Happy Fourth of July!

Written by: Lisa

It's Independence Day, woohoo! This time last year we were all still in Seattle and the fireworks were so late we missed them because we were in bed, so hopefully this year we'll get to catch some. We had a nice long 16k row this morning and Josh is giving us the afternoon off so we can relax and have fun. Doug and Nalini are going to get the grill ready so we can bbq it up, which I'm psyched for. And I'll be baking cookies and we bought more ice cream so we should be all set!

Josh took a lot of nice photos of us rowing on the Occoquan yesterday so I will include them here. We've been getting there for our AM practice around 7:30 and going until about 10am, and then we head back to the house and shower/eat/nap until 3pm, when we leave for our PM practice. On Wednesday we put in 30-31 kilometers between the two practices and yesterday we did 26k. We're really working hard to nail the technique now and make sure our movements are completely together. Sculling (using two oars) is so different from the sweeping (one oar) that we do in college - the stroke is much smoother and more fluid, and you really need to fine-tune every tiny movement of the body, and make sure that each side is completely symmetrical. And rowing in a double is challenging because the two rowers need to be identical in all movements. So that's what we're really trying to work on right now!

But even with long practices and all the hard work, this is the life. This is totally what I love doing . . . having rowing be the number one priority followed closely by eating and sleeping. The weather is so great (a little toasty, but I live for the warmth!) and we're really just having a very enjoyable time. It would be so great if we could do this for a living...

The worldrowing.com website released the list of entries for U23s so you can check them out here: http://www.worldrowing.com/index.php?pageid=146 Our event is the "BLW2x" - the Senior B (Under 23) Lightweight Women's Double. We're one of sixteen crews competing. The first day of racing is two weeks from yesterday, which seems way too soon! But Josh keeps reminding us that we still have lots of time left, which, considering the little amount of time we've had already and how far we've come, is a good point.

Anyway, I should go get started on those cookies...chocolate chip and oatmeal butterscotch (the latter is my roommate Heidi's specialty!). Hope everyone enjoys the holiday!