We Have A Bracket

Finally! I've been checking all day to see the elimination bracket Eric would be placed in. Here's the link.

http://www.archery.org/UserFiles/Document/Results/Results/2011/11_PWC_Turin/IEFCMO.pdf

He has a bye the first round and the second round should go by easily for him. He will shoot the second round at 17:35 today, which is 8:35 our time. Don't forget about the live scoring! :)

Then he will most likey face Bartos, the #17 seed next in the 1/16 round. Eric said he's never even heard of him, so Bartos doesn't know what's going to hit him! That head to head won't take place until Saturday morning at 9:30am, so 12:30am our time. Then the rest of the eliminations (1/8, 1/4 & 1/2) will follow in succession.

The gold medal match will be Sunday morning at 11:00am, so for us it is the early hour of 2am! You know I'll be up watching (even if I am in the mountains of Payson at girls camp!)

In all of the talk about the head to head eliminations, I haven't even mentioned that the USA team is ranked 2nd and will be competing against other teams on Friday. To compete in the team round, a country must have 3 competitors in a certain division. Then they combine those 3 scores for a total and rank them. We are 2nd out of all the teams. The team round will be from 11:25-13:25 on Friday...so 2:25-4:25am for us. Gotta love the time difference! Eric feels, and I agree 100%, that they have a really good chance of medaling as a team.

Okay, I think that does it for how the competition plays out from here. Let me know if I missed anything or if you have any questions. :)

Qualifying Round Updated

I was able to instant message Eric a bit after his qualifying round. He was really bummed about how it all turned out. I knew something went wrong in the 50 meter round since he stopped giving me updates. :) So that's when I turned to the live scoring, which is really handy! This is what Eric had to say about what happened during the 50 meter round.

"Well I was on the left and the guy on my target was on the right. He is in a wheelchair. After lunch he positioned himself toward the center squeezing me to the left. Because of that I was turned wrong. So, on the very first arrow I was worried that I was going to bump into him. As a result I was thinking about not bumping him and I was lined up wrong. When I drew back I didn't check which target I was aimed at because I was thinking of being in his way. Shot a ten on his target."

The head to head eliminations start tomorrow, but there's not a schedule posted as of yet. Remember you can go to archery.org and they have a link on their main page to watch the live scoring. It's pretty fun to follow the progress and the "refresh" button get's pushed a lot! :) If I find out a time, I will be sure to pass it along. It will more than likely be in the middle of the night, but I think it's worth sacrificing the sleep! ;)

Qualifying Round Completed

Eric realized he got internet from the competition field on his phone, so he sent me an email at 2:20am just after he finished the 90m round. He finished that round in 8th place. Then I got another email from him at 4:20 when he finished the 70 meters and he was still in 8th place. He said it was very hot and humid. I can't even imagine shooting 72 arrows and then still knowing I had another 72 still to shoot.

I didn't hear anything from him after that, so thank goodness for live scoring. :) The refresh button and I became best friends. He finished in 10th after the 50 meter round. And after shooting 36 arrows at 30 meters, he landed 15th overall with a score of 1337. That's a total of 144 arrows in one very long, hot day!!

We are proud of you Eric!

Qualifying Round

It is 7am in Italy and Eric's getting ready to shoot the qualifying round. The schedule changed and he's shooting all four distances today (90, 70, 50, and 30 meters). It's going to be a long day for him, but he's prepared. This qualifying score will determine where he gets placed in the head-to-head elimination brackets. Send lots of positive thoughts towards Italy today! :) He's hoping for a score of 1360 or higher. I'll post results as soon as I hear anything.

Not Much New Today--From Italy

Not too much to report today. Eric was hoping they would be able to watch the finals of the able-bodied compound shooters today, but they couldn't secure transportation to the competition field. So he spent most of the day in the hotel. Which to some might sound very nice and relaxing, but not to Eric who wants to be out on the field shooting his bow.

Here at home though I've had a very busy day. I spent my morning taking a test, that if I pass, I'll be able to add the Media/Library Specialist endorsement to my teaching license. That would allow me to be an elementary school librarian. How cool would that be?! I felt good about the test, but don't have the results yet...so I'm waiting on pins and needles until then. Don't know how soon, or if ever I'll actually pursue being a librarian, but it's always nice to have that option!

Then tonight I was invited to go with wonderful friends to FanFest that's going on in downtown Phoenix. It is in conjunction with the All-Star baseball game that is in town right now. The kids and I had a blast running bases, sliding to steal bases, doing an obstacle course with the style of Reebox shoes the baseball players wear, and even arm painting (I wouldn't let them paint their face!) The kids even got to experience riding the light rail, which they thought was pretty cool. I was so bummed that I didn't think to take a camera and my camera phone is just awful, but here's a fun picture of the kids. It's been a fun day for us and we really missed Eric at FanFest. I know he would have loved it. :(

World Championships--Turin, Italy

Eric left early Wednesday morning to begin his travels to Italy. He left Phoenix and flew to Dulles International Airport and waited for 6 hours there to board the next plane. He then traveled to Frankfurt, Germany finally landing in Turin, Italy over 24 hours later.

I've been able to communicate with him a couple of times through instant messaging. Internet costs him $15/hour and he's having a difficult time getting his computer to hook up to the network, so I'm afraid we might not be able to talk as much as we would like.

The good news is there's a website, www.archery.org that has a link for the Paralympic World Championships (make sure you find the Paralympic link and not the able-bodied championships that is also going on there!) and it looks like there will be live scoring available. So hopefully once he begins to compete, we will be able to keep up with his successes. You'll have to stay up into the wee hours of the night though, due to the 9 hour time difference! :)

Here is a brief outline of his shooting schedule:

Tuesday, July 12th--Qualification: Long Distance

Wednesday, July 13th--Qualification: Short Distance

Thursday, July 14th--Individual Elimination

Friday, July 15th--Individual Elimination & Team Elimination

Saturday, July 16th--Team Elimination & Finals, Award Ceremony for Team

Sunday, July 17th--Individual Finals, Award Ceremony for Individuals

So this is how it all plays out: Everyone will shoot at 90 and 70 meters on Tuesday. Then everyone will shoot at 50 and 30 meters on Wednesday. This will give them a qualifying total. Based off that total score, they will be ranked and will enter a head-to-head competition. We will see Eric shooting in the Individual Finals on Sunday! When Eric medals here at world championships, he will automatically qualify to go to the Paralympics in London 2012.

Eric did mention the hotel they are staying at is very nice with "fancy food". For those who know Eric, fancy food is not always a good thing. He told me the shooting field is on the grounds of an old castle and looks pretty amazing. He said the castle is on a hill up above the field. He's hoping to get a picture soon to send me that I'll be able to upload.

He sends his love to everyone and appreciates all your support and well wishes. Please feel free to leave comments and questions if I failed to explain something. :)

An Appendix on the Appendix

Eric had his follow up appointment yesterday with the surgeon who took out his appendix. Dr. Le Le told him that he had a gangrenous appendix and that miraculously, somehow, all the infection stayed contained in the ruptured appendix. They also found a polyp on it they had tested, and fortunately it was benign. We were counting our blessings before, but now we truly know he was more than just lucky. Someone was watching over him, I have no doubt about it.