A second sport that starts with “Z”!?

I am standing high atop Horseshoe resort, reflecting back on past Gymineer episodes, and thinking about how so many of them have had me pant-stainingly-nervous in the moments leading up to great adventure. “They’ve all worked out before” I tell myself, as I climb into a giant beach ball and get ready to be thrown down a ski hill.

This is called zorbing; it looks like Horseshoe Resort is one of the only places in Canada that offers it, and it really is as simple as climbing to the top of a ski hill, jumping into a giant ball of plastic, and rolling to the bottom.

Of course, by now you’re probably thinking “I bet New Zealand invented this”, and you’re totally right. The mountains there are plentiful, and I guess someone had an extra oversized beach ball lying around.

Actually, zorbing origin stories are hard to come by if you don’t do any research at all, but I assume that a younger sibling – tired of being rolled down a hill in a tire – decided to step things up a notch. I’ll also assume that “to zorb” is a Mauri adjective of some sort. There’s really no other way to explain this one.

In terms of burning calories – you’ll get your heart pumping with adrenaline, but you’re not exactly running the Boston Marathon here.  On second thought, if you’re walking up that hill under your own power, you’ve probably found a p-90x replacement.  Spinning end over end on a big enough hill, you may also  be able to lose some of those lunchtime calories before they’re even fully digested, though I’d hate to promote that sort of thing.

In all honesty it’s a ton of fun. I despise spinning and those damn “teacups” more than anyone, but I’d hop in a zorb and do this again. If you don’t feel like harnessing in the way we do in this video, you can also check out  hydro zorbing, where the inside of the ball has 6 inches of water in it, so that both you and the water stay in the lower half of the zorb the whole way down.

Safety Tips from Safety Jamie

You’re basically sitting inside the world’s largest airbag. You’ll be fine.

I’ve had this dream before. It’s the apocalypse, and as a horde of people run for their lives, I am stuck there in place – my legs slowly locking up in wet cement. I even catch a glimpse of Batman and Spider-man and all their super friends zipping by, running from whatever…

A nurse unapologetically bumps my shoulder, then continues to flee, never offering to help me and my newly diagnosed Jello Leg Syndrome.

Except, this time it’s not a dream. To be fair, it’s not the apocalypse either. It’s a Warrior Dash, a 5 km race through mud, cargo nets, ski hills and whatever else the event organizers want to throw at a handful of dressed-up weekend warriors and masochists. That Jello Leg Syndrome I’ve developed is a direct side-effect of the 3 feet of mud I am trying to wade backwards through to find the shoe it ate off my right foot.

The Dash

Run by Red Frog Events (the same folks who put on the Great Urban Race), the Dash is only a few years old, but they have sprung up all over North America and caught on quickly. Our event at Horseshoe Resort had flights of racers (about 300 or so) heading out every half hour from 8 am until 6:30 pm.

Because I seemingly refuse to allow early risers into my circle of friends, we didn’t arrive until around noon. The first thing to stand out to me was the 4 foot tall pile of muddy shoes located beside the finish line. Racers are invited to discard their inevitably mud soaked kicks into a pile to be cleaned and donated at a later date. It looked like a lot of people we’re taking up the option to ditch their runners, and getting hosed down by the friendly firemen, post-race.

The Folks

The variety of people you’ll encounter at the Warrior Dash is wide. From folks who’ve shown up to race their competitors and the clock, to those looking to get out in the sun, and those looking for an excuse to bust out their favourite Halloween costumes once again.

We saw everything from elderly men sprinting out of the gates wearing nothing but the fierce glimpse of determination, to hippie couples kumbayaing their way through the muddy rivers of Warriorville. If you don’t fit in here, then you’re probably hard to stereotype.

Safety Tips from Safety Jamie

Don’t be fooled! Despite its focus on post-race beverages, costumes and mud wrestling with a bunch of strangers – Warrior Dash is still a hilly 5+ kilometre run (where you get to drink, dress up, and mud-wrestle strangers).

Over this past weekend a number of my friends ran the event at Whistler, BC, and I am told that the organizers didn’t shy away from the hills there either (which are exactly the same size as Ontario’s, if my memory serves me right).

This warning certainly isn’t meant as a “don’t do the race” (You totally should do the race), but perhaps more as a “Don’t sprint the first 100 metres on a full stomach” kind of warning. Your adrenaline will be revving when those flame-throwers kick up and you countdown to the starting gun, but I urge you to consider the arduous road ahead.

We had a platoon of injured Warriors with us (injuries sustained from our reckless lives – not from the Dash), but the Dash will give you ample opportunity to throw your body into the line of fire – both literally, by allowing you to throw your body through a line of fire, and figuratively, by letting you climb over a bunch of things on a mountain.

We hit the course a little later in the day, and found a few of the obstacles were left pretty battered by the morning Warriors. In some instance – like mud puddles and hay stacks – this made the course even more awesome (The only thing more fun than mud is well-trampled mud). In others, like the Slip-and-Slide-and-Hit-Your-Ass-Off-The-Rocks obstacle, I honestly would have opted for a more pampered experience.

That said, if you’re looking for a realistic excuse to explain all those bruises on your ass, Warrior Dash welcomes you with open arms.

(Warning: Don’t wear your Sunday best to Warrior Dash. And don’t mud-wrestle anyone without prior written consent).

The Ride

“Hey Peter, we’re driving Indy Cars on Friday up in Barrie, you want to come?”

“Yeah I guess so.”

“Do you know how to drive stick?”

“No… well, I guess I sort of know how, but I’ve never done it before – except in video games. I am really good at it in video games.”

This most unique Gymineer episode began to take shape last fall, when I first got in touch with a man named Hans Wolter. Hans had started up a mobile company called Wings and Slicks, where he toured to a few different cities around the GTA and set up shop – and by “shop” I mean he left a trail of hand-built grand prix race tracks in his wake wherever he did roam.

A chilly morn last October, we decided to forget about my golden rule of sleeping until sunrise, and headed up to Barrie to get behind the wheel of one of these freaky speed machines. We awoke at 5:30 am and begun the long drive north. About 30 minutes outside of Barrie I checked my phone and saw 3 missed calls from Hans. I rang him back. “Jamie, Hans here. We arrived in Barrie and, well, there’s a good inch of snow on the ground.”

At the time, my reaction was the standard “Screw you, Barrie” that everyone musters under their breath whenever they drive by the city of Barrie. But as the saying goes: “Whenever the weather in Barrie screws you, it takes about a year for things to work themselves out.”

Winter then struck, and the delay in my driving development left me a bitter, bitter hibernator. But in a seemingly unrelated turn of event, the next few months would see me reconnect with the talented minds at Engage Learning, a film studio in Toronto. With them by my side, we were able to produce this Gymineer episode in a manner that’s had industry critics abuzz – with comments ranging from “Professional!” to “That’s actually a lot better than that thing you were trying to do before.”

“I don’t know how to drive stick”

This episode was populated with the crew from Engage – which as I mentioned is located in Toronto. I don’t know if you’ve been to Toronto lately, but a lot of people there have given up on the dream of the automobile. I was worried that people in our office might not know how to drive stick, so I asked around. Four of the first Ten conversations went like this:

“We’re going indy car driving – Do you know how to drive stick?”

“I don’t know what “stick” is, but this sounds like something you’d need a license for.”

“You don’t have a driver’s license!?”

“What are you, a suburbanite? It’s shoes, bikes or buses around here ol’ chum – and don’t you forget it!”

Okay, so you do need a license to get behind the wheel of an indy car. Surprisingly, you do not need to know how to drive stick – but it helps.

Pessimistic Peter was perhaps the most worried of the non-stick driving bunch. He took about four tries to get the car in motion on his first round of laps. Then he apparently suffered a flashback to Cruisn’ USA, as he slid into gear and took off, hammering the first corner at a nasty clip.

The lovely catch of it all is that you just have to get the car moving – then you can just leave that bad boy in 1^st gear as you zip around the track pulling 0-60 mph in under 3 seconds and topping out at just under 80mph. The adventurous spirits can pop down on the shifter (no-clutch needed to shift up), and voilà, you`re toasting the track in 2^nd.

The Pit Crew

Obviously anyone who’s tight with a judge and has a few hundred thou’ to blow can go out and buy a few indy cars to rip around in. What really sets this experience apart is the professional racing team you’ve got holding your hand as you take your first, tiny, 80 mph baby steps.

The operation is run by the Brian Stewart racing team, which in terms of both talent and Canadiana coolness makes this experience the equivalent of a private golf lesson from Mike Weir.

Like I said, Video Game Peter – the most reluctant hero I’ll ever have on an episode – ripped off the starting line cleanly his second time driving one of these cars.

Safety Tips from Safety Jamie

Inevitably the day is littered with spinouts – You want to push the car, but you don’t want to push it too far – then it hits you: The only way to know where that boundary between “fast” and “crap, that was too fast” is, is to (cautiously) find it.

I was once asked on a form what my favourite guilty pleasure was – to which I responded “binging on glossette’s.” Now that I’ve seen the world spin around me while strapped into an F2000 indy car, it might be time to move on from dried grapes and milk chocolate. Maybe this is how people finally start liking that 90% cocoa stuff.  Mmmm…fast.

If you want to feel the pull out of an S-turn and onto a straight away, put down the accelerator and check out www.wingsandslicks.com. Tell ‘em Gymineer sent you. Corporate events welcome.

“Jamie, quick: What are your favourite movies?”

“Easy – Fight Club and Winnie the Pooh”

“That’s messed up. What’s third?”

“Obviously Iron Will”

For those of you uninitiated with the beauty and power of Iron Will – it’s the captivating and inspirational story of Will Stonemen – a son who enters a dogsled race to keep his recently widowed mother from selling the family farm. It throws Prefontaine, Seabiscuit and Days of Thunder to the ground and gives them all big snowjobs. It’s also 92% responsible for my insane level of excitement when I got the opportunity to go try Dog Sledding as part of the Cannington Dog Sled Race and Festival.

With the Gymineer-mobile packed, we jumped in and headed fifty minutes north to Beaverton. We pulled up beside a lake where a few hundred ice-fishing huts dominated the horizon.

A small sampling of a horizon that knows when it's been dominated

As we walked out onto the frozen water, Paul unknowingly began to creak open Pandora’s Box with this seemingly innocent question:

“So guys, what lake are we on, anyways?”

The debate would rage for hours, and much blood was spilled. “Scugog” one of us would answer matter-of-factly, only to be retorted with a sharp “Simcoe, you idiot.” We were all too proud to ask any outsiders.

It was there on Lake Scugog or Simcoe that we met the day’s celebrity encounter: the Jamaican Dogsled team. Spending most of their year training dryland in Jamaica, they had recently traveled to the Great White North (Lake Scugog or Simcoe) to partake in the Cannington Race. As their training methods were explained, all I could picture was John Candy and wooden bobsleds in my head. But much like their bobsledding brethren, the Jamaicans are a serious threat in the winter events, and they were eagerly after their share of the $10,000 purse.

We were attending a media day prior to the race, and when the calls came for tv crews and personalities to climb on board a sled, my hand shot up.

The Jamaican dogs had some size to them, and are a bit aggressive for first timers, so we were treated to a ride with some recreational dogs, each taking us out for a spin to the middle of the lake.

As we took off, with the musher yelling behind me, I tried to stabilize the camera as I suddenly flashbacked to my snowmobiling days – mostly on account of the eye-squishing combination of Canadian winters, open space, and fast movement. I don’t know if you’ve been on a frozen lake lately, but it gets really, really cold.

I eventually came to terms with the weather, and my focus then shifted to the amazing reaction the dogs have to each of the musher’s commands. From a full 180 degree pivot to “Run to the truck and stop”, these dogs understood english better than anyone I’ve ever encountered on a customer service help line.

My eyes eventually thawed, and my stomach was eventually filled with warm buffalo stew thanks to our kind hosts. If you’re looking to make the most of a Canadian winter, this is a pretty kick ass way to do it.

Also a special thanks to Mary G and the team at Engage for the editing on this video.

“So Jamie, after we finishing locking you into this, you’re going to be dragged up the hill under the ski-lifts.”

I looked at the instructor incredulously, trying to delay my reaction long enough for him to break a smile. “Seriously?” I replied after a couple seconds without laughter.

“You’ll see.”

That was how I learned about the humour of the CADS guys at Brimacombe.

I was up for the day to try my hand at sit-skiing, a modified version of skiing that allows those without full control of their lower limbs to enjoy the slopes.

“Are you strong?”

“Not particularly” I responded.

“Hmm… well if you’re really strong this is a lot easier. Guys who have been using a wheelchair for a few years can pick up this sport fairly quick. We’ll have to be careful with you.”

My weak arms let me down again.

I’ve been scared on ski slopes before. In fact, every time I’ve ever been on a ski slope I’ve been terrified.

So you can imagine how I might have felt being strapped into a bullet shaped piece of carbon fibre and carried to the top of a hill.

The good news is that my talent wouldn’t be put to the test on today’s runs. My job was to keep poles across my lap and not panic. I only panicked once. Similarly I only fell once.

For a guy who isn’t very good at anything on the slopes, sit-skiing was an interesting ride. I was guided down the mountain by Rick and Brock, two of the CADS instructors, and both very strong skiers.

Not having to rely on my own skills meant these runs down Brimacombe were the fastest and cleanest I had ever made. I also got to experience what proper carving feels like, something I hadn’t been able to do before when relying on my own talent.

If yourself or someone you know is looking to get into modified skiing, I highly suggest getting in touch with the CADS group – as they not only offering sit skiing but a number of variations that allow just about anyone to experience the fun of the slopes.

While I just dipped my toe into the beginning stages of sit-skiing, we had Ben McColl come out and show us what the upper levels look like. An advanced Sit-skier can load and unload onto the lifts with complete independence, and there weren’t many people on the slopes able to keep up with Ben (I didn’t see anyone who was able to – but I don’t want to rule out the possibility that Picabo Street was just around the corner).

The learning curve steepens when you start using your own arms and muscles to manoeuvre yourself – a stage I never got too on in my brief time on the slopes, but you can definitely rock the slopes at a high level in a sit-ski.

One of my favourite arguements involves a fictional game of golf between two identical twins. If they go out to play a round today, and one uses the most expensive modern equipment he can find, and the other a set of 15 year old clubs and balls – well, my money is on the guy using the modern-alloy, oversized, custom fitted clubs.  The equipment has just come so far – but the result has just been that courses have had to be longer and rounds take more time and people opt for golf carts instead of walking.

But the best players should still be the best players – so really, all of this development has just meant longer playing times, more money spent, and higher real estate costs for courses.

I confess, I have two sides.

While part of me bemoans the constant push for something new, my other side has been known to rip logos off of my shoes to cut weight. Competitive nature always rules – from Bill Bowerman building his own track spikes to Andy Bathgate curving his own stick.

I would be foolish to overlook the fact that innovation:

1)      Can lead to safer activites

2)      Provides us with more used equipment – which means more people can afford to access new sports

3)      Makes activites easier to pick-up: lighter hockey sticks for children, better golf clubs for people who aren’t very good at golf, etc

I tell you this because myself and NHL All-Star Jonas Hiller have recently tried our hand with some new hockey equipment: the MLX skate. Named after part owner Mario Lemieux and sparked when Olympic speed skater Dave Cruikshank came around and said “Hey, look how awesome speed skates have become. Why are all of you hockey players still wearing those skates from the 80’s?” (paraphrasing) I believe Mario then said “Here are my feet, do what you want.”

The result of that awkward encounter is the MLX skate, who’s forward thinking innovations include:

Tendon Guards that Bend

• It is ridiculous that it took someone this long to think of this. When you extend your foot in a full hockey stride, your toe is pointed, meaning there should be a straight line from your toe to your hip. Every skate ever has been built with a firm, unbendable tendon guard that makes this movement impossible. No one has ever bothered to build a flexible tendon guard before. I want to shake the MLX designers’ hands and then shake my head disapprovingly at every other skate manufacturer.
  

  The flexible tendon guard on the MLX (Left) allows for a full range of motion that, for some reason, no one ever thought would be of interest to hockey players

Removable Toe Cap

• These skates have tiny inserts at the front of the boot, which means you can have a perfect fit even if you’re not perfectly normal and have a slight difference in size between your left and right foot. It  also allows youngin’s to grow a half size before needing new skates.

Shifting Blade Holder

• This one actually confuses me a bit. The blade holder is held to the boot with screws (unlike the rivets found in traditional skates). Owners can loosen these screws and shift the blade holder left of right a few millimetres to make sure that their weight is centred on the skates. The problem I had with this is that there aren’t any easily accessible guides that show you how to figure this out – it’s essentially trial and error, and I was happy with the original location of the blade, so I didn’t move anything.

The Home Baking System

• If you’ve bought a new pair of skates in the last few years you know that you can have them “baked” at the store – they literally put your skates in a skate-oven, then let you put them on and the skates mold to your feet. Now, for the first time, you get to enjoy the fresh smell of homemade brownies while customizing your hockey gear. MLX skates come ready to be baked in your regular old kitchen oven (Instructional videos on all of this can be found on the MLX page).

While older skates have been “heat moldable” , they’re not heat moldable like the MLX. My feet are pretty beautiful, but on the back on my right foot I do have what’s called a haglund’s bump (or haglund’s deformity for the politically insensitive). It’s basically a buildup of cartlidge on the back of my heel caused by years of running and skating (apparently high heels can cause them too, ladies).

Also of note – I had my leg run over by an Impala (the car, not the antelope) when I was 18, and after that accident, the skates I had been wearing – a pair of Flites – would dig into my ankle and cause extreme discomfort. So I switched to a pair of hand-me-down Nike’s and finally a pair of hand-me-down Grafs (It’s common for 26 year old men to get hand me downs, yes?) I also started wearing thick wool socks in my skates to make them more comfortable.

Now I am wearing the MLX’s and I’ll say this – they come with a warning that because the skates are so radically different from other models, it may take a few hours of skating to adjust to them. These are the most comfortable skates I’ve ever slid on. Wearing them was more akin to a well-fitted basketball shoe or track spike than a typical hockey skate.

Anyways, these skates did nothing to improve my sucky slapshot, so I am pretty disappointed about that, but otherwise, I am starting to come around on this “equipment innovation” thing.

First on our list is Ultimate, aka Ultimate Frisbee, an addictive game that seems to hook newcomers like myself.  In my case this has led to me joining three separate leagues to ensure that I am playing year round.

I first encountered Ultimate in highschool gym class. I had mixed feelings after catching a nasty backhand follow-through across the chin.

Fast forward a decade and I get this email from my old phys-ed teacher:

Hi Jamie,

Heard you guys were so bad at hockey you couldn’t even win an old man tournament this weekend! Just don’t tell the guys you play against that you all went to Austin, it would give us a bad name.

The real reason I am contacting you is to see if you play Ultimate. I figured a guy who runs like you and spent time out West would play for sure. I play on a team made up mostly of teachers and we have done very well in the past, but we lost 2 of our best players for this season. Let me know if you are interested in playing.

And so the expectation was set that I could help replace two of the best players on a very good team, and the potential for disappointment was sky-high.

What this teacher was unaware of was that I in fact had not spent any time playing Ultimate, out west or out east. This was a shame, as it turns out I like the sport very much.

Our league is a co-ed, 7-on-7 set-up. The goal is to gain points by catching the disc in your opponent’s endzone. It’s a fast action, continuous game – you can’t run when you’re holding the disc, when you catch it you have ten-second to throw it, and if a pass isn’t completed it’s a turn-over and the other team picks up the disc and heads back up the field on offense.

Also of note is that calling it “Frisbee” instead of ultimate is akin to calling facial tissue “Kleenex” – you’re giving props to a specific brand rather than the proper name for the item. Some people frown upon this. I tend not to care because if I ask for a Kleenex and you start to argue with me you’re just going to get sneezed on.

It’s an amazing workout – quite akin to the cardio you’d pick up playing soccer. The outdoor games go an hour-and-a-half, so depending how many subs you have (ranging from none to about 8), you can get pretty sweaty.

There are two standout features that make ultimate different from any other sport I’ve played:

The Disc: An object based game that doesn’t use a ball. It’s actually incredibly novel. (After discussing this with family and friends it took me about two hours to realize hockey also fits the bill). Playing with a disc allows for so many unique throws and catches that could never be accomplished with a ball. You have to watch some of the game’s best to truly appreciate it, but throws that can hover, curve, rise or fall give the thrower (fittingly known as the handler) a huge array of options.

Similarly, it takes some time as a receiver to adapt to reading a flying disc and figuring out where it’s going. My track background has paid off numerous times when I’ve been on one side of the field and a throw has missed it’s target somewhere else, but hovered in the air long enough to allow me to get close enough to make a catch. A similar number of times my inexperience has made me look quite the fool as I sprint off in one direction and the disc curves off in the other.

The “Spirit of Game”: This summer I played in three leagues – Hockey, Slo-pitch, and Ultimate. These leagues were entirely populated with people who had full-time jobs outside of their recreational sports. Literally everyone I played against had to go to work the next morning, or at least look for jobs (promise I’ll be out of the basement soon mom).

The one big difference among the sports was that slo-pitch and hockey had referees while Ultimate had just the “Spirit of the Game” governing our actions. Accordingly, every week in hockey and slo-pitch, some chump would go off and try and start a fight over a close call (or in many cases a clearly correct call). Obviously, not being able to stretch that single into a double in men’s league Tuesday night slo-pitch was going to ruin this guys week.

There was one particular situation in slo-pitch where an outfielder sort-of caught a ball as it hit the ground. He raised his glove in the air to signal a good catch, the ump agreed, and the out was called. After the game a teammate of mine, One-Eye’d Willy, asked this opposing player if he actually caught the ball, and he smiled and said “of course not.”

This brings me to the beauty of the “Spirit of the Game”. There were perhaps five disputed calls all summer in Ultimate, and the worst result was that the play was repeated from the last throw. I also never noticed anyone lying about a catch, and in fact saw many instances where someone could have claimed to have made a play, but opted instead for modesty. Observing this odd sportsmanship, it occurred to me that it had nothing to do with the sport itself. If I go and play hockey or baseball with a bunch of friends, or even non-friends, we’d almost never have a disputed call, and certainly no one would lose their cool over a close play.

My theory goes that putting a man in stripes out there for people to deceive, lie to, and yell at, encourages people to be deceitful, loud, liars when they’d otherwise just enjoy the spirit of competition and exercise. Or maybe all the guys in my baseball and hockey leagues are just jerks. Either way, Ultimate – the sport that’s name literally translate into “incredible, the best, far out, and the craziest” – is great, and you should try it.

We were at Beach Blast in Toronto, celebrating the 5^th annual Sunrise Medical Indoor Beach Volleyball Tournament, with all the proceeds going to the currently-under-construction Durham Abilities Centre. Our team was the opportunistic and quick striking Sunrise Team #3, aka Team Jay. There is dispute over where the nickname came from, with my teammate Steve suggesting he invented the name based on his “personal fascination with the numerous species of medium-sized passerine birds in the crow family.” Others suggest the name arose when we were all given shirts that said “Jay” on the front.

What we lacked in creativity we made up for in effort, and leading the way for us was Paul L, who wasted no opportunity to dive chest-first into the soft sand. Watch the video to judge for yourself, but after seeing Paul’s exuberance at sand-diving, it’s safe to assume that’s just how he’d walk down a beach. (It’s even funnier if you watch the video imagining that our whole team is actually a militia who have joined forces over our mutual addictions to brown sugar, and we’re playing on brown sugar, and the ball is some kind of sugar destroying sphere. Oh, and imagine every time someone dives they’re yelling “Nooooo!”)

In terms of the sport, you’ve probably seen beach volleyball before (When you turn on your TV during the summer Olympics and see those four girls in bikini’s – you know, the ones hitting the ball around – that’s beach volleyball). The main differences between indoor beach volleyball and its lakeside counterpart are primarily the roof, which is actually in-play on one of Beach Blast’s courts, and the fact that I could play for hours and never get a tan, making it a safe alternative for vampires. (I am hoping that including the word “vampires” will really spike up the hit count on this article… Twilight, Twilight, True Blood yeah!)

When it was all said and done my ears were full of sand, but Team Jay walked away as pretty big winners (thank you silent auction, raffle prizes and lawn chairs for all!) We ended up playing 6 games in total I believe, and I think all of them were battles with single-digit margins of victory. It was a sweet fall day – I was active, I was competitive, I was well fed and surrounded by good people – I was content and happy. Eleven months to get ready for 2011.

The idea of gymineering has come a long way since it first started out inside a young man’s brain as a quest for a new form of competition. As I’ve had more and more people join me on adventures, the concept has slowly morphed from having an end goal of finding my favourite sport into something entirely about the process – the journey of experiencing so many different people’s passions and activities.

If there were ever any fears regarding there being a finite number of sports, those worries left my mind long ago. I could be doing this when I am 80 and not have found all the ways that humans have invented to have fun, compete, exercise and train. A greater concern for me has become the struggle to find the time to showcase some of my most cherished events. The fall season is undoubtedly here now, and as I look back on the summer I shake my head in disbelief that this was the first year since 2005 where I did not host the annual Pool Volleyball World Championship. What sort of monster have I become?

In the last year I’ve entrusted my life to some ropes dangling across a gorge, jumped into the middle of a white water river, been shot in the face and groin (with paintballs), been towed behind a jet ski, and ridden a never ending wave – and still the biggest gut-check of them all comes every time I have to climb into a car that my friend Paul is driving.

I’ve been lost in the forests of Northumberland, the city of Toronto, and the frozen trails of Haliburton. I’ve scavenged my way across the big city, climbed the CN Tower and delivered a baby horse. I’ve flown a plane… ahh, you know what? It’s all in the video. Enjoy, and come gymineering sometime. Seriously, there’s a lot for you to be doing out there. Thanks for reading.

Two years ago we entered the Prospects into the first annual Human Foosball Tourney, and riding the striking hot foot of a man named Kyle, and the hulk-like goaltending of trapshooting commentator Alex, we rose to the occasion and hoisted the champion’s trophy – despite the best efforts of some wily Irish vets and the cheering/looting of a angry, toothless English hooligan.

This year it would be a hearty group of young gentlemen that would be our undoing, and with kyle out doing married- guy-stuff, we looked like a trio of underwhelming chicken shish kebob that had been left out in the sun too long.

Perhaps our only saving grace was Alex’s innovative goaltending. The game of Human Foosball pits the players in an inflatable arena, attached to horizontal metal bars which the players strap their hands into (thus connecting them to a teammate). With their hands locked in, a ball is kicked and launched around the arena, leaving under-protected groins and faces exposed for impact. Alex  throws caution to the wind when it comes to protecting his groin and face, but his personal take on goaltending goes beyond that.

If a normal goalie is caught out of position – say, on the right side of the net while a ball is kicked towards the left side – that inevitably ends up as a goal. Alex refused to accept the status quo. While Alex knew his body may sometimes be on the wrong side of the net, he realized that the metal bar he was holding stretched across the entire width of the goal. Alex discovered that he could either put his weight on the metal bar to lower it and stop the ball, or using his immense strength, he could lift the metal bar – and the entire half of the inflatable arena – and stop a ball kicked into the top half of the net. Sheer brilliance.

This year would see more teams attend the tourney than ever before, and with that came more talent and more friendly people than we were able to contest with. It also meant more time to sit down at the Crown and take in a beautiful afternoon. Hope to see you next year.