Lightweight Eats

Last month, Dan and I took a much needed vacation! We are both fortunate with flexible work schedules, and were able to head west for three weeks.

My coach gave me permission to take 1-2 weeks completely off. I knew it would be difficult to train away from home, so I fit in training where I could. I ended up taking about 1.5 weeks completely off and another 2 weeks of half-time training.

We started in California, where we were able to visit my parents, grandparents and sister. I went on some nice long runs and bike rides, saw a baseball game, hiked to Land's End, ate a lot of food, drank a lot of wine and generally recovered from a pretty stressful 11 months.

Mom and Dad during our Land's End hike.

Dan doing Dan things.

All of the fruits and veggies all the time.

My Dad's fresh bread

New sneakers!

The second half of vacation was spent in Oregon. I flew into Eugene, and immediately fell in love with the place. We had an awesome vegan brunch before heading to the coast to escape the heat.

On the coast, Dan found a crazy awesome camp site. We stayed two nights while we visited Dan's dad, who was docked in Coos Bay for boat repairs. We then drove up the coast, visited Dan's mom, picked blackberries, had an amazing meal in Portland and flew back to Connecticut.

Just a small haul of berries.

The only person in the world that makes Dan look short.

Our campsite.

Sunset in Coos Bay.

Back in Connecticut, it was time to get back to serious training. Our return coincided quite nicely with the Rowing World Championships. We were able to watch the races most morning before our training sessions, which was great motivation those first uncomfortable weeks.

Although the U.S. was plagued with injury and illness in this important year, the country still had a fabulous showing, particularly on the women's side. The U.S. women qualified all of the Olympic boat classes, and reached the A-final in all of the non-Olympic boat classes (including one gold and one bronze medal, no less!).

However, if you have to pick just two races to watch, I recommend the LM4x and M1x A-finals. Very exciting. Watch at worldrowing.com

Now that the 2014-15 season is all wrapped up, it's time to start looking forward to the Olympic year! I have always known that making the team in 2016 was a stretch. Gaining speed takes a long time, and improvements have been slow for me. However, I'm in a good place going into this fall season and poised to have my best year yet. Who knows what it will bring, but I'm excited to see where it will take me.

Check back soon for updates on my fall racing schedule, winter training plans and ways you can help support my dreams!

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