- Hey, guys, Shane Farmer, here.
Dark Horse Rowing.
Wanted to give you a follow-up to yesterday's video.
We've had a lotta response.
We've had a lotta people reaching out, asking questions,
speculating as to how this is happening, what's going on.
And, at the end of the day, there's no real magic to it.
We reached out to Concept 2, obviously, they didn't have
a ton of time to respond, as well.
But, Peter Dreissigacker, one of the founding brothers
of Concept 2, reached out and helped us to understand
what was going on, and also, wanted for everybody
to be able to understand it, so that we can
limit the exposure to what this is.
Remember, the point of yesterday's video was, simply,
to evaluate whether or not this was happening,
and to draw the conclusion that this is
absolutely a cheating of the system,
and in no way anything that you should use.
I'm going to read Peter's quote directly,
cut straight to the chase, and we'll let it be at that.
"There is no magic here.
"I believe what you are experiencing
"can be explained as follows:
"There is a time limit programmed into the monitor
"of six seconds from the finish of a drive
"to the start of the next drive.
"A delay of more than six seconds signals the monitor
"that you have stopped rowing.
"Among other things, this allows the user to pause
"to take a drink, or pull off a sweatshirt
"during a long row, and then continue the row.
"The monitor's self-calibrating function uses
"the completed stroke cycle, drive, recovery, drive,
"to determine the drag factor to use in calculating
"the correct data you see on the monitor.
"Unfortunately, by pausing for seven seconds
"before you start your next drive,
"the monitor assumes that you have stopped rowing,
"and the monitor never, quote, 'sees' a complete stroke.
"It determined you had stopped rowing before
"it could sense the end of your recovery.
"If the monitor never sees a complete stroke,
"the drag factor will not be correctly determined,
"and the data displayed will not be correct.
"In terms of getting a valid score, what you are doing here
"is like painting 45 on your 25 pound weight plates.
"Peter."
I want to reiterate that last statement.
This is the equivalent of painting 45
on your 25 pound weight plates, and claiming
that you were getting a true result.
Let that sink in, but that is your answer,
that's why it's happening.
Don't evaluate it as anything more than a party trick
and a way to just rout around the computer
Other than that, go about your day, continue to work on good
movement and mechanics, there's nothin' to see here.
We'll see you on the other side.
After that initial response, Concept 2 sent along
a further note to follow up on
what's happening with this hack.
And, I think it's important to listen to, because,
as we're all understanding, and as this is coming out,
we're realizing it really is nothing special,
nothing magic, as we said before.
But, I wanted to go ahead and add
this piece on for your consideration,
and also, so that we all understand where this begins.
So, this is, again, from Peter Dreissigacker,
one of the founding brothers of Concept 2.
"We'll be honest, we're not too worried
"about people trying to workout at strokes
"lower than 10 strokes per minute.
"However, we are nothing if not thorough.
"Since the customers raised the question,
"we are looking into opportunities to upgrade the firmware,
"so that the, quote, '7-second hack' is no longer possible.
"This hack requires a stroke rate of 9 strokes per minute.
"The Concept 2 performance monitors
"are not designed to calibrate based on activity
"performed at less than 10 strokes per minute."
It's important to understand that this
machine is meant as a workout tool.
There's no reason that somebody should be rowing
at less than 10 strokes per minute.
The only time that I've seen that
is when we're implementing the counting drill
of a five or a seven-second count.
That is specifically for drill purposes,
and in no way tied to performance.
If you are using this machine with this in mind,
you are using it completely incorrectly,
and you're missing the point that this is meant
to induce work, and to help create fitness,
also, to help rowers perform better at what they do.
A stroke rate of 10 or less, there's no purpose for that
in a performance basis, so don't use it as such.
Guys, thanks for watching this.
We really appreciate all of the comments,
all of the questions, and everybody jumping in to
try and help solve what this was.
And, at the end of the day, Concept 2's already on it,
and they're ready to bring you a fix.
We'll let you know more as it gets updated.