A short summary: judging, writing, sleeping, eating, judging, writing, judging, eating, sleeping, judging, judging, writing, etc.
JETLAG
Hardcore? Surprisingly not that much... Reaching a certain point, being jetlagged becomes a non-countable fact, period. You are not a bit or a lot jetlagged, you are just jetlagged and you deal with it. Especially when you arrive the afternoon before the World Championships of Freestyle Slalom and you have to judge them!
And even if you had to suffer a 23-hour trip with one train (Paris-Brussel), one international flight (Brussel-Beijing), one internal flight (Beijing-Wenzhu) and one shuttle bus (Wenzhu-Lishui). Alone.
Don't pity me on the loneliness though, I love travelling by myself. I was just trying to be pitied a bit more.
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| from -9 to +6 |
Hardcore? Surprisingly not that much... Reaching a certain point, being jetlagged becomes a non-countable fact, period. You are not a bit or a lot jetlagged, you are just jetlagged and you deal with it. Especially when you arrive the afternoon before the World Championships of Freestyle Slalom and you have to judge them!
And even if you had to suffer a 23-hour trip with one train (Paris-Brussel), one international flight (Brussel-Beijing), one internal flight (Beijing-Wenzhu) and one shuttle bus (Wenzhu-Lishui). Alone.
Don't pity me on the loneliness though, I love travelling by myself. I was just trying to be pitied a bit more.
RUSH
I had been asked to judge the Championships a couple of months ago, but having had no news from the organization, I had just assumed that they had found a solution... until two days before I took my plane to the USA, when I received an e-mail giving me the green light to take my plane tickets for Lishui, China.
Crisis situation. The whole story was a big mess to get organized: I could not deal with the plane tickets as I had no real access to the Internet, and I had to book my appointment at the Chinese Ambassy to get my Visa on my way back to France! All in all, I asked for a little help to put me on the right track and not lose time, and I managed to get my Visa ready for the day preceding my flight! It was close.
JUDGE OUTFIT
I was very excited about discovering the 2012 judges outfits. They are always so becoming and delicately cut, that they perfectly fit our athletic bodies. They are always mainly white, but the designs vary every year, and I could not wait beholding the new collection.
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| Judges Marching & Presentation. Credit: Frozwheels '12 |
I was not disappointed (Hell no!) and I tried them on for the first time with feverish emotion -- in a rush, a couple of minutes before jumping on the bus to the Opening Ceremony, under the teasing eye of Naomi whom I shared my room with. Great baggie pants and skin-tight polo shirt. Badass looks.
Although I complain, I must confess that I am really ok with it: It is also part of the fun to try to look serious and respectful dressed up like that. And I (secretly) like taking the challenge up. Except for the McDonald's caps. It was not actual McDonald's caps but they were cut in such a way that you really could have been mistaken for a McDonald's employee if you happened to wear it.
Yes indeed, it is a great demonstration of love to the skaters and the sport, to willingly surrender to the wearing of pyjamas for the sake of the competition!
FREESTYLE
I had not been plunged into the Freestyle world since the last world championships in Geisingen, Germany... and although I was extremely busy judging (and writing reports), the few times I took the time to chill out were unexpectedly great. I feared it would have been awkward after so long.
REPORTING
I made the most of my presence at the event to get back to my old ways and write a series of reports: I've been writing official reports of the main freestyle events I go to since 2008, and they are all archived and listed in the "Articles" tab of my freestyle website.
I have just finished to write the 4 parts of the Report Series on the WFSC 2012 in both English and French, and they are available on RollerEnLigne.com (French) and Online-Skating.com (English)!I spent more than 10 days on them and challenged my mental sanity as I almost went mad with all the data, the result sheets and the judging notes. But now that it is over, I am glad I did it!
JOURNALISTIC THANKS -- I would like to thank all the people who put themselves out to shoot, edit and upload videos of the event with an impressive reactivity, with special distinction to Sueb of Frozwheels and ReKiL. And I would also like to thank Da Lang who is currently working on the Chinese translation of the report and who already did a great job in doing so for the last world championships.
4-PART FULL REPORT OF THE WFSC 2012
- Pt.1: DAY 1 Speed Qualifiers & Jr Classic FR | EN | 第一天
- Pt.2: DAY 2 Classic, Pair, Battle Q. FR | EN | 第二天
- Pt.3: DAY 3 Speed Slalom, Slides FR | EN | 第三天
- Pt.4: DAY 3 Battle FR | EN | 第三天 （下）
And now... a little bonus to end with. Enjoy the Classic Pair performance of Korean Kim Sung Jin and Lee Choong Goon, because they're worth it.
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