Its been a month

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How time flies, I've been in Canada for just over a month! Heres a re-cap of whats happened so far
After departing Sydney on Jan 7th (the day after winning my 2nd NSW Open Decathlon title!) i had a direct flight to Vancouver. 14 hours and alot of inflight movies later i landed at Vancouver International Airport and proceeded to the nearest Tim Hortons for a taste of Canada - its soooo good!
I had a 3 hour layover which i spent wandering around the airport. I stepped outside into the -5 wearing my shorts and hoodie - not so bad!

I then boarded an Air Canada Jazz flight to Regina. We flew over the rockies, which were beautiful. I knew we were getting close to Regina once the landscape flattened out and became fields of snow. Then out of seemingly nowhere Regina appeared. Upon landing i was picked up by the UofR rep Ivan and driven to the uni (after trying to get into the wrong side of the car!)

Arriving at the uni at about 6 i got into my accomodation in La Residence - in the French Institute on level 5. My room consists of a bed, fridge, desk, bathroom and lounge chair. Each floor has a tv lounge and a microwave. I had to buy a meal card which i can use at the food outlets on campus.

Seeing as I was still wired, despite not sleeping for longer than 20mins in over 30 hours, I decided to head to the track to meet the team. The facilities here are great with a 4 lane 200m track above a triple gymnasium - plus a pool, 2 weights rooms and hydrotherapy etc.

After conversing by email for about a year I finally met head coach Carla Nicholls and was really impressed straight away! I also met a bunch of the team who had added me on Facebook and the rest of my training squad and a few from other squads. After the intro my body decided it was time to sleep to I hit the sack with 8:30am class the next day

The 1st week flew by and i was asked to run the 4x400m at the Janus Festival meet on Jan 12th. at the Regina Fieldhouse. After recvieing my sweet Cougars Uniforms, i ran a 60m (first ever) which was an experience. Then the 4x400, i was 2nd runner and managed to get the baton around, albeit quite slowly (54.x) the tight curves really threw me!

The track team had a cabaret that night, which is a fundraiser, where we artied quite hard and i was introduced to the game of flipsy cup - which I believe i have a future in! I think i managed to meet the entire team that night whether i remember it or not!

We travelled to Edmonton on Friday 18th. Leaving at 7am for an 18hr bus trip, we arrived at 3pm local time, checked into the hotel and headed straight to the track for a 6pm start in the Pentathlon. I scored 3021 points, highlighted by a victory in the 1000m with 2.45.30. The venue - the butterdome - is a massive yellow building that loooks like a block of buetter, but houses an awesome track and gymansiums.

The following weekened was Australia Day and lets just say i celebraeted in true aussie fashion - drank alot, partied hard, met lots of new people!

Last weekedn we travelled to Winnipeg for the Cargill Games. No Pent, just hurdles, long and shot - felt really flat and competed poorly - dont know what went wrong really. Patried hard at the athletes after party though- good times.

This week has been a bit more full-on with Uni, a few assessments and a mid-term, but its all good!
Have had a good training week, and will compete in a pentathlon at our home meet at the Regina Fieldhouse tomorrow. Im going out to watch everyone else tonight to cheer them on! I will also debut my Cougar Bodysuit - its up there with the UTS Sperm Suit of AUG's 2007. A few of my international student friends are also coming out to watch so it will be a good time!

Also planning on goin to see the Regina Pats hockey team play on saturday night, and then am going curling with the international student society on sunday - so a bust weekend.

Thats a pretty comprehensive wrap up of what has happened so far - I'm going to keep this up to date with my activities whilst im in canada and when i hit the road in May!

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