My first race!

On Saturday July 14th, i competed in my first Outrigger Canoe Race. It was at Stevenson WA in the Gorge and was 9.5 miles. I survived it well with all the white caps from the wind and the barges and other boats going by. Our Team did really well. We came in 10th out of 24 overall with the Women's and Co-ed team. I was on the Co-ed team, and compared with all of the other co-ed teams we came in 6th out of 15. So overall we did pretty good and i was told that's the best our team has done. It was great to be a part of it all! We all had a blast!

Putting the Skirt on our boat so we don't get soaked- witch we still did anyway :)
My Crazy team! We had "diapers" or due rags on
our head, and we all had fake tattoo's on our arm
to make us look tough! What a crew!










Everyone that raced that day! There were three boat. A Woman, Men's, and Co-Ed.













Before the race to did a blessing on the boat
to wish us luck and ask God to look over all of us
as we are out there in bad water conditions.
Most of it was done in Hawaiian language. They
asked everyone to join in, so you can see my mom
and dad also joined us. WE all had our hands on
the boat. It was very nice! We also go anklet things
that were hand made by someone in the group that
was made from a seaweed type thing. Its also for
good luck.









This was our last "TEAM" meeting before hitting the water.















Here we are taking off out of the cove to head
down to the start line. I am the second from the front with the blue on my head.


Here we are about half way through the race passing another boat. It was a 4.5 mile course that we went around twice.














Here we are passing the finish line! We completed the race in 1 hour 41 minutes and 4 seconds. We were exactly 1 minute behind the 3rd place team!


This was after we finished, we paddled over to the cove where the mens crew and all the friends and family where there to greet us. You can see the top side of my new paddel i just got that morning. I wanted to have my own instead of borowing one. It is such a nice paddel! My mom and dad were able to drive up for the day to watch us, and Liz came up with me and camped for the night.





Liz and I at the finish! My dad is in the background along with some girls from the womans crew. What a relife to be done!








Thank You to all the people that were supporting me both there at the race and at home, and for the phone calles and good luck wishes! It was nice to know i had lot of friends and family thinking of me as i went out on my first big adventure.

My next race is in 3 weeks, August 4th in Seattle on the Puget Sound. Pictures and Stories to come!