Triathlon News

Things have been kind of crazy around here  after the wedding, but I will have plenty of time to fill you in this week. The one thing I did want to tell you about right away was the movement forward on finding me guides in Scotland to train with.
In May I spoke with the founder of One with One, a non-profit organisation based In Ottawa Ontario. She was working very hard to help me find guides overseas and she has done a fantastic job. We've emailed a few times and just last week she sent me an email with four contacts in Edinburgh Scotland. Three were people who wanted to act as guides and the other was the "go to" person for the triathlon club located in Edinburgh. Armed with these four email addresses, I started firing out introductory emails and now have officially received a reply back from each person.
The woman associated with the club sent me a sign up form and told me that I should contact the Scotland Triathlon organisation with regards to competing as a disabled athlete. She said the club would help me with whatever I needed, but she was just not sure what I needed. As I'm not entirely sure yet either as this is a very new thing in my life, I will definitely be emailing Triathlon Scotland.
Each guide has emailed me back and two seem very enthusiastic. One has informed me that he has an older tandem bike we can use to train on, but he said racing on it might be a disadvantage when we get good enough to start competing. It's heavy and that would definitely fatigue us quicker and slow us down, but it's a start. The other potential guides have not guided a blind triathlete before, but are very excited to help out where they can. The one guy has actually guided a guy through a downhill skiing race a time or two. I think these skills will come in handy-I'm brave, but definitely not brave enough to race down a mountain. This particular guy's wife also works at a school for the blind and I am thinking she could be helpful as well. He also told me that he's spoken to a couple of swim coaches, including the head coach for Swimmers with a Disability in Scotland. It sounds like he's got his sh** together. I am so excited and thankful to these amazing wonderful people who are willing to risk their necks and dedicate heir time to my crazy dream. :)
With all of these exciting things in mind, I'm hopping in the pool tomorrow. I haven't swam laps in almost three years and so I am going to take things slowly. I am aiming for one kilometer, but we'll see how I feel. I don't want to over do it and then be set back with my minimal training just because I was over zealous.