Right before he contacts the board... 

He breaks the board in half on his first try! 

Proudly displaying his broken board! 

Basketball

Chillin' before the game. 

As always he led his team in rebounds. 

Defending their number one scorer, but unfortunately it wasn't enough... they lost their first game by six points. 

Deja Vu!

Kiersten reminded me that her very first "triathlon" bike, her brother's 30 pound, steel-framed, 20-inch wheeled mountain bike with BMX tires (pictured here) which she won her first five triathlons on against girls on road bikes was also stolen. That was sad because it was the bike that started it all for her and had obvious sentimental value.

Because she was still too small for a road bike we replaced it with a real mountain bike with 24-inch wheels and put slicks on it. She won her first national championships at 8-years of age on it against girls on road bikes and set a record bike split... on a mountain bike! 

Stolen Bike!

Unfortunately Kiersten's favorite bike was stolen last night.

Two bikes were stolen but one recovered, unfortunately the still missing one is the one with the hardest to replace parts. Thankfully several friends from our family at Slowtwitch have stepped in to try and get Kiersten back on a bike before her first race of the season which is only two weeks from now!

Busy day... baseball tryouts and then a basketball game back-to-back!

So... today was tryout day for baseball. Unlike many of the other kids who have been working with coaches for the last month just for tryouts, we haven't thrown the ball since the end of last season. That's how we do it with every sport. A "hockey parent" I'm not ;-)

His first throw was on target but low, but he brought it up some and hit the first baseman on his numbers every throw after that.

I asked him afterwards if it made him nervous when that first ball went low and he said it did but he just corrected it afterwards and it went where he wanted it to.

He felt really good about his performance because usually he doesn't shine in tryouts (since we don't prepare for them). Since he's been on the all star team virtually every year the coaches all know him so truthfully even when he has a bad tryout it doesn't affect his draft because everyone knows his abilities. 

He was on a roll... snagging every ball thrown his way. 

Waiting in line for his at-bat. 

He had an awesome time at bat... the only kid who hit every ball... even this poorly-thrown one! 

He was assigned to guard Cole, who played on his team last year and is the best player in the league. Cole got his share of points on the board but Kees probably limited him to half as many as he was capable of putting a lot of pressure on him the whole game. 

Breaking away for a drive to the hoop... although he was the defensive force for the team today he got six points on the board. 

He was the king of rebound... using his size and strength to grab more balls than anyone else... here he is getting some air to get his hands on another one!