Tuesday morning I did a gym session and then headed for the river. Once again there was a screaming wind from the south and it looked like there might be some decent downwind action out on the Mississippi. But I'll refer you to my comments last week on that topic.
Anyways, I had a workout to do. After warming up and doing three 8-stroke sprints in the sheltered area on the west side of Mud Island Marina, I pointed my boat north and did three 1000-meter pieces in the harbor with the wind at my back. I started a new one every 12th minute. I aimed for 80 strokes per minute during each piece. My times were 5:11, 4:57, and 4:58, and yes, those efforts were very wind-aided, but the fact that I was having to paddle up and over waves in some areas of the harbor offset the wind advantage somewhat. I think the main reason that first piece was so much slower than the other two was that I did it in the section of the harbor between the Memphis Queen Line boats and the Hernando DeSoto Bridge, where the waves tend to be at their biggest.
In any case, it was a good substantial workout. I felt pretty good about my hip rotation; as I mentioned in my last post, the rotation isn't automatic for me yet--each time I paddle I'm still having to say "Oh yeah, I'm supposed to be rotating my hips"--but it's encouraging to see that it's no longer so awkward for me that it's slowing me down to a crawl like it was a few weeks ago.
I didn't do any training activities yesterday, but I received a bit of big news: I am among the lucky winners of permits to run the Colorado River through Grand Canyon next year. My launch date is August 27, 2025, the day before my 58th birthday. Even though I'm in my fifth decade of paddling, this will be my first true multi-day wilderness river trip. At this time I have absolutely no idea who will be in my group, what kind of raft support we'll need for carrying food and camping gear, what the daily schedule will be, or how many days total we'll be on the river. It's a good thing I've got 18 months to make myself an expert in all these areas (well, actually 15 months--I have to complete the trip application and provide a participant list with the National Park Service by May 29, 2025). I've always been terrible at rounding up groups of people to do anything, so I don't know where my up-to-15 companions are going to come from, especially since I'll need some people with expertise in remote wilderness paddling trips. People I know who have taken Grand Canyon trips in the past assure me I'll have a hundred best friends as soon as the word gets out I've got a permit, so I guess I'll find out soon how true that is. For now, I'm just excited to have this adventure waiting for me on a distant horizon.
The other thing that happened yesterday is a front came through with a mass of colder air behind it. So I donned more layers and put the pogies back on my paddle down at the river this morning. All told it wasn't too bad; if it hadn't been for a pesky east-northeast wind, it would have been a nice morning to paddle. The sun was shining more than I'd expected and the temperature was rising toward 50 degrees Fahrenheit. I paddled for 60 minuets and worked on--you guessed it--rotation from the hips.
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