Day One - INDOOR NATIONALS

They started the morning off with the usual 5 minute warm-ups for each age group. They run through each division twice for a total of 10 minutes of warm-up. As a coach it barely seems like enough time for a skater to roll onto the floor, roll around a few times before it seems like it is the next age groups turn.This is the time a skater is supposed to use to warm-up, roll around and get used to the floor which, by the way has a new coat of roll-on as well as making sure their wheels are going to work. If the skater does not feel comfortable on the floor their first time out and they feel they are going to need to make a wheel change, they only have about 15 minutes from the time they roll off of the floor until their final 5 minute roll around. Although our announcer, Bob Justice, who is probably the best in the business, asks the skaters to skate only their division warm-up, some skaters take serious advantage and skate several warm-up groups. Yesterday there was a classic lady who warmed up with the Junior, Senior, Classic, Grand Classic and World Class ladies. Funny thing is not only is this lady a Classic lady, but she is a Novice Classic lady whose official practice isn't until tomorrow. She wasn't the only one doing this .... there were several Freshman, Sophomores, Juniors and Seniors (men and women) doing the same thing. But add all of those to the 25-36 skaters that are truly in that division and now you have 50 skaters on the floor at one time trying to accomplish the same thing. It can become total confusion.So now you have a skater who is trying to feel the floor out and doesn't want to sprint the first minute or so that they are out there... and by the time the last group finally gets off of the floor and this group get's completely on.... minus the skaters that don't belong out there, the original skater has about 3 good minutes of skating.The floor looked great when we walked in and from listening to the skaters, I wasn't sure if it would be fast or not. Some skaters were frantically changing wheels. This is common as most rinks do not have fresh roll-on down on their floor and skaters are not used to the tightness and the roll is good but it can slow down much faster than what a skater is typically used to. Once the racing got under way, there was no question whether or not it was fast .... let's face it, from the second race out, the first of several National Records were broken. It's funny... I put this story "on hold" for a few hours so that I could take some photos and come back with results.... and the next thing that I know is that we are now on day 3. Before I realized it, I blinked and it's day 3. I have 4 sets of batteries for my camera that were charged and ready to go when I left home, but have somehow lost their charge so I do not have any photos to put with my story. On top of that things have been so busy with coaching, video taping and the regular meeting of friends that I haven't seen in awhile, that I am way behind! Forgive me for that. I hope that I will be able to bring more news tomorrow.Some names to be listening for: Nicole Lloyd-Ultimate Speed, Scott Stubblefield-Washington, Zach Lloyd-Ultimate Speed, Jonathan Blair-Georgia, Jacquline Blair-Georgia, Kimani Griffin-North Carolina, Sara Thrall-Washington, Marty Lauffer-Wisconsin and so many more!!!Tonight they introduced the Junior and Senior World Team as well as the staff. This is the largest group of staff members attending with the World Team. They are a great bunch of coaches and parents and I expect that they will do a wonderful job!! Good luck to Team USA in SPAIN.Ross Creveling is doing the LIVE FEED voice-over and I had an opportunity to speak with him for a few minutes tonight. It was pretty cool except he gave ME the headset with all of the scratchy noise!!! I hope that I was the only one that heard it because it drove me nuts (which is a short trip anyway!). How cool it must be to be sitting at home in your torn, old ugly, but very comfortable PJ's, with your feet up, a bag of chips and maybe a soda (if you're not skating this is ok-LOL) and watching the most incredible skating going on. No commercial breaks (can be a problem if you need to run to the restroom though... you might miss some more action) so that you can watch from start to finish. WOW... and you haven't spent a dime!! I may try coaching that way next year!!! :)We start back tomorrow morning with the doors opening in just 4 hours at 5:30am. That's right. I am here typing away at 1:43am Central Standard Time. The thunder and lightening is incredible and almost a distraction as I finish tonight's blurb. With the roar of the rain God's yelling loud and long, we were forced to stop this evening's skating at the Junior Ladies as we waited to see if the roof leak would continue to do so onto the skating track area. Due to the heavy rain storm coming through Lincoln, it just seemed to overload the air conditioning vent area with water. And of course it had no where else to go but on the skating floor! I do feel sorry for the athletes that were all fired up and ready to skate. That's hard to get yourself psyched up and then let down and told to be back in the building in 7 and a-half hours and be ready to do it all over again. BUT...... in all fairness...... every skater in each of those sprint finals will have the same conditions. It will be the skater who will go right back to their room, lay everything out for tomorrow morning, who won't be bummed out, who will think positive thoughts, who will get up and eat something, warm-up properly and return to the auditorium ready to RIP those other skaters apart. THOSE will be the skaters to succeed!!! As I said, each of the 6 finalists in each of the divisions will have the same advantage or disadvantage, depending on how they look at it!With that in mind..... I need to shut down this monster! I hope that either I can bring you photos or that Mark Virtue will loan me a few to post here! Have a great night and I hope we see you bright and early in the AM. Linda :)