#competitive sports

[acanthusarchive]

This is not a new thought on my physical disability situation.

But my body being like this right now is because of my heavy training in childhood.

This is going to be a long one so, more under the cut.

CW: for brief mentions of anorexia and the Eteri expiration date

I will start by explaining a couple of examples of this with the team Tutberidze.

The team Tutberidze is managerd by Eteri Tutberidze and is mostly known for her olimpic winners, all being trained through their early teen years until they're able to finally get to the olímpics.

Issue is, the way she trains them, notably to do quads, is via starving them (they're not allowed to drink any water or eat anything on competition days as Alina has mentioned before), the main way you can do quads is if you weigh very little.

So she focuses on that, low body weight, and forgoes a lot of strength training that is not needed for that technique. Now, in the early teens everything is okay, issue comes at 16-17.

Yulia Lipnitwkaya, in 2014, was the first in this long line of hers. She did great in her individual olimpic category and went home with gold through the team event.

When she went back to Russia her body started crumbling down, all her skills slowly diminished, her technique became poorer and failed most jumps.

At 19 she retired from competitive skating.

Then there's Evgenia Medvedveva, she went undefeated for two years after junior categories had been fully won. She then went to the olimpics.

She was 17-18 when she went to the olímpics with her teammate Alina Zagitova (being 15 and much less injured). Six months before the olimpics Evgenia fractured her foot, which she still skated on during europeans being beaten by her teammate Alina.

She went to the olímpics still, both skated great, Alina won by 1.31 points and for the first time Evgenia cried in a competition. After 11 years of training under Eteri she went to another team in Canada.

Alina slowly lost her skills at 16 and by 17 announced she was going to take a pause in competitive figure skating. At 19 she left competitive and was hospitalized for three months to battle her anorexia.

Eteri has never been able to train boys into the Olympics (in single category) as far as i know, this plus how all this athletes slowly crumbled down physically after a certain age has created the term "the Eteri Expiration Date" which is 17 years old.

My specific case was similar, artistic/sincronised swimming, competitive training that favored girls of 11-15 and while we trained our strength and all, it was favored to be on that skinny side, not fit, low body weight focus.

My chronic pain started at 15 with my articulations then moved to my back with the scoliosis at 16. By 17 I stopped going to training for personal reasons.

At 18-19 I was also battling with anorexia and semi successfully got out of it on my own, to this day I still have to battle with that way of thinking.

I recently had the chance to talk with one of my old teammates, she basically told me our trainer ignored questions about me when they asked why I wasn't there anymore.

Most importantly, I asked her about the physical side, if she remembered it being LIKE THAT, now, she doesn't have any physical disabilities, but she did leave at 15 a year later (she was younger than me) and did agree that the training was brutal, bruises were common nearly every week, and that our trainer was probably thinking Olympics when training us. Plus, she also went through ED issues.

I'm not sure if this is a few isolated cases or this is a genuine phenomenon at this point, I always second guess myself, so.

If you have had this experience, know someone, have any more info on this, etc. Please comment it.

I won't make a paper or anything but putting a name to it, or maybe there already is one, would help.

If nothing comes of this at least I put it out there, this is half a vent half that reaching out thing honestly.

[evilhorse]

You afraid of competitive sports?

(Captain America #195)

[ssshh-im-a-secret]

I have an idea.

Hear me out, ok, hear me out.

.

.

Balloon sports.

[discgolfmindset]

Sai Ananda continues to dominate FPO Division in DGPT Silver - Discraft's Cascade Challenge

The FPO division of the A-Tier DGPT Silver – Discraft’s Cascade Challenge presented by GRIPeq in Shelton, Washington has witnessed an impressive performance by Sai Ananda. As the tournament enters its third round, Sai continues to dominate the fpo division, sitting in first position with an impressive score of -7. However, fierce competitors Lisa Fajkus and Kat Mertsch are hot on her heels with a…

[mj-skyair-star]

█🕹️👾🎮Chapter 12: Waiting (Part 2/2)░▒▓█

March 29th, 2036, Saturday, 9:50 a.m. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

We met with the rest of the group again. They all remained on the same bench chatting away like everything was normal, everyone except Jet Greez. Until the group detected us, Airis and I shared the wonderful news that got them exceedingly enraptured like we were celebrating another new fantastic year. Jet Greez, on the other hand, might care less about it so I'm not unforeseen of him. The only time I would actually be astonished is if he cheers for someone whose life has been saved... Or he could be hiding his care.

Soon we began chatting among ourselves, well, more like chatting with Airis, our first human being to interact with. We basically questioned her about Real- er, Earth (is what she wants us to call it rather than the name 'Real Earth'. We weren't sure about that, although we could understand) since this magnificent planet piqued our curiosity, unduly intrigue... of course, again, except for Jet. Although, he didn't join the group nor chat. I never comprehend why he always likes alone time for himself the majority of the time. Regardless, he watched us from a distance from where we were sitting (still at the same silver, shiny, metal table that Airis was sobbing over). It might sound a bit creepy of him, but I assure you, he's not... Let's just say he sees it as 'he's a part of it, just sitting/standing from afar distance'.

It's not like I'm going to force him anyway.

... I must admit, I deeply miss his extrovert side... He hasn't been very open to people since-...

... Since... since...

... I... get why he has become more of an introvert now...

Nothing you should know!

Because Oscar is resting adequately for a couple of hours, we can't have that serious sit-down discussion yet. In the meantime, at some point, we'll have to do something other than lounge around and chat. Not that I have a problem with that. I'm more of an active bot who likes to do activities most of the time or twenty-four-seven which is rare, primarily when it comes to running. I don't sit still willingly for more than three hours. If I have to, I would just let my leg stim.

I still want to learn about Earth, from a human child's knowledge, and so far, the answers were extraordinary indeed. I'll give it two hours of this!

***

Two hours later.

Alright! Two hours are up! This is perfect timing because things were just getting awkward at this point. Luckily, I came up with something to prevent that from happening. I stood up from the bench and suggested to everyone that we should play a game of Hoop Ball. My team extended their enthusiasm upon hearing those two words. Barring Airis, she didn't know what it was so I had to explain to her the game and rules. Then I got off guard when Airis told us that Hoop Ball is exactly a mixture of 'Basketball' and 'Netball', in her Earth understanding. HA, HA! Surely it is laughable! It's not the same as 'Basketball' and 'Netball'! I don't really believe it, and I don't think anyone else does either... Well... things did extensively turn into a mini remote debate, not in an adverse way, of course!

Everyone has different opinions and we should respect them no matter what.

... Excluding the problematic ones.

We all headed to the 'basketball' court (us robots call it the hoop court), located next door to the cafeteria to get ourselves ready.

Since I know Jet is likely to cheat, in some way, when he plays any game, I decided to make him the referee. He might also be likely to call false fouls. Even though I had never seen him as a referee before. For months (or feeling the foreverness of not seeing him face-to-face in general) I have zero ideas of what he's been up to apart from being there for Artron. From memory of the last time I played sports with him. I recall the previous time he actually cheated in Hoop Ball.

And boy, the moment I told him my decision of roles privately. As a result, I didn't think Jet would call it unfair. His response is: 'It's unfair because I was biased towards him just because he (Jet) betrayed us and worked with Artron from time to time.'

Listen. I know he betrayed Artron back, however, just because he did the same to him. That doesn't mean my trust towards him is open. I know Artron would have the same feeling too.

I find his words dull-witted. Again, I am only doing it because I don't trust him to participate in sports. He is capable of cheating at any time, and he will. I managed to convince Jet by pulling out the Qute card. Qute is the only bot who loves to play referee (also, she's quite small and doesn't like sports. Her words, not mine) howbeit she's unavailable, we don't have anyone else to be a referee. I win that unnecessary argument while Jet Greez grouches and agrees to take the role.

Moving forward.

The team were split into two groups: Me and Airis versus Obus and Grezzer.

Mectra and Kitt are cheerleaders for both teams as well as bench players who wait for teammates to switch places with them (Mectra is on my team and Kitt is with Obus and Grezzer). The two sat on the long blue bench, outside the lined court, cheering us on as well as waiting patiently for any switches.

Jet came into the court with the ball after we'd done our mini warm-up. He stood in the middle of the white-ringed line of the massive school court. Meanwhile, I positioned myself near Jet, standing on the opposite side of Grezzer, outside the ringed line. The body-built bot did the same position as I did. Me and Grezzer shared the competitive expression.

Following that, Jet held out the orange ball with black lines up between me and Grezzer. He had his whistle in his mouth... ready to blow it at any given moment... Things were slowly getting intense and overestimated the ambition of winning... and ignoring the certain grouchy bot sending me daggers.

WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

The whistle was blown, shrilly, at the same time as Jet threw the interesting-looking ball in the air. This caused me and Grezzer to jump with our arms up and stretch as much as we could in the air, at the exact same time.

So who touched the ball first?

I did.

I slam against it, sending the rough orange ball flying past the orange bot's head to head towards Airis. Unfortunately, Obus caught it before she did.

Obus took three steps and passed it to Grezzer, who caught it. I rapidly sprinted, using my speed boost, to catch up to Grezzer and snatch it off him. I then took three big steps, close enough to shoot my goal, the sweet first-round victory in the hoop-

WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

Immediately after my throw, the sound of that high-pitched, irritating whistle paralysed me! My neon blue eyes stare at the ball, it misses the hoop, instead, it bumps into the orange ring. It lands on the clean, reflective court, bouncing away gradually... I am taken by what just happened... Me? Getting whistled? My mind rushes with thoughts of disbelief at how I could get whistled at in a game. I'm sure this was a mistake- Wait a minute!-

Brushing off the bizarre juncture, immediately, my programs got me reminded that I put Jet to be a referee. Turning around casually to see Jet jogging toward me with a sinister cocky smile spread across his face (that I decided to ignore) I frowned with a mix of suspicion behind it.

"In Hoop Ball, you're not supposed to use your special abilities or powers, remember?" He told me, once he reached for me and raised up a yellow card.

...

"Ugh! I completely forgot about that! How could I!?" I facepalm.

I stayed in that position for a couple more seconds due to the presence of embarrassment crawling up my system. This was reasonable to call out. I will admit, I retrospect on him a lot of times... Maybe I have judged him too hastily?

Jet smugly sniggers.

"You explained everything to Airis about this game. How could you forget it? Ha!" I rolled my eyes, giving out a short sigh. "First warning, Captain Bias," he whispered the last word so no one could hear.

He laughed mockingly at me yet I don't care, but what I do care about is that he'll aggravate me for the rest of the five rounds.

I simply walked away from him to run over to Obus with my speed boost deactivated this time. Grezzer has the ball and tosses it towards us. Obus and I jumped up to catch it. How ignorant of me. He caught it and threw it into the hoop at the speed of light.

"Ah-ha! Yes!" In victory, the red bot cheered.

"Team OGT on one point, TAM remains zero," Jet declared.

Mechtra and Kitt cheer wildly in the background, as well as, sharing support to keep trying towards me and Airis. It would be something that Airis needs because I noticed her feeling disappointed in herself.

I, on the other hand, let out a smirk.

My second in command made an excellent shot, as excellent as his combat skills. I admire a few things about his skill. Although, I am 100% confident that me and Airis can beat them. I'm sure of it.

The real game begins~

***

Another two hours later.

"Obus! I'm open! I'm open!" Grezzer cried out, waving his arms around like a baby bird trying to fly.

It was the final round. My team and Obus' team points were tied, we were getting eager to win a tiresome game..! More like the human girl is getting tired rather than the rest of us. Us bots don't get tired like humans, besides some of us run either charging or batteries.

Obus had the ball and threw it towards the strongest bot but I caught it before he did. With a smirk, I hurriedly took three steps and tossed it to Airis, thankfully she was already closer to our goal.

"Catch it, Airis!" I call out to her.

She opened her arms and caught it, then swiftly turned her heel to successfully throw it into the hoop!

Fortissimo, the whistle blew.

WOOOOOOOO!!!

"Game! Team TAM wins!" Proclaim the referee.

"Woohoo!" Me and Airis run towards each other and earn high-five for victory.

Suddenly, my attention was drawn to something off to the side, near the two-way door. I diverted to see what it was and couldn't help but smile the moment I had the full view of it. My robotic blue eyes had spotted something remarkable that Airis will be on the top of the world.

"Hey, Airis," I tapped the pigtail girl's shoulder.

She turned to face me once she finished shaking hands with Grezze and the unsportsmanlike Obus (he accepted the defeat later on).

"What is it?" The girl inquires.

I gestured my head to the side, still grinning (to the point that I might look silly).

"Look over there." She took a quick glimpse and gasped in stupefaction, a great big smile forming on her face.

No- Please allow me to rephrase it. She jumped so high! Over the moon!.. Uh- Okay, now that I'm witnessing this more, maybe she's gotten too happy...

"Oscar!" The brown-haired girl bolted towards Oscar and Qute.

Qute briskly floats out of the way, knowing that Airis might hug her friend to death or knock him down to the floor (if she decided to jump on him for an unbreakable hug). I have never seen anyone with this much exhilaration. Even Oscar could see what was happening, judging by his smile turning a tiny bit crooked.

"A-Airis! Wait! Wait! Wait! WAIT!!!" Too late.

She braces herself for the cuddliest hug around him, very tightly... Hopefully not to death.

"I was so worried about you! I mean, sick to death! I'm so glad you're alive!" Airis looked like she was about to cry out of pure joy, meanwhile, Oscar became a limbed rag doll thanks to Airis' clutches crushing him.

"Miss- you- too- air-!" Oscar chokes his broken words due to oxygen drifting away from him.

"Oh, sorry!" Airis immediately released him and got tense that she hurt him though Oscar reassured her that he was fine, after gasping for air to catch his breath. "How are you feeling?" This time, Airis was much more tranquil and softer towards him.

"All... better..." Huffing, Oscar gave her a meek smile and a thumbs up.

It was a heartwarming sight to see two friends reunited together. Really, it is.

...

... Now it's time.

I became serious in my expression since we were approaching the main situation.

"Now that he's here, it's time to explain what is happening,"

"Children!" I called out to them. They both turned their heads towards me. I gazed at the members, sending them a message through my emotions. They know what that means so they become serious too. I face the children again. "I believe it's time to explain why we're here and what's been occurring around here,"

"Oh right. I nearly forgot about that." Airis says.

I approached the two before the others did.

"Please, follow me," with that, I walked past them to exit out of hoop court, knowing everyone followed my lead.

***

We led the two kids upstairs to the Computer Room.

Opening the blue wooden door, the human children gasped, whoaed, and commented on how cool the room was remodelled. The one comment I don't get is: 'This room looks like a meeting room from Star Wars!'... What's Star Wars?.. Possibly a video game that I wasn't aware of? (We turned the 'I.C.T' into our own style-like home. We'll fix everything once we defeat Artron and the ones that serve him).

I sat down on the desk chair across from where Oscar and Airis are sitting. Obus and Grezzer sit on my right side, Mechtra and Kitt are on my left. Qute just floated near Airis, and Jet Greez leaned on the wall near the door we just entered, arms crossed.

...

...

Silence had its time to shine long enough so I broke the silence. I am captain so I mostly do the talking, and yes, I allow others to speak as long as no one accidentally overlaps each other's talking. Especially when dealing with 'After you,' - 'Oh, no! After you!' type of problem.

I straighten my posture and lay both of my robotic arms on my desk, crossing them for my hands to dangle off the table edge.

"Since Oscar has been recovering for four hours, it is finally time to tell you what's going on,"- I inhale a short breath, steadily- "I believe you two have so many questions that you want answered, yes?"

"Yes," they both unison.

I earn them an earnest nod and continue the conversation.

"Would you rather hear the explanation of how we found out about this sinister plan, and why Artron and his associates want to kidnap you?"- I point to Airis for about a period of three seconds until I place my hand down.- "and then the questions last. Or the other way round?"

"I think hearing the story comes first. Obviously, we need a lot of explanation to understand how the heck you guys got here, or how you exist. Asking questions helps but it would take a lot of time if we didn't hear the explanation first. Particularly since the explanations do answer a considerable number of questions for you. Well, for some of them, I guess" Oscar replied.

"I'm with him," Airis answered after Oscar.

I nodded again and started explaining everything, not leaving a single detail behind. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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[streamie-was-taken]

Why is it that sports culture is leaning away from 'take care of your body' when talking about injury and more towards shame and encouraging athletes to 'push through the pain'? Stop it. Do better.

[masgwi]

What a great display of sportsmanship !

[sports-shift]

(via motorcycle in the space Graphic T-Shirt by SportsShift) If we are going to race through space, we must always be the strongest and fastest

[one-time-i-dreamt]

Hozier visited my college and held a competition which I won, the prize was that I got to play Wii Sports Resort while he critiqued me.

[egophiliac]

ok so as someone still relatively new to TWST (and someone just taking the events as they come to EN instead of keeping up with the JP side) and as a Jack Howl simp

I am of the (CORRECT) opinion that he should absolutely get an Applepom look because... fwuffy. and hat with ear holes. and he'd be SO insistent that he's used to the cold and doesn't need it but he will take it once it's insisted on because he's polite and won't refuse Gramma Felmier

Also I think a fun twist on the "someone's sled breaks and their plushie tears so they have to come up with another idea" bit from the other event is that Jack goes wolf mode to pull the sled (because as said in his starsending wish he pulls sleds back at home on breaks to try and get faster as a wolf!)

I'm biased though because I need more Jacc in my life

Thoughts?

thank you anon for bringing the mental image of harveston Jack into my life. he would be SO fluffy...so warm...he would haul so many apples...

also while I love the imagery of him pulling the sled, I feel like that would probably get them insta-disqualified. :( unless they can somehow 1) convince the judges that this enormous talking wolf is actually a very well-made plush, and 2) get Jack to go along with it (I do think Jack would instantly respect Marja as being more alpha or whatever and would have to, like, choose between his sense of JUSTICE, or going along with cheating at this sporting event so an authority figure doesn't get mad at him) (...wait this is just the plot of episode 2 again) (DANGIT)

[pucksandpower]

… and so it continues.

The way that Williams Racing has nearly completely lost the lovable underdog reputation they have carefully cultivated over the last few seasons in record time needs to be studied.

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Μικρού δ’ αγώνος ου μέγα έρχεται κλέος.

Sophocles

Little effort will not bring much glory.

[bigfatbreak]

Birds of a Feather previous / next

[carlos55inz]

we need to have the conversation of how charles fans treat his teammates without falling into the accusatory zone that we want to harm charles by having this conversation.

i mean charles no harm, but it is something that is getting extremely out of hand and it needs to be talked about. some charles fans have gotten too freely with being cruel to others drivers.

people used to call sebastian vettel a CORPSE. yes, scuderia ferrari screwed him. yes, everyone loves sebastian vettel again NOW (because he is far away from it and free from this hell) but back in 19/20? charles fans, mainly on twitter, made his life miserable. he couldn’t win. he couldn’t make anyone happy. if he won, he was taking something from charles that belonged to charles rightfully. it he lost, he was old and bad and should retire already and this sport wasn’t for him. he wasn’t a team player. he didn’t care about ferrari. he wanted to screw charles over.

if you just got here, if carlos is your first experience of how charles’ teammates are treated, let me tell you. everything that is being said about carlos has already been said about sebastian. and it is crazy for some people to understand that because everyone loves sebastian again, so you can’t even imagine what he went throught.

and i’m sorry for generalizing all of charles fans, im a charles fan, but it is something we need to stop and look at and talk about. how long will we let it go. how long until it starts to happen to lewis hamilton, of all people. how long until they dismiss his victories and say he is old and should give up of this sport so charles can win.

and you know one of the worst part? charles loves to race. every time he had to fight for it, he loved it. when he and carlos race in that track, he comes out with a big smile and talking about how he loves to race carlos. how this is real racing. he loves to fight for it. to prove himself. to have to sweat for it.

all while his fans try to make everyone just bow down their heads and give him things in a plate, already chewed and easy to get. as if he would like that. as if he can’t prove himself worth otherwise. as if he isn’t good enough to fight for it.

[scooby-doo-exploration]

lobelee

[undeniablespice]

i remain sincerely, unshakably convinced that aeron’s one true talent is basketball. he’s 6’5” and built like a scarecrow i know he would absolutely destroy the westerosi bball circuit if it weren’t for the Trauma turning him away from sports towards substance abuse and religion