Training Summary

Saturday, October 17, 2009

Celebration

Im at my parents house with my siblings celebrating my Dad's 81st birthday. I think he has a lot of years left if his parents are any indication. His mom lived to 96 and his Dad to 92 those are some nice genes to have inherited. Its been a fun day especially playing with the neices and nephews.

Changing gears - I think we should all be pretty happy with the US National Team winning Concacaf. They have had some bad breaks with Charlie Davis's terrible accident and the inury to Gooch. They have a lot to sort out in the next few months. I for one would love to see Dempsey and Altidore up top. A midfield of Donovan, Bradley, Edu, Holden. In the back it all depends on who is healthy. I would really like to see more of Torres and Benny.

John

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Reading ...and USMNT

Its been awhile since I have posted but my crossfit buddy Kevin Daigle has inspired me. But instead of blogging about crossfit I will share some thoughts on a few books that I read this summer that i thought were truly exceptional. The first one is "Born to Run" by Christopher McDougall. This book is interesting even if you are not a runner. It covers anthropology, native diets, native cultures, sociology and ultra runners. I found every chapter a page turner and have listened to several podcast interviews to gleen even more information and stories.

Thinking of stories and story tellers reminded me of the passing of Frank McCourt this summer. Frank McCourt was an incredible story teller and writer. I think what is more important though is the impact that he had on so many students lives. Think about the talent this guy had and how much he was able to share. I wish more people would think about becoming educators versus chasing a buck. In fact if I ever hit it big my idea would be to create a fund that would pay off entire student loan debt in exchange for teaching in a public school for 3-5 years. Im hoping that this would be something that would motivate a few high fliers to make a pit stop in education and maybe never leave. I would hope that it would generate enough interest that we would have to select on the top candidates. Let me know what you all think of that.

Completely changing topics, its only a week away before the final two US MNT World Cup Qualifiers. I would have hoped that Jermaine Jones and Maurice Edu would both been healthy enough to play. Alas that is not going to happen. I hope that Landon can put this team on his back for the last two games and put us through.