At the margin: erg vs bike for conditioning?

Hey BBM team, I was turned on to your programs after an in-person session with Alan Thrall and it’s been a breath of fresh air after grinding through Starting Strength initially. So, thank you.

I’m currently on Block I of the beginner prescription and so there’s quite a bit of squat/deadlift/row volume in my routine. I currently use a Concept2 rower and sometimes notice a little bit of low back fatigue (certainly not pain) and/or notice myself getting slightly lazy on form on my conditioning days when going 20+ mins on the rower.

I could also get access to a Concept2 bike. At the margin, is a rowing machine more fatiguing / challenging on the back alongside a strength-focused routine compared to a bike? Merit to switching to a bike? Or is the difference not really one worth considering?

Thank you so much for all your wonderful work!

Howdy!

My view on conditioning is that the active muscles used by a particular modality get more fitness adaptations as well as fatigue. Whether there’s some sort of interference effect from too high of a training load due to do rowing is a different question, however. For an individual whom the Beginner Template is appropriate, I would guess this is a possibility.

I would recommend doing at least two or three different conditioning modes on the Beginner Template.. We discuss this a bit in the eBook accompanying that program.

-Jordan