Fanzine

[Muffinman]

Top post:



Nice. I liked the smog > pixie paradon drill.


For the GoPro, all of them can do really good slowmo. I don't even have a Hero3, I have the Hero2, and it's great, quality-wise. All of the Hero3s will be better, I imagine, but the black is the one I was referencing that has particularly high res and (I think) the functionality of filming with just the centre of the lens (I only heard someone mention this, I haven't see it in action -- may have actually been Scott Davidson). The GoPro can be partnered with any one "backpack" peripheral (LCD screen or extended battery -- you can't use both at once as far as I know -- they just plug into the back of the camera easily and the attachments come with extensions for the casing that allow it to resize to fit the new dimensions.)

Something it really highlights for any of the Hero3 models is the wifi capability, so you can use your smartphone as a viewfinder remotely, which is super cool. I have that functionality with my Hero2 I think, but I've never used it. I imagine it would take a lot of battery life from your phone, but it would also allow you a lot more flexibility in framing a shot (for example, if the camera's really close to the ground or backed against a wall, or mounted on the ceiling, the LCD screen won't help you much, since you can't get in behind to see it, but the phone would let you see from anywhere) -- you could always just use your phone to establish the shot and then turn it off once you're satisfied. I do that with my LCD screen sometimes.

The quality of the black model Hero3 is definitely worth the extra $100. They're pretty flipping cheap to begin with, considering the quality and versatility. 720p at 120fps! (mine can shoot in 120fps, but only at, like, 480p or something.) 1440p at 48fps! (Mine goes to max 1080 at 30fps, I think (while this one also does 1080 at 60fps.))


EDIT: Apparently Hero3 and Hero3+ are different things. This might be helpful:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3W5fk-imy8[/youtube]

[C-Fan]

Good tripless at the end, too.

Thanks Matt! All my furious practice is one-sided, so I've been drilling a bit of tripless lately to remind myself what its like to hit tricks on both sides. I'm pretty sure my old record for unique tripless was 24 or 25, so I was happy to hit 29 yesterday:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5mLAhHeLCk[/youtube]

I'm pretty sure I could get to the mid-thirties if I threw in ducking osis before each ducking pdx mirage, and if I did like spinning butter-spinning osis-dyno-dyno-torque at the end. Or if I added a couple tomahawks in the middle somewhere. For now though, 29 is a new record and I'm happy with it.

Nice. I liked the smog > pixie paradon drill.

That was inspired by a Mark Monistere challenge. I hit the smog-paradon link tighter on another try, but on that one I had to bail to pdx illusion instead of egg at the end, so I went with this clip. Mark's actual challenge was smog-pixie paradon-ps egg rpt or something like that. I still can't hit flip PS egg though. I can pdx flail OK on that side, but every time I try and tack on the extra legover my brain short circuits and I end up hitting WHAT?!? instead. That's actually how I invented WHAT?!?...by trying PS egg and failing.

Nice top post, btw. I knew I was due for one karmically.

Thank you also for all the advice on cameras. I think the Hero 3 Black is my frontrunner now, though I'm going to wait until I get back from the honeymoon before I buy anything, cause weddings are expensive as hell. I'm very intrigued at the possibility of framing/checking my shots on my smartphone. I can't tell you how many times I've had to reshoot beasts because I was badly framed. Just the worst feeling.

Yesterday was a weird session for me. I went into it with 3 goals:

1. Work on tripless
2. Hit blender-twirl, a challenge from Cassy
3. Don't waste time on furious dream tricks

I ended up hitting 29 tripless within a few tries, so that didn't take much time from the session. I worked on Cassy's challenge throughout the session, which was fun. I also worked on twirl-blender, which I found much easier. The third goal is where I did the worst. I ended up spending probably 60% of the session chasing these tricks, even though I know my camera sucks. My set was feeling good though, so probably not the worst thing in the world to keep working at it. I ended up hitting 3 tricks on my dream list, which is definitely a record for a single session. Unfortunately two of them weren't to my standards, and the 3rd one was unsealed (though undeniably clean). I still felt very encouraged by them though, and definitely think I'm making progress. My next project will definitely be to make a nice video of furious dream tricks once I get the new camera.

[C-Fan]

After a bit of a dry spell, I have now played footbag 7 of the past 8 days! I think it's been helping me cope with the wedding planning stress. That said, my right knee feels a little tired today, so I'm going to take the day off to heal up. The wedding is Saturday, but Friday we are having a picnic, so maybe I can get in some footbag with some of the guests then. We'll see.

I'm not currently planning on taking footbag gear on the honeymoon, but I ordered new shoes for the trip...so depending on whether or not they work for footbag, we'll see. Our goal is to pack super light, so we ordered these shoes that are good for hiking and the beach, and dry super quickly. They might have some footbag potential, but if they don't then I'm OK taking a week off footbag anyway.

Shoes arrived! They're called "water shoes," and they're basically like tevas, but with mesh enclosing the rest of the shoe. The idea being that you can walk around town in them, but that they also breathe and dry quickly because of the mesh. I think they're normally like $90, but we got them online for $40. As I wrote above, we got them so we'd only need one pair of shoes on the trip and could pack lighter.

I spent yesterday morning walking around in them to break them in, and the whole time I kept wondering if they'd be good for footbag. They're definitely lighter than the g-units, and the toes are flat...but there are also no toe walls, and the instep is curved. I ended up bringing them to my shred in the afternoon, with the intention of testing them out while I warmed up. To my happy surprise, they were pretty good for footbag! If anything, they reminded me a bit of playing in clima cools, except the clipper pocket isn't as good. Playing in these shoes really exposed the weak points in my game. Specifically, I had to focus a lot harder to do any sets with my left toe, and my right osis was horribly inconsistent. I found that I could hit individual tricks pretty well, and I could also shred normally, just that I had to focus about twice as hard to hit what I'm used to hitting. Here's a vid I made of the session in my "honeymoon shoes:"

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_E2MJXA2wag[/youtube]

The last big trick in the video is "the," but I kept it in there to show that big tricks are do-able in the shoes, and that the lightness allows for quick motions.

Do I expect these shoes will replace g-units for me? Definitely not. Are they the best non-footbag shoe I've ever played in? Definitely yes. I think they also have some potential for me as a training tool, since they force me to concentrate more on my form. More than anything though, I'm just excited I'll have the option of footbagging on my honeymoon without having to pack an entire extra pair of bulky shoes.

Yesterday's session was also encouraging to me, since it showed me that I can find a way to keep playing even after my last pair of g-units die. That's hopefully a few years away still, and even then I may not find a shoe I like as much as the g-units...but it's not like I'll be forced to give up playing entirely. It was dumb luck that these water shoes happen to be good for footbag. I'm sure that if the day came I had to find replacements to the g-units, I could find something even better, or I could adjust to another shoe and make due. Definitely a reason for optimism.

[boyle]

Good luck on the wedding Ken, that's cone around quickly. Hope you have a great honeymoon too.

[C-Fan]

You said it! Can't believe its only a few days off now. I think we're in good shape with the big details, but we still need to wrap up some last minute stuff. I think we'll be OK, but I'm also greatly looking forward to when its over.

Took the last 2 days off of footbag to rest up a bit, and my body feels better. Family and guests are starting to trickle into town, and there are still details I need to take care of, so it might be hard to carve time out for footbag. That might be more likely if some of the guests want to play and we set up a time. We'll see.

My last real session was a fun one. For some reason I felt like messing around with beasts, and was pleasantly surprised to hit 2 new ones with relative ease. I also worked a bit on blubberman, which is still a very frustrating drill for me. I don't really get why either, since my quantums aren't that bad. But for some reason, stringing it all together is a challenge...I think it's an energy management thing.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okdtojHdxKE[/youtube]

I was curious how many beasts I've hit, so I took a few minutes this morning to count out what I've hit. I counted 37 "pure" beasts, which is to say they didn't use x-dex, x-spin, or anything questionable. So 37 beasts that would count in Finland. I only had like 11 beasts that used x-dex or x-spin. Most of the x-dex ones involved fury or voodoo, and the x-spin ones were mostly with double peeking osis. As I was compiling the list, I noticed a few potential combos which I either haven't hit, or hit and forgot. So next time I play I may try some of them so I can add them to my list and get credit for them. It'd be nice to be able to say I've hit 40 unique pure beasts.

I'm going to bring a footbag on the honeymoon, but I'm not sure if I'll have much opportunity or desire to play. The water shoes at least give me the option to play, but I'll likely play it by ear. Once I get back from the trip, I think my next goal will be to buy a GoPro, and work on hitting and rehitting some of my furious dream tricks in better quality. I'd also like to train for East Coasts, but I want to wait to see when the dates are first. I have to do a lot of work travel before the fiscal year ends (Sept 30), so the timing may not even work out. I'm hoping it will though. It'd be nice to see family and friends in NY again, and I'd also love an excuse to do routines again.

[C-Fan]

First post on modified as a married man! Man, married life sure makes the forums look totally different. Gonna hold off judgment on the new template until I give it a couple weeks. I usually come around to the new schemes anyway.

So yeah, wedding came and went, and I survived. Not much footbag occurred. I got in one session with Jon Schneider and Pascal the day before the wedding, but that was pretty laid back. We ended up playing on grass, and I mostly just chased single big tricks. Jon hit a bunch of good stuff, and gave me some tips on swirling out of dragons, as well as better flapper kicks. Pascal said he hadn't played in almost a year, but was still hitting some good stuff like whirl bsos and stepping out of osis.

The days after the wedding were crammed with seeing guests before they left town, cleaning up the apartment (it was our staging area pre-wedding), and returning stuff to stores (tuxes, games we didn't use, etc.). I finally got in my first post-wedding shred yesterday. My goal was to try more of the Dzem Jam request combos, but I couldn't remember that many. Mostly though it just felt good to play, and to play without any wedding pressure looming over me:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlYea6Zl1xA[/youtube]

We fly to Costa Rica tonight for the honeymoon. Pretty excited for that. Going to bring one footbag, so I may get some shreds with my water shoes, but probably won't film them. When I get back from the honeymoon my next footbag project will be to buy a proper HD camera, and revisit my furious wishlist once I have it.

[boyle]

Congrats on joining the married man club! Glad to hear you survived well. Have fun in Costa Rica....they will probably be celebrating their world cup efforts for months to come!

[C-Fan]

Back from Costa Rica! Super fun honeymoon trip, but its also nice to be home too.

Remember when I got all excited about my water shoes, since it meant I wouldn't have to pack my footbag shoes for the trip?

We fly to Costa Rica tonight for the honeymoon. Pretty excited for that. Going to bring one footbag, so I may get some shreds with my water shoes...

Well, it was a great plan, except that I forgot to pack a footbag! D'oh! So while it was a great trip, I was unable to hit any fairy drifters.



It wasn't a bad thing to take a break from footbag, but towards the end of the trip I was having footbag dreams. I got back yesterday, and made a point to get in a shred. My legs felt pretty good, and I didn't feel that rusty, which was nice.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBMEWU4FM10[/youtube]

I made a slight adjustment to how I do whirr, which appears to have paid off. In the past, my whirrs were like a whirling set followed by a whirl, so there'd be a moment between the two whirls when the bag was no longer in the dex zone. Like, my dex leg would complete the first whirl but then drop vertically, before coming back to do the second whirl. Yesterday though I managed to keep the whirling leg "up" after the first dex, so it doesnt have to travel as far for the second dex, and the bag always stays within the dexing zone. Don't know if that made any sense, but I finally felt like I was hitting whirrs correctly, which made me happy.

This weekend I'm going to do a bit more research on cameras, and maybe even suck it up and buy a GoPro. Wedding and honeymoon are over, so I have more time now to dedicate to footbag. I'm way past due for a new camera, and I'd really like to capture some of my recent stuff (longer fearless, furious tricks, etc.) in good quality.

[C-Fan]

Back from Costa Rica! Super fun honeymoon trip, but its also nice to be home too.

Remember when I got all excited about my water shoes, since it meant I wouldn't have to pack my footbag shoes for the trip?

We fly to Costa Rica tonight for the honeymoon. Pretty excited for that. Going to bring one footbag, so I may get some shreds with my water shoes...

Well, it was a great plan, except that I forgot to pack a footbag! D'oh! So while it was a great trip, I was unable to hit any fairy drifters.



It wasn't a bad thing to take a break from footbag, but towards the end of the trip I was having footbag dreams. I got back yesterday, and made a point to get in a shred. My legs felt pretty good, and I didn't feel that rusty, which was nice.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBMEWU4FM10[/youtube]

I made a slight adjustment to how I do whirr, which appears to have paid off. In the past, my whirrs were like a whirling set followed by a whirl, so there'd be a moment between the two whirls when the bag was no longer in the dex zone. Like, my dex leg would complete the first whirl but then drop vertically, before coming back to do the second whirl. Yesterday though I managed to keep the whirling leg "up" after the first dex, so it doesnt have to travel as far for the second dex, and the bag always stays within the dexing zone. Don't know if that made any sense, but I finally felt like I was hitting whirrs correctly, which made me happy.

This weekend I'm going to do a bit more research on cameras, and maybe even suck it up and buy a GoPro. Wedding and honeymoon are over, so I have more time now to dedicate to footbag. I'm way past due for a new camera, and I'd really like to capture some of my recent stuff (longer fearless, furious tricks, etc.) in good quality.

In other news, USO happened while I was on honeymoon. I'm a little sad I wasn't able to defend my title, and I'll definitely miss being able to tell people I'm the US champ of hack. Beyond the vanity of it, it's also just an easy thing for people to wrap their head around when you are explaining footbag to them and they ask if you are any good. I'm glad I was able to say that on the Mo Rocca segment for example. But while I'm sad I missed USO, I'm still glad I won it last year. Cause if I hadn't won last year, and I was forced to miss this year, then I'd really feel like I missed my window. That's why it was such a big deal for me last summer to make my competition goals, since I knew this summer was going to be a wash.

I have to do a bunch of work travel before the end of the Fiscal Year (September 30). In good news, it sounds like I'll be in Boise for some of that, so hopefully I can hook up with Penske and bring my new camera too. I'm really hoping East Coasts is announced soon, so I can schedule my work travel around that. I'd love for my next personal vacation to be East Coasts combined with some time with my nieces in Jersey.

[C-Fan]

I bought a GoPro! Ended up ponying up for the GoPro Hero 3+ Black, which is the top model out now. I still need to figure out all the shooting modes, and the wifi aspect. I shot a session yesterday without using the wifi, so I didn't know if I was well-framed or not. Ended up not being too bad, but I really should figure out the wifi app so I can frame better in the future.

Shredwise, I was real happy with my session. Got a beast, 10 fearless, and some nice drills. I think the video quality is a lot better with the GoPro, but the audio is almost non-existent. Maybe that will motivate me to start putting music on my vids again.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1ml_u7gwoY[/youtube]

Now that I have a good camera again, my new goal is to shoot a highlight video with music and everything. Basically a sequel to my Upular video, showing my best Sick3s, fearless, and big furious tricks. The plan is to shoot for the next month, and take the best highlight or 2 from each session and stash it away for the final video, but continue releasing session videos along the way.

[Matt K]

Camera looks really good. First link was totally tits

[isirc10]

Ken, I'm really happy that you got a GoPro. Spend some time to learn the settings and you will be unstoppable with that thing. There are even ways to get rid of the fisheye distortion that plagues most GoPro footage. Really looking forward to what you come up with for your next video.

[boyle]

I'm looking forward to seeing how you go with the GoPro, think it will suit you well. I'm still strongly considering getting one, think it would be fun to use.

[C-Fan]

Haven't been able to film/play much with the GoPro since I got it. The weather since we got back from Costa Rica has basically followed this pattern every day: sunny and no clouds in the morning, but warmer than it should be. Afternoons heat up to uncomfortable/unsafe temperatures in the mid 90s. Around 5 pm, storm clouds roll in and we have rain, thunder, and wind. On Sunday I expected this, so I went to go play early in the morning to avoid the heat. No dice, as it hit mid-90s by 11 am, and it was just brutal. Monday through Wednesday I've gone out to play, and its rained on me every time. I still played, but it's not been ideal conditions by any stretch. I've also been focusing on trying to rehit my furious wishlist tricks, so some of my sessions haven't yielded any footage at all.

In good news, I'm getting more used to playing with the GoPro. I have a better sense of where to stand in relation to the camera to be in frame, and I'm less worried about stomping on the camera or going out of frame. I've been really bad about playing with the video settings, which I need to work on. I've been filming everything in 1080 with 30 fps, but I want to start filming in 60 fps. Need to experiment.

Speaking of experimentation, I feel like I've had a minor breakthrough with furious. My last breakthrough with furious was thinking of the set as a wonton set underneath me. Overall that method has yielded good results, but one challenge has been placing the bag underneath me (as opposed to next to me) when I go for the wonton dex. In simpler terms: furious sets start on a clipper, and clippers are by nature next to you. For furious tricks where the bag needs to travel laterally across your body, I wanted the bag to be set under me, and not next to me. By thinking of the footwork as similar to a pogo set, I have had more success in placing the sets where I need them. I don't know if any of that made any sense to anybody, but it did to me, and I'm feeling more optimistic now about my chances at getting a clean nemesis because of it. Yesterday I had perhaps my closest attempt yet.

East Coasts has been tentatively announced for the end of September. I usually don't like booking my travel until I know dates are set in stone, but who knows if/when that will happen. I think what I'll do is just ask for the time off, buy my plane tickets, and just treat the trip like a visit to NYFA if they change the date of the tournament. That'd be unfortunate, but I'd rather do that than wait til the last minute for finalized dates, and pay twice as much in airfare. I'm looking forward to East Coasts for a few reasons. #1 is just the fact that I haven't done a routine since Worlds 2013. I've got a good song picked out already, and its exciting just envisioning yourself going dropless. #2 is that I haven't seen NYFA in what feels like forever, so it'd be great to catch up with the old crew. #3 is that I'd likely get to compete against Cass and Bear. I wasn't able to defend my EC title last year, or my USO title this year, so it'd be fun to go head to head against the players who took those titles in my absence.

Finally, I wanted to put down some thoughts on a topic that came up in Bear's blog. Basically, the question was raised: "who are the 5 best players in the US?" This led to an interesting discussion of how you measure skill, but I didn't want to hijack Bear's blog on that topic. In a nutshell though, I'd argue that "the 5 best" in anything footbag related, depends on what events/abilities you are talking about. The list of the 5 best shredders (raw shred ability) is probably different than the list of the 5 best routine players, and even if both lists did happen to have the same players on it, they'd probably not be in the same order. Of course, it makes everything easier when you have a player who is the best in all levels of comp and shred, as was the case with Mulroney in 2000 and 2001, and Vasek for most of the 2000s. But even with Mulroney, a case could be made that Ahren or Chad were better shredders than Ryan during those years. The fact that Ryan dominated routines/shred/sick3, and was also a top 3 shredder, made it easier to proclaim he was the best.

If we were to have a dream US Open tournament, with a huge purse and all competitors travel paid for, and everyone were healthy, it'd be interesting to see where people finished. I think that Clavens would probably still win routines. For Circle, I have no idea...though Evan and Clavens would be frontrunners. I think Evan would beat everybody in request contest. Shred30 would be between Clavens and Penske probably. As for overall shred ability, Landes would have to be in the conversation. Its hard to say really. At this stage in my footbag career (17 year vet in my mid 30s), and with the current US scene, I'm not sure I'd even still make the top 10 in terms of shred ability. That said, I like to think I'm still a strong competitor in routines and circle. I'm curious to see when I decide to retire, as well as what precipitates that decision. I'm hoping for at least a couple more years before we get there though.

Here's a quick vid of some sandvich combos. 30 fps, and shot as the sun was setting, but not bad quality for the conditions. I'll try and shoot my next vid in 60 fps as a point of comparison.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0Tj72oeta8[/youtube]

[boyle]

You're doing pretty good for a veteran...I think that competitive spirit, and your overall consistency across the different competitions has you up the rankings.

I guess the biggest question is - do you ever see that dream situation, or anything remotely close, ever happening?

[C-Fan]

do you ever see that dream situation, or anything remotely close, ever happening?

Oh man. Hypothetically yes, but it'd require a lot of time and effort. I feel like I could run a pretty good tournament still, but its hard to predict what my work travel will be like in any given year. There's also part of me that feels like I wouldn't have enough time to both organize a tournament, and also train hard enough to compete at USO and Worlds in the same summer. I definitely want to put in a strong effort at USO and Worlds the next two summers, so I don't know if organizing a tournament is on my horizon. Who knows though, if I do particularly well or horribly next summer, I might decide to retire.

I've been really bad about playing with the video settings, which I need to work on. I've been filming everything in 1080 with 30 fps, but I want to start filming in 60 fps. Need to experiment.

I'll try and shoot my next vid in 60 fps as a point of comparison.

Well, I toyed around some with the GoPro, and I'm pretty happy with the results. Thanks to Jay for reminding me to do this, especially before I filmed too much footage for my next big video in the wrong settings.

When I got the GoPro, I shot everything in the standard settings. The standard settings actually aren't bad, and definitely were better than my old camera's. That said, the standard settings don't take advantage of the power of the camera, and they also give more of a fisheye quality to the footage than I'd like. After some research, I changed the settings from 30 frames per second, to 60 fps, and the field of vision from wide (fisheye) to medium (much less fishy). Here's a clip with similar light and the same background, shot a week apart using the old settings versus the new:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aRDDGRjnzoc[/youtube]

There you have it. Not seemingly a ton of difference, but the second clip is a bit smoother in terms of frame rate, and not as distorted. Once I experimented with the new settings, I decided to go back and re-shoot all of my old footage for my upcoming vid, which is what I did this past weekend. I'm excited to have a new video project, and I'm happy to say its coming along pretty well. My main goals with it are to showcase my dream furious tricks, and also to show some fearless in better video quality. I'd also like to make a well-edited video. I tried doing that with my "season ender 2013" video, but the quality was so bad it was just depressing. I'd love to have an HD video with good editing for posterity, so when I retire I can look back on what my game was like in 2014 when I was still pushing hard.

This week the plan is to continue working on clips for the video. If I get enough "B roll" of footage I won't use, I will try and release videos of that. I still haven't hit a nemesis that meets my standards, so I'm going to push hard on that this week. Wish me luck!

[C-Fan]

This week the plan is to continue working on clips for the video. If I get enough "B roll" of footage I won't use, I will try and release videos of that. I still haven't hit a nemesis that meets my standards, so I'm going to push hard on that this week. Wish me luck!

I've got a feeling people didn't wish me luck.

The whole week, weather and circumstances conspired against me playing. Even though Denver is technically a high desert with very low humidity, the past two weeks we had abnormally high humidity which led to thunderstorms almost every evening. Some days it was cloudy but I was able to play (though I couldn't film well), other days I was rained out. The other wildcard that messed with footbag this week, is that we're selling a bunch of our wedding items on Craigslist. Just stuff that we bought for the wedding, used once, and don't need anymore. But yeah, I've had 2 sessions that were cut short or started late because of this, which is frustrating.

Despite these setbacks, my video project is slowly progressing. My original plan was to get all my dream furious tricks in one video, but now I'm worried that'll be a little boring. Maybe not boring so much as repetitive, especially since all the big tricks are the first trick in the string, and all with the same furious set. My new plan then is to have a video that includes most of the dream furious tricks, but interspersed with some sick 3s, big tricks, and fearless. I'm also trying to get some nice backgrounds in, especially since all the footage has to be tripod based. I'm slowly amassing the footage I need, though I'm starting to worry now that good shred alone won't carry the video. I think some scenery shots, and maybe a handheld string filmed by my wife would improve things, but even then I worry about my editing skills. After reading the Jay/Ivan conversation that went on in Jay's blog, I'm half considering sending all my footage to a better editor so the final product won't look as amateurish. Then again, I like the challenge of editing, even though I suck at it. We'll see where I'm at with my footage in a few weeks and go from there.

In other big footbag news, I bought tickets to East Coasts this week! My original plan was to take off a whole week from work so I could spend time with my nieces, but various factors made that an impossibility. Instead, I'll leave Denver Thursday afternoon and get back Tuesday night. Hopefully that's enough time to shred, compete, and do some sightseeing. I really hope the organization is better this time around than the last East Coasts I attended. That time around I got sick, largely because we had to wait over an hour in the rain for Ted to get back from the net site so he could perform his routine. What a disaster.

I'm excited for East Coasts. I haven't done a routine in a year, and I love/hate doing routines. I love them because its fun to put on a show, and its the BEST feeling when you do a good routine. On the other hand, I hate routines because they require so much practice, and it can be pretty stressful. I've already picked out 2 songs for East Coasts, so now I need to decide which is my main one that I'll use in Finals, and which is my expendable first rounder. I doubt I'll be able to prepare 2 routines to the level I'd want, but if I can get one roughly choreographed and the other solid, I'll be thrilled. I also really really want to get one more dropless routine. It's been a couple years since I last went dropless, which surprises and disappoints me a little. It'd be great to get just one more dropless.

Preparing for East Coasts and shooting my dream furious video are on different ends of the footbag spectrum in many ways. Routines require consistency and stamina and minimal flash, while shooting for the video is all about pushing my game's envelope and hoping I hit something crazy. Even if I only hit it once, as long as I got it in frame that's all that I care about. Because these two goals involve such different skills, I think it makes the most sense for me to set a date where I transition from one to the other, since it'd probably be really hard to try and do both at the same time. On that note, my current g-units are getting really worn down, which in a way is nice since they feel so broken in and light. While I'm continuing to chase highlights for my video, they're probably my best option. But once I transition into East Coasts prep mode, I'll exhume my Yankee blue Units from last year, which have better tread but are a lot stiffer. I don't see myself hitting nemesis in those shoes, but they should work better for routines. If I make the switch on August 18, that'd give me one more month of video highlight chasing, and still give me 6 weeks to get into routine shape. I want to take tournament prep seriously, both because it'll be my only routines this year, and also because I might have some stiff competition if Bear and Jay come. And that's to say nothing of the competition I'll face in Circle if Kemmer/Polini/Hogan show too.

This weekend I'm going up to the mountains to hike. Maybe I'll bring my gear and can get some footage...or at least get some nice scenery shots while I'm there.

In my quest to not make video-less posts, here is an old video I made inspired by some Ianek links. Ianek; so hot right now:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOdyXZqwe0I[/youtube]

[isirc10]

I've got a feeling people didn't wish me luck.

The whole week, weather and circumstances conspired against me playing. Even though Denver is technically a high desert with very low humidity, the past two weeks we had abnormally high humidity which led to thunderstorms almost every evening.

...

This weekend I'm going up to the mountains to hike. Maybe I'll bring my gear and can get some footage...or at least get some nice scenery shots while I'm there.

Hmm, I actually wished you luck, but I guess my luck has been of the "bad" variety lately. Oops. If it makes you feel better, State College also go hammered by thunderstorms and torrential downpours early in the week.

Please take pics when you go hiking. Man, that's something that I seriously miss doing, and it's one of my goals to eventually make it out West and do some hikes. Also, *good* luck with the video and ECFC training. Look forward to reading about/watching both of them.

[Asmus]

Ianek, My Back, Lick My P***y and My Crack. So dirty right now.

[Derek]

Wished ya luck. Sounds like we've been dealing with some similar weather, which is odd. Your Ianek Tribute is probably one of my favorite videos. I may be finally meeting you! Looking forward to another great viddy of yours.