Snowboarding frustration

In honor of the 2006 Winter Olympic Games, my brother and I went snowboarding this past Sunday--only my 2nd trip of the season and of my life. We did the night run from 7pm to 10pm at Mountain Creek. I feel very fortunate to live an hour's drive away from these slopes--close enough to make a half day adventure doable.

Unfortunately, this half day turned out to be incredibly suckie. Y'see, I had been so stoked from my snowboarding lesson on my first trip that I thought I would have little trouble on the slopes this time around. However, I'd let too much time pass between then and now, and I'd forgotten many of the skills that I'd learned. Actually, my brain didn't forget; my muscles did. I felt like I hadn't taken any lesson at all and was starting from total newbie status.

I was scared as well. The snow was too firm and icy from the past weeks' warm days. I kept thinking of the inevitable pain of falling down and so couldn't enjoy my runs. We did the green trail from the very top of Vernon Peak and I did nothing but brake (and fall) the whole way down. I don't know what got into me. I guess it just wasn't my night.

Still, I'm not discouraged. It's one of those things like ice skating (which I'm also trying to learn; the family and I went to a rink last Thursday) and triathlon that I find so physically uncomfortable in the beginner stages, but still keep at it by being so focused on the rewarding pleasure I'll feel when I finally become proficient. And I truly cannot wait for that feeling when that day comes.

Oh well. For now, I'm back to square one in boarding skool.

Shani Davis and gold

Today, I tried to figure out what the deal was with Shani Davis.

Last night, I saw him win gold at the 1000 meter speed skating event. And then I saw his immediate post race NBC interview in which he came across as rather unfriendly and bothered. Arguably, not good for his PR. At first, I thought he was just a sore winner with a chip on his shoulder. But then I figured something else was up and I needed to do the Google thing to find out.

At MSNBC.com, I found a short bio video about him and his Chicago roots. Here his personality came across as much more positive. I searched further. I read he was ridiculed by his peers, was shunned at the 2002 Olympic event by his teammates, had hate mail posted on his website, may have a control freak of a mommy, etc etc.

I spent a good hour reading as much about him as I could. And then slowly I saw the two heads of the coin and finally understood where Shani Davis was coming from and why he came to be the way he is today. Unfortunately, I also strongly felt the media fanning the flames of scalding opinion between him, his teammates, commentators, coaches and ultimately us his audience. Like the same way school kids would taunt others into a fight: "He said this, they said that about you. What're you gonna do about it?" and so forth.

I'd found numerous quotes from Davis, but for the moment, this seemed the most appropriate in response to all the latest hubbub: "It's my career. I don't care what anyone else thinks."

Interesting links:
1.Pic: American Shani Davis, left, is congratulated by the Netherlands' Erben Wennemars after winning the gold medal in the men's 1,000 speedskating final Saturday. Wennemars took the bronze.

2. Shani Davis' website.

3. Ridiculed: "Every once in a while, if it was cold out, I would wear a Bonnie Blair sweatshirt and everyone else would kind of make fun of it, because it was out of the norm," Davis, 23, says. "No one had ever seen a Bonnie Blair sweatshirt before, so they were like, 'Why are you wearing that white girl on your shirt, what's wrong with you?"

4. Bonnie Blair not allowed to comment on Davis: "I'm not allowed to talk about him," Blair said. "His mother sent me an e-mail and told me not to talk about him. So I can't talk about him."

5. Mommy's (Cherie's) tough love: In December, Cherie hurled rough words that seemed to hurt her son. USA Today located a Dutch TV documentary about Davis...that revealed tense scenes after Shani failed in a wild attempt to make the U.S. short-track team.
Cherie: "Someone's going to see what a loser you are."
Shani: "If you're going to be negative, get out of here. You think that makes me feel good, telling me I'm a loser?"
In another sequence, Cherie laughs and says, "I'm so sorry you let all those little kids beat you. Maybe you should retire." Says Shani: "I cannot wait until this season is over."

Olympic catalysts

Two weeks of human fuel: Michelle Kwan, Bode Miller, Shaun White, Apolo Ohno, Chad Hedrick and soooo very on and on. The list is huge. How could I not be motivated to lift myself up and give anything a go? And just a few weeks before, I didn't think I'd be psyched up about watching the Olympic Winter Games. Bingo bongo, boy was I wrongo.

So far, I've recorded each night's broadcast so I could watch the events as soon as I put the kiddies to sleep. I looked forward to NBC's short biography segments of the medal contenders; it helped me get more emotionally involved when I finally saw the athletes in competition.

Tonight, I watched Shaun White's gold medal comeback victory in the snowboarding half-pipe. Wow, real cool and so graceful! And even though I already knew he was going to win from the news reports (I should've closed my eyes and ears), I still watched as if I didn't know his fate. And of course, his celebration got me all choked up. All that hugging and tearing with Shaun and his family. Glad I could share in the emotion.

Can't wait for tomorrow's viewing.

Breakfast for two

It's my flagship of this morning's breakfast: Peanut Butter & Banana Stuffed French Toast. The major players include bread, peanut butter, bananas, honey, eggs, heavy cream, cognac, butter and spices, all topped off with powdered sugar. It's major calories but worth it as a blue moon feast. I enjoyed cooking this one (actually two, for Melinda and me) and boy, was it incredibly sinful to eat. It's another recipe I'll be adding to my collection of cooking favorites, thanks to Sam The Cooking Guy. All part of my cooking passion and lifetime tribute treats to Melinda.

Bon appetite!

Dick Hoyt

This article is for my personal inspiration. I've quoted it here so I know where to find it when I need it.

Today, I needed it.

*****************

Strongest Dad in the World
By Rick Reilly (Sports Illustrated - June 20, 2005)

I try to be a good father. Give my kids mulligans. Work nights to pay for their text messaging. Take them to swimsuit shoots.

But compared with Dick Hoyt, I suck.

Eighty-five times he's pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons. Eight times he's not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and pedaled him 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars--all in the same day.

Dick's also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain climbing and once hauled him across the U.S. on a bike. Makes taking your son bowling look a little lame, right?

And what has Rick done for his father? Not much--except save his life.

This love story began in Winchester, Mass., 43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs.

"He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life,'' Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. "Put him in an institution.''

But the Hoyts weren't buying it. They noticed the way Rick's eyes followed them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the boy communicate. "No way,'' Dick says he was told. "There's nothing going on in his brain.''

"Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain.

Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate. First words? "Go Bruins!'' And after a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, "Dad, I want to do that.''

Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described "porker'' who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried. "Then it was me who was handicapped,'' Dick says. "I was sore for two weeks.''

That day changed Rick's life. "Dad,'' he typed, "when we were running, it felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!''

And that sentence changed Dick's life. He became obsessed with giving Rick that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon.

"No way,'' Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren't quite a single runner, and they weren't quite a wheelchair competitor. For a few years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they found a way to get into the race officially: In 1983 they ran another marathon so fast they made the qualifying time for Boston the following year.

Then somebody said, "Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?''

How's a guy who never learned to swim and hadn't ridden a bike since he was six going to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick tried.

Now they've done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in Hawaii. It must be a buzzkill to be a 25-year-old stud getting passed by an old guy towing a grown man in a dinghy, don't you think?

Hey, Dick, why not see how you'd do on your own? "No way,'' he says. Dick does it purely for "the awesome feeling'' he gets seeing Rick with a cantaloupe smile as they run, swim and ride together.

This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston Marathon, in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters. Their best time'? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992--only 35 minutes off the world record, which, in case you don't keep track of these things, happens to be held by a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at the time.

"No question about it,'' Rick types. "My dad is the Father of the Century.''

And Dick got something else out of all this too. Two years ago he had a mild heart attack during a race. Doctors found that one of his arteries was 95% clogged. "If you hadn't been in such great shape,'' one doctor told him, "you probably would've died 15 years ago.''

So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other's life.

Rick, who has his own apartment (he gets home care) and works in Boston, and Dick, retired from the military and living in Holland, Mass., always find ways to be together. They give speeches around the country and compete in some backbreaking race every weekend, including this Father's Day.

That night, Rick will buy his dad dinner, but the thing he really wants to give him is a gift he can never buy.

"The thing I'd most like,'' Rick types, "is that my dad sit in the chair and I push him once.''

*****************

Team Hoyt then.
Team Hoyt now.

My online triathlon world

I'm surrounding myself with virtual athletes. They're random triathlete bloggers that I've searched for and whose online journals I've added to my daily/weekly reads. I'm trying to add some peer pressure to my lazy winter ass to finally get up and get a movin'.

And my goodness, what interesting blogs there are! A 50 yr old cancer survivor that's training to do an Ironman; several moms and dads chatting on how they balance athletics, career and family; experienced triathletes dishing out well appreciated advice on training; general out-of-shapers trying to get into shape for their first triathlon. The list goes on. Ad interessante.

The entries are inspiring and certainly starting to get me into the groove. I've started checking out the schedule of races for this year. I should be signing up for my first 2006 event shortly. Perhaps this week.

Stargazing 2

What a beautiful night to be looking up. At 10 pm, the skies were sooooo gosh darn crystal clear, the light-polluting moon was still below the horizon, and the constellations were at the perfect rotation.

I was excited to see the Big and Little Dippers in full view for the first time since my recent interest in star gazing. I like to use these constellations as the key to finding Polaris (the North Star) when I'm away from my house. The trick is to find the two stars at the "spoon's tip" of the Big Dipper. These always point straight to Polaris. By the way, contrary to what many people think, the North Star is not a very bright star (disappointingly ordinary, really) and is often confused with Sirius (the Dog Star), which is THE brightest star in our skies next to the Sun.

My highlight of the night was being able to naked-eye spot the Orion Nebula in the cluster of three stars (Orion's Sword) just below Orion's Belt. This is a visual feast thanks to the clear skies of winter, which really is the best time of the year for star gazing. Jack Horkheimer gives an exhuberant video presentation (RealPlayer) of this nebula.

Winter surfing 2

It's my new ride (and a followup to my latest snow adventure). She came in the mail just a couple of weeks ago and I have yet to boogie down a hill with her. As for details, the board is a Morrow Clutch @ 154cm in length. I got it online together with boots and bindings as part of a package deal. Has ABS sidewalls for a smooth ride, goes from zero to 60 in 7.2 seconds, has driver and passenger side airbags, fuel cells, moon roof, Turbonium and death ray.

I just hope that it serves for much more than show and never collects dust.

Thanks, Santa.

New Year's cardio begins

I have this little growing fire burning in me to get my workouts back into swing. It arises not so much from a New Year's resolution, but from exercise withdrawal due to more time spent with holiday activities and other such stuff rather than being at the gym.

Also, I've been gluttonizing myself these winter months more so than the year's average. Like yesterday. It was a saturated fat fest. As was the day before. And the day before. Ad nauseam. All thanks to deep fryed Crisco cuisine and endless alms of cheesecake. Topped with coffee--my staple crave. Plus, I was out of protein powder. What else is a grown man to eat?

I certainly loved it, but it's conflicting with my blog profile--aiming for big things in endurance sports--and is offsetting my ying-yang thingy. The road will surely lead to nowhere but frustration.

So what shall I do? Well, for a starter, how 'bout a little request for benediction: "Oh my dear CycleOps, god of all bike trainers, deliver me from my couch potato ways and give me the strength to output at least 200 watts onto your bearings (fluid bearings, mind you) for my cardiovascular redemption. Plus, I've spent so much money on you, I have to justify the purchase somehow. Amen."

Ahhh, thank goodness for prayer. And now the fire burns more brightly.

Mission Stardust

The Stardust spacecraft is coming home.

I watched a segment about it on The Discovery Channel a few months ago and thought what a cool mission this is: launch a spacecraft to rendezvous with the Comet Wild 2 (it took 5 years!), then maneuver behind it, catch some of the particles that are flinging off, and finally return to Earth with the spacedust for analysis. (I still find it incredible that we have the know-how to do these space feats with precision!)

The launch was seven years ago. And now it's seven years later. January 15, 2006 is the touchdown date.

There'll be some submicroscopic interstellar dust to be analyzed, but first it all needs to be carefully searched for and found in the amazing aerogel that was used to catch the particles. The number and size of the particles is miniscule compared to the size of the aerogel, so researchers are actually asking online public joes like us to use our computers to help look for the stuff with 'virtual microscopes'! Anyone can sign up and so I registered to be a potential volunteer, although I'm not sure how much time I can dedicate for the search. Still, I think it's a wonderful concept.

I'm continuing to read up on it with keen interest as it's supposed to be a big deal, although I still don't quite understand how much unique information may be added to our current knowledge of the universe.

(Additional: summarized video clip)