A long time ago I played ice hockey.  I wasn't much good, I did play one game of Senior A but that was because the Sharks A grade team was desperatly short of players to field a team and all the rest of the B graders were sooks ... but I digress ... After Dino, Em, Mason and I did a session at the Blackburn velo on Saturday morning (sprints, standing starts and match sprint tactics) I had a spare afternoon, and after dropping Lucie off at the Monash Gallery (she works there a bit) I headed to the ice rink in Oakleigh with my old hockey skates. 

Hockey skates are worn tight, very tight.  I wear a 44 or a 45 shoe, my skates are a 41.5. Suffice to say that they're not very comfortable.  Normally I'd wear some very thin socks but all I could find was some worn thin cycling socks.  C'est la Vie ... I skated around the rink for a total of about 35 minutes, did a few stops and fast-ish laps and was amazed that I could still skate backwards and do some of the basics (hockey stops etc).  I was pretty unco, but the basic motor still worked. I had to stop every 10 mins to take the skates off to let my feet recover, and after the last block of skating I noticed the blisters.  Ok, that'll do!  Mefix is pretty good on blisters as well as road rash, which is convenient.  Later in the day Dino & Em came over and we did a session in the 'haus to complete the day's training.  All up, pretty good.

Today Luc & I are going to hire a big kayak and do some splashing around a lake.   Tomorrow's the Blackburn Australia Day Madison and I'll be racing in some of the support races (enduro stuff, blah) and commentating on the main races.  I'm looking forward to it!