Training in Germany

Hey guys,

I’m over in Europe for a few months this summer; I’m here with a few of my Lanier Canoe and Kayak Club teammates.  We’re spending 3 weeks training in Germany and another 5 weeks training in Romania after that.  So far we are 2 weeks into the Germany portion of our trip.  We’re training in Magdeburg with the “Kanu club” here along their small channel which branches off of the Elbe River, a narrow river with really fast currents.  We also visited Duisburg, Germany for the World Cup races last weekend.  A high percentage of the athletes at these races consisted of future Olympians preparing for the upcoming London games.  Some of the best German, Hungarian, Russian, Spanish, Italian (etc.) athletes were hear competing in flatwater sprint races of all the usual distance: 200m, 500m, 1000m.  It was a great experience to watch these top athletes compete in some of the best competitions the sport can offer.  An experience like this will definitely get a young athlete excited about future training.  While in Germany we’re competing in a few regattas here and there.  It’ll be nice to get a few extra sprint races in this summer! America unfortunately only hosts about 3 big regattas each year (National team trials, Lake Placid international Regatta, and National Championships). As far as training, we're doing 3 paddles a day, one lift and one warm-up run in the mornings.  Training in Europe feels like quite a dream.  I'm hoping it'll all pay-off at Nationals in August.  More to come soon!