We're Baaaaaa-aaaaaaack!

So, Team Virginia made it back! (Luckily our connecting fiight was nowhere near Chicago or we might still be in Omaha!)

Everyone was amazing!  From the 1:45 am wake up call to huffing it through to our next gate in Dallas only to find out (once we got there) we were delayed an hour to getting off of the plane in Richmond, all of our athletes and coaches hung in there with no problem.  Team Virginia is truly amazing!

In the next few days, stayed tuned for our wrap up highlights, pictures and stories.

Yesterday's Highlight
All of our athletes clapping during take off and landing!  Bet you don't hear or see that on a plane very often.

What a great day for Team VA!

I think that today's blog title says it all.  What a great day for Team Va!  Team Virginia is rollin' in the bling.  Gold, silver, bronze and ribbons is all that is being seen on Floor 3. 

Here are today's results!

Aquatics:
Chris- He won 2 gold medals today swimming in the 100 Free and the 50 Back!  Way to go Chris. 
Patrick- Patrick came home with the silver and bronze in the 50 Back and 50 Free respectively.
Jordann- She swam in the 50 Free today and took home the bronze! 
Heather- She placed 5th in the 50 Free!

Tomorrow's Competition for Heather and Jordann:
Heather and Jordann compete in their last race tomorrow morning!

Athletics
Track and Field finished up today with a strong showing from Team Virginia! 

Katy- Speedy Gonzalez took home the gold in the 100M by 4/1000 of a second!!!  (It really was a nail biter of a race!) Katy earned another gold in the Long Jump!!  Way to go Katy!!
Matt- Earned a gold medal in the 800M and a bronze in the 1500M.
Jason- Jumped his way to a bronze medal, a threw the shot put far enough to earn him a silver and received a 4th place finish in the 100 M run!

Bowling-
Team bowling took home a 6th place ribbon today!  They all had a personal best with some tough competition! Way to go Tracey, Jennifer, Matt and Tony!

Tennis
Jeff- After a long week of tennis, Jeff volleyed his way to the silver medal!

Taylor- Taylor played some of her best tennis ever and received a gold medal for it!  Taylor showed (and is still showing) everyone her medal and saying "Look at this!" Super job Taylor; you earned it.

Powerlifting-
Jed- Jed swept his division earning 4 gold medals.  He lifted 105K in the squat, benched 80K, Deadlifted 155K for a combined total of 340K or 748 pounds!! Wow, that's amazing.

Sean- Sean earned a silver in the squat lifting 100 kilos, benched 75 kilos, deadlifted 137.5 kilos for a combined total 312.5 kilos!  This is 687.5 pounds! 

We are all so pround of Team Va!  They have all hung in there through a long, exhausting week!! 

Most everyone finished up competition today.  This gave everyone plenty of time to head out to cheer on their teammates today and to head over to Olympic Town for games and for Healthy Athletes!

Here are some pictures of our day!

Photo Finish!!!

Clarence cheering on his teammates at Aquatics!

Taylor being called for gold!! 

Tomorrow is our last day here!  It is hard to believe that is has gone so fast.  We are all looking forward to our last day here and being busy!  Tomorrow night is Closing Ceremonies. We can't wait to share with you the excitement of Closing. 

Today's Highlight
If you have never been to a Special Olympics dance, you are seriously missing out!! Tonight over at Outside Olympic Town, the Landsharks jammed out to some serious tunes and our athletes had an amazing time at the dance! 

Championship Day-Wednesday Highlights, Schedules and Results

Team Virginia was a whirlwind of activity today.  All of the golf group wrapped up their competitions today with some outstanding performances.  Laurie Ann Kehoe sank the only hole in one in the long putt competition> Go Laurie Anne!!  Jada Goodson posted a great score of 213 points and took home the gold.  The Fischers had some tough competition on a wet course today and took home the silver.  Congrats to our two 18 hole individual golfers who continue to impress us on the course everyday.

Golf Results:

Jada Goodson:  Level One Skills : Gold Medcal,  213 points

Laurie Ann Kehoe:  Level One Skills: Silver Medal

Harris and George Fischer:  Level 2 Alternate Shot:  Silver Medal

Grace Anne Braxton:  Level 5, Gold Medal

David Curtin: Level 5, Gold Medal

Laurie Anne with a great drive

                                                .

Jada Goodson with a great putt!!!

Aquatics had three in the water today.  Their events and results were:

Heather Boncher:  100 Free, Time: 2:29:73,  Bronze Medal

                             50 Back Prelim: 1.20:14, which beat her personnal best time ever!

Jordann Long: 100 Free, Time: 1:53:41, Fifth Place

                       50 Back Prelim: 1.01:32, dropped an astonishing 17 seconds on this time! 

Patrick Warren: 50 Free, Time: 59.13, Participation medal

Tennis results were:

Jeff lost to an Ohio athlee 6-8, 6-2, 6-8.  2 out of 3 tiebreakers.

Tayler had her best skills score and when the volunteers at the shuttle stop asked her how she was doing she simply said "wicked".

Bocce had a fantastic day.  Ian and Christine beat Utah for the Gold medal in Doubles.  Clarence and Shannon beat North Carolina for the gold.  Way to roll!!!

In athletics Jason Smith set a National Games record for mini jav.  Katy Sanchez was awarded the silver in the shot put and the bronze in the 400 meter.   Matt Jones took the silver medal in the mini jav. 

Soccer lost a two games today.  One game 3-0 and 3-1.  They are working real hard and have one more game to go.

Bowling results will come later.

Schedule for tomorrow:

Powerlifting:  Sean and Jed finally compete tomorrow.  Jed will start lifting at 9:00 am and Sean will be lifting around 1:00 pm.

Tennis:  Jeff has his final match at 10:15 tomorrow morning and Taylor has her final skills competition at 8:30 am.

Soccer:  Soccer plays their final game at 10:00. 

Bowling:  Bowling has their Four Man Team Final at 9:21 am. 

Bocce:  Bocce will be getting their awards from today starting at 9;00 am tomorrow morning.

Aquatics: 

9:00 am :  Patrick and Chris:  50 back final

1:30 pm:  Patrick and Chris:  100 free final

                Heather and Jordann:  50 free final

                Chris:  50 fly final

                4 x 50 free relay final

Athletics: 

10:00 am:  Katy: Long Jump

10:15 am:  Matt: Long Jump

                 Jason: Shot Put

11:05: am: Matt: 800 M

11:45 am:  Jason: Long Jump

12:51 pm:  Katy: 100 M

1:51 pm:  Jason: 100M

3:46 pm:  Matt: 1500M

Daily Highlight:

I think this picture says it all!!!

Today's Festivities

Again, another early morning for most of Team Virginia. 

Team Virginia started off this morning with the Gold Medal round of Bocce Team Competition.  After an impressive round of double elimination, Team Virginia took the Silver! Ian was Team Captain today and he did a great job!  Here is Ian planning out his strategy with his teammates. 

Track had some great action going on as well.  Matt ran the 1500 M prelim and ran a 6:44! His best time ever!

After all of our competitions today, there was time for a nap! 

Well at least Coach Hall managed to get a little shut eye.

Tonight we had a great opportunity for 7 of our Team Virginia athletes.  They got to be part of a Flag Football Clinic which was ran by Matt Blair, Tony Covington, John Turner and Joey Browner.  The athletes ran through drills that professional football players do and then we watched the Celebrity Flag Football Game which featured the players and one of the Special Olympics Flag Football Teams.  The best part of the evening was the guys all getting to hang out with the players afterwords and talk with them and get their autographs. 

As always, Team Virginia was the best looking group there.

Today's Highlight

Bocce winning a silver medal was definitely one of the highlights today.  The other highlight would be getting to see our new football players running around getting autographs from all of the pros! 

Results and Schedule

Our athletes are amazing and are doing fantastic out here in Lincoln!

Bocce

Results
Bocce was the first team to bring home the Silver Medal in Team Competition.  Way to go to Christine, Ian, Clarence and Shannon.

Schedule for July 21
Bocce doubles start tomorrow at 8:00 am.  Team Clarence and Shannon and Team Ian and Christine are all looking forward to their competitions tomorrow. 

Bowling

Results
Today was our Womens Singles competition.  Bowling an impressive combined score of 357 and bringing home the gold in here division was Jennifer!  Tracey's last game of 101 pushed her into 6th place into her division.  Way to go girls!

Athletics

Results
All 3 of our athletics athletes finished up their preliminaries today and will start their finals tomorrow.

Schedule
Katy-  Shotput 9:15
            400 M 11:30

Matt-  Mini Jav 9:15

Jason-  Mini Jav 10:00

Aquatics

All 4 of our aquatics athletes put in impressive preliminary times.  In the 100 Free, Chris took an incredible 40 seconds off of his time.  In the 4 x 50 relay, the team dropped their time by 41seconds.  We can't wait to see what Team Virginia does in their finals starting tomorrow.

Athletics

Our athletics team also finished up their preliminaries today!  They also are looking forward to competing in their finals which start tomorrow. 

Golf

All of our golfers are posting impressive scores.

Level 1- Highlands Golf Course 10:30
Laurie Ann-  43
Jada - 75

Level 2- Mahoney Golf Course 8:30
Team Fischer- 49

Level 5- Highlands Golf Course 10:30
Grace Ann - 80
David - 104

Tennis

Both Taylor and Jeffrey have their final rounds tomorrow.  We wish them good luck!!

Powerlifting

Jed and Sean still have tomorrow off.  They most definitely are looking forward to competing on Friday. 

Day 2 Craziness

Just kidding!  Not too crazy.  Well, a little crazy but definitely still a lot of fun. 

Tonight's blog will again be written by HOD, Dave.

Wow what a jam packed day for Team Virginia.  Soccer practiced in the morning and played in a preliminary game this afternoon.   Pool play will start tomorrow at the Abbott Sports Complex.

Alfred Robinson makes a great save in todays soccer preliminary. 












Bocce had divisioning this morning and then team play this afternoon. The Bocce players are getting better and better on the turf surface and have placed themselves into the gold medal round for tomorrow morning..  Way to go Bocce!! 

The Bocce Team had a moment to pose for a team shot. 











Aquatics had a great prelim day cutting seconds off of their personal bests.  We all expect they will just get better and better as the week goes on.  The crowd is great at the pool.  If you are going get their early for a seat.

Jason Smith threw 11 meters today at the shot put. Great job Jason. 

Jada sank three short putts in a row on the road to a great Golf Skills Score today.

More tomorrow.  Stay tuned for more great highlights from Team Virginia!!!

Results and schedule!

First day of preliminaries is complete! 

Here are some highlights from prelims:

Super swimmer Jordann took 30 seconds off of her 100M Free.  Heather Boncher also shaved time off of her swim! 

Jada was sinking putt after putt in his Level 1 competition. 

Soccer player Alfred could've been playing in a World Cup match today the way he was blocking goals and making saves. 

Since today was only preliminaries, there are no official results to report of at this time. 

As of Monday at 5:00 p.m. (central time) these are the competition schedules that we have for tomorrow.

Track and Field (all prelims)

Katy-  Long Jump - 9:30 am
           100M - 1:42 pm

Matt-  1500M - 9:32 am
           Long Jump - 11:15 am
           800M - 12:20 pm

Jason-  Long Jump - 12:00
            100M - 2:20
           

Aquatics Morning Session 9:00 am (All events are prelims)
Chris - 100M Free & 50 Fly
Heather and Jordann - 50M Free

Aquatics Afternoon Session 1:30
All swimmers- 4 x 50 Free Relay

Bowling (All prelims)
Jennifer and Tracey - Womens Singles

Golf- (Includes todays results)

Level 1- Highlands Golf Course - 10:30 am
Jada - 68
Laurie Ann - 47

Level 2- Mahoney Golf Course - 8:30 am
George and Harris Fischer - 49

Level 5- Highlands Golf Course- 8:30 am
Grace Ann- 82
David - 94

Tennis
Jeff (singles) - 8:45 am
Taylor (skills) - 8:45 am


Soccer and Bocce are currently unavailable at this time! We will post their schedules later as well as todays post! 

Go Team Virginia!! 

Bocce Coach Massie and Tennis Coach Toombs!

Day one!

Day one was an incredibly busy day.

Day one started at around 5:00 am for most of Team Virginia!  All teams had practice in some form.  After practice everyone headed back to the dorms for lunch and then to get ready for the most exciting part of the day; Opening Ceremonies. 

Team Virginia was the best looking group there! (Absolutely no bias!!)

We had to get staged for the Parade of Athletes and then we had to sit for a little bit, so here are some shots of us hanging out.  (Note the great glasses that were given to us by the National Games Committee!!)

Heather posin' with her shades!!












Hanging out inside! 

We hung out in staging for awhile and then finally got to go in! 

Our seats for Opening Ceremonies were great! We had a prime-time view of all of the action. Some of the highlights include Brooklyn Decker, Michael Sarver (who sat next to Team VA on the plane from Dallas to Omaha), Jars of Clay who played us a couple of their greatest hits, and of course, the Lighting of the Olympic Flame. 

Check out the cool cauldron! 

A great time was had by all!  Tomorrow starts our first day of preliminaries and competition for all sports. The schedule for all of our athletes is posted in the blog below. 

Today's Highlight

Besides Opening Ceremonies, the overall consensus for today's highlight is the food here!  The dining hall is serving up more than anyone could (or should) eat!  The best part of the dining hall is the vanilla soft serve ice cream at the end of the meal.  The hardest choice you have to make in the dining hall; bowl or waffle cone?

Schedule for Monday, July 19, 2010

Powerlifting:  No competition or practice tomorrow.  Jed and Sean compete on Thursday.

Tennis:  Taylor has divisioning at 8:30 am.  Jeff has divisioning at 10:45 am.

Soccer:  Soccer has a practice at 11:15 am.  They begin competing at 1:30 pm.

Bowling:  All bowlers have preliminaries at 12:30 pm

Bocce:  Bocce has divisioning at 7:30 am and Team Preliminaries starting at 1:00 pm.

Golf:  Level 1:  Laurie Ann and Jada have their first round of competition at 10:30 am at the Highlands Golf Course

Golf: Level 2:  First round of Competition for George and Harris Fischer at 8:30 am at Mahoney.

Golf Level 5:  First round of Competition for Grace Anne and David Curtin starting at 8:30 am at Highlands Golf Course.

Athletics: 
           Jason:  9:45 am: shot put prelim
          
           Katy: 11:15 am:  400 meter prelim
                     12:15: Shot put prelim
          
           Matt: 11:30 am: Mini Jav Prelim

Aquatics:
          Heather:  9:00 am 100 Free Prelim
          Jordann: 9:00 am 100 Free Prelim
          Patrick: 9:00 am 50 Free Prelim
          Chris:  1:30 pm 50 Back Prelim


Go Team Virginia!!!  We'll keep posting competition updates as we get them.  All competition schedules are tentative and subject to change at the discretion of the GOC at any time of the day.  We will post competition schedules nightly to reflect the most recent changes after the nightly coaches meetings.

They've arrived!!

They're here!! 

First, tonight's blog will be written by our HOD, Dave.

Let's back track to last night!  We have some pictures of the Night with the Flying Squirrels.  The highlights of the night included Matt Jones throwing a strike for the ceremonial first pitch.  The entire team with host Leon Stepanian Jr. were introduced on the field in front of a crowd of over 7,000.

A good time was had by all.  To the Bottom and Back gave the athletes and coaches a great ride into and back from the game.

The team beat the sun up loading the buses to the airport at 4:00 am.  After a long layover in Dallas we arrived in Omaha at 3:30 pm and we rolled into Lincoln about 5:00 pm.  One long gone.  The troop did great and were in good spirits. 

Coach Sarah, Jordann and Christopher enjoyed some group reading in the Dallas airport.

Arriving in Lincoln.  Go Huskers!













Tomorrow starts practice days for all team, some divisioning rounds and certainly the most exciting part of the day, Opening Ceremony.   We will post pictures and highlights of the Opening Ceremony in tomorrows blog. 

Today's highlight

The best part of the day was hearing and seeing athletes as many experienced their first ever plane ride.  I'll bet not too many flight crews in the world get applause for taking off and landing their plane.  Only in Special Olympics.  You gotta love it. 

Home sweet home!

The only thing missing from our rooms right now is the chocolate on the pillow! Again, the dorm is nice. The rooms are pretty spacious and the beds aren't awful. 

Team Virginia is currently finishing up the first leg of their journey; they will be landing in Dallas for a somewhat lengthy layover. 

For those who are interested in watching the Opening Ceremonies which will be held on Sunday, June 18th from 3 - 5:30 p.m., the Opening Ceremonies will be streamed live through the SOI website.  The parade of athletes will start at approximately 3:15.  Don't forget to look for Team VA!!  We will have on white polo shirts trimmed in navy and will have on navy shorts.  We are sitting on the floor. 

Go Team VA!

Sheer Excitement

I think the title of today's blog says it all!  Team Virginia is still back in the Commonwealth at this point (hopefully sleeping) but will be here tomorrow!  While I definitely have enjoyed getting everything prepared and ready for everyone's arrival, Lincoln will be a whole lot more exciting when the team gets here. 

Today was full of activity.  I believe this is the first time I have really sat down today.  From making sure everyone has the right amount of beds in their rooms to attending the HOD meeting, I seemed to always be on the go. 

The Games Organizing Committee (GOC) and the city of Lincoln are very excited for everyone to get here and both groups have gone out of their way to make sure that the athletes feel welcome. When I checked in yesterday, I was given a yellow envelope.  The envelopes contain letters from local 6th grade students wishing the athletes good luck and even giving them advice on what restaurants to eat at here in town!  They are very cute and I can't wait to share with the athletes.

Not only do the athletes have these letters to greet them, but the GOC has put together fun gift bags for the athletes containing cool carry bags, water bottles, cups and magazines.  The cups and water bottles will come in very handy while we are staying in the dorm.

Thanks to the GOC and some of the great sponsors of these National Games for making these gift bags happen! 

On campus, there are three clusters of dorms that the athletes and coaches will be staying in.  Our dorm is a large dorm, so we are the only dorm in our cluster, but this dorm is nice.  It has recently been renovated.  It has its own dining hall so we don't have to walk anywhere to eat, bonus! I think the part that the athletes will like best though is the fully stocked store.  (Yes, this dorm even has its own convenience store.) The store carries everything from ice cream to soda to sandwiches to snacks to coffee.  The whole sha-bang! The dorm rooms are typical dorm rooms with most rooms having two people, although we do have a few that have three.

Back in Virginia, I heard that the Squirrels game went great! Matt J threw out the Ceremonial First Ball and it was a strike! Way to go Matt.  I take that as a sign of good things to come for Team Virginia this week. I'll post pics of the game as soon as I get some. 

Again, I don't think that there are words to describe how excited I am to see our athletes tomorrow. For them, they officially start their journey at 4 am. I see tomorrow night being an early night for everyone.

Sleep tight Team Virginia! I will see you soon!

Highlight of the Day
Going to the post office downtown and surprisingly getting to see the Torch Run pull in! Thanks to all of our law enforcement for everything that you do for Special Olympics.  There are over 200 law enforcement officers volunteering their time to work the games this week here in Lincoln providing security for our athletes and coaches.  We truly appreciate your time!

Day 1 (minus Team VA)

Lets start today with an introduction. (No mystery writer for this blog!) I'm Leisha and I am the Director of Events for SOVA and I am the Advanced Head of Delegation (AHOD) for Team VA and lastly, for the most part, the writer of this blog.

Being the AHOD, I get to come out early and make sure that all is good to go and ready for Team VA's arrival on Saturday.  I arrived into Omaha (yes, Omaha) this afternoon.  Team Virginia will also arrive in Omaha on Saturday.  For those who have never been to Lincoln, Lincoln has the smallest airport I have personally ever seen.  Lincolns' airport consists of two gates.  A gate to the right and a gate to the left.  When Team VA went to book their flights, it was slim pickins' into Lincoln.  Plus flying into Omaha allowed our entire team to stay together on the way out and back.  Yup, that's right!  We managed to get 48 people on all of the same flights.  (Props to American Airlines.) Got my rental car, GPS and hit the road!

This is somewhere in the middle of Omaha and Lincoln.  Driver side view.

Passenger side view! (Sorry for the car shot!) I would say the drive to Lincoln from Omaha would not fall under the overly exciting category.

At the University of Lincoln, things are starting to get a little bit more exciting than the drive in.  Welcome Special Olympics signs are going up.  Volunteers are checking people in.  Set up is occuring all over the campus.  I officially have one more day until Team VA gets here.  Tomorrow while I am making dorm beds, sorting keys, running some errands, attending the AHOD meeting and getting our last minute stuff together, here is what Team Virginia will be up to back in the Commonwealth.

Athletes and coaches will be departing their homes to get to Richmond by 1:00 to check in at the hotel.  Once there, our HOD, Dave P, and all of our coaches will help our athletes transfer all of their clothes, etc., into their new suitcases and duffle bags.  Once that process is done, Team Virginia will be boarding a bus provided by To the Bottom and Back to head to the Night with the Flying Squirrels to partake in a picnic dinner and ballgame.  You still have time to purchase tickets to come watch Global Messenger, Paul Marretti, and see Team Virginia introduced on the field before the game.  After the game, Team Virginia will head back to the hotel and get some sleep.  The first shuttle from the hotel departs at 4:00 am!  Saturday morning will be a bright and very early morning for all members of Team Virginia. 

Since I am not currently where we will call "home" for the next week, I will have to post pictures tomorrow. 

Again, Team Virginia is excited to share our journey with you!  Daily highlights will be posted everyday.  It could be a group highlight or an individual highlight.  Since I am the only one currently in Lincoln, the highlight you get today is mine. It's not so much a highlight, but just something that floored me. I thought I read the sign wrong.....

Today's highlight:

The speed limit in Nebraska is 75 mph!

Night at the Squirrels

In 4 days, (yay!), we leave for Nebraska for a week of sports, competition and most importantly, fun! To start our journey off on the right foot, on Friday, we will be heading to the Flying Squirrels game.  The entire National Games team will be there!  Not only will the team will be introduced on the field but local Global Messenger, Paul Marretti, will be there to address the crowd.  After the introductions, the team will cheer on the Flying Squirrels victory! Richmond's new beloved mascot, Nutzy, will be there as well. 

So, come on out and cheer on the Squirrels, Nutzy and Team Virginia!

Flying Squirrels Tickets

 

Our bags are packed!

Okay, so maybe our bags are not yet all officially packed, but they are packed with all of our new gear! After a week long process, the bags have been stuffed with everything from new uniforms, casual wear, tennis shoes and Opening Ceremonies wear.  Everything is packed and just waiting to be worn.  Soon enough!

Thanks to our wonderful Head of Delegation, Dave, who has handled most of the uniforming, Team Virginia will most definitely be the stylish out of all 50 states attending National Games. (Surely not biased!) Stay tuned to see some of our most stylish pieces that we will be wearing out in Nebraska!

In the meantime, check out our Team Virginia logo and what the Suitcase Room, formally known as the Small Conference Room, currently looks like as we continue prepping to head out into Nebraska's Fields of Gold.

                                                                                               

Team Virginia Logo

                           
Our awesome suitcases with color coded luggage tags by team! 

In the news!

All of our athletes heading out to Nebraska are incredible! Here is a story on one athlete in particular, Christopher Woodrum.  Chris will be competing in Aquatics which will be held at the Devaney Sports Center. Click on the link below to read this fantastic story about Christopher Woodrum.

Read about Christopher Woodrum

Go Team Virginia!!