Archive for the 'Other Sports' Category

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Part Two: Brought to you by the Men

Published on April 5, 2008 by Corinna Carlson | 0 Comments

Back in January, the 15th to be exact I started wee write ups on some of my favourite athletes and I had intended it to be a once a month series that will at one point cover my most and least favourite commentators as well, some former athletes and some, and some… well there are just some. I realized after I put Part One up that I had included a retired athlete, I’ve been thinking that had I been thinking I would not have done that, so this post will include a retired male and when I eventually get to my favourite retired athletes I will only do FIVE of each sex.

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© samcloseup on Flickr

Roger Federer, Swiss, Current Rank World No. 1, Tennis

I started following the career of Roger Federer in 2004 which just happened to be the year his career exploded. This was back when the live Wimbledon matches aired at some insane time, I think it was 4:30am and I was up to watch them, regurgitating all of the band wagon knowledge I had picked up on my new favourite player to Adam who hated tennis at the time but didn’t tell me until the next year when I yet again got up at I think 5:30am to watch Federer annihilate his competition. As of March 2008, that No. 1 ranking he gained himself when he won Wimbledon in 2004 still stands. A record 218 weeks. Federer has had a rough go of it this season, his health has been ailing and I suspect lady troubles. I always enjoy watching him face Rafael Nadal because he seems to be the only player that can realistically beat the Rog. It does get a little boring watching him win allllllll the time and I think it is natural for athletes to have slumps. I’m also a HUGE fan of his friendship with Tiger Woods. The commercials they do together = priceless, seeing them at each others events = priceless, hearing them talk about each other in interviews = priceless. Why shouldn’t two of the worlds BEST athletes be BFFs? There is really nothing I do not like about Federer, he supports many charities and started his own, The Roger Federer Foundation. Although he can be an emotional player he is always humble and when he actually loses it is always with grace.

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© ETW Corp

Tiger Woods, American, Current Rank World No. 1, Golfer

My love for Tiger Woods was already well formed before I even started golfing. Which I guess doesn’t really mean anything, it is probably a pretty common statement, or close, a lot of people who have never picked up a club still love the Tiger. When I did start to golf back in 2000 I was able to draw a lot of inspiration from Tiger and still do. I remember when Tiger used to be a very very emotional player, a club thrower, you could read the swears from his lips, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him take it as far as I’ve seen John Daly go but he has thrown some pretty good tantrums. Watching him mature over the years has been a huge help to my golf game. When Tiger went through his slump during the 2003 and 2004 season I was constantly angered by the remarks made about him, I don’t know if it is just because I am a woman, but I KNEW it was related to his family life and what was still [until late 2003] his hot model girlfriend and not to mention he completely changed up his swing.

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© Alexandre Despatie Photo Album

Alexandre Despatie, Canadian, Olympic Silver Medalist, Diver

In 1998 I was at home visiting my parents when 13 year old Despatie stunned Canada into and instant love affair when he won gold on the 10m at the Commonwealth Games. I remember that moment in diving like it was yesterday and I have been a fan of his ever since. He became the first man in Canadian history to win an Olympic medal in diving, winning the silver in Athens on the 3m and is a hopeful to medal in Beijing, although realistically the Chinese divers may already have those medals covered but the fingers are still crossed. In 2003 Despatie had won the gold on the 10m, making him world champion, at the 2005 World Championships in his home town of Montreal he added gold medals to the 1m and 3m making him the first diver to hold the gold on all three boards at the same time.

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© earthhour on Flickr

Ian Thorpe, Australian, Five Time Olympic Gold Medalist, Swimmer

I did not know that Ian Thorpe had retired, yes I knew he had taken a break; I just hoped and willed him to go for the 400m freestyle Olympic gold hat-trick in Beijing as was his original plan. When I found out it was in late 2006 that he retired I became mad at myself for not knowing. What kind of fan am I? I try not to expect anything in life but I know it wasn’t wrong to dream of battles that I ASSumed would take place in the pool in Beijing between the Thorpedo and Michael Phelps [up next!]. Ian Thorpe MADE the 2000 Olympics for me and I thought that of all of the Olympic performances I had ever seen in my life that nothing would ever beat it. And you are reading a very proud Canadian’s blog who LOVES Canadian athletes [highlighting more of them is on the way don't you worry] But I was proved wrong, watching him and Phelps in Athens was amazing. Just bloody amazing and until I found out Thorpe had retired I had been dreaming of them together side by side in the fast lanes cruising to easy finishes and medals. My dreams have been dashed. But thankfully Ian and I support some of the same charities so my admiration for him continues on. And he will, I’m sure, forever be known as one of, if not the best freestyle swimmer of all time.

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© sja30044 on Flickr

Michael Phelps, American, Six Time Olympic Gold Medalist, Swimmer

I love Michael Phelps; forgive me I did not know that he has now tied Mark Spitz’s record of winning seven gold medals at one event, the 2007 Worlds in Michael’s case, but I still love him. For an athlete of his age and his stature his maturity, how humble he is, how soft spoken he is, how gracefully he wins and loses is what puts this guy on my list. I’ve had no choice, although I enjoy a lot of other swimmers, but to give him the number one favourite male swimmer position. Although my dreams of watching him once again swim against the Thorpedo are over there is not a shred of doubt in my mind that he will be a highlight for America at the Beijing Olympics. I remember hearing of him in 2000 at the Sydney Olympics because he was a hopeful at the time, super young, but he was mentioned by commentators because he was, at 15, the youngest American male at an Olympics in over 65 years. Just as Ian Thorpe made the 2000 Olympics for me the rivalry between Thorpe and Phelps with a little bit of Dutch swimmer Pieter van den Hoogenband thrown in MADE Athens. Adam and I listened to A LOT of ‘Greased Lightning’ watching those boys fly across the water.

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© the internet this photo is everywhere

Lance Armstrong, American, Seven Time Champion, Tour De France

I used to despise Lance Armstrong. He was basically everything I hated in an athlete: Pompous, arrogant, a sore loser, a prick to interviewers, ugly.. It wasn’t until my friend PH [now deceased] told me the story of Lance and how he had one nut and it wasn’t until he had just that one nut that he won his first Tour and how much he had overcome and that he had been given a 1% chance of survival with his cancer diagnosis. YES, ONE PERCENT! Read his first book! Now partially in honour of my dear friend, and partly because I believe that for the most part Lance has now earned his right to be a pompous, arrogant ass if he wants to, I admire and respect him to the level that he is now one of my heroes, he hasn’t reached a Terry Fox like status but he is up there. The fact that he also now runs Marathons doesn’t hurt either. He is brave, he fights for what is right, he doesn’t take no for an answer, he is loud, and he won the hardest race ON EARTH seven times against the very best cyclists in the world, all while being run off into hay fields and crashing because of idiotic fans trying to touch him while he is trying to WIN the TOUR DE FRANCE. He sits on a list with very few athletes as the best in the world at what he does and in the process carries a torch he doesn’t always even want to carry extremely high for team beat cancer a team that in one way or another I think we are all on.

Vancouver Bloggers Bowl for Big Brothers

Published on February 18, 2008 by Corinna Carlson | 7 Comments

Some of you may have noticed the new addition to my side bar a smaller version of the 2008 Bowl for Big Brothers Classic badge below.

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I participated in the Bowl for Big Brothers Classic back in 2000 and had a great time and being that although I could walk my other favourite charity events around the city they are supposed to be runs and I can not run right now, but I can bowl, and I love to bowl.

STRIKE

TEAM BLOGGER consists of:

Rebecca Bollwitt: Team Capitan aka Miss 604
Corinna [that is me] of Gus Greeper
John Bollwitt of JohnBollwitt Update your links! John has a new domain!
John Biehler of JohnBiehler
Keira-Anne of Keira-Anne She fooked her knee up real bad over the weekend so go send her some love!
Duane Storey of DuaneStorey
Phaedra McEachren of Memoirs of Me
Raul of Hummingbird604
Tod Maffin of todmaffin

I’ve sent an email or two to the Big Sisters and have never heard back from them, being recently inspired from running into some people from Terrace that I went to high school with, [seriously we are EVERYWHERE right now] and discovering that one of them is a Big Brother and has been for four years now he had this to say about his experience and his reasons for volunteering his time:

I thought it was time to give back to the community and growing up with a single Mom I figured Big Brothers was something i would like to do.

Turns out he called. I’m going to call. I think it will be interesting with my past to see whether they would even take me, could be why I never got any emails back. We will soon see. I will keep you posted.

This organization has also always been of interest to me because my father spent time as a Big Brother way back in the day and it comes up on a semi regular basis. My dad has also said I should call. My aversion to the phone is becoming almost phobic. I did make a point to talk on it yesterday though.

My father had this to say about his experience:

I was a big brother many years ago. It was in the early 70’s. I still remember my first little brother’ s name. Bobby Pallen. When I first started as a big brother, I assumed it would take a lot of time and cost a lot taking him places. What really happens is we mostly just hung out and did things. Play catch, go to the park, watch a movie. Just the same kinds of things that you would do with your own kids. Little brothers just want someone to give them some attention and spend some time with them. It is such a rewarding experience that more than 30 years later I still think about Bobby. I moved away and that was the reason I had to give up seeing Bobby.

We are bowling on March 16 at Xcalibur Bowling in Surrey. We all need your pledges please the easiest way to get to our individual pledge pages is through Miss604′s post. Or you can sponsor our team as a whole by clicking here. You can also reach my pledge page by clicking on the badge – top right in my side bar.

I set my goal at fifty dollars because I have to raise that to be able to bowl, but I would of course LOVE to raise more than that so I do ask for your help please dear blogging buddies and readers, anything you can offer is going to be greatly appreciated.

Part One: Brought to you by the Ladies

Published on January 15, 2008 by Corinna Carlson | 0 Comments

With two of my favourite sports Golf and Tennis back in full televised swing and taking over the sports networks I’m reminded of how many athletes I absolutely love and admire so I thought I would share some of them with you. I’m going with current and keeping it to Track, Tennis and Golf. Nothing personal but I could go on forever, in fact narrowing down the men ‘of now’ is going to be way harder; this could turn into a 2.5 parter.

Paula Radcliffe, British, Marathoner and Current World Record Holder

Even when Paula runs a ‘slow’ 2:17:42, she is still the fastest female marathon runner in the world and has been since 2002. I will never forget the excitement of running my first half marathon in Kelowna on October 13, 2002, at the same time that she was running her second marathon in Chicago and blew the previous WR held by Catherine Ndereba, of Kenya away by a minute and a half. She would later destroy her own WR in 2003 [London] by setting the current standing women’s time of 2:15:25.


Photo © bycolley on Flickr

Charmaine Crooks, Canadian, Five Time Olympian, Runner

Long retired but still a favourite none the less. It was hard not to grow up idolizing this woman having had the pleasure of meeting her when I ran for the Track team in Smithers. She gave our team some tips and hung out with us. It was one of the most memorable times of my life. She is not just a highly regarded Canadian Athlete she is also very respected in the Vancouver area for her fund raising efforts and she currently serves on the International Olympic Committee’s 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics Organizing Committee.

Photo courtesy Bell Champions

Justine Henin, Belgian, Current Rank World No. 1, Tennis

Justine plays some of the best tennis I have ever seen, it has been exciting watching her rise through the ranks over the years. Her praised one handed backhand brings fear to the best players in the game. She is young, cheeky and don’t let her seemingly small size fool you she is a power house who keeps the court full of action. Although having been accused of unsportsmanlike conduct over a call in a match she won against Serena Williams back in 2003, I tend to disagree and think it is a shame that basically because Serena is a Williams sister it sticks with her. Henin is also an Olympic gold medalist.

Photo © ebtg bwtt on Flickr

Maria Sharapova, Russian, Current Rank World No. 5, Tennis

At Wimbledon in 2004 Maria Sharapova made jumping on the bandwagon irrelevant and brought even the mention of Anna Kournikova’s existence as a tennis player to near extinction. She makes Michelle Wie look like a little girl. She is drop dead gorgeous and when she brings her A game she will take her oppenent down in straight sets almost every time. The game face of Sharapova is one of my favourite game faces in all of sports. And yes y’all I know that the key word there is ‘when’ she brings her A game but this is a loving post.


Photo courtesy Sports Illustrated

Morgan Pressel, American, Professional Golfer

I started watching Morgan Pressel on the Golf Channel when she was an amateur. I could tell she was one to watch and so I watched her. She is very mature for her age and is a great role model for young female athletes. She was not able to turn pro without appealing to the LPGA to admit her due to being a year too young at only seventeen in January 2006 when she needed to be eighteen. In 2007 Morgan won her first Major, the Kraft Nabisco Championship making her the youngest LPGA member to win at eighteen years and three hundred and thirteen days. Turns out she wasn’t just one to watch as an amateur.

Photo © esmith132 on Flickr

Lorena Ochoa, Mexican, Current LPGA Rank No. 1

Lorena Ochoa came onto my radar in 2005. That year at the US Women’s Open she was in great position to take the tournament and put it in the water on eighteen and it just became worse and simply unforgettable from there. I remember feeling incredibly bad for her but was one of the assholes who called her O-choke-A, that was of course before with her always calm poise and method of play even when in the crapper she became one of my favourites to watch. Lorena is also the first Mexican of either gender to be ranked number one in the world in the sport of golf and is sponsored by Lacoste (drool), the greatest gator-based clothing line ever. She is like Sammy Sosa is to the Dominican aside from the drugs and the bat corking.

Photo © PGA Mexico on Flickr

For the Record

Published on October 4, 2007 by Corinna Carlson | 15 Comments

Canucks Playoff Fever Group 1 Although many do not consider the NHL season under way until their home team plays as all hockey fans and Canadians a like know it did OFFICIALLY start over the last weekend in London, England between the Los Angeles Kings and The Stanley Cup champions the Anaheim Ducks. It was during Saturday’s game I realized that I am not over my Bertuzzi crush in any way shape or form even if he is playing for an expansion team and YES I know Vancouver is also an expansion team but I mean ones like in ANAHEIM for example where it is like WARM all year and stuff. I sat drooling over the TV while Adam said something about it being ok or expected or something I was distracted. Even though in 1998 he came to Vancouver at the expense of Trevor Linden, at the time it was love at first bone crushing hit. It actually gave me a reason to start paying more attention to the Canucks because I’d been living in Vancouver for two years at the time and was feeling sort of lost and alone with my love for hockey.

Lost because even though we left Ontario when I was at the wee age of seven, and as most of you would know headed to the snowy North of B.C. we watched Toronto teams, sort of, once in B.C I know we did branch out slightly but don’t tell any of my sports loving relatives that. There was always Blue Jays baseball on and there was always Hockey, NHL, World Cup, World Juniors etc. but when it was NHL it was the Leafs or the Oilers. I grew up crushing pretty hard on Doug Gilmore, the Pert Plus commercial he did was such a treat because he had his teeth in. But in 1991 thanks to the Canada Cup I fell in love with Eric Lindros and even bought two of his hockey cards. [I can not stand him now, no love for Lindros] This was all after the era of Wayne Gretzky when he was still ALL Canada’s and playing for the Edmonton Oilers, if you were old enough to remember it, it was a very sad day for Canada when in 1988 he was traded to the Los Angeles Kings. BUT at the end of the day it always came back to the Leafs.

the joke that no one got I learned pretty fast that Vancouver Canucks fans are not fans of Toronto Maple Leafs fans and that Toronto Maple Leafs fans aren’t fans of Vancouver Canucks fans and I knew I was in trouble. I don’t know if it is because I grew up in very small towns or because I was getting older and had my own opinions and could talk hockey with the boys but I have never been accepted as a Leafs fan living in Vancouver. I may as well be some sort of mutant. Now this doesn’t bother me, I can take the heat, not only can I take it, I can laugh at and join in on it as clearly displayed by this post. I’ve openly admitted that at one Canucks vs Leafs game I did take my Leafs jersey off but only one I’ve seen them play the Leafs more than once.

So I guess my point is that I simply consider myself a hockey fan first, NO I’m NOT going to become an Anaheim fan now but if they go for the cup again of course I will be watching because I watch HOCKEY I honestly don’t care what team it is, I’m Canadian, it is in my blood, I don’t care if it is WHL, NHL, Olympics or World Cup. I LOVE HOCKEY. Thankfully the Leafs and the Canucks haven’t played for the cup against each other, if that were to ever happen, which actually makes me chuckle to even write, then I would be in some serious trouble.