Tom never liked to have silence time when he was around others and he would always challange you with a unique question so my question to you is :

What are you going to do the challenge yourself and others?

Hi, My name is Greg Ruddock and I worked and played closely with Tom (and Kim for that matter) for many years, memories of which I will always treasure.

I have never counted myself as an athlete of any great shakes and always believed endurance stuff got in the way of a good eating or drinking session.

However after much badgering Tom Tucker convinced me to join him in the Hawkesbury Classic, a 100km canoe event down the Hawkesbury river in Sydney Australia.

As he did in all fields of endeavour, Tom set up an exhausting training schedule for the 3-4 months leading up to the race. We paddled every creek, estuary, river, inlet and occasional storm water drain that Tom could find. We paddled through 2 metre swells around Lion Island, we paddled to meet people for lunch, we paddled and ate lunch and we paddled with no lunch. All the time Tom was his usual upbeat self and we discussed every subject from religion to politics, relationships,  kids, sex, lack of sex, you name it. I got to see more of Sydney in that three months than I had in the previous 5 years living there.

Most weekends after a six hour practice paddle I would go home and sleep for the remainder. Tom would change sports gear and get on his bike or do a quick 25 km run etc etc. It exhausted me even thinking about it.

Tom organised all the equipment. I organised an iPod that we could both hook up to.

The day of the race came and we blasted out of the blocks at 4pm in super quick time and the first 4 hours were great. The second four hours were OK. By midnight we were out of gas, conversation and dry clothes. Tom's helpful and way too cheerful pick me up comments were inviting images of a quick whack with my paddle so we both decided to turn to the iPod. At midnight with no light and a paddle it's tough to navigate an iPod and we found ourselves caught in the the blues genre for the next 2 hours. Anger and blues and a turn of the tide saw us accelerate however by 2am, Tom threw his earphones at me and told to change my music selection or get another paddler. The iPod got put away.

The last hour with the sun coming up at Brooklyn and the finish line in sight was very emotional for me. Tom had experienced this sort of accomplishment many times before but I was a novice. When we landed I stood up, fell over and then hugged the guy who coerced, badgered and supported me in what will probably be one of my greatest physical achievments. Thanks again Tom.

Best wishes to Kim, Bella and the Tucker family. I am proud to have known your husband, father, brother and son.