Olympic Champions, day +18

First of all, apologies for the slowness in updating the blog. Frankly, it's been mental! Finding time to eat and sleep seems like a bit of a task these days! But really, it's not that bad, it's just that when your brain has turned to mush from trying to comprehend that you are an Olympic Champion, even small tasks are difficult!

Well, I'm not going to tell you about all the things we've been doing these last 18 days, as some of it has been on TV, some of it has been in the papers and some of it has been on radio. We have been trying to put interesting morcels on our Facebook page, so you can see a few bits on there. Also, for better or worse, I have joined Twitter, to add my voice to 'twitterati'.

What I will tell you about is how many people we've met, spoken to, had photos with, shown medals to and just enjoyed being with. It has just been amazing to speak to so many people who watched the Olympic slalom, who know what happened and who enjoyed it. So many people say that it was one of their highlights. To me, it is just incredible that I was a part of their experiences. It is also just so cool to imagine how many people's lives have been touched by the great sport of canoeing. Did you know that 4.9million people watched the re-run of the slalom that Thursday night? When you add Ed McKeever's Gold to Liam Heath and Jon Schofield's Bronze, it is possible to imagine a very special effect on canoeing as a sport.

For Tim and I, being a part of the Olympics, in London, was just such a cool thing. The Olympics is huge, when you're a part of it you can scarcely get the perspective. But being out there, reading newspapers and watching TV just gave me the sense that the UK was going slightly Olympics bonkers!!! Being 2/542nds of Team GB during its greatest ever outing was special. And to be a 1/29th share of the Gold Medal haul - well, that's just something else entirely! That's just special in mile high writing (with pigs taking off from the tops!)!

One of the nicest things we have gotten to do (and the task is not even 2% complete) is speaking to those people who have shared and helped us on our way. We are certainly the product of our environment, one that is populated by generous, dedicated and warm hearted people. If it wasn't for all these people, subtly (and others profoundly) affecting our lives, we wouldn't be here now. I love saying thank you to them and telling them one or two memories I have of their effect on me. It is making me smile twice as much!

I am sure that future articles will expand on these themes and add some too. This journey has been a long and a rich one. These last few weeks have crammed almost too much into a short space in time. I wished I could rewind and play some bits is slow-motion, but I certainly have a lot of things I could write about! Maybe someone will enjoy reading about them?!

Bye for now

Etienne

(Posted on the 20th Aug 2012)