Photo Shoot

Today was a very, very long day. We started out and got picked up at our apartment at 9. We had to be in our suits and we drove about 40 minutes to get to the place. Then we took pictures for about an hour in our suits.

Then we waited for a long time. After, we got into our jerseys and took more pictures. Then we had lunch at noon in their company cafeteria. The lunch was good. It was noodles, rice, soup, and some chicken type stuff. It was all pretty good.

Then we went back and took more pictures. Then we waited. Then we took pictures walking. Then they changed the backdrop to black. We took more pictures. Then we waited....and took more pictures. It was a long boring day. I smiled and I stared at the camera. We were there for 9 til 5 just taking pictures. I guess I should wait to get a 9 to 5 job since I am not cut out for that.

Tomorrow we leave for training camp. It is about an hour away and we will be there for 2 a days for 4 days. I will try to blog while there, but I'm not sure if I will have internet. Thanks for following.

First Day of Conditioning and Practice

I woke up this morning and via skype had a premarital counseling session with Hope and our mentors - John and Diane Diendu. They both go to our house church and John was a pastor for a long time. It was a good session and thanks to technology that we are able to continue moving our relationship forward from many miles apart.

This morning we went back over to the weight room and had conditioning with our assistant coach Big Bashi as we call him. Big Bashi is a mammoth of a man. For those of you that have seen the movie Troy. The big champion that Brad Pitt fights in the beginning. A Japanese version of that man is Big Bashi. For those of you that haven't seen it - he is a Japanese Shaq.

I still can't do sprinting yet, so I had to do bike sprints. I went down with two of the other Japanese players to do bike sprints. I got to the bike put the seat as high as possible...let's just say it was close to fitting. The bike sprints were pretty tough and if you were under the 120 rpms it made a loud warning sound. It was kind of annoying, so I tried to avoid it as much as possible. Mine went off only once or twice. The other players...well a couple more times than that. Little Bashi as he told me to call him is 35 years old, so I guess he has an excuse. Coach told me that he tried to talk him into retiring and becoming an assistant coach, but he wouldn't. In my mind he is like the Brett Favre of Japanese basketball.

After bike sprints I headed upstairs to join the rest of the guys for the rest of the conditioning workout. We had to do some drills and then Bashi (whose English is very limited) told us to go to the baseline and sit down. I thought we were done because we had going a little over an hour and had a 2.5 hour practice later that day. We sit down and Bashi tells us we can't move our upper body. We have to put our legs out straight in front of us and then lift our butt and our hip and move it forward. Then do same to the other leg. I didn't move very far after doing this and guessed we would do 10 reps a piece. Bashi says go to half-court and back. It was crazy. Try it at home. It is very difficult and your hips will burn if you do it right. Don't use your upper body, just your hip and buttocks and go a good distance and then back.

Later today we had another practice. It was at a different gym. On the other court in the gym there were about 3 ping pong tables set up and some very intense ping pong games happening. They looked like something that would be on the Olympics. So after that we got practice started and I felt a lot better today. I practice quite a bit more but didn't do any of the live 2 on 2 or 3 on 3 drills yet. My ankle was much better today. Afterwards I went to the store and got some food to cook up for dinner. I had egg sandwich and some cereal tonight for dinner and then later had some ramen noodles (which are way better here).

Weights in Japan and First Practice

Today I woke up and made some breakfast. I had eggs and some cereal. It's a good thing I learned how to cook a little bit this past year or else I would be going hungry. At about 8:40 Mike and I met coach downstairs and followed him to the weight room. We went through some back alleys and it was about a 10 or 15 minute bike ride.

We got there and I still haven't gotten used to the custom of having to take your shoes off everywhere you go. Even in the gyms you have to take your shoes off when you get there, put them on a shelf and then change into your basketball shoes. I didn't realize this and just took my shoes off and put them back on.

The weight room isn't much but it gets the job done. It is a public weight room so there is everyone from middle aged women to professional athletes to old guys just trying to make sure they can move. After we started lifting for a while they told us we had to do some orientation.

For orientation I had to stand on a machine with metal on the bottom and then hold a couple of metal handles. I felt like I was going to get shocked or something. After about a minute I stepped off and they had the most detailed analysis of my body I have ever seen. I couldn't read it but my translator told me what all it said. It had measurements of details like the size of my right calf, left calf, the balance from my right side and left side. It had details about my muscle mass, my body fat (at a lean 5.6%), and the number of nutrients I have in my body. It was impressive. Then he taught us a few things about positioning your arms different ways to have more effective strength while playing. He was very good. Then we lifted for a little while and just headed back.

After we got back I saw Martin, who lives in our building. He manages some of it, but also runs a small English school close by. He lives here with his wife and two kids. Martin let me into storage because one of my friends that I played with in Australia with the Athletes in Action team, Ray Schafer had stuff in storage. Ray played here last year. Ray and his wife Sara left a lot of stuff in storage. I got into it and it was just like Christmas. I now have many, many things I thought I was going to have to live without. Things like big bowls and an iron skillet. Very valuable things. So I carted some of those up to my room and by the time I was done unpacking it was time to head off to practice.

Mike, Gary and I got on our bikes and took off for practice. The ride to practice is all along the lake and was absolutely beautiful. Our practice gym for the day is on the second floor of the building and when in there we open a bunch of the big doors to let air in. It opens up right to the lake and it is absolutely beautiful - still very hot, but beautiful. Practice went well. My ankle is still sore. I've been doing anywhere for 1-2 hours of rehab everyday on it and it is getting better. I still can't go full for practice yet. I made it through a lot of practice though and then we walked through plays at the end. It is definitely going to be a fun year. I'm excited to get back into playing 100%. My ankle really needs to hurry up because I hate sitting out.

Well, I made a decent dinner and I talked to Hope while she got ready this morning like I always do and now I think I'm gonna call it a night.