Members of the Cornell track and field teams are currently in the United Kingdom, part of the quadrennial two-week tour of Great Britain that culminates with the decades-old rivalry with Oxford and Cambridge. Throughout the trip, women's distance coach Artie Smith will send updates from selected student-athletes as they chronicle their experiences for CornellBigRed.com.

Here's another journal entry, this time from men's captain Scott Jaffee '10. Scott recounts his three days in Cambridge. After a wonderful three days there, we arrived in Oxford yesterday and our match against Oxford and Cambridge is Tuesday!

Scott Jaffee '10
CAMBRIDGE:
Day 1 (Thursday, June 24):
The bus ride from Birmingham to Cambridge was an easy two and a half hours compared to our last bus ride. Once we arrived in Cambridge, the first thing most people noticed was how nice the city was along with the colleges. The architecture stood out because of the unique designs of the buildings and the mix of building types. The first day included lunch, a shake-out practice, move-in to the dorms at Fitzwilliam College, dinner and then a trip into town with a few Cambridge athletes. A small group of us stayed at a pub to watch Cameroon vs. Netherlands in the World Cup, while most people walked around town and joined us later to get to know a handful of Cambridge athletes.

Day 2 (Friday, June 25):
After an early 8:00 a.m. breakfast, a big group of the team met with the Cambridge team leaders to go punting on the River Cam. In groups of six, we hopped into boats and, with the help of a small paddle and the punting rod, we attempted to make our way up the river. The start was a huge mess of boats turning into walls and each other. Local pedestrians enjoyed watching us attempt to punt as many boats moved around in circles trying to figure out how to steer. The highlight (or lowlight, depending on how you look at it) of the punting trip was when Melissa Hewitt '12 fell off the boat into the canal when her punting rod stuck into the muddy ground. Luckily, she was within arm's reach of a wall and was able to eventually get back into her punt.

After punting, we explored town. Danny Hagberg '12 and Chase Aaronson '12 found a custom belt-maker in a small arts and crafts market. For 10 pounds, we got to choose the leather, the belt buckle and then have the belt initialed. Once Danny and Chase showed people the belts, many of the guys decided to get one and some of the women decided to buy them as gifts for friends and family.

Next came lunch, a long practice at the Wilberforce Road track, dinner and free time. I went with a small group into town to find Mexican food before watching the Spain vs. Chile World Cup game. Although we had just eaten dinner at Fitzwilliam, the mixed group of throwers (Bob Fiedler '13, Erin Rossi '12, Bob Belden '12 and myself), Rick Zamora '10 (pole vault) and Nate Edelman '11 (very long distance) had room for another meal, mainly because we wanted to see how United Kingdom Mexican food competed to that in the U.S. After Mexican food, we got to watch the second half of the Spain vs. Chile game, where Spain showed again why they are a World Cup contender. The rest of the night was spent planning for the very long day ahead in London.

Day 3 (Saturday, June 26):
Today was completely devoted to a day trip from Cambridge into London. The team split into a bunch of smaller groups and chose different sights to visit. One group decided to wake up very early (between 4:00 and 5:00 a.m.) to catch the train to Wimbledon. I didn't have the ability or desire to skip breakfast, so I waited to catch the 8:45 a.m. train. Here is a list of the places we visited:
-Ben Ben/Parliament
-Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery
-Buckingham Palace
-Chipotle
-London Aquarium
-Maritime Museum
-London Tower and Tower Bridge
-Fever Pitch pop-up bar for the USA vs. Ghana. 

The highlights of the trip for me were the National Gallery, Chipotle, Tower Bridge and Fever Pitch. I'm usually not a huge fan of walking through art museums all day, but we kept our visit to a little over 30 minutes and the quality and stories behind the paintings made for an enjoyable experience. Chipotle is probably not on most people's highlights for London, but we have been looking for one since we arrived in England. Bob, Erin, Rick and I knew one of the restaurants for the chain was in London so we made it our goal to have lunch there before we left.

Tower Bridge was an incredible sight to see. The view of the Thames and the actual bridge design made this a great last site to visit. At the end of the day, a lot of the team met up at Fever Pitch to watch the US play Ghana in the knock-out round of the World Cup. Sadly, the US played poorly but it was fun to see how other people's days were and to watch the game as a group. But the time we got back to Cambridge, I was ready to pass out from all of the walking in London. Luckily, we had a 10:00 a.m. departure the next morning for Oxford, so we could get some sleep.

Our time in Cambridge was short but I enjoyed the slower pace of the first two days as well as the trip to London. I'm excited to take on the Achilles (combined Oxford and Cambridge) team on Tuesday.