Training Center!

Today was my first day of training camp for rowing and it was awesome! The facilities are so amazing!

Just look at that water!

How cool is this? I’m meeting tons of new people on my team as well. Ok, I’m going to blow through dinner last night. We ate at Souplantation. I had a plate of salad to start.

Chinese Chicken, Casear, and Spinach with apples and dried cranberries.

On the side I had a bit of turkey soup, and half a slice of wheat bread with butter. For dessert I had a couple of muffins and a bowl of chocolate lava cake with frozen yogurt on top. My large dessert probably wasn’t the healthiest decision, especially since back at the hotel one of my teammates had homemade cookies and sweet chex mix, which I naturally had to take part in (team bonding, right?).

This morning we ate a quick breakfast at the hotel, which I didn’t get a chance to photograph. I had raisin bran, and I started to eat it with blueberry yogurt but the yogurt was too sweet for my taste so I gave up on it, and a banana.

We headed over to the training center at 7:30 to rig the boats and unload the trailer. For those of you unfamiliar with crew, rigging the boats basically means putting on the part of the boat that holds the oar in place. Since the boats can’t travel with the riggers on, anytime we take them anywhere we have to rerig them. This ended up taking a very long time, and we didn’t hit the water until probably 11. It was so nice to be in the water again! I was worried that after a month off I would be rusty, but it felt completely natural.

We ate lunch at the training center cafeteria, which is fairly small but seems to have healthy options.

I had an open faced turkey and swiss sandwich with a salad, both topped with Italian dressing. It was pretty good but nothing to write home about. That was ok though, because I wanted something fairly normal given my afternoon workout. I also had some dried fruit and fresh fruit, and half a slice of cinnamon bread with a little peanut butter. For dessert I had some type of carrot bread/cake (pictured farther below), which was delicious.

Dessert for lunch probably wasn’t the smartest idea considering I had my 6k in the evening. It ended up being ok, but it might have been a problem.

Ok, now for the 6k test. A 6k test is pretty much the worst thing ever for a rower. It is 6000m on a rowing machine at all out effort. I’ve been dreading this ever since I found out about it, because it is super painful.

Well, I made it through it! I wasn’t really happy with my time, I was slower than my last one. I feel like I could have done better and pushed myself more. 6ks are definitely a mental game, and I definitely wasn’t there mentally. I kept losing focus, and my pace would slow way down for a few strokes. However, I felt strong. This is exactly what I needed to get my butt in gear, and to get excited for my next 6k test. And to take better care of my body. I’ve eaten really badly over the holidays, and I think if I clean up my eating my performance should improve significantly. Ok, enough about rowing, onto food!

Dinner was baked salmon, assorted veggies, and a salad with olive oil and vinegar.

And roasted potatoes with ketchup!

The food here is healthy if a bit boring. But that is fine with me, I am here to improve my fitness, body, and rowing, not to enjoy gourmet dining. And considering we’re eating here 3 meals a day…

Dessert was another slice of the carrot thing.

I was tempted to go back for another dessert, but the thought that I’d have to report it here stopped me! Yay for blogging!

Now, I’m back at the hotel to just hang out for the night and watch “trash TV” with my teammates. Honey Boo Boo anyone?

How do you spice up boring food?