Red Rock Country

I wrote this one a while back. seems to have gotten lost in transit somewhere over the Atlantic....

It was a little bit of an odd group. Some juniors, some U23, some older kids, some that haven’t quite grown up yet, most in school, although some were taking breaks and some were on strike. From Ontario, Quebec, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and the odd Bajan. City kids, country folks, Frenchies; swimmers and runners turned Triathletes.

All these fine folks came together under the blazing Arizona sun, looking for some solid training amidst the cactuses and the garbage-eating javalinas.

I made a little pit stop in between a couple WTS races, caught up on the gossip, formed new alliances, put in a few solid miles and worked on my bathing suit tan, which has been neglected since my time in Barbados.

A few tips if you ever run into one of them at the races…

Domi is an absolute beast on the descents, even if it’s only warm-up. Tristan is a country boy. Whatever D-quick threw at him from Stevie’s Ipod, he could sing along. To be fair, Stevie knew all the worlds as well, but that’s old news. Gabby knows her way around the track, I heard she’s got wheels (didn’t get to join in the track fun). Things would have gone to the dogs without Mama D. She’s got this uncanny gift of organizing things and planning without being bossy or getting people irritated. I don’t understand.  Unger has no real concept of what ‘pacing’ means. But you know what, he means well. And he just won Thief River Falls for the 4^th time in a row. Kudos. You might not know Tyler B, he’s rather quiet. But if you ever get the chance, join him for a ride or something; he’s pretty cool even for a middle kid. And he fixed the ice maker (sorta, we ended up with ice is what matters) . Derek Quick and Tristan are now ready to cause some serious havoc in Quebec bars, with pickup lines and swears taught by Manon and Jo. Thanks girls. Zander hasn’t quit yet, which is very fortunate since he’s the comic relief. If you need a nickname, he’ll hook you up real quick. Apparently You can’t trust Jason with your chicken, unless you want some charcoaled dinner. Leave the grilling to Domi or Riley M instead, they’re unbeatable. Rachel seemed to eat up books, I didn’t know you could read that much AND get some serious training in during the day. And throw in the occasional Make it or Break it episode, just to balance things out. I got stuck in a room with the all the frenchie, and some of them (such as Manon and Joanna) would dance with the pillows before sleep. Weirdos.

Sadly, my team lost the IM relay on Amelie’s 19^th birthday, but we had the highest cumulative VO2 max and we had to go against team #1 who had Tyler x2. Not fair. If only the race was on the track…

 Huge thanks to Craig for organizing the whole thing, and to RossAnn for the coaching on-site. And thanks to everyone for the awesome week, even though I wasn’t on the same plan and I decided to arrive late and leave early. All in all, I predict we’ll see some pretty good things from young Canadians this summer.And it’s only the beginning…