The Canadian Olympic Committee in conjunction with RBC has launched a website called Olympic School which is a great resource for teachers, kids an schools. Currently rowing is the featured sport and I am one of the featured athletes. Not a big "feature" but nonetheless, there I am.
Encourage your children to use this website and check it out!
http://www.olympicschool.ca/default.aspx?PageID=1034&LangID=en
Olympic Champion Cox - Men's 8
OLYMPIC CHAMPIONS!!!!
Friday, February 29, 2008
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Hello! Magazine Photo Shoot
This past weekend the Men's Eight showed up at the Empress Hotel, (best hotel in Victoria) for a suave photo shoot. HELLO! Magazine had approached Rowing Canada's marketing department about doing a 2 page spread pertaining to a pre-olympic issue and build up.
I was surprised at just how much time, money and effort went into this on their part. The clothes and stylist flew in from Toronto. The photographer and makeup girls were from Vancouver and the location had been pre-scouted a couple weeks ago. All that for a 2-page spread!
Upon arrival to the "Bengal Lounge" in the hotel we were greeted to a huge rack of clothes, shoes, ties & belts. Thank god there was a stylist deciding what we would be wearing. All of the clothes have yet to arrive in stores so this was mini preview of what was going to be "in" this summer. A couple of the guys dress pretty well....but for the most part we are just your normal dressers so this was different for sure!
I like the look that Kyle ended up with which she called "nerd/sheik". Basically and argyle sweater vest and white dress shoes, he wasn't too sure, but I thought he looked good!
Anyway, once we got our clothes on we sat in the makeup chair for about 10mins getting all kinds of crap put on our faces. No wonder ladies take longer than us in the bathroom!
The photo itself was done in front of a fireplace and had us all looking pretty sharp. Funny thing too was making sure there was room in the middle of us all for the "seam" in the magazine, something that didn't cross my mind but the pro's there knew to make sure it didn't land on one of our faces.
The whole thing took about 2.5 hours and was a good time for sure. It will be in either the July or August issue so make sure to grab it while at your local convenience store this summer!!!
I was surprised at just how much time, money and effort went into this on their part. The clothes and stylist flew in from Toronto. The photographer and makeup girls were from Vancouver and the location had been pre-scouted a couple weeks ago. All that for a 2-page spread!
Upon arrival to the "Bengal Lounge" in the hotel we were greeted to a huge rack of clothes, shoes, ties & belts. Thank god there was a stylist deciding what we would be wearing. All of the clothes have yet to arrive in stores so this was mini preview of what was going to be "in" this summer. A couple of the guys dress pretty well....but for the most part we are just your normal dressers so this was different for sure!
I like the look that Kyle ended up with which she called "nerd/sheik". Basically and argyle sweater vest and white dress shoes, he wasn't too sure, but I thought he looked good!
Anyway, once we got our clothes on we sat in the makeup chair for about 10mins getting all kinds of crap put on our faces. No wonder ladies take longer than us in the bathroom!
The photo itself was done in front of a fireplace and had us all looking pretty sharp. Funny thing too was making sure there was room in the middle of us all for the "seam" in the magazine, something that didn't cross my mind but the pro's there knew to make sure it didn't land on one of our faces.
The whole thing took about 2.5 hours and was a good time for sure. It will be in either the July or August issue so make sure to grab it while at your local convenience store this summer!!!
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Our "B" boat defeats Cambridge
Last week our "B" Men's Eight was over in England to race Cambridge University as a tune-up for them before the famed Boat Race with Oxford. Each year both Oxford & Cambridge do this to get experience racing a top international crew as their final preparation.
Our B boat is by no means a bunch of slouches.....they are fast and they proved it beating them by 1.5 lengths in the first 7 minute piece and then 4 lengths in the next 7 minute piece. It was kind of funny as the margins were reported in the paper as much smaller than they actually were but who cares....a win is a win. What ever makes them feel better.
The official boat race takes place on March 29. If you are interested in more info you can check out
http://www.theboatrace.org/
Here is a press release about the race.
http://www.sirc.ca/news_view.cfm?id=20001
In the past 4 or 5 years we have had many Canadians in the victorious boats and they have also held the title of president twice at Cambridge and once at Oxford over that time. With this being an Olympic year the level of oarsman is not nearly as high usual, but the British love this race nonetheless.
Our B boat is by no means a bunch of slouches.....they are fast and they proved it beating them by 1.5 lengths in the first 7 minute piece and then 4 lengths in the next 7 minute piece. It was kind of funny as the margins were reported in the paper as much smaller than they actually were but who cares....a win is a win. What ever makes them feel better.
The official boat race takes place on March 29. If you are interested in more info you can check out
http://www.theboatrace.org/
Here is a press release about the race.
http://www.sirc.ca/news_view.cfm?id=20001
In the past 4 or 5 years we have had many Canadians in the victorious boats and they have also held the title of president twice at Cambridge and once at Oxford over that time. With this being an Olympic year the level of oarsman is not nearly as high usual, but the British love this race nonetheless.
Friday, February 15, 2008
Invites and Awards
This isn't a new thing, but the invites and awards are continuing.
Whenever you win, people start calling letting you know you have been nominated for different awards and TV camera's want to come out and film us. Don't get me wrong...this is all cool, but we have to make sure that we don't A) let it get to our heads & B) get in the way of our training.
We recently attended an awards banquet here in Victoria where we won the George Hellar Award for outstanding team of the year for PacificSport. It was a great gala with all the local press there. That banquet was easy since it was in Victoria. The next two that we have been invited to are in Vancouver and Winnipeg! Vancouver might not seem far, but we are on the island and need to take the ferry and since the last ferry runs at 9pm that means staying overnight.
What we have decided to do instead is send two people to Vancouver for the BC Sport Awards where we are up for Team of the Year and two different people to Winnipeg for the Canadian Sport Awards where we are up for Partners of the Year.
Next week we have a photo shoot on our Sunday off with a prominent Canadian Magazine where they are looking to do a big spread on us. I will tell you who later....once we know all the details about the shoot. Also next week we are currently scheduled to meet with comedian Rick Mercer and appear on the Mercer Report. This will be shown nationally and should give us some great press.
We were also invited by Cambridge Boat Club in England to race them prior to The Boat Race on the tideway...all expenses paid, but instead we are sending our second crew who should give them a run for their money.
So as you can see.....between awards, invites, tv shows and photo shoots, we have to keep our eyes on the prize in 6 months and not get too caught up in all the hype and miss what got us to this point which is training our butts off!!
Whenever you win, people start calling letting you know you have been nominated for different awards and TV camera's want to come out and film us. Don't get me wrong...this is all cool, but we have to make sure that we don't A) let it get to our heads & B) get in the way of our training.
We recently attended an awards banquet here in Victoria where we won the George Hellar Award for outstanding team of the year for PacificSport. It was a great gala with all the local press there. That banquet was easy since it was in Victoria. The next two that we have been invited to are in Vancouver and Winnipeg! Vancouver might not seem far, but we are on the island and need to take the ferry and since the last ferry runs at 9pm that means staying overnight.
What we have decided to do instead is send two people to Vancouver for the BC Sport Awards where we are up for Team of the Year and two different people to Winnipeg for the Canadian Sport Awards where we are up for Partners of the Year.
Next week we have a photo shoot on our Sunday off with a prominent Canadian Magazine where they are looking to do a big spread on us. I will tell you who later....once we know all the details about the shoot. Also next week we are currently scheduled to meet with comedian Rick Mercer and appear on the Mercer Report. This will be shown nationally and should give us some great press.
We were also invited by Cambridge Boat Club in England to race them prior to The Boat Race on the tideway...all expenses paid, but instead we are sending our second crew who should give them a run for their money.
So as you can see.....between awards, invites, tv shows and photo shoots, we have to keep our eyes on the prize in 6 months and not get too caught up in all the hype and miss what got us to this point which is training our butts off!!
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Training Going well in Oakland
We've been down here now for a week and training has been going well for most of the team. Some members have gone down for a few days with some kind of sickness/flu bug. It seems as though it hits someone new each day. Time for isolation rooms I think!!
The weather has been much better the last few days as we haven't seen rain since Sunday.(day off) Training on the waterway is definitely different than on Elk Lake. For starters it is salt water and absolutely filthy! We all try to make sure that if we get our hands wet.....which we obviously do, we don't touch our mouths or eyes. As soon as we get back to the boathouse everyone has a shower, washes up and uses disinfectant hand sanitizer. Apparently you can get a nasty staph infection if you don't. Since my clothes usually get wet, I only wear them once so I have a few "outfit" changes per day!
We generally row about 10km down the waterway and if we wanted to could row out out to the Bay Bridge or Alcatraz, but it is usually just too rough with all the container ships out there. I think we all had pretty much the longest row ever the other day. Two hours almost continuous, just 2 short 4 minute breaks. Talking for that long did start to get a bit much for the guys, but I suppose you could suffer through worse. (training meetings :))
The weather has been much better the last few days as we haven't seen rain since Sunday.(day off) Training on the waterway is definitely different than on Elk Lake. For starters it is salt water and absolutely filthy! We all try to make sure that if we get our hands wet.....which we obviously do, we don't touch our mouths or eyes. As soon as we get back to the boathouse everyone has a shower, washes up and uses disinfectant hand sanitizer. Apparently you can get a nasty staph infection if you don't. Since my clothes usually get wet, I only wear them once so I have a few "outfit" changes per day!
We generally row about 10km down the waterway and if we wanted to could row out out to the Bay Bridge or Alcatraz, but it is usually just too rough with all the container ships out there. I think we all had pretty much the longest row ever the other day. Two hours almost continuous, just 2 short 4 minute breaks. Talking for that long did start to get a bit much for the guys, but I suppose you could suffer through worse. (training meetings :))
Monday, January 28, 2008
Arrived in Oakland California
The Olympic Rowing Team has arrived in Oakland California for its annual winter training camp. We are staying in a place called Alemeda which is right near the Oakland Airport. Several of the rowers in camp went to school down here at the University of California Berkley and so we are boating out of their very new 10 million dollar boathouse!!! Yes....10 million!! It is amazing. It makes our facility at Elk Lake in Victoria look like crap....but then again....it is.
Anyway.....we will be training twice a day here which may not seem like much, but these are 2 hour rows and we will always do at least one long run of 40minutes of hard rowing in eights side by side, no stopping....this is killer stuff. So far, my boat has won both of the rows leaving the other boat in our wake basically alone for about 25mins. Not fun for them. We will continue to row in the eights for the next few days then we will break up and row in 4 fours for a few days.
I can't stress enough how important this training camp is for us as a crew and a team. This is the type of environment when all of our focus is on rowing, we can bond more as a crew on the water and learn what makes us go fast. The physical aspect of this camp will pay off huge in 2 months. Anyone who misses out on this camp or doesn't take full advantage of this situation could find themselves struggling to make a crew come selection time in March/April.
These pictures are of the Cal Bears Boathouse....it is sweet!
Anyway.....we will be training twice a day here which may not seem like much, but these are 2 hour rows and we will always do at least one long run of 40minutes of hard rowing in eights side by side, no stopping....this is killer stuff. So far, my boat has won both of the rows leaving the other boat in our wake basically alone for about 25mins. Not fun for them. We will continue to row in the eights for the next few days then we will break up and row in 4 fours for a few days.
I can't stress enough how important this training camp is for us as a crew and a team. This is the type of environment when all of our focus is on rowing, we can bond more as a crew on the water and learn what makes us go fast. The physical aspect of this camp will pay off huge in 2 months. Anyone who misses out on this camp or doesn't take full advantage of this situation could find themselves struggling to make a crew come selection time in March/April.
These pictures are of the Cal Bears Boathouse....it is sweet!
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
ICE!!!!! Testing on hold!
We went down to the lake today to do the second part of our January Testing period to find ice in front of the docks!!!Unfortunately, ice is one of the things that stops us. The other is fog.
On Monday we did our second major ergometer test of the season and as a whole the guys did amazing! Out of the 20 guys who competed 15 of them had personal bests!!
I think our captain, Kyle Hamilton put it best when he said "that is extremely motivating to see my team-mates perform, it shows that our training program is working, we're on the right track here."
Today we were supposed to do 2 X 2km in the pairs then 2 x 2km in the singles. We then add up all the times, erg+pair+single=overall ranking and top port and starboard rower.
SO, we have put off the testing till tomorrow and hope that it doesn't get too cold tonight and the ice thaws. This afternoon when I went by the lake, the ice all around the docks has melted but I am still optimistic about the rows tomorrow. If it is frozen we will do it on Saturday.
We leave this Monday January 28th for San Francisco for our winter training camp.....apparently not a moment too soon.
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