close call...

1st Meet of the year, Dakar Grand Prix in Senegal this Saturday....not going ;(

About 6 days ago, during a high intensity throwing session I felt something give way in my knee. After a few days of sweating bullets and several doctors visits, it was determined that I had just a small bone bruise that caused some inflammation to the tissue and fluids surrounding the knee. Typically this wouldn't be that bad of a problem, but given my knee history of 2 surgeries...I was a bit worried. I have a few bone spurs left over from a 1999 ACL reconstruction and when the fluids and tissues around my knee get inflamed those bone spurs turn into a painful problem. My doctor compared it to someone biting their cheek. It swells up and rubs against your teeth and hurts but when the swelling goes away, so does the pain.

So where am I now? I am going to attempt to take a few throws on the grass tomorrow and see how it feels. My manager has pulled me out of the Dakar meet and we are pushing the season opener back to May 9 in Doha Qatar for the IAAF Super Grand Prix. The past few months have been ridiculous with injures and set backs and this years training season has been one to test every last nerve and ounce of patience and diligence that I have. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to do hardly any community service work as almost every waking hour the last few weeks has been spent on rehab of an ailing shoulder and now knee.

I am hoping that better times lay ahead and that the upcoming competition season will interject some much needed confidence and motivation for the 2009. I keep hearing people say the grass is always greener on the other side..but they fail to tell me how to get there! Till next time,
M++

Bonsoir...MarHaban, Kayfa Haaluka...and oooohh Jessica Simpson!

I'm attempting to brush on on French and Arabic as I am looking at my upcoming schedule over then next month. I just received the 1st 2 confirmations of the 2009 season.
I am headed to the 1st IAAF Grand Prix of the season in Dakar Senegal on April 18 and then headed back to Doha, Qatar for the IAAF Super Grand Prix on May 8. If you didn't have a chance to hear what happened the last time I was in Doha....here is a quick recap.

Flight from San Diego was cut short due to medical emergency in board, as a result, missed my connection in DC (and also lost my luggage). I was re-routed through London and eventually to Doha and 36 hours later arrived in Doha, with nothing with me but what I had on. After 3 days of hassles with Qatar authorities I still had no luggage and competed in borrowed spikes and a Qatar uniform. After all that, I ended up setting a lifetime best.

http://in-the-arena-mike.blogspot.com/2008/05/doha-disaster.html

Although I am hoping for a similar result this year, I am planning to bring as much necessities with me on my carry on as possible. Even if my luggage gets lost this time, at least I will have a few weeks in Doha to rest up and wait for it. I am flying from Dakar to Casablanca then to Doha and will meet up again with my buddy (04 ad 08 Olympic Champion) Andreas from Norway. We will have 2 weeks of training to prepare for the Super Grand Prix. After Doha, I will return back to the states for my 1st meet in the USA (other than USA Championships) since 2006. The Tuscon Elite Throwers Meeting. This meeting is the site of numerous personal bests from other athletes last year and promises to have near perfect conditions. It is there that I am hoping to chase a big throw and take advantage of the conditions that other athletes get to do every year.

My shoulder has healed up nicely and I am now going on 1 week with no pain and am thanking my luck stars (a.k.a God) for helping me through these trying times. No matter how you try to talk your self through an injury, nothing feels quite as good as being able to train pain free. All is well here at the Training Center and the invasion by some of the best foreign athletes in the world has started. Some of my friends from Norway are already here with other long time training partners from the UK. Some of my closest friends...of whom I lived with in Finland will be here by the end of the week.

Overall, it seems as the hard training period is starting to wind down and many athletes are using the spring to tighten their screws, so to speak. For now, I am going to sit here and watch my roomate Karl type his blog and then Im going to go look for Jessica Simpson, rumor has it she is here at the Training Center! Look here for more details: http://in-the-arena-sarah.blogspot.com/

Here are a few pics from my visit in Atlanta, had a chance to speak to the Duluth High School Varsity Soccer Team....till next time,
M++

Making Lemonade...

...Isn't that what you are supposed to do when life gives you lemons?
I am typing this blog as I just have finished packing for a 4 day trip to Atlanta Georgia. Why? I am headed top the east coast to see a specialist who is going to try to repair some small tears in my posterior labrum.

I just returned home from my 6 week Scandinavian training camp and learned so much about my event...and unfortunately wont be able to utilize what I learned until I get my shoulder back to 100%. I was having some shoulder pain while in Europe but thought it was due to the volume of training and throwing. However, after being diagnosed in Europe and here at the training center of having labrum tears, I have decided not to have surgery and try to rehab the shoulder and throw this season. If I can get my range of motion and strength back then it will just be a pain tolerance issue, which is one that I have learned to deal with fairly well over my career. I have tentatively scheduled my 1st 2 meets of the year for Dakar Senegal and Doha Qatar on April 18 and May 8 but now everything will depend on how fast I can get back to full strength.

My community service projects are now starting back up after the 7 week break and I will be making my 3rd visit to the Brady Children's Hospital next week for the annual Relay for Life. Along with the Children's Hospital I have booked 3 classes of 5th graders here at the OTC and cant wait to get back in the mix with the kids!

I hope I have some better and more exciting news to report in 2 weeks time...now how much sugar goes in the lemonade?
M++

Tips For Record Breaking

For this blog entry, the In the Arena athletes have been prompted to respond to a recent article about a UK man, Richard Jenkins, who is attempting to break the world land speed record over ground by a sail powered craft. Throughout his battle to break this record he has had to had to over come many obstacles, some personal, some financial, but all potential set backs... He compiled a list of "Tips for Record Breakers" and my task on this blog is to create my own, "Tips for Record Breakers" using what I have learned throughout my athletic career.

TIPS FOR RECORD-BREAKERS

• Develop a plan that continually evolves and adapts to your circumstances. If part of your plan fails, then learn from that and modify it. Most importantly, trust in your plan.

• Hope for the best, but plan for the worst... pack an extra pair of shoe laces or backup uniform. The phrase its better to be safe than sorry was coined for a reason.

• Develop your own training plan through trial and error, find out what works for you and try to make that aspect of your training stronger.

• Be goal oriented. Make immediate goals that can be accomplished every day. Make short term goals that can be accomplished in the near future and finally and most importantly, make long term goals that drive you to be who you are.

• Don't stick to conventional training. Think outside the box, just because the book says it is to be done one way, doesn't mean that there are better ways that work for you.

• Start from the ground and work your way up. In most athletic events, the initiation of movement or action starts on the ground. If you are having trouble with your technique in your upper body, track the flow of power or movement backwards and try to find out where the problem starts. Where you see the problem isn't always the cause.

• Lastly and most importantly....stay healthy. This comes at all cost. In the athletics arena, he who stays healthy longest wins. It doesn't matter if your the worlds strongest or fastest, if you are injured you cant compete. World class performances also require world class treatment. If you are aiming for world records then you have to treat your body the same way.

The last tip for me is often the most important one. Don't be afraid to spend money to stay healthy, after all, if you cant compete because your injured, then you cant make money in the first place. One of the greatest coaches in the world said, "be prepared to spend 15% of your income on treatment." When an individual is competing at the highest level, it is no different than driving a formula 1 car. Do you think that after the F1 drivers take their million dollar vehicles out for a run, the simply just park it in the garage? No, they change the oil, check the tire pressure, monitor the cars computer systems, tighten screws, replace fluids...and so on and so on. The human body is no different. I hope that theses tips give some insight to what I have learned over the last 5 years.

Oslo Training Camp

God Morgen, jeg kan bare litt norsk! so that being said, I guess thats all the Norwegian that I will be able to use at this point but Im making it a point to pick up as much as I can. I am now in Oslo for a 2 week training camp with the 2004 and 2008 Olympic Champion, Andreas Thorkildsen. I come to Oslo fresh off my 3 week camp in Finland and am anxious to see what the training system is like over here. My coach, and my coaches coach, all learned the majority of their training systems from the Finns, so this will be a great learning experience for me.

I arrived Saturday mid afternoon and so far have just been enjoying good company and hanging out enjoying Oslo. Sunday I had the chance to go with my training partner to walk his dog around a frozen lake outside of town. The lake was a hotspot...ironically, for cross country skiers and people walking their dogs. I got a chance to try out a new camera and took some pretty cool shots that I will try to upload soon.

Today we will have our 1st throwing session, indoors of course, which will allow me to continue to refine some of the technical changes that I picked up in Finland. The goal of this camp is to continue to work on technical changes and also try a few different training techniques and methods and hope that I come away with something that will help me generate more power and cleaner flights of the javelin. I will try to post a few of the throwing videos as I get them. For now, here are a few pics from the lake...

Ha det bra! M++

Nature vs. Nurture

This blog entry is taking place 4 hours north of Helsinki Finland in a town called Kuortane. I’m typing on my laptop and looking out the window wondering what in the world all of this white stuff on the ground is. Being a Southern California boy and a summer sport athlete, snow is often something I only see on the TV, and in fact, the last time I saw snow in real life was when I was here, 4 years ago. Needless to say, I have a huge appreciation for all of my fellow ITA athletes who have to compete in this "stuff". The In The Arena Athletes have taken on a task of responding to a fellow ITA athlete, Matt Chisam's, request to answer a few questions to help him out in a classroom discussion...so here it goes.

1. What is the athletic background of your parents and family?
My family comes from a very athletic background. My father was a 2-sport standout athlete in football and track and field in college. He ventured into distance running as he got older and competed in numerous marathons well into his late 40's. My mother was also active in track and field as well as cheerleading throughout her collegiate years. My older brother competed in track and field in high school but opted for rugby in his collegiate years. Post college my brother found himself joining the Professional Disc Golf Association and is now a touring professional and has competed in a few world championships.

2. When did you begin participating in your sport?
I began participating in my sport full time my junior year of college in 2000. The 1st time I ever tried it was my freshman year in 1998.

THE EXTRAS (if you have time)

1. What was your early experiences with sport like?
I excelled in sports as a young kid. I remember being a bit undersized but faster than most of the other kids. I had no favorite as a kid; I was equally a fan of soccer, football and baseball but ironically showed the most promise in baseball due to my arm. Which strangely has ended up being how I make my living, with my arm. Growing up in the USA, football, baseball and soccer dominated the youth playing fields and track and field was no where to be found.

2. How instrumental were parents and coaches in the early part of your development as an athlete?
My parents were extremely instrumental in my success as a child. They provided the means for me to excel but not the motivation. I was never pushed into sports, it was something that I genuinely enjoyed. I am thankful for that as well because alot of time you see talented kids get burned out by the constant harassment of family and friends. As I reached the middle school and high school years, the coaches in my hometown of Temple Texas were as instrumental in my development as an athlete and as a person as my parents were. I believe that alot of my work ethic and character values were instilled in me by the coaches who I grew up with. I was fortunate to be coached by very moral and Christian men who knew the impact that they would have on developing core values and beliefs at a young age. They are values that I take with me even to this day and will pass on to my kids as well.

3. How were you introduced to your sport and how many other sports did you seriously participate in?
I began throwing the javelin as the result of injuries that forced me out of my primary sports. I attended Texas State University on a football scholarship and also played baseball for 3 years as part of a "package deal". Although scholarships are not allowed to be shared between sports at the collegiate level, I took a football scholarship and "walked on" to the baseball team. Throughout my 1st 3 years of school I bounced back and forth between football and baseball trading red shirts and never fully committing myself to either one against the wishes of many on the coaching staff. Heading into my junior year of football I tore my ACL in my knee, immediately ending my football career. I rehabbed the entire fall in hopes of making it back in time for baseball season but was unable to do so. Throughout the course of several conversations I decided to try out for the track team and attempted the decathlon. That didn’t last very long, a few months at most and my coach and I decided to stick with my best event which was the javelin. The rest, as they say...is history.

4. Is your success a product of nature or nurture?
I believe my success as an athlete is an equal combination of both. I also feel that it is not possible to reach the highest level of sports without an equal combination of both. I like to look at athletic ability and athletic success like a computer. You need to have equal software (mental) and hardware (physical) components. A lot of times you will see phenomenal athletes with amazing talent that have a massive "hardware" component but lack the "software" to run that hardware package. You also see the opposite. Athletes that have a huge "software" component, such as desire, coachability, and work ethic but unfortunately don’t have the hardware to keep up with the software package. I believe that it is when you combine both talented hardware and software components that you see athletes reach the top of their sports.

5. Are you an expert in your field? (by your own definition)
I believe that I am now an expert in my field. Up until last year, I would say that I was a specialist but not an expert. As an expert, I feel that an individual should be able to self diagnose problem areas and be able to prescribe solutions to fix those problems. I am reaching a point in my career where I am beginning to understand what makes my body work and what it takes to get it to perform at the highest level. I am also continually learning as well, and I think that as soon as someone thinks they know it all about their event or sport, that they will start to see a decline in their performances. Even experts look to other sources sometimes for possible solutions to problems, that is the beauty of what we do. The continual search for knowledge and the "what if" factor when finding new and improved means to get higher performances.
M++

Trading 85 for 25....degrees that is!

This blog entry comes as I am preparing for a winter training camp in Scandinavia. I am leaving the sunny Southern California weather on Friday and headed to Finland and Norway for some training with the worlds best. This is the time of year last year, that I left for Australian summer Grand Prix series. After being notified that the javelin would not be part of the 09 Aussi Grand Prix series, I decided to head to training camp instead.
The timing could not be better! After competing well into the end of September on the Olympic year, I felt I needed the extra few weeks of training and will now push my 09 season opener back to the end of April. Most of the worlds best javelin throwers are either in Portugal or South Africa on warm weather training camps this time of year. Fortunately for me...living in San Diego, I am at warm weather training year round, so its good for me to change it up and head north to get some solid technical training in.



Some people may wonder why I would leave the comfort of my home training camp and head to where the temperatures hover around 15 degrees and the sun is only out 4 hours a day...the answer is an easy one...thats where the best in the world do it. All of the northern European throwers and Scandinavian throwers, who just happen to be the best in the world...throw indoors 7 months out of the year. Throwing inside into a net takes away the distance factor in your training, which allows you to focus more on refining your technique. When you are changing your technique, the distances you are throwing are almost always very bad and subconsciously your body wants to revert back to what was your prior (and not necessarily better) technique in order to regain some of that distance. If you take away the distance component, there is no need or desire to see the javelin fly far and thus allows you to continually refine your throwing motion to perfection.
Lets use golf as an example, which is very similar to the javelin. All power and no technique will often result in sliced or hooked ball flights, and no power and all technique will result in straight flights but no distance. Its the same in the javelin. If you take a golfer away from the driving range and make him hit inside into a net where he cant see how far the ball goes, the golfer then focuses on the swing, not how far it goes.
Lets have a look at the top ranked throwers in the world this year and see where they come from...of the top 25 throwers in the world, here is the breakdown:

21 of top 25 throwers are from Northern Europe (myself, Canada, S. Africa and Australia are the only exceptions)

7 of the top 10 and the entire top 5 are from Scandinavia.

Impressive numbers for such a small region. I guess one can say going to Scandinavia for javelin training is like going to Mexico to learn Spanish, its simply where they do it the best and most often. I haven't been back to Finland since 2007 and I spent almost a year there from the fall of 2004 though the summer of 2005 and cant wait to see some of my old friends and training partners. My last week of my training camp I will be training in Oslo Norway and staying with the current world #1 and the 2004 and 2008 Olympic Champ, Andreas Thorkildsen. Andreas is one of the coolest guys on earth and has always gone out of his way to help me out even though we are competitors. For a really cool story, dig through my blog entry "The Doha Disaster". The airlines lost all my bags on my way to my 1st Super Grand Prix in Doha Qatar and Andreas let me borrow his old competition spikes and I ended up setting a new personal best. I'm hoping that I borrow a few pieces of his good luck while in Oslo and bring home some new technique and monster throws in the future.

Heres a clip of the some of the snow in 2004...
M++