Well it has been a VERY cold month. I am now in the build up to the KZN and South African Marathon Champs at the end of the month. The big news  is that my new marathon boat arrived at last from Plastex Poland. What a beautiful boat. Plastex used an emerald green glitter on the boat and as you can see from the photo, she is stunning. At 8kg's, the boat is exactly spot on for the international marathon specs and I can already feel the difference when racing. I was lucky enough to have Brandon van der Walt help me install the pumps. It's not every day you get a world champion help you to do that :)

The first race in my new boat was held on the same course as the SA Marathon Champs at Shongweni Dam. Well it went perfectly! I not only beat the other top girl in marathon in South Africa by over 6 minutes, but placed first women overall. The portages were so much easier with a light boat and of course my boat speed was awesome. The next race in the series was a real tester. I had a terrible start and was off the front bunch for the first lap. Well the hard training really kicked in. I managed to dig deep and gradually fight back to the front bunch. At the next portage take out, there was a real scramble. I jumped out, ran hard and put in ahead of the others. A massive interval by me on the water and I broke free. The next two laps I paddled on my own and won by a good 1000m. Sometimes a race that goes badly and yet still turns out well is even more satisfying!

I am now on the last month of training before the National Champs. I am focusing more on speed work now with lots of interval and sprint training. The hard work has been done - bring on the racing!

It's definitely harder to train and get my daily fix of watching the Tour de France! Go Cavendish!

Thanks for your support.

Emma Horner