Paul Rosenquist

While we here in cold Europe consider our season over and done with the guys from the Southern Hemisphere are right inte the next one.
Most of the elite guys here either put on some skis or head for sunnier places and easily clock the miles and lift weights in comfy gymes. Some might give the erg a bash every now and than.

Not so in New Zealand. Here 3 times world champ Mahe got an unexpected (assumingly) surprise of his once example Rob Waddell. If everybody in A final of Single races are super human, than Rob might be classed as hyper human. In 2000 the 200cm long kiwi weighing 97kgs won the Olympic final in Oz. He had by than won the world champs two years in a row before that. Mahe has now won all three and has his bow ball fixed on the Beijing gold. Rob turned to grinding winches on the Kiwi America’s cup boat. Having not been able to return the prestigeous cup bask to New Zealand probably made him think of his successes as a rower. He has obviously worked really hard during a couple of months losing 30 kg’s of upperbody grinding muscle and retaining his extreme fitnes levels. Rumours go that he has crushed the 15 min barrier on the 5 k erg! Lassi last year was awesome with 15:11,2. Not completely confirmed but I read a 14.58 (1.26 last 500mtr) somewhere…that together with a 2k test that left him 1 second short of the world record 6.38…. Inspiring stuff to see how, with some talent, you can just open the bag again and come back to this extraordinary level!

THIS weekend on sunday he will race Mahe for the first time…a friendly match but you can bet there are lot of eyes on this regatta. Mahe, the coolest rower I know probably doesnt get to stressed about it all…the trails wont be until march or so.

I will be thinking of that while cruising up and down on our nearly frozen lake here in Stockholm.

Some links:
http://nz.sports.yahoo.com/071212/3/39un.html

Some Video:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=d0JOq0HCBAs