When I think about the many benefits that I receive by exercising everyday, I mostly think in terms of improved health and fitness. And while doing research about daily exercise and the physical benefits, I realized that there are many great reasons to exercise, that are specifically related to improving my work performance.
Exercise has many positive mental benefits: reducing stress and anxiety, improved focus, better mood, increased energy, and better sleep quality!
Every one of these mental benefits translates to better performance at work. When exercise reduces my stress and anxiety, I go to work more relaxed and calm, and enjoy my interactions with co-workers and clients even more than usual! When exercise improves my focus, I'm better able to efficiently complete the tasks at hand and helps me to innovate effectively! And when exercise improves my sleep quality, I arrive at work more alert and feel rested throughout the day!
I exercise everyday, and I have since I turned 40, over 8 years ago. It has had a positive effect on my work and my family life. Consider pushing yourself to break a sweat every day! It is amazing what you might accomplish!
Here is a video showing off what I have accomplished over the last 3000 days of exercising everyday.
Even the US Government has done research to prove the benefits of exercise in the workplace. Read more about it here.
One of my clients was telling me this story about a woman who he would see playing tennis every day. When he finally asked her why she plays tennis so much, she said "I play every day because I'm 86 and if I don't play today, I'm not sure Ill be able to play tomorrow."
She has it right! We all need to embrace the mobility we have, and not take it for granted. Someday it might not be there.
"Use it or Lose it!" This has been a theme of the videos I publish and a core part of my message to others. I could let myself go and play a couple of times a week... but if I do, I'll spend two days catching up for every day I take off. So I choose to play every day, and to allow NO EXCUSES to get out of it.
Everyone needs 30 minutes of vigorous exercise daily, but for athletes and especially Footbag freestylers, muscle memory has a short term memory loss problem. If I take a day off I'm afraid I'll lose my edge. That's why I play everyday. Join me!
I love to hear these stories about other people who are also exercising every day... it keeps me motivated.
Here is what the Mayo Clinic says about exercising every day...
http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-living/fitness/in-depth/exercise/art-20048389
Today is 2822 days in a row shredding for me. And I know I'm not the only one!
Practice update: Today I hit some unique seamless tricks, like Fairy (phobic) Gyro Miraging Seamless Juggle and Legbeater Seamless Juggle. Also Spinning Symposium Butterfly seamless Juggle both sides too. BSOS. Still getting better every day. Thanks for all your support!
Here is what the Mayo Clinic says about exercising every day...
http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-living/fitness/in-depth/exercise/art-20048389
I started this blog when I was at 1000 days into my ongoing commitment to shred Footbag freestyle every single day, I am now at 2071 days in a row. When I look at that in context with my life, where I'm 16,681 days old, it means that for the most recent 12% of my life, I've been playing Footbag every day! That is 12.41% to be exact. Find what you love to do and play everyday!
I believe I have proven my hypothesis that as we 'age', we need to continue using our physical assets on a daily basis to keep the mind fresh and the body young. Use it or lose it! I have been fortunate to keep this going for a long time, and I am in the best shape of my life and I have all the energy I need to fully enjoy my life.
I start my jams with a set of 'warm-ups' which are getting a bit repetitive, so I've been mixing them up a bit lately. I feel the need for some direction, as I've been hooked on 'new-trick development' for a while. Then I tend to get stuck working on a trick category, and new versions of tricks because I've also proven that old dogs can learn new tricks! I look forward to more structure, so this is what I've come up with...
I've decided to create 1-minute and 2-minute performances set to music, and I want to find the perfect music for each. I'm calling out for song suggestions. If you've always wanted to do a performance to a certain song, but never got it done, let me know what song that is.
I miss the process of Performance Development. I miss 'song selection,' I miss the creative process of finding the right tricks to fit with the song. I miss making playlists of my music segments, and I miss practicing them. It really gives me direction. What is great about this time around is that I don't have to do it in secrecy!
My next blog post will be the official call for music. Please visit my youtube channel to see any of the 170+ footbag videos there, http://www.youtube.com/footbagenlightener.
Shred notes: I've been working alot on juggling. Seamless juggle, from clippers, butterflies, spinning butterflies, working on flipside, also Vortex squared on both sides, and blurry drifters and paradox torques both sides. 2070 days in a row today.
I suppose this is pretty basic stuff, but I wanted to make a general rule of toe about this one.
HIGH IMPACT TRICKS ARE ALWAYS HIGH ENERGY TRICKS, but not necessarily the other way around.
When I think about high impact tricks, I go right to Symposium tricks. These tricks are probably the classic example of high impact, just about every one of them, except the little ones. They require one leg to be both the dexterity leg and the landing leg. And honestly, I am still reprogramming my brain to look at atomic and nuclear tricks as medium impact tricks. Why is this important? When I am training daily, I don't want to do 100% high impact tricks because of, well, the impact factor. I know better than that. I want to do plenty of high energy tricks to get the most out of my workouts, and I know that while high energy is a pre-requisite for high impact tricks, I need to keep a balance that keeps me at a high level of mastery of my high impact tricks, while still advancing on the many other high energy tricks.
I have started to notice that when I get to my frontside strings during warmup, that it jumpstarts my warmup period and gets me super warm, super fast. Also, all this extra training of my frontside tricks has been providing the high energy usually associated with Dexterity tricks, and giving me a better cardio workout.
High energy tricks are not necessarily high impact, and the important thing to remember is to differentiate the tricks appropriately in your minds accounting of the tricks. For example, in the context of Atomic tricks, it looks high impact, but is really high energy.
See ya!
-enlightener
Some High Impact examples:
Shred notes: First half of Feb. 2011... I'm at 1528 days in a row today. Already shredded, but plan a 2nd session later. I have hit Gyro Zulu Butterfly on both sides on film, and Gyro Zulu Whirl on both sides but try as I might, I haven't hit it on film yet. I have gotten way more comfortable with Symposium (no plant) Blurry Torques. Also Shooting DaDa's and Symposium Blurry Drifters. Lots of film to go through. I have been trying to film in vertical frame because it shows the whole body in the frame from closer up, yet I still struggle with framing and lighting. It is weird, but when I stand in front of the camera when it is on its side, I have a harder time predicting the right place to stand. The double secret location hallway has fluorescent lighting and I don't have the cash for the proper portable lighting system. The Kodak ZX1 does great in good light, so I really should focus on getting some good lights to offset the fluorescents and see if that works.
My footbag career has spanned several decades, and I'm working on several more. I went to world footbag championships for 20 years consecutively starting in 1985, took 2nd many times, finally won it in 1999 and had a blast in the process. I have had many players who have inspired me to turn up level of my game which takes me in a new direction. Starting with Andy Linder, Kenny Shults and Rippin' Rick Reese who got me truly addicted to freestyle and got my game going, then later there was Ryan Mulroney and Vasek who made me light that internal fire and step it up to the next level. Watching Ryan come up and dominate the shred game, it really made me train hard and took me to the world title. In the past 10 years, after Ryan disappeared and Vasek took over. I have learned different lessons from all of them, and little lessons on the side from my other competitors like Eric Wulff (ducking), Jonathan Schneider (dragons) and too many others to mention. They all had these things in common: They innovated because they could see the possibilities beyond the current reality. They pushed themselves to attain great things and focused on their strengths.
Thanks to all the greats, and to all my friends who make this sport what it is!
Here is a movie I just made with the new movie software on a mac, and even though I didn't spend more than 20 minutes making this one, I think it is one of my better ones. Enjoy!
Shred notes: 10/22/10
I've crossed the 1400 day mark. Looking at end of January for 1500 days, but first it will be December 19th as my 4 year mark. I've been interspersing long strings in with new trick development. In small spaces it is easy to go to new tricks. Gotta consciously work on long strings. I've been filming with a new Kodak Zx1 but not happy with the quality. Been publishing crazy videos very frequently. Using my phone and computer alternatively to publish. Getting confused on which footage is published and what is not. Sooooo much footage. Gotta go through and keyword it.
I came across these tricks that I have visited before, but never got on tape or even discussed them that I can remember. The Barfly has always been a challenge for me to do solidly, and I have been working on them for literally 20 years now. I've been doing a lot of Rakes lately, especially cross-body Rakes. This past week, my peanut butter got into my chocolate and I brought Barfly together with Cross Body Rake and made a BarFlake. I know this has another street name, as I know it has been done before, but because I live in a vacuum I don't know what it is called. I didn't stop there, I have also done versions starting with Fairy, Pixie, Stepping-opp, Stepping-same and spinning. All on this film, and with slo-mo to reveal the thinness. All kind of thin, they look good from above. It is especially noticeable since I had to use an up-angle when I was filming.
I also hit a Blur that has an extra Symposium Mirage before the toe pickup. Also in slo-mo. It was suggested that this is a stepping paratoxic (backside symposium) blur, I don't know what to call it, which is why I put it online for peer review.
Shred notes: 1st two weeks of August...
Played through my injury from last week of July, it is no longer effecting me at all, thank goodness. I've been obsessed with these new tricks. Been lucky with weather! Totally lucky, like cloudy-icky mornings turning to sun literally as I arrive at the Mammoth Springs Training Center. Mosquitos everywhere near the river, but not on the asphalt playing surface that I utilize. I'm going to Funtastik and I have been getting some NICE run-thru's of my routine! I'm gonna be ready again this year and I look forward to a great event!
Life is teaching me a lesson about pain. How serious it is when someone is in constant pain, please take them seriously and try to make them comfortable. It is mentally debilitating. It effects my every moment. I work hard, I play hard and I love every minute of it. My intention is to perform my best at every moment, in every aspect of my life. To lead by example. Even in the best of situations, it is difficult to stay in the moment. When pain like this is present, it makes its way to the foreground and hampers my best efforts at excellent performance. It distracts me from my focus on performing well in the moment, and makes me just try to survive it.
I tried to take a short nap before the Argentina vs. Mexico world cup game today, and I thought about how the pain is amplified by landing on my right foot. Really, it was the shoe constricting against the swollen toe that causes the pain. I was in so much pain when I was at work this week, standing all day in tight fitting shoes. I would wear sandals to work, but the new rules there technically keep me from that and I think it is unsafe to wear open toe shoes when riding a xootr anyway. It occurred to me that regardless of how it looks, I need to relieve my pain at work so just standing there doesn't make me cringe in pain, I need to convert a pair of old Rod Laver shoes into Genzu modified Rod Lavers. I looked up Daryl's blog and found the picture that changed my day.
Today I modified a pair of old blue Rod Laver's so the right toe is open like Daryl 'Genzu' Genz's. It worked, an orthopedic success! Especially since the only shoes I ever wear are Rod Laver tennis shoes. I did a footbag demo at Taste of Chicago with Alex and Valeria, and I made it through the two hours with the microphone, and another hour kicking with the CIC guys by Buckingham Fountain. I got some good footage and will publish a movie soon. It was hard to set the footbag off of my right toe because of the intensity of effect caused by my toe curl, but I could figure that out if I had to. My infection did get worse and the swelling went up, but I was able to bear it. I hope this infection passes, because living with pain like this is unfathomable. I can't imagine what it must be like for someone with real problems like Cancer, Diabetes or heart disease. Ouch.
-enlightener
Shred notes: 6/27/10
Just glad to be shredding. Infection still getting worse. Little white dot showed up in the middle of the swollen part. Playing on grass sucks, but when doing youth outreach, you can't be picky. Not ideal, but probably less impact on my toe too.
I have had a videocamera since 1988, thanks to being inspired by Jay Moldenhauer, Greg Nelson, then later Steve Kremer and Josh Casey... also Dennis Jones. I was at the beginning of my footbag career and I saw how Jay was videotaping the finals of events and the sideline shredding as well. They were using it as an effective learning tool and accelerating their footbag game exponentially. It was amazing. I purchased the exact same camera that Jay had, it was a sony hi-8 camera (and I have TONS of footage to convert from the old days, just not enough room to store it, time to do it, or money to buy the thingy that converts it to digital) that served me well for many years. I never get credited with this, but I MADE THE FIRST SHRED VIDEO EVER! I put together the best footage I had of routines and side-shreds and made about fifty copies onto videotapes and I gave them away for free with labels on them that encouraged the recipients to make more copies and give them to their friends. No copyrights, free distribution. I was spreading the word. I still am.
Videotaping has evolved since those days, youtube has made free distribution into a fun pastime. Footbag has gotten more complicated, even faster action and still uses a very small ball that is sometimes hard to see. Here are some tips for making videos of footbag:
1. Get a good camera. HD quality and a wide angle lens is helpful. See comparison of footage between a point and shoot and my new Smartest Phone from a built-in HD video camera (starts with an "i") below, just released into the wild 2 days ago.
2. Pay attention to lighting. When shooting outdoors in direct sunlight, try to keep the sun behind you. It is better to film on a cloudy day than in direct sunlight because the diffused light that the clouds let through is more evenly distributed across your subjects. If you are shooting indoors there can be many shadows depending on your lighting style. In a conference room, the fluorescent lights provide a good diffused light experience, but sometimes causes a kind of harmonic resonance when the frame rate of the camera exactly matches the flashing-cycle rates of the fluorescent lights, plus for reasons of cleanliness, conference rooms tend to have very busy patterns in the carpeting which make it bad for playing and filming. In a garage, you are going to need lights coming from as many angles as possible to reduce the shadowing, but it can get pretty bad if you only have a few lights. If you have a shadowing problem indoors, try to stay with your back to the best light.
3. Learn to stabilize your shots, limit movement if you don't have a self-stabilizing camera or use a tripod.
4. Get the right angle for the right shot. Best is a straight on shot from just below hip level with the sun behind you, or good ambient diffused light indoors. I use a lot of upward angles because I don't have a tripod with me most of the time and I balance the camera on the ground. Angles from above are a nice novelty, but really don't give a good idea of what is going on.
5. Don't shoot from too far away. If you use the optical zoom to 'get closer', be aware it will amplify any movements you make, so if I had to use optical zoom, I would always recommend a tripod.
6. Turn OFF digital zoom, it is useless. Seriously, turn it off! Now!
7. When I am taping, I keep recording until I get something worth keeping, then I stop and restart the recording. This makes reviewing the footage go MUCH faster because rather than reviewing every second of footage, I go to the end of each clip and trim away everything before it to save space and get rid of unusable footage ASAP.
8. When using a tripod, I find that the mini ones are easy to carry around, but are hard to set up to get the right angle, only because I have to pretty much lay on the ground to see what my image frame is capturing. So for the mini tripods, I prefer to set them up on a pedestal to make it easy to check the frame field. Ideally, a medium size tripod puts the camera at the right height to get a good shot and be easy to set-up. I prefer to set my tripod at about 2 feet high.
9. If you are putting your camera on the ground to film, I suggest a slight upward angle. On my Canon point-and-shoot camera, I use the hand strap under the front of the camera which props it up at the right angle so I don't see a lot of ground in front of my feet. On my new Phone4, I had to rest it in my extra shirt to angle it back, but I could not see through the viewing side, I had to guess at what my camera was capturing, but it turned out to be useable.
10. Get the right distance from the player. All cameras are different. Think about how you are going to use your footage. If you are doing a static tripod shot, the closer you are to the players the less range the players have to move around in, and you risk losing good footage when players drift out of frame. On the other hand, if you put it too far away, you lose the necessary detail and sometimes can't see the footbag because it is so small.
11. Choose a solid backdrop when possible. If you have trees, or random objects in the background, the viewers may not be able to see the footbag as it travels across the foreground. So if you are videotaping, and you have any 'say' in the process of picking a location, try to find something as close to a solid color for your background.
Comparison of video camera footage for your review:
Canon Powershot SD630 (about 4 years old) with 640x480 frame size 24fps:
Video from my new phone camera which is HD 720p at 30fps (this popular camera phone was released on June 24, 2010):
(make sure to click on the HD version at bottom right) It seems that youtube knocks my videos down to half quality. Not sure why.
Footbag Net match - Finals from last weekends Windy City Cup 2010 on old Canon camera:
For videotaping footbag net, you really need two cameras that are timestamped together. I would generally like to keep the camera from moving left to right, so a long shot from either end of the court would be great for most of the match, but use the camera that is along the net line to do close ups of the arial dog fights that are the 'meat' of the matches.
Shred notes: Week of June 25th, 2010
I have had a hangnail for the past week that is killing me. Hurts like hell every time I step down on my right foot, but it hasn't stopped me from shredding every day. It seems to be getting worse, which means that on Monday if it hasn't gotten better, I'll be going to the doctor, which are words rarely uttered from my mouth. Either way, we have a Kick for Health youth outreach today and tomorrow at Taste of Chicago from 4-6 and plenty of time to shred then. Been skooling routines a lot. Jay Claffey and his daughter came by the other day to visit me during my lunch shred, that was awesome too.
In my most recent post, I focused on being 'in' the moment. Mostly because upon further analysis, the moment is all we have. In life and in footbag, being focused on the moment, while having an outline for the future and a fond recollection of the past is what makes a good person great!
When I can complete a trick that has 5 or 6 elements and follow it immediately with a series of other tricks that are similarly difficult, I know that I have mastered that moment, that I was in 'the Zone.'
To reiterate my recent postulation, I feel that my experience with footbag where I am constantly challenging myself to focus as many elements of difficulty into each moment, has helped me to realize that some of my greatest moments are when I'm just enjoying the beach with my family, eating dinner with my parents. Different situations require varying types of mastery, but recognizing that it is the moment I am in, rather than the moment that is (in theory) coming up, which is truly valuable.
I ask myself as often as possible, how can I master 'this' moment? I find myself going through this mental exercise more frequently during my conscious hours... In the morning, how can I be more efficient in getting things done around the kitchen while still preparing for work and enjoying it? How do I get to work? How can I out-perform at work? How do I get the most value from my play time (shred sessions)? What is the implications of my commuting decisions? How can I be the best dad when I'm around the house in the evenings and weekends?
I think living in the moment, allows me to live without regrets. So I find myself asking myself, "Self? How can I be 'in the Zone' in every aspect of my life?"
-enlightener
Shred notes: from Thurs, June 17th
Kicked at Mammoth Springs Training Center and worked mostly on routines for the past 2 days. It has been fun. Nothing new, but still hitting the barfly ending in cross body rake in many iterations daily. Skool it baby!
If a footbag freestyle performance isn't a great example of 'living in the moment', then I don't know what is. From a philosophical perspective all we really have this moment right now. The past is a memory and the future is merely conjecture. Time is really the passing of a series of moments in rapid succession.
A footbag freestyle trick takes place in about a second and for most people, that is the equivalent of a moment. We cram as much action as we can into the moment that a trick takes place in. Think about it, whether the footbag simply goes from one toe catch or another, or in between delays there were three distinctly unique leg dexterity motions, a half turn and a moving toe pickup like a rake, the same amount of time has passed. The same moment could be a boring toe delay or it could be a blurriest barfly cross body rake, and then followed by another moment of brilliance, and another. To achieve multiple motions in a single moment is to master that moment, and I get to do this every single day!
I believe that my life is enriched by this principle. So many people worry about the future and regret the past. It is important to make plans to conquer the future, and to fondly remember the past. Through footbag freestyle, I have really improved my ability to really kick back and enjoy this moment, the only moment that I am guaranteed, the moment I am in right now!
-enlightener
Shred notes for June 2010:
Have been shredding at Great America, Brookfield Zoo, Mammoth Springs Shred Center, Rehm Pool, my double-secret hallway indoor location and at Oak Street Beach. We've been having a nice summer so far. Also hit some killer stuff recently... I have been going through my routine obsessively every day at the end of my shred, but also on alternating days (mostly) I work exclusively on the routine. What is it called when you do a barfly ending in a cross-body rake? Well I hit that in blurriest, and spinning varieties. And on film too. Spent a day just working on threading tricks... hit threading juggles and threaded blurs. Hit Phobic spinning xross body rake, and a butterfly version of it too. I have a hell of a video to put together with updates on what I've been working on for the entire spring. I love this sport!
Yesterday, I hit Nuclear Paradox Twirl and Fairy Symp. Mirage on film, many times. I am not sure that never before in the world of footbag freestyle (hacky-sack) has anyone hit Nuclear Paradox Twirl, NOR am I certain that it deserves the Paradox (but I know it should)... just note it is the opp twirl I do from the side I nuclear set on. So L clipper set, L let nuclear set, R leg Twirl ending in L clipper again. I think symposium might be possible too.
Sometimes I wonder if I have hit this move before. I'm going to search my archives here and my notes otherwise, but I remember Allan H. hitting this before. Somehow this feels familiar, but I love it!
See ya!
Scott 'Enlightener' Davidson
Shred notes: 5/13/10
Today I nearly hit what I can only describe as: "Pixie set, backside symposium toe blur" Battery ran out, and I had only gotten close, not quite hit it. I think I need to finish the 2nd dex faster to get time for the pickup. If I obsess for too long on any one trick, I risk injury so I have to move on for now.
Note: Epic Fail technical error due to 'fat fingers' on iphone accidentally causing premature publication of a blog post that was barely a draft. Then no known reason, when I try to type in my browser view of blogger.com on my iphone, it makes every character a capital letter, very strange. Sorry.
I won the 1999 World Footbag Championships, Footbag Freestyle Singles event. I have only seen my performance twice since then, it is as if no one recorded it.
We did have a great recording done with professional cameras, but that footage got lost immediately after the event, during a move, and I have never seen it. So I got in touch with our videographer by chance through facebook, and he finally tracked down the footage and is putting it in the mail so I can get it up on YouTube. I can't wait. I really can't wait.
Shred notes: 5/11/10 - Skooled routines today. Really got into it after about a half hour warmup. The past few days have been productive... Nuclear Paradox Twirl and Fairy Symposium Mirage. The first is a new trick as far as I can tell, and the 2nd is new to me.
I practice everyday, and this I believe leads me to innovation in such a natural fluid process that it seems to happen frequently! I'm very happy about this.
Over the past few days, I've been practicing some concepts that are new to me. Someone told me that one of these concepts was "Muted" but I don't think he was correct after looking at other videos on youtube that mention Muted tricks.
What I have been doing is best described as: "Landing and catching at the same time on the same foot ending a trick" which I would rather call "Solo" or "Soloing" as verb.
I hit Gyro Muted (Solo) DLO and Phobic Muted (Solo) Mirage and tons of other muted (Solo) family members.
I also combined Zoid sets (otherwise may be known as Rooted) with Muted (solo) tricks, on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcciFv21gzA
Another day, another shred... maybe for most people, but today I definitely innovated!
Today I forgot to bring shred shorts to Alex's TKD tourney, so I had to shred in board shorts. It's not devastating, but it is a departure from my normal strategy of doing anything I damn well feel like doing. Not to mention that I am playing in public so I have to do longer strings.
Playing in long shorts keeps me from doing most tricks from the ripwalk family so alot of my bread and butter moves get blocked because the area that represents the upward path the Footbag has to take is clogged with fabric.
Today in addition to hitting some nice strings I rehashed an old concept... To set tricks with little mini pendulums. I have done this with many trix in the past, osis, torques and DLO's, and today I added swirl to the mix. Sweet.
Shred notes: 4/25/10
long rake strings, pendulum set swirl. Yesterday I hit Muted Gyro DLO and Muted phobic mirage on tape, film will be on YouTube tonight or tomorrow AM.
Bikram Yoga is a vigorous style of yoga done in a room set to 105 degrees fahrenheit. While playing in extreme heat in the summer is a challenge that requires a delicate mix of hydration, training and insanity. Playing in my living room in extreme heat is another thing.
Most people have control over the temperature of their home. I live in a condo where the heat is either on or off. When the heat goes on, without my control, our radiators kick into high gear. And since we live in the bottom unit, all the building pipes are routed through our house. We get double the heat. To top it off, our radiator in the washroom is bleeding steam and totally out of control. It is usually very hot in my home. We typically regulate the heat by opening windows when it becomes unbearable. We call it "Oppressive Heat".
When I shred at home in my living room, I try to time it so I play when the heat is off. However, when I play early morning or sometimes when I get the urge, it is during a hot-cycle. When I play in the extreme heat of my home, I call it Bikram Shredding.
I sure get warm fast in this kind of heat, and while I am unreasonable in my commitment to shred every day, the challenge is to keep playing hard for over an hour in a small space, and to accomplish something great in the process. Sweating profusely in my living room has a down-side though, my 65" TV tends to get drops of sweat on it from my spinning. Oh well, just another thing to clean.
Shred Notes: 2/24/10 Nothing spectacular to speak of. Skooled the hell out of flip-side Blender, felt like Brian McKenzie doing blenders back to back all over the place. This is significant because I have a tendency to pull a Dyno when I intend to do a Blender on my flip. Getting better at the flip Blender. Yeah!
I'm a big fan of getting to work early and getting home early. I don't mind getting up early, I like it. I have a pretty good routine that gets me off to work on time, but still gives me plenty of coffee and time to do the dishes. I rarely kick when I get up early in the morning, but today I did. I am working at a place where I can't be sure to have a place to shred at lunch, so I kicked this morning solidly, and again at lunch for fun. The morning jam sessions feel more like a workout than later in the day, like I am forcing it. Especially the warm up part.
I know that cyclists and runners get up early and do their 'workouts' first thing in the day. There are a couple of reasons why I try to play later in the day when possible. First, I am more comfortable kicking and enjoy it more in late morning. Secondly, when I play with people who come in from out of town, or with local shredders, it is usually later in the afternoon. I wouldn't want to habituate to kicking early, and make afternoon shreds more difficult.
I would rather kick early to keep the rally going, than miss out because of my work location. That is not a good enough excuse.
Shredding early is better than not shredding at all!
In the process of working on Whirr sets, I realized it is the perfect set to do a blender ending in a cross-body sole! Hit it my first two tries. Has anyone hit Blender ending in X-body sole? I call it "Splendor," that is if I have the right to name it. I think it is a perfect name. I'll film it and post it soon. I love this sport.
Shred notes: 2/15/10 Got two jams in today. Skooled the hell out of soliosis, both sides. Small area, living room cluttered, still had some good strings. I don't know what made me do the 2nd session, just felt like it. And as it turned out, that was when I hit the first "Splendor" tricks. Side note, during the second jam, felt the lower back pain I have been getting every morning if I sleep more than 6 hours. Solution, don't sleep more than 6 hours at a time.
I love the Olympics! It is such an open, fun place to be. There is an energy at the Olympics, generated by the atmosphere of internationalism, literally because sports fans from all over the world descend on this single location for the purpose of creating a historical event. It really is something to do. I really wish I could go to more of them.
I often go to the 'tabletop show' of large running and triathalon events to get a dose of this energy. As there is a similar, albeit less intense, 'athlete vibe'. These shows are also a great place to see what companies are sponsoring events, in the pipedream hope that I can get new sponsors for our upcoming events.
There is something about putting that many athletes and fans into a small area which generates the sensation that something great is going to happen. So much more so than when going to a baseball game, or football game.
I want to do a better job of planning for the next Olympics in London 2012. As for any of my friends who are in the Vancouver area, I would say you are CRAZY if you are not spending every spare moment at the Olympic Venues. I am sure there are public indoor areas that would be suitable to shred at. The appreciation we felt from the audiences on the streets in Atlanta '96 was palpable. Shred in public, and what better place to show off at, than the Olympics... where everyone there appreciates athletic talent.
Shred notes: 2/13/10 Almost hit Blazing Twirl today. Also working on my 'swirls' which I always apparently have been doing reverse swirls all this time. I hit Reverse Twirl today too, but it really feels 'the'.
Footbag freestyle is a living workshop on Physics combined with Physiology. Terminal Velocity of a falling object is 9.8 meters per second squared. That is one of the few things I remember from high-school physics class. I don't know why that stuck, but it did. I quote Wikipedia: "An object falling toward the surface of the Earth will fall 9.81 meters (or 32.18 feet) per second faster every second (an acceleration of 9.81 m/s² or 32.18 ft/s²)." I read a few other cool things at wikipedia on this topic, but most of it made my eyes roll into the back of my head.
When I think about how this plays into my footbag game, I am reminded of how I am truly the master of the obvious. Really, footbag players don't have to deal with footbags at Terminal Velocity (for a human, that is about 120mph). We deal in Apex and the beginning part of the 'falling' process. When we set the footbag, we can somewhat control the height of the set by the amount of energy we put into the set, and the Apex is split second when the footbag stops moving in mid air... think about that. Stopped in mid-air, pretty cool. Really, every trick no matter how difficult contains the Upward, Apex and Downward motions. We refer to the motion that starts the whole process as the "Set."
During the Downward portion of the path, the footbag falls at 32.18 feet per second faster... each second! When I think about how that impacts our sport, I am glad I don't EVER kick the footbag over 32 feet high! Even Net players rarely kick it that high, but because of Terminal Velocity our sports are very different. Our brains can compensate for this with enough practice, that is why not everyone can be an outfielder in professional baseball... it is a learned skill. Footbag deals primarily with the first 5 feet of downward acceleration, which tells me that I have had a lot of practice learning about the path of a footbag because almost every set is the same. Ironically though, they are all unique and I dare say that no two sets are the same. The point in space where the footbag is located at any given moment is only accurately portrayed using X, Y and Z coordinates. Even though I have done literally MILLIONS of sets, I don't think any of them were the same.
By my math, after the Apex, a footbag set at four feet would take 1/8 of a second to fall. So while most tricks have a set height of under 4 feet, that means that most of the trick happens VERY quickly after the Apex. It is amazing how many body motions can be put into such a small amount of time. I mean, I love playing and improving, but look at the last two world champions in the sport and how many micro-motions they put into the strings they do. They are truly pushing the edge. Insane.I think I'll stop now, because I am very impressed with myself and all my fellow shredders.
Shred notes: 2/6/10 Hit Blurry Symposium Whirling Cross Body Rake (7 adds) on film (somewhat thin)... hit it on my first try, pre-camera much more solidly. Also hit Blurry Whirling X-Body Rake on both sides in the same string. SWEET! Tons of rake strings today. Raked the hall.
"I've forgotten more tricks than I know!" While this statement is not entirely true, I often struggle with keeping up with myself. I innovate all the time, and part of my process is to blog about it here. It makes my progress somehow seem more concrete and traceable. I can search to find all the instances of a certain trick, people can keep up with my progress even though I basically shred in seclusion, and I can get feedback from my peers. It is pretentious of me to think anyone would want to keep up with me, so my blogging has a dual purpose... I know there are people who do get inspired, and it is always a nice bonus to know I've inspired someone but mostly it is a 'concrete' summary of my accomplishments and failures, which is fully searchable in a way that I very much desire. It is really my diary. A review of my progress. What a great thing. Thank you google for this platform.
I am pretty sure I have hit Phobic Twirl before, and now I can search my blog to see that it has not been mentioned since I started this on my 1000th day of shred. But I am pretty sure I have hit it, now I have to search my YouTube videos because I might have posted it there. This blog lets me tie the information together so I can retrieve it.
Shred notes: 2/1/10 Using new warm-up strings to get warm fast, and really energized from it. Lots of frontside stuff.
