Up-Downs were a bad choice and Anna Advice

First I should note that the ice we skate on as of late is probably one of the more challenging ice surfaces that we’ll ever have to train on.  For example, after about a 1000 m (9 laps) the ice gets so chewed up that it’s comparably worse than the ice at the end of a Mens 5000 m (45 laps) Relay.  It kind of gets dangerous but in some ways it’s a really good thing.  I’m fairly confident that it’ll make us more comfortable when ruts get nasty on good ice.  

We had a ton of laps at pace to do today with not a whole lot of time for rest (for me that's a bad thing) as we now share the ice time on occasion with Groups 2 and 3 of the Oval program.  We get an hour, they get an hour.

Everyone seemed to manage themselves fairly well, we pushed through the program and finished it in our alloted time.  Normally after a tough program like that we’d have a fair number of hours off before our next program...  Not today though, we had a dry land program which is argumentatively one of the more challenging off ice programs we do all year.

After finishing the first set, my mind mulled over two important questions:

“Why on Earth did I do all those extra Up-Downs the day before?  Knowing full well that today was going to be like this...”

and

“Are Jon and Jeroen on crack...?!”

Needless to say we finished it...  Barely...  If I’m not stronger physically...  Well then maybe I’m stronger mentally!?  Maybe.

Anna Advice: “Liam, you probably shouldn’t be allowed to play with yourself...”  (On the topic of my teeth incident, my skating and my in-lines)  

After she said it she instantly burst out laughing.  Maybe this was embarrassment but my bets are on the stunned expression swept across my face.  Anna is one of my amazing and awesome physiotherapists that keeps my body functioning at 110%.

Making sense... I think...

You know it’s kinda funny...  I set up this blog a number of days ago with the intentions of writing something about my life as a Short Tracker and the group I train with.  When I finally sat down it became apparent that it is difficult to write about the things we go through from day to day.  For me it’s the norm, I wake up like everyone else, eat breakfast like everyone else and brush my teeth just...  like...  everyone...  else!  But the difference is, when I walk out the door of my condo complex, I’m not dressed up in a suit and tie and on my way to a job where I get paid on salary, I don’t walk out my door with a bag full of school texts on my way to some class at the University...   I walk out my door in training short and a t-shirt with the relief knowing I get the opportunity to go and do the thing I love doing more than anything else in the world:

Short Track

Note: I’ve decided not call it speed skating anymore...  We’re not long trackers, those are the “real” speed skaters.  It’s not that we don’t go fast or anything, just our sport’s evolved and moved on.  We’re all tactic and agility, where our success depends on our judgement and ability to think quick on our feet.  In my opinion you can’t interchange the two.  Some short trackers seem to excel in Long Track, but in their hearts they’ll always be Short Trackers.  And Long Trackers...  Well they’ll always be Long Trackers.  Sorry Jeremy...  Plain and simple.  

Any who, That’s why I’ve decided to focus on the things that have kept me in this sport.  

As I've said, I’m lucky to be doing what I love so much.  It started out as something I did outside of school when I was younger.  It kept me active, I met some great people that became close friends, it allowed for family bonding on weekends at numerous competitions throughout the season and for my parents it was something to keep me out of hockey.  It’s kinda crazy actually, they had this strange notion that I would get myself hurt playing hockey.  You know, turn out looking like one of those stereotypical hockey players - Hernia, repeated Concussions, missing teeth...  

Ha. 

Boy were they wrong...  I turned out exactly like one of them anyway, but in a completely different sport!  Including those top three but add: severed tendons and nerve in my wrist (still no feeling in the back of my right hand), countless ice burns and bruises, and the back of a 80 year old...  And not one of those spry 80 year olds.

But you know what?!  Other then my teeth, I have no regrets.  For the few hours or days of pain I experienced with each injury, I have a thousand other great experiences to latch onto that moved me forward from those first few wobbling steps around the cold Moose Rec Centre of Medicine Hat, to my cool and confident strides in the (unnaturally humid) Vancouver Coliseum where the Canadian Olympic Trials will be this coming August.  I look forward to competing there!  

It turns out I've made a lot of friends along the way, and I value them greatly for what they have given to me.  I guess I’m a reasonably social person by nature, but the sport forced me to meet people outside of Medicine Hat and as a result I have created many lasting bonds that I will always cherish (even if they’ve moved on from the sport and started different lives for themselves, I’ll still always treasure the times I had with them).  Be it coaches, athletes or parents, they’ve all given a little bit which formed the type of skater and person I am today.  I especially remember all those neat experiences I got to share with them...  Alberta Winter Games, making the Alberta Team, Canada Winter Games, countless North American and Canadian Championships and even a couple times to and from China (once for University Games).  

I’m never going to forget those little things that people outside the sport don’t see.  For outsiders that might just be a list of accomplishments or events I’ve attended, but for me they’re things I can fall back onto when times get tough (which they sometimes do) and if I question if it’s worth to keep going.  And it always is (worth keeping going that is).

 

Three years ago I set a goal, to be among the top 16 in Canada and be eligable to skate the Olympic Trials for the 2010 Olympics.  I’ve made that reality, now it’s time to take it to the next level and dream even bigger!