From Cali- Entry #13

From Cali- Entry #13: I am not sure what to tell you about the theme of this evening at the world roller speed skating championships in Cali, Colombia. Falls? Korea? Colombia?

The USA team suffered some pretty nasty injuries, including Jessica Smith going down hard and fast in the sr women's 1000-meter final, Skylar McKormick (spelling?) going down in a 15-ish skater pile up, and one more skater (I don't know his name) suffering what looks like a broken arm. Ecuador's Jorge Balanos (Pan Am Games bronze medalist) was looking stong in the senior men's 15km elimination race and he went down in a multi-skater crash and smashed his nose.

On the Canadian side, Jesse Pauley skated his 15km elimination race really well, improving dramatically on his performance yesterday and placing 19th. He was rubbing shoulders with the top juniors. Morgane and Martine also skated better races than yesterday, getting deeper into the pack during the race. Alex D'mello who skated with Jesse started on the back line and passed a lot of skaters, but he ran out of gas early. I had one of my better races, coming 32nd of 58 or so. I was in the pack the whole time, and when I was eliminated, the skater from Iran was behind me and I thought we were at single and not double eliminations. It's part of the game.

I am sitting on some really good video that I'll put together when I have time, but now it's time to sleep. Tomorrow, I've got the 500m and I am going to watch, enjoy, cheer, and take photos & videos of the relays. I will also try to find some time to update SSW with outside-of-worlds news (Canadian news- Steve Robillard won pro men at St Paul, Randy Plett won pro veteran men, and Aaron Arndt finished 4th in the St Gallen 111km- more on these later).

I think it's safe to say that there were all sorts of tales of greatness and tales of sadness today- and I will try to tell those tales with the photos below. I hope you enjoy them.


Long line ups to get into the competition venue to watch

Outside the venue

Some skating shirts for sale- and from Ottawa? How cool!

Chris Nelson and a whole bunch of back-packs

A wooden motorbike. I don't know if it works, and the sign, well, I think that means don't touch, especially you Jesse!

One of the security dogs- I saw a few skaters playing with this guy and he is a sweetheart

Junior women 15km elimination

Junior women 15km elimination

Filming the junior women 15km elimination

Skylar McKormick (spelling) in front during the 15km elimination

Italy down... after a 15 or so skater crash. It was nasty- I was right there and all of a sudden, the girls came flying, flipping, and tangled towards me...scary stuff

The racing goes on...

...and on...

...Colombia down and out

And he made sure he got in to take photos

A 2nd crash claimed more victims

And finally there was a winner in the junior women's 15km elimination- Colombia's Maria Claudia Salazar Roa

Junior men's 15km elimination

Lots of bodies in a small area in the junior men's 15km elimination...

...and this leads to a crash....

...going down, notice the skates in the air? And the New Zealand skater flying?

The New Zealand skater can fly!

Junior men 15km elimination- Jesse Pauley in the mix

Junior men 15km elimination

Junior men 15km elimination- Jesse Pauley in the midst of the action

Junior men 15km elimination

Senior women 15km elimination

Senior women 15km elimination final kick- Korea's Hyo Sook Woo (silver) and Colombia's Alexandra Vivas

Senior men 15km elimination- we are too fast for my camera

Senior men 15km elimination- Ecuador's Jorge Balanos leads the way

Senior men 15km elimination

Senior men 15km elimination- yes I was in this race

Senior men 15km elimination

Senior men 15km elimination- Yoo Jong Nam in the lead (Korea) led a lot and won the race- he was a beast!

Ecuardor

Fans

Senior women's 1000-meter final turn- rubbing is racing between the top girls- USA's Brittany Bowe and Colombia's Briggytte Mendez tangled up in the final corner; Mendez got the silver, Bowe 4th- New Zealand's Nicole Begg won the gold

Senior men's 1000-meter final turn- USA's Joey Mantia won the gold over France's Julien Despaux- for both these guys, it's their 2nd gold & 2nd silvers in as many days