Sooo Italia...

40 hours in transit. With a stop in Hong Kong and Heathrow. The guy that drove me from the airport to the hotel didn't speak a word of English and I don't speak Italian. But somehow in my broken Spanish and his Italian we managed conversation and a coffee on the way :D

Someone on AT was whinging about how much I whinge on here... so heads up..archers like to whinge. It's our hobby. Shooting arrows is just our obsession. And well the whinging in Italy has been stella :D The hotels are all miles apart and the food has been interesting, there's riot police in all our hotels and nothing to do at night unless the ladies hanging on the street corners outside all the hotels are of interest. I'm guessing they aren't outside every night for their health...
:D and our hotel was one of the better ones :D

The opening ceremony was epic. A massive light show to kick off the week and a chance to hug old friends. It's the best opening I've ever seen and not even the most cynical archer has claimed otherwise (although a few hardcore cynics griped about the need to have one in the first place).

Practice... seemed okay. Good weather. Good arrows. My usual telling off about my gear...this time my fletching is okay and it's my nocks that aren't good enough... baby steps :) one day I'll get through an event and have everything up to scratch :D

OMG we got George back!!! We love you George! :) World events are never the same without George's dulcet tones. Folk keep asking what these events feel like. They feel like home. The people who understand why you do what you do, the field of play and George's baritone to welcome us back.

Started on a high note in practice and then shot a miserable first half and a much improved second half. Ivana noticed my bow arm elbow was sloppy and too much tension in my hand and the coach from Nederlands gave me a verbal smack up the back of the head and the second half went much better. He said 'bow hand and release hand must be the same in here' and pointed to his head... and truer words have yet to be spoken. There were lightning strikes and we got rained on, but otherwise perfect weather.

Went down by two points in the first match to Victoria from the Ukraine. I shot okay. Not great. Just okay. No disasters, just not enough tens. So I'm alright with it. No I'd rather not be officially on holidays, but I can live with that match.

On the technical stuff... the consensus is that nocks must be perfect at all times. I figure I'm not good enough to see the difference right now, but point taken. Every little bit helps. Fletching, I've been using a  glue with a primer. My comp arrows I used a glue that came with my previous telling off... and my practice arrows with a glue I found at home that seems to work the same...so far not a fletch lost.

The fight with my bow shoulder may finally be won with turning that elbow. When I turn it the same way I do with recurve, the shoulder is much improved. And the balance of bow hand and release...well something I know, but sometimes hearing it from a different source is really what you need. Man was a life line. Told me to come to Nederlands and train and checked on me all week. How cute is that? And I'm seriously tempted.

And the rest... well my fav peeps haven't had such a good run this trip... so teams aside, we're all officially on holiday...
Maja from Denmark took out a Korean (people are still saying wow) in recurve...in fact there was a lot of upsets this week... the usual suspects aren't all going to finals. And here we thought somethings never change :)