IrishFreestyle

Today was the second day of team training. People were getting more consistent with their moves although the water was slightly higher than the day before resulting in a smaller hole on surfers right and a larger one on surfers left.

It seems that this years' fad or "must have item" is the French carbon kevlar Gui-gui Prod boats. Everybody in one is doing very well on the feature throwing more agressive blunts that their plastic clad counterparts.

I worked on my run today. Due to the change in water levels entry moves were trickier and I've decided to scrap them for tomorrows' run. I did manage to nail a felix at one point. The other Irish lads and ladies were all looking solid, appart from at one point where Bowsie took a sly swim after attempting some large move and having his sponsored deck pop! All I saw was him swimming to the shore and his boat full of water. No swim beers were bought tonight but thats excusable given the impending competition. That makes us even for the swim I took at Jacksons Monday night before last.

At the team captains meeting there was an issue with timing with the head judge proposing that a competitors' run time start when the cross the eddy line to begin to surf across to the wave rather than starting the time when they actually hit the white water.  This meant that people dropping onto the wave were at an advantage to those who opted to surf across (and lose several seconds during the ferry on). Anyway the Irish team single handedly managed to get the rule changed so that the time starts for those paddling on from the eddy only when they hit the white water of the wave. 

It should make for an interesting comeptition tomorrow anyway. Our very own Brian "Bowsie" Cahill will be the first competitor of the European championships 2008 starting at 9am in the morning and being followed in the number 2 spot by Jim Kehoe also in heat #1. Tim Harris is up next in heat 4 I believe and then myself and my brother Leonard are in heat # 8. The senior women are then up in the afternoon. I'll try to get the results up before the afternoon is out.

I've also entered the squirt category as they were short numbers to make it a legitimate event. I will be using my wavesport project in the event as I've only ever sat in a squirt boat once at a DCU pool session for about 5 minutes.

There will be more photos up after I've competed as its tough getting photos of the team when you're a competitor in 2 different categories, team manager and judge all at the same time! We got a great shot of the team in front of the feature after todays training session which I'll try to get up in the coming days. Today was in fact the first time ever that this years' freestyle team have all been together at the same freestyle session. There has always until now been somebody missing for some reason or another. We're all together now and rearing to go for the big show tomorrow! Roll on the Europeans 2008!

This photo was taken after today's session. The red boat actually belongs to Seppi Strohmeiher from the German team. Leonard had borrowed his boat for the session.