2017 World Footbag Championships, day 6 of my trip to Portland, Oregon. Competition day 4

Today we are approaching the most interesting parts of the tournament. In Open doubles the quarter finals didn't produce any upsets. Teams 1,2, 3 (easily) 4 (shakily) advanced to the semi finals. We will be in for a treat in the 2 vs 3 match as it  is full of questions. Team number two is François Depatie-Pelletier and Manu Bouchard packing a little more offence playing the Finns Tuomas Karki and Matti Pohjola showing a little more regularity . I see that match as being more of a tight bout than the other. 

Team number four appeared shaky at best in their appearance vs Chris Siebert and Dan Greer. In fact it's kind of a miracle that they are still alive. Wiktor Debski (Poland) and Luc Legault (Montreal, Quebec) are not used to play together and they will meet the team with the biggest serves in the semi finals. Walt Houston and Benjamin Alston appear as clear favorites in this confrontation. They just won the Akisphere (Montreal annual tournament) and they have one more year of experience under their belt after finishing 3rd last year. As Walt also appears to be the grand favorite in open singles they will be exsuding confidence. Luc and Wiktor's serves are also below average it should be a walk in the park for the #1 seeded team. As for my predictions for the finals I'll reserve my judgement after the semis.

In the women's singles category Lena Mlakar (Slovenia) scored a big upset over Geneviève Bousquet (Montreal, seed #1) There was also a bit of a controversy as to how this bracket was ran. Without being too technical something abnormal happened and will need further study for future tournaments. So no more Montreal representatives in the singles category. Geneviève still has to play in the Women doubles finals and the mixed doubles semis and hopefully finals.

Otherwise the players are pushing the envelope more and more.
Here are some images of this net day by Cory Current:



In the freestyle world routines semi finals were on the menu today and the few echoes that I gathered are the following: Scott Bevier and Taishi Ishida went dropless during their presentation and Vasek Klouda was not satisfied with his performance. Which could be a good thing as he could even do better in the next round.

Good luck to all the competitors for the next steps. This time I'll leave you with a picture of two legends of the sport who, each in their way redefined the game of Footbag Net and Footbag Freestyle.

Left: Eric Bartholomay, AKA Bart great singles specialist brought his very dynamic, powerful and totally offfence minded game to the sport in the 1990's.
Right: ''Rippin'' Rick Reese redefined a lot of the boundaries of footbag freestyle in the 80's and 90's with a combination of great difficulty in the moves and creativity in singles and doubles routines. One of the first real ''shredders', of the game. 
They met, I suppose at the Denver airport en route to Portland to see old friends and spectate with great interest. 

Lots more action to come, stay tuned.

2017 World Footbag Championships, day 5 of my trip to Portland, Oregon. Competition day 3

Hello everybody,

Hope you all had fun today! First I wanna talk about the Open doubles round of 16 results.
My partner Santeri and I had an encounter with Luka Weyler-Lavallée and Russell Arseneault and we had a hell of a match. Final result: 11-910-1211-9 for them. At first I felt so dissapointed, of course, going to the quarter finals would have been a huge accomplishment for us. We came short a couple of points. They scored a total of 32 points in the match compared to our 30!!!!!!! The positive points are: We made the show and gave our all.

Our match was so long that most of the other duels were done before we finished,  so they gathered around and supported us. We ended up finishing 10th. OK.

Yves Archambault and Santeri Karvinen 2017 World Footbag Championships

There was an upset also as team # 10, Jeremy Mirken and Dan Baron defeated #7 Grischa Tellenbach and David Bernard. The rest of the matches in that category were uneventful.

Here's a look at the bracket

In the women's doubles the finalists will be Geneviève Bousquet and Julie Symons versus Kerstin Anhuth and Lena Mlakar. North America vs Europe, I expect an enormous match.

The 3rd place went to Evanne Lamarche teamed up with Becca English-Ross who outplayed Leanne Mackrow and Audrey Tumelin. Much honor to all the players and their family.

And finally I want to leave you with this beautiful picture of 4 women Hall of Fame members met at the scene today in Portland, Oregon's Convention center:

Sitting on the chairs, from left to right: Tricia Sullivan-George, Julie Symons, Lisa McDaniel and Becca English-Ross. They are talking with 2015's Women singles routines champion Paloma Mayo. Power to the women.

2017 World Footbag Championships, day 4 of my trip to Portland, Oregon. Competition day 2

Another hot day in Portland. The Championships are in their second day and its time for Open and Women's doubles

The men's doubles started at 1:15 and most of the matches ended up the way the organizers predicted, there was only one upset in Pool B where the team that was pre classified #3 beat team #2. No big surpises. 

My team was in pool E and we just kept our rank for tomorrow. We lost to the top dogs of our pool and won against the lowest ranked team. Here's a picture of my partner Santeri hitting a spike. (Picture courtesy of David Leberknight)

Tomorrow we will enter the main draw, there are 16 teams left, all battling for the title, some with more realistic chances than others ;-)

In the women's doubles the pool had four teams and the team number two, Geneviève Bousquet (Aki Québec) and Julie Symons took the number one team. The Germano-Slovenian team of Kerstin Anhuth and Lena Mlakar seemed more affected by the conditions. High heat and, let's be honest, terrible courts.

In the the next round (semi finals) the European team will have a tougher road than Bousquet and Symons. They will have to face Evanne Lamarche and Becca English, two seasoned veterans with lots of skills.

So that's it for now, stay tuned, much more action to come.

2017 World Footbag Championships, day 3 of my trip to Portland, Oregon. Competition day1.

One of the main reasons that I go to Worlds every year or so is the people. People you meet, people you play with. Always nice to reconnect and to make new friends. Let's start with a very cool picture that Tricia took tonight at the restaurant:

That's a whole bunch of classy people right there. From left to right:
Steve and Sarah Femmel, Yevez, Evanne Lamarche, Jim Derricott, Tricia George and Brett Milliken. 

Now let's see how the competition unfolded. 

Open singles started at 10 am or so (Footbag time) and  I witnessed some hard battles . Kenny Shults had to work hard in his pool, Jeremy Mirken was especially menacing to the legend. On another court Chris Cleaver brought the European Championships bronze medalist to his last resources in a hard fought three setter. Wiktor Debski finally won but Chris defenitely got his respect. Luka Weyler-Lavallée also took Wiktor for a special ride loosing 17-15 in the 3rd set. For the Montreal fans out there Luka is still in the contest. 

Later during the day Mixed doubles also brought some very interesting play. In the last match of the day Kenny Shults and Evanne Lamarche beat Wiktor and his partner Lena Mlakar after being dominated in the first set. Click here to see some of this match
Our Montreal teammates Genviève and Luc cleaned up their pool very easily. It's gonna be interesting to see if they can win it this time. They already played in the finals twice (2009, 2010)

There is still of footbag to be played this week but the first day was very promising.

In the women singles Geneviève Bousquet (Aki Quebec) cruised through her pool. In the second pool the order was also respected with Kerstin Anuth (Germany) taking Lena Mlakar (Slovenia)

So far so good then, lots of interesting footbag to watch in the coming days. The freestyle will also be on it's way soon.

I will start to play tomorrow with my open doubles partner Santeri Karvinen who I had the pleasure to play with for the first time today . It was only pickup games but it was fun. Wish us luck regular readers! And I will leave you with a couple more pictures of the beautiful people of footbag:

World Footbag Championships 2017 my travel blog to Portland, Oregon.

A new year, a new World Footbag Championships. It's time to blog. Let the world know about my passion for this sport once again!

Day 1

The travelling day. I left my apartment in Montreal on August 4th at 4am to get to the airport for my 6:45 flight. I had to work a lot to get all my preparation together in time for this departure. The taxi driver was a little bit too talkative at that point, the only thing I was thinking about was sleeping. And I did, on the plane ride to Calgary, I slept as much as I could. Then a little problem delayed my arrival in Portland for 3 hours. Our scheduled plane broke down and they had to bring one from Seattle. That's exactly why I always try to travel in a couple of days early to important tournaments. I got in touch with Tricia, who was picking me up at the airport and everything went fine from there on out. 

So my friend Tricia and her husband Doug picked me up at the airport. From there we went to some cool people from the footbag family's place. Lori and Robert made me feel at home on their awesome property. We had watermelon and Tequila drinks. They used a hand blender to crush the inside of the watermelon, ingenious! 

After that relaxing arrival, pool dip included, we went to Master Tricia's house. 

Second day

On the second day I found out where food was sold. I temporarily healed one of my insecurities by getting groceries for a few days. Now I can concentrate on playing and filming (at the end of the week) I also had a taste of the river. It's not even a five minutes walk from the house, so refreshing. After that I had a little nap and we headed to the practice courts. 

We played some pickup games on the grass that'll be used for the 2 first days of the tournament: Westmoreland park

It was a cool little leg shaking, mind shaping practice. Here's a couple of pictures of the first arrivals, either to play or to prepare the courts for the start of the tourney: 

So good luck to all the competitors and good patience to all the staff of the 2017 World Footbag Championships. I will play my first official games with my partner Santeri Karvinen (Finland) on Monday at 1:15 pm. in the open doubles net category. Wish us luck and follow this blog during the week.

My 30th World Footbag Championships travel diary - days 12 and 13

Ok! I know I said that my series was concluded! But you know what? I can't stop blogging about it!

So day 12 - The competition has ended. It's time for the last goodbyes. Done and...felt. Now a group of kickers has to get to Vienna to travel further. The organization gracefully provides a bus for us. Of course it was intended for more people...but due to the hard World Championships conclusion partyin' a few missed this opportunity.

So most of us survivors make it to the Vienna airport in about an hour and thirty minutes. A little invigorating nap for me to recup for the 1 1/2 hours of sleep I had before leaving... I told you it was a hard party. Thanks to the Mayor of Trnava for organizing it BTW.

Vienna

At that point I'm travelling with François Depel, Mary Dee et Barthélémy Meridjen. Our mission is to find a connection with our Air B'n'B hostess for the next night.

We chill on a patch of synthetic grass with Eurik, Shirin, Camillo et Jean-Marie, between the airport and the train station.

Finally a connection is established with our short term landlord. Her name is Maria and we get all the info the retrieve the key, in the center of Vienna, in a bar, in the afternoon....

François and Barthélémy got the key, we get to the apartment. Posters of Bob Marley, poster of Legalize.eu.  Very nice apartment with 3 bedrooms. 

At night, while all the youngsters are passed out, I continue the video acquisition and classification project of my 30th World Footbag Championships. I did all I could that night before falling asleep. But before that I met one of the roomates and showed him some good footbag footage. He liked it. Jakub, tall and hansome fellow with dreads and so cool. We talked about Salzburg...

Vienna Airport bis

So at this point you think, god these idiots didn't see any of Vienna? Well, actually we did, a little bit. We walked after settling down and had the most delicious vegan meal at a restaurant called the Harvest.  We then proceeded to go towards the center. Enough to get a view of the Danube, the mountains in the back on a gloriously sunny day. We walked a bit alongside the water and decided to go back early and rest.

Marilyn and I went on a second walking exploration on that first night to find out exactly where the train station was and as we were there ask about all the info needed for our departure and, of course, we bought our tickets.

On the way back we stopped at a grocery store. The place was packed at 21:30 full night on. We didn't know about having to weight the bananas and got some flack in german for that, from the lady cashier. She wasn't happy!!! Then a younger lady reassured us with a nice comment and a smile. I see a lot of anger in Vienna but also a lot of F......g cool people!

Finally Marilyn and I left the apartment at 7:15. Took the train at 7:45 Airport, well in time, our check-in already done the previous day. First step - Check.

In the air and land and air and land (you choose the melody)

My first flight is to London, a couple of hours, everything goes smoothly with Austrian Airlines. Then 3 hours to kill in Heathrow. No problem.

I finally embark on my flight to Montreal. 7 more hours of flight.

You probably think that this nonsense is over? No way, still take the bus from the Airport, then the Subway with a change of direction. The last step: 7 minutes of walking with all the luggage to carry. This is definitely the hardest part, luckily I decided to be patient as a Sherpa through the whole experience. Finally home! Always good to be home isn't it?

Yes, we saw theVienna Cathedral

In my next article I'll make a recap of this 2016 World Footbag Championships. Stay tuned.

My 30th World Footbag Championships travel diary - day 11

What a day did we have to conclude this World Championships in Trnava. I want to take a moment to thank all the people that were involved in making this event happen. Special thanks to Dexter Struz who made my life easier in anyway he could without ever loosing his smile. Having power cords to fire up my cameras instead of operating them with batteries is a life changer when you film 2 days of action non stop. Many thanks to Mr Mayor Peter Brocka to welcome us in his city with a lot of perks.
Also a big thanks to all the support staff for the food, setting up the sites and handling our requests so beautifully. Also thanks for the event directors, on the net side it was Tuomas Karki, for freestyle I'm not sure but thanks anyway. And once again thanks to the generous donators that made my trip possible.

Women doubles

Now back to the action on the courts and in the freestyle arena. In the first match of the day two of our girls from Montreal offered us our sole title for this year in the Women's doubles. Some solid play by Geneviève Bousquet and Maude Landreville lead them to a convincing victory over Lena Mlakar, the little Slovenian dynamo and her partner Piia Tantarimaki, the Finnish powerhouse. Congrats to all of you it's beautiful to see you play.

Maude Landreville and Geneviève Bousquet, happiness after the win in women's doubles

Open doubles 3rd place

Next was the bronze match in Open doubles and it turned into a grueling duel between Americans Walt Houston and Ben Alston versus the French team of Sébastien Maillet and Grischa Tellenbach. Ben and Walt finally won it in the third set after the French mounted a serious comeback fro 5-13 to 14-14. The Americans closed the debate with pain and sweat but overall it was a well deserved win.

Mixed doubles

Following the 3rd place men's match it was time for one of my favorite events, the mixed doubles finals. I love to see a woman and a man work side by side on the court (and everywhere else for that matter). Florian Gotze and Kerstin Anhuth beat Arthur Ledain and Lena Mlakar in a quality match where Arthur seemed a little off. Florian on the other side was...Florian, the greatest net player of the last decade. Well done my friend. 

Freestyle events

There was women the women circle contest. It seemed a little disorganized at times with 6 players, which in my opinion is a bit too much. Win by Tina Aeberli.

In the open team freestyle finals the 2014 and 2015 winners repeated, Martin Sladek and Tomas Tucek are in a class of their own. Nice effort by team Madrid though as Paloma Mayo was obviously hurt and still courageously played with her partner Sergio Garcia. We could see the potential of the routine and the creative flow of these two.

The women singles routines offered some good moments but overall too many drops. Another win by the great Tina Aeberli from Switzerland.

Finally in the Open routines Evan Gatesman from the USA clinched the only titles that he never had before at Worlds. The legend Vasek Klouda came in second. No dropless routine this year in the finals.

Open doubles

The tournament returned to the net court and concluded with the doubles finals, the most awaited net event. After playing against Arthur Ledain in the Mixed doubles finals, Florian Gotze partnered with him to face the Finnish team of Matti Pohjola and Janne Uusitalo.

If Arthur was off in the Mixed, it was a totally different story in the doubles finals. Flo and him dominated all the aspects of the game, offense, defense and limiting the unforced errors.

Arthur also hit a series of incredible spikes derived from Sepak Takraw a cousin sport from east Asia. Roll spikes, sun backs were numerous and crazily athletic. Florian Gotze although having a more conservative spiking style hit his part of winners and their team demolished the Finns 15-2 in the second game after winning the first set. Big win, big shots and big fun. This is it the 37th World Footbag Championships is over. Of course we had a chance to say goodby with a good party at the end. See you next year in Portland, Oregon, USA.

Arthur Ledain and Florian Gotze celebrating their World doubles title - Photo by Pro Kicker