Dawn at Alex Head
It is raining yet again this morning, but it clears up again
as we get to the beach. Team trials,
round 2.
With Noah out of the picture, Jim is subbing in Saba.
Jim, Mat and I are starting in Men’s IC, and we’ve no
paddler in the 4th heat.
Devon and Kate are next in Women’s IC
Then Devon is up again in Master’s IC
Next, Saba is going to paddle Junior’s IC, then Buey is
going in Junior’s HP
Jim is then up for Master’s HP, followed by Rachael and Kate
in Women’s HP, and then No Paddler, Buey, Mat and I to finish off Men’s HP.
The weather turns nice, and it’s time to go.
Jim scores a first in his heat, and then Mat scores a fourth
against super-tough competition. Time
for me.
I’m not making the same mistakes as yesterday—I’m going to
catch everything I can. I feel like I’m
doing well, and sure enough, I’m third!
So I feel like I’m doing enough to
keep us in it.
The scoring is tight all day, with teams moving back and
forth within only a few points of each other.
The Junior IC heat is a hoot. Both we and the Aussie’s have very young and
very novice paddlers in the heat, to avoid the points, and the dads of the two
paddlers plus at least one other person are hovering nearby to try and flip the
paddlers upright when they capsize. On
the outside, the Basque paddler (England has nobody for the heat) is tearing it
up while being generally ignored by the crowd, who are cheering wildly for the
kids, and for the dads too. Saba comes
in third, which is great.
Getting Saba launched…
…while Mom looks on.
After lunch, I re-do my foot braces with foam, removing the
Happy Feet that I’ve been using. I’m
just not getting enough support with the Happy Feet. I get it all set, and I’m ready to go for the
last heat.
Conditions have gotten rather small. As I paddle out, I can tell that the foam
braces are a huge improvement. I
immediately start catching waves after wave, and in the midst of this I’m
really happy about all the prep time I put into this competition, because I’m
feeling great. The horn sounds and I
paddle in to find…I’m again third!
Awesome.
But Team USA still scores 4th highest for the
day. We are out of the finals..
Still, I feel like I’m improving every day. I can’t wait for the Grand Masters
rounds.
Tomorrow we get a much-needed day off. Thank goodness. Maybe I can dry my stuff out.
Mat showing how it's done in IC
Me
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