This year has continued the way it began; with me being astonished at every corner. I began a crowdfunding campaign to financially support my first world cup tour. Within two weeks I made almost 90% of the costs of the races. People I haven't spoken to in years, people I know for sure don't really have that tenner to spare, strangers I've never even met. It is the most bizarre feeling, in a world that is so connected digitally but so detached personally, to feel that astonishing mass of love and support. In a lot of ways, the words and comments and donations that were directed at me became a more important experience than qualifying for my first world cup race. People didn't even need to be asked twice; they jumped on board my journey with their palms open, and I cannot imagine being in a luckier position.

Another development over the last couple of months that I find incredibly exciting (and canoeists who share my love of coffee will totally get it) is beginning a new partnership with Glen Lyon Coffee Roasters. Scotland is where I have lived longest in my life, and my slalom life began here. Which is why after years of stopping by for flat whites and gazing lovingly into the roasting room, I'm absolutely blown away that this roasters, not half a kilometre from where I first sat in a slalom boat, wanted to be a part of my journey too.

My international season began in Krakow, with the Presidents Cup. I started at this race two years ago in 2016, coming 9th. This year I came 2nd, just 0.8 off the win. Not a tiny margin, but small enough for me to be able to feel the speed I need to keep pushing to the top.

After the presidents cup came demonstration runs, at Krakow world cup. Due to an unprecedented set of issues with the U23 World Championships course in Ivrea, the World Cup was un-released to me two weeks prior to the race. Setbacks are an inevitable part of sport, and while this is the most beautiful, difficult sport in the world, for it to continue to exist we have to accept that on some levels it is a business. And at that moment, business said that I would miss out this time. 

Demo runs were terrifying; during a race you can be absolutely isolated with yourself, completely focused on the job that is yours and yours alone. During demo runs, every single athlete watches you - and they DO care how you do! It was an amazing rush to be performing in front of about 99% of my idols, and I was proud of the way I handled it.

Augsburg was the first time I'd ever sat on a world cup start line. It's funny when you look back on moment like this; part of you really expects it to be a different level, a whole new experience that you weren't expecting. 

Actually, while the event hosted in Augsburg was exceptional, the race I put down felt incredibly normal. I was absolutely jittering with fear on the start line, ready for feelings of being chased down the course by the monstrous 'WORLD CUP' feeling. But finally I felt as though I was being released on the water to do my favourite session - full runs. I put down a slow, clean run in the first round of qualifying, unfortunately too slow to put me through to the semi finals. In the second round of qualifying I was fast enough to make the semi finals, but picked up three two-second penalties at the bottom of the course. A little too tight, a little too fast-and-furious.

But I feel like the richest human alive coming away from this first experience. I got to spend a lot of time catching up with people I haven't seen more than once or twice over the last couple of years, and meeting new people who I hope I get the chance to hang out with a lot more in the future. We talk a lot about slalom being a big family. But nothing feels like family, quite as much as when you have to run to them for help. Fifteen minutes before my first qualifying run in Augsburg, my 500 gram weight fell out of my boat. This thing had been resined in for nearly six months, so I hadn't planned for it to release its hold quite so soon. As paddlers know, if our boats are under the 9kg weight limit, we get disqualified. Holding in the panic, I (calmly, steadily, CALMLY) walked to the GB tent. Kim was the only person there. I explained what had happened, and I have never seen a person jump into action as quickly; 'right, we're DOING this.' Kim was preparing for her own race run, but was happy to help me finally wedge the weight in under my seat.

I'm grateful for everything that has happened to me over the last few months. I hope I can continue the chain of support and love to athletes and people around me, because it's truly the most valuable, life changing part of this experience. I'll check in again soon, from Bratislava! 

GB selection is a wild ride every year. There is something mind-numbingly gritty about winter training in Britain. It might be the routine, the cold water. It might just be that the temperature and wind inevitably extend into March and April. It's a celebration of dedication and determination. There's something glorious about the ache from training, and the way you fall instantly to sleep at the end of the day. And it's always with a singular focus; GB team trials in spring. 

My selection series this year was a mixed bag. I had some touches, and a couple of runs that could have been a lot better. On the final day, I knew that I had to put everything on the table. I had to express the techniques and the fitness that I'd been working on. It's probably the most terrifying race countdown of my life. But it felt good, the same way hurting after pull ups or your fingers stinging from the cold feels good. Having these feelings isn't necessarily good or bad, but the trick is to accept that they exist. Acceptance is the first stage of letting go, and your heart might be pounding in your ears, your tongue might feel like a piece of driftwood, and your muscles might be uncontrollably shaking. But if you can embrace those feelings as part of you, you can take the first step towards having a clean mind. 

 My last two runs in the series put me in sixth place, within the required percentage margin. After a couple of anxious weeks, the GB teams for the world cups were decided; and I'm going to three of them!

​Three world cups out of five is more than I dared to hope for. I feel exceptionally privileged to get this far in slalom, and it's completely down to the support I receive from family, friends and sponsors. The amount of failure it requires to begin succeeding wouldn't be possible to recover from without the people who have your back. My role models demonstrate the qualities of resilience and character in sports, and the way it can be applied to help anybody find their best life. Everything is true about getting up and doing it again. But getting up is made a thousand times easier when someone gives you their hand, and pulls. 

I'm excited to share my experiences this summer, and I think I'll be in situations that I've never experienced before. I feel prepared to cope after the incredible structure and support from the Scottish Canoe Association this winter, from my own mindfulness training and the support of everyone, in every way. I want to help younger athletes learn lessons that I am continuing to learn every day of being an athlete. 

If anybody reading this is able to help, I need to raise £1050 to get to the world cups. I'm overwhelmed by the generosity and kindness from everyone already. So even if you can just spare £2, it would mean the world to me. I'd be incredibly privileged if you would join my journey, from here.

Yours in sport
https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/lovetotrain

Photo credit: Toby Maudsley

This is a topic fairly guaranteed to get some people's blood boiling. The concept of 'talent' is attractive for all kinds of reasons. It can be a badge. It can be an excuse. A lot of people seem to think it is part of their character. I completely accept that for many athletes, performance development specialists and basically anybody who has a vague interest in sport, the concept of 'talent' is too comfortable and nice to reject. 

As with any approach to having an open mind, I have to consider both sides of this argument. It has always been fascinating to me that people will develop general overviews of something that they only possess a fraction of information about. I'm going to deconstruct my personal information about this, then make a conclusion based on just three sources. 

I started my slalom career around the age of fifteen. As in, I got in a slalom boat for the first time. When I was around seventeen (practising slalom for two years by this point, around 600 hours), I was told by a performance coach that I 'didn't have a natural feel for the water, so we're going to have to do some extra work on technique. It will be more difficult for you, because you aren't very good at reading water.' So I now think I can conclude from that expert statement that 600 hours of water time, elevates an athlete from novice, to beginner.

At around the age of 19 (practising slalom for four years by this point. I also began training full time at the age of 18. So I can estimate the practise time at around 1500 hours), I was told that I had very good fitness and strength, but again had not developed 'consistent technique because you train hard, not smart'. Now I can see the benefit of keeping a training diary, because I'd like to be able to say how many hours of training had been overseen by a coach. But I didn't, so I'm going to make a generous estimation that around half of my time on the water had been guided. I will conclude from this section that around 1500 hours of practise elevate an athlete from beginner to slightly more experienced beginner.

At the age of 22 (practising slalom for seven years, training full time for four years. I'd estimate around 5000 hours of water time by this point) I put down one of the best full runs of my life as a forerunner for the 2015 World Championships in London. I was commended by British senior team athletes (and a few others as well!) for having displayed consistent technique (after several practise runs on that course - which is not common practise for racing!). A coach, at this point, referenced me as 'talented'. So I would like to speculate that 5000 hours of practise elevates an athlete to intermediate level.

I'm trying to be as objective as possible here, because while slalom is an extremely dynamic, unpredictable sport, there are trends in improvement and mental development that are consistent with the amount of time an athlete has spent being guided through the processes of technique and mental approach. I also think that variety of training and being away from 'comfort zones' - not in the conventional sense of pushing hard, but altering routines and feedback systems, is important. I have never been to two races that have been laid out in exactly the same way, and so the physical environmental factors cannot be analysed in the context of peak performance.

Now I'm 24, and based on my quality hours of coached water time, I would say as an athlete I am elevated towards advanced/professional level. I often get referred to as 'talented' by people without previous knowledge of my background or racing experience. The reason I find this interesting is that the 'audience' of canoe slalom gets regular opportunities to observe and judge singular racing performances. We don't often get opportunities to see other athletes in the most critical, exciting parts of their development - everyday training. In the same way we never get to see the amount of hours that get put into mental preparation, and developing concentration endurance. 

The three sources I can relate to in this discussion are 1. myself, as a professional athlete. 2. Bounce: The Myth of Talent and the Power of Practise by Matthew Syed. 3. The Sports Gene: Talent, Practice and the Truth about Success by David Epstein. The two books are, in general, opposing sets of research as to the word 'talent' in high performance sports. Both reach a similar conclusion; with measurable factors of physiology, hours of practise, and ability to learn techniques, and less measurable factors of mental attitude and capacity, innate understanding and previous experience in similar environments, sports success can be predicted and measured. 

Now I can (sort of, sorry!) get to the point. I'm not really writing this as an autobiography of my experience in slalom. I wouldn't change the way I've gotten to where I am, because I've learnt so much and developed so much high quality experience that it would be unjust to say otherwise. 

I want to throw this discussion into the open, because there is a misconception by young athletes that there is a pre-determined rule of how much they can achieve. I want to say, that there is no such thing. If anyone says 'not talented', they aren't making a statement about you. They are displaying the amount of opportunities they've had to observe you. It is so very important that you understand that to take full responsibility for your training, you have to do just that. It has never been about what other people think. Your coach (if you have one) is an incredibly important part of your life. But only you know how hard you have worked in every hour you've been on the water. Were you concentrating for the whole loops session? Or were you too tired to think, and let your body go into 'auto-pilot'? 

At this stage I would say role models are incredibly important. It's far too easy to neglect this with an attitude of 'oh well they live here, and have this coach, or this team...' instead, athletes have to consider the amount of focus that has gone into the sessions, every day, for that athlete's life. There are no anomalies - just normal people who have worked exceptionally hard. Ability to concentrate is also something I believe is not innate. I believe it also comes down to hours of practise. Having a 'poor memory' or 'short attention span' is learned in the athlete's environment. Taking responsibility for this incredibly important part of development, looks a lot like removing those preconceptions, and identifying ways for you to practise something you know you could be better at. Because mental health and development are under-supported in modern sports, it can be tricky to find the right pathway for yourself to exercise this kind of practise. But that's what I mean by taking responsibility. You really, really want this! 

It's very easy in a blog to project my opinions as facts, but in reality they are my own thoughts. I understand the thousands of approaches to this discussion - and I love hearing about all of them! So in a slightly unusual conclusion, I would like to invite further discussion with myself and within the slalom community about this stuff!

I know it's cold up here, but it's still the most beautiful sport in the world! X

At the end of every season comes a time for unwind and rest. Canoe slalom is an incredibly high intensity sport - for your mind as well as your body. Having a long, heavy summer training block is tough, especially when there are no big races to taper and peak for. So having a few light weeks to rehabilitate your muscles and brain is essential to starting a strong, productive winter preparation block.

I love going into winter training - because right at the start, I always have a list of things that I want to have improved or mastered by the end of the winter. It comes with challenging conditions - getting 'better at racing' is extremely tough to simulate in a blizzard with ten paddlers and one stopwatch. I've actually learned over the last three years, that prioritising and preparing for your sessions in this environment is almost as important as the actual session. Being comfortable, nourished and having proper equipment are the bare essentials to this kind of training block. Having a strong training group who prioritise the session over the rest of their day is also essential. This is a pretty difficult situation to come by - especially because a slalom squad is a lot of individual sport athletes, having to function productively together as a team.

What is pretty awesome as a senior athlete, is seeing junior athletes you have trained with for years in 'different' focus groups, stepping up their standards to participate as senior members. Currently at Pinkston Watersports, we are productive and efficient: everyone builds the courses, everyone times one another, we share and work together with what we're learning. There are nearly eight years between the youngest and the oldest paddler. 

Strategically, we all have different goals for the end of winter training. The racing experience between paddlers is vastly different, and so are the performance criteria going into 2018 selection series. But a whole group of people who love being on the water, and are applying the same level of concentration and effort to each session, produces feedback that everyone can identify with and learn from. 

I want to spend this winter taking a step back to the basics. I've had an awesome summer, learning on some of the hardest and most technically challenging courses in the world. For the winter, I want to focus on basic sequences and simple stroke patterns. Because while I technically refine and solidify basic practise, I want to step up on my physical and mental preparation. Those are probably two of the hardest areas of sport to work on at the same time - a tired brain is not always a cooperative one. But I learned a lot over the last three years about regeneration and focus. You absolutely cannot focus constantly. But you can learn to allow attention to deviate less and less from the task at hand, until you realise that you've spent 100% of your time focussing on yourself. Which is one of the reasons resting your brain is so important - you wouldn't expect your body to run a marathon if you've been constantly jogging for a week!

Getting physically stronger for me is surprisingly simple. People do invent a lot of ways to improve specific areas of fitness and strength. I think it's quite easy to over complicate. I love strength and conditioning, because I enjoy weightlifting, but I think this kind of preparation is very specific to the individual. I want to do a lot of aerobic sessions for the first part of my winter block, to create a baseline of fitness for the really tough months in January and February. In slalom we often talk about 'training to train'. Our races are around 110 seconds of highly intense effort. In running and swimming this could mean a lot of anaerobic interval training, VO2 sessions and high intensity endurance. But because our sport is so technical, we need to spend a lot of time on the water doing hours of high intensity bursts of activity. Which you actually need to be incredibly fit for - so finally, it pays to have a long block of aerobic endurance under your belt, to be able to cope with the length of our technical sessions. 

So looking out the window at twelve degrees and Scottish drizzle, I'm excited firstly for a bit of brain regeneration - and then to get stuck in to what we've planned for the next five months!

After a long, hard, and extremely productive summer, we are home. I never thought I'd find myself looking forward to rain and temperatures below twenty five degrees celsius, and I'm sure I'll re read this post in January with regret - but it's SO good being back in a cooler climate! Jumpers and socks and waterproof jackets are something we use daily in the UK, and I actually missed them.

Alongside the high volume of whitewater training plus strength and conditioning of the last three months, we have been in the process of launching a not for profit organisation: The Phantom Project.

Over the coming years, this will be an endeavour to create a support structure for athletes like ourselves, who feel we are on the edge of making our national senior team. Slalom has a huge variety of athletes, with an even more versatile range of peak performance ages. A peak performance age is when an athlete reaches the height of their skill and physical capability. In slalom, this can be anywhere from the age of nineteen to late thirties. 

Currently there is a slight gap in the support structure in the UK, for non-junior athletes who narrowly miss the margins of making senior team. The principle reason for founding The Phantom Project, is to create a structure that can provide services for these athletes, who want to give everything to make the final push into the elite level of senior team. 

Of course creating this support structure requires investment from people who can provide these services, and as with any industry this involves financial backing. Slalom is currently still a 'smaller' sport in the UK, with fewer athletes in the premier category than in 'larger' sports such as swimming or cycling. With the success of canoe slalom in the Olympic Games, we hope to see slalom grow at every level, from recreational to high performance. 

What we would like to make potential investors aware of, is the accelerating growth curve of slalom. It's a highly aesthetic, exciting sport to watch, and as we establish better viewing methods for world cups and smaller international races, the viewing figures are increasing annually. What we are offering people is an opportunity to firstly expand recognition of canoe slalom, a sport that the UK excels at. We are in the top three most successful nations in the world at it, and as we develop more ways to integrate people at a recreational level, our elite performance level will only continue to improve. It's a rapidly accelerating curve that is open for the taking - and the opportunity to jump on board and be a part of the development is approaching. Secondly, we want to develop a support structure that continues to develop qualities in people that are rarely given an opportunity to develop in any other way.

These qualities are clean minded thinking. They are persevering in the most versatile, volatile sport in the world, through successes and failures. The principle of elite canoe slalom, is to create a mindset for yourself that allows you to live absolutely in the moment, while performing at a world class level. These are the ideals that we want to reinforce and nourish, for people who would otherwise be forced to drop off in training through lack of financial support and performance structure. 

As an athlete, I really do love to train. I love racing, and I love every part of what can be identified as a high performance lifestyle. I want to be part of creating a wider base for this to be possible for more people, because the opportunity to learn personal development skills is becoming increasingly important in society. 

I guess the point of this post is to condense what our social media and website say about The Phantom Project. Phantom: ‘a representation of something abstract, ideal, or incorporeal.’ Project: ‘a specific plan or design'. I want to help create the specific plan that can make the abstract of this endeavour become palpable and productive. Canoe slalom is the most beautiful, difficult sport in the world, and I simply think everyone should have a go!

I have some more training and racing specific posts lined up as we enter the second half of our racing season in the UK - meanwhile, I hope everyone continues to #lovetotrain and #beyourselves. Our small slalom family is growing, and those are my two favourite bits of it!

I've always found one of the most challenging parts of training to be knowing when to hold off, or go a little easier. It's easy to say that you know your limits, but in reality athletes are constantly pushing, constantly trying to reach the edge of their limits. The 'limit' isn't even about making revolutionary changes to training or technique - it's about pushing your limit a little further, about making it slightly harder to reach next time. And the next.

In slalom it's kind of hard to define, because we don't really push physical limits in the same way as cycling or swimming. It's more about exploring what quality of training you can project each day, and how consistently you can maintain it. To simplify it a little, it's easy to have a great day when the sun is out, you happen to wake up in a good mood, and your boat does everything you want it to do. Mistakes seem less significant, and it's easy to think your way around problems. It's harder to have a great day when it's snowing, your boat is a little bit battered, and you've let something put you in a bad mood.

These things are always in an athletes control. It's a choice, to let something put you in a crappy mood, or to allow yourself to get brought down by something out of your control (boat repair, in retrospect, is 100% in a paddlers control!). You decide how you feel, and with some effort, you can put yourself in the same zone day after day.

So my problem is when to know it's time to back off. I know that a few things can clear my mind and put me in a good mood. Climbing (which I'm terrible at, but love), cleaning (modern-day 'nesting' I suppose), running (which I never thought I'd acknowledge in any positive way but hey) and other easy, feel good things. So when it comes to a session, it feels like the loveliest part of the day. I spend all my time making my brain happy, in order to have a quality session.

Then your body says no, I'm done today. Sorry. My elbow hurts, and I'd like you to take some time off. I know you're not tired, but you're gonna have to suck it up and do what's best.

I spend a lot of time ignoring excuses that my brain and body offer me. Nothing is too hard, because the price of a good session can't be too high. So a niggling pain that won't quite go away after the session, or a little itch in the back of my throat, feel like really easy things to ignore. But they always creep up on me. I'm prone to tendinitis in my forearms, but to be honest in slalom forearm pain is part of the package.

In a world full of uncontrollable variables, I just want something that tells me exactly when to stop, to let certain things recover. When is pain bad? Should I ignore it or keep going, because keeping going is what we do? I guess the answer is, don't expect black and white answers in a world where nothing is as easy as that. I think paying more attention to what my body is relaying to me is also fairly key - it sounds stupid but it's really hard for some athletes to open up to that. This year I've caught tendinitis before it gets bad - icing and rest, sauna and ice baths. It's hard not to question yourself, but at the end of the day, you know your body best.

So my birthday came around in March, carrying me into my first senior year of competition. Approaching senior selection, where only the top three boats can qualify to race at the world championships, I knew this was a time to lay down everything I had learnt in the winter, without fear or reservation. A chance to throw caution to the wind and display what I know. I think it's possibly the first time I have ever sat on the start line of a selection race, and really looked forward to the run. Other races have always felt different; you can play with different approaches, different plans and styles of attack. Selection has for me, always been a time for reservation, for using only what I know I can do 10/10, every single time. 

I started the series with a strong race, coming fourth overall on the first day. The second day was a little tougher, a tricky, technical course that I never quite found my flow on, leaving me with a fifth place. Over the three day race, it's your best two results that count in the end, and so I felt strong and confident coming into day three. 

What happened on day three was a little bizarre for me, and I felt it highlighted an area of racing that I can now spend a year developing and enhancing. I spend twenty five minutes warming up for a single race run, running through physical and mental processes that I have found put me in the right state for racing as hard as I can. I do turning drills, some stretching, sprints to build my lactic levels up to optimum and breathing exercises to prime my focus. I run through the course a set amount of times in my mind, and going up the conveyor belt to the start pool I know exactly how I will feel, and what I want to do. 

In my semi final run on day three, the start person called fifteen. At this point my vision focusses, and I get that first rush of adrenalin that absolutely directs every stroke. I pull into the flow, and at ten seconds to go, I begin my start sprint. In my semi final run, I heard a hiss and bang, but it didn't register at all. I was already absolutely in the moment, in the perfect zone. I flew through gates one and two, and was on the charge to gate three when I heard voices and shouting that were absolutely out of line with what is normal. People were shouting for me to stop - some of the pumps had overheated and stopped. 

I sat like a gibbering mess in the eddy next to gate three, my brain already four gates ahead, underneath the bridge. My whole body was shaking with suppressed energy that didn't know where to go. Finally a friend told me to get out of my boat, I had to go back to the start pool. My coach carried my boat to the top, and I was told that in five minutes I could start again. A better athlete would have refocussed. At the time of course, I was confident that I could reset. You have to be - there is no other option when approaching a race. To be honest, perhaps my whole race run would have gone like that anyway - off camber, nervous and hesitant into all the moves. There is a good chance that was what could have happened anyway. But I'm annoyed with myself for letting an opportunity to practise self mind control, overcome my race. I don't know how I would have finished with a perfect run. I am only absolutely concerned that it was not how I planned it would go.

But the beauty of this is I am free to travel around the best slalom courses in Europe, and commit to essentially a second block of winter training - in the summer months. I can go away and work on what it was that let me down in London, and bring back everything when we race all over again next season. Thanks everyone for your support, love and making my kayak life the best it could be. I look forward to sitting on the start line with everyone again, and hope to watch and celebrate our senior team demonstrating the highest standard of racing in the world series 2017. 

Thanks Peter Milsom for the photo!

In a world of intense concentration, critical analysis and repetitive training, I think I'm learning some of the most valuable cycles of thought. Everyone talks a lot about relaxing and regenerating, but I think for people like me it's quite hard to understand that thinking you are relaxed is very different from actually being in a state of relaxation. When you are truly in the zone of regeneration, it doesn't make sense to apply a word to it. Why would you waste energy saying it? Or bother thinking about how relaxed you are? Being absolutely focussed on yourself is one thing when you are training or thinking about improving. But it is absolutely another exercise entirely to focus on yourself in a kind, gentle way. 

For me this often means giving myself permission to do things that are not essential or directly 'productive'. I know already that if I can sit down and do a couple of hours of work, or organise the dreaded paperwork for the next few weeks, I get a feeling of 'relaxation' that is lovely and makes me content. But that's a cycle that involves doing something non relaxing in order to feel satisfied. Which is quite similar to training, so one could argue that it is not the same kind of 'relaxed'. 

What I think true 'brain recovery' is, is doing things that in society are often negatively identified as being lazy or unhelpful. When you are in a zone unconnected with the future or past, there is nothing to worry about other than what is directly in front of you. I think training should revolve around this principle, but the nature of sport requires that we look at our times from the session and analyse what we have done, and what we will do to improve. So the only time you can truly be 'in the present' is actually when you are required to do nothing at all. Maybe a film, or playing a game, or in a particularly exciting conversation. Or even just drawing, napping or reading. 

Quite often I can get stuck 'trying to relax,' as ridiculous as that seems. I don't know if my brain just ticks over too fast for a whole week of the training and relaxing cycle. But sometimes taking a step in what feels like the opposite direction of relaxing actually works. Going for a long walk or sitting in the sun isn't what I'd immediately think of as a relaxation technique, especially as an athlete. But I think it works to firstly clear my brain a little bit, and when I finally get down to doing some serious chilling, it contrasts so that the relaxing seems a bit more lovely. You can get quite committed to this; I think doing exhilarating things are the best methods of clearing your brain, like cliff jumping or swimming in cold water. But they put you in the most receptive position to relax properly afterwards. 

Ok so I'll admit it's pretty hard to keep track of blogging while you're travelling - not necessarily an excuse, but I think working by the 100% effort rule when it comes to both training and relaxing is definitely guilty for how little I've done here! If you're here you've probably come via Facebook or Instagram. So you may also have seen where I've been spending all my time.

January was a month spent learning about myself, admittedly in New Zealand and possibly with a lot of sun and wonderful company. But beginning to learn about what makes me tick as an athlete and as a human is one of the most valuable ways a person can spend their time. Chess, making gin and tonic, and writing are also extremely high on this list of valuable off-water activities. All of them are about relaxing your brain so that you can come to sessions ready to give maximum effort. 

Having an opportunity to race abroad before the 'real' season starts is another incredibly valuable experience that I strongly recommend. Paddlers who are learning to be independent of organised trips, paddlers who love to travel... Basically anyone who loves to race and wants to have a unique start line experience should find a way to get into a pre season race. Everyone there is training hard, usually right through the event - so it feels a little different to a normal season competition. The competition is still high and intense, but there is a sort of camaraderie approach to the levels of fatigue that everyone is experiencing. We all know, we've all been there. It's incredibly enjoyable to share it with other paddlers. 

On coming back to the Northern Hemisphere, I've dived back into a coached regime. Racing in New Zealand gave me an opportunity to identify for myself what I want to work on for the next year, and I am delighted to find that many of them have been addressed in the first week of our Scottish training camp in France. We are based in Saint-Pé, a small natural course near Pau in the Pyrenees. Having a smaller course to drill out some bad habits and experiment with new styles is invaluable, especially when I get a chance to apply them every day on one of my favourite courses in the whole world, Pau. 

This is a new experience for me, because usually by this time of year I'm dying for the taper that comes with the first races of the season. New Zealand ignited a fire for racing that usually only lights by selection for me, and it's amazing being able to train with that level of focus and intensity. Of course, slalom is full of ups and downs. You have to be prepared not to feel on fire constantly. At least in a good way - the lactic block is yet to start! Until then though, it's important to seize the sessions where you feel awesome, and enjoy them. Remember those feelings to hold on to when it gets a little tough. 

Winter months in canoe slalom are hard. Even when the weather isn't record-breakingly cold, the frozen mornings and black night sessions can make it seriously difficult to create a '100%' attitude. Everything takes just a bit more energy, and as soon as you're physically exhausted it can be difficult to remind yourself why you are there. 

I guess part of what gets me on the water every day is knowing what the return will be. The immediate return is physical and mental satisfaction. I am confident every time I get in my boat I will learn or become aware of something new. When the temperature drops and my hands start to hurt, I know that I am building a layer of resilience that very few people are lucky enough to have an opportunity to build. 

It's easy to talk about learning new things when sessions are going well - when sessions are going in the wrong direction, or you can't seem to turn on the speed, it can begin to feel like you're going backwards. Added to the dark evening sessions and freezing water, motivation can take one look and run screaming for the warm changing rooms. 

Finding ways to keep yourself motivated between sessions is a very personal routine, and it can keep changing through an athlete's career. At some points in my paddling, it has been about reminding myself how far I have come from the beginning. Other times it can be remembering the feeling of sitting on a start line, and being absolutely happy that I have done everything physically and mentally possible to create a good run. Right now, it is about the future, and where I will see myself in four years time. When you look at long term goals, it is easy to zoom out too much and be drawn into a fantasy about the ultimate dream. But when I can connect the dream with the day, and the day with the session, it becomes about the exact moment that I decide to get into my boat and paddle.