Day 12 – Fri Aug 15

An absolutely glorious morning meets us when we wake up.  Feels like a good day to perform.

We prepare in exactly the same way as we have done for the last few days and in fact exactly the same way as we have done for the last few years.
We arrive at the course by taxi and this is where we separate for about 90 minutes.  Heth goes and does her pre-warm on the water and walks the course with Sylvan, the US coach.

We meet up an hour before her run time as normal and we prepare for the semi-final run.

The course is a tough one with gates 3,4,5,6 being the particularly difficult sequence.  The approach is slightly different to the qualifiers.  This is not just about a steady safe run like the qualifying round.  This is now a race….but not stupid….a sensible considered race.

As 6th boat off, of the 15 qualifiers, If Heather is leading after her run, then she is definately in the final.  The first run down is a very careful clean run by the Japanese girl in 107s.  I figure that this means the pace will have to be about 100 if Heather is to challenge for a medal.  My view quickly changes as the next couple of paddlers come down.  It was carnage with a couple of people missing gates and getting 50 point penalties.

Heathers run arrives.  I am actually pretty nervous as I know this is the run that will decide a) whether she makes the final and b) whether she has a chance of a medal.

Her face appears on the big screen as they announce her.  She starts well and her approach to gate three is fantastic, gate 4 goes well but as she turns in to gate five, she doesn’t get round quite enough and the boat is in trouble.  She is off line going through the stopper and cannot get back to gate 6.  She misses it and has to loop round to get it.  This probably costs us 7 seconds in running time.  A touch later means another 2 second penalty.  She reaches the bottom with a 114s run putting her in second place with 10 still to go.

Fortunately we do not have to wait long for someone to get another 50 and finish behind her (don’t like wishing bad things to competitors but hey I’m biased…sorry).  Heather now definitely in the final.   The course is proving incredibly difficult and a couple of the top favourites also get 50 second penalties and don’t make it to the final.  Heth is eventually 8th after first runs.   Absolutely awesome.  I’m ecstatic but I think that Heth will actually be a bit disappointed.   The leading times are pretty quick but anything is possible with second runs.

We have a very short time between runs and Heather is really late getting back to me before the final.  Turns out all the athletes were held after their runs.  We don’t really know why and suspect this might have been to help the Chinese athlete who was one of the last down in the semi final and would have had less time to recover than the early athletes.  The Chinese athlete gets a 50 second penalty and doesn’t make it to the final.

Heth is disappointed.  She knew that a medal position was on after the first run.  My “half time talk” is one of….relax and enjoy and anything can happen.  By the time she leaves for the second run I am more confident that she is feeling better about the possibilities.

Heth returns to the water for her final run.  She knows she needs to put a perfect run down if there is to be any chance of snatching a medal from this far back.

The paddlers go in reverse order in the final so Heather is third boat down.  I am for the first time in months, totally calm about this run.  Whatever happens, I know in hindsight that Heth will be delighted that she made the final of the Olympic Games…..everything else will be a bonus. I know she won’t feel like that straight away, particularly if she has a bad run……..but she is now an Olympic Finallist….a massive achievement.  6 World team medals means nothing without the additional……”and I’m also an Olympian”.  It perfectly rounds off her career…..the itch will finally have been scratched.

Again she starts well, but again gate 5 – 6 causes a problem and, rarely for Heth, she rolls the boat between 5 and 6.  As she said afterwards, “suddenly I was upside down and all I could see was blue and I thought what am I doing seeing blue on my Olympic final run”.  She recovers instantly and this time makes it to gate 6.

The rest of the run is good and she posts a 104 second run…….but oh no.  The judges give her a 50 second penalty at gate 5,….indicating that she didn’t pass fully between the poles.  There is nothing we can do until the end of the competition.  Heather’s total running time is a 155s giving her a total of 269s for the 2 runs.  Genuinely neither Heather or I think she got a 50….and we would say if we thought she had.

The rest of the racers come down and Heather’s time eventually places her 8th in the final.  Once again a number of the top paddlers have difficulty with 50 second penalties.  Only the eventual winner, Kaliska, has two perfect runs with no difficulties and ends up winning the Gold by 15 seconds.  Even with the 50 removed, Heth would have only been 5th, so appealing the penalty didn’t carry much conviction…..8th to 5th…..doesn’t really matter….only medals would have made the appeal worth while.

An hour after the run we finally meet up with Heather.  I give her a huge hug and congratulate her.  She has very mixed emotions….delighted with 8th in the final of the Olympic Games, …..but also disappointed as Silver or Bronze was there for the taking.  Almost instant swings of mood between wanting to do it all again for London 2012 and retirement.  I think we’ll wait a bit before even contemplating any discussions.  No time to stop and review everything though.

Unfortunately the work doesn’t stop.  We meet up with Heathers mum, cousin and brother who came out to watch.  We now have a bunch of photo’s to take in order to get some shots in different kit, in order to thank the kit suppliers that have helped us, as this is the last time we will be at the course.  This takes about half an hour and we eventually start to make our way back to the hotel.  Get some great photo’s though.

We now have to check out of the hotel and get in to Beijing and check in to another hotel.  We have more bags than we know what to do with and are very grateful for the help of the family.

Finally at 21.00h we get 5 minutes to ourselves after checking in to the hotel in Beijing.  Literally only 5 minute though as we then have to go out to dinner with everyone.  Finally midnight and we clamber in to bed together too tired to chat and start to share the emotions of the past days weeks and years, happy to just to sleep without any nerves or pressure the next day.

It is a really strange feeling immediately after your event ends at an Olympic Games or other major championships.  I have experienced this a number of times and at least have been able to chat through this and prepare for it.

Anyway the race is over….we reached the hotel and we are exhausted.  Time for bed and we can start to think about things and reflect tomorrow.

A fantastic achievement coming 8th at the Olympic Games.   Disappointment at what might have been.   Fantastic support from the family members that travelled all this way to support and all the people that have helped us…………and all I can think is that now I am only the second best Olympian in our household!!!!!!!!!!!

Kind Regards
Geoff Parsons