I am in tech heaven! My very specific (USB C OTG TO female USB 3.0 😵💫) adapter finally arrived Thursday. Tiny but it was the missing link to get me completely hooked up with Zwift through my Rower!
So just a word of warning, as this post will have a lot of tech. Initially, I didn’t know where to post it: even as I am hovering on the brink of the IC couch, I have now become a virtual runner in Zwift’s Watopia! So I am running with other treadmill runners, and thus it might have been appropriate to post this in one of the runners forums. My Watopia runner self even posts all her runs to Strava - with pictures I took of her whilst working out! How cool is that!!!
But I am not running my virtual avatar on a treadmill, I am rowing her from my indoor rower!
Mmhm, uh-hu! 😃😃😃 That’s right, I’m rowing my runner!!!!
So I’ll post it here as it’s actually cross-training! Of course hubby tried to curb my spirit and already told me off for suggesting I ran twice on Thursday!
“You didn’t run, you rowed,” he said.
I said: “My runner ran 3k on top of the 3k I ran that morning”
“Uh-hu, but you didn’t run the last 3k”, he said.
That’s him. The poor sod lives only in one world.
I on the other hand run in his world and in Watopia!! 🌁🌳🌄🚣♂️🌋🏞🚴🏜🏃♀️🌅
So, here’s my story how I started with Zwift. Earlier this year I was inspired @Julia-P on the Bridge forum, who ran her whole Bridge210 journey on the virtual worlds on Zwift via a Treadmill, having cycled on Zwift before. She explained Zwift so much nicer than I could, at healthunlocked.com/bridgeto... .
Through her I found out that registering as a runner rather than a cyclist gives you a free account. I think runners are seen as the added ornaments of a virtual world designed for cyclists, so for now running is free in Watopia.
And I had tried connecting half a year ago, but with an iPhone one could connect only to a cyclist and I didn’t have an Android to try out the rowing-running connection. And who wants to row a cyclist, I ask!? So 🤔 hum ho! 😕
But opportunity struck when my good old phone broke! My iPhone gave up it’s ghost last month, alongside my metatarsals (post about my metatarsals was here: healthunlocked.com/bridgeto... ) and I took the chance to get a cheap Android (no SIM needed) to bide my time for my perfect 2nd hand iPhone to come along. That was my excuse, as this got me a big step closer to my dream of row-running on Zwift’s Watopia.
A setback was when my Bluetooth connection didn’t work on the Android, so off to order another £3 adapter for the rower cable going to the Android.
And on Thursday came that last piece. And since then I have already had a lot of fun running around in Watopia…uhhh, ok…. rowing my runner around Watopia. (Ok, hubby?)
So my whole connection path is:
1. My concept2 rower has a PM5 Monitor with a printer like cable ending in USB
2. Adapter (USB C OTG TO female USB 3.0) goes in there, adapting to Android phone, running “RowedBiker” app
3. Android’s Bluetooth is on, and that is connecting to my old iPad’s Bluetooth. IPad is displaying the Zwift world, in all its glory.
4. And of course I still have my new secondhand IPhone, which now is running the Zwift companion app, allowing me to choose events, send messages and very easily navigate and chose the paths at junctions that I see are coming up on my IPad Virtual World
I know this sounds complicated, and it took me some time to “get this setup”.
But many rowers are using this, as Zwift has not yet released its rower version, and I am sure this would cost, whereas the rowed runners are free (well, except the cost of the Android😏).
So of course this makes my stint on the injury couch so much more bearable.
And Zwift has a nice Zwift101 introduction running plan, that cycles me through 3 runs per week over two weeks, covering the whole functionality whilst giving me a plan that establishes my baseline, gets some interval training in, and allows me to explore some different routes.
Most brilliant of all, my Rowed Biker app does an initial translation of energy used, so in Watopia I AM NOT AN ULTRA-SLOW RUNNER ANYMORE!!! Did you hear that? Sorry, I shouted there. I just got a bit excited …. (But for all you Strava buddies out there, I am waving to you as I am back on Strava 👋👋👋 but just hold your praise of my sudden average speeds. I am still the Queen of UltraSlow in the running world, I just seem to be a bit of a more average speed rower)
So my row of ca 2000 meters translates into a ca 3,5km run in Watopia, and I can row-run easily up to 10km/hour.
So lots to explore. And I apologise ahead for the posts to come.
But my injury couch and my indoor rowing has suddenly become so much more exciting!!!!
Keep on keeping on in whatever world you run, row or work out in!
