From when I get up at 6am till I go to bed I am either training or working which doesn't leave any time for socialising and relaxation.
A few days before this much looked forward to relaxing holiday a letter came through the post from Sport England inviting Antonia and I to testing for the Girls for Gold Scheme. Great Britain are doing another scout for talented athletes in Cycling, Modern Pentathlon, Windsurfing, Bob Skeleton and Rowing. I don’t know if we are insane but somehow we couldn't resist doing the testing. It would have been like closing a door on opportunity. With this testing due, only a week after the holiday we had to get in some quality sessions. So we took our road bikes and loads of training kit and off we went.
No it's not a big seal it's my Dad. The sea really is that colour - Beautiful!
The day we arrived our cousins got us in the sea and we swam a mile across the harbour. Ok it wasn’t that intense but I did have my little?? 21 yr. old sister Suzanna on my back for half the way as she didn’t think she would make it.
Day 2 was Antonia’s birthday. We were going to take it a easy so we got the bikes out to go for a discovery peddle around. We saw a sign to Land’s End and thought how exciting lets cycle there and get the train back!. OH MY GOSH it was soooooo hilly. Up a hill half an hour....., down a hill ......2 seconds, up a hill...., down..., there was no flat the whole way!! As we hadn’t prepared for it, by the time we got there we were staving and in shock. There was no train station, in fact there was nothing apart from a touristy shopping complex. I had such a sugar low I could barely walk, but we found the pasty shop and had the most AMAZING pasty I have ever tasted. We then rang Suz and got her to pick us up. She wasn’t amused and granny had told her not to come and that we should cycle back!!! Perhaps she was right but we wouldn’t have made it before dark and Ant’s birthday BBQ would have been over!
Another ridiculous idea was going for a run first thing before breakfast, along a the coastal path to Zenner, it was 7 miles. We thought, 'that will be a good run there and back.' It started off fine then turned into extremely rocky terrain so we had to run where we could and climb the parts we couldn’t. Antonia described me as a mountain goat to some passers by!! After an hour it turned very misty and there was nothing but cliff edges, rocks, sea and gorse. There was no escaping and there was no way we were turning back so we carried on. Luckily we found a stream half way and had a drink out of it - I couldn’t taste dead sheep so think it was all right. We got to our destination after 2.5hrs (I'm sure it was more than 7 miles!) and were so pleased to see a cafe in the tiny Cornish village we ordered a huge lunch at 11am plus it had a bus stop. We weren’t running back!
Amongst pier jumping and swimming with seals, we also went mackerel fishing which was a big mistake. Five minuets into it I felt so sick I had my head over the side - Dad thought I was just taking the fishing very seriously until he himself was sick, followed by my Auntie, then my little cousin then my sisters. At that point the fisherman said he better take the hospital boat back to shore. I am never doing that ever again!
The last adventure we went on was a trip to Portrieth, to go Surfski kayaking with Holly, who we had met on the fast track programme. The Surf was huge and we were using these kayaks you sit on instead of sitting in. We paddled through the surf to get 'out back' which was great fun.We fell off and had to quickly get back on before the next wave crashed over us, then paddle as hard as possible to make it over the next wave. Once we were through the breaking waves, there were yet more huge rolling waves. It was awesome fun. Holly is into Quadrathlon which is swimming, kayaking, cycling and running - I have to do that one day, I may as well put all these skills to use.
So, not very relaxing holiday! Although it was a break and I don’t do sunbathing anyway. Plus the boys made it much more fun and they learnt the valuable skills of washing up!
We had testing last weekend for the Girls for Gold. I don’t want to say too much about it. I was really glad I went and again they sell you the dream of competing at a home Olympics. What they don’t say is there are no guarantees, you can give up everything and give it your all and then that isn’t enough either. But for me it’s worth that risk, it’s not a risk it’s a choice to take the opportunity.
