Alex Dunne

My team had a really great showing at the Masters Nationals Rowing Championships down in Long Beach, CA last week. The MRA ended up winning the overall points trophy for the regatta, and I medaled in every event I was entered. (Which was payback of sorts — when I rowed at the World Championships two years ago, I got shut out of every event.) My final tally was a bronze, four silver medals, and a gold.

The weather was excellent, and the course was a mile-long strip of sandy beach that was purpose-built for rowing back in 1932 for the Olympics. It was a great spot to race in terms of weather, the beach, the calm wind conditions, parking, etc. We got a write-up in our local paper yesterday here.

What’s more, during breaks in our races we were able to watch the Olympic rowing events, including the eights’ finals, in which the US women took a gold and the US men took a bronze. That was inspirational.

With the conclusion of the summer 1k sprints, we’re now transitioning to 5k and 6k races this Fall. I won’t be making it to the Head of the Charles in Boston, unfortunately, but there are lots of local “head” races…

My rowing team (Marin) is getting ready for the Masters National Championships next week in Long Beach, CA. Hopefully we’ll do well; the competition should be fierce. I could be in up to 10 races over four days, which will be an endurance test. (Frankly I wanted to focus on just a few races, not this many, but our coach likes to go for the overall point trophy, which means entering as many events as possible and hoping for the best.)

On a different subject, here’s a vid (I just received) of the boat I was in that won the San Diego Crew Classic back in April. I’m the guy in the bow, black visor. We had a hell of a race!

You know inflation is skyrocketing in your country when you have to introduce the $100 Billion banknote.  The poor residents of Zimbabwe (despite most of the country being billionaires, they are indeed dirt poor) such astronomical inflation that they literally bring wheelbarrows full of cash to market to purchase basic groceries.  In fact, the new $100 billion note only gets you some fruit.  Rather than address the root causes of its inflation, the government of Zimbabwe responds by issuing more currency, and at higher and higher denominations.   I’m assuming that their government is readying the trillion dollar note, and eventually the Googol dollar note.

But hey, the new bill at least gets Earth off the hook easily with Dr. Evil, no?

We just finished another fun week at the Lair. It was so nice to unwind, see our friends, let the kids run amok, and hang out in the mountains. Here are some pics, and click thru for a special vid…

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An article in yesterday’s New York Times about the Chinese quest for gold at the Beijing Olympics game was a great read. The country’s drive to dominate the medal count at the ‘08 games will probably succeed, just like some other massive, nationwide efforts that the country has undertaken. The 119 project is the sports equivalent of the Three-Gorges Dam. To wit:

China has spent millions — perhaps billions — on personnel and infrastructure to accelerate growth in medal-rich sports in which it has had little success.

Americans (and probably other countries who fear that the Chinese will end up at, or near, the top of the medal count in August) will criticize the Chinese effort from various angles. Some will call the Chinese athletes automatons without spirit, slaves to the system, not “true” athletes for whatever reason, and so on. Some are already leveling charges that the Chinese are doping:

Mike Teti, the coach of the United States men’s rowing team, said, “We know they are cheating, but there’s nothing we can do about it.”

That is a very bold statement. Wow. What does Teti know that the rest of the world doesn’t, and why doesn’t he come forward with details to back up that allegation? If he has some evidence of cheating by the Chinese, he should present it. Otherwise, he is only looks combatitive and defensive - like’s he’s preemptively building a case to explain U.S. losses to the Chinese teams in Beijing.  (For the record, I think the Chinese will do well in the sculling events, but not as well in sweep events.)

Whatever happens at this point, you can bet that the Chinese are not going to welcome Teti, nor the American rowing contingent, very warmly.

Here’s a short clip of my team (from the Marin Rowing Association) on the San Francisco Bay, in the waters near San Quentin — our home course. Filmed in late March ‘08, this was a practice 2k race in preparation for the San Diego Crew Classic that took place at the beginning of April (which we won). We’re the first boat shown in the video (among 4-5 others shown); I’m the last guy in bow with the red jacket.