Monday, February 28, 2011

Work vs. Play.



It'S FUNny where LIFE can take you sometimes...So I'm in Calgary, Alb. at the moment, sitting in the lobby of my hotel, writting this, and waiting for a flight back to Ottawa, Ont. I've been here since Wednesday covering the 2011 CIS National Swimming Championships at the University of Calgary (note: I work as a sports writer for the University of Ottawa Gee-Gees varsity teams. So they sent me out here, expenses paid, to cover our swim team.)

So yeah the trip started when the legend Matty Beiler picked me up at the Calgary airport Wednesday morning. Next thing you know I was driving past Calgary's Foot hills up into the mountains, it was pretty surreal considering I woke up in downtown Ottawa. Anyways, we made a quick pit stop in Banff for a few essentiels and Matty's board. We then headed over to Sunshine for an epic shred, fucking freezing I mind you, but absolutely amazing. The snow conditions couldn't been better, a fresh layer of 20 cm gave me a whole new outlook and stoke on snowboarding. Now, I get it.

Next day was the first day of  'official business', my very first varsity swim meet. I really didn't know what to expect, nor did I really have any idea what I was doing. But over the three days, things got exciting, entertaining, and fun. I must say it was a pretty cool to experience something totally out of my comfort zone. Like I'm used to wakeboad and snowboard contests, but it's funny how much the culture of competition is the same, no matter the sport. And I'd even go as far to say that the parties are just as good too.

On my last day, I took some time to head up to Canadian Olympic Park (the C.O.P.). 2 weeks ago my buddy Travis Desormo told me about this place, so that's I knew for sure I'd be bringing my snowboard with me, how could I not? So yeah on my last day,had a good shred on a sunny day with some the gentle chinook warming things to a perfect -1C. Got my first chance to check out and attempt to ride a 'superpipe'. The thing was fucking massive, 22' walls yo!! Accepting that I couldn't possibly pop out of this thing, I just rode it like a massive ice wave and had a lot of fun doing it! 
So yeah all in all a pretty sweet 4 day stint here in Calgary, always nice to blur the lines between work and play. Now it's time to jump on the plane, and enjoy some live satellite t.v. courteous of WestJet. Guess I'll watch the Oscars...