Brandon Nelson
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NW Ergomania: Indoor Rowing Championships
On Saturday, I ventured down to Seattle University for the NW Ergomania Indoor Rowing Championships. If you’ve ever tried a Concept 2 rowing “Ergometer” at your gym, that’s what I’m talking about.
These fitness (read: ‘voluntary torture’) machines can be calibrated in groups, synched up to a fleet of digital boats on a movie screen, and if it weren’t for the lack of salt-spray and seagulls overhead, you’d swear you were sculling for gold in the Summer Olympics!
My wife Heather and I added a Concept 2 rower to our quiver of training tools just before Christmas, when it was too icy cold to paddle a surfski. Over the past 6 weeks, I’ve grown to love the intense, full-body workout the machine delivers.
So when I heard there was an actual Ergometer rowing race in our backyard of Seattle, I was there. The NW Ergomania event has grown at a logorhithmic rate over the past few years, with this year drawing the biggest crowd ever. From freshman high schoolers to 70-year-olds and up, the sport draws a passionate and extremely fit crowd.
Over the course of the day’s races, my friend Dale McKinnon and I watched male and female athletes push themselves so hard as to literally collapse off their machines. We watched 71-year-old Luanne Mills break the world record for 2000 meters in her age group (one of two world record performances for the day, another occurring in the 20-29-year-old women’s race).
I raced in two events, the 30-39-year-old Men’s 2000 meter, and the Open Men’s 1000 meter. I credit a winter of weight-training, surfski and stand-up paddling, and the past six weeks of in-the-garage Erg training for my surprising (to me) victories in both events.
For access to my top secret “ninja race strategy” and other lessons learned, visit the story on our family adventure blog, Ultramarathonpaddling.com.
And treat yourself to the 43-second video of the start of Luanne Mills’ world record-breaking 2K race. Her form and strength are impeccable — a true thing of athletic beauty.
