Tough Road Back!

This year of training was quite possibly the most difficult of my career. You take two years off, the issues with my body, and add to that a full time job (as a middle school PE & Health teacher) and you have a season of training that will have you questioning why you train.

The shortened version of my daily schedule looks like this.

6:15 am Wake Up
6:30am Out the door to Basehor-Linwood Middle School (Great place to be!)
7:00am Arrive at School
7:05am On a Physical Education Day - Set up gym for Lesson, Health Day - Prep for Lesson
7:50am 1st HOUR starts
2:55pm 8th HOUR ends
3:00pm Clean up classroom or Gym
3:15 - 3:30 Leave for Home
4:00pm - Let Dogs out, Grab a Snack
4:15pm - Off to my workout
4:30pm - Warm-Up
4:50pm - Start Throwing portion of workout
5:30-6:00pm - Head to weightroom
7:00pm - Head to Sauna or Home, if I am tired.
Bed time ranges, this year, between 7:30pm and 10:00pm. It really depended on the night, stress the workout, etc

Repeat day 2 and day 3 no workout. Repeat, Repeat, Repeat. There were a lot of nights this year, that I got to 4:15 and off to practice didn't happen due to fatigue. This kind of schedule isn't ideal for being a great teacher, a great athlete or a great husband. And that is why I struggled with desire to continue to do track.

In February this year, I nearly quit! I was continuing to have issues with both of my knees, I had bulged a disc in my low back and trying to get back into throwing shape was not happening. I felt like I was getting farther and farther away from my goal, returning to the World Championships and Olympics. I sat down with my wife and discussed my options. I could quit right now (Feb) and just walk away or I could wait until May and give myself a chance to see if I can still throw competitively. I really wanted to just stop, but I didn't train for 6 months to not see how I would do in a competition. I decided to make my decision on May 1st. The reason I did this, was to give myself a chance to do at least one meet, Kansas Relays.

April came around and I was still having issues with injuries. I had only throw a few times in between mid-March and Kansas Relays. About a week out from KU Relays, I was able to start throwing again. My first good practice in two and a half years came three days before Kansas Relays. Maybe I'm back?

I decided to rock the pink and the blue one more time. For those of you who don't know what the "pink and blues" are, they are the best uniform in NCAA athletics. Many people question why an athlete would want to wear fuschia. However, there have been many great NCAA and Olympic athletes that have worn them. To drop a couple of them, Bill Mills (Olympic Gold - 1960 10,000m) and Al Oerter (4x Olympic Gold Medalist - Discus). Why wouldn't you want to wear something that one of the greatest throwers of all-time wore? I wore, because of the pride in KU that I have and maybe there was a little magic let in that old Jersey.

My Series of throws was unreal! My first competitive throw in Two years was 79.31m! Insane! That is good enough for "B" Standard for the world championship. The rest of the day looked like this...
79.31m, 81.96m, 74.41m 75.60m 78.31m FOUL

That's right 81.96m. That was 4cm off of qualifying for the world championships (if it was after May 19th - opening of qualification period for Athletics Canada).

So, basically, I had to continue throwing. How could I quit, when I had just thrown my best opening throw in my career. Later in this season, I won my 9th Canadian Championship and decided to compete in Canada the remainder of the summer. I competed in the 1st Annual National Track League in Canada. To shorten this blog, I competed in 5 Meets (in two and a half weeks), the last won being the best.

Canadian Nationals - 77.46m
Edmonton - Cancelled because of rain
Vancouver - 79.51m
Victoria - 73.78m
Halifax - 79.43m

Toronto - 84.81m Canadian National Record!!!

Actually, I though Toronto would be the last meet of my career. I needed to throw 79.50m or better to qualify for the world championships in Korea. If I didn't do that I was finished and could begin my coaching career. I was mentally ready to be finished and I told myself that it is ok if I am done. Just when you think there isn't a hope and you just don't care, you find something in you that blows your mind. My third throw flew and I knew it was good, but didn't know how good. 84.81m!!! Canadian National Record! World Qualifier! #8 World Ranking. And more than enough reason for me to believe that I can be one of the top javelin throwers in the world at the world championships and Olympics

There were many times this year that I wanted to quit. There are even times now, I question why I am still doing this, but the simple answer is that I love this sport and I don't feel like I have accomplished all that I am capable of.