party animals, realize that we go to parties once a year.  Usually, if we do go anywhere, we have to bring the Princess and that does not count as going to a party.  The Princess makes a great excuse if you ever want to leave a party early.  This time, the Princess got to stay with grandparents.  At the party, we told friends that we had abandoned our first born child to the wolves.
7. Also realize that this party was a going away party for a good college friend, one who saw the insanities of crew and one who made sure I filled in some sort of answer on the homework.
8. After coming home, I tried to sleep, but once up, I usually cannot sleep again no matter how tired.
9. While waiting for my hungover husband to wake up, I went on run around Lake Chabot, up on Skyline Boulevard.
10. I quickly found myself in the middle of the Lake Chabot half marathon.  Luckily, the race was pretty small and the runners were spaced out.  I followed these runners around the lake and to the finish line.
11. It was a little awkward to run and have people cheering you on when you are not actually in the race.  It makes you feel like an impostor.
12. The finish tent and line were parked right on the trail, and I had to run off the road in order to not cross the finish line.  Unfortunately, I was not fast enough because a race photographer managed to snap a few photos as I approached.  So now, there is probably a photo of me floating out there on the web for a half marathon I did not actually run.
13. I still feel bad about missing practice this morning, and three hours of sleep is not enough for this old lady here.  But at least, I finally got use out of the trail shoes from Boulder.  

Oh, What a Day

Saturday: Saturday was supposed to be the Lake Berryessa 1 Mile and 2 Mile Open Water Swim.  If you live in the Bay Area, you will probably recall that Saturday was filled with rain and wind. 

Although it took me two hours the night before to pack (what are you supposed to bring to an open water swim?  A life jacket?), I still spent a good twenty minutes in the morning, checking and re-packing.  I carpooled with Marcia, her daughter who is a long-distance junior swimming champion (how could you not be when you have Marcia as your mom!), and another fellow swimmer.  The drive took about two hours, up through Vallejo and Napa and along tortuous twisty two lane roads. 

By the time we got to Lake Berryessa, the rain had lightened to a drizzle, but we had bigger problems than the rain.  Ever been to the ocean?

Looking out at Lake Berryessa; the island on the left marks
the turn around point in the 2 mile

Waves crashing to shore and two foot tall waves with white caps in the middle of the lake.  The MEMO: (apparently there is a colon at the end of the team name) team set up two tents and wrapped a tarp around half of the enclosure to keep the wind out.  One of the guys brought a gas heater and we huddled around the heater.

The amazing propane heater; photo courtesy of Sharon

Wind, rain, and cold temperatures are all nemeses of open water swimming.  Wind creates waves that make it difficult to see and breath—instead of inhaling air, you inhale water.  Rain creates poor visibility.  Cold temperatures make it difficult to stay warm, especially if you lack the “natural” body suit, i.e. body fat.  These factors can make open water a dangerous sport.

In these conditions, the race committee delayed and then, canceled the race all together after seeing no change in weather.  But the long drive and the misery in the rain were not totally in vain.  We still got to open water swim.  

Technically, I am not a newbie to open water swimming.  Of all the triathlons (a whooping total of four) that I have ever done, three had open water.  But in college and before Marcia, I was such a bad swimmer that I never really tried.  In fact, I cannot really remember any of my triathlon swims (probably selective memory loss).  The swim portion was just something I had to do before hitting the road with the bike and run.  Secretly, I was a little scared of Lake Berryessa.

Here we go!
photo courtesy of Sharon

The first ten minutes in the water were horrible.  Water and waves left and right.  Panic and disorientation setting in.  The feeling like your lungs are closing on you.  There is no wall to hold onto, and no black line below to look at.  For a moment, I had to stop, tread water, and simply wait for the panic to dissipate.  Afterward, I was able to find a rhythm and felt almost calm swimming in the water.  No clock to look at, no laps to count, only buoys and waves to watch for.  We swam almost one mile.

After the swim; do we look happy or what?
photo courtesy of Sharon

I learned a few things today about open water swimming:

1. When there are waves, do not breath to the side.  Breath almost behind you.
2. When you swallow water, do not panic.  Just pretend you were drinking water (and not breathing).
3. Did you know there are open water swims of 5k and 10k distances?  In fact, because swimmers are in the water for so long, they need to rehydrate and refuel.  There are actually feeding sticks, i.e. a long pole with a cup at the end, that coaches (or generous friends) can use to give their athlete gels or electrolyte drinks!!
4. Only go to sanctioned masters open water races.  These races will typically have better marked courses and medical personnel on site.  Accidents can happen to anyone in open water.  

Good to see the ambulance onsite

What Legs?

Wednesday morning:  This morning's swim main set was:

1. 4x25yd flutter kick with board; first piece SPRINT and rest easy
2. 300yd free at 90% pressure
3. 4x25yd flutter kick with board; two pieces SPRINT and two easy
4. 300yd free at 90%, but 5 seconds faster than first 300
5. 4x25yd flutter kick with board; three SPRINT and one easy
6. 300yd free FAST

300 yards is eight lengths of the pool.  Although 300yd only takes about 4-5 minutes, it feels like a long distance, chasing the black line at the bottom of the pool back and forth (repeat).

Thursday morning:  Fin Day!  I should be really excited about fin day, considering that kicking with fins is about the only swimming "thing" that I am fast at.  In order to swim fast with fins though, you have to have leg power.  After yesterday's 25yd flutter kick sprint and 300s, I jumped into the pool and found out, "What legs?  My legs must be on strike!"

Fin Day workout, all with fins:

1. 4x20 seconds on, 10 seconds off of vertical kick, hands in streamline
2. 4x25yd butterfly
3. 4x25yd underwater kick with no breath (Marcia: "It's just air!  You don't need it!")
4. 4x75yd odd pieces breast with fly kick and even pieces back dolphin kick
5. Repeat #1-4
6. 100yd one arm free with partner and PVC stick

I am absolutely ready for the end of the week and a relaxing, chill weekend.  Unfortunately, the weekend will be packed with an open water swim race at Lake Berryessa (I'll let you know if I survive) and several parties.    Are you ready?  Here we GO!

How Far We Have Come

Lake Merritt at dusk

Tuesday evening:  8x500m.  First four 500m with starts; last four 500m with sprint.  Three minutes of rest in between pieces with 5 minutes of rest in the middle of the set.

We had 1 eight, 1 double, 2 men's singles, and 3 singles from the Bay Blades out on the water.  In the eight, we were lucky enough to have a volunteer coxswain from Berkeley High who did a wonderful job and had no problem steering around the lake.  I sat 5 seat in the eight.

In the long warm-up, the eight felt slightly "off"--different handle heights, lots of extra body movement.  Chris badgered us, "Watch your handle heights.  It looks like you guys are not completely here.  Don't think about other things."

For the most part, the 500m pieces were rough with the set being off, high rates, and windy water.  Some of the starts were too high on the rate (imagine that!) and felt out of control.  Some of the sprints were tough with hands getting caught at the finish.

In between pieces, we heard quite a bit from Chris:

"How often do I care about numbers (e.g. stroke rate, power, speed)?  Sometimes numbers are important and sometimes they aren't.  Today though, the stroke rate is important because when you go above the assigned rate, the boat gets out of control."

"How many strokes should it take to settle from a 40 to a 34spm?  (insert awkward pause here)  ONE stroke.  And how many is it taking you guys?  (obviously too many for Chris)"

"How many strokes should it take to go from a 34 to a 40spm for the sprint?  (another awkward pause)  TWO, maybe three strokes."

Despite all of Chris' beleaguering, we, as a team, have made a lot of progress from the first time we did the 8x500m.  Sure, there were moments of craziness and water splashing everywhere today, but I did not get the urge to jump out of the boat and swim to shore or the mental freak-out at the high rates.  It is a testament to how far we have come in our training.