Joining a gym

Yesterday I finally signed up for a summer gym membership. I am joining Sierra Athletic Club for the summer. A great gym with great management and staff as well as members. This will allow me to lift heavier weights and work on other lifts such as the power clean and snatch.
I have not had access to a rowing machine all winter. I really missed training on this machine. Rowing is a great cardio-vascular and strength building exercise. Rowing works all the major muscle groups of the core, arms and legs and believe me will challenge any fitness level.
In the Scandinavian crossfit challenge I competed in last November we did Tabata intervals on the Concept2 rower. 20 sec of max out put followed by 10 secs of rest X 8. A total of four minutes worth of work left me, and I am sure I can speak for every other competitor, totally wasted.
Missing this impact in my training I was eager to get back on this machine and see what I could do. I set the clock at 12 minutes and decided I will row 2,000 meters as fast as possible and with the remaining time do as many double unders as possible until time runs out.
I finished the 2,000 meter row in 8 min 6 secs and performed a total of 157 double unders with the remaining time. I think the best thing I could say about this work out was that I was able to keep a consistent pace through the whole distance. I have never actually rowed a longer distance like this before. So mentally I figured i would just focus on 500 meters at a time. I think this approach helped out because my pace times were consistently at 2 mins. I am happy with this
The double unders were another story. I forgot my jump rope at the house prior to leaving for the gym. The club did have a couple of other ropes laying around and they were the old school kind with the little plastic pieces of different color on the rope. I thought this would be great because I am so used to my rope that maybe this would add a little extra challenge and it did. This rope was slow and awkward. Honestly speaking I don't think I would have managed very many more with my jump rope vs the gyms rope. I was just that tired in the arms and the legs. Overall a great work out that left me lying on my back for a few minutes after.
Below is a video of the tabata row in the Scandinavian Crossfit challenge November 1st 2009.