When we arrived at the hotel, the sun was shining, and the weather was warm and balmy. Our teammates who departed from Philly came and we all ran out onto the beach to see the ocean.  And it was actually blue. We all agreed it was definitely not the Jersey shore.  When it came time to practice, we noticed there was an ominous black cloud heading towards the boathouse. We all thought it would pass, but just our luck, as we placed the first boat into the water, the sky opened up and rained buckets.  However, all considered, warm rain is much better than negative temperatures, so I was okay with it. Practice consisted of re-orienting ourselves with the mechanics, getting back into feathering, squaring, body angle, and all that good stuff. We did some drills before diving into IMT breathing and a long steady state.  Our primary focus was on reviewing the grip on the oar. It was nice to get back to team workouts and rowing in eights after three weeks of solitary runs, ergs, and lifts by myself. I could feel everyone else's focus and excitement at this, as practice went really well considering we've been off the water for almost three months. However, sometimes it was hard to focus because the thought of seeing manatees can be a little distracting. So far, no luck on that front but I'm not giving up. Maybe when the weather warms up, they'll come out for us. 

--- Alexa