A 2K training pace is a great way to tailor a training plan to your individual, current fitness and strength levels.
It centers around using your current best time to row 2000m.
Here’s a video explanation I made right in the very early days of RowAlong (when it was another brand, which I needed to stop using) but read on if you’d rather.
Calculating your 2K Average
This all starts off with rowing a 2000m time trial. Set your monitor to 2000m and row it as fast as you possibly can. Don’t take it easy – put in maximum effort. (Be sure you don’t have any health problems before doing anything like this though!)
Take a look at your final time. The monitor should show you the total time and the Average /500m split time. You can calculate this yourself if you don’t see that.
If you rowed 2000m in 7mins 40sec – the average time to row 500m would be 1min 55sec
(There are 4 x 500m in a 2000m piece, so 7:40 split evenly into 4 is 1:55)
Even if you started at 1:40 and fell back to 2:10 – the average time is still 7min40sec split into four – which is 1:55
Applying Training Pace Guides
Then you just take that pace, and add or subtract the pace guide. So in the example above, 2K+18 would be 1:55 +18 which is 2:13 pace.
Set the monitor to show the current /500m pace – and try to hold 2:13 for this guide. And if it changes to 2K-5, then in the example above, you’d then speed up your pace so you’d be rowing at 1:55 – 5sec which is 1:50.
Over time, you’ll start to use the times you compete rows in as ways to look back on how your training has worked for you.
So before starting any performance plan which has some kind of end test, do the test at the beginning, to set your baseline. Then go through the plan – and at the end, do the test again, to see how much you’ve (hopefully!) improved.