Wednesday Sprints

Jack came up with the idea of Wednesday afternoon sprints. Oh yeh, count me in...was my quick reply when I first heard of it. I've been looking to mix up my training a bit and this sounded ideal. So the go was to meet at 4:30 to start on the river.

Since I was now K-less (due to the club K1 getting repairs), Jack brought down his Flash for me to do it in. He really is so generous. He doesn't hesitate to offer to loan his equipment or help, and I really do appreciate it very much.

Anton was a wus/woose (is that how you spell it Anton?) and decided at the last minute that he wasn't going to join us. Sorry...couldn't resist!So it was me in the Fash, Jack in the Struer K1 and Michael Carpenter on a Surf Ski. Now who do you think was going to be the slowest huh?

We paddled to the bridge and back as a warm-up and then paddled up to the 200m start. Jack had previously done his research and with GPS accuracy had measured out different distances and knew the starting landmarks. Jen was all set up back at the boat ramp (finish) with the stop watch, and with a yell from Jack of "Ready, Go" we were off for our first sprint. I felt ok, but found it hard dealing with the wash of the other 2 kayaks most of the way. They were a fair bit quicker than me. Anyway, after we crossed the finish and found out our times (which were surprisingly pretty good), Jack worked out the handicap times and we slowly paddled back up to the start again. We repeated all this for another 200m, 200m, 250m, and 500m. Even with the handicap start, I still came last each time. This didn't bother me, as we were all just trying to paddle the best we could. But I did notice that I was fatiguing a lot quicker than I had hoped for. So I guess this means that this is exactly the type of training that I need to do (especially if I want to get into some sprint racing).

Thanks again Jack, for yet another well thought out, well planned, well organised and well-executed event. I look forward to doing it again.