I would like to start off this post with a quick apology about missing last weeks post. Ok got that out of the way that was easy as pie. No but seriously I got a few threats asking kindly that I remember to update every Sunday like I promised. So yes I am back. So here goes...and how is pie easy? I couldn't make one.
Where did I leave off? Injury status: Nelly - Cleared to play ASAP (leg) Flemming - Swinging hard again (shoulder) Me - 95% (leg) Schøler - out til '10 (knees) Søe - Out til '10 (broken foot)
So 3/5 coming back to the grind is good news. This is really good news because we are leaving for Stockholm Friday morning for pool play for the Nordic Cup. The Nordic Cup is a small tournament featuring Denmark, Norway, and Sweden's best teams. We have a tough draw in pool play with Nyborg top club from Norway and Sollentuna 3rd or 4th ranked club from Sweden. Considering Marienlyst (my team) won Denmark last year that means two #1 seeds are in one pool. Which doesn't make much sense but we are up for the challenge regardless. Not only do we have fresh bodies coming back, but we signed a 6'9" middle from Australia and he landed in Denmark today. This move really solidifies our team and adds much needed depth at the middle position which has been plagued by injuries and absences due to prior commitments and agreements. Adding another full time player will make practices that much more competitive and will really I think make us the team to beat in Denmark if we weren't already.
Apart from the daily practices, miles of biking, and regular weight lifting sessions I decided to start swimming at the local pool. I thought it could be fun and a low impact way to loosen the muscles up and get into good shape. I bought a 30 entry pass and figured I would go once a week and that pretty much covers the season here. Christa, Nelly, and Joe all came with and seemed game for the plan of once a week at the svømmehal (swim hal). It is a nice facility nothing fancy, a 25yd pool with 6 lanes and a springboard diving board. Naturally our eyes lit up at the sight of the board and we ripped a few jumps before we got into actually swimming. We neded up knocking out 24 laps of mostly freestyle with a few breaststroke laps mixed in. It was a really good work out. Swimming is hard! Week two is tomorrow.
On the volley front we have actually been playing some pretty good volleyball. I can't remember the last set that we dropped. We have been starting to click on the pins (volleyball set either front or back all the way to the antennae) and everyone is starting to feel what their rolls on the team are and really performing accordingly. It has been a relief to finally see some of these things falling into place. By no means are we even close to our potential yet but all I'm saying is you can start to see what we could really look like come Feb-Apr and it is exciting.
We had to set up the city again this week (see previous post). It wasn't as bad as I remembered the first time around we got a bit smarter and made it easier on ourselves but the work really isn't fun at all. But I only had to do that Monday. Today I got to travel with the team that I coach on Tuesday mornings at the Hjallese School. Today they played in a small tournament in Bremming a city to the west about an hour and a half from Odense. This was the first time that they were actually playing real matches since the whole time that I have had them so they were excited to play. They are a really fun group of 15-16 yr old girls. I started using some of the little Danish sentences I've learned and it made the day pretty entertaining. I had all of them laughing they must think I'm crazy. But they really surprised me with how well they played today. To actually see them focus all of their attention to the game was really cool to see. They won both matches the first 3-0 and the second 3-1. The tournament was supposed to have more teams but from what I heard a lot of the teams backed out when they heard the winning team would get a bid to play a tournament in China. I guess if you really weren't going to consider going then there was no point in playing in the tournament. So since we won we got the bid to China. I guess they are going to have a meeting and decide if they can afford it. The principal of the school was asking me about if I would be free in July for the tournament. If they buy the ticket I am there. That would be incredible China is on the travel list for sure!
Friday morning we are driving to Stockholm leaving at 6 am and playing Saturday and Sunday in pool play. Probably coming back directly after I would imagine so I will be gone all weekend. I will have my computer so hit me up on Skype anyone at home can call me for free at (708) 572 - 4499. Leave a message if I'm not there, yea it's fancy so what!
Also here is my address for anyone who was curious:
New Address:
Christiansgade 79 stuen tv.
5000 Odense, Denmark
Currently Rocking:
Music Albums- Paramore - Brand New Eyes/ Pearl Jam - Backspacer/ Mew - No More Stories Are Told Today, I'm Sorry, They Washed Away/ David Gray - Draw the Line/ Delta Spirit - Ode to Sunshine/ Artic Monkeys - Humbug/ Blitzen Trapper - Black River Killer/ AFI - Crash Love
TV Shows- 30 Rock/ Top Gear (uk)/ Miami or LA Ink/ Kitchen Nightmares
Book-Harry Potter 5
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Dropping Like Flies!
It seems like everyone on the squad is getting injured these days. Pretty soon we will have to forfeit matches. We have two outside hitters out for an extended period of time with bad knees and a broken foot. Nelly has some foot issues and has been limited at practice recently and sat out the match this Saturday. Flemming our stud middle has a shoulder injury not too sure how severe it is but he also was held out this Saturday. I am slowly creeping off of the injury report. My leg has been improving a lot thank goodness. It still aches and is not 100 percent so I am occasionally limited at practice but it is way better than it has been. So hopefully the worst is behind me with this stupid leg. I had a small scare while taking down the "city" last week. One of the heavy walls that we set up kind of fell and knocked my knee and bruised it pretty bad. I was unable to practice the next day but luckily it was fine the following day. Phew. So hopefully we get some of these bodies back in order because it is really hurting our practices and slowing our development as a team for sure.
I was really busy last week doing some work for the club so I missed last weeks post. Last Sunday we took down the city. Took 6 guys about 6 hours to do it all. Thought it would be much longer but it went pretty fast. It is frustrating setting up all this stuff in the gym because the system is pretty silly. The walls are super heavy. The majority of the walls are two meters long and about 7 feet tall. They have steel framing and solid plywood in the interior. One of these suckers probably weighs 100 pounds at least. The walls are at least 25 years old so there has to be a modern system that just makes much more sense and is easier to set up. Plastic maybe? Just thinking about having to set up the gym again in December for the next one makes my head hurt.
More work was done Monday-Thursday. We delivered phone books for 4 hours each of the days. We have some designated routes on a map that we had to knock out. This work is fine not to difficult. We got some food on all of the days so that was nice.
This Saturday we had a home match against KSV a team from Copenhagen. They weren't such a strong team so we expected a quick 3-0 win. Like I said before we had some injuries so our bench was pretty much depleted so luckily we had this easy match to rest some of the guys. We did win 3-0 but by no means would I say we played well. Our passing and serving was a bit rocky and we didn't have that much intensity on the court. It was a pretty boring game really. KSV never really pushed us. I was satisfied with my play for the most part. I have got my serve going. Got some aces and killed all but two of my sets I think. My leg held up well I didn't even really think about it at all during the match. Legs felt pretty fresh so all in all I was happy.
After the match I went over to Christa's aunt and uncles for her cousins birthday party. Met some more of the family and had some nice food. It was a nice party. Toward the end of the party the Denmark vs Sweden World Cup qualification game started. Denmark just needed two more points to qualify. So basically a win solidified thier bid to the World Cup. The game was dead locked 0-0 through 78 minutes when finally Denmark scored. That was all the scoring for the match and Denmark won and got its bid. It was pretty exciting much more so than the live game I went to. So it was watchable for me. After the soccer match I headed back to the gym. All of the guys were still there following the volleyball match having some food, some beverages, and watching DK vs SWE match. I got there around 10 I want to say. The øl (beer) was flowing pretty consistantly since I had left for the party so everyone was having a great time by then. We ended up just staying there all night and played some games had some laughs and then called it a night.
Today I just have been relaxing for the most part. Read a little bit on the Kindle. FYI the Kindle has an international edition that was just released! Missed out on that which stinks. I also did some Rosetta Stone with Christa helping me with some of the pronunciation. I feel like I learned a lot in the two hours that I was practicing. Got through 10 lessons and my pronunciation is coming around. It's still super hard to say brød (bread) and rød (red). I'll get it just need some practice making those sounds! After I knocked out some RS football was on and I caught a few of the games on the internet. Bears have a bye week so that is a bummer. My fantasy team took a beating so I lost interest in this weeks games pretty quick. Might watch some of the afternoon games or might watch Inglorious Basterds. Just got that so I think I'll have to do that.
This week we don't have any work so it should be a more peaceful week. Might get a few workouts in over at CCS and get ready for the match this week. All for now. Hej hej miss everyone!
I was really busy last week doing some work for the club so I missed last weeks post. Last Sunday we took down the city. Took 6 guys about 6 hours to do it all. Thought it would be much longer but it went pretty fast. It is frustrating setting up all this stuff in the gym because the system is pretty silly. The walls are super heavy. The majority of the walls are two meters long and about 7 feet tall. They have steel framing and solid plywood in the interior. One of these suckers probably weighs 100 pounds at least. The walls are at least 25 years old so there has to be a modern system that just makes much more sense and is easier to set up. Plastic maybe? Just thinking about having to set up the gym again in December for the next one makes my head hurt.
More work was done Monday-Thursday. We delivered phone books for 4 hours each of the days. We have some designated routes on a map that we had to knock out. This work is fine not to difficult. We got some food on all of the days so that was nice.
This Saturday we had a home match against KSV a team from Copenhagen. They weren't such a strong team so we expected a quick 3-0 win. Like I said before we had some injuries so our bench was pretty much depleted so luckily we had this easy match to rest some of the guys. We did win 3-0 but by no means would I say we played well. Our passing and serving was a bit rocky and we didn't have that much intensity on the court. It was a pretty boring game really. KSV never really pushed us. I was satisfied with my play for the most part. I have got my serve going. Got some aces and killed all but two of my sets I think. My leg held up well I didn't even really think about it at all during the match. Legs felt pretty fresh so all in all I was happy.
After the match I went over to Christa's aunt and uncles for her cousins birthday party. Met some more of the family and had some nice food. It was a nice party. Toward the end of the party the Denmark vs Sweden World Cup qualification game started. Denmark just needed two more points to qualify. So basically a win solidified thier bid to the World Cup. The game was dead locked 0-0 through 78 minutes when finally Denmark scored. That was all the scoring for the match and Denmark won and got its bid. It was pretty exciting much more so than the live game I went to. So it was watchable for me. After the soccer match I headed back to the gym. All of the guys were still there following the volleyball match having some food, some beverages, and watching DK vs SWE match. I got there around 10 I want to say. The øl (beer) was flowing pretty consistantly since I had left for the party so everyone was having a great time by then. We ended up just staying there all night and played some games had some laughs and then called it a night.
Today I just have been relaxing for the most part. Read a little bit on the Kindle. FYI the Kindle has an international edition that was just released! Missed out on that which stinks. I also did some Rosetta Stone with Christa helping me with some of the pronunciation. I feel like I learned a lot in the two hours that I was practicing. Got through 10 lessons and my pronunciation is coming around. It's still super hard to say brød (bread) and rød (red). I'll get it just need some practice making those sounds! After I knocked out some RS football was on and I caught a few of the games on the internet. Bears have a bye week so that is a bummer. My fantasy team took a beating so I lost interest in this weeks games pretty quick. Might watch some of the afternoon games or might watch Inglorious Basterds. Just got that so I think I'll have to do that.
This week we don't have any work so it should be a more peaceful week. Might get a few workouts in over at CCS and get ready for the match this week. All for now. Hej hej miss everyone!
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