14 Miles Saturday

We had ideal weather conditions for our Saturday morning paddle, warming but not hot and partly sunny but not too much. Since you should be paddling reasonably hard you really don't need the sun beating down on you, too. Our crew started out with Kristen stroking, then Meilee, Nancy, me, Rives and Lianne steering to get practice for Lotus Iron coming up on June 28. Can I just say 'I love following Kristen at stroke!' Her pace is comfortable, her reach is long, and her stroke is powerful. She is so easy to follow, she is also an awesome steerer. Too bad we can't clone her to have her sitting both ends of the boat! Minnie and Lianne are doing a fine job stroking, but they are still quite new in those positions. Over time I have no doubt they will really grow into those positions. Lianne is already showing a lot of potential at steering, too.

So, we paddled south past the 520 bridge and onward towards the I-90 bridge. We hit the 7 mile mark off the marina at Leschi. No chance of seeing our dragon boating team members, they were all up north in Vancouver for a huge weekend of racing. We took a nice easy turn and then stopped to swap people around. Lianne to stroke, then Rives, Nancy and I kept our places, followed by Meilee, and a somewhat tired Kristen to steer. Kristen hasn't sat anywhere but steering much at all this summer and that is a very different type of fitness.

The last mile or so were tough. We went 14.2 miles total and it felt like it. It was a good workout and it helped bring us another step closer to being ready for Gibson's.

After we got back to SSP Clem and I documented dings and wear spots on the three OC6s. We're hoping to get some rough time and cost estimates from the guy who is repairing our ama so we can figure out when to pull the boats for maintenance.