Great week in Sport!

Well I'm back in Girona after a couple of weeks training through the orange fields in Oliva. It was great to be back there for training and catching up with friends. I also saw some of the regular walkers and bike riders on the bike path and they all remembered me and wished me well for Beijing! Training is coming along and I've increased the kilometres as well as taking in some spinning classes at the local gym. I'm too lazy when I go for a bike ride on the road and I just look at the scenery too much and then try not to crash!

The great week in sport is reference to the "MIGHTY RABBITOHS" winning two games in a row, coming home like a steam train in the last 30 minutes today against the Cowboys (the Natioanl Rugby League in Australia) The Rabbits showed their traditional fighting spirit that we as fans love (Wish they showed it on TV over here!). Let's hope the streak continues, good luck boys!

The second big thing was the Spanish football team making the Final of Euro 2008! They play Germany tomorrow night. If they win there will be fireworks and crazy young people driving around the streets all over Spain honking horns and hanging national flags out their windows! They go mad over here; when Barcelona won the league this year there were crackers and horns going until the early hours of the morning in Girona!

I leave for St Moritz on Tuesday and Matt is leaving for the Tour de France on the same day where he will be Number one Sports Director of the newly sponsored Garmin-Chipotle presented by H30 (formerly Slipstream-Chipotle H30). The new sponsor is Garmin a GPS navigation systems so at least they won't get lost! I know it has been an interesting experience for Matt to do all the races as a Director in the car and not as a rider but he's relishing the change and I'm proud of how well he's made the transition. The entire team has worked hard to ensure the riders get to the Tour in great shape and I wish them luck. After the Tour Matt will come to St Moritz for four days before I come down from altitude. I'll put some photos of beautiful St Moritz in my next blog.

Congratulations to Ivano Brugnetti (Athens 20km Olympic Champion) and his wife, Christina on the birth of their second daughter, Frederica this week. Lucky Ivano, two daughters!

Returning to Hard Training

I'm currently back in my old base in Spain; Oliva (south of Valencia). I'm training here for a couple of weeks. It's great to be back on my old bike path in the middle of the orange farms!

I had planned on racing the IAAF Race Walking Challenge in La Coruna on 7th June, however I withdrew the week before the race. My training wasn't progressing well and I was really tired so matt and I didn't see the need to overdo it at this stage. I had a week of easy training and now I'm back into hard training for Beijing.

Although I did travel to La Coruna for the IAAF Race Walking Committee meeting which was held the day after the competition. It was my first appearance at a meeting and it was a huge learning curve. I think race walking is in great hands as there was some positive discussion about the future of our event.

I'm staying here for another week before heading back to Girona for a week then onto St Moritz for a month of altitude training.