University Track Nationals

March 14th

So in this, my last year of university, nationals were held in Windsor, Ontario. Because most of the meets throughout the years have been either in Toronto or Windsor it didn’t feel like nationals until I’d look at the corner full of Calgarian athletes or Dalhousie students. The feeling for me this time around was especially different. Since I hadn’t competed in pole-vault since before Christmas, and hadn’t started jogging till the week after provincials, I was more worried about not embarrassing myself then living up to any expectations. The day of I started warming up an hour and 45 minutes early in order to find my long approach mark and get comfortable but ended up just jumping twice from the short approach since my foot was bothering me. After spending some time with “the message” and hearing the rules from the official the meet began. My teammate Vuk pulled out of the meet in warm up because of an injury but I still had coach James, Guelph athletes, my mom and Sarah there supporting. The first height was 4m35 and I made it over on my first attempt. I swung back too fast on my next jump and hit the crossbar off at 4m50 but made it on my second attempt. That was my last successful height and tied me for 7th place, one up from my ranking and good for 1.5 points. Guelph had another great year overall as the men got bronze, just 1.5 points ahead of Manitoba and the women missed first place by a single point.
I am extremely grateful that I was able to compete this weekend and enjoy the thrill of pole vaulting and the pleasure of travelling with the team one more time before I graduate. Vuk, although unable to jump this time, will recover soon and may compete at the Pan American games this summer.

this is the 4m35 jump:

Ottawa-Guelph trip

Feb 16th, 09

so on Monday the 16th I was in Ottawa for my third day thinking I'd leave the next morning by bus or train. Before going out with friends I looked into transportation. After finding that the bus would take 8 hours to get me to Guelph and the train was over $100 I looked into rideshares. I found one on the University of Ottawa site to Toronto for just $30 that left in under 3 hours and I took it. 2 of my remaining hours were spent with 3 high school friends making a music video to the tune of a Sum 41 song. Little thought was put into it but it was good fun gathering random footage and a great way to finish my stay.
I hoped in the rideshare car with what turned out to be 2 guys who also attend Guelph and some U Ottawa girl. I ended up in the front with leg room, they were all friendly and talkative, without being too talkative, and we were listening to a funny mix CD with everything from "What is love?" to "bad boys" to some Ace of Base song. Not music that I'd listen to on my own but it was entertaining and brought some smiles. Certain that things were going far too well I figured we'd be late for the last bus leaving for Guelph at 9:30 but we arrived in time for Ben(one of the passengers) and I to buy tickets and make a call. Ben is a philosophy major and on the way to Guelph we ended up discussing ideas like creativity and what it means to "create" something. The type of conversation not often had around the TV at my house. Overall it was a refreshingly enjoyable trip from Ottawa.
Two days later I had the pleasure of watching the music video one of my friends had edited and posted on facebook. Especially after having experienced good footage go to waste in the past I was pleasantly surprised by the motivation.

Winterlude

Feb 15th, 09

Friday night I made a last minute decision to visit Ottawa for a couple days so I grabbed the bus at 7 the next morning through Toronto and back home. On a cold-but-I’ve-seen-colder Sunday morning my mom, brother Alan and I drove downtown to see Winterlude, the capital’s winter festival. We walked around, ate some Beavertails (deep-fried pastry goodness), toured some great ice sculptures and witnessed the last 25 minutes of a pretty neat competition on what turned out to be a beautiful day. 8 ice sculptors stationed around a fountain had 2 hours to sculpt something out of their own 300 lbs block of ice. They used drills, chisels, hot irons and real live chainsaws to carve, shape and finish their creations. As the countdown was going, snow was flying into the crowd who looked on in awe…..or mild interest depending on the person. In the end there stood, amongst others, a swan, Pegasus the flying horse, a ballerina, and a fish eating a fish eating a smaller fish. As we walked briskly back to the car I was more impressed than my toes were cold.

3:55 am review

Nov 21st, 08

It’s hard to believe that I’m finally here. Months ago I would look at my calendar and see the 21st box under November and wonder how I would make it there, past all the other boxes in between filled with meetings and due dates, interviews and classes. It’s the busiest I’ve ever been for 3 consecutive months, the toughest semester I’ve ever fought through, just as I expected. I had heard stories about the operations HTM 4190 class and dreaded it before hand. Long gone are the days of a midterm and final. This semester was all class participation, assignments and projects, group projects. The two final projects due earlier this week went fairly smoothly while this Regatta case was more challenging. This group had more work to do and a lower average GPA but it’s all done. It’s been my first semester as a nerd and I’m ready to end it. I liked being busy but school work is not for me, nor are weekends and thanksgiving in the library. Although it could be a little overwhelming at times I think I did a good job of enjoying the breaks in between. It was nice to have track 6 times a week, gave me a rest from academics.

Intramural soccer was entertaining as always; we made the quarterfinals for the second time where I got speared in the box and scored on the related penalty. Ed missed and I hit another in shootouts to win after a 2-2 tie, great team game. When in the semis for the first time ever I managed to get a goal in against the #1 team. Then in the last minute of play I touched it past a couple players and, with Ed waiting off to the side, I wired a shot that curled just above the crossbar as all 22 players, ref and fan (Latham) sighed.

We went first in the shootout, Ed wanting to redeem himself missed unfortunately and I scored the 5th to tie. Debus dove on their last one but only got enough to deflect the ball just behind the post. If only he had cleats, if only Ed had scored, if only I had passed, if only… Probably for the best as both Sarah (who started to enjoy soccer by the end of it) and I would have missed the final for our trip to NY. Unfortunately the telling of that particular glorious story will have to wait till another time. Now I sleep, in the morning I will hand in this 4th year paper, the night after hearing the dreadful 2am library alarm for the first time and tomorrow afternoon at Guelph’s first ever field meet I shall dominate…with God’s strength of course.

3rd annual pizza hut eating competition

November 28th, 08

There is a tradition that started 3 short years ago with my roommates at the time where we attend the pizza hut buffet and compete in pizza eating. We eat either until eating is no longer possible or until the others concede. The luncheon is traditionally followed by a long lasting feeling of disgust, an afternoon nap and most importantly, year long bragging rights for the winner. If anyone loses their lunch due to an upset stomach before midnight though, they are automatically disqualified.
The slices of the competitors are measured and compared and the standard pieces are counted. 4 Pizza Hut slices is generally 2.5 to 3 standard pieces. The first year I finished with 16 pieces, two ahead of Ed in second. In 2007 after returning from Calgary I defended my championship with another 16 piece performance just beating Ed who finished with an improved 15 and a half pieces.

This past year discussing the recent and upcoming pizza hut eating competitions was literally a daily occurrence. Ed was convinced he could take the title while Latham, who had finished with 11 pieces, was eager to redeem himself. Throughout the spring and summer friends would join these conversations, make predictions and form support groups. Although not contenders, our small roommates Sarah and Megan who get full off a bagel and yogurt both said they’d pass the 10 piece mark this year. In the fall, things really started to heat up as the date drew nearer and current eating habits as well as confidence levels were constantly being scrutinized. We all knew though, that this competition was a mental game.
So the day finally arrived, the last Friday before exams, with fans as far as Germany awaiting the results. I wore my “world champion” T-shirt for intimidation and everyone sported stretchy pants to the event. It was soon apparent that not Ed but Latham would be the major contender this year. At 8 standard pieces I wanted to stop, and at 11 pieces the pizza stopped tasting good altogether. Sarah surprised everyone by reaching her goal of 10 and collecting her $20 winning from me. Megan on the other hand finished up at a disappointing 7. On the men’s side Ed had a poor showing of 12 pieces while Latham and I had both eaten 16 at the buffet’s end, 75 minutes in. So we went to the tie breaking 17th piece of which I ate half and Latham had but a bite. This year certainly left the contestants feeling more disgusting than ever as they pushed themselves to the limit. However exciting, the future of this gluttonous event may be in jeopardy as none of the competitors are eager to relive the experience.

Guelph’s first ever Tenke Classic

November 21st

So at the University of Guelph the vaulters practice 6 times weekly in an un-insulated dome on the infield of a 185 metre long track, 15 metres shy of the standard indoor track. Usually the colder it is outside, the colder it is in the dome so in the winter we practice in 2 degrees Celsius, depending on the day. Because of this we wear sweatshirts and pants and tuques while jumping instead of shorts and pinnies.
My first year was also the first year of pole-vault at Guelph and without a proper trough(box) we would dig out a spot for a temporary trough in the long jump pit every practice. That small corner of the dome wasn’t particularly safe but it was all we had and our small mats did the trick. If the jumpers needed the pit, we placed the box on the ground up against the mats and attached weights to minimize movement. Later that year myself and another vaulter helped dig out a hole below the astroturf and finally installed the box when it was 20 below (inside the dome). Over the past few years we have acquired a strip of mondo for a runway, proper sized second hand mats and a few new poles. We’ve even sent 3 vaulters to the university nationals. To cap off our development as a team Guelph hosted its first ever sanctioned field meet this year (our track is too small to have any track events). So although few attended from other schools and it felt a lot like a busy practice, it was great to jump on home turf, in the freezing cold, and have it count for the rankings. Small crowds of people sporting their heaviest winter outfits came out and gathered by the long jump pit, throwing area, high jump mats and vault runway while we competed in our events. It was a wonderful first for the veterans (not the war kind) and I was thrilled to be part of it before I graduate.

New York

November 7th, 2008

I was in the middle of a my busiest semester so when Sarah asked me if I wanted to go to New York I told maybe but probably not. She asked me again on the last day for sign ups, so I checked my schedule and decided that a break from school would do me well.

We left after a busy day with two bus loads of Guelph students at midnightand arrived at our destination by 11am. We stayed at the central park hostel in an old New York building with the classic metal fire escape covering one side. The 100 some odd students pilled into the tall narrow building, dropped our bags off and hit the streets. We were within a couple blocks of 2 subway lines, central park and just a dozen from Harlem.

Unfortunately that's where my coverage of New York ended in my journal as I must have fallen asleep and not finished it off. Some interesting things about the city though:
- Servers in general are less friendly, all business, less small talk and smiling.
- It's beautiful, central park is gourgeous, so is Columbus square as well as much of the architecture in the city. Most everything except for times square. However unsightly the big advertisements are, it's interesting how people flock there like bugs to a lantern, I'm just glad no one got zapped.
-Harlem is not that scary. We went there for a genuine New York experience and attended a nearby gospel church. There we only 20 of us there, Sarah and I the only white people, and it was a great experience. A good amount of signing, clapping and emotion was part of the 2 hour service and the members were real friendly.

Feel free to ask me for more details, in the meantime, here are a few pictures.