Friday, June 19, 2009

Thunderstorms and Tweaking Meds

Its has been an interesting week, weatherwize, as every afternoon seems to bring thunderstorms and torrential rain. Now thunderstorms here in Virginia are not that unheard of during our hot humid summers, but the ones this week seem to have gone above and beyond. Needless to say, it has played havoc with my rowing schedule. Our safety rule states that no launching of boats until at least 15 minutes has passed since the last sound of thunder (or visible lightening but its hard to have one without the other). I didn't row on Tuesday, although that was more due to a family issue then the weather. Last night (Thursday), the storms came and dumped a few inches of rain on us, but luckily cleared before practice. The bad weather did have me running late to practice though and our coach had already assigned seats and I had the choice of riding in his launch or going to Sandy Run to row on my own. A third alternative emerged when I talked a fellow rower, who originally decided to sit out a practice, to come row a double. He has limited experience sculling, but unlike most of the men (or women for that matter) in my club, he actually rowed in college (Naval Academy) and is probably the strongest rower we have. I let him row the stroke seat and I rowed bow. Like on Saturday, we rowed up to Ryan's Dam (actually just beyond) and manged to get in a 7 mile row. We even raced the Men's 4 from Fountainhead Park up to the Dam. We actually held them off for the most part until I caught a semi-crab, which brought us almost to a complete stop. Considering my stroke had wanted an easy row so as not to aggravate a sore shoulder, we decided that was enough racing for one night. Going back we passed out fitness rowers and out novices so I suppose that means the double was moving pretty well. Turned out to be a good row overall. I had to agree with my stroke when he commented that the Occoquan was the most beautilful piece ofw water he's rowed on.

Today I had a follow up visit with my Doctor. He's been trying to fine tune my blood pressure medicine. I think we are getting pretty close to where he wants me to be, but he did tweak it a bit more. The medicine he increased slightly this time has a known side effect of making some people dizzy so I'm suppose to be aware of that. I can't imagine that being to good for my balance on my bike or when I'm out rowing. Hopefully that side effect won't rear its ugly head.

Enjoy the weekend!

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