On Sunday July 21 (my mothers birthday - happy birthday mom!), the women paddled a 2km exhibition race (with turns every 500m) on the Tisza river in Szeged. This was a chance not only to check out the race course for the world championships, but to work out the inevitable kinks caused by travel, adaption to a new routine and boatmates. The race went well - we were in a heat with mens crews and we didn't come last !! Plus, we had an unofficial sub 9 minute time (8:40 ish), which is a great time for a 2km race. The officiating wasn't exactly on par with what we are used to, however, so we aren't quite sure how we finished relative to the other teams, and how quickly we finished. But... we finished.
That afternoon we ended up at the racecourse where we will be competing for the rest of the week. The course is BEAUTIFUL!!! It's got a great set up for paddlers, spectators, racers, everyone!! It really is a dream course, and I'm counting myself very lucky that I have had the opportunity to paddle on it!
Below is a picture of the course.
Below is a picture of the athletes area - where a bunch of athletes are warming up.
Today, we had two practices where we focused on our starts and our sprint pieces. Each practice gets better and better and the boat is really starting to come together. Krysta and I walked around the city a bit during our lunch break, but I have a feeling we won't be exploring much of Szeged because we are really trying to focus on practice and racing.
Our hotel - I haven't spoken to that yet. The hotel is owned by a man who used to live in Canada, and he is very happy and excited to be hosting Canadians at his hotel. He held a team dinner for us last night in his courtyard - the dinner was fantastic and very well received. The owner and his staff have been really incredible to us - providing a home away from home to the premier womens, mens and mixed crews. The hotel itself is in a rather interesting building featuring castle turrets and the like. In general, the architecture here is really quite interesting - a blend of pre-communist Autrich-Hongrie and communist style buildings - side by side. Ornate flanked by bland - really neat to see.
That's all for now - I will post our race dates/times as I get more info.
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