Monday, December 27, 2004
Oh how the mighty have fallen.
Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away, but today I'm not half the man I used to be.
Or something like that.
Today was kind of rough for me. It wasn't the snow - there were still plenty of good places on the mountain (my first run was in knee deep and almost untracked leftover powder). It wasn't the crowds, although there did seem to be many more tourists out than yesterday.
It might have been that today was always going to pale in comparison to yesterday (when I was very happy with my riding, and successfully pushing my limits). It might have been that I was tired after yesterday when I was riding both steeper stuff than normal and a lot more actively than normal (flexing and extending my knees to absorb large bumps in the snow and variable conditions). But mostly I just sucked.
The problems with today were all my fault. It wasn't just that my riding was about as sharp as a butter knife, although that was frustrating. No, the big thing was that I just wasn't motivated to ride well. I just couldn't get my head into the game (or some sporting cliche like that).
I could try and blame it on being tired, or trying to adapt to a different stance, or on any number of things (the sun was in my eyes), but basically, I wasn't trying. For example, the board started to bounce around while I was on my heel edge and rather than trying to fix it by throwing a quick turn or getting properly balanced, I just let it slide out from under me and collapsed onto my bottom. This happened quite a few times. I also didn't feel right turning heel to toe.
I was riding fairly well a lot of the time, but as soon as anything went vaguely wrong I gave up. I tried riding switch on some easy runs (with my right leg at the front for a change) but that really didn't work, and I fell over hard. So I tried to work on my spins. I finally landed a couple of 180s (even if they were ugly, it's better than the 120 degrees I spun the first few times today) off small bumps (accidentally scaring a couple of beginners when I whooped in triumph at not horribly messing things up again). But I was struggling to even think through what I needed to do, and my hands were cold, so I gave it up and came home to do my washing.
All that snowboarding talk basically says that I wasn't riding well, and I didn't care enough to try and ride well. It wasn't a conscious decision to suck, a little goblin snuck into my room last night and stole my motivation.
Rather than struggle through a day of sucking, I went home after about four hours (and this after going up late. It's the advantage of being here all season. I don't feel like I have to spend all-day every-day snowboarding whether I want to or not to make the most of my holiday.
Anyway, I'm counting it as a day on the slopes, because I did snowboard for reasonable length of time (and despite my whining, it didn't all suck) so that makes ten for the season.
Plus, I did my washing, which I've been meaning to do for a couple days now (I was running out of "safety clothes", and actually had to wear my boarding gear while I was waiting for the machines to finish.
Yes, I used the tumble-drier. Hanging wet clothes out in -10 or colder just doesn't seem like a good idea (although clothes will, theoretically, get dry - some sciencey thing that came up in Trivial Pursuit once, and a bona-fide physicist confirmed it).
So, that's about it as far as I am concerned. It's good to know that people are actually reading this (although I'm not confident enough that I have an audience large enough to need a webcounter - rather than the fingers of one hand). So, please please comment, it's not like you need to have anything to say - I usually don't, and look how much I write.
Or something like that.
Today was kind of rough for me. It wasn't the snow - there were still plenty of good places on the mountain (my first run was in knee deep and almost untracked leftover powder). It wasn't the crowds, although there did seem to be many more tourists out than yesterday.
It might have been that today was always going to pale in comparison to yesterday (when I was very happy with my riding, and successfully pushing my limits). It might have been that I was tired after yesterday when I was riding both steeper stuff than normal and a lot more actively than normal (flexing and extending my knees to absorb large bumps in the snow and variable conditions). But mostly I just sucked.
The problems with today were all my fault. It wasn't just that my riding was about as sharp as a butter knife, although that was frustrating. No, the big thing was that I just wasn't motivated to ride well. I just couldn't get my head into the game (or some sporting cliche like that).
I could try and blame it on being tired, or trying to adapt to a different stance, or on any number of things (the sun was in my eyes), but basically, I wasn't trying. For example, the board started to bounce around while I was on my heel edge and rather than trying to fix it by throwing a quick turn or getting properly balanced, I just let it slide out from under me and collapsed onto my bottom. This happened quite a few times. I also didn't feel right turning heel to toe.
I was riding fairly well a lot of the time, but as soon as anything went vaguely wrong I gave up. I tried riding switch on some easy runs (with my right leg at the front for a change) but that really didn't work, and I fell over hard. So I tried to work on my spins. I finally landed a couple of 180s (even if they were ugly, it's better than the 120 degrees I spun the first few times today) off small bumps (accidentally scaring a couple of beginners when I whooped in triumph at not horribly messing things up again). But I was struggling to even think through what I needed to do, and my hands were cold, so I gave it up and came home to do my washing.
All that snowboarding talk basically says that I wasn't riding well, and I didn't care enough to try and ride well. It wasn't a conscious decision to suck, a little goblin snuck into my room last night and stole my motivation.
Rather than struggle through a day of sucking, I went home after about four hours (and this after going up late. It's the advantage of being here all season. I don't feel like I have to spend all-day every-day snowboarding whether I want to or not to make the most of my holiday.
Anyway, I'm counting it as a day on the slopes, because I did snowboard for reasonable length of time (and despite my whining, it didn't all suck) so that makes ten for the season.
Plus, I did my washing, which I've been meaning to do for a couple days now (I was running out of "safety clothes", and actually had to wear my boarding gear while I was waiting for the machines to finish.
Yes, I used the tumble-drier. Hanging wet clothes out in -10 or colder just doesn't seem like a good idea (although clothes will, theoretically, get dry - some sciencey thing that came up in Trivial Pursuit once, and a bona-fide physicist confirmed it).
So, that's about it as far as I am concerned. It's good to know that people are actually reading this (although I'm not confident enough that I have an audience large enough to need a webcounter - rather than the fingers of one hand). So, please please comment, it's not like you need to have anything to say - I usually don't, and look how much I write.
Comments:
<< Home
Of course to get the odd comment you need be shameless in self-promotion, leaving comments on other people's blogs, like this, then with any luck they leave comments on yours, and soon thanks to the wonders of Google soon all the world will beat a path to your door... of at least blog.
Post a Comment
<< Home
