11/4/12 - Tucson Games

Tucson Highland Games A Class

Bs – 33+ (2^nd)

Os – 47+ (1^st)

Hwd – 41’7 PR (1^st)

Lwd – 78+ (1^st)

20# Sheaf – 27’

Hham – 94+ (1^st)

Lham – 114+ (2^nd)

Caber – 2:30ish (3^rd)

WOB- 16 spin (1^st)

Overall 1^st

Well, that was a fun games. Haven’t had that much fun in a while. Lots of talent moving into the As as of late and it keeps you on your heels. It was great seeing the guys and hanging out.

Bs- ugly piece of shit 24.5# AZ stone (which I thought we got rid of and replaced with a decent 22 pounder). Couldn’t get a good handle on this thing. I went 35+ with it in Phoenix the first game of the season. Just lacking explosion here today. Good enough for 2^nd which is fine because there’s no way I wanted to take extras with that piece of crap.

Os- meh, the trouble ensues. Went 46+ for the W and then took extras and went 47+. No PRs here. Was just focusing on getting my right foot down, staying low then bringing my left foot down very quickly. I tend to progress pretty quickly and with all the recent changes I just didn’t have enough time. I will have some very big ostone numbers next season though.

Hwfd – went 39+ on my first attempt, just walking through the positions. Fouled my second at 43+ and I can’t remember my third. Took the extras and finished with 41’7 which is a PR. I should be happy but there is much more in the tank here as I wasn’t really able to crush the finish on any of these. I had a decent sprint and just blew by the push on the finish.

Lwfd – blegh 78+. Was getting great speed on the sprint but again missing the finish. Not unhappy with this but not happy with it either.

20# sheaf – Cleared 27ft without much of an issue. Went to 30ft afterwards and had missed on accuracy. Was either peaking in front or behind the bar. Only spent about 3 weeks practicing sheaf so it’s time to invest time time and get good at it for phoenix next year.

Hhammer – playing with a new grip so not really focused on the normal stuff. Just trying to get longer on my left side for a smoother pull and I think I’ve taken that step forward. Watched a video of the Celtic Giants in Norther Ireland from 2005 and noticed that Vierra only has 2 fingers of his right hand touching the hammer and the other two fingers are wrapped around his left hand. Gave this a shot and was getting very long. Felt great. Didn’t put anything on it but still dropped my first one at 91ft and second at 94ft, good enough for 1^st so I passed my 3^rd since I knew Adam would give me a run for my money on Lhammer.

Lhammer – Just worked on hitting positions and really only increasing speed on 3. I think I went 109, 112, 114 and Adam hit 115 on his last one so he took the cake. Going to be working hammer a lot this off season too. Now that I’m getting more comfortable with the positions, it’s time to take A LOT of throws and work on getting them fast.

Caber – 18ft 100#s, by now we were all pretty tired and this caber def felt more like 150#s than 100, lol. It had gotten windy all of a sudden so we were chasing a hell of a headwind when running. I think only 4 of us turned the caber. Neither Adam nor myself turned the 1^st attempts so we took a deep breath and figured we had to actually try on our 2^nd and 3^rd attempts. I think I got a 2:30 or something on both 2^nd and 3^rd. Both attempts I had a great pick and really good run, then I put the caber into position on my hip, stopped and pulled… both times the headwind slowed the top of the caber down so much, haha.. oh well..

Wob – 16ft spinning. First time ever spinning. I attempted a spin in phoenix 2011 and that was just silly. I cleared 12 and 13 standing. It was a long day, 9^th event and we were all tired so I decided to just have some fun. Chalked the shit out of my thumb and went for it with the spin. Cleared 14 and 15 easy. Then Adam wanted 15’6 to go for a PR and he crushed it. Then I spun 15’6 and 16’ again pretty easy. Jumped to 17 and just couldn’t get it. I would have it the bar on one of the attempts but my peak was off. This was pretty fun so I’m going to play around with this learning the accuracy. It’ll be a nice tool to have in my box.

Overall had a great time on a great field. Thanks to Rich Wells for putting on a great and fun games like he always does. Thanks to my teammates Adam Brezina and Jake Nicol for pushing me and having a great time. Thanks to Stewart and Torgersen Injury Law (1800ourlawyer.com) for continuing to support us and allow us to keep having fun at all these games. We’re very proud to and grateful to have the chances to represent the company the way we do. Props out to Ed Brown, my training partner, for putting together a solid performance. Tech is looking much improved. Had you not DFL’d hwd by fouling completely out, I think you would have gotten a pretty good placing. Thanks to my family for coming out and supporting me and taking care of my little boy while he runs all over the place. Big big big thanks to my always supportive wife, hauling our (almost) 2 year old 2 hours away from home and out on the field while being 6.5 months preggers and still looking so damn fine while doing it. Love you always sweetheart.

Now, it’s go time. Off season is going to be big this year. Contemplating increasing calories to maintenance now and making some real progress. I’ll take a week to decide for sure if that’s what I want to do or not. First games of the year will be Phoenix in March 2013. I’m going to label that a “Game of PRs” for me. Haha..