This weekend we participated in the Head of the Elk (8K) and Head of the Gorge (5K). I was supposed to just go and watch, when Randy found out that I was not racing he insisted that he would not go unless I did. SIGH. So I stupidly signed up. Well then Randy (of course) got a gig working at the Seattle Opera, and surprise surprise he had to work the weekend of the races and couldn’t go with me to Victoria. Nice, real nice. Anyways I road-tripped with Betsy, Gareth and Susanna and let me tell you, it was probably the most fun I had all weekend! To get to Victoria it took about 6 hours of driving, waiting and ferry riding. So it was a good thing that we had so much fun! We ended up staying with a bunch of other rowers at a beach house, fantastic view of the water.
The races themselves are pretty insane.
Head of the Gorge is a 5K race where you “water launch” (COLD) from the finish line. Thus you have to row 5K just to get to the start line, oh and the kicker? The narrows. In the middle of the race course is a small narrow where the current is so strong you have to be coxed by a person standing under the bridge on the shore. You then get to go back through it, at full speed, during the race. A-w-e-s-o-m-e. The up side is that everyone dresses up for the event; instead of wearing team jerseys (score). We dressed as angels, and our cox dressed as the devil, very fun!
Head of the Elk is an 8K race where there are 3-4 really tight Starboard turns (damn being on Starboard). It is a very long race.
Here are some pictures of our adventure weekend! :-)
1 comment:
But Victoria is a pretty town I thought. The museum is good! How much of a geek am I?!
Did you see any whales? They're meant to live in the bay, but maybe only in the summer.
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