David has left the frosty UK winter to train under warmer conditions in Australia, telling us about the experience and what he’s been doing, he emailed to say, “Just starting into our second week of training here. Got here on Wednesday 19th and was straight into training that day! The course is Penrith Whitewater Stadium, which is about an hour inland from Sydney and was host to the Olympic Games in 2000.”
Warm weather training is important to the GB Slalom Canoe Team and something that they undertake each year. The sport is predominately European, so there are few places warm enough during our winter and with the right caliber of course in which to de-camp to. Australia is one of the few places and is the usual destination for the GB Team, plus many other teams from around the world.
David went on to say, “It’s great to be training in the warmth after such cold training in the lead up to Christmas. There are lots of other international paddlers here from France, Canada, Italy, Austria, Togo and Slovenia so far; over the next month many more paddlers will arrive I’m sure. They’ve made quite a few changes to the course since last year and it’s pretty good.”
“Unfortunately Richard (Hounslow) and I did break our C2 double canoe on Friday, but we’ve fixed it up over the weekend. I’m here for about five and a half weeks training, of which my coach, Mark Delaney, is here for three, having just arrived this weekend. Other than training we’ve been playing a bit of tennis in the evenings and taking the odd swim in the pool. On Sunday we had a day off and went to watch a bit of cricket in Sydney to see the women’s Ashes, as one of our former physiotherapists works for the women’s England cricket team.”
“It’s due to get very hot this week, but I’m a bit acclimatised now and I’ve recovered from jet-lag without too much trouble.”
We’ll hear more from David and how warm weather training is benefiting his performance in a couple of weeks time.