July 10th, 2015

This past week has been a very good one for me. I made a couple of breakthroughs in some areas that haven’t seen too many improvements in a while. It feels really good to see the individual skills that we have been working on coming together.

As I mentioned in my previous update, we have been training out of the Pan Am games venue, as one of my training partners will be participating as a competitor.  Just being in this environment has been a cool experience. We also got a chance to link up with some of the other Pan Am competitors for some practice races. It was a great opportunity to sail with some top sailors. Even more, it was a good reminder that when you are racing, the reputation or past accomplishments of your competitors is irrelevant. If you go out and sail fast and make good tactical and strategic decisions, nobody is unbeatable.

Today was our last day of training in the Toronto harbour because the whole area will be closed off with the Pan Am games starting tomorrow. Over the next five days, I will get a chance to do some sailing on my own to touch up on my boathandling, do some equipment maintenance and hopefully watch some of the racing! On Wednesday, I will be heading down to New Jersey for the US Nationals.

Thanks for reading and until next week,

Fillah