Fortune Cookie

I just returned from the USATF Nationals in Charlotte, NC and in spite of a particularly bad performance on my part, I have no regrets about going. It was quite a display of what talent, hard training, and good genes can accomplish. A lot of the folks I saw were just incredible.

As for my performance, what can I say – I had a bad meet. A very bad meet. In fact, my longest legal throw was just 2 feet longer than my typical standing throw. Ouch! But I’ve got to remind myself that my throw was still a foot longer than my average last year, and even though it was a big stage it’s still just one meet. (I did have one sector foul that appeared to be fairly decent.)

It’s hard to explain what happened. I fouled 2 out of the 4 throws even though I average about one foul every 3 or 4 meets. I fouled left and I fouled right, when at my last meet all 4 of my throws would have fit inside a 2 meter circle. It was like a different person was throwing and using my name. I think the technical term for this is “choke”.

Good things that happened:

1. In spite of my being physically dwarfed by most of my competitors at Charlotte (about half of them looked like they averaged 6’4” and 250+ lbs), the guy who blew everyone away and won the whole enchilada was just about my size. For me, THAT was a very good thing to have witnessed.

2. A couple of my friends, and people I compete with all the time, won big-time even though they were hurt. Carol Finsrud, who is recovering from a serious hand injury and has hardly trained all year, won the discus (and I believe the hammer). And Bruce Navarre, at age 49 (or is he 48?) with 2 bad shoulders and a bad back, threw the 2k discus over 46 meters to win his age group. When he moves up to the 1.5k discus, look out!

3. I met Joe Schleppi, a fellow thrower who seems to be a great guy, and who may be the only person who reads this blog on a regular basis. (Nice throw at the Ohio Senior Olympics, Joe.)

4. And last but not least, there were a lot of women with really nice looking legs at this meet.

So…after my disappointing performance, and before I was able to stop wallowing in self-pitty, I happened upon an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet near my hotel. Feeling near rock-bottom, I decided to drown my sorrows in soy sauce. I emptied 2 full plates and then threw in the towel. They left a fortune cookie with my check, and on the way out of the restaurant I cracked it open and it said (I swear) "practice makes perfect".

Talk about good timing!