Well, here we are, 11 weeks down and life is good, sort of. Unfortunately this week I had a some sadness in my life, I split with my partner Jessie after 18months. For obvious reasons I won't be going into details but I figure if this is a blog about me going through my 12WBT and emotions and feelings play a big part in what we eat, how we train and motivation it definitely relates and therefore needs to be mentioned. Currently I'm feeling a little lost, I really miss the friendship side of things. Jessie is a great girl and we used to do a lot of fun things together. Wether it be Stand up paddling in the bay, to her coming along to one of my Saturday Super Sessions or even us just going for a run together, it was great and we always got along whilst we did it. Over the last 7 days I have had times where I've felt like throwing it all in, ordering a Pizza and ringing one of the boys and saying "Lets demolish a case of Coronas" but in the end, how is that gonna help? I'm only gonna feel guilty as hell for breaking the promise I made to myself at the start of my 12WBT or get drunk, emotional and maybe say or do something I regret, it's a lose lose situation. Instead this week I opted to fill my days with training and just kept as busy as I could, you won't believe how clean my place is ! On the training front I did my best to channel my emotions and used them to lift more in the gym, swim faster in the pool and and give it everything in my Shift60 sessions and it seemed to work. I again tried to train a little smarter by not doing weights on the same day as swimming and it paid off. Thursday nights swim squad session felt great and I really think my stroke change is starting to come together. I swam 3.5km and at no point was I feeling overly fatigued. Bring on my 800m time trial, I think I'm ready !
If your looking for a healthy snack I have just the one for you. Phil, my main man at Hexey got me on to their Naked protein snacks a month or so ago, I was instantly hooked. Its only 286 calories and is a trail mix type snack that contains 20g of Protein. I now have one every day on the way to work. I've found they help me feel full and sustain energy through out the morning. Another bonus is they have a resealable top so if you don't feel like finishing it you can save some for later. You can buy them direct from the Hexey weekly menu. Do your taste buds and health a favour and rip into one today, you won't be disappointed !
Our weekly task for my 12WBT was to design a 1 hour training session. I decided to make mine lifeguard specific and took our basic M-Shape course ( Surf Ironman minus the Ski leg) and added things that I thought related to when we need to have that edge fitness wise during serious rescues. I named it "Rescue under Fatigue". I drew a lot of my inspiration for this training session from my first ever serious rescue/resuscitation and one that I'll never forget. It was in my second or third season on the beach so I was still pretty raw but extremely keen to learn. It involved rescuing and resuscitating a 26 year old girl named Candice who was learning to surf at the south end of Bondi back in 2005, a couple years before they started filming Bondi Rescue. The surf was about 4-5 foot closing out, low tide and really dumping hard on the sandbank, not really the best conditions to be learning. She was in the impact zone when a set wave cleaned her up. Her board hit her head so bad it knocked her unconscious. For some crazy reason our serious rescues seem to happen when we least expect them. Not when you are on the beach just waiting for them to happen! I was in the car park loading some boards onto the roof of the lifeguard truck to take over to Bronte for our annual lifeguard challenge when I looked down towards South Bondi, I saw what I thought was a girl lying face down just outside the impact zone. I turned to Benny Quigley and said "Sh!t mate, I think we are on here" and proceeded to run back down towards the tower. As I ran through another lifeguard named Kailan, who was down south had already also spotted her and was calling it through on the radio. Back then we only had one Rhino (beach buggy) which Kailan had so I proceeded on foot, running as fast as I could across the soft sand for 400m. When I got there Kailan was already halfway out, but knowing how hard it is to get an unconscious patient onto the board I went out also. After what seemed like an eternity we wrestled her onto the board and Kailan paddled her in. Candice was a dark shade of blue and in a very bad way. Meanwhile the other boys in the tower had run down with the oxyviva and defibrillator and had it set up on the beach ready to go. Once we dragged Candice up we started working on her straight away. I remember I was doing the oxygen bag with Hoppo while the Kailan was doing compressing as the other guys set up the defibrillator and placing the pads on her. After at least 8 rounds of CPR and 3 shocks with the defibrillator she came round. She began to breath on her own and was even talking to us before the ambulance arrived. We found out from doctors she was officially dead for at least 4 mins. Candice was a very lucky girl but I put her survival down to an awesome team effort on the day. Everybody knew their role, stepped up and delivered. I was honoured to be a part of it.
That feeling, when you get someone back from the dead is unexplainable and big part of the reason why we are lifeguards. It really makes you feel like all the hard work and effort in training has paid off. It also really reinforces why we need to have a certain level of physical fitness because in the line of work we do it literally does save lives.
Just before I filmed the boys going through my training session I noticed a pod of Dolphins swimming around the bay, having my camera handy Bacon and I ran down and paddled out to try and have a swim with them. It was a group of mothers teaching their babies how to use their flippers, so amazing. Not sure if it was our bad breath or ugly looks but after about 2 minutes they sadly moved around to Tamarama and we don't swim fast enough to keep up. I still managed to get a little bit of footage. PS: I love my life :)
This week I did my body a favour and on Thursday I got it a massage. It was a deep tissue massage and quite painful, I guess thats the price you pay for lots of training and very little stretching. It was my second ever massage and money very well spent. I have now locked in one a week for the time being. I think I owe a lot of my great pool session later that afternoon to it. Thanks a million Ash, feeling great!
In the blink of an eye it was Friday and I already had a new love in my life. You may think I'm a fast mover but she's 14 feet tall with just enough rocker to rock my world. She will always keep me afloat and with the use of a good leg rope promises never leave me. Friday I received delivery of a brand spanking new, down wind ocean SUP (stand up paddle) board. It came from my friend, ex Gold Coast lifeguard and 10 X world paddle board champion Jamie Mitchell. Jamie owns JM Paddleboards and uses his vast knowledge of the waves and ocean to design and produce some of the best boards in the world. I took her out for our first date in the bay at Bondi as soon as she arrived. It was love at first sight and we hit it off straight away. I'm looking forward to getting to know her much better as we chase the wind together out on the deep blue sea.
When I woke up early Saturday morning to the sounds of my blinds bashing against the windows I realised right away it wasn't looking good for Lifeguard Ryan "whippet" Clark's annual Bondi Big Paddle. My plan was to use my new SUP board and I was frothing at the opportunity but if the wind was to strong it wasn't going to be possible. I took the hound for a walk down the beach to check the conditions and they were terrible. It was raining heavily, there was thick fog out to sea the wind was howling from the North and a rising swell from the East. After chatting to Whippet he told me he'd decided to scrap the original 2 way paddle from Bondi to Coogee then back and go with a triangle course that would be repeated several times in the bay at Bondi. After assessing the conditions again right before the race started, I had no choice to leave my new board safe and sound at home and paddle Corey's prone (lay down and kneel) 12ft board. Paddling a SUP against light wind is tough enough, your body acts as a sail and is very hard going, in strong winds you pretty much go backwards. Im in this sport for fun not complete and utter torture. The race went well and many of the lifeguards stepped up and took podium finishes. Bacon, Hoppo, Corey and Gonzo all won on their specific craft but the surprise packet was Dunstan "Dunno" Foss who took out the Dash for Cash in a close finish. For the record I came in second behind Corey but Im not going to start building and extra trophy cabinet just yet as there was only 3 of us in the unlimited division :)
Normal course that was canned due to bad conditions
New course to suit conditions
The Bondi Big Paddle presentation was held at the amazing Bondi Icebergs and believe it or not but the sun came out eventually. Sydney hadn't seen sun in a week so it was a lovely surprise! The Icebergs is great place to have a beer but unfortunately I was drinking water. Its times like these, after competing in a race, giving it all I've and finishing that I really miss a beer. Today, considering the conditions I felt I earned one. I really had to draw on all my self disciple to say "No Thanks". The function loads of fun and everyone seemed to have a ball also loads of money was raised for the Sydney Children's Hospital with raffles and auctions. Big shout out to Whippet, he put in a lot of effort and turned what could have been a disastrous day into a lot of fun.
Great view
Bondi Icebergs
Corey O scored $250 for his unlimited paddle board win !
This dude won 2 brand new SupLove boards for taking out the 2km race
Some Bondi Big Paddle crew
Can you believe how good the day turned out?
You'd think after the big race on Saturday I'd spend Sunday kicking back, No Way. I just had to take my new board out on the ocean for a paddle. After working water safety for a special event starting at 5:00am on Bondi I headed out with Daq's and Corey O for a little cruise around the bays of Bondi, Bronte and Tamarama. The west winds made it a little hard but otherwise it was just very healing just to be out on the water on such a beautiful morning.
While you were sleeping. Bondi @ 4.55am
Sunday morning paddle
After a busy Sunday afternoon of work at Bondi I was left with some serious paddle rash under the armpits while doing 5 rescues. Haven't done that many in 1 day in a long time. We were also left frothing when we bumped into a lovely lady named Sally Fitzgibbon. Sal is a shredder from the south coast. She's the current world number 2, reigning Bells champion and all round legend and is in town for her sponsor Red Bull. She told me she has to Jet off to Fiji tomorrow to go surfing... Poor girl :)
North Bondi @ lunch time. Not so busy !
Harries, Dunno & Sal
Frothing !
Next weekend I'm heading down to Lorne down in Victoria to take on the Anaconda Adventure Race in a team with Maxi, Bacon and Azza Buchan. We raced last year at the Anaconda race in Forster, not only did we have a ball we won our division. For more details on where you can come and see us while we are in Melbourne CLICK HERE.
Anaconda @ Forster last year
Again I always love the feed back you guys and gals leave in the comments section, it blows me away that you take the time to write them and for that I say "Thank you".
Wow, 10 weeks have passed and I haven't had a beer, not even a sip. Is that un-Australian of me? Maybe a little but just maybe for the sake of sensibility it's a good thing. Maybe we need to change the stigma that is "Aussies are pissheads" or maybe we don't. Maybe we are proud of it, or maybe we aren't, who knows. Either way I'm proud of myself for staying true to my promise that I wouldn't. It's a real sense of completion and a feeling you can only get from doing, not just saying. When I was younger my dad used to call me "Gonna Reid" because he said I'm always saying "I'm gonna do this" and "I'm gonna do that" but never see it through. How do you like them apples dad? :)
This week on the training front I decided to take note of my poor 800m swim performance and pulled back on the weights a little. I dropped 2 sessions, so I only did 3 instead of 5 and really noticed the difference in the pool on both Tuesday and Thursday night. After not doing my regular leg weights sessions on those particular days my lower body didn't feel heavy and sink which in turn throws my whole stroke out. Just like my swim coach "Aldo" told me it would :) Whats that saying: "Old head, young shoulders". DOH !
Anyone that lives in Sydney would have noticed that Monday and Tuesday were bloody scorchers. Monday especially with the mercury rising to 37 degrees. I absolutely love hot weather and couldn't think of anything better than having a hard training session with lots of sweating going on, so I decide to do a little experiment with Chappy from Shift60. We decided to see how much sweat I could lose during an "Hour of Power" class. As well as being a fun experiment it also made me push myself that little bit harder. According to my HR monitor I lost nearly 900 calories and got the HR over 170 many times. Chappy even gave a couple of free sessions to two of ladies that guessed my sweat loss for the class. Doing things like that really keeps training interesting and exciting, give it a try at your next session.
Shift 60 Sweat Session
One of my favourite things about living in Bondi and I reckon anyone that has lived here will agree, is that on warm summer evenings you can pop down and have a swim at 7:30pm, its the perfect way to end the day. Below is a picture I took when I did exactly that. After my Shift60 sweat session on Monday I grabbed my hound and we made an appointment with the good Doctor, DR Pacific. Its the perfect medicine for a hard day at the office and as you can see from the photo there were many others doing exactly the same thing. One thing I must mention, and this is just the lifeguard coming out in me, the lifeguards on Bondi and many other city beaches go home about 7pm so if your thinking about having a late evening dip, please be extra careful if you're not a strong swimmer. The rips and currents don't leave the beach when we do and there is a chance you can still get into trouble.
Bondi, still pretty packed at 7:30 on a warm night. Great place for a swim !
As far as I'm concerned Friday's are dipped in gold and this one was no exception. It started with work early then straight to the gym at North Bondi SLSC for a very productive arm weights session. As I got home I ran into Phil (the very cool dude in the picture below). Phil was delivering my Hexey lunch and dinner for the the day. He does this Monday through to Friday and always wears a friendly smile on his face. Along with that smile and delicious healthy food he provides motivation and inspiration which could only come from someone as passionate about helping people as Phil is, he genuinely cares about his clients and their goals. Wether it be to lose fat or bulk up Phil is your man. Not only can he tell you what you should be eating, he can deliver it to your door fresh, daily. Over the past 8 weeks Phil has become a close friend of mine and I'm truly grateful for everything he has done for me.
My Friday didn't end there, with the sun shining and the water glistening there was no way I was missing a hot afternoon at Bondi on a SUP (stand up paddle). SUP'ing is really taking off in Australia, the amount of people I see out on SUP boards at Bondi is increasing by the day. My paddle was going to be a little different as I was using my new Vibram's from Barefoot Inc for the first time. Vibram's Five Fingers encourage the body to move naturally by allowing your feet to land the way they're supposed to, not supported by your regular running shoe. As I'm only in the first stages of wearing them I am restricted to only wearing them casually for short periods of time. The long term personal benefits I am hoping to see from the Vibram's is ridding myself of the pain from Plantar Fasciitis. I have had the problem for about 2 years now and its really hindered my running which I love so much. After my last half marathon in 2010 I couldn't walk for 4 days and the pain was so intense I swore I wouldn't run another long distance race until I had sorted it out. Now your probably wondering why I wore them paddling and the answer is grip. The particular pair I have are designed to get wet and allowed me to move around the board with less chance of slipping but still using the muscles in my feet and toes for balance. I found they worked great during my paddle and I am really looking forward to slowly getting used to running in them over the coming months.
That is a Canon 5D MkII in a Aquatec housing on the front. Pic: Cora B.
Saturday morning started early, I don't even bother trying to sleep in, my body clock just won't let me snore past 5:30am. I took the dog down the beach for a walk then headed up to Shift60 for my Super Saturday Session. Things got interesting when I was doing my first run set and found I could crank the Woodway treadmill past the usual 20kph its normally governed to. Woodway treadmills are some of the best on the planet and can reach speeds of 38kph. The boys turned them up a little to allow us to run that little bit faster. I got mine up to 25kph at one point and was absolutely flying. I only held it for a minute but I'm looking forward to more training and seeing just how fast I can push myself.
After Shift I had to race home, chow on some healthy breakfast and get to work at Bondi for 9am. The weather forecasters predicted a hot one and boy, they didn't get it wrong. The beach and it surroundings were packed to capacity through out the whole day. Also blanket of ocean mist covered the beach for most of the morning making things very difficult to monitor swimmer. We were just very fortunate there was only a small swell running, therefore the rips & currents weren't causing us much trouble.
BSc Compression are a perfect way to help the legs recover after a hard session
The heavy ocean mist made it hard to see swimmers.
Once the mist slowly cleared it only got busier.
One of my weekly surprise tasks for the 12WBT was to design a 12WBT T-Shirt with a motivational slogan. It's 3 weeks late so I don't get to win any prizes but below is my attempt. It came to me Saturday night when I was kicking back on the lounge so I put this tee together. What do you think?
Today is Sunday and it's a rest day, well sort of. As you should know by now I have a little trouble sitting still so I grabbed the hound again and took him for a paddle in the bay at Bondi. We only did about 4km's but it was just awesome to be out on the water as the day was beginning. Another bound was getting to see the all the Sculpture's by the sea from a different angle, really wish I could of taken my good camera out there. As the sun was rising the big Tap looked so cool from out in the bay.
This mornings paddle course.
View from the bay.
Who left the tap running? Pic: Samantha Burns
Coming into week 11 It's set to be a big one. As well as my regular training through the week, on Saturday morning Im going to paddle in fellow lifeguard Ryan "Whippet' Clark's annual Bondi Big Paddle. Then on the Sunday I'm going to compete in the Coogee beach, Express Glass Island Challenge. Im not expecting to break any records, I'll just be stoked if I can finish the both of them.
Another thing I'm super excited about is the 12 WBT group training session followed by the finale party later that night. Ill be a quite sad that its all over but I'm really looking forward to seeing everyones transformations. I can't believe its 20 days away, bring it on!
Thanks y'all for for stopping by again,
"Don't just follow your dreams, chase them down till they become reality".
I have been doing a lot of thinking this past week, just about what happens at the end of my 12WBT. Will I fall back into bad habits, make wrong choices and give into peer pressure? Cant I just hit the pause button on life, I really like the person I am at the moment. Focused, fit and feeling good. Unfortunately in years gone by when I'm on a "fitness high" so to speak thats when the little man on my shoulder says "Go on mate, things are going well, rip into a few beers" then a few beers leads to a thousand beers and I wake up the next day hungover as hell craving crap food and I spend the day on the lounge pigging out on chocolate, Crust pizza and everything else I have been leaving out of my mouth for the last 12 weeks and the vicious cycle begins.
This is what Im hoping for once my 12WBT is over, and I'm putting it on my blog so that I can try and be true to myself. I will tone the training down (Chappy tells me every week I'm over training and he is dead right) but still do at least 1 session a day, 6 days a week. Maybe even try and do a Super Saturday Fun Session once a month just to keep things interesting. Also try and train a little more sport specific. By that I mean, work more closely with the boys at Shift60 and put together a training program that will help me improve my power, stability and stroke on the SUP. Reason being is my long term goal is to get back to Hawaii in 2012 for the Molokai 2 Oahu paddle race. I'm also hoping to continue with my Hexey diet. The team behind the Hexey are just fabulous,they really know their stuff especially when it comes to nutrition for athletic types. Also the convenience of being able to focus much more time on training and less in the kitchen while knowing I am still getting the right healthy fuel for my body just makes life so much easier. As for my old partying lifestyle, I think its time I grew up a little and used some self control. Unless there is a real reason to celebrate I think from now on I'm going to do my best to be booze free. Believe it or not but something this past 9 weeks has taught me is "you can still have a good time without a gut full of grog".
This weeks weigh in was a big surprise for me when I saw I had dropped 1.5 kilos. I totally expected the scales to go up. Not quite sure wether to be happy or sad? I have a fair idea why this might be. Normal weigh in day is Wednesday morning and Tuesday nights I do swimming training where I don't think I sweat a lot. This week I forgot and didn't weigh in till Thursday morning and Wednesday night I did one of the hardest Shift60 Full Throttle classes ever. It was about 30 degrees in the shade and Nicholas was flogging me after my little photo stunt in the last blog post. I have never sweat like that in my life and I reckon I lost 3 kilos in fluid. I did try and replace as much as I could but there is only so much you can drink. Either way a loss is a loss and I'm happy, although I'm weighing in at 67.1 kilos and I don't think I wanna lose anymore.
As most of you know I work as a recycle loader in the mornings through the week. I have my own set daily run which covers the coast from Dover Heights to Bronte beach through out the week. I work with a great couple of blokes and we love the early starts and physicalness of the job. Every now and then something random happens. See below:
Another random thing I saw this week was a tree house, not just any tree house, this thing was proper. It was high up and hard to get to, just how I liked them as a kid but unfortunately it got me thinking again. Most kids these days aren't allowed to build tree houses, most kids aren't allowed to do a lot of things that are active and usually its through fear of them getting hurt. Have you seen those new age trampolines? They look like space ships and you couldn't hurt yourself on them if you tried. Whats wrong with kids hurting themselves? Sure I don't wanna see anyone get seriously hurt but heck I used to hurt myself all the time as a kid, hurting yourself is a sure fire way to learn the difference between right and wrong. If we wrap kids up in cotton wool and don't let them have any fun then what will they know when they are older? They'll think there will always be a safety net there to catch them and sometimes there isn't.
Anyways, enough of my rambling, this weeks Super Saturday Fun Session just happened to be on a Friday (due to work all weekend for me) but it definitely was a lot of FUN. I was invited by the Red Kite team to be a part of their inaugural Sailing Regatta to raise money to help kids with cancer. Along with super cool Australian actor Les Hill from hit channel 10 show Terra Nova and Australian TV personality, host of much loved Channel 7 Deal or No Deal, Andrew O'Keefe plus the crew from Everjoy Consulting we raced 11 other teams around the Sydney Harbour on Sailing boats. The weather was amazing and the day a massive success with lots of money raised. I had so much fun just hanging out and meeting new people while enjoying all the views our beautiful harbour has on offer.
Sydney Harbour
Holy Cow was the winner on the day. Moooooo !
Mosman Sailing club
Our crew
Not a bad view
Di from Red Kite
On Saturday afternoon after doing a 9 hour lifeguard shift at Bronte beach I decided to do an 800m time trial in the swimming pool. I just wanted to see where I'm at with achieving my goal of breaking 11minutes at the end of my 12WBT. Unfortunately I was left very disappointed. My best time ever for 800 meters freestyle is 11:15 and on Saturday I swam 12:48. I was shattered, If that was the lifeguard test I would have nearly failed. Feeling gutted I went home a sulked about it but after speaking to few friends that know how much I've been training they put It down to serious fatigue and said to make sure I have had a couple of days rest before trying it again. I am not going to let it break me and am determined to smash that 12:48 time next swim. I still believe my goal is achievable and will try even harder next time.
I would like to apologise for this weeks blog. I had been trying to put it together through out the week but towards the end I just got so snowed under with work and training that I really didn't get a chance to do it properly. Its now Sunday night at 8pm, I have just finished a 9 hour shift on Bondi and I'm buggered. We weren't overly busy with rescues but the sun was shining and there was plenty of people to watch over all day and that really takes it out of you.
It's milestone week in my 12WBT and what a week its been ! Apart from completing all of my regular Swim, Weights and Shift60 sessions, I had a weigh in on Wednesday that went North. The scales have finally started to go the other way and I have gained 0.4 of a kilo which is good news for me. It means all the weight training I am doing is paying off and I'm putting on lean muscle. I also had some improvements in my fitness test when I dropped 15 seconds from my 1 kilometre sprint and extended my wall sit by 90 seconds. Although my push up count in a minute was 3 less than the last test, I put that down to fatigue from the serious chest and back weights session I had done the previous afternoon. All in all I'm very happy with how things are going and am looking forward to the next 4 weeks.
Many people find inspiration from some of the greatest athletes in the world and thats totally cool but I don't think it's the only place. There is inspiration everywhere, I think it's just how you look at it. This morning I was coming in from a lazy Sunday morning SUP (stand up paddle) surf at Bondi. The sun was shining, water was warm and the waves were fun. As I walked back up the beach I saw one of the local guys, Stephen Ford, who is a legend dude and great waterman, taking an ocean swimming, beginners course. When looking at the large group he had in front of him I noticed there we people of all ages, shapes and sizes and almost straight away felt inspired. These people, for what ever reason were up early on a Sunday, down the beach, getting out there and having a go. None of them may ever win bronze, silver or gold so their only prize once they finish their first ocean swim is a sense of completion and self satisfaction and that really gets me stoked, I really love that and find inspiration in it !
Making poor choices about food when your tired is an easy mistake to make. Last Sunday I got very flustered. After a nana nap late afternoon I woke on the couch to find nothing healthy to eat in the fridge for dinner and was giving some thought to takeaway but just couldn't think of anything healthy at the time. Yeah I know some of you are saying, "Come on you can have at least one crappy meal" We'll you should know me by now, "all or nothing" and at the moment it's nothing! I ended up just getting a kebab and felt guilty as hell about it all evening. Then Monday the boys at Shift60bondi tweeted:
After reading the tweet I was like "Dam I wish I thought of that yesterday" but it gave me an idea. You can find healthy take away meals pretty much everywhere if you look hard enough so now I have started a list of healthy eat out options in the notes section my phone. I think it's a great way prevent me making silly decisions on weekends when I'm feeling lazy !
While we are on the topic's of inspiration, eating well and Shift60 I thought I would share the below photo with you all. The guy in this shot is Nicholas. Nicholas is the brother of DC and together they own and run Shift60. Both Nick and DC are constantly helping me with advice, inspiration and training tips to help me advance through my 12WBT. To see shots like this really goes to show that they know their stuff when it comes to the human body and how to train it right. Although I am pretty sure when Nick see's that I have posted this picture of him on my blog he is going to make my next few training sessions extra hard. Bring it on BIG BOY :)
Nicholas " Oooooh" Chapman
This weeks Super Saturday was exactly that, starting down at Bondi at 6am I belted out my fitness test and took the dog for a quick walk. From there I jumped on my push bike and rode up the very steep Wellington Street to Shift 60 and ripped into "Full Throttle" session. After the session a dude named Colin approached me and said he liked to read my blog, I was really blown away that he took the time out to tell me. Thanks mate, I really appreciate your kind words.
With the weather gods putting on their blue sky best, I decided to take my dog for a kayak paddle on Sydney harbour or my Super Saturday Fun Session. My friend Tommy Woodriff owns Oz Paddle down at Rose Bay. Tommy, who can be regularly seen training with or teaming up with my boss Hoppo on the double ski is one of the most respected paddlers in Australia. Now I haven't done a lot of sit down paddling in my life so Tommy gave me some tips before me a Daquiri dog headed off on a double ski. In the bay all you could see were people everywhere on all sorts of water craft enjoying the magical day, it was great. We (when I say we I should say I because Daq's didn't do much paddling) paddled all the way out to the point at Nielsen park, around Shark Island and back in. It was about 5km in total and I found pretty tough work out on my butt and lower back which Tommy told me later was probably because I was paddling a wide double ski and had to push a lot of water. It was a great way to be active and spend the morning, I highly recommend it to everyone.
Kayak Paddle
"What do you mean you want me to help out with the paddling?"
Sydney Harbour
Money might not buy happiness but it will buy you a big boat to have fun on !
Kids Sailing
Rose Bay
Big Tommy from Oz Paddle
Thinking I had done enough and was going to spend the rest of the day on the lounge, I went home, put some eggs on the boil and kicked back. No sooner had the egg timer gone off, my phone rang. It was Corey O and he yelled down the phone "Winds up brother, LETS GO PADDLING" so I was off again, doing a sprint paddle down the harbour. Ocean down wind paddling is so much fun and something myself and a few of the other lifeguards got into through a good friend of ours, ex Gold Coast lifeguard and 10 x World paddle board champion, Jamie Mitchell. Jamie is one of Australia's best watermen who probably spends more time in Hawaii than he does back here in Oz. After watching his amazing achievements and seeing how much fun and free it looked I just had to give it a try. First paddle in I was hooked. 8 months later I was booking flights to Hawaii for the 2010 Molokai 2 Oahu World championships. Some of the other lifeguards from Bondi competed also which made it one of the best experiences of my life. I put together a video from my trip to Hawaii. It's about 17mins long but some of the underwater stuff I shot with my Canon 5D Mk II is pretty amazing.
So Corey and I started our paddle at Watson's Bay, heading into the wind up to the nudie beach at Lady Jane. Corey said it was because he want to make the paddle longer but I reckon he just wanted to see some nude people ! We then paddled all the way back to Rose Bay chasing wind chops. Its always awesome but this Saturday had a little element of danger. The harbour was packed with big sailing boats racing, these boats don't have breaks and if they're gonna crash into you your always going to come off second best. We did make it back okay but I had to hide behind a lighthouse for 5 mins while a fleet of about 20 boats missed me by meters ! Corey flogged me by about 10 minutes and was sitting on the beach with a cup of Tea and his feet up waiting for me when I hit the beach but I didn't care, it was loads of fun !
Down wind paddle
Boards are longer than the car !
2 x really short men
Paddling into the wind SUCKS
Corey loved it !
Saturday night the stage was set, myself and some of the other lifeguards were off to Wentworth Park Greyhounds to compete in our annual sprint race on the track for charity. It's televised nationally on Sky sports racing and there is quite a large crowd in the grandstand so pride is on the line and everyone wants to win. The last time we raced Maxi gave all the boys a hiding so we were all pretty keen to do better. Unfortunately this year was similar with him smashing us again but the real winner on the night was charity with Maxi donating his $500 prize cheque to his charity, Canteen. Its always a really fun night with the fabulous people at Wentworth park really looking after us with dinner and drinks, thanks a lot guys and gals. Special thanks also to the crew at Body Science for supplying us with some great compression wear for the race. We all seemed to run a lot quicker, including Maxi unfortunatly !
Bondi Greyhounds ?
Yak Yak Winner
Quick Greyhounds
Serious race reparation
Some of the boys backed a few winners !
It's now 2pm and I've been working on this blog for the last 4 hours.Starting to get cabin fever so I'm gonna close the Mac and get out and enjoy this beautiful sunny Sunday. I will definitely be wearing extra sun screen today though after yesterdays scalding.
Pass the Aloe Vera please...
Thanks again for tuning in for another week, hope you all have a great day :)
