Mens Lake Louise Speed Events

November 25-29 were the dates of 3 Training runs of downhill, one race run of downhill, and the last day a race run of Suger G. First Training day, Didier Cuche won the training run, you will hear about him a lot this season as he has been skiing great in speed events in recent years. Bode Miller was 6th for the first American. Second day, the training was canceled due to poor weather. On the final training run, Michael Walchhofer of Austria took first, Bode Miller was 2nd. Travis Ganong, a name I know well as he is my age and I have raced him on numerous occasions, took 13th with Erik Fisher on his heels in 14th. NY native Andrew Weibrect, lives in my town of Hanover, NH currently as a Dartmouth College Student, took 19th. Ted Ligety took 86th place. On the actual race day, Didier Cuche won the overall, and teammate Carlo Janka took 3rd...again. Andrew Weibrect took 12th while Bode had a mishap and ended up 29th. As for the Super G on the 29th of November, Canadian, Manuel Osbourne-Paradis won his first ever World Cup. Benny Reich of Austria was 2nd and teammate Michael Walchhofer was 3rd. First American finisher was Ted Ligety in 8th. Andrew Weibrect was 12th with Marco Sullivan in 15th. Congrats to Manuel Osbourne-Paradis on his first win!

Levi SL

November 14th and 15th was the first World Cup Sl race in Levi, Finland. The race was a rather difficult Slalom for a first race with sub-stellar conditions. The snow was lacking but the course maintanence crew did a great job holding it together. The Womens race was held on the 14th, the winner was Maria Riesch of Germany with Lindsay Vonn in 2nd only .08 seconds out of the win. Tanja poutiainen, the victor of Solden, took the podium finish in 3rd. Hailey Duke and Kaylin Richardson took 21st and 23rd respectively. Sarah Schleper was a DNF first run. On the Mens side, Reinfred Herbst of Austria captured the victory with Ivica kostelic of Croatia and Jean-Baptiste Grange of France in 2nd and 3rd under half a second off the leader. Ted Ligety and Jimmy Cochran of Keene, NH were 18th and 19th respectively.

World Cup Skiing

I am going to change my topic because I have not been able to blog much more on Jai Alai due to the lack of information. I am going to begin my topic of World Cup Ski Racing since the season has begun and is well underway. I would like to talk about the American skiers but their results have been pretty poor thus far this season so I will start by talking about the World Cup as a whole. October 24, 2009 was the first Women's race at Solden, Austria. It was a Giant Slalom on a fairly easier course for World Cup standards. The winner of the race was Finnish skier Tanja Poutiainen. The top American was Lindsay Vonn in 9th place just under 1.5 seconds off the leader. The next American was Sarah Schleper in 24th. No other Americans Finished the race. On October 25, the Mens race at Solden took place and American Ted Ligety placed 2nd .6 seconds off the leader Didier Cuche of Switzerland. Fellow Swiss skier Carlo Janka was third to round off the top 3. No other Americans finshed the race. Congrats to Ted Ligety for a great first race!

The best players

Inakai "Goikoetxea" Osa is undoubtedly the best Jai Alai player in the world right now. He has won the singles championship at every world class tournament since 2005 and has won the world championships since 2003. His speed and strength makes him such a strong player. Watching videos of him I have seen him dominate games at the world championships. Another famous player is Jose Ramon Areitio who holds the world record for the fastest throwing of any ball in history. He threw his pelota 188 miles per hours in a game held in Newport, RI in 1979.

Short Documentary on Jai Alai

A bit of the History of Jai Alai

The sport of Jai Alai is thought to be created over five centuries ago in the northern part of Spain known as the Basque region. The original name for the sport is Pelota Vasca, translated to Basque ball. The Basque region has their own language of Basque and throughout history has tried to become their own country because it is culturally and physically so independent of the country of Spain. This interests me because I have never really heard about this region. The region is in the heart of the Pyranees Mountains and consists of many small mountain villages. The name Jai Alai comes from the Basque language meaning Merry Festival, this name was given because the game was only played on Sundays and on holidays. The game of Jai Alai was not introduced to the United States until the St. Louis Worlds Fair in 1904. Casino's in America have captured the wonder of the worlds fastest ball sport. Florida is considered the home to Jai Alai now because there is more Jai Alai games played there than anywhere else in the world. Other place in the US where the game is played are Las Vegas, Reno, Connecticut and Rhode Island. The only changes in the sport over the 500 years of existance are the speed of the game and the courts that are used, they are much faster courts than the old church walls they play on in the Basque region.

The game of Jai Alai

Jai Alai is a game of quickness and accuracy. There are three walls, front, left and rear. The ball, or pelota, is a handmade tightly woven sphere with leather tightly wrapped around it like a smaller, harder version of a baseball. When the ball is thrown at the front wall it has one bounce and after that bounce an opposing player has to catch and release in one fluid motion or else it is a point. It is a very fast game where the eight players on the court are all against each other and each player has teammates on the sidelines. When a player gets scored on, he then leaves the court and another teammate must step on. When any given team reaches nine points the game is over. If at anytime a the ball goes off the court, the player who threw the ball out loses a point for their team. Most courts or Cancha's are around 180 feet long, 50 feet tall and about 40 feet wide. The walls are made of solid granite to ensure the walls are strong enough to withstand the impact of the pelota traveling aproximately 188 miles per hour.