Epic Camp Day 6 saw the mood and emphasis change slightly with the impending race tomorrow. It started with a short walk to a nearby beach where there was a catamaran anchored off it. Neil jokingly said that Coach John would probably make us swim out and around it 3 times - upon arrival John said "ok guys session is out and around the boat three times" - I think we are getting used to his ways! It was a relaxed swim in fantastic clear water the whole way and after the session we did some mass starts and sighting practice.
After the swim it was breakfast, if there had been ice cream Phil would have had some, with most people still eating enough for a small nation. It is interesting to note that at the start of the camp there was a few people purporting to be Paleo/LCHF/Low Carb etc however as the camp has gone on all food is just considered fuel - waffles and maple syrup are Paleo right? After breakfast we changed bike tyres, cleaned chains etc and took a short run to registration to hand in our run bags and it was on to the ubiquitous expo to hand over our hard earned cash to WTC for branded clothing - actually have they thought of M Dot Waffles.....
Lunch was picnic style out on the grass and the afternoon was free which meant a lot of lying down and catching up on blogs etc. We then cycled en masse to the bike drop off. This race has a split transition with the swim and T1 being at Hapuna Beach and after the cycle up and down the Queen K you end up by Mauna Lani at Fairmont Orchard for T2 and the run around the golf course. So it is race day tomorrow, I know I've never done this much training leading into a race as we've done 28 hours of training in the last 5 days. Before I started I suspected that the race would feel short but there would be nothing to give in terms of effort; the evening before I feel very relaxed and it just feels like a short training day - that's one of the things Epic Camp does for you it makes a 1.9km ocean swim, a 90km bike, followed by a 21km run feel like a day off. The other thing it does is make you very tired!!
