Knitting-magazine-wise, this autumn is a mixed bag. The newest issue of Interweave Knits was waiting when I got home; now that I’ve looked through it, my reaction is best summarized as *yawn*. I don’t thnk I’ll be knittng anything from this issue. On the other hand, the fall Knitty will be the tiebreaker, but it probably won’t be out until next week or so.
Right before out trip, I bought The New Rules of Lifting for Women, and read it on the plane. I think I’ve developed a bit of a crush on the author, Lou Schuler, for his sensible approach – I liked it enough to buy the original The New Rules of Lifting for Ted (and also because mine was on the Kindle, not the handiest place to look stuff up when you’re trying to get to your workout). After looking through the original NRoL, though, I’m a little bit disenchanted with NRoLW in some ways. For one thing, why just one workout? Do all women have the same goals? The men’s version has the workouts divided into sections, and then explains how to combine them for different goals. Also, the men’s book talks a little about what to do if you do want to combine the weight workouts with some endurance work, instead of just saying “don’t”. Not all women are recovering cardio bunnies; some of us actually need endurance for our sport.
Even in the men’s version he makes it clear the two don’t combine all that well. I suspect the answer is that, while rowing is a power sport in some ways, rowers need to be strong, not strongest. More than you need to move the boat at speed going upwind is more than you need, so weightlifting is needed but doesn’t have to be optimized. Then again, neither does endurance during sprint race season. What I probably need is power (as opposed to strength – power = force over time) and anerobic capacity, then back to endurance for head race / marathon season.
Also, the food suggestions in NRoLW look great, and the principles make sense, but unfortunately a lot of the specific ingredients he suggests are just not available here. I haven’t seen plain yogurt, for instance. Too bad, because they look tasty. I wonder how one would go about making a protein shake with dohua?