Yoga for Paddlers

Reason #21. Yoga Makes us Better Paddlers by: 

         •Increasing our flexibility/torso rotation

      •Increasing our balance 

      •Prevents injury and delays age related physical ailments so       we can paddle for years to come

      •Helps us to focus and relax (when is focus important?) Big    seas, interesting conditions, navigating whitewater, combat    roll

      •When we are focused and relax, we have better performance

Why Do I Practice Yoga? 

•After years of endurance horse back riding injuries and a serious whiplash injury that permanently straightened my neck vertebrae, I had very limited neck rotation and chronic back/shoulder pain

•YOGA keeps me paddling and has increased my flexibility to allow me to roll, never would I have been able to do that without it

•Yoga greatly enhances my connection w/

         mind, body, spirit, boat, nature

         and the water

Yoga Makes You More Grateful

When and Where? 

•In a studio

•Every day

•At home

•Shore side before entering a boat

•In the boat (KAY-YOGA)

•After paddling

•Whenever sore, stiff, hurting

•In the early morning

•At your desk

•In the evening

•With your family

•By yourself

•With strangers in a class

•Outside is the BEST! J 

Chris fit at 53

I am grateful for kayaking

Yoga isn't Just for Women! 

From Men’s Fitness Magazine, professional athletes who practice yoga:

•Shaquille O’Neal Basketball

•LeBron James Basketball

•Ray Lewis Football

•Victor Crews Football

•Mike Krzyzewski Basketball

•New Zealand Rugby teams

•Philadelphia Eagles

•Evan Longoria Baseball

•Kevin Garrett Basketball

•Vernon Lewis Football

•Kevin Love Basketball

•Joe Taft 

Men, Proceed with a Small Note of Caution:

 NY Times

•Yoga for men can be harmful IF:

•They ignore aches and pains

•Force themselves into poses that they are not ready for (being more muscular than women, they tend to do this)

•Don’t jump into advanced poses too quickly

•Women naturally have more flexibility, men have more muscle and less flexibility

•Begin with a certified YOGA instructor, beginner classes

Where to Start? 

Your local studio: we have partnered with mind/body/fitness yoga in Greensboro at www.mindbodyfitnessyoga.com 

At home: 

www.shopgetoutdoors.com 

www.yogaventures.com

www.amazon.com 

www.greenlandorbust.org

Laying the Foundation for Paddling Stronger: Cardiovascular Training Part II

by Stephen Knight

In the previous entry we began laying the groundwork for improving paddling fitness by ranking the changes in breathing due increased effort.  These changes were listed on a 1 to 10 scale to produce the Rated Perceived Exertion (RPE) Table.  We then assigned Training Zones (TZ) to the RPE scale in the second table as an abbreviated way of describing our efforts in order to train consistently. A benefit of using the RPE-TZ Table is that there’s no instrumentation – you are the “on-board computer”.

That’s not to say a Heart Rate Monitor  (HRM) isn’t useful, but it only generates numbers if you don’t know what’s driving them. Beats per minute (BPM) become useful when they’re coupled with the physiologic responses to increased effort like those described in the RPE Table.  This correlation lets us  devise fairly accurate TZs based on BPM at levels of exertion up to RPE 8.  Beyond that level of effort it’s not possible to determine an accurate lactate threshold and maximum heart rate outside of controlled testing conditions. Each person’s heart rate and response to exertion will be unique due to age, conditioning, state of rest, and innate physiology. That kind of precision is a lot more in-depth than we need.  For now, the RPE-TZ table and a sports watch are all that are needed.

Before getting started with any performance training,  meet with your physician for an objective evaluation of your overall health to ensure there aren’t any underlying conditions you need to know about, especially as we get older.  Read http://www.surfski.info/getting-started/tips-training/item/1025-atrial-fibrillation-and-the-athlete.html.  Furthermore, you need to establish a baseline to measure improvements over time.  You can expect positive changes in your health with consistent training. 

Time to get started.  Let’s assume that you fall into one of two groups, the first being relatively untrained and paddle infrequently or at a low intensity.  If this is the case and your goal is to improve your aerobic endurance then you’ve got to spend more time paddling outside of your comfort zone.

According to the RPE –TZ table, that’s going to require paddling at RPE 3-4 / TZ 2, where your effort is hard enough to make conversation difficult or in mostly short, broken sentences.  These are the long, steady sessions lasting one to four hours with few if any rest stops.  Start with 30 minutes to one hour at this level of paddling at least two times a week; more often will bring faster improvements. Keep extending your paddling at the same intensity until you literally feel that you can paddle all day.  Be patient, it could take several weeks before it gets easier and the full benefits may not be apparent for a month or longer. Can’t get out on the water as often as you’d like? You can get much the same benefit from cycling, running or swimming at the same RPE.  Personally, I encourage running or jogging on trails because in addition to an aerobic workout (yes, it’s OK to walk the hills), the uneven terrain improves your sense of balance and awareness while in motion.

If you fall into the second group where the goal is to improve speed and long-distance endurance then the intensity has to increase. A lot. Training must continue to build aerobic conditioning as well as adapt paddle specific muscles to long periods of endurance. 

There are two thoughts on how to achieve this goal, the first being to paddle at RPE 5 or TZ 3 for long steady efforts lasting one or more hours. At this level of effort your breathing is heavy but limited conversation is still possible.  Rest periods, if any, are kept very short. For many paddlers this level of conditioning is good enough but it can come up short if you are challenged by weather, currents or a heavily loaded kayak.

The second approach is where the effort is harder but the rewards are greater. You can expect substantial changes in endurance and power. Extended intervals at RPE 6-7/TZ4 will push your muscles to a point where they are just below the point of having sufficient oxygen to perform efficiently. This is the sub-lactate threshold, and training at this level may take 6-12 weeks before you see the benefits, assuming you have good aerobic fitness to start with.

Here’s an interval workout that takes a little over an hour. Warm up thoroughly for 15-30 minutes emphasizing good forward stroke form, leaving the socializing and skills practice for later. The first interval is 12 minutes at RPE 6-7 /TZ4. Your breathing will quickly become very deep and hard - talking will not be something you want to do, but you still can. This is not a sprint or all out effort. Your goal is to be able to complete the entire 12 minutes in the training zone.  Recovery! Three minutes of easy paddling. Now go again at the same high intensity for 10 minutes and recover for 2.5 minutes. Repeat for 8 minutes and recover for 2 minutes.  See a pattern? Now go for 6 minutes and recover for 1.5 minutes.  Last one, go for 4 minutes and cool down. You’re done for this session.  Interval workouts like this can be done two to three times a week as long as you allow 1-2 days of recovery time between sessions.

If at anytime you feel faint, or your breathing doesn’t seem to slow down when you let up, then stop.  You’re not ready for this level of workout.  Drop back to the RPE 5/TZ 3 workouts for several weeks before trying the higher intensity workout again. 

 “I don’t know. All of this sounds too much like race training”.  Well, you’re right. It is race training. However, your body doesn’t know the difference between competing in a race and paddling in challenging conditions. Skip even the least amount of conditioning and eventually fatigue leads to being left behind or you risk developing an injury. Those are reasons enough to incorporate some “race training” into your paddling.

Thanks for reading my blog entry for the Carolina Kayak Club.  I’ve been engaged in a number of outdoor activities for most all of my life as a participant and instructor. When not competing in trail running, bicycle and kayak races, I’m a USA Canoe and Kayak Team Paracanoe Coach and work with the Bridge-II-Sports Foundation for Adaptive Sports as the Parakayak Racing Club coach.

Laying the Foundation for Paddling Stronger: Cardiovascular Training Part I

By Stephen Knight

    

We’ve all seen a paddler quickly glide by seemingly with little effort and know it’s because of the hours of hard training.  Your second thought is “my interests are touring and enjoying the water, not going fast”.  However, that thought quickly fades when you lag further behind your group of friends or can’t cover the distance they can. “I paddle a lot but I’m still slow. How come?” The answer is not the amount you paddle, but the how.

     Let’s start with the “how”. Without using a heart rate monitor, we can get a good estimate on your level of exertion by how you’re breathing or the Rate of Perceived Effort (RPE).  Using a 1 to 10 scale with 1 being the easiest, we can see that most recreational paddlers stay within an RPE of 1, 2 or 3. Beyond that, the ability to continue at a higher RPE is very limited.  What’s more, it’s going to take a few minutes or longer to recover from a higher effort.

     Now that we’ve established a way to gauge our effort while paddling, what does that tell us about what is going on within our bodies?

     Taking a cue from our breathing, we can divide our response to exertion into five distinct levels and call them Heart Rate Zones. Each Zone is the body’s response to a diminishing availability of oxygen to the working muscles.  At this point a heart rate monitor would be useful as a means to precisely measure our response to working harder.  However, we’d need to know several other pieces of information and that’s beyond the scope of this article.  For our purposes, the RPE scale is perfect.

Looking at the Zone and RPE table, we see two distinct divisions.  Aerobic (with oxygen) in green, and Anaerobic (without oxygen) in red.  These divisions represent the predominant type of energy generating metabolism going on in the working muscles.  The tipping point or Lactate Threshold (RPE 8) is where the body is losing the ability to deliver sufficient oxygen to sustain the effort.  Although glucose can still be utilized anaerobically to produce energy through an alternative pathway, it is short term and produces lactic acid as a by-product.  The body does not let very much go to waste and lactic acid is no exception.  It’s transported from inside the muscle cells through the blood to the liver as lactate for processing into glucose.  Wait, isn’t that why I get sore after working hard?  No.  Lactic acid has an undeserved reputation for producing residual “muscle burn” or soreness when in fact it’s trauma to muscle cells that is the real culprit.  Another name for this discomfort is Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness or “DOMS”.  Fortunately, it goes away on its own and becomes less frequent with regular exercise. 

Now that we’ve learned how our bodies respond to exertion let’s go back to the original question, “how” are you paddling?  If you spend all of your time at an RPE of 1 or 2 there are definite benefits but your fitness level will still be quite low.  Increasing the intensity to an RPE of 3-4 will provide substantial improvements in your ability to paddle longer with less effort, but it still falls short.  It isn’t until you spend time at an RPE of 5 to 7 that you see significant improvements in your fitness. Training at higher levels of intensity will increase

your lung capacity, stimulate the heart to pump blood more efficiently, deliver more oxygen to the muscles through an expanded capillary bed, develop more efficient energy metabolism, and increase the number of mitochondria in muscle cells.  That’s a pretty enticing return for an investment of effort.  But, is it that easy, just paddle harder? Well, sort of.  There’s a smart way and then there’s a hard way to improve your fitness. We’ll go with a smart way to get good results in my next entry.

Thanks for reading my blog entry for the Carolina Kayak Club.  I’ve been engaged in a number of outdoor activities for most all of my life as a participant and instructor. When not competing in running, bicycle and kayak races, I’m a US Canoe and Kayak Team Paracanoe Coach and work with the Bridge-II-Sports Foundation for Adaptive Sports as the Parakayak Racing Club coach.