The faster half of the couple
Is not me.
On Sunday I raced Head of the Port with my Head of the Charles crew. It was a decent piece. We went off first, since our club won the race last year. The crew behind us went off several seconds after us, more than the 10 second gaps which are customary. It made it hard on us, at least from my perspective, since we were then left to "row in a vacuum" with no crews in front to chase and nothing close behind to run away from.
None the less, I tried to keep my eye on them and to make sure we were pushing them back behind us. Make them small. Make them a dot on the horizon.
We were strong, albeit a little short, which is our one nagging problem. There seems to be a critical mass of guys in the boat who want to jack the stroke rate and row short when they want to move a boat. They don't think to row longer and harder. Longer, harder strokes hurt more. But the boat goes.
We had the fastest raw time of the day, but it turns out a crew well outside our view edged us out by 2 seconds after the whopping 40 second age handicap was applied.
We're designed to be over 40 years old on average, and as fast as possible after satisfying that requirement. We're not designed to be the fastest age-adjusted crew on the water. But is sucks to lose a head race to any of the other local clubs. We'll have to fix that.
On Sunday, K did the Alcatraz swim. She swam from Alcatraz to SF. Which is pretty insane to merely undertake and complete. She was an elite swimmer in her youth before a skiing accident took out one of her knees. K's tall and has the back and shoulders of a swimmer. Girl has muscles. Which not every guy on the planet can deal with, but I think it's hot.
Her plan was just to cruise and finish.
Except, deep down, I know she's a racer. I told her this.
And having been conditioned to chase small boats in the water, after swimming behind me in my single in the creek, she chose to chase the lead kayaker. And she did the whole thing in under 36 minutes. Which had her winning her age group and placing in the top 5 women. Out of about 80. Only 19 men were faster than she was. After training a little for a few weeks.
So my girl is a serious athlete.
I like this.
Work, sadly, made me fly to NYC on Sunday, so instead of hanging with K after her race and feeding/ snuggling her on the couch, I had to get on an airplane. Fun!
My Monday meeting in New York ended a little after 5 PM, which meant the earliest flight I could take back to CA departed at 8:40 Eastern. Getting me back to CA around midnight. Except it was delayed for more than an hour on the ground, so I didn't touch down in Oakland till a little after 1 am.
As has become our tradition, I just crashed with K in SF that night. Girl had hot chocolate chip cookies waiting for me when I walked in around 2 am.
Girlfriend of the year award.
With only two practices to go before traveling to Boston, I had to make the Tuesday session. Which meant getting up at 5. Less than 3 hours sleep: Fun!
And while I'd have preferred to go home and sleep, the fun people on my new project scheduled a meeting at 9 am in SF. So I got to that, then stopped at the office to handle a few things, then went home around 1:30 in the afternoon and slept.
And this is why I've not blogged in so many days.
On Sunday I raced Head of the Port with my Head of the Charles crew. It was a decent piece. We went off first, since our club won the race last year. The crew behind us went off several seconds after us, more than the 10 second gaps which are customary. It made it hard on us, at least from my perspective, since we were then left to "row in a vacuum" with no crews in front to chase and nothing close behind to run away from.
None the less, I tried to keep my eye on them and to make sure we were pushing them back behind us. Make them small. Make them a dot on the horizon.
We were strong, albeit a little short, which is our one nagging problem. There seems to be a critical mass of guys in the boat who want to jack the stroke rate and row short when they want to move a boat. They don't think to row longer and harder. Longer, harder strokes hurt more. But the boat goes.
We had the fastest raw time of the day, but it turns out a crew well outside our view edged us out by 2 seconds after the whopping 40 second age handicap was applied.
We're designed to be over 40 years old on average, and as fast as possible after satisfying that requirement. We're not designed to be the fastest age-adjusted crew on the water. But is sucks to lose a head race to any of the other local clubs. We'll have to fix that.
On Sunday, K did the Alcatraz swim. She swam from Alcatraz to SF. Which is pretty insane to merely undertake and complete. She was an elite swimmer in her youth before a skiing accident took out one of her knees. K's tall and has the back and shoulders of a swimmer. Girl has muscles. Which not every guy on the planet can deal with, but I think it's hot.
Her plan was just to cruise and finish.
Except, deep down, I know she's a racer. I told her this.
And having been conditioned to chase small boats in the water, after swimming behind me in my single in the creek, she chose to chase the lead kayaker. And she did the whole thing in under 36 minutes. Which had her winning her age group and placing in the top 5 women. Out of about 80. Only 19 men were faster than she was. After training a little for a few weeks.
So my girl is a serious athlete.
I like this.
Work, sadly, made me fly to NYC on Sunday, so instead of hanging with K after her race and feeding/ snuggling her on the couch, I had to get on an airplane. Fun!
My Monday meeting in New York ended a little after 5 PM, which meant the earliest flight I could take back to CA departed at 8:40 Eastern. Getting me back to CA around midnight. Except it was delayed for more than an hour on the ground, so I didn't touch down in Oakland till a little after 1 am.
As has become our tradition, I just crashed with K in SF that night. Girl had hot chocolate chip cookies waiting for me when I walked in around 2 am.
Girlfriend of the year award.
With only two practices to go before traveling to Boston, I had to make the Tuesday session. Which meant getting up at 5. Less than 3 hours sleep: Fun!
And while I'd have preferred to go home and sleep, the fun people on my new project scheduled a meeting at 9 am in SF. So I got to that, then stopped at the office to handle a few things, then went home around 1:30 in the afternoon and slept.
And this is why I've not blogged in so many days.
posted by Kenneth at 9:09 AM
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