Well, I hope everyone had a great break and rest of the summer. The season has begun!! It is great to see so many people returning and also so many new members. I am excited for another great season.
Congratulations to all Royals who attended the BCSSA Provincial Championships in Burnaby. It was a late season meet and although I am sure you were all feeling the cumulative fatigue from the season you, once again, represented the club as a force to be reckoned with. Nice work everyone!!
Upcoming events:
Bring a friend swim Sept 29 - see coaches or Kevin or Tammy for more information
Royals awards night and Team Dinner October 8, 20 6:30 p.m or Royal Roads Cafe
Reminder:
Friday Naden Practices are for Jets (Winter Club Swimmers) only.
Junior Coaching Program
We will be holding our first coaches workshop on Wed September 23 at 4:45 at Naden. All those who are 13 years or older and interested in getting involved with coaching are welcome. If you are interested, but unable to make it on Wed, please let Travis know as soon as possible.
Note from Coach T - Practice what you preach"
Well, sometimes that just isn't possible.
I left off the last blog post advocating the benefits of taking some down time, not doing anything to stress the body or the mind and allowing yourself to rejuvenate for the long season ahead of us.
What began, as an attempt to accomplish the above for me didn’t really go according to plan.
As we have done for some 11 reasonably consecutive years, my parents and Katie and I planned a Trip to Topaltos Beach. Topaltos is a magical, beautiful expanse of soft fine sand located in Barkley Sound. Getting to the beach entails a boat ride from Port Albernie, followed by an arduous 3-hour hike from Bamfield along some gnarly West Coast trails. The reward of being able to sit on the beach in complete solitude, listen to the calming surf and watch the sun sink below the horizon is well worth the hike.
A traditional pastime of ours has been to play a game of beach baseball while we are there. We find the best piece of driftwood to serve as our bat, draw some bases in the sand and have at er.
This year we had a new addition to the camping party, our 9-month-old collie. Collies instinctively like to heard anything that moves, goats, sheep, horses or people. Needless to say Remi, made it a little more exciting trying to run for home base.
Around the bottom of the 7th, mom hits a good one to left...beach. She's off around first...second and heading for home when you guessed it, Remi decides to suddenly start playing outfield taking moms feet right out from underneath her.
Mom went down hard and we immediately knew the game was going to be postponed. Her chief complaint was her knee. She couldn't stand, and it started to swell up almost immediately.
We were able to put a splint on it, ice it and give her some painkillers. We decided to wait to the morning to make a decision as to what to do as it was becoming very apparent that the possibility of her walking out was not going to be an option.
The next morning, we made an emergency call to Tofino radio, which patched me through to The Victoria Rescue Center. We explained the case, and they said they would try to get a helicopter to her that day. We waited, waited and waited, but there was no sign of the chopper. Apparently it was too foggy for it to take off, so they were going to try again the next day.
Thankfully they (Parks Canada) were able to get a zodiac in the next day and transport mom out. Katie, Remi and I hiked out and met them at the Bamfield nursing station.
After mom finally got some x-rays and advice from some specialists we learned that she had shattered (their words) the head of her Tibia, torn her ACL, LCL and meniscus and, to top it all off, had sprained her ankle.
In retrospect it is hard to believe that she spent two nights out there with a broken leg.
Topaltos still holds a special spot in our hearts and despite the turn of events we will be back. As for my mom right now...it is a good thing she retired from teaching (elementary) at Christmas, because she is completely immobile with a giant brace on her leg.
So I do hope that you were all able to get a little more relaxation in than I.
Coach T
No comments:
Post a Comment