Canberra, Australia via SCL - Daniel Boyle

[boyle]

Yours will be on the next few days. I think I've got it scheduled for Day 6. Very happy with that session, I'm normally happy if I hit one new trick every few weeks, so that was a nice motivation to keep learning some more!

[h0ag3yb3atZ]

loving the calendar so far dude, great work. Looked like you crushed it in that Aussie jam video for sure...I assume we'll meet in Portland in 2017?

[boyle]

I hope so. I would love to go to Portland. I don't think Slovakia is an option as we already have tickets to Vietnam and plans to go to Chile next year, but I would like to go to Worlds every second year.

[boyle]

I feel the answer to a lot of issues in footbag that get brought up on the Facebook group is a curated Youtube channel. I might start doing that once the Joulu finishes, though it sounds like a bit of a pain. I think there is a lot of scope for using Youtube better, in reality we are just sticking things on there, there's not much building of community within youtube (with so much b.s. in the comments, it's not really a surprise).

It was interesting someone listed the "big" footbag entities that have a Youtube channel and sportslashlife was mentioned as one. There is a YT channel, but it's not used so much, it was mainly used just for the tour.

I have a couple of minor injury issues at the moment so I'm glad I got that video out the other day. My whole body is pretty sore actually, but I went and had a game of soccer and I don't think that did me much good. Anyway, up to Day 6 of the calendar, so it's about a quarter of the way through.

I've got a few trips to Sydney over the rest of the month so hoping to get in a kick with some of the guys up there.

[boyle]

Hello pals. I am catching a bus back to Canberra after an express trip to Sydney. Had a good fun day today, which included a kick with Ryan.

I played pretty well, though the runs could have been longer. I hit whirling rev swirl which I have been plugging away at for a while and that was my first time getting it. Got to catch up with a couple of mates and now I am taking it easy and seeing the sun set behind the trees.

That Olav video was insane. No other calendar video had a reaction anything quite like that. I haven't checked yet but I imagine it has the most views.

Calendar is going well, I have the next few days of video ready and I will be back at home to sort things out. It was a little tricky keeping things going in the road.

[boyle]

Hi friends

Have had a lot of positive messages about the calendar and there's been some great videos. We're coming into the back end of it now, so there's some light at the end of the tunnel.

Interesting post from Evan in the Joulukalenteri thread, which pointed out that Jay has this sweet international job (ready about it in his blog) and that Evan has a sweet footbag company (read a bit about that in his blog).

(yeah, Modified is dead, sure).

And he pointed to the European tour as being a key driver for both of them going on to more, though these are two really driven people and it's great to see them going bigger and better.

It is interesting looking back on the tour, and will probably be more interesting some years back down the track. I didn't have a lot planned at the beginning, as to get into the program was pretty well a low percentage bet. (Considering I had applied twice before and not got in), so just getting into the program was the bigger goal, then by the time I was in it was like, oh wow, need to do something with this.

It was (and still is) my dream to create something like a world tour / something like the ATP is in tennis. Obviously time and money constraints wouldn't allow that, though I actually had some ideas based around Chile's games but it was too early in the piece (ie I didn't have any money yet).

I have just done the most recent couple of links for the calendar. Happy with ducking butterfly>vortex and pixie gyro toe>double orbit. Normally I hate the "new" system of naming, but I guess double orbit is a lot better than specifying out-in or in-out.

My last combo of that short session was crispy flux (atomic op osis)>op butterfly swirl. Took a few turns but felt good to get.

This is the first of an 8 day streak of working days, so these quick kicks in the park/late night garage sessions are probably all I am going to get in this coming week. I've footed spinning ducking blender a few times recently. It would be really great to catch that before the year ends.

The year is almost done and we haven't had a nationals this year, which is a little disappointing. I will try and make sure that we have one next year. At least we had a couple of good events in Narooma and the event at Railway Square with the freestyle football guys. The Nationals for freestyle football will be in Sydney this year, so hopefully we can combine something as that should be quite a big event.

And I went to Worlds as well, which has been a big goal of mine. I am so glad that my most recent appearance is not so long in the past, like it was before. Unfortunately I have already written off going to Worlds next year, but I have my heart set on Portland the following year.

I should be finished my teaching degree by there, so I would like that to be like a big celebration. I'm quite interested in trying to line up some kind of mini tour around that time. I have strong doubts I will be able to convince a government to give me some more money, but you never know.

That's enough for today. Another thing I want to hit (I was challenged to 6 years ago and still haven't got it) is whirling swirl x 2. That would make me very happy.

[boyle]

Big wall of text on this page. That's not going to change for this post. There's 14 videos you can watch in the Joulukalenteri thread if you want to see some colours. Speaking of that calendar, today's PipenRocket combo was very well received, I was really stoked on that. When I took on the task of doing it, Phil was one of the first people I wrote to, hoping for the best.

He wrote a few days ago saying he had a short video that Nathan had edited. I was thinking, who's this Nathan, there must be a new player in NZ, forgetting that the famous Pipebomb had been there for like a year already, though I had the feeling he was elsewhere than Christchurch.

So anyway, I get this video and from the description from Phil I'm thinking it will just be a bonus for a day because it will be too short. On watching I said to myself, this is no bonus, this is great. As has been said on the facebook group, to see footage of either of these blokes is great, but both together, and really current - that's just a whole new level.

So I had to chat to Don Pipenberg today, and said he should come to Australia while he is so close, and he said he may just to that next month, and I thought that would be pretty good. So hopefully that works out, I might try and take a few days off work, hopefully it will tie in with when Narooma is on.

I just hit atomsmasher>pixie paradon while at work. I'm hoping that will be a combo in the Link of the Day, but I have some doubts on my ability to get in on camera. I did a good bike ride/bushwalk today, taking in 3 hills. I had a goal at the start of the year to get to 20, and I was on 19 before this journey.

I am actually a bit confused if one hill I went to is the same I went to early in the year, I came up on it from the opposite side and it was totally overgrown, which is a bit different to how it looked at the start of the year, so I might have to knock my count down from 22 to 21, but that's ok because it's still over the goal. Some of the recent ones have been quite small, but they've got a trig point on the top, so I think that counts. It's just a personal goal anyway, so I can set whatever I want to count.

One thing that has worked very, very well and saved me a lot of hassle for the posts on the site is that I got a plugin for Wordpress that sets the image from a video in the post to be the Featured Image of the post and that has just been such a timesaver. People have really enjoyed the little writeups on the site each day, and that image makes it all easy.

It's also pleasant for me seeing numbers like "200" or so each day on the views on the website, rather than "3". When we were doing the site more seriously (when we had the funding and I had a couple of people helping me), getting 100 would generally be a good day. When I was working on the newspaper site there in Chile, to get 1000 would be generally a good day, so I'm pretty happy with these numbers. Once the calendar is over, I'll do a bit of a look at how many views on the site, how much on Youtube etc.

I have this plugin called Embedly, and they used to send me an email saying exactly how much people were watching different videos on the site, but I don't get that anymore. I was looking on their site and I think you have to pay for that now.

I think having this kind of activity is really important if I want to do any kind of projects in the future. A pet project I might undertake next year is to put up all the other Joulukalenteri calendars for the old years. Because they're not easy to find at this moment, unless you go to the thread on the Facebook group and find the particular thread that discusses exactly that.

Another late night at work, not sure if I will get in a kick tonight, I'm pretty tired, but it always is so energising to have a bit of time to myself, hit some cool tricks, listen to some songs and drink some beer. So we'll see how I feel once I get home.

[boyle]

The Joulukalenteri is coming to a close and I am certainly glad of that. It has been a good run of videos, but I'm tired of doing it. That was great the comment from Evan saying that the future is looking up after watching these videos.

This is exactly what he said.

This list definitely has some unforgettable videos. I'm more excited than ever for the future. =)

Impressive work, Everyone!

Yesterday at work I managed to injure my thumb. It really feels like I have just put it out and had someone smash down a hammer as hard as they could on it. We had a high chair to put together and one of my colleagues had put one part in the wrong way. I was trying to fix it up and did things a bit too quickly which ended up being a key error.

Anyway, on to my playing. I have been trying to do the Link of the Day each day, which means the combos are fresh from that day, and also means sometimes I'm not able to hit the planned link, but that's ok too.

I went to Sydney on the weekend, and will go back again tomorrow, which will be the third time in two weeks, which is a bit excessive. I had a short session with Caroline on return, and a good combo I hit off camera was ripped warrior>spinning symp mirage.

Hopefully will be able to get in some kicking while we're in Sydney, but I guess it will be mainly eating Christmas feasts to begin with.

It's been an interesting experience to run the calendar, at the beginning I was basically just waiting for people to send in their videos and that has work pretty well. The only ones I really chased, and it wouldn't be such a chase, more of a message saying, hey why don't you make a video for the calendar, were from Phil and Taishi and I really enjoyed both of them.

[boyle]

All done.

A big relief to have the calendar finished. It turned out pretty well. I am on the bus to Sydney for the third time in two weeks, and that's when it was always difficult.

Some really good videos. I was pretty pleased that the Narooma video was one of the most watched. Honza having a competition within his video was a great way to finish it off. Like most of the videos, that's just how it came.

I had a short session with Caroline across the road from the bus station. She had a couple if really good long runs and I hit my final links for lotd. Have been in contact with the Sydney guys so hopefully there's a few sessions to be had. We are around for 5 days so there should be some good times.

[isirc10]

Thank you, thank you, thank you for making December a month to remember.
My favorites in no particular order:
Olav, Nathan+Phil, Polini, Aleksi

Very smooth presentation and I enjoyed the little tidbits that came with each video. Nicely done!

[boyle]

Thanks Ivan. It's great to keep that community spirit going, and also awesome to read people like David and Jorden taking time from their day to watch some of these moments.

171 tiltless for me just now. That's my record and probably the best I will get for the year. I was hoping to crack 200, but that's my first time past 150, so happy with that milestone.

I will be setting some footbag goals for next year as part of my general resolutions. I am going to Vietnam next year and Johnny Murphy lives in Ho Chi Ming. I would really like to get him out of retirement, so that could be fun.

I am not sure of footbag related projects for next year, I would like to go into more schools, which is relevant to my degree.

All will be revealed in due time...

[Tjuggles]

Thank you much for organizing the calendar this Dan. It was really great.

I am going to Vietnam next year and Johnny Murphy lives in Ho Chi Ming. I would really like to get him out of retirement, so that could be fun.

I kicked with a couple of weeks ago, well hacked really, but I reckon if you got him a pair of lavers he would be really tempted. He is still on point.

[boyle]

That's grest to hear, even a bit of hack would be good fun. Do you have any plans for an Australian visit while you're so close by?

[Tjuggles]

That's grest to hear, even a bit of hack would be good fun. Do you have any plans for an Australian visit while you're so close by?

Yeah, hack with him is definitely fun.

No plans to visit Australia...until you put it in my head. I feel like it might be a waste not to. In the near future it likely won't happen, but maybe within 6 months or so?

[boyle]

You can get quite cheap flights from Jetstar and the like from time to time. Let me know if you do make it over some time.

[boats]

Thanks for running the Christmas Calendar this year! You did an awesome job

[boyle]

Great work on the link of the day tricks. Normally I get to about day 5 and it gets too hard for me, then something pops up close to the end that I can do. I wanted people to be able to stick at it longer this year.

Speaking of the calendar, looks like this is the top 10, according to views on the Sport/Life site. Olav, Milan, Aleksi, Narooma, Matrix, Evan, Jakub, Nick P, Nathan Bonslaver, Garden City (Red Rocket/Pipebomb). I'm going to do up a post which has all the videos in it, but I'm not going to do that right now.

I'm still feeling a strong relief that the calendar is over. It's a lot of work, but I feel I did a good job of it. I was a bit concerned about the link of the day, because people who have done it before have a much better trick range than me, but there's some challenging links in there. I also like the fact that I just went out and hit the tricks that day (most of the time), rather than having a big stock from one session. I actually went and did the bulk session like 3 different times, but I didn't like the feeling.

A couple of links that I was not able to hit that would have been cool were:

matador>torque (with my flip nuke) - I actually didn't get any nuclear tricks in there.
matador>spinning whirl (that was with the strong side)
spinal tap (atomic ss torque)>ducking ps mirage

Can't think of any more from the top of my head, but that last one would be really cool.

I stole a couple of combos I read about from other blogs or saw in the videos.

Double spinning clipper>ripwalk
spinning clipper>whirling swirl

We're back from Sydney, just came straight back to work. Didn't get to meet any other footbag heads, but got to go to the beach the last two days and that was really great.

[boyle]

The family friendly fireworks have just popped off so it must be getting towards the end of the year. This has been a pretty good footbag year for me.

This are some things of note.

- Had Juho and Dexter stay at my house. Great to have international guests. We also had Caroline staying with us for a large chunk of the year so there was a lot of footbag related conversation.
- We revived the Narooma Jam after a few years off. Really happy about that one. I also put out that video (almost a year later), as part of the calendar
- I ran the Joulukalenteri. Really makes you appreciate the effort others have put into it in the past, and how much work it takes.
- Put on a footbag/freestyle event at Railway Square YHA. That is something I've talked about doing for years, so it was great to pull it off. The event was fun. I have become more involved with the freestyle football community which I think can lead to some great opportunities.
- Competed at Worlds. It was great to go again after a long absence and overall I was happy with my competing. My best results came in circle, where I reached the second round after coming into my qualifying pool as the lowest seed.
- Did a demonstration at the Socceroos match in Canberra. This was one visible benefit of getting involved with the freestyle football scene. It was a mix of ball and bag and went quite well despite some really terrible weather.

So those are all pretty good. I'm a bit disappointed to not do a Nationals this year, but obviously it's too late now. Narooma should happen next year though not sure what date as the normal time is not going to work. Nathan Pipenberg will hopefully be making a visit, that would be really cool.

In terms of my game, as per usual, I need to get a bit more balance on some tricks. My flip pdx whirl and double down tricks are key culprits, I would be able to get a lot bigger longer runs if I could link things with those tricks all in a row.

I think these were my goals last year, but they still stand.

200 tiltless
100 guiltless
20 tripless
5 fearless

There are a couple of 7s that seem within reach, so that would be really cool to tick one of them off in the new year.

I went swimming in the ocean the other day. I'm not so sure how far it was, maybe like 400m total, but I have pulled up very sore. I was carrying Nicolas on my shoulders quite a lot today so that's added to that too. I have been feeling quite tired in the body overall the last couple of days.

[boyle]

My first post for the year. Haven't really had a proper session yet, but have been kicking. We walked up Mt Majura on Jan 1. Nicolas was very impressive in walking a whole chunk of the hill by himself. I want to beat my score for "mountains" from last year, which was 21. There were some suspiciously small hills in there (in the 620m range), which I mainly did to get to my target of 20 for the year.

Majura is the highest within the metropolitan ACT (there are higher further out of town). It is also the closest to my house, so I go there reasonably regularly. At a guess I would say I went up Majura 7 times last year and Mt Ainslie (also close to our house) maybe about the same. I did both in the one go twice as well.

It is something that I have been getting quite into in this last year and I know there are really good communities based around it, but I'm not sure if I really want to get involved. I enjoy a bit of time to myself on those walks and have done some good ride/walk combos in the last couple of months. A friend of mine was back in Canberra for about a month and he is right into it, so it was great doing a few walks with him.

Hopefully if that Pipenberg visit comes to fruition, we can do a walk or two.

Anyway, enough walky-talky.

New combo today, pixie ducking osis>blurry whirl. Was from my weaker pixie. I was also trying pixie diving osis into the same, but that wasn't quite working.

41 contact guiltless run today, the most I've done this year. It was very early in my quick dinner break session so was happy with that. I'm feeling a lot of soreness from carrying Nicolas on my back, so hopefully in coming days I can feel full strength and have a good and proper kick. I know Caroline has been working a lot so hopefully catch up with her in coming days.

[boyle]

Good little short session in my lunch break today. Hit my first 5>5>5 (s) of the year and nearly equalled my fearless record

had

phoenix>blurry whirl>scorps
darkwalk>spinning ducking butterfly>spinning ducking osis with tomahawk coming off my foot. That's the same combo that I did to get 4, I think I can extend that out, maybe with a pdx blender in between those last two tricks. I am hoping I can tick off that 5 fearless early on in the year and go for some more. I think I have enough little combos of 5 add tricks that I can join together to hopefully boost that up a bit more.

Still feeling pretty sore and still not had a proper session but if I'm getting those kind of tricks in the quick runs, then that's a good start.