Zen and the Art of Speedskating

In the morning, effort on the ice.

I like this image, Long Tracker Liam Ortega is followed by National LT/ST team member Ryan Bedford, Derek “I’m just trying to keep in shape” Parra, and good guy Travis Jayner.

I am quite a bit bigger than Derek, and we were paired together in a relay, and Derek was making huge grunting sounds (joking) when it was his turn to push me. I replied that speedskaters need more upper body work. Relays are so much fun.

later that afternoon-

That which does not melt me makes me stronger-

Morning on the ice, afternoon riding your bike in crazy hot weather, it never fails to feel weird. However, at least it’s a “dry heat”.

What would happen if one combined these two images, fire+ice+a speedskater on a bike. I think it might look something like this-

This is Rochester speedskating team/coach/organizer Jim Cornell toughing it out on the bike leg of the Lake Placid Ironman triathlon. It poured rain all day long. Thanks to Marty Haire for the photo.

When Jim skates sick fast times this winter at world masters allaround champs in Norway, this is one of the moments he earned it.

6 Comments »
Filed under: from home

Every subculture has it’s own unique & quirky ways to get a laugh. Until this past month, I was completely ignorant of this particular method of self expression. The short track Quick-Tip.

First of all, if you are unfamiliar with what a Quick-Tip is, here is an image of our best known short tracker, in the final corner of a world cup short track race chasing two Koreans.

Notice how at top speed, a short tracker puts his left hand down on the ice, for those who do this hundreds of times every time they train, you can eventually wear out the fingertips of your gloves. For this reason, many truly fast short tracker use “ET finger-like” glue-on plastic tips for their gloves.

Here was the first pair I noticed- these belong to a Korean skater, training in Utah, who we know as “Sky”. She is about a third my size (really), and as I was skating behind her one day, I noticed 5 perfect Korean flags looking up at me.

Once I started looking for them, funky quick tips are EVERYWHERE among the elite short track crowd. Here are Nathaniel’s, stating the reason many people are skating here.

Cory Williams is just going for the art effect.

Patrick, whose gloves are wet from the snow & ice buildup after a hard training session…

Tucker Fredricks, showing the name written on his heart, and incidentally, fingertips.

Is it a bird? is it a plane? no it’s Tony Sergeant, goofing around during an obscenely early hour of the morning.

In my estimation, this is the most impressive pair of industrial strength quick tips I saw in my brief glance at the subject. This is national short track team member Jordan Malone.

Note the matching helmet, Jordan MAKES these in his garage, and sells them.

These looks so bombproof I bet Jordan could handle Kryptonite with them.

5 Comments »
Filed under: from home

My mom & a few other good friends have emailed me, asking “are you ok? Your blog is silent!”

Before I get to that, here are some images:

The ice at the Utah Oval has been laid this past week, here is what it looked like on Friday-

And finally, today, it was skatable! Yay!

Here it is on the last few moments before any skate touched it.

It’s pure, clear, and feels like a virginal baseball diamond before spring training begins to tear upon it with frantic cleated intensity.

I shuffled out on the ice in my socks to get this image. I am standing at the 500m start line. Click on the image for a larger one

I’m an extreme night owl who married a morning person, and I do a sport requiring lots of early mornings. If it weren’t for occasional moments like this, I’d consider mornings a huge ripoff.

My training mix right now is technically focused short track, maximum strength focused lifting, and bike racing for a nice dash of brutality.

On this 3 hour mountain bike ride, I could not get that song “fields of gold” out of my head. Of course the terrain had something to do with it, downtown Salt Lake is in the distance.

Cycling is a solid fitness base for skating. In another one of my two dozen semi-finished posts that will probably never see the light of day, I wrote about the “speedskaters hillclimb” that about 30 athletes took on.

Here is April Medley hammering up a relentless grade. Does she have a grimace of effort? a smile that the finish is just around the corner? Or is it a mystery?

Her best friend Ashley, fighting the switchbacks. The incomparable Teri Willingham shot many photos at the event and the huge party afterwards (thanks Don for letting your house be overwhelmed by skaters!)

I take back every nasty & doubting thing I have ever said before about short track. I finally have some control, but not nearly as much as studs like Matt & Anthony.

It’s surprising how much short track seems to improve everything else. It’s like this activity seems to supercharge the bodies’ capacity to “do”.

The national team long trackers are also doing some short track. Brent Aussprung has just moved out to Utah, to join the national sprint team (he has a very nice website, by the way) and his folks were briefly out here.

This photo would have been perfect, Brent skating along, his parents just over his shoulder, the Utah sun reaching in the windows. However I made one mistake- The skater is the identically dressed Tucker Fredericks. Oops.

Originally the knife was the skaters body, the fork & spoon were where the blades are & Eric Krann was explaining some points of weight transfer technique over dinner.

and then I had to add snow (salt) and then some comment about skating on gravel in lake placid (the pepper), and then heaps of splenda to represent the artificial ice in salt lake…

Then a glass of water was knocked over and chunks of ice scattered everywhere, and that became the oval at Butte. The whole table was in stitches.

It was one of those weird, skater moments that 99.9% of Humanity would just not get.

So, how I started this post was to answer the question where have I been?

I’m exhausted, utterly and completely crushed beyond caring. Why? Here is the list:

1. Work has been extremely intense, professionally very promising, but emotionally intense.

2. Morning short track plus a full work day plus a second workout takes a lot out of me

3. Bike races are HARD, lovely, fun, but taking away my last grams of strength

4. I am still writing posts, and photographing, but I am so tired much of the time, I just can’t “finish” them. It’s not training tired, it’s just that there is too much “going on” kind of tired.

5. Some stuff I seem to be writing these days is a tad too personal for this space.

6. Oddly enough, watching my wife ripen like a watermelon (Jess is six months pregnant now) has not added to my exhaustion, it’s absolutely fascinating to see your partner go through this & it must be profoundly weird to experience.

I think, 3 months from now, I will have even more reasons to be tired.

All this said, I skated long track for the first time this season, and felt absolutely astonishingly good, go figure.

12 Comments »
Filed under: from home

Thoughts to contemplate in Chris’ T-shirt, early in the morning, as the muscles loosen up & the day begins with some fast laps on the frozen hamster wheel.

For many years, when it comes to short track I used to agree with Ashley’s t-shirt though-

Short track always seemed like you had to be nuts to do it.

Maybe it is. But in my first few seasons I had neither the proper equipment nor the hip strength & stability to skate safely. Now I have both, and & even though I am far from an expert, for moments it now feels more like Andrea’s t-shirt.

(this is from the coolest t-shirt company on the planet- Threadless.com)

It’s still dangerous though, as I narrowly missed a potentially nasty crash on this day. But now there is control & fantastic moments to be felt & seen.

Like Robert Lawrence leading the group here. Robert’s skating so strong right now, coach Kooreman had him lead several 25 lap sets. Ouch.

I don’t have a helmet cam, but someday hope to, and I will send pictures of what it feels like to be in this agile & eternal turn.

Till then, this is the closest I can get. A group this size creates a sizeable wind blast as they rip by.

Skating circles & circles & circles on that frozen hamster wheel.

Your perspective within the circle often changes because of other circles.

Like this tungsten wedding ring newly worn on the hand of sprint LT national team member Chris Needham.

Congrats Chris!!

Maybe short track will always truly be a sport for the young and fearless, those who have not gone headfirst into the wall too many times, Chris himself transitioned to long track because of severe short track injuries.

However on those moments when you lean over, touch your hand to the ice, defy normal physics, and rip around that turn, it’s a rush like nothing else.

(note to self: remember- you can’t lean over that far when cornering hard on a bike…)

11 Comments »
Filed under: from home

I have occasionally used the term “allskater” to refer to someone who skates ice & inline. But I think there is a new word needed. And Ryan Bedford is the perfect example of it-

Ryan has long been known as a short tracker, but last year at LT nationals, he finished 6th in the 5k. He went suddenly from being on the National ST team to skating the 10k at the Hamar LT world cup.

There needs to be a word for this, for folks who go back and forth like Trevor Marsicano, Shani Davis, and Ryan. A word that signifies how hard this is to do, even though there seem to be great benefits.

Actually, US skaters of prior generations did tons of short track, with LT being a brief 6 week window of midwinter outdoor racing. Maybe the recent generation has made a great unintentional error in separating the two disciplines.

When I was looking at the list of registered athletes for today’s Sugarhouse criterium bicycle race, there was Ryan on the registration list. Very cool. So maybe there is a new word needed for this as well? Spdscylaterist?

Sugarhouse is a hard race, with 2 hills that when taken repeatedly at race pace, hurt a lot.

It’s a course with such variety, it does not favor any particular kind of rider. It’s a beautiful, sweeping place for a bike race.

Ryan is scary strong on the bike, and about halfway through he got into a breakaway with 2 other riders from the Spin and Canyon cycling teams. Here is Ryan leading on the climb.

I saw this, moved to the front and did a long pull at the head of the pack contributing to the chase. Not because of Ryan neccesarily, but the Spin team races very smart, tactically, and has the strong riders to win races in many ways (note the one on my wheel).

But even when you are strong, this course can hurt. Speedskating takes a lot of mental strength, and so does cycling. Here are two of the Spin guys. Good fellows too.

I felt strong & smooth for the first half hour of the race, but the last 15 minutes of hauling my 195lbs up the hills hurt a good deal.

As the bell was ringing for the final lap, even though the speed was high, it was quite a slamfest for good position, with lots of handlebars banging around.

Somewhere in this maelstrom, two riders slipped away. With my heart machine-gunning along in the high 190’s I did not see the move go.

Final time up the hill, here is the winner cranking away, pain & pleasure mixing together.

Behind him the field sprint is boiling across the road like a pot of boiling water. The cyclists like noodles fighting to stay on top of the froth. A surge up the side of the road & I go from 3rd to 11th place in an instant.

Ryan leads it out, dang he has a motor!

Thanks for Jess for filming, she was cheering so hard, the camera was bouncing, but she caught this moment right before the line. Ryan won the field sprint, 3rd place overall, and I managed to claw back a few places to finish 7th.

But the great thing is, after a race, no matter how you have placed, no matter if it’s Le Tour, or just a local crit with a cool trophy, no matter if you are national team or not, at the end of the day, to your dog, you are still the same guy.

And loved with the intensity & loyalty only a good dog can give. The only difference is that you taste better because you are salty.

11 Comments »
Filed under: RACE DAY