Jarhead

Harpoon

These training sessions are dedicated to SOC Derrick C. Benson (SEAL) who lost his life in Afghanistan in August of this year. Today was a long paddle session that can be seen on “Find me on SPOT”. On this long paddle Jarhead and Harpoon joined me and the area we paddled in was the Hillsborough river.  Having company and new things to look at really made this paddle enjoyable. The paddle ended up covering 21.8  miles in 5 hours 50 minutes with an average speed of 3.7 MPH. We started this paddle in the early morning hours sometime around oh dark 30.  As we paddling up the river the early morning sun was coming up and it was extremely quiet and peaceful. We approached a large bend in the river when we started hearing load music, a guy with a loud voice braking orders, and a lot of trash talking. I couldn’t believe that some boaters were starting to celebrate the arrival of the New Year so early. Then all of a sudden out pops a Dragon Boat, paddlers cranking, heavy breathing, and there may have even been a little fire-breathing out the front of the boat.  Luckily we were going in opposite directions so the meeting was brief.  One of the things that was different on this paddle from the two other twenty milers was this one was accomplished at a slower speed. I was pretty shocked at how much better I felt at the end of this one versus the other two but the speed was only about .4 MPH slower. Something to really remember for the UFC. Fueling protocol worked real well. On Friday my workout consisted of 4 miles on the elliptical and a weight lifting session. On Thursday I biked 11.2 miles in 33 minutes, did a TRX workout and then paddle 6 miles easy with an average speed of 4.4 MPH. The workout today was a long one and seem to make the day slowdown. For the family of SOC Derrik C. Benson (SEAL), which included a young son, facing life without him makes the days seem especially long.  A donation to the Special Operations Warrior Foundation will help provide a college education to son of SOC Benson.  http://www.firstgiving.com/fundraiser/billwhale/ufc2012