Knelly
09-15-2008, 09:43 PM
Hey Everyone :D
I wanted to share these photos with you so you all of you could get an "inside" look at the finals in West Virginia. What a great experience/competition it was. I am so proud of all the atletes that competed. They really pushed themselves to the limit as far as physically, mentally and just being away from home for 2 weeks. The fact that there were 5 Americans in the finals is AMAZING. And each one of them deserves a lot of credit. Jason Bergman looked great on the log press and plane pull, he is brutally strong. Travis of course is a monster and looked good on the pull as well. I think I can safely say he gets the "put all the effort he had" in that pull award. He laid flat on the ground right after, but that just tells you he gave it his ALL. Phil looked too strong. And he was in great shape, he was great with the crowd and he competed in his last competition with class. Dave had (from what Derek tells me) the best competition of his life. You can tell he is one of the hardest workers when it comes to training. He always had a determined look on his face and got in the zone before each event. He is a great guy and VERY humble. I know he has a great strongman career ahead of him. Nobody should ever count him out if competing against him. As far as Derek goes....you had to be there to understand these past few days. Some rumors are flying around about how he didn't hurt his ankle. I don't feel the need to back him up and say I was there making him ice it inbetween events and at night....so let the rumors continue...but they will end on December 26th when you see the video of him loading the last stone.....you might need to cover your eyes for that one!
Anyways, I want to say that I am truely proud of Derek. He was in first place for two days and going into the stones. As much as he deserved to win, it just wasn't meant to be that night at that hour at that minute. Derek didn't come in 2nd place that night because he wasn't strong enough, he made a mistake. Derek was the man to beat that night, not Mariusz. Mariusz is a great athlete/person and he deserves his 5th title. He never gave up and that will show in the plan pull especially. Mariusz knows exactly how Derek feels because of WSM 06, and Mariusz was very respectful to Derek.
Derek and I had a long drive back home today (11 hours total!) so we had time to talk about things. His head is up, and he is proud. Would he have liked to win? I would say yes of course, but I will let Derek feed more into that. All I have to say is that he decided to start training again THIS wednesday...and I pointed out that he only has 50 more weeks until WSM 09......we both smiled at eachother and enjoyed the rest of the drive.
Derek, you are my hero. You inspire me and motivate me every single day of my life. Every time I watch you train/compete I am amazed. Keep up your drive and determination and all your goals will come true, what ever they may be. I love you.
Here are the pictures from the Finals at WSM! (there are a few from the first week and some random pics of Chris and Garrick raiding the town! ) Enjoy!!!!!!!!!!
K
ps...a BIG thank you to Garrick who took most of these photos. I had to give him my camera so I could tend to Derek! Nice Job Garrick!!!! :KD:
share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=1AZMnDlo1ZsWHw
I wanted to share these photos with you so you all of you could get an "inside" look at the finals in West Virginia. What a great experience/competition it was. I am so proud of all the atletes that competed. They really pushed themselves to the limit as far as physically, mentally and just being away from home for 2 weeks. The fact that there were 5 Americans in the finals is AMAZING. And each one of them deserves a lot of credit. Jason Bergman looked great on the log press and plane pull, he is brutally strong. Travis of course is a monster and looked good on the pull as well. I think I can safely say he gets the "put all the effort he had" in that pull award. He laid flat on the ground right after, but that just tells you he gave it his ALL. Phil looked too strong. And he was in great shape, he was great with the crowd and he competed in his last competition with class. Dave had (from what Derek tells me) the best competition of his life. You can tell he is one of the hardest workers when it comes to training. He always had a determined look on his face and got in the zone before each event. He is a great guy and VERY humble. I know he has a great strongman career ahead of him. Nobody should ever count him out if competing against him. As far as Derek goes....you had to be there to understand these past few days. Some rumors are flying around about how he didn't hurt his ankle. I don't feel the need to back him up and say I was there making him ice it inbetween events and at night....so let the rumors continue...but they will end on December 26th when you see the video of him loading the last stone.....you might need to cover your eyes for that one!
Anyways, I want to say that I am truely proud of Derek. He was in first place for two days and going into the stones. As much as he deserved to win, it just wasn't meant to be that night at that hour at that minute. Derek didn't come in 2nd place that night because he wasn't strong enough, he made a mistake. Derek was the man to beat that night, not Mariusz. Mariusz is a great athlete/person and he deserves his 5th title. He never gave up and that will show in the plan pull especially. Mariusz knows exactly how Derek feels because of WSM 06, and Mariusz was very respectful to Derek.
Derek and I had a long drive back home today (11 hours total!) so we had time to talk about things. His head is up, and he is proud. Would he have liked to win? I would say yes of course, but I will let Derek feed more into that. All I have to say is that he decided to start training again THIS wednesday...and I pointed out that he only has 50 more weeks until WSM 09......we both smiled at eachother and enjoyed the rest of the drive.
Derek, you are my hero. You inspire me and motivate me every single day of my life. Every time I watch you train/compete I am amazed. Keep up your drive and determination and all your goals will come true, what ever they may be. I love you.
Here are the pictures from the Finals at WSM! (there are a few from the first week and some random pics of Chris and Garrick raiding the town! ) Enjoy!!!!!!!!!!
K
ps...a BIG thank you to Garrick who took most of these photos. I had to give him my camera so I could tend to Derek! Nice Job Garrick!!!! :KD:
share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=1AZMnDlo1ZsWHw