Building our characters

The weather this week has been, shall we say, challenging for training, the sort of weather our parents and those who happily don't have to go out in it would describe as "character building". Easy for them to say while they're still tucked up warm in bed while we're out freezing in Ely.

It's hard to believe that just over a week ago we were rowing in unisuits in the South of France, this week has been a week of double leggings, as many tech tops as you can fit on your body while still being able to move and buffs pulled up to eye level. Even that at times hasn't seemed like enough.

The week started off not too badly, a bit of chilly rigging and boat washing but temperatures still above freezing, it was almost like Ely was welcoming us back gently. It didn't last however. Ely appears to have it's own microclimate, guaranteed to be at least 3 or 4 degrees below the temperature in Cambridge and that's on a good day. This week Ely also decided to provide us with freezing fog.

Freezing fog for those of you who haven't had the pleasure of experiencing it provides many challenges:
a) Poor visibility - visibility at 6am at this time of year is bad  enough as it is, add freezing fog into the equation and visibility extends pretty much from one end of the 8+ to the other. Thankfully when headed for straight at a tree our holding it up skills proved very effective.
b) Everything freezes - hair (see photo below), splash jackets, pogies and even the wheels on the seats. Attempting to row when your wheels don't turn is somewhat challenging especially as ice starts to build up in the slides, makes rowing twice as hard as your pulling yourself up your slide, only then to be told by the coach to "glide, feel the boat with your feet"...feet? what feet? we lost sensation of those before we boated, let alone by half way through the outing. on the bright side on the second day of freezing fog we were provided with a can of WD40 in the boat, it didn't stop the wheels freezing, but at least mildly aided the pulling yourself up the slide process.

After the initial excitement of "OMGIT'SSNOWINGGGG!!", the rush outside to make the mandatory snow angel, followed by the time spent contentedly watching more snow fall from the comfort and warmth inside, the realisation starts to dawn that snow actually makes getting anywhere very difficult. Especially when your only method of transport is a bike. And you live a helpful 3 miles from anywhere you need to be. In a bid to avoid injury, our coach has instated a "bike ban". This involves regularly hopping on and off the bike at any sign of ice or snow, receiving some odd looks from passers by, any daredevil ice riding moves suppressed by the fear of calling the coach and explaining "Sorry, I can't row, I hurt my body part of choice because I didn't get off my bike on that tiny patch of ice". Frankly, the only solution we can think off to this issue is for the sponsers to buy us a four wheel drive, or perhaps a snowmobile.

Even when we manage to make it anywhere on time, there is always the danger of not being able to make it back. This we found out after getting the 5.55am out to Ely, but turning up to the station on the way back found the train cancelled. Initial panic ensued, we're stuck in Ely??! We can't survive off the geese!!! etc.etc. Eventually we got back on the replacement bus service, an hour late after getting stuck in the rush hour traffic into Cambridge and going through the villages to reach the little station inbetween Cambridge and Ely with all faint hope of a productive morning crushed. On the plus side, we got our brush with fame after briefly appearing on Look East even though the interview they took didn't make the final cut (probably because of the lack of  the "I'm SO ANGRY this has ruined my life completely!!!" kind of quote they were looking for).

So, like we said this week has been challenging, would we give up rowing to avoid such challenges? Not a chance, but if one more person tells us it's "character building" we may scream. As far as we're concerned we had enough character already. Those who refer to it as "character building" can always go and give it a go. Until then we'll fall back on a quote we were given a couple of weeks back; "sport does not build character, it reveals it." Well Ely our characters have been revealed this week and we'd like to think  we've come out of the experience as better rowers, but we feel our characters have been revealed enough, time for some better weather, roll on summer rowing once more.

On a lighter note, not everything since we last posted has been as miserable and typically British as the weather. While still on camp we did have a run in with a fairly amazing dog. As you may have noticed, we seem to mostly post about rowing and not all that much about vetting. This is partly because we are both in third year and thus don't get to see many animals and spend much more time attempting to read papers/write dissertations. This results in great excitement at the sight of any animal, as can be observed by the dressing up of said dog, who put up with us pretty well.

Fit, we think you'll agree. A tad windburnt.

How we felt at the end of the week