I recently read a nutrition blog post where the author answered a series of questions about her nutrition and wellness routine. It inspired me to think about my own answers to the same type of questions relating to my own fitness and workout routine, so I thought I’d share them with you. 1. What’s your favorite workout? Outside of paddling? Well, I’m a water-lover by nature, so I love to swim. Not only is it a whole-body workout, it’s also great cardio AND it correlates well with our sport. I
Winter training just started for my team and, I have to admit, I felt like I had lost my “mojo”. While I love my team and I love paddling, somehow having a break during the month of October didn’t seem like enough this year. Sure, I went to the gym and rowed on the erg during our time off, but I seemed to be missing some of that sparkly enthusiasm I’d had in years past. Knowing that I had lost a bit of my passion, I decided to find some
Let’s talk about confidence. I’ve been thinking a lot about it lately and so I decided to look into the relationship between confidence and performance. Why? Because I am frequently doubting my own abilities and I am always intrigued by other paddlers I see who seem to be incredibly confident. I really began to wonder not only how this affected my abilities, but also how I could get some of that self-assuredness. I truly hesitated publishing this post. In fact, I’ve been stewing on it for over a month. Examining
This was my first full year training in a location that actually has seasons and, therefore, a true training cycle. I’m sure that sounds funny to most of you, but I began my paddling career in Miami. It’s a place where there are essentially two seasons: “really hot” and “even hotter”. There, we spent the whole year on the water and never thought twice about it. Now that I am living in a city with actual seasons which limit our on-water time, I see how beneficial it is to
In the middle of a recent training session I started thinking about how many parts of my body were hurting. I let my mind wander and it became my worst enemy. I started questioning why in the heck I put myself through the hour-long torture session we affectionately call “training,” especially at 5:45 in the morning. My mind started to take over and sadly I willingly let it. The truth is, paddling is a mental game. Obviously technique is important, and you can’t neglect the physical strength and proficiency needed
We train hard. We go to practice. We remain focused. We set goals. We work hard to achieve them. Yet inevitably there are things standing in our way, preventing us from improving at the rate we would like to. All too often, we focus on the things we think we need, rather than things we need to get rid of. Perhaps it’s time to take a look at things to eliminate in our life in order to see the improvements we so desperately desire. Here is a list of 10 things to
A few weeks ago, I steered a race for my Florida-based team. It was a beautiful race venue, but that particular weekend there were several conditions which proved to make the steering challenging; the ever-changing winds, the tippy 10-man boats, and strong currents all played a factor in making the races more interesting, especially from a steer’s perspective. No one was immune to these elements and yes, there were a few incidents throughout the weekend. Steering mishaps during a race are indeed a steer’s worst nightmare. What inspired me to write this blog post was
Whether you are back on the water in the southern hemisphere, hitting the paddle pool in the northern hemisphere, or still paddling in the balmy temperatures of the waters near the equator, you need the relentless focus and concentration to get the most out of your training and help you to finish in front. But how can you develop that mental focus to give you the edge needed to compete at a higher level? Mindfulness is a useful tool in dragon boating that can improve your performance in many ways. Definitions of mindfulness certainly
