:Japan )

Last Sunday I had my last chance at getting ranked this season. To be ranked you must meet certain time goals on 2 of 3 possible tests: 500m, 1000m, 1500m. Naturally most people select 500m and 1000m, I’m no exception. This season there were 3 possible testing dates, each about a month apart. The first test, I was still getting used to the ice again and healing up from my summer injury, failed both trials. The second chance I attempted after a previous nights nomikai (intraoffice drinking party). Between the remnants of that and not lacing my skates up tight enough, I made a disasterous run of the 500m, falling several times, and was full of self-doubt on the 1000m — failed both trials. In the week leading up to the third and final test of the season, I made a new personal best on the 500m at 1:05 so I was feeling quite good going into the last test. Had been training pretty diligently, my ankle had healed completely, and I had learned to pay specific attention to how my skates were laced up. The goal was to obtain E rank (the lowest sadly) which is 500m in 1:10 and 1000m in 2:30.

Dispite an unexpectedly strong morning wind on that Sunday I was able to make the 500m trial in 1:07. The 1000m proved to still be elusive as I had a terrible start from the line and then fell down on the 2nd to last curve. I got back up as quickly as I could to finish in 2:45.

The goal this season was to get the cross-over on the corners perfected but as this season is beginning to draw to a close I still can’t say I feel too much closer to that goal. I feel like most of the beginning of this season was dedicated to building back up the muscle and endurance that I lost due to inactivity and injury in the summer. Nevertheless I’m happy that I was finally able to show some progress from last season’s best time of 1:10.

Today was supposed to be normal day and it pretty much was up until the very end where it sparked with moments of high adrenaline.

My first incident happened at the end of speed skating practice. The coach had his nephew and me lined up ready to toe the blue start line. He was in the middle of wondering if I could match my 1′10″ out loud when suddenly he yelled “あぶない！”　(abunai — danger, watch out!) Before I could even turn to look, my feet were swept from under me and I was falling backwards. Luckily for my head, past years of karate practice gave me the reflex to put my chin down as I fall. Double lucky when I looked down to see unknown dude’s skates had barely missed poking me in the ribs. It’s very rare for those kind of accidents to happen on this rink especially with high school students who I almost never see fall, which is good because they go super fast. In the end I thought I got out without a scratch, but as I was getting off the ice and putting away my skates I saw 1.5 cm of the very back of my right skate’s blade had been chipped off Coach says it’s not really necessary for skating but I was hoping my $500 investment would last relatively unscathed for a little longer.

To wind down the day I thought I would get some dinner at the local super market, take it home and relax while eating it. Those plans were ruined when I was taking a back alley to get home and slid a little in the curve due to the fact it had become complete ice. Surely you’ve seen in movies and TV shows where cars are able to teeter totter on edge of some steep hill? Well, my car kept sliding until the front left wheel had started down the enbankment and my back right wheel was about 2 feet off the ground. In that moment I didn’t even want to breathe for fear of giving it that last nudge to finish a 3 foot drop into someone’s rice patty. After about 15 minutes of thinking, checking stability, and futilely trying to reverse out, I was able to get out of the car without causing any more trouble. However to make matters worse I hadn’t brought my cell phone with me. So I had to run about 1.5 km to my house, got the phone, and started making calls. Initially I thought maybe there was a chance for two people to get the car out by using one person’s extra weight over the back wheel in the air but after Mehan arrived, we both decided that idea was a little too dangerous.

Luckily about that time my coach friend called me back and after explaining the situation to him in broken Japanese, he was able to get some his friends together with an SUV and tow cable and pulled me out of the ditch. The only thing I can give myself credit for is not over reacting once in the slide and getting my wheels pointed in such a way that I stopped the car from rolling futher down the hill, or worse rolling over laterally down the enbankment. Once pulled back on to solid ground, my car ran fine and it does appear to have any body damage. I’ll have to give a more thorough check once there is light to check it with. Nevertheless tomorrow I will be facing having the piss taken out of me yet again by the office. And now finally at 10:40 pm I get to eat the dinner I initially bought at 8:30

Had my first full day at an elementary school today (I usually only get to visit and elementary school about 5 times a month). It turned out being a pretty kickass day. The teachers were all really nice and I was able to find quite a lot things to talk about with them, surprised me even. They even invited me out for dinner sometime! I haven’t gotten that offer from any of the schools I visit once in the 5 months I’ve been here. Sometimes I began to wonder if these kids were really having fun with the alphabet and simple introductions (most of them seemed to know it before I taught) but they all seemed to get a kick out of it. Teaching the letter V is always fun because they don’t have that sound in their syllabary so it always comes out like a B or Bu-i. So I get to teaching them about holding their upper lip so they can’t make the B sounds. Always gets a lot of laughs. (more…)

New time is 1′ 25′’ almost had 1′ 20′’ on another trial but fell down just before finishing.

So far it’s pretty easy to shave off many seconds as I get better at the form and my muscles get used to the work load but I’m expecting a plateau soon. My goal is to make the 50″ mark without having to buy one of those skin tight suits these people wear. To me it kinda stops being a hobby when you start buying all the professional gear.

My new record time for 500m speed skate track is 1′ 32′’ 6 seconds better than last week but still a far cry from the 50′’ goal.

–Edit
The world record for the 500m is in the range of 34-35″ There is a 12 year old on the team I’m practicing with that is skating it in about 42″ In fact the first time I attempted to go 500m the coach challenged be me to do it faster than the previously mentioned kid’s 1000m time of 1′ 35″… couldn’t do it. The 50″ goal above is for a “Level C badge” I don’t know what the 1000m time requirement for that is.