Fanzine

[boyle]

I like how the outfits fit together, I don't know if you see too much of that - more things like "let's all dress up as the smurfs" or things along those lines, not something that is kind of out of the "common" thought, and something that works together with how you will be running.

What time did you do the 5k in?

[Outsider]

What time did you do the 5k in?

Judging by the shadows in the photo, I'd say that they did it at about 4 or 5 pm.

[C-Fan]

Damn Jon. That was impressive.

Dan: Haley was injured, so we ended up walking about half of the 5K. We finished in like, 36 minutes. I definitely want to try another one, and see what kind of time we could get if we both ran the whole thing.

I like how the outfits fit together, I don't know if you see too much of that ?

On that note, you may like the costumes we wore on actual Halloween:



I'm Bob Ross, and Haley's a "happy little tree." We actually ended up winning a costume contest at the Denver Museum with them. I think we got extra points for being art themed.

I got back from Vegas last Saturday, did the 5K on Sunday, and then proceeded to take an entire week off of footbag after that. I didn't even feel like I needed the break physically. I just felt like I needed a break from footbag. Since moving to Denver I haven't had much of an off-season, so a little time off sounded like a good idea. The weather is also transitioning to winter already, so it felt like the universe was being supportive of taking some time off too.

Yesterday I went to a yoga class with Haley and my friend Luis (footbagger from Cornell). I hadn't done yoga in like 6 months or longer, and I had forgotten how much I like it. Beyond the physical benefits, I just feel like its a good mental cleanse as well. After yoga I decided to get in a shred and end my weeklong break. It was a little blustery and overcast, but I still managed to hit some links I was pleased with.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RO6GswAefU[/youtube]

I was most excited to find I could link strong pdx torque to weak. The best I managed was pdx torque x3, but I bet I could get 5 on a good day. Something to shoot for.

Weather this week looks pretty meh, but maybe I'll get in some indoor gym sessions to work on basics. This coming weekend I'm taking Monday off and Tuesday is Veteran's day, so I'll have a 4 day weekend. I might be able to get some outdoor shreds over that time period if I play around noon.

[Matt K]

I dug the toe drills

[Derek]

Your guys' Halloween costumes cracked me up. Snazzy tune, and I very much dig the recent background. Looks like a peaceful park. Stepping Double Pickup BSOS looked satisfying, and look all the toe triples. I bet you could get P. Torque*7 on a good day.

[C-Fan]

Thanks guys. I never did much with double pickups before, but they're surprisingly fun.

Daylight savings switched over 9 days ago, and yesterday we got our first snow of the year. It definitely feels like the season has come to an end. To be honest though, I'm kinda welcoming a break. My season began in earnest around February, and while I only prepared hard for 2 events (NOLA and East Coasts) I pushed myself pretty hard all year. Part of that was for Ivan's video, part of that was that it helped me feel less bad about missing USO and Worlds this summer. In any case, I played pretty hard for about 9 months straight, and so I'm looking to ramp down both the difficulty and the frequency of my sessions for the forseeable future.

This ramping down process has been a bit harder than anticipated. For one, I've had more sessions with other players post ECFC than expected. Red and Johnny Sarah visited Denver, and I was out in Vegas for a bit too. Whenever I play with other people, I want to play my hardest, which is counter to my current goal of ramping down for the winter. On a related note, my mind and body had gotten accustomed to hitting certain things and playing at a certain level. Now that I'm getting out of game shape, I find myself getting frustrated when I can't hit stuff I was doing a month ago. That shouldn't surprise me at all, and yet I still get super frustrated.

Now that winter is heading in, I plan on taking more days off, and keeping my indoor sessions to short practice sessions for basics. I'm not looking to chase fearless or beasts or big tricks. If I work on anything "big," it will be to develop a flip furious set. Even that's probably a lower priority for me though than say, improving my spins on both sides. I think the key thing will be to work on basics and just make sure I don't lose complete touch with the game over the next few months. The real goal is to do well at Worlds next year, and I think my best shot at that is to avoid burning out this winter, and to methodically train up to Worlds in the spring. If I pull it off right, hopefully I will be peaking right before Worlds.

Here's a video of my last 2 outdoor shreds. I'm sure I'll get a few more outdoor shreds in Denver through the winter, when we get warm spells and whatnot. That said, I expect to be doing more indoor sessions than outdoor between now and March.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DU3jhqMCQPk[/youtube]

[Allan]

Nice inspins!

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

That comment means so much coming from that specific person. I hope Allan Hagget says those 2 words to me one day

But yeah, seriously, awesome awesome video. It looked like you pushed out of your normal style of game/trick selection just a bit. Really interesting stuff. That Diving Inspinning Osis (?) was really really nicely executed. So close on the Inspin Osis> Spin Osis drill. Refreshing video.

[C-Fan]

Thanks guys!

Nice inspins!

That comment means so much coming from that specific person..

I agree, I took it as a very high compliment considering whom it came from. When Red posted the old 2004 Foursquare video, the part that stood out to me the most was Allan's mid-string double inspinning osis...and that was 10 years ago!

I've been playing fairly regularly this week, but all light indoor sessions. The GoPro doesn't film too well indoors, which isn't a big surprise. I definitely think its better indoors than my last camera, but I still have zero motivation to hit anything big indoors, since I know it'll come out blurry. I saw Mike Lloyd post an interesting online comp for the end of the year which I'd like to enter, but I half wonder if it's worth the effort to hit something super-hard if it'll come out in poor visual quality anyway. We'll see. I'm actually kinda hoping the poor indoor film quality will motivate me to just work on basics all winter, and not get seduced into chasing hard stuff. I remember Anz mentioning symposium whirl as a good trick to drill to improve clippers, so I've been working a little bit on them. On one side they feel pretty good, but even that one I can't do more than 2 in a row. I'd like to work on it through the winter and see if working my way up to symp whirl x5 on each side does much for my game.

It's been cold and snowy in Denver all week. On Wednesday our high temperature was 5 degrees...fahrenheit. Yipes. In good news though, I'll be out in Vegas again soon. I should have most of Sunday to hang out with Evan and shred, and I'm looking forward to just being able to play outside. I probably wont be able to shred with him again on that trip, but 3 days in warmer temps is something I'm definitely looking forward to.

In non-footbag news, today marks the 5th anniversary of meeting my wife. I sometimes think about footbag, and how lucky and random it was that I discovered it and fell in love. I definitely feel the same way about my wife. Kinda awesome that happened to me twice in my life.

Here's a quick video from my past 2 indoor sessions. Mostly focused on symp whirls, and trying to strengthen my flipside toe some:

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

[C-Fan]

In Vegas again. I've been here so many times in the past year for work, the novelty has worn off. Like, when I flew in on Sunday and saw the Strip from the plane, there was no excitement. Seeing the iconic casinos from the plane is the sort of thing that normally gets me pumped, but at this stage I just felt nothing.

It's been a good trip so far though. I got to spend most of Sunday with Evan, including a very good shred session. Considering it was freezing cold and snowy in Denver when I left, it was a real treat to get to play outside. We shredded at the UNLV campus, which was pretty much perfect. It was cold in the shade, but we played in the sun and I was fine in a long sleeve shirt. Shredwise I played better than any of my sessions with Evan over my past few trips. I just had a good attitude throughout, and my legs felt fresh. I'm not sure why I was playing well, but I just ran with it and enjoyed it.

I still have zero motivation to hit anything big indoors, since I know it'll come out blurry. I saw Mike Lloyd post an interesting online comp for the end of the year which I'd like to enter, but I half wonder if it's worth the effort to hit something super-hard if it'll come out in poor visual quality anyway. We'll see.

On that note, I managed to hit entries for both contests on Sunday, in outdoor light. I forgot my charging cord for the camera, so I haven't reviewed either yet for cleanliness. I guess its possible they're both bad, but I feel optimistic I can use both. I'll know for sure when I get home Wednesday. I might even have enough good footage to make a vid for the xmas calendar.

I remember Anz mentioning symposium whirl as a good trick to drill to improve clippers, so I've been working a little bit on them.

I got some good advice from Evan on this, which I'll try and apply when I go home. I think this is a good goal for the winter, so I'm going to try and be diligent about it.

Depending when the sun goes down tomorrow, and when I get out of work, there's a chance I get another shred in with Evan. Without my charging cord, there's no way I can film, but no biggie. At least I got one real good session on tape this trip.

No video in this post, since I'm on the road.

[C-Fan]

Few quick hits just to catch up.

My trip to Vegas was short this time, but I feel like I packed in as much footbag and hanging out as I could. I spent most of Sunday shredding and hanging with Evan, and Tuesday night we got in another session and dinner. I've been going to Vegas a lot for work lately, and I have more trips there coming up. I'm really glad I have friends there, because other than them Vegas holds very little appeal for me.

My first few sessions after the seasons changed were pretty rough, I think because I was expecting myself to still be playing at the level I was over the summer. Since then though, I have adjusted my expectations and mental game, and I've been transitioning to an easier game which has been good for me both physically and mentally. I only played twice on this trip to Vegas, but my mental game and attitude were way better than my previous trip there. I was proud of that.

My GoPro froze up on me when I came back from my last trip. I bought this camera new about 4 months ago, and already this has happened twice. Last time was right before East Coasts, so Ivan was able to fix it for me. This time I need to do it myself. I'm still figuring it out, but I think my choices are either:

A. Try a firmware update, but risk losing the footage that's already on there.
B. Sink more money into the unreliable POS by buying a SD card converter, so I can try and save the footage from the camera using the card directly, then do the firmware update.

The whole situation is incredibly frustrating. The salt in the wound is that the camera froze right after my outdoor shred at UNLV, which was one of my better sessions this fall, and included my entries for Mike Lloyd's contests:

I managed to hit entries for both contests on Sunday, in outdoor light. I forgot my charging cord for the camera, so I haven't reviewed either yet for cleanliness. I guess its possible they're both bad, but I feel optimistic I can use both. I'll know for sure when I get home Wednesday. I might even have enough good footage to make a vid for the xmas calendar. .

If the camera had frozen up one session later, all I'd be losing is some blurry indoor footage. Instead, I might lose outdoor footage of Gatesman and myself, which is definitely a lot more valuable to me. Urgh. I just can't believe I paid so much to get a camera that craps out on me every 2 months. Shittiness.

In better news, Worlds 2015 has officially been announced! I have already asked for time off from work that week, and that request was approved. So now I just need to buy tickets, book accomodations, and start planning out a routine. Given the location, I have to assume that most of the strong Finns and Czechs will be there, which likely will make it harder to make it to Finals. That said, if I stay health and train my butt off, I think it'd be a good goal for me to shoot to make Finals again, and try for a better finish than last time (6th place). I think that'd be an ambitious, but achievable goal.

Red Husted recently interviewed me for BSOS.IT. We had a good conversation, and they added some nice photos and videos to the final interview. I was very happy with how it turned out. Thanks Red and Asmus! http://bsos.it/?p=387

[Kylescook]

I read the BSOS.IT interview this morning. Definitely a good read!

[C-Fan]

My GoPro froze up on me when I came back from my last trip.

B. Sink more money into the unreliable POS by buying a SD card converter, so I can try and save the footage from the camera using the card directly, then do the firmware update.

Went this route, and thankfully it worked. Dropped $15 to get 2 converters, plus an 8GB card. The extra card might come in handy if I'm filming a lot at a tournament, or maybe if I need to send footage to Ivan, but for the most part I probably won't use it. I was just relieved I was able to pull the footage off my camera, since that UNLV session had a lot of good stuff.

On a related note, I confirmed that both my filmed entries for Mike Lloyd's end of year contest were clean. I was particularly happy about the BSOS sick 3. The only disappointment that came from reviewing the footage, was finding out I didn't hit one trick as well as I thought. It's the first trick in this video of outtakes, which I thought I got a deeper duck on:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3tDw8fsX4Y[/youtube]

The third clip in that video was when a couple cute girls walked by and complimented my shredding, so I went for a long (boring) run where I talked up Evan's ability.

But yeah, it looks like I have enough footage to make a decent video of me and Evan, so I'm going to work on that for the xmas calendar.

In other good news, the weather was surprisingly warm today. I got in a pretty good session at my usual outdoor spot, but I haven't reviewed the footage yet. In the meantime, I'm just glad I got to make a post with some video in it, and that I didn't lose that UNLV footage.

[Asmus]

I am happy that you liked how the interview turned out. I enjoyed reading it a lot.

Stop posting in that Team Fortress thread and do the NBA thread already dammit.

[C-Fan]

In the office today. Don't think I've worked the Friday after Thanksgiving in the past 4 years or so. It's not bad...super quiet, and I've been able to get some work done. Only bummer is that the weather is awesome outside, so I'm missing a potential shred. At least tomorrow is supposed to be equally nice, so hopefully I can get an outdoor shred then.

Not a ton new on my end. I committed to make one video for the Joulukalenteri this year, but the plan right now is to submit two. I already submitted one, so I feel the pressure is off. It'd be nice to contribute two though. I don't think I've submitted a Joulukalenteri video since my Evan special 3 years ago:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_wLgO4gHxw[/youtube]

Maybe I shouldn't have posted that...the editing is way better in that than anything I'm making this year.

I entered Mike Lloyd's end of the year contest, but one of my entries wasn't usable since I bobbled the handcatch. That was tough to take, since the bag came straight up off the combo, and it was an easy catch. It wasn't like I was lunging for it or anything; I just suck at handcatches. I also don't think I can hit that combo again, which sucks because I think it would have been a contender. Since I hit the actual combo well though, I put it in one of the Joulukalenteri videos.

Weather should be good on Saturday, so I'm hoping this weekend I'll be able to get in an outdoor shred, and also finish editing my 2nd Joulukalenteri video. No new footage lately, so I'll leave you with my shred from last Thanksgiving:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISUq6nYYv8A[/youtube]

[C-Fan]

I've been quiet on the blog front, because things have been quiet for me footbag-wise lately. I've actually played 6 of the past 8 days, including the past 4 days in a row, but they've all been light sessions. I'll go to the gym after work, warm up, hit Polini's LOTD, spend 10 minutes working on flip furious or ripstein, warm down, then go home. I barely break a sweat, but I'm convinced even these light sessions help me sleep better at night. Hopefully they also prevent me from getting too rusty over winter. That said, my plan is to give my body a bit of a rest over the next few months, since I want to train for 2015 Worlds super duper hard.

Not a ton new on my end. I committed to make one video for the Joulukalenteri this year, but the plan right now is to submit two.

I ended up submitting 2 videos, and was pretty happy with both. Originally I planned on just submitting some footage so Polini would have some variety to work with, but once I started editing seriously, it kinda sucked me in. My first Joulukalenteri video was released today. The concept is that it's a tribute to Sunil and his section from the classic 2002 video, Where the Ripwalk Ends. I got the idea over the fall, when I watched his section before going out for a shred. I spent that whole session trying to play like Sunil did in that video, which was a fun challenge. That footage sat on my computer for a couple months, as I shifted my focus shortly after that session to preparing for East Coasts. When Polini announced there'd be a Joulukalenteri this year, I decided to dedicate one more session to playing like Sunil, and set to work on editing it up. Shout out to Ivan for helping me get the music track, and the original video in MP4 format so I could intersplice some of the original WTRE footage into it.

Here's how it turned out: I was pretty happy with my edit. Shredwise, the only thing I regret is that I couldn't hit any flip furious for the video. During the yellow shirt session, I footed flip fury, but didn't hit anything usable. I'm hoping that in a couple months I'll have made some progress on flip furious, but I couldn't get anything in time for this video. Other than that, it was fun playing outside of my comfort zone. Specifically, it was a good challenge to use fewer ducks, and also to try and step out of hard tricks on my flip stepping side. I was probably proudest of the HPD-bedwetter-pixie paradon combo, since the last 2 tricks are flip, and both transitions are hard for me. I was a little surprised that people reacted so strongly to the Clownface at the end. I've put out at least 4 videos this summer with a Clownface in it, including Ivan's video which was pretty heavily promoted and watched. Though I suppose the structure of the Sunil tribute emphasized the trick more than my other videos with Clownfaces in them.

In other footbag news, it sounds like my next two work trips are to Sacramento in January, and Vegas in February. Hoping I can link up with my footbag friends when I go on those trips. I'll also be in Tucson over Christmas to see family, so hopefully I can get some outdoor shreds in while I'm out there.

I'll close out with this classy image Paul made in response to my Sunil video:

[C-Fan]

December continues to be quiet on the footbag side. I've been good about playing regularly, but I'm not pushing my game hard. A typical session this month is going to the gym, warming up, hitting the LOTD, doing a few runs, and then stretching down for a long time while reading a book. I've hit the first 8 LOTDs without too much trouble, getting 6 of them both sides, and I think 5 BSOS. Of course, the first 8 days are the easiest, so the real test is going to be how many of the remaining 16 I can get. I haven't tried gravedigger-spinning ducking clipper, but I can see that being pretty challenging.

My second video for the Joulukalenteri was released today. That means that in the first 9 days of the 2014 calendar I've contributed 2 videos, and appeared in 3. Definitely feels nice to participate this year. Here's my second video:
That was a fun one to put together. The footage is from a single session from last month, minutes after I got off the plane and Evan picked me up. I wasn't sure it'd be warm enough for us to play outside, but it was actually pretty nice in the sunlight. Playing in long sleeves was the right move for me, as it kept me warm but didn't get in the way of the bag. The final combo was the highlight of the session for me, since I had never hit a 6 out of genesis before, much less used genesis in a beast. I was so excited to hit it that I jumped up in excitement as I tried to handcatch the bag, which made me slap the bag into the air. So not a perfect seal, but I'm counting it. I definitely feel lucky I got to shred and hang out with Evan so much this year.

In big life news, which is tangentially related to footbag, we're buying a house. It feels crazy even just typing it, much less going through with the whole process. We hired a realtor last month and have looked at some houses in the past couple weeks, but this past weekend we found one we really liked, and made an offer. They accepted, so now we're navigating the process of getting it inspected, and hopefully moving in 5 weeks from now. Assuming everything goes well. Which it should, but its my nature to not celebrate it until the ink is dry on everything and we've moved our stuff in. Very crazy and surreal. If it happens, maybe I can talk Haley into letting me host a tournament and have people crash here. One thing at a time though.

[Asmus]

Very crazy and surreal. If it happens, maybe I can talk Haley into letting me host a tournament and have people crash here. One thing at a time though.

You might be all grown up, but you still think like a footbagger!

I have enjoyed your participation in the Chris Calendar. That beast was sick.

Did you see this?:

Ken: The shirt you are playing in is a Besiktas jersey, right? I also mainly play in a Turkish football team jersey, from the team Fenerbache.

I still owe you a soft drink from when we were in Prague. I will buy you a Cola Turka when you come to Copenhagen

[C-Fan]

Yes, that's a Besiktas Cola jersey. I bought it this summer because the material wicks nicely, I liked the colors, it had a number on the back, and it was $4. I couldn't say no. I had never heard of the player (Filip Holosko), but the name looked cool too. Turns out the guy can bend it like Beckham:
I'm pretty stoked for Worlds this coming summer. Now I just need to start planning the trip out, lock down tickets, etc. At least now I know to budget for one less beverage on the trip. Thanks Asmus!

I'm continuing to do my light schedule of footbag still. Evening sessions in the gym where I work on LOTD, then stretch. If the weather is good this weekend though, I may try and film outside. If I do, I need to remember that I'm not in peak shape anymore, so I shouldn't get frustrated if I can't hit my harder stuff.

The LOTDs this year have been fun. I feel like my game doesn't line up well with Nick's game, so that's made it a good challenge for me. I don't do a lot of blink/swirl/zooming/flapper so working on the LOTDs has pushed me to try for some stuff outside my comfort zone. I think my favorite one so far was the gyro blink-atom. I had never hit gyro blink before, so it was fun to enter that session with the goals of:

1. learn to do gyro blink
2. hit one that's good enough to atom smasher out of

Last year I only got 11 of the LOTD links, so this year I'm hoping to get more. I'm at 10 of 10 so far, and the 11th combo sounds do-able, but from now on out I wouldn't be surprised if they get really weird. It's like Nick's getting revenge on me for our HORSE game at NOLA Jam! In any case, even if I don't hit a lot more of the remaining LOTDs at least it's been a good excuse to go to the gym and not be a total slob in December.

Here's my latest LOTD video:

[Derek]

So far, you've been in my favorite videos. You'll get past your 11, I believe. Another record I was thinking about attempting is Pixie op Pick-up, if you want to go ahead and smash on that Crazy amazing news about the casa, hope all goes well.