Race Day #2

Great day of racing today!  I'm really not sure I'm the best one to blog about it, because today I was out on the water all day lining up the boats at the start line.  See... here's a picture of some of the referees:

They are really nice people, even though it's true they might disqualify you for rule infractions.  Going outside of the lane has been a popular one.  Speaking of lanes, I've got a new favourite way to refer to the lane marker, or buoy.  "Number ball."  I like it a lot.  And it is really very much more descriptive. 

So, here is the link to the results page again in case you don't have it bookmarked already!  Just like in the Olympics, we've also got a running medal count.  So far, Hawai'i is in the lead with 21 medals, followed by New Zealand with 15 and Canada with 7.   Here's the link where you can see what went down in each race today:

http://results.worldsprints.com/7/results/race

Also, did you know there's live streaming video of the races on the website?  True story!  Thanks to our technology wizards, you can watch every day starting at 8:00 am MST.... which might be pretty early for those of you in the Pacific region.  You're getting up early to watch, right?

And, one of our local paddlers, Bill Hemstock, happens to also be a pretty good photographer & has posted his album here - check it out.  They're definitely better pictures than mine! 

http://www.jmodo.ca/JMODO_Graphics/Photography/Pages/Worlds_2012.html#grid

I'm lucky to be here though... Here's another glorious picture from this morning:

I've got to get the name of the man who's doing the race announcing. He's from New Zealand and he's doing a fantastic job!  (Even just pronouncing everyone's names from all these different countries!  Wow!)  I promise to get his actual name tomorrow for you (bad blogger, right?)

It was also a bit cold today... sorry about that.  I ordered better weather.  Still, we haven't been rained on, so that's a plus!

We also had some pretty fantastic races today from the adaptive paddlers. The last race had 3 women who are adaptive paddlers.  There were 2 hulis - one at the beginning and one at the end, but not one during the race itself.  A little huli doesn't discourage these ladies - they are inspiring!  Here's some celebrating at the end of the race (thanks to my friend and fellow volunteer, Ella Wilson, for the photo!)

And if the greeting from their fellow paddlers wasn't cool enough, some young men from Team New Zealand performed an impromptu haka in their honour, recognizing fellow warriors:



Then, some medals were given out for the V12 champions.  Here's a shot of the golden masters winners, Team Canada, in a Team Hawai'i sandwich.  Hawai'i won silver and bronze in this event.

So tomorrow I think I'm off the water and back to mingling around and doing other weird jobs, including being the official blogger.  I promise a better post!  In the meantime, I hope Bill's pictures and all the results postings will hold you.