Varese Week One

One week down.... One week to go.

Our first week in Varese has seen us battered and bruised. Our sessions have been extremely hard, with little down time during the day. Blue skies and good weather has helped us keep a positive attitude. We have also had the opportunity to catch up with some other sports (such as rowing, sailing and canoe/kayak) to see where they are in their preparation and how everything is going. The ETC ('European Training Center) set up and run by the AIS is fantastic. This training center offers us gym, recovery and treatment facilities, as well as the much needed WiFi. Not to mention its gorgeous lake side location. 

We were lucky to arrive in time to be able to attend a presentation at the ETC. Michael Groom completed the "big five" (five highest mountains in the world) without the assistance of oxygen in 1999.  Four of which he climbed without the front third of both feet. Very inspiring and unbelievable achievements!

Training Pool on the upper right of the park map

With many sessions leaving us crawling out of the pool totally exhausted we welcomed our day off on Sunday (15th). This gave us the opportunity to take in some rays and satisfy our various shopping addictions in town. Perhaps a coffee or gelati was on the menu as well. Varese is situated 55km north of Milan, with a collection of lakes and snow capped mountains separating Italy and Switzerland. Cobbled stone streets and colourful building in the city center, provided the perfect back drop for our rest day. 

But all good things must come to an end. Monday is here and its right back into another hard week of training. It will be our last week before flying off to London.