Yikes…Where does time go? Only 34 days till the Games!!!I can honestly say that I’d planned to write my update on the flight back home… well, I guess that beckons the real question – where is home really these days?!
If it were Weymouth (here for a total of 3 months & a week out of 4 months leading up to and including the Olympics), I’m following through as planned – I wrote this on the plane heading back to the UK for another bout of training.
I did come back to Vancouver, albeit for a short 8 days.
My days at home are never enough but nevertheless much needed. After 7 weeks in Weymouth and seeing the sun for only 12 of those 50 days (and they were all in a row too), a change was necessary both physically and mentally.
Good thing Vancouver’s weather has been so similarly crappy…the last thing I’d need to stress about is having to acclimatize!
Sail for Gold Regatta just kind of came and went…more like fizzled out. I started off terribly on day one – but was able to turn that around in the races that followed.
I climbed up the ranks each day – from 35th to 17th to 13th and then finally to 12th.
Unfortunately because of the weather we ended up having only 7 races, it was too windy to race.
Our last day of sailing was a crazy one – the weather forecast had the wind increasing steadily throughout the day to super windy 40+knots.
The race committee tried to get a race off for each of the sailing classes as we were all behind schedule and it looked like the day following was also going to be as windy.
Thus, we had one race in the morning before we got sent in to wait for a further race later in the day. At our time of racing it was only 18-22knots, for which I had a simple game plan and stuck with it. I got off the starting line and off I went.
I rounded the top mark in 1st, then the lead changed a few times before I took it back by the last top mark. I nailed it and got a bullet!!!
After waiting for the rest of the day,
I’m bummed we didn’t get another chance to race so that I could have the opportunity to climb the leader board again and make the medal race, however, in the end, I did go out with a bang.
And if what some say is true… you’re only as good as your last race…well then…I guess I’ll just have to start the Olympics where I left off 🙂
We had some pretty intense wind come through on the last 2 days of the regatta.
Coincidently, I was rescued both on my very first day of training here at the end of April and on my last day of sailing at Sail For Gold – they had sent us out again in the afternoon (after the race I won in the morning) once the wind had picked up, however… once out there the storm bit of the wind came through and we saw well over 40+knots out there, some reckon it was up to 52knots.
The men’s fleet had been racing and only 16 of 53 competitors were able to finish, and hardly any girls but a few (myself included) dared to head out to the race course.
I had sailed to the course area and tuned up to try to get comfortable with the conditions, when the wind really hit. Then there was carnage everywhere.
The race committee put up the “rescue” flag, which meant all coaches and anyone on a boat was in rescue mode. Many sailors ended up leaving their gear on another beach – I ended up towing my stuff home but with much difficulty.
It was a pleasant surprise to come back to shore with all sailors helping each other get back on land and de-rig. Luckily both my gear and I survived the day!
Unfortunately the following day it was too windy to race again early on and unfortunately the race committee cancelled the races for the day way too early – an hour later the learn to sail kids were out there.
What a shame we didn’t race again. Just before Sail for Gold Regatta, the official Canadian Olympic Sailing Team announcement was made.
We were all presented with Canadian Sailing Team gear from Gill as well as some cool HBC Canada Olympic Team Jackets. There is an option to go for custom team warm up jackets if the team wants to add to their collection as well!
The first picture depicts the whole team, the Paralympians, the Olympians and the coaches while the second and much smaller group is of only the Olympic sailors.
Go Canada Go! And now that I’m back in Weymouth…I’m back at it. Today was my first day of training here.
It was too windy so we called off sailing so instead I hit the gym twice.
Fun times. Lots more news to come as I ramp up towards the Games!
Nikola
