Last weekend, the Westlakes Classic was on and This year, like last year, I opted to do the 12km course.
Conditions were not the best, with wind around 20km/h, but you deal with what it is on the day.
Unlike last year, I didn’t take anywhere near as long to finish – I did the 12km in 1:20:21 at 9km/h! Well, lets face it, 12km v’s 208km, 12km is a sprint and I didn’t leave much in reserve. Short events like this are good as they give you a reasonable indication of your flat-water paddling speed, and year to year, this shows me that my flat-water speed has improved (or my training this year has been reasonably effective). Just like last year, I did jump back in the boat and put a few extra km of paddling in, did another 8km at a fairly steady 8.5km/h (told you the 12km was a sprint!)
Yes, a sprint speed does not realistically give me a marathon-pace speed, but if I do a direct comparison to last year, I should be a tad faster over the 208km (at least I hope I am) – I’ll know either way in 2 weeks time 🙂