Great meet... great throws!

Great meet with a tiny bit of drama thrown in.

The boys were separated into three flights... the first flight with the shortest-throwing boys (based on their regional championship throws), the second flight with the longer-throwing boys and the third flight with the longest-throwing boys. Kees was in the third flight with the sixth-longest throw in the country.

I can't post pictures... yet... but you wouldn't believe the size of these ten and eleven year olds... from 5'6" to 5'9"... making Kees, at almost 5' (and the second-tallest in his class) look tiny!

The drama: they rulled Kees' discus illegal... saying it didn't fit into the template, being slightly too thick and too small in diameter. A discus varies pretty dramatically from one to another with their feel and weight distribution and a thrower gets used to the feel of his own disc. To young throwers this is especially true. Kees throws a Polish disc with 55% rim weighting which allows him to get a good spin on it with his smaller size. Without that disc, and perhaps being forced to throw a more rim-weighted discus, his performance could be seriously affected... let alone the psychological consequences that come with not being able to use his "favorite" discus.

Since I had coach credentials, I went to the implement certification and requested that they re-measure it in front of me and lo-and-behold... it measured in! Now, why it didn't before I don't know, but his discus was in and the drama was averted... time to compete.

This was serious business... eight field judges in white shirts and straw hats, strictly cordoned-off throwing area, a rotating board with throw distances displayed for the spectators, coaches and team cars fom all over the country with matching team uniforms, video cameras on tripods... it was just like a college meet, just with younger athletes.

The first flight was uneventful since the kids were no threat to the longer-thowing boys in the third flight, but in the second flight one kid got off a seventy-something foot throw and woke everyone up!

Then came the final flight... the big boys with the long throws... and things got interesting.

Kees typically starts slowly... throwing longer with each throw during practice and then longer with each round he throws in competition.

After the first round Kees had the seventh-longest throw... then after the second round he had the fifth longest throw... with kids sector and foot fouling, and with Kees' usual consistent throws in the middle of the sector and never fouling, there was a chance he could move up... unfortunately in the third round he came a little bit straight out of his turn and over-rotated slightly and did not throw longer than his second throw and fell to 10th as other boys got in longer throws.

He was disappointed, but with only a couple feet separating third from eleventh he did a fantastic job... and come on... tenth in the country... that's fantastic!!! What was most impressive was that he was the smallest of the long-throwers, in a sport where size is a huge advantage, he threw with the big boys... some almost a foot taller than him!

He has vowed to come back next year and make it into the top-five... and considering he had less than a quarter of the experience of the boys in the third flight I don't doubt that he can do it... stay tuned!