The Fast and the Furious: Operation El Kemino, Tokyo Edition

[Matt K]

I played again yesterday for about 2.5 hours. If the last post it felt like I hadn't played for 6 months, yesterday felt like I had actually not played for just the one month, which was very reassuring. I went back into the drilling I was doing back in December:

Rev Swirl 10x bs
Swirl 10x bs
Bubbabeater 5x bs

I ended with 5 runs of 25 contacts, which took me much longer than I would've liked, but it was satisfying to get them all, and they were all legit runs with not too much bullshit tricks. I'm going to try to rearrange my schedule so I have an hour between work and dinner where I can play everyday, I'm just worried that the waking up earlier is going to kill me. Oh well, it'll be worth it.

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

Great to hear it man. I'm sure the time off helped your body feel much better too. Looking forward to this time stretch of your shred.

[Matt K]

Today was my 8th anniversary of playing footbag. The only thing footbag related I did today was a legover with my wallet before getting into bed just now. I really wish I had the time and space to play every day right now.

I might do a longer reflection piece later. I've officially been playing for 1/3 of my life which feels very strange but very normal at the same time.

[C-Fan]

Today was my 8th anniversary of playing footbag. I might do a longer reflection piece later.

I hope you do. You write well.

I've officially been playing for 1/3 of my life which feels very strange but very normal at the same time.

I know exactly what you mean. I think sometime in May/June I will hit the "half my life" milestone, which will feel insane and also perfectly normal. For better and worse, footbag is part of us.

[Matt K]

I will probably write at least a short reflection, hopefully this weekend. Thanks for the encouragement, Ken.

Well, Rent is completely over. It was one of the best experirences of my life and I really miss it. It was extremely satisfying though, and it's already leading to more musical opportunities.

And I have actually managed to play the last two days. I think I only did a dozen uptime moves; I've mostly just been trying to get a good sweat going. I did hit some small stuff that I've never really done before which I enjoyed:

Ducking Osis>Rake>Whirl rpt
Pdx. Blender>Bubba Beater bs
Bubba Beater + Pdx. Eggbeater bsos

Now that the show's over it's mainly just the snow that's keeping me from playing all the time. The weather here can't make up its mind, but I hear it's supposed to warm up this weekend.

[Matt K]

I was feeling nostalgic tonight so I was looking back at some school things I had written years ago. I found this paragraph at the end of one of the versions of my college essay (which was about footbag) that I wrote 5.5 years ago that I'd like to share:

I’ve never been satisfied with any conclusion I’ve written for this essay. I don’t think it deserves one. If I could somehow just write “. . .” after the fourth paragraph, I think that would be a better way to end this than one I could ever write. Maybe when I’m old and have forgotten the significance of 20 fearless, or who Vasek Klouda is, then I can finally put an ending on this essay, and really see how footbag has affected my life. But, I hope it never comes to that. I hope that I can never write a conclusion to this, because I want my involvement and experiences with this sport to stay with me until the day I die. I want there to be a point when I’m retired, and I can call up my friend and say “Yeah, the record for Nemesis is 6 now, but remember how you were the first to hit it back to back?” The experiences I’ve had with this sport have been the happiest times of my life, and no matter what happens, it will always have a special place in my heart.

[anhkhoashevakt]

I was feeling nostalgic tonight so I was looking back at some school things I had written years ago. I found this paragraph at the end of one of the versions of my college essay (which was about footbag) that I wrote 5.5 years ago that I'd like to share:

I’ve never been satisfied with any conclusion I’ve written for this essay. I don’t think it deserves one. If I could somehow just write “. . .” after the fourth paragraph, I think that would be a better way to end this than one I could ever write. Maybe when I’m old and have forgotten the significance of 20 fearless, or who Vasek Klouda is, then I can finally put an ending on this essay, and really see how footbag has affected my life. But, I hope it never comes to that. I hope that I can never write a conclusion to this, because I want my involvement and experiences with this sport to stay with me until the day I die. I want there to be a point when I’m retired, and I can call up my friend and say “Yeah, the record for Nemesis is 6 now, but remember how you were the first to hit it back to back?” The experiences I’ve had with this sport have been the happiest times of my life, and no matter what happens, it will always have a special place in my heart.

Can you upload the entire essay? Pretty please?

[Matt K]

Ha, maybe. I think that's the best part of it. I'll take a look at it.

I played at the college last night with a new guy, Dan. It was a really fun session, and he's making good progress already. He says he'd like to keep going so it'll be nice to have more reasons to play.

I hit a couple new things that made me happy:
Gyro Eggbeater (sort of both sides, but flip was super sketchy)
Drifter>Eggbeater>Whirl rpt

I've always really sucked at eggbeaters (besides symp, which is a pretty different trick), so it's nice to be able to use them for real.

edit: I feel really psyched on footbag right now, it must be the weather getting better. I was reading back through my mid-2011 posts and I really want to try to get back into fearless. I don't know if I'll follow through on this, because I hate filming, but I might dedicate like 20 minutes at the end of sessions to film/document getting old fearless links back up and running

[Matt K]

Had a 2.5 hour session. Haven't played that long or hard in a solo session in a while, it felt good. Worked on random fearless links which were feeling better by the end of the session. Nowhere near where I was in 2011, but it's something.

Blurry Whirl>Bubba Beater>Dimwalk rpt bs
Whirlygig>Spender bs
Blurry Whirl>Blurry Whirl>PS Whirl>Spinning Whirl>Mobius bs

I haven't gone for a certain number of fearless in years, so getting 5 by the end of the session was nice. Hopefully I can slowly get the number back up to 10.

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

Matty, props on getting back up to 5 Fearless! Awesome you're pushing yourself again… with your normal ass tricks Just kidding, I still can't do a lot of your normal ass tricks well lol I'm guessing you can get to 10 again sooner than I can get to 10 for the first time. Can't wait to shred face with you at the (Mini-)Jamps IV.V (4.5)

Keep it up man.

[C-Fan]

Is 10 your fearless record? Have you hit a beast?

[Matt K]

10 fearless is indeed my record.

I have hit a few beasts. Off the top of my head:
-gig>wind>spender
-food>wind>spender
-food>spender>spender
-gig>spender>food
-spender>wind>spender (or may have just footed it, I can't remember)

It'd be nice to get some new beasts too.

[h0ag3yb3atZ]

sick drills, especially diggin' the eggs and the both sided fearless runs. i challenge you to hit 45 fearless with no whirls or dexes all in spanish.

hoping everything works out and we can go to penn state in a month. a hoag/kemmer road trip sounds awkwardly epic, i imagine it like fear and loathing in las vegas only replace ether and barbara streisand paintings with yellow gatorade and me throwing quarters out your window on the highway. good times will ensue.

[Zac Miley]

killin' it bruh

[Matt K]

thanks bruh

Had another session with Dan today. He's making good progress, I'm excited to keep playing with him (and it's good motivation to get me to play at least once a week).

I played an hour with him then an hour solo after he left. Did some more eggbeater stuff and some old fearless drills:

Pdx Drifter>Eggbeater>Pixie ss Clipper rpt bs
Blurry Whirl>Blurry Drifter rpt bs
PS Whirl>Spinning Whirl rpt bs
Blurry Whirl>Tomahawk>PS Whirl>Spinning Whirl bs

[C-Fan]

Do you think you could hit: blw-bld-blw-bld-tom-tom-psw-spw-psw-spw? Maybe tack on a pdx blender at the end to get a new fearless record?

[Matt K]

In time, yeah, I think so. I'm not very good at tomahawks yet but if I keep playing often enough and keep practicing these drills something like that shouldn't be too hard.

[Matt K]

Well, I had to miss PSU because of a family wedding on Saturday. The wedding was a lot of fun, but I'm bummed I couldn't go.

Another session with Dan today. He's making great progress, I'm excited to see where he is in a month.

We played outside for the first time this year and it felt amazing. There's just something about playing in natural light that gives me a rush of energy that I love. I played really well; not so many highlights, but a lot of longish runs with good control and a lot of shuffle.

PS Whirl>Spinning Whirl rpt bs (yay old friend)
PS Whirl>Stepping Whirl bs
Bubbabeater>Atomsmasher bs

[Matt K]

Another 1.5 hour session with Dan this evening (and outside again!). I'm loving these, I'm super glad he's into it. He's improving a lot, both in form and specific tricks/records.

I played really fantastically for myself; the fearless stuff I've been messing around with is definitely bringing back an element of my 2011 game. Mostly I just had long and dense strings. A couple things I got towards the end:

Tombstone>Blur>Legbeater rpt
Gyro DLO>Dolomite bs

and I forgot: Pdx Blender>Gyro Whirl rpt

I wrote down a bunch of combos that I had in here from a couple years ago that I'd like to rehit. That was one of them

[Matt K]

Snuck in a quick 45 minutes between work and dinner (woo, haven't done that in years!).

I didn't have much time, so I got right to drilling:

Swirl 10x bs
Rev. Swirl 10x bs
Bubbabeater 5x bs
Tomahawk>Stepping Clipper 5x bs

Worked on harder stuff after that:

Tomahawk>PS Whirl>Void bs
Tombstone>Blur>Legbeater>Blurry Drifter>Blur>Legbeater bs
Blurry Drifter>Blurry Whirl rpt bs (sloppy; need to get this one back)
Blurry Whirl>Tomahawk>PS Whirl>Spinning Whirl>PS Whirl>Spinning Whirl(>Mobius one side) bs

7 fearless is my personal best for the year. 10 is feeling super attainable in the near future.