red bag over china

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 13 Aug 2006 04:54

August 13, 2006

Skooled twice today. I pulled five hundred osis this morning with a high of six in a row. That is alright but not great I think I will continue to practice alot in the morning. I did some torques tonight but my back was sore and so was my knee so I was not really into it. Anyways, the osis morning session does not seem to bother or wake up the wife so I will keep it up. After my holiday I want to change it to diving osis.

So looking forward to getting home. 29 days and counting.

Mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 14 Aug 2006 05:19

August 14, 2006

I have decided to post at night now since there is some chinese history show that the wife is really into watching. I would not say that it is for me. Whoever cooks controls the tv so her choice. Something about the king of mongolia and his adventures but he is definately not one of the huns I have gathered that much.

My session tonight went really well I skooled whirls again. I did my usual 500. Highlights were consistantly hitting three on strong with a high of four. But hard to get that fourth one to sit. Also, I hit the first six whirls in a row I tried on flip but could not manage more then two in a row after that. Strange way to start my flip but I was pretty happy about it.

I have really been enjoying my sessioning and have been considering doing some training to go to worlds next year. I think it may be the last tournament I get to as we are planning to have a kid in 2008. That is a very lucky year for Chinese, I think solely based on the Beijing (北京) olympic thing but we are getting older so a family is not a bad idea and we both want kids. That is just a random aside. Time to eat and get ready for bed so I don't miss the morning session again.

Have a great day and shred to your potential

Mike

janis · Post by **janis** » 14 Aug 2006 05:35

hotstepper wrote: My session tonight went really well I skooled whirls again. I did my usual 500.

your commitment to schooling tricks is inspiring, keep it up!

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 15 Aug 2006 22:21

August 16, 2006

I missed my session last night due to a fever. Man I hate the weather here it is like 35 and polluted out everyday. However whenever you get inside a building it is like 15 and frigid. The constant extremes have really started to take a toll on my health. Where I work the word sess poll or chemical waste dump are not strong enough. So I am really hoping for the transfer to Hong Kong next year because they have much mor strict regulations when it comes enviromental issues and protection there. I hope to play tonight I went to the doctor this morning and he said it just a fever nothing serious and just to get more rest.

I hope to jam to sweat this fever out tonight. In fact, that is all I am thinking about right now.

I hope you have a great day and good shred

Mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 20 Aug 2006 17:58

July 21, 2006

Hey all, I know it has been a few days since I posted. I have been busy with getting out the remainder of summer orders for this year. However, so I missed three days of footbag in a row. I had been getting back home late at night last week the average time being around 9 to 10 at night. However starting on saturday I was able to get back in the groove.

Saturday I did 500 whirls with a high of three in a row on strong and 2 on flip. I did the same thing on Sunday with the same results and I think that my whirls are really coming around so I am going to focus on them for the rest of this month everyday. Starting in september I will add ripwalks again.

Just one problem, I am fiding on my regular side whirls it seems as I do them consecutively my set height seems to contiunally rising, so that on the last whirl in my three the set is way too high. Any points of advice would be welcomed in my blog.

I hope you all have a great day and shred to your potential.

Mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 21 Aug 2006 00:53

August 21, 2006

This is ridiculous. I am going to Munich in two days now. I will be working there for the international gift show. After the usual problems of getting things processed here I got my plane ticket so I am gone in two days.

Max if you end up here while I am away I apologize for that

Mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 21 Aug 2006 19:07

August 22, 2006

My life is a blur. Getting ready to international travel in two days licks ass. Anyways, I will be in Munich from the 23 to 27 then maybe to paris. If anyone knows anyone who would like to footbag in those two cities let me know, I will try to make time while I am there.

Dizzy from too much preparation,

Mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 23 Aug 2006 01:18

August 23, 2006

Just about to leave to the airport for frankfurt. I will be there until august 31st. I did not bring my footbag gear but if there is anyone who sells bags there I would like to buy some. I have all day off on August 30th. PM here.

Mike

krawallier · Post by **krawallier** » 23 Aug 2006 01:54

good i read this - iwa just going to pm zou that i'd come to shenzhen this saturday. i am in hongkong now. have fun in europe!!!

if you want to shred in hk before you leave, let me know! you can call me on my german mobile, cause the chinese sim won't work here
+49 163 6186388

shred!
max

ps: a tip: contact the munich and paris crew directly if you want to shred with them there...

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 29 Aug 2006 13:28

August 29, 2006

I am in frankfurt until the 31st then back to shenzhen for a week and a half and then back to Canada. This week I have had no time to shred and I hope to get back into it sometime next week when I am back in Shenzhen but probably won't play again until I get back in October to Shenzhen but I will keep you all posted.

on the move three continents in three weeks

mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 03 Sep 2006 06:56

September 3, 2006

I did six hundred osis tonight. I finally had some motivation to play. My high was six with several strings of four. I am gonna try to keep up my practicing until head back to Canada in ten days. Just these days I have been so busy with work and just generally burnt out that I have not had any motivation to play. I think it has been too many time zones and strange flight times.

I hope to get back into practice flops everyday until I get back china after I go to Canada. I will to hold down a three day routine of osis, whirl and paradox mirage I hope my flops will be super solid again by then.

If anyone else has any advice on other basic threes to practice let me know here. I am getting tired now it is like ten thirty here and I feel wiped out.

Take care,

Mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 04 Sep 2006 06:00

September 4, 2006

Skooled whirls tonight. I did four hundred, my high on regular was four in a row and on flip was two. I seem to be having difficulty holding the clipper stall on my second whirl on my flip side and sometimes I am too late on the delay. I suppose it is a timing thing. If anyone has any advice on that problem let me know. Feel free to post here. It seems that lately no so many people read my blog but that is all right I enjoy doing it anyway.

Ten more days and I get to go back to Canada. I make it sound like I have been exiled. Well I suppose a self imposed exile as I have been too busy to get back but I am really looking forward to it. That is about it for now. I hate the fall in China it is even hotter then the summer. In some places like wuhan it has been like 40+ the past couple of days. Down here it like averages out at about 35 a day lately. Too hot for my northern blood.

Take care,

Mike

Tjuggles · Post by **Tjuggles** » 04 Sep 2006 20:17

Hey! I still read your blog btw

I was wondering, when you do x-hundred whirls, for example is it like this:

whirl > whirl > catch and think about what to do to make them better

OR is it like this:

whirl > whirl > drop > whirl > whirl > whirl > drop >whirl ...

Four hundred is a lot of one trick, so I was just wondering. Thanks.

T

PS I know what you mean about the hot weather. It is averaging here just about the same as there. Just about 34 today...

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 04 Sep 2006 22:37

Answer to the question is how I practice tricks,

Generally speaking I try to freeze every final dely when I am skooling a single trick, for example, whirls. I try to avoid any hand catches, I only hand catch if it is my last possible option. I practice in sets of twenty or twenty five. Then I take a little time to think about what I am doing and how to improve or it or what I was doing right. I try to not to think about what is negative that I am doing. I feel that if I focus on the positives I improve quicker.

I feel that by holding or freezing the final delay it gives me the sense that I have done the move cleanly. I feel that it slows down my style and that is fine with me. I realize that when one is practicing linking you do not have that luxury always but I will find away around that problem again when i start practicing linked flops in October or november.

Mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 05 Sep 2006 04:53

August 5, 2006

Had a slack session tonight. I only did 200 paradox mirages. I dunno my head was into it tonight but my body was not. I suppose that is what I get some days at my age, becoming a middle aged man slowly. My knees were sore from the whirl session last night along with my back. Anyways, enough about that. I was able to hit 9 paradox mirage to same side butterfly on my strong side and 6 on my weak. I thought it was decent and really wanted to skool it more but alas, as mentioned above, my body gave me strong idications that it did not want to be pushed tonight. So then I did about half an hour of yoga with the wife. She does yoga and I footbag, kinda an agreement we have to try to keep ourselves active as we both spend the majority of the day on our asses in front of computers. I am really looking forward to doing osi tomorrow, it is easy on the body.

I bought the new outkast album, and played to about a quarter of it tonight. Nothing stood out as spectacular to me but , meh, it was all of two dollars and twenty five cents canadian. I am so music starved here, I know all about downloading but usually the china firewall blocks alot of it out. So it is that my old music collection from Canada, while I watch most of my old discs deteriorate, or buy some bad chinese techno. But, I get enough bad chinese techno walking down the street. I suppose if I was not used to it, it would make the streets around my place seem vibrant with all the lights and noise. Now I just block it out. Oh oh, I could buy some bad pop music like the back street boys or celine dion or some other crap like that. I love when chinese act all hardcore and then you here them singing the backstreet boys, or the other night when some chinese singer, the wife loves that crap, comes out all punked out with a ramones shirt on and busts out some sappy ass love ballad. I suppose I still find it naseatingly funny.

All I can hope is that the new college of rock n roll at beijing music university produces something decent. Rock n roll was considered subversive by the government until the 1990s so it was largely outlawed in favour of love songs and pop music. I read it in an article in the english newspaper here a while ago. Ok that is enough for tonight.

Take care,

Mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 07 Sep 2006 05:19

september 7, 2006

Skooled whirls tonight did 400. I was able to hit five in a row on my regular side and two in a row on my weak. However, there was alot of consistancy tonight. I was averaging two in a row about 80% percent of time on my regular and about 60% of the time I was hitting three in a row. I was hitting about two in a row 30% of the time on flip. I am happy with the progression. I am going to try to keep up the routine while I am back in Canada. My body felt really good today as I did not session yesterday. I had a supper meeting with our companies hong kong partners and I didn't get home until 11.

I am going to be able to pick up some new bags while I am in Victoria. I got an email from Matt today saying that he is stitching again. That is good since my only bag, a lon irish, is starting to look haggared. So I am looking forward to pickin up some new bags.

Take care,

Mike

Wim · Post by **Wim** » 13 Sep 2006 10:47

Hey Mike,

Just to say I can hardly wait to see how your training regimen will work out for you when you move on to combos.
I don't have the patience to focus that long on a single trick, I always try to put 'a bit of everything' in my sessions because otherwise I would feel like I neglected stuff.
So yeah, I'm pretty curious to see how the total opposite of my approach to training will work out. Yours is pretty unique, it kinda reminds me of those martial arts movies where they practise stuff for such a long time that they attain perfection.

All the best, Mistah Consistency!

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 28 Sep 2006 22:11

Sept 29, 2006

I am back in China now and I will start skooling again. I really didn't have any time when I was in Canada, I spent the majority of my time visitng with my family. I haven't seen them in two years so it was important me to do that then skooling footbag. Anyways, I plan on working on a three day schedule.

Day one - osis
Day two - whirl
Day three - bopping

I will keep you posted on the progress.

Mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 08 Oct 2006 19:32

October 8, 2006

Skooled finally for the first time in a couple of weeks. I did four hundred whirls last night. Nothing special three in a row on the strong side and two in a row on the week side. I plan to get it going again as my life here is organized again. I will keep everyone posted.

Take care,

Mike

hotstepper · Post by **hotstepper** » 09 Oct 2006 04:36

Oct. 9, 2006

Skooled whirls tonight. I did 400 and had a really good session tonight. I hit a personal high of six in a row on strong, but flip was pretty awful and I only hit two in a row. I could not keep my balance on my flip and that really sucked. I am going to try to wake up around six tomorrow morning and try to get in an osis session before work, that would be worthwhile and when I was in university I used to do morning sessions all the time so I would like to get back into that. I feel that some morning exercise does a body good. I will let you know how it goes.

Take care,

Mike