9*12*11 Another AM world championships and final prep.

This past weekend I made a couple flights and headed north to MN to compete in the Amateur World Championships.  I know some of you will read this and say "wait I thought you already did that?"  The answer is yes.  However, there are multiple Amateur World Championships.  This one I did this weekend has been around for a number of years and has a field mostly of the top Americans with some Canadians and a young Scottish lad thrown in to boot.  I did this games last year and had a great time.  When I was invited back I knew this was going to be possibly my last shot to get to throw against the top American Amateurs.  I have not seen many of these guys since throwing with them in January in FL.  It was a great time getting to talk shit and laugh with this group, is as good as it gets.

I flew out of our shit airport in Baton Rouge.  This thing is small and has nothing to offer, but it is much closer than New Orleans and less people in it so that is a plus.  Air travel is something I typically try and avoid at all costs.  I hate it.  I hate everything about it.  I hate crowds of people, standing in line, touching strangers, dealing with the heard of mutants that they hire to be security, and most of all I hate being uncomfortable.  So I am never very excited about it.  This is why I drive everywhere I can.  After leaving the Baton Rouge airport in a shit tiny plane with very little AC. I made it to Memphis.

This guy designed the airport... probably an asshole.

Memphis airport sucks donkeys.  With its shitty beige brick walls and stupid music inlays in the floor it makes me want to fight the architects and bite my fingers.  There are cheap shitty reproduction restaurants of some of my favorites in Memphis.  Interstate BBQ is one example and  is possibly my favorite BBQ ever.  The airport version sucks.  After eating a really lousy cheese burger from back yard burger.  I made my way to my gate.  This flight however totally redeemed the day.  I had a full row in the back of the plane to myself.  During travel this go round I watched two movies.  "Limitless" I thought was good Ill give it a ranking of cool as finding a dollar in the pocket of pants you haven't worn in months.  The other movie was something a bit different "44 Inch Chest" This english joint (that's what spike lee says so I'm going with it.) about cheating wife and revenge.  Turned out to be a bit more artsy than I expected.  I give it early morning bangers and mash after one to many pints.

shitty burger and fries thanks memphis airport...

This is the way A BOSS would sit on jets... well this or 1st class

(side note: I sometimes wonder about things.  One of those things is what age or maturity will I eventually reach that if the option, to lay across three seats like a savage is available, will I decided to sit in my chair next to fat strangers.  I hope never.)

Just totaled elite for SHW.. pictured while at parallel for SPF.

Finally arriving in MN the weather is good and things maintained a pretty normal schedule.  Stop by the field, head to the hotel, get food, and then lay around watching TV passing in and out of naps.  I did to eat pizza that day and take home every ones leftovers and plow through them the rest of the day working on sweet carb comas.  There was a badass picture on the wall there of this monster fat guy.  It didn't have any info so I figured I could do my own commentary.

CONTEST: 
For whatever reason my head never felt really in the game.  Warm-ups felt really mechanical and sloppy.  At least I hopefully got this out of the way since next week I will need everything to be firing like a machine.  Well a chubby machine built to throw moderately heavy things slightly above avg distances.

things went well I won 6 of 8 events and managed a new world record in the 56lbs Weight for Height.  I threw 17'10" which is a Personal Record by 10".  This came out of no where, but I'm not complaining and Ill take it.

So moving forward I have one major game remaining in my season.  IHGF Professional World Championships at Loon Mountain in New Hampshire.  This is my first official Pro games so why not start with  one of the biggest most competitive ones there are.  This will 13 total athletes from various countries all over the world.  I am very excited about this opportunity to throw with these guys and it is going to be a shoot out all day long.  My goal for it is to finish in the top 5.

Preparation:

My sweet gear box.. still the consummate gear whore.

This week is going to be all recovery work.  I have Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday to get everything dialed in.  Everyday I will do a full warm-up and stretch along with mobility stuff.  I may take a couple throws on Tuesday but that will be it.  I will attend to any nagging injuries and address them the best I can.  There is no reason to kill myself this week training.  If it hasn't been done strength or technique wise by now it isn't going to happen.  With all that said I can already tell my head is thinking differently about this contest.  Not necessarily nervousness but a focused anxiousness.  I know what I am capable of and that is what I need to go and do across the board in all the events.  I can't afford to drop the ball at all and neither can anyone else.  I have always been better in big competitions than compared to training or smaller ones where nothing is on the line.

I CAN'T WAIT...




Other pics....

I hate signs with shitty puns on them...dummies

Perfect I was hoping to talk to doug about video games and yoga... Just give me my pumkin late hero...

Ground control to Major Tom?

I did come home to my wife kicking the shit out of some naps and a book she picked up for me.  I do love david bowie.  As I have been called by Bert Sorin (name dropper) the GlamAteur.. or the David Bowie of highland games.  That guy looked bad ass in Labyrinth and was effing Nicoli Tesla.