Shaun Rubenstein

Training update!

The last 3 weeks of training h ave absolutely flown by. I am very happy with how they have gone. I did some awesome sessions with Tim Brabants for the first 2 weeks which was unbelievable. Always a great privilege to train with Tim. Not only did we do some great sessions on the water we also cycled up to the mast on top of the Tokai mountain. It is an 11km non stop clinb to the top and we did it in 1h10. It takes about 20mins to the bottom as you cant go fast because of all the switchback turns. I have really enjoyed this session and I have done it twice since with my best time going up now being 60mins and 13 seconds.

The last week has been spent training with Ant Stott and Graham Solomon. Great to have quality guys to train with again and I got some good marathon experience trying to hang on their wave while they were doing their K2 sessions. For now I only have 1 week left training here in Cape Town before I head off to Singapore. Most of my tough sessions are now behind me and I am just going to concentrate on maintaining the good rythm that I have found in my k1 and also try and get my speed up and portages waxed.
I have really enjoyed my whole build up to this world champs. Not only is it great to be doing something different for a change, I am really enjoying building up for this event without any pressure. Not even I know whether I have managed to build up enough endurance over the past few weeks to last the pace and distance of a marathon world champs and with Hank going so well at the moment, all SA’s hopes lie with him to bring us back a gold. I have been able to just lie low and do my own thing under the radar and I have loved it. After all the pressure of trying to qualify for the Olympics and the low of not having achieved that, these last few weeks have been a real pleasure.
So for now its just making sure I am completely recovered and healthy for race day and then to hope that my experience can get me through with a sniff of a medal