Links, 11 Consecutive Olympics, Ronan Sanchez Interview

Links: Here’s a website that if you’re Italian, you’ll enjoy reading: Pattinaggio Bellusco. If you can't read Italian, don't worry; I'll direct you to my favourite part of the website: the photos.


The trick is to get 'em into skating when they're young
Do you know Gavin Thulien? Steve Robillard is the best at saying Gavin’s name. He says ‘Gahy-viin’. It’s not that he’s making fun of Gavin, it’s more that it’s Steve Quebec accent that forces him to say Gavin’s name like that. Apart from Gavin being a good guy (and yes Gavin, I remember that I still owe you those $30), he’s been running ZT Sports for some years now. At last, he’s got a website! Visit ZT Sports. You might notice a few of my pictures on the main page, hehehe, 'Peter’s Inline Racing Web Page...', uh, I mean 'SpeedSkateWorld.com; everywhere'.


Gavin with a pen in his mouth- not the best snack eh?
11 Consecutive Olympics: From the article 11 Consecutive Olympics posted on RoadSkater.net, there’s a quote that reads: ‘While I consider aloud if St. Louis has created a speed skating dynasty, I also ponder the future of speed skating in general. USS seems to be raiding the speed skating cupboard by going for inline skaters instead of expanding the sport. The inline speed skating sports seem to be shrinking with reduced participation and discontinuance of some inline events while I am hoping for expansion. I am optimistic thanks to growth in Asia and Europe, but I still must wonder where are we headed here in the US. Is this just a "dry spell" here in the US?’.

I feel the pain that the author; the Toronto Inline Skating Club- the club that I’ve been a member of since 1993- needs a lot of help in certain areas including volunteers, money, skater recruitment, media exposure, etc. There is a current batch of fast skaters just as there was on the day I attended my first speed practice in 1993. While TISC has developed some great skaters and the faces of the club have changed over the years, there are a few things that have remained constant, such as the heavy workload silently falling a few people’s shoulders...


That's me back in 1993 taking my training seriously- to the left if Eric Gee, the good guy
Ronan Sanchez Interview: Can’t speak or read Spanish and therefore you can’t read the Ronan Sanchez interview on MundoPatin? Then run the interview through AltaVista’s Babel Fish Translation. That’s where I get some of my semi-comprehensible/ semi-accurate news.


Ronan Sanchex getting dirty in the rain in the marathon at the 2006 world championship