Trying to get stoked for a "virtual" race

In most respects, the Memphis area got treated gently by what was left of Tropical Storm Cristobal.  I watched the Internet radar and the heaviest rain seemed to avoid the city.  By mid-morning Tuesday the rain had moved out and we had a day of warm, muggy weather.  Then on Wednesday some cooler, drier air moved in and the rest of the week has been lovely.

I did a round of the strength routine Tuesday morning, once again without the dips.  I'm still trying to manage the achiness in my biceps/shoulder area.  After that I did a loop of the harbor with Joe.

A somewhat strong west wind blew all day Wednesday as Cristobal's southern portion moved through.  I hadn't planned to paddle on Wednesday, but by lunchtime I was thinking that maybe, just maybe, there were some viable downwind conditions on the westward-flowing section of the Mississippi River below downtown Memphis.  So around 3 o'clock I put my V10 Sport surfski on the car and drove across the Memphis-Arkansas Bridge to where there's access to the river from the Big River Trail.

I put my boat in the water beneath the Harahan Bridge and headed downstream.  As I rounded the big bend to the right I was hoping to find some good swells, but as it turned out there wasn't much more than some chop.  So there would be no sweet rides, and I spent the next hour trying to get the boat moving on small bumps and stuff like that.

I now turn my attention to the "virtual" Outdoors, Inc., Canoe and Kayak Race.  As I mentioned last week, I've laid out a 5000-meter course in the harbor:

The course starts and finishes at the magenta line in the bottom left corner, and the turnaround spot is marked in the upper right corner.

This morning I paddled in the harbor and did five 12-stroke sprints, and I also spray-painted a marker on my turnaround landmark so that anybody who wants to join me can recognize it.


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