Oktoberfest is all over

Jen and I went to Oktoberfest and had a blast. We left on Wednesday(21/9) and came back Saturday(24/9). We had a blast with the LUDUS crew and drunk some very large 1 liter beers. We tooks some good pictures and it was amazing how many people convergered on Munich for this once a year festival. Jen and I had some travel worries on the way back (we flew out of Stuttgart), but with some swift running and a bit of luck with our plane being delayed by 45 minutes we made it on the flight. You see I thought we were catching the 10:35 plane, but infact it was the 10:05 plane! Anywho, we made it and relaxed on the 2 hours flight back to BCN.

Barcelona

Barcelona
Originally uploaded by mikegregpower.

Just a little view of some rare grass in BCN. It is getting close to the end of summer in Spain, so had to snap this before the rain set in.

Let the Games Begin!

Ok, so the time is nearly here for this thing to kick off. We have had some luck of late with getting FILA as a sponsor of apparel, so we should clear that up next week which will be a relief. Now only a few other things to tie up before October 1st. Madrid Fit is my next aim to get some things going.
Jen and I are off to Oktoberfest with the LUDUS (www.ludustours.com) group this week. We meet up with Adam, Jessica, Salma, and some others. Should be a blast for 3 days. This week we had a friend of Adam & Jessica in BCN, Anders. He's a great bloke from Denmark (now lives in Zurich) and we had fun in some nice bars that Jen & I hadn't found and the Barca Casino.

All quiet in Barcelona

Barcelona has gone quiet as everyone has gone off to a holiday place for a rest. The city is no where near as busy and most of the shops won't open until the end of the month. The World Athletic Champs are on and I either listen through the iaaf.com website, or through the local english pub at the end of the road. We are going down to the beach soon to play some beach volleyball.
Talk soon.

Having fun in BCN

Ok, so my mate Matty is in town and we got around abit the other day to Tarragona, a town about 60mins train ride south of Barca. Some great Roman ruins as it was a major city in the ripe old days of Roman dominance. To the right you can see Matty and I before we jumped on the train. We are outside Gaudi's house on Passeig de Gracia; a very popular place for the tourists and their cameras....us being one :-)
Below you will see why the Romans took Tarragona to be a stronghold. They could dominate the seas with the great views and perfect positioning on the Mediterranean. BarcelonaFit.com is nearly up and running, well the English version.
Cheers and whoever reads this...dont you have better things to do??? hahaha

Great Site

Back into training in BCN

Hi all, sorry i haven't writen in awhile just a little out of sorts being in the big city and trying to get things sorted before everyone heads out to their holiday destinations. You can see our street that we live on; it's sometimes noisy, sometimes quiet (sundays!) but we love the neighbourhood (Gracia). We are trying to learn as much Espanol as possible and move up to 4hrs/day tomorrow, so learning should come quicker....well hopefully.
I am back into training for the marathon (Barcelona Marathon) to coincide with BarcelonaFit. Hopefully I can crack 2:30.
We have got the start date for BarcelonaFit set for October 1st, 2005 for 25 weeks of training before the March 26 race. We hope it will all work out for us and we are trying our best.
I will write more soon and hopefully more consistantly from now on.

We are busy here at ESPANAFIT

ok, so the business has started and now we are getting the website up, flyers done, business cards finalised and trying to narrow down local sponser. Our Espanol is getting better, but nothing exceptional. We are flat chat with emails and everything...busy, busy, busy. Daniel and Jen Lincoln are here celebrating their 2nd wedding anniversary, so this week has been great catching up with them, although today Dan is having a bad bout of food poisioning. Off to the Tour de France tomorrow for saturday's State 14. Should be fun camping on the side of the 2001 metre mountain!

Everything going well in Barca

Everything is going well here in beautiful Barca. We have had a relaxing weekend and ready to push through more meetings and positive ideas this week. Hoping to solidify some coaches this week and also a track that we can call 'home' for the program. Learning the city bit by bit. Jen was a little sick today, but rested up well and we had a little walk around el barrio de Gracia tonight. We lazed on the beach at Premia de Mar yesterday. Good to get out of the city for the day. Hoping to get to Montserrat this week.

Here in Barcelona.

Ok, so both Jen and I made it to Barca. After a week stay in our small apartment we managed to come across a good one (photos soon) in only the first day of looking. So we were please. At 700Euros/month we were happy to find one in our budget .......yeah I know, this is about 1400 aussie per month! So pretty pricey around BCN.
We have been walking alot and looking around the city. It is big, busy and hot. I regards to BarcelonaFit, we are making inroads. After a hiccup a couple of days ago when we thought the BCN marathon was put back to October 2006 and nothing before, we we looking down the barrel of moving our sorry butts to Madrid. Something we didn't want to do. After getting a train ticket (the trip would last all night), we got news that there are actually 2 marathons in 2006. On in March and another in October. So we are pleased and may even work both if we are doing alright. We are struggling in understanding the Espanol (and Catalyn around these parts), but we are getting into classes this week.
Write more soon.

As close as I can get to a cat.....this is Sabre 

Out at STIR with a few mates....Ryan Botha (L) and Marc Rodriques (R). 

Ok, off to the White River we go.

Jen and I are heading 3 hours East of Fayetteville today to get to the White River. It is a long trip for such a short amount of time we are going to be there and we hope it is worth it. I am just running about 10 miles/week for a couple of weeks, then will hopefully get the urge to get back into it while in Barcelona. Photos of camping are coming....

We are waiting to head off....

Ok, so the latest is that we are trying to get everything organized before we get on the plane to head to Barcelona. The date is just about set for travel on the 21st June. Both Jen and I are pretty excited about it all and after reading alot of the details about the USAFit program we are more confident about what we are doing. We are in Fort Smith, AR, staying with Jen's parent until we leave. We're trying to stay fit and do some exercise each day, but some days slip by!!! arh well, we are trying..... The sun is out most days, so we catch up on the sun-baking skills at least. All is well and we are working hard to get to Spain with everything we need.....

Boulder Boulder 2005. What a hard race! I felt I let the Aussie team (Andrew Letherby & Kim Gillard) down. I hope I can redeam myself next year....if I am invited back! Great experience at racing at the ass-kicking altitude of Boulder, Colorado.