Well lately I have been putting in the final touches to my preparation to the European Championships in Alicante. Since this weekend I am tapering and the weekends before we had the Lifesaving.nl pool event and the Dutch Surf Championships. The Lifesaving.nl pool event is being hosted by the 2 guys behind the webpage lifesaving.nl and is conducted in the 6 lane 50m pool in Breda. This year I decided to do the 50m Manikin carry and the 200m Superlifesaver, since these events are my focus events for the EC, in the pool. I did a hard week of training before the event and was really pleased with my times, did a 33.9 on the 50m carry, while I just before had finished my 200m SLS in 2.23.someting.
I went of pretty well and lost it on the last part, that was to be expected because of my past workload. And the 50m carry followed about 45minutes later, since I didn't do much sprinting and speed work just yet I was happy with the 33.9...
The plan is that I do these event a little bit faster at the European Championships, at least breaking my PB and for the 200m SLS my aim is to finally break the 2.20 mark. At the European Championships the 100m Rescue Medley is also added to my individual Pool program, and I will also start in the 4x 50m Rescue Rube Relay and the 4x 25m Manikin Relay.

The Dutch Surf Championships were intended to be my final test for the EC, but due to family circumstances I wasn't able to do all the events. The unfortunate death of a close relative of my girlfriend made sure that I hit my bed on the night before the Championships at about 03.00. And then it wasn't even my intention to hit my own bed, but to stay at a campsite close to the Championships about 2 hours drive from home.... In consultation with my girlfriend on the next morning that I decided I would still go to the Championships for the team events and maybe some individual events. To my fortune I was able to do all 3 of the conducted relays, I was the fin swimmer in the Rescue Tube Rescue Race which we won and I paddled the Ski in the Oceanmanrelay and in the Board Rescue I was the patient. In the Oceanmanrelay and the Board Rescue we finished second behind Rb Heythuysen. For the individual events I had entered the Board, Ski, Run-Swim-Run and the Oceanman. To my luck the morning events had to be rescheduled and postponed, due to thunderstorms... And I was able to do the Run-Swim-Run and the Oceanman, in both events I was able to claim the title....

So I guess I am reasonably fit and ready to go! I can't wait to get started with the European Championships....

This weeks trainingsession:

REST!!!!
Recovery is the most important part of a trainingprogram, so always make sure that you have (had) plenty