Oct 13, 2007

Friday Oct 5 2007 Magical Moment in Toco

Ryan came by and woke me nice and early so I could enjoy breakfast with the other international athletes. There were 4 from Florida (2 teams of 2 relay teams), Martin from South Africa, Richard Usher and his wife Elina from New zealand and myself. After breakfast we headed to the kayak centre, where I got a chance to test out the red 7 surf 60 ski. We got it set up for me and into the WARM ocean I went. It was mildly choppy (nothing big), I managed to stay in the boat but was using a lot of extra energy and concentration to balance in the body, energy that should be used to propel me forward....so I tested out the sea kayak...I felt much more stable and confident in this boat and was actually moving quicker becuase of it. After discussing my options with Martin (professional kayaker in SA) and Richard (professional multi sport athlete) I decided to go with the sea kayak as it would probably be more enjoyable for me and I had pretty much a guarantee I would finish the kayak stage in that boat.

We then headed to the bike shop. I bought some canisters (which later on i unfortunately needed to use) and some tire protectors (as I was told the roads were in pretty rough condition...and they were at points..).

We then began our journey to TOCO (the village where we would start the race). It was a winding rough road...we made it there for about 5pm. We were staying in a gorgeous guest house with an unbelievable view. We unpacked and Marting, Richard and I headed down to the beach for an evening sunset swim. It was absolutely magical. We could see Tobago across from us, and some jagged spectacular rocks jetting out of the ocean. The four of us (Richard, Elina, Martin and I) had a pasta dinner and set ourselves up for the morning. Richard kindly taped my ankles for me as I was a little worried about them for the mountain run stage of the race. As I rested in bed I was getting antsy about the race and curious about the journey I was about to put myself through....

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