Well, as they say in the classics, “That’s a wrap!” Bus, luggage and team all safely back in Sydney.
Sunday brought the final pool swim – a gruelling 8km, 3 hour session to close the camp. With all swimmers doing themselves proud in closing out the week well. Water Warriors – Tom P (awarded the first ever double WW), Holly, Maddy, Georgia P and Claudi.
It was then back for breakfast, presentation and final pack up. Harry and Tom P took the opportunity to take up the Weetbix Challenge with Tom P getting through 21 Weetbix in a sitting! – Gross.
We then held the Presentation with the coaches and “the bus driver” all having parting motivational speeches to the team. The team leaders thanked the managers and coaches with heartfelt speeches and gave gifts. It was then time to pack and have a final swim at the beach before packing the bus and heading to the airport.
And so to the big Team Award.
The Winning Team goes to………………
………………, (drum roll please)
……………………………………………………
Fishion Impossible !!!!!!!!!!
This comes after a huge last couple of days of bonus points and Water Warriors. A clear winner in the end with over 15,000 points. The winning team for all their hard work over the week receiving prestigious Noosa snow globes. – classy
And the thankyous…
Massive thank-you firstly to Liz and Nicole. The girls did an enormous job in the preparation of the food both prior to the camp and during. Up at 6am to make sure the team were fuelled for the sessions ahead, they provided pre-breakfast, breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks every day as well as looking after the sick, injured,tired and emotional when required, and also organising all the extra curricular events for the team. Tireless effort from both during the week. Would hate to try and work out how many plates they washed for the week.
Just as big a thankyou to the Coaching staff including Jess. We are incredibly lucky as a club to have the calibre of coaching we do and the commitment of those coaches to take themselves away from family and friends and their jobs (and an Hawaiian holiday for Raf) to spend 18 hours a day preparing and delivering an amazing week for our team of fun, hard work and teachings for our team. How you manage to balance hard work and still make it fun on these camps is beyond belief.
Thanks to Abbotsleigh for the use of the Bus for the week and their continuing support. Also, thanks to Dan and the team at the Retreat Peregian Beach who made our stay so easy and enjoyable.
And finally, a big thankyou to the team. Perfectly behaved, respectful, helpful, polite and fun are five attributes that spring to mind of many adjectives I could use to describe the group. They were genuinely a pleasure to take away. As we spoke about during the presentation, you are building a team culture that any Australian elite team would be jealous of. Culture doesn’t just happen, it takes effort, trust, respect and belief and you are demonstrating all of these qualities in spades. We are building a reputation as a fun but hardworking and disciplined squad and now need to take the next step of being known as the team with the best skills (starts, turns, streamlining and finishes). Take your learnings form the camps, and continue to work hard both in and out of the pool as you currently are, concentrate on doing the small things right and I’m sure we are all in for another great season this season.
And so to sign-off this year’s Camp, I leave you with Leanne’s words from her poem she recited for the team at the Presentation. Oh, and by the way, if anyone sees Leanne’s pink juggling ball can they let her know. – an in joke.
2o15 Noosa Camp Poem by Leanne
Here we are at the end of our great camp
Our bodies mind and soul all now revamped
Surfing, team flags and ocean swims- such great fun
So very lucky to do all this with our mates under the Noosa sun
We have churned up and down that 50m Noosa pool
In order to create our very own version 2.0- how cool!
Jess has pushed our bodies on the land and on the sand
She stretched us, triggered us and looked after us with her massaging hands
Raf, Brandon and I pushed your abs and nabs
Creating water warriors with bodies that are now pretty fab
The beach war games were hotly contested
You gave it your all even though you weren’t so rested
Master Chef saw some tasty pizza ideas
And all through this camp- you conquered your fears
We played music bingo, juggled and solved the cube
While the captains played us a song worthy of YouTube
The skits were of the highest quality yet
We have done so many things except use the volleyball net
Chris you set up our turning skills and ran alongside us
Nicole and Liz have climbed so many stairs that would easily reach Everest
I thank you so much for the things that you do
To make this camp magic- three cheers Woohoo!
Sam’s accents, Adri antics and all of your jokes
Have had us laughing so hard we nearly coughed up our 1000 egg yolks
Thank you for being the team you have become
In my eyes you are all now version 2.1!