I got all excited when I came to write this thinking I’d actually managed a week without crying….but I’d forgotten about Monday!

Monday was actually my birthday, but of course that doesn’t mean we stop training, and I had my usual 4am start to get to Nottingham. However, the traffic obviously didn’t appreciate it was my birthday, and I had the most horrendous journey missing the session with my group. This meant I had to join in with the second group which includes some of the strongest paddlers in the squad. This meant I was left behind after every effort….making me feel like I was just going very slow! Of course, being the perfectionist I am, this really frustrated me, so I came off the water feeling grumpy, frustrated….and a pretty useless paddler. Now normally I would’ve just thought logically about this and realised the guys I was paddling about were all men who were much more experienced than me….but not today!

Because I was late I then ran out of time to catch up on emails, but did quickly flick though to see there was a whole load of forms that needed filling out for my athlete funding….which included details which I’d left at home…the stress continued to rise! Before I knew it we were back on the water for our first “starts” session since before Christmas. My first few starts were pathetic to say the least…the tears nearly came then! Thankfully the session picked up.

After spending the next couple of hours form filling, it was time for food and bed. I decided that it had been a bad enough day, and seeing as it was my birthday, I’d treat myself to a Chinese (not the behaviour of a dedicated athlete I know!)

The Chinese was shut!

So I spent my birthday sat in my camping pod eating a packet of Revels (again not the behaviour of a dedicated athlete!) watching a DVD on my laptop. I reckon I was allowed a few tears!

Apart from that, it’s been a challenging but good week. I’ve struggled to keep all the balls in the air, what with training, the Climbing Out Charity Evening and a lot of the organising for this year’s Climbing Out programmes needing sorting out now….but it’s all part of the learning curve and it’s something I’m going to have to get better at managing.

I’ve had good days and bad days on the water….and I feel like I’ve really pushed things in the gym. I’m still struggling to get my weights up any further, and after hitting a wall while doing what seemed like a hundred reps of bench press, Luke our strength and conditioning coach told me I couldn’t rack the weight and sometimes it was good to get into a hole that you felt like you couldn’t get out of. I eventually managed to get the bar up (after much grimacing and some very unladylike language) but I haven’t been able to feel my arms since then! Again, all part of the learning curve I guess!

I’ve got a light week next week as I’m working at Battle Back. It’ll be a challenge for me to back of training, but hopefully it’ll mean I’ll be back at Nottingham a week on Monday feeling fresh and strong….and ready to smash that bench press!!!

 I feel like there’s been some pretty massive steps forward this week. We still haven’t managed to get on the water much because of the weather conditions, but when we did, I could feel some huge improvements! The training programme has been pretty punishing…..there wasn’t a muscle in my body that wasn’t hurting by the end of the week! The focus has now moved from strength and power to speed, so we’re doing some pretty harsh lactic sessions….but this is what I love about the sport – you work hard and the gains start to happen!:-)

It’s been such a great week of learning’s. The ergo sessions are really helping me with my technique. Firstly I can sit in front of a mirror and see first hand what I’m doing, secondly Matt, my coach, can really break down each part of the stroke and work on the finer points, and thirdly, I can try things out without having to worry about falling in! We’ve been really working on getting me to relax my shoulders (something that I haven’t done for the last 40 years!), and the impact on my paddling has been exciting. My focus now has got to be on maintaining this technique but applying more power and pace…it sounds so straight forward when I put it like that!

I also had my first proper session with the team psychologist this week too. I’m fascinated by the sports psychology side of things and it will be really interesting to see the impact it has on my performance.

I’m lifting more weight in the gym, the technique is improving on the water…and I can’t wait until we start racing again and I can hopefully see some big improvements in my times. Roll on April!

The challenge this week has been balancing training around Climbing Out. As we start to approach the spring, things start getting pretty hectic. We’ve 5 programmes planned this year, 2 weekends and several fund raising events, the first of which is our “Evening with Climbing Out” on March 14th. Trying to focus on training and still organise everything that needs doing has resulted in a bit of brain fry this week:-( The answer…..well the honest truth is, I don’t know! Both things are so important to me and I don’t want to let myself, or anyone else down, but there are only 24hrs in the day! I think we’ll call this challenge work in progress!

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November last year SDN Management Committee Member started a blog on living with Wet Age-Related Macular Degeneration (Wet AMD) now Ian shares more with us on his personal journey. 

What causes AMD ? 

The causes are basically a combination of genetic reasons, environment and age.

Particular risk factors are- getting older

                                   – gender

                                   – family history of AMD

                                   – smoking

                                   – sunlight

                                   – poor diet

                                   – high blood pressure

                                   – being overweight

Looking at these risk factors in my own case, the situation is like this – 

Getting older

I am actually quite young to get AMD (if anybody says they find it hard to believe I am too young for anything, there will be trouble:-) Broadly speaking, AMD generally occurs in people over the age of 65, although it can develop in people who are in their 40s and 50s- as it did with me. 

Gender

More women have AMD than men, but that may be because women tend to live longer than men. 

Family history of AMD

As far as I know, there isn’t any in my case. Some genes have been identified that may link to the development of AMD in some people. This has been discovered by looking at families with more than one member who has AMD, but it is thought that not all AMD is inherited. 

Smoking

I haven’t smoked for many, many years and when I did smoke, it was only ever a few cigarettes a day. Smoking greatly increases the risk of developing AMD.

Studies show that stopping smoking can reduce the risk of developing AMD. 

Sunlight

Some studies suggest that exposure to high levels of sunlight (particularly the UV light contained in sunlight) throughout your life may increase the risk of developing AMD. As yet, there is no proof of this. Wearing sunglasses to protect your eyes from the UV light in sunlight is a good idea for everyone throughout their life. 

Poor diet

Depends on what you class as a poor diet, but that could be a whole new topic for a blog! My own opinion on the five a day situation is that nobody ever proved that five portions of fruit and vegetables a day was the optimum number.

I understand that current opinion is that five isn’t enough anyway- seven is it now?

Having said that, I don’t eat a balanced diet and that is something I should indeed address I must admit- not enough fresh fruit and vegetables (whatever the number of portions!), too much red meat etc.

A number of studies have looked at diet as a risk factor for someone developing AMD., but presently there is no agreement on how much of a risk factor diet is.

There is some evidence that vitamins A, C E and zinc may help to slow the progress of AMD in people who already have the condition. 

High blood pressure

Yes- that’s me!

Am on a variety of tablets for this. On occasions, my blood pressure has been sky high and (whatever the first figure is for) it once topped 200!)It is more or less within normal limits now, although it has always been a bit on the high side of normal for me. 

Being overweight   

Ok I will cough to this one- even I must admit that I am not exactly Twiggy size!