Setembro 9, 2008
Semis (Im in the final, just!)
Well thankfully with my win in the Quarters I was given what looked to be the slightly easier semi (if there is such a thing) we had three top guys Synek, Campbell and myself (the three winners of world cups this year) but then the others in the semi, Greece, Lithuania and USA were all late qualifiers from the qualification regatta. I was thankful for that especially when I woke on Tuesday to find my illness was far from over and I had lost 2.5KG over night and 4 in past 48 hours. I went for a row in the morning and after running out of energy after 6K decided it best to spend the rest of the day in bed and eat and drink my day away with regular trips to the scales. After battling to get my weight up, in the afternoon I was coming right and finally putting some weight back on. This is far from what I had envisioned as my perfect Olympic preparation but I suppose at least I got it early in the week instead of the day before finals.
Because I was feeling good Tuesday night I went to bed confident I would be back to my usual self by the morning. Unfortunately when I woke this morning that wasn’t the case and I was back on the toilet and 3KG light. Now its not the worst bug I have ever had but my energy levels have certainly taken a hit and its frustrating that no matter how much I eat or drink it disappears just as fast. I had a good pre race and again the conditions were perfect down at the lake. I was then back home for a snooze before returning to prep for the race. The strategy was pretty simple, get out quick, try and drop the slowest three, cement my qualifying position and get far enough in front that I wouldn’t need to sprint at the end.
I got a good start to be level with Synek and in touch with Alan, as we moved through the race I was feeling great, I was level with Synek battling it out for first, while Alan started to drop back slightly. The plan was going well with the USA, Lithuania and Greece all off the pace. Through the 1000M mark I was feeling good and felt as though I was normal, I kept pushing and with 500M to go I was just ahead of Synek with Alan 4.5sec back and the Greek guy in 4th 8.7sec back. At this stage I felt confident I would make it and was pretty happy with how things were progressing. Then suddenly with about 400M to go, the wheels started to fall off. Your mind is a very powerful tool but my body was packing up saying “enough is enough, the tanks empty dude” There was no panic I tried to conserve my energy and took the rating down a couple to let Synek go, with about 300M to go, suddenly the Great Wall of China appeared in my lane and I hit it full on. Alan and the Greek were closing and I wasn’t sure if I could even finish the race let alone hold my position. The legs had nothing and I could see my Olympic dreams fading before me. I dug deep and kept pushing, my vision was going and every stroke felt like I was pulling a fridge behind my boat. With about 100M to go I realised I wasn’t going to hold off Alan and focused on the Greek, somehow he had come from 8 seconds back and was now level. I am still not quite sure how I managed it but I went to overdrive somehow brought the rating up a little and at the line had what seemed an eternity until I saw my name come up third. It was the best third place of my life and I was in the Olympic final by 0.45sec. I then struggled to the pontoon to be informed I was up for a drug test, I just managed to make it to our warm down room before once again emptying everything in my stomach into a bucket, this time the poor drug tester didn’t know what to do or where to look.
Once again I actually feel great after emptying everything out of my stomach again, I am very relieved to make it through to the final on a day of Olympics semis where people with nothing to loose where fighting for their lives and a number of top rated crews were relegated to the B finals. I am also very upbeat, as today I raced a wonderful race for 1500M. With two days rest now before the final I am confident I will bounce back and find the last 500M when I need it most going for a medal on Saturday.
The final therefore is Synek, Campbell and I (lanes 4,5,6 respectively) and Karonen, Tufte and Maeyens (lanes 3,2,1) Hacker has missed his second Olympic final with a 4th in his semi and joins a raft of crews including our own Emma Twigg and Men’s four who both very narrowly missed out on a place in the A final. The men’s four is crazy with the Dutch and Italians also in the B final making none of last years medallists a chance at gold. The men’s pair and double from NZ also made the A Final but had to be content with 2nd and 3rd place finishes respectively. The result means most of the kiwi crews in finals on Saturday will be in outside lanes, for me it will be the first time I have ever raced in lane 1 or 6. but Im in the final and couldn’t care less where, as every lane has an equal shot at a medal.
Well that’s it for now, It has been a very weird and wacky day and I hope to wake up tomorrow to some normality and health.
Mahe
