Read Cougar junior Leilani Roberts' notes from her team's Christmas training trip in sunny Puerto Rico
After a long seven hour flight from New York to San Juan, Puerto Rico, we
finally made it into the city around 10:30 p.m. We spent an hour and a
half sitting in New York on the runway, something was wrong with the
plane. San Juan is three hours ahead of Utah, I'm already dreading
have to get used to Utah time all over again.
First day of work out wasn't too bad. We are training long course,
which will take a bit of adjusting, but will be better for us. The
facility is great! Much nicer then the pool we train in at home. There
are 10 lanes in the meter pool and about 10 in the short course meter
pool. There are about seven other universities here training as well,
including Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, etc. We've done a couple relays
with them and it was a lot of fun. We also had a combined workout
with several teams. The coaches split everybody up into three groups,
distance, stroke, and sprinters. It was tough, but a good experience
for us and a great opportunity to represent BYU and get to know other
athletes from around the country.
Today we went and did some sight seeing. We visited the Fort San
Cristobal in Old San Juan. This fort/castle was used to protect the
city from land invasion and the fort connected to it, Castillo San
Felipe del Morro, about 1 mile northwest of Fort San Cristobal,
protected the city from sea going enemies. The structure was amazing
and it took about 250 years to fortify it. It has been used as early
at 1539, and was used during the Spanish/American War and World War
II.
Church started at 9:30 a.m. We went to a Spanish-speaking ward on the
east side of San Juan, not far from the hotel. It was about a 35
minute drive. Most of the members spoke English, so we had several
people help in translating. Two missionaries also helped, one from
Orem, Utah, and the other was from California. I think the team
really enjoyed the experience.
We visited a rainforest today. Saw several iguanas, by the way there
was a huge one on the way to practice this morning, and the team hiked
to La Mina Falls. We swam around in the waterfalls for a little bit.
Stopped by a souvenir shop on the way home. It was a good break from
afternoon practice.
Workouts have been tough. Coach Crump is beating us up, but the team seems to
be handling it pretty well. He's switched up our dry land training a
little bit, so we're all really sore. It's been a good trip and a good
cultural experience. Our total yardage is about 75,000 meters, which
is right where Stan wanted us to be. We worked hard!! Hopefully it
pays off at the conference championships. The drivers are crazy here and
you really have to be on your toes. We are having some food from
home tonight, Chili's and Macaroni Grill. We can't wait!!