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Goodbye to the Joe

April 10, 2017 by Leave a Comment

Oh man, what a day.

First, Sergio Garcia finally wins the Masters, at his 73rd attempt at winning a major. Then comes news that John Clarke, one of the greatest comedians ever produced by New Zealand/Australia and a local of my hood, passed away while hiking in the Grampians on the weekend. And all this while I was watching the last ever Detroit Red Wings game at the Joe Louis Arena.

This last one was going to be enough to unravel me on its own, even without Clarke’s unexpected passing, or feeling happy for the Spanish golfer who burst onto the scene years ago as a wunderkind who was going to dominate the sport but sadly emerged at the exact same moment Tiger Woods appeared through another door and actually did dominate the sport.

Unfortunately, this was as close as I got to the Red Wings season-ending last game at the Joe today. I cried anyway, from half a world away.

‘The Joe’ was the Red Wings’ home for the last 38 years. It was an old barn of a building; one of the least attractive in a shiny new millennium NHL world, but of course the fans adored it and, until recently, other teams dreaded the lair of the all-conquering Wings. The Joe made its debut just as the infamous Dead Wings period of the club’s history was coming to an end. Within three years of its opening, Detroit pizza magnate Mike Ilitch would buy the team, start spending money, the recruiters would get a lot right and suddenly the team went on a roll that included four Stanley Cups and a record 25 straight years in the playoffs. Until this year, when the team finally fell off a cliff and missed the post-season.

Which is why today happened: the final game at the Joe, in early April instead of a month or so later during playoffs. But you know what? It was kind of perfect. Knowing it was the final game meant the Wings could do it properly, without the uncertainty of playoff success, home and away. The date could be penciled in and man, did they do it right.

For starters, by sheer luck, it was captain Hank Zetterberg’s 1000th game and the pre-game ceremony for that had me misty eyed. He’s always been a favourite of mine since I first tuned into the team and he was an absolute star. Then Riley ‘Tinky Winky’ Sheahan, a guy who had inexplicably not scored a goal all season, at last found the net for the Red Wings’ opening goal. Of course, Zetterberg scored because he’s Zetterberg, and then Tatar goaled and finally Sheahan again (to score his own tiny piece of hockey immortality: last goal ever at the Joe). Meanwhile, the Devils played the straight-men to this Detroit lovefest, a crammed-to-the-rafters Joe in a sea of red. Meanwhile, the TV coverage was keeping an octopi count, to note how many poor deceased octopi were hurled onto the ice (it’s a Red Wing thing), and the last tally I noticed was 27.

Rally Al the octopus’s only appearance this season: as part of the final game’s octocount.

At the very end, at the finale of a long ceremony where Red Wing greats spoke about the old building and the fans and how much they love this hockey team, the organisers showed they knew exactly how to play the heart strings of the fans one more time. The unofficial Red Wings victory anthem, Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’, filled the Joe as the fade out. Born and raised in SOUTH DETROIT.

And to the exits for the final time.

Of course the franchise will move on and the fans will be more comfortable, the ice will probably be better, life will be generally more pleasant in the shiny new Ilitch family stadium, Little Caesar’s Arena, when it opens in September. When the Wings left the creaky but historic Olympia stadium for the brand new Joe in 1979, I’m sure there was just as much sadness and nostalgia.

But today, it was good bye Joe and tears in all directions.

I’ve written before about how being a sports fan is about the journey, not the silverware, because the vast majority of fans are disappointed every year in terms of premierships, cups, whatever the prize.

Flashback to 2011: The Podium Line of Place boys on the glass at the Joe. A life highlight.

In my entire hockey journey, the joy for me has been in being a Red Wing fan, among all the Red Wing fans, from Hockeytown to Australia and everywhere in between. I am so so so so so so so happy today that my boys and I visited the Joe in 2011 to watch some games there. It didn’t occur to me at the time that I would never be there again. The Wings managed to lose all four games we saw, and so we didn’t get to belt out Don’t Stop Believin’ in the flesh, but it didn’t matter. We sat there, in good seats, in a sea of red jerseys with white winged wheels. We saw our heroes – Lidstrom, Zetterberg, Datsyuk, even Helm and Jimmy Howard. We saw Gus Nyquist’s first game as a Wing and Mackquist bought his jersey – without doubt the first one of those to make its way to Australia. A Wings representative showed us around the back corridors of the stadium, showered us in free merchandise and let us watch warm-up from behind the goal. It was a total and complete lifetime-memory blast.

But it wasn’t the Joe that actually stayed in my head as much as the humanity of Detroit. The people of Motorcity embraced us so warmly, unable to believe three Australians had travelled all that way just to sit in the Joe and watch the team.

I have no doubt if and when we make it to the new arena, with slightly roomier seats with better lighting, fancier corporate boxes and a bigger, sharper jumbotron TV screen, we’ll be embraced just as much.

Captain Hank today: The Perfect Human 2.0.

That’s what it all comes down to in the end. It doesn’t matter where the hockey is played, no matter how much you love the arena and the history seeping out of the walls of the joint – and believe me, I really did with the Joe. But ultimately  it’s the people. It’s the fans.

That’s why I wept when the Bulldogs won last year’s AFL flag. Not for the players, happy though I was for them, and sad though I was for Bob Murphy who was injured. My heart went straight out for the fans who have waited so long, who have stuck through thick and a lot of thin, who finally tasted the ultimate success. My unofficial footy coach at the Bang, Jimmy, flew back from Greece for the finals when he realised something was happening. The phone video of Jimmy and his family celebrating in the stands when they realised they had made the grand final was an all time highlight reel on its own. When they won the whole thing, he painted his house red, white and blue. The joy was so pure.

This year, my team, the Tigers, are 3-0 after three rounds, sitting in unfamiliar atmosphere at second on the ladder. Saturday’s game started in 27 degree sunshine and ended in a wild thunderstorm-battered, rain-drenched tempest. The fans stayed without blinking. We belted out the song in the wind and the rain. The players high-fived the fans on the boundary and we all started to wonder if we can dare to believe this side can do something significant this year.

The weird tradition of octopi on the ice (and Joe manager Al waving them crazily over his head) will no doubt start again in Game 1 at the new stadium.

We’re so lucky that we play at the MCG, the home of football, after a wrench away from the Punt Road Oval many years ago. Some older fans will have been have been there through that entire journey, through the flags of the sixties and the seventies and 1980, and then the dark wasteland years that have followed.

Whether Richmond plays at the G or in Oodnadatta, it doesn’t really matter. It’s those fans, my dedicated Tiger brothers and sisters, who count.

But having said all that, thank you, Joe Louis Arena, for the memories and for being the foundation for all the Wings adventures I have experienced so far. Thank you for honouring ‘The Brown Bomber’, one of the most legendary boxers ever, and for hosting my sons and I when we briefly, happily, took our place among the Wings faithful.

And one more time, rest in peace, John Clarke. Farnarkeling’s finest ever spokesman. You will be missed.

 

 

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Losing with a capital L

April 19, 2016 by Leave a Comment

To be a fan is to be a loser.

I staggered back into Melbourne from overseas late last week, just in time for my beloved Richmond Tigers to get smashed by West Coast. The next day, the Detroit Red Wings got beaten by Tampa Bay, to go 2-0 down in a playoff series that they somehow fell into despite an underwhelming season.

By the weekend, I needed to shake off jetlag so I attempted to go for a run. As I plodded through Edinburgh Gardens, I heard an unmistakable roar from the Brunswick Street Oval on the other side of the tennis courts. Feeling excited, I made my way to the top of the small rise overlooking the oval to see that the mighty Reds (what’s left of the Fitzroy club that used to be a VFL/AFL side) had goaled to edge to within a straight kick of their opponents with minutes to go. Of course, as I watched, the opposition booted two to put the game away. I ran sadly on.

A big crowd in for the 'Roys at home on a perfect autumn afternoon. Shame they lost. Pic: Nicko

A big crowd in for the ‘Roys at home on a perfect autumn afternoon. Shame they lost. Pic: Nicko

It all got me reflecting on how the life of a sports fan, or player for that matter, is almost completely one of ultimate loss, apart from the occasional miraculous occasion.

At the most elite level, I have seen exactly one championship win by a team I support in my half century on the planet. Granted, Richmond won flags in 1967 and 1969, as well as 1973/74, but I was really young and only just tuning in by those Seventies flags, so they didn’t really resonate. By the time I was a foaming at the mouth, dedicated Tiger, we won the premiership in 1980 – my first live grand final at the MCG; the most epic of days, with my lifetime friend and fellow Tiger, Shaun.

I had no idea that by the age of 51, that would remain my only flag.

The Red Wings? I saw them lift the Stanley Cup in 2007/2008, when I fell in love with the team. But I can’t claim it. I only tuned in, as a flu-ridden, bored total hockey novice, for the Stanley Cup finals, and became engrossed over the course of the Wings victory over the Penguins. So I don’t feel that I can claim that as a cup that I ‘earned’ as a fan. Now, eight years later? Yes, I sweat blood for the Wings and can absolutely claim to be among the Motown army, even from half a world away.

Thank God for the Melbourne Ice with a quiver of men’s and women’s titles, and the Lorne Dolphins’ several flags over the years, in coastal footy, because as far as Richmond and now the Red Wings go, every single year except for once when I was 15, the season has ultimately ended badly.

Detroit's 2008 Cup: I was lucky to see it.

Detroit’s 2008 Cup: I was lucky to see it.

Which is pretty standard, unless you happen to be a Hawthorn fan in the AFL, winning life’s lottery over the past three decades. For the vast majority of sports fans, barracking life is destined to end, year-in, year-out, at some stage in failure. Look at the Collingwood Football Club with its vast, ever-cocky army – and exactly one more premiership in my lifetime than the bedraggled Tigers. Meanwhile, my more recent love, the Wings, have made the play-offs now for an unbelievable 25 years straight – through salary cap introduction, through Hall of Famers’ retirements (God, I miss The Perfect Human, in defence), through everything, but it’s eight years since they actually won the Cup and could be a while yet.

The Tigers? God, don’t even start me.

And trust me, in footy I know that I’m doing better than fans of the Bulldogs, Saints and Demons, all without a flag in my half century on the planet, or, in the NHL, fans of the Blues, Canucks, Capitals, Sabres and Sharks: teams that have NEVER won the Stanley Cup.

The Tigers triumph in 1980. My one and only premiership. Back before the world was in colour.

The Tigers triumph in 1980. My one and only premiership. Back before the world was in colour.

Imagine being a player. Matty Richardson for the Tigers, maybe Bob Murphy for the Dogs; playing your guts out for almost two decades and never raising that cup … watching other players who maybe manage 50 AFL games for their career luck out to be on the ground when the stars align and it matters. I feel vaguely disappointed that I’ve played four seasons of summer hockey now without any medals to show for it, so how must they feel? But again, in 2016, for 17 AFL teams and 29 NHL teams, and all but one Summer Division Three team, this will be the way it goes.

For some reason, we never look at this big picture, at how we almost always see a season end in despair. Instead, the fans, and players, get lost in the individual games, even in the individual moments within those sirens or buzzers. Players are touted as genius or idiot, rising star or useless, game to game, or minute to minute. Us fans watch it all, riding every bump, pouring with emotions, sweating on the next puck or goal or wicket or farnarkle or whatever happens to be your poison. I read Winging It in Motown, a very enthusiastic and well-populated Wings blog, and the screen seethes with rage and frustration and elation and sorrow and anger and happiness and wistfulness and … well, you get the picture. Sometimes all during a single game feed.

My cluster of Richmond diehard mates are already wincing at another season wobbling alarmingly at the start, with the team down 1-3 and not inspiring much hope of a premiership run. Again. All the parts that looked so bright and formidable in the pre-season, a month ago, now looking blunt and harmless compared to the razor-sharp skills, game plans and promising rookies of other teams. But then again, if the Tiges suddenly win five in a row …

And so the road goes, as ever. Up and down, peaks, troughs, but hardly ever reaching the desired destination.

Alex Rance: life is about more than silverware.

Alex Rance: life is about more than silverware.

Which is actually okay. In an excellent interview with The Age’s Emma Quayle during the week, the Tigers’ charismatic full back Alex Rance spoke about caring too much and about how his unstoppable competitiveness and passion for the game can get in his way. Raised a Jehovah’s Witness, Rance thought about leaving the game, leaning back into his beliefs to consider whether he even wanted to play football any more; worried that in the end it was pointless and took him away from his family and true priorities.

Rance said, ‘I’d play a crap game and think, “life sucks”. Then I’d play a good game and everything was awesome. It was like, how can you survive like this? There were peaks and troughs all over the place. It made me think about what faith is, and what I should really be basing my happiness on.”

You don’t have to be of a religious persuasion to see a general wisdom in Rance’s words. Sure, play hard, barrack hard, live or die on a swirling Sherrin in a breeze, or a deflected puck bobbling near a flailing goalie, or a putt curling towards the lip of a golf hole. But see it for what it is, win or lose; an entertaining aside to the real world that is ever travelling alongside, with much higher stakes and greater highs and lows.

In a day or so? Red Wings v Lightning, Game 4.
On the weekend? Richmond v Melbourne at the MCG.
Down at Lorne? Hopefully the Dolphins will be in action, so I can drink a beer on the muddy step grandstand and cheer the locals.
At the Icehouse? The Melbourne Ice men’s team begins another campaign, searching for a Goodall Cup, something has been tantalisingly out of reach for a few years now, but here we all go again.

I’m excited. As usual.

Giddyup.

Just remember it’s all in the journey.

 

 

 

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The pelican

October 21, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Yes, we segwayed Washington. Not even sorry.

Yes, we segwayed Washington. Not even sorry.

Four years ago, on this day, I was sitting up on an all-night train from South Carolina to Washington DC. I adore long train rides, always have, but on this ride, I was sad, having waved goodbye, for who knows how long, to one of my best friends in the world. Trent is a Horsham boy and an old journo brother-in-arms who married an American woman and now has to live over there, meaning I hardly ever get to spend time with him. On a big US trip, my boys and I had dropped into his world. We’d attended soccer training with his daughters. We’d gone past a freeway sign to a town called Batcave. I’d driven a left-hand-drive car for the first time. We’d drunk local beer in a folky bar in Asheville. We’d talked deep philosophy until late in the night. We’d talked shit until late into the night. We’d gone white water rafting, accepting a dare from the guide to go overboard, gasping and laughing in freezing river water, and I’d spotted a bald eagle lazily flapping ahead of us. We’d gone camping in bear country where Trent had told me that you didn’t really need to worry about bears unless you were stupid enough to have food in your tent. One guy got mauled because he had a chocolate bar in his pack, for example. I tried to sleep, knowing my two boys were in a tent just on the other side of the dying fire; sleeping soundly but at the mercy of bears that almost certainly would never come. At about 4 am, I became convinced I had a chocolate bar in my bag. I gave myself a lecture about paranoia and finally slept. In the early morning, the sun just rising, Trent and I creaked to our feet, straight-shot local authentic moonshine to jolt ourselves awake, and grinned at one another. I checked my bag and found a chocolate bar.

Camping by the South Toe River, North Carolina. Bear country. 2011.

Camping by the South Toe River, North Carolina. Bear country. 2011.

Now I was aware that Trent was fading with every mile as American countryside rolled by. This train’s seats were annoyingly about 10 centimetres too close together, just short enough in leg room so there was no way to get comfortable. My youngest son, Macklin, trying to sleep, stirred and shifted and then lay in my lap. I put my arm across his shoulders and it occurred to me that this moment may never come again. When kids are young, you get used to them flailing all over you, sleeping in your bed, or slumping asleep on top of you when they hit that moment kids get when they just can’t stay awake. But Mack was 15 now and at an age where he was starting to want his own space. He had outgrown holding hands as you walk along the street, or overt displays of affection. Was midway through that awkward teenage stage of growing and separating. So it was a rare thing to have him curl up in my lap.

And so we rolled into Washington, a city I had never particularly cared to visit but this time had a reason. As our endless train ride came to an end at Union Station (Paul Kelly: ‘He came in on a Sunday, every muscle aching, walking in slow motion, like he’d just been hit’) a private plane, the Red Wing 1, the Detroit hockey team’s plane, was getting ready to fly from Motor City.

And we had tickets to our first ever NHL game, Detroit @ Washington at the Verizon Centre.

We had a day and a half to fill and hit Washington hard. Peered through the fence at the White House, toured the Smithsonian museums – highly recommend the space museum and the pop culture one – ate at the spy museum café, bought the t-shirt, took a Segway tour of the monuments. Visited Abe Lincoln in his big chair. Stood where Martin Luther-King stood, looking not at a million people by the reflection pond but instead at a work site; an uprooted, drained pond-full of pipes and mud. The boys headed to the Washington zoo while I grabbed a public rent-a-bike and pedalled my way around town, seeing the monuments, the Newseum and other treasures.

And then, finally, it was game time.

Something I had waited years to see. Pic: Nicko

Something I had waited years to see. Pic: Nicko

I can still remember walking into the building; worrying that my first-ever Stubhub ticket purchase would be declared invalid at the door. Relieved as they bleeped us through. So many hockey jerseys, including enough Detroit red and white that I relaxed about us being targeted as the enemy in the building. Americans so friendly, Caps fans or Wings; mostly so happy to meet three crazy Australians who had travelled half a world to be there. I remember watching warm-ups; marvelling at seeing Henrik Zetterberg, Pavel Datsyuk and Nick Lidstrom in the flesh. Other favourite players like Helm, Bertuzzi and Howard. Taking photos of everything from a pyramid of pucks on the bench to the crowd filling the venue.See the video below: this is my film of my heroes emerging onto the bench and then to the ice (plus a baby-faced assistant coach, Jeff Blashill, making his way onto the bench alongside Babs).

After decades as a journalist, including covering world title fights, grand slam tennis and many other major events, I was like a kid; a fan again. It wasn’t just seeing the Wings either. Our seats were close to the Washington bench and we were only metres from Alexander Ovechkin, the huge Russian with the Bond-villain face, and the hardest shot I have ever seen. He flicked his wrist like every other player but somehow the puck that came off his stick looked like it would blast clean through a brick wall. No wonder he scores so many goals.

It was Nick Lidstrom’s 1500th NHL game. During a break in play, the achievement was written on the four way big screen above the ice and the entire building gave him an ovation. Lidstrom glancing up to the screen, realising the applause was for him and graciously raising his stick, in his under-stated Perfect Human kind of way.

Good seats at my first ever NHL game. Shame about the scoreline. Pic: Nicko

Good seats at my first ever NHL game. Shame about the scoreline. Pic: Nicko

The Wings lost 7-1. Got jumped 3-0 early and never got it back, Ty Conklin having a less than stellar game in net. No matter, we thought. We have three looming games in Detroit, at the Joe, to console us. We’ll watch the Wings win at home and sing ‘Don’t stop believing’ with our people. We flew off to Chicago, then to Motor City, and Detroit lost every game. We flew back to Australia and Detroit proceeded to set a NHL record for winning the most consecutive games at home.

But do I care? Not at all. At the time, I thought I’d be back in a year or two to watch more NHL games. In fact, when the Wings were announced as a Winter Classic team, Big Cat and I started trying to measure up a trip.

But four years is a lot of sand through the hourglass. Life has changed. My boys have grown, become more independent, as they should. Are planning overseas trips that don’t include me – and on their own coin. Meanwhile, I returned to Australia, felt my heart lurch one or two more times and then met a French woman who turned out to be the unlikely piece of the puzzle I needed for my life to make sense. All my overseas travel since has been aimed at Bretagne instead of Detroit, but believe me, I am okay with that. If you’d seen Chloe’s home town of Rennes, you’d understand.

But exactly four years since I saw the Wings first hand, I find myself wondering when or even if I’ll ever see them again in the flesh? Lidstrom’s No. 5 is now in the rafters of the Joe, which itself is on borrowed time as a new stadium starts to take shape in Detroit’s midtown. Zetterberg and Datsyuk are in deep, deep hockey middle age – although I have them covered on that front, even if I am only two games into my fourth competitive summer.

I was among a group of backpackers in Greece a long time ago, who gathered for a communal meal in Delphi. I got talking to a bloke from Yorkshire who had cycled to Delphi in the hope of seeing a pelican. He was a twitcher and pelican was high on his never-seen bucket list. An unimaginably exotic bird if you were from Yorkshire; something he couldn’t quite believe he might actually see, if he was lucky in the next day or so at a nearby lake. I thought of all the pelicans I’d seen in Australia. Even on the wastelands of the Geelong Road, you see flocks of them flapping overhead. Once, between waves while I was surfing alone around the coast from Lorne, a pelican flew up and landed right next to me, in the water. It hung out for 20 minutes or so and, high on nature and surfing and the beauty of life, I talked and sang to this enormous bird. Not unreasonably, it left soon after. Yet for this Yorkshire cyclist, he’d worked so hard to try even to glimpse one. Such a rare jewel.

Maybe live NHL hockey will be that for me? Both my boys are studying careers that could easily see them end up living overseas, including Toronto and LA so perhaps that’s how I will cross paths with the Winged Wheel once more; on a visit to my sons as they take on the world?

Or maybe I never will. Maybe money will tighten or health will change or circumstances will dictate that my days of jetsetting are done? I t took me until I was 24 years of age to manage to leave Australia and I’ve always felt it is a privilege to fly, to see other countries. I’ve never taken it for granted. And one day it will be over.

Maybe Washington and Detroit in 2011 was my one shot. Maybe I’m destined to be huddled in front of NHL Gamecenter for however many years I have left on the planet, riding a televised puck and Detroit’s fortunes, but with the blessing that in my memory bank is the additional colour and flavour of what it was like to Be There. Of having walked into the Verizon Centre and the Joe Louis Arena; of having seen the numbers and the pennants in the rafters; of having lived NHL hockey live and in the flesh.

How blessed am I to have done that? For that experience, and the wider trip with my sons, four years ago. I saw my pelican. And it was amazing.

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Going under in Paris.

October 7, 2014 by 1 Comment
Catacombs art. Picture: Nicko

Catacombs art. Picture: Nicko

The tunnel is maybe 600 years old. At times I can walk upright; at times I have to crouch. There are parts of it where crawling on your stomach is the only option. And slightly higher parts where you can sort of crawl on your hands and knees.

Which is when I start laughing, startling my much younger ‘cataphile’ companions, who are also grunting, sweating and struggling forward.

I start laughing because I realize that to get through this part of the illegal catacombs, deep under the city of Paris, I need to do what my personal trainer, Lliam Webster, and I call ‘Spider-man-ing.’ Knees out, core strong, hips low, moving forward, one hand then the other.

It’s training I’ve been doing for a year or so, week in week out, and it becomes apparent in this bizarre underground world that while I thought I was training for ice hockey, I was actually doing the perfect training for catacombs adventuring.

'Spider-man' training kicking in. Picture: 'Twist'.

‘Spider-man’ training kicking in. Picture: ‘Twist’.

My training at Fluid with Lliam kicks in everywhere. Sliding on my stomach, I use my hands to push a backpack ahead of me across the muddy clay. Isolating upper body strength and movement from my legs. In parts of the tunnels where you can’t stand upright, classic hockey stance is the perfect way to keep moving; knees bent, back straight, headtorch shining ahead.

I am with three Frenchmen, all around 30 years of age. They are true cataphiles, as they call themselves. They have nicknames so that if we are caught by the French cops, no real names are used. One is known as Syphilis, and I’m not sure I even want to know the origins of that name. Apparently, by day, he’s a doctor so maybe it’s less sordid than it seems. Another is Twist, or the Philistine. One is so stoned so quickly that I don’t bother with his name much because every time we stop, he either lights up or dozes off. He offers me drags of whatever he’s smoking but I politely decline because the illegal catacombs are NOT a place I want to be out of my head, even one per cent. I want my wits about me. We headed into this place at dusk, from a hole in a wall of a disused rail line, keeping an eye out for the gendarmes, and now it’s closing in on midnight and we are deep deep deep within the rambling catacombs tunnels. If I didn’t have a head torch, I would literally not be able to see a thing. I turn it off occasionally, just to get a sense of how dark darkness can be, when you’re 20 metres below Paris in 15th or 16th century tunnels with zero natural light.

Edging along a particularly narrow part of the illegal catacombs, below Paris. Picture: 'Twist'.

Edging along a particularly narrow part of the illegal catacombs, below Paris. Picture: ‘Twist’.

Apart from the locals, who are showing me around, there are three other guys, Israelis in their twenties. Two are trainee Rabbis, about to be ordained or however you officially become a Rabbi, when they return home to Jerusalem in a couple of days’ time. The other guy runs an abseiling business but is heading home to be commandeered into the Israeli army, for compulsory military service. We stumbled across them in the catacombs, without a map, hoping that they’d find their way back out using a compass and taking notes on when they turn right or left. To my mind, they might have died if we hadn’t happened to be down there on the same Monday night. On a weekend, a hundred people or more might sneak into these catacombs; parties are held most Saturday nights for those in the know. But this is a Monday and once your torch battery runs out, there is nothing. And the concept of turn right/turn left gets fluid as the tunnels veer and fall and rise and curve and do their medieval thing. These three had tried to abseil in earlier in the day and roped straight onto a beehive, being stung hundreds of times each. But came back and somehow did find their way in.

A shallow part of the water-logged section of the tunnels. Picture: Nicko

A shallow part of the water-logged section of the tunnels. Picture: Nicko

‘Can we come with you?’ they asked Syphilis and he said, ‘Well, you need to stay with us the whole way. We’re in here for six hours or more.’

By the end of the night, when we stumbled up a ladder and out a manhole into the middle of a major St Germaine street at 3 am, they were starting to realize how lucky they were to find him.

Me too, as we wander through a big party room called The Beach, with all kinds of street art on the walls, or the Santa Claus room, or past what is occasionally a cinema, or past a sobering tunnel where the roof fell in. There is a part of the catacombs elsewhere in the city that has been cleaned up, made safe and opened for tourists, but we’re in the other part – the catacombs that are officially blocked off and supposed to be out of bounds. There’s no guarantee that the exit we aim for won’t have been locked by council workers, or blocked by cops. At least, now we’re in, we know we can always hike all the way back to where we arrived, if necessary, but that would see us emerge around 7 am and I’m hoping that is not the case.

The catacombs are closed for a reason. They can be dangerous and, among other things, are apparently part of the Paris reserve water supply, so that even as we walk through parts where the water is up to our mid-thigh, it feels clean and fresh. But of course, people find their way in, and I love that there are always those who will find cracks in the city, other dimensions beyond the ordinary. Once inside, the place doesn’t feel overly dangerous, especially with a map (hello, Israel) and the right equipment. There are no rats, no spiders; there is no life at all. We walk past graffiti from the 18th and 19th century, we walk past skulls and bones. We crawl through a tiny hole into a circular room loaded with a mountain of human bones from the Cimetière des Innocents, a large cemetery that was in the heart of Paris in the 1700s and 1800s. Twist tells me that there was a plague, maybe 500 years ago, and it was blamed on the cemetery, so the bodies were dug up and dumped down here. I work hard not to step on a single bone. One of the Israeli dudes laughs, grabs a skull and pretends to be eating lunch.

Five hundred years ago, there was a plague ...

Five hundred years ago, there was a plague …

We head on to the Oyster Room, and have one of the best pic-niques of my life. Twist pulls out a dozen or so candles and we turn off our headtorches, preserving batteries. By candlelight, we drink beer, eat breadstick and pate, Camembert cheese and the awesome Petit Écolier chocolate biscuits that would be the best thing ever invented in France if it wasn’t for French women and wine. The stoner tokes and dozes, and Twist peers at a map of the catacombs, downloaded off the internet, plotting our next course. I chat about the stark difference between the word ‘normal’ in Israel and Australia with the army-bound abseiler (Him: ‘We had a war last month. Three of my friends died. It’s how it is where I live. It’s normal. You cry for two days and then you move on. My parents both carry guns. I carry a gun sometimes, to move around town. People don’t want peace. They want revenge. They want to fight.’ Me: ‘So let me tell you about Melbourne, where I come from …’)

Spongebob makes an appearance among the catacomb artwork. Picture: Nicko

Spongebob makes an appearance among the catacomb artwork. Picture: Nicko

And again, I am struck by the mysteries and wonder of my blessed life. That I have the means and contacts and spirit and ability to be sitting in a candlelit cave, deep within the bedrock of Paris, somewhere under the Jardin Luxembourg or thereabouts, chatting war and peace with a Jerusalem native while his Rabbi friends softly prays and then sings next to us. I had been genuinely apprehensive, leaving my flat and heading off to this adventure, but I have a policy that if fear is the only thing stopping me doing something, then I have to do it. So I went, and oh man, I am so glad at this moment that I did.

And as we literally crawl through tiny tunnels and I slide into holes so small I am not sure I’ll fit through, being the lead explorer at this point and needing to bend in an L-shape and corkscrew my torso to make it, feet dangling, unsure where the floor is or, shit, even if there is a floor on the other side, I give thanks for Lliam Webster and hockey and the fact that at almost 50 years of age I am fit enough and supple enough (and stupid enough) and have built enough trained core strength to be able to embrace a fucking crazy adventure like this one and come through it in one piece, smiling.

A candlelight dinner in the Oyster Room.

A candlelight dinner in the Oyster Room.

We pass a former font of the Chartreuse monks, who invented that lethal spirit. We decide it’s past 2 am and we haven’t got time to detour to the German war bunker nearby. (Urban legend has it that Hitler pissed in the toilet there.) We also can’t visit the only official underground grave of the catacombs – a gatekeeper who started walking them 200 years ago (possibly hunting Chartreuse) and one day didn’t return, his body found 21 years later in the tunnels. This trip, the cataphiles won’t make it all the way to under the military hospital, where punk concerts have been known to happen.

It takes both Syphilis and Twist to push against the solid metal manhole cover and release us into the early morning air of a deserted Paris street. Covered head to toe in yellow clay, seven men emerge from the ladder and run for the darkness of a nearby sidestreet. No yells. No sirens. No flashing lights. We jump a fence into the deserted jardin, peel off our wading boots and rainjackets, stash headlamps and I try to regain some sense of normal appearance for the 4 am bus ride back to where I’m staying. My hair is caked in yellow clay and dust. Twist and I share one last beer, grinning at one another like maniacs, like brothers who have shared secrets, like friends who have seen things most don’t get to see, like outlaws who have somehow, against all odds, escaped the law.

And the next day, I avoid a trip to the Eiffel Tour with my travelling companions, because I’ve climbed it before and anyway, oh God, I need to sleep. But my body isn’t even that sore, given what I put it through underground. My hockey training has come through again. When I needed it. In the most unlikely circumstances.

Resting in not much peace. Picture: Nicko

Resting in not much peace. Picture: Nicko

Today, I’m back at my desk, more than a little jetlagged, and tomorrow night I’m back at the Icehouse, wobbling around in yet another round of development training. On Friday, the Detroit Red Wings begin another NHL campaign, playing the Bruins, and then that night I dress for a practice match with my summer league team, the Cherokees, to see if all my fitness work will translate into actually being a better competitive player.

In other words, life is back to normal, but I have a whole new batch of memories to carry me along.

Here’s to hockey, and to Lliam Webster, and to keeping fit, and to embracing adventures when you can. This was a good one.

Ah, Paris.

Ah, Paris.

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Kettlebells, rubber bands, Icelandic horse sex and me.

August 13, 2014 by Leave a Comment

I’ve been going to a lot of Melbourne International Film Festival screenings over the past week. French films about relationships, relationships or, maybe, relationships. A strange Icelandic film about horse sex and people who are slightly mad. A beautiful but strangely emotionless Japanese animation. Robert Connolly’s fantastic new live-action kids film, Paper Planes. Between sessions, we walk from the Forum to the Capitol or maybe Hoyts at Melbourne Central, rugged up in puffy jackets and beanies, huddled against the biting breeze.

The Podium Line does the red carpet, at the world premiere of 'Paper Planes'.

The Podium Line does the red carpet, at the world premiere of ‘Paper Planes’.

But then, on Facebook yesterday, somebody posted: ‘Only six weeks until daylight savings.’ I blinked. Really?

Meanwhile, in the AFL, it’s coming down to the wire with less than a month to the finals, which means two things: Richmond will finish ninth and the sun will start to shine and the grounds will become less muddy.

At the Bang, my footy brothers and I will stop and sniff the Spring in the air and start to lairize even more than we do now, with one handed marks, drop-kick attempts and other shenanigans we’re too old and only occasionally skilled enough to attempt.

And, most importantly of all, Ice Hockey Victoria’s summer season will loom and my team, the Cherokees, will again continue our quest to be competitive in Division 3.

Just like all the other summer players, we’re busy getting ready, doing the training, hoping we’re better than last season.

I can hardly wait for the competition to start. Last summer was pretty much blown out for me by the much-chronicled Year of the Knee, as I could hardly skate or, when the knee finally repaired, didn’t have enough legs to feel like I was at my best.

Even, so, I unfortunately did better than Big Cat Place who broke his ankle before the season had found full stride and barely played from that point until the last few games months later.

Big Cat and I committed there and then to play at least one more summer together, both fit, both able to be true teammates, before the inevitable happens and he gets too good to play on the same team as me, and so the summer of 2014/15 is shaping as a critical time of my hockey life.

I haven’t written much here lately because, as always, I don’t want the blog to just repeat the same old stuff and I would get as bored writing it as you would reading about every development league game or Red Wings playoff blowout.

Plus I had a manuscript to finish, which I just have, and so all my writing hours were taken up with that 135,000 word-mountain.

But between my real job and the novel draft, I have been training hard, getting ready for summer. I’m currently heavier on the scales than I have been for a while but feel fitter than I have been for a long time, which either means I’m delusional or I’ve gained extra (heavier than fat) muscle where I need it. Maybe those two things aren’t mutually exclusive.

Fluid Health: just a few of the tools of happy torture.

Fluid Health: just a few of the tools of happy torture.

All I can do is the work. Twice a week I trek to Port Melbourne to meet with the bearded one, Melbourne Ice and Australian captain Lliam Webster, to toil on improving my functional body movement, core strength and explosive power. This training remains the best and most entertaining I have done after years in gyms, lugging weights. It involves everything from Spiderman crawling along the floor to carrying barbells as far and as fast as I can while a giant rubber band threatens to twang me through the opposite wall. Some days I’m pushing a sled loaded with weights across the room, or deadlifting a barbell, other days I’m sliding on the slide board while Lliam has fun frisbeeing plastic cones at me to swat away as I glide.

The muscles being worked are all core hockey muscles and I can feel the extra balance and strength through my deep stomach muscles, glutes and hamstrings. As a happy aside, my dodgy lower back is better than it’s ever been, I have shaken off a shoulder that was hurting me for months and The Knee is now strong enough that I’m hopping onto platforms or over distances and landing on the same left leg.

In other words, for the first time in at least 18 months, I am pain free. Amen.

This has all been a long process involving Fluid Health, acupuncture needles, Enzo the magic osteo and a lot of damage to my credit card, but it feels fine to sit here and be able to write that I am pain free and feeling fit, with a couple of months to go before I skate out in the Braves jersey for a new season.

On days I’m not at Fluid, I hit the gym near my work in Richmond, lifting weights and building upper body strength.

The weights room at my local gym. Every now and then, I actually turn up there.

The weights room at my local gym. Every now and then, I actually turn up there.

On Wednesday nights, I have signed up for power skating, which is an hour of pure Hell – well, actually, that’s not strictly true: the bag skating and explosive speed stuff I quite like. The outside edge work, not so much, because I remain so shit at it.

But I made a conscious decision – with much support from hockey friends: ‘Do power skating. You need to. You NEED to.’ – to spend at least one term of Wednesday nights working specifically on my still dubious skating, instead of playing dev league.

Getting better on skates is such a slow, gradual thing that it is difficult to chart progression. Some games, friends/opponents vow that they were astonished at how much faster I have become. Other times I know that I sucked dogs balls, as an old girlfriend used to say. Wobbling around like an Intro Class rookie.

One thing, though: I’ve actually reached a significant point in my skating, where I don’t mostly think about it during games. I see the puck and go to get the puck, or make position. I don’t have to think abut my legs or where my feet are moving.

It’s like learning a language where they say you have truly made progress when you think in that language. At some point, skating stopped being something I had to concentrate on and became something happening while I was playing hockey, so that’s an improvement.

But then come those moments where I get run down from behind on a breakaway because I’m not fast enough, or I have to turn fast, clockwise (my “bad side”) and I curse that I’m less nimble. Or I just watch others who I started with, several years ago, who now skate like a dream. Or I realize that there are entire moves, like backward crossovers, that I simply don’t ever attempt under pressure in a game.

The beauty and balance of an Icehouse power-skating class. (Ten bucks says one of us, probably me, was on his arse within 30 seconds of this being taken.) Pic: Macklin Place

The beauty and balance of an Icehouse power-skating class. (Ten bucks says one of us, probably me, was on his arse within 30 seconds of this being taken.) Pic: Macklin Place

And so I trudge off to the Bradbury Rink for skating lessons with Zac, not the Henke Rink for the fun of playing actual games.

Today, I’m hitting the gym at lunchtime for some weights. Tonight I have power skating. Tomorrow, Fluid with Lliam. Friday? Maybe the gym again, if I don’t have a social game of hockey with or against the IBM team. Sunday: the Bang.

This is not to brag. I need to do this to even attempt to keep up with those young’uns I’ll be skating with and against this summer.

I need to do this anyway. I long ago realised how important regular exercise is to maintaining my potentially fragile mental health. I also long ago realised how draining on my emotional and mental health writing fiction can be. So it’s no coincidence that I’m on a big fitness campaign while driving a draft to the line.

Anyway you look at it, I believe that’s known as win-win. My body is coping. I have miles in my legs. Spring is in the air. My book first draft is done. The Cherokees are starting to get excited.

Bring on the summer.

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A heatwave, the Winter Classic and question marks

January 15, 2014 by Leave a Comment

“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive. The world needs more people who have come alive.”

–       Jonathan Harris

It’s been an unusual summer. Of course, in Melbourne, there’s the weather, which did its perverse trick of being cold, grey and mostly un-beachy through the two weeks or so that almost everybody is on holidays and sitting in traffic jams along the coast, dreaming of sitting on a beach, so they can fret about how they look semi-naked in swimwear, and, all going well, just bask. Now most people are back at work, it’s hitting 40 degrees Celsius. Every. Day. And they say God, that complex woman in the sky, doesn’t have a sense of humour …

I had all kinds of plans for my Christmas-New Year break. Six days clear? Let’s hit LA!!!! Hmmm, timezone issues, and we’d lose an entire day (literally – that fun/crazy phenom where you leave LA near midnight on, say, a Friday, and arrive back in Melbourne on Sunday, Saturday having somehow evaporated in space or science or something). So, not LA. Then, hey, Tokyo!!! No? Lombok!! Umm, Byron! Err, shit, another few days at my parents’ place at Lorne?

In the end, Chloe and I mostly hung around Melbourne., enjoying how awesome the city is when there aren’t any actual people living in its canyons, the crowd absent from its streets. Riding bikes along mostly empty roads and bike trails, and watching films in sparcely populated cinemas.

More and more, as is my brain’s way, I fell into introspection and wondering where I’m heading next? Off the ice for almost a month, I found myself with no real desire to attempt a general skate at the Icehouse. Part of this was practical: Facebook told me that the Henke Rink was being relaid, so I knew general skates and any other on-ice activities would be crammed onto the Bradbury Rink, and general skates on half or two thirds of a rink are remorselessly crap. You need some room to move.

But I also started to worry that I had so little desire to skate, to be on the ice.

A panorama of the Big House: the largest hockey crowd ever, and in snow and 12 degrees F.

A panorama of the Big House: the largest hockey crowd ever, and in snow and 12 degrees F.

I watched a lot of hockey. On my Apple TV and iPad, the NHL continued, and my Red Wings were lurching along, as they have this season; suffering injury after injury, patchy results building as a play-off spot becomes less certain. The Wings suffering from star goalie Jimmy Howard losing form, confidence and health, plus an ongoing inability to score goals, and a bunch of Grand Rapid Griffins kids filling holes (although one of my absolute favourite prospects, Tomas Jurco, debuted, scored, looked great in a Wings jersey!)

Nevertheless, we believe. Big Cat Place turned up at my house for a 5 am alarm so we could watch Detroit play Toronto in the outdoor Winter Classic. Man. Two Melburnians in Winter Classic merchandise huddled in the dark in an Australian summer, watching 105,000 people brave sub-zero temperatures at the Big House, in Ann Arbor (and receiving gloating snapchats from Ice stars Tommy Powell and Shona Green, in head-to-toe Toronto gear, a few suburbs away). Snow on the seats, snow on fans’ heads. The weather so cold as the polar vortex approached the mid-west of America that the goalie waterbottles had to be constantly replaced because the water was freezing inside.

Cold, cold seats at the Winter Classic, half a world away from a Melbourne summer.

Cold, cold seats at the Winter Classic, half a world away from a Melbourne summer. Pic: Detroit Free Press.

It looked awesome, and fun, and freezing. The Wings, of course, lost in a shoot-out, looking ineffectual when it mattered most.

But then, in their next start, smashed the Dallas Stars, 5-1, with Tomas Tatar, ever-growing in confidence, scoring a fantastic lone-drive goal. Then had a few days off and got belted by the Sharks. And so it goes.

Between Wings angst, I read an amazing book, by Bill Bryson. It’s called ‘One Summer’ and is about America in the summer of 1927. Charles Lindbergh became the first aviator to fly the Atlantic, and became a national hero, before turning into a Nazi enthusiast. The crazy art project of Mount Rushmore began. Sacco and Vanzetti were tried and executed, rightly or wrongly. The Jazz Singer was released, making talking pictures a mainstream reality. Baseballer Babe Ruth was hitting home runs at unprecedented levels, and living an impressively sordid lifestyle to go with it. The entire mid-west was flooded to unbelievable levels. Pre-Nazi America First ‘pure race’ theories were so extreme the Klu Klux Klan looked tame (tens of thousands of Americans regarded as being of ‘lower race’ or ‘lower intelligence’ or ‘lower morals’ were sterilized against their will. No, seriously.) Even as I read of these horrors, in this much more enlightened world, almost 100 years later, Liberal Senator dipshit Cory Bernardi was declaring to Australia that ‘non-traditional’ families with a single parent are more likely to have higher criminality among boys and promiscuity among girls.

Tomas Jurco celebrates knowing he's pretty much NHL ready. Pic: Ducks website.

Tomas Jurco celebrates knowing he’s pretty much NHL ready. Pic: Ducks website.

Where Australia is headed worries me more and more.

And then the holiday was over, work was back and my usual world started to return to its normal rhythms. I belted out 4000 words of my new novel in one day, showing that, as I’d suspected, my brain had really needed some time off by the end of 2013. But then found myself staring at the screen once more. Hey ho. Do the work.

And I wondered what 2014 will hold, should hold? An American philosopher/artist Jonathan Harris wrote a heartfelt essay on being ‘stuck’ and assessing why he’d been stuck at various points in his life and how he’d moved past those moments. (Thanks Kayt Edwards, for finding it and posting it.)

I’d fully recommend reading it, but ultimately Harris argues that you have a very limited time on Earth and you need to spend it doing things that move you, inspire you, fully engage your creativity and energy.  It’s a nice theory for the wealthy: he’s the kind of guy who apparently can afford to go and sit in a cabin in Oregon for months at a time without having to worry about paying for groceries. People with mortgage headaches and medical bills and whatnot might not have his free-thinking luxury. Nevertheless, there is merit in what he says.

Squinting at 2014 from the top of the ride, I find myself wondering whether I’m stuck? What most moves me, what most excites me? Is it still working in media? Is it still hockey? Is it still writing novels? Is it Little Big Shots, the kids film festival I work on? Is it still living in Melbourne?

Is it still being, well, Me?

These are questions I ask myself a lot and I think it’s mostly healthy, if it doesn’t paralyze you. According to Harris, being ‘stuck’ precedes a fundamental shift of some sort, but I don’t think I’m at that point. Am I? I can see friends who definitely are, whether in their relationships, or work, or other aspects of their life. It’s always easier to see clearly looking in, as against looking out. But where am I at?

A highlight of summer: Big Cat Place back on two legs and back in skates, at the Charlie Srour game.

A highlight of summer: Big Cat Place back on two legs and back in skates, at the Charlie Srour game. Pic: Nicko.

One definite way to avoid paralysis and to keep the brain process moving is to retain context. On Sunday evening, I picked up Big Cat and made the long trek to the (freshly-painted and spruiced up!) Oakleigh Ghetto. Tried to remember the order my armour goes on, and strapped on skates for the first time since mid-December. Nobody in the rooms but close friends from the hockey world, all united for a game in  honour of Charlie Srour, a treasured member of our little gang who died a year ago on New Year’s Day, to eternal regret. We toasted Charlie with Russian vodka, Big Cat spent the warm-up managing to stand in skates and move around on the ice for the first time since breaking his leg, and then we had a very informal scrimmage for the sheer joy of being back on the ice.

It was one of those games where nobody cared about the score. In fact, I honestly can’t recall what it was, three days later. We played four-on-four and laughed a lot. Melbourne Ice women players attempted figure skating moves between face-offs, the standard good-natured sledging hit astronomical levels, and I felt fantastic for about three shifts before my rusty legs started to run out of steam. Man, that happened fast. In the photos that Big Cat took, I can see myself return to my bad-old legs-wide flat-foot skating, as I get tired. God, another year of trying to move my legs, to become more mobile on the ice. That’s where one of my 2014 challenges lies – not to listen to the voice inside that says I don’t seem to be getting any better, that I’m only ever going to be mediocre; that after three years, I remain so so-so.

I have to banish those thoughts. The fact was, it was fun to be back out there. I did love playing again. I still have chapters of this hockey journey left, I think. I just have to keep doing the work.

Wayne McBride does his best Frank the Tank post-brawl celebration, after 'fighting' Apollo Patrick in the Charlie game. Pic: Big Cat.

Wayne McBride does his best Frank the Tank post-brawl celebration, after ‘fighting’ Apollo Patrick in the Charlie game. Pic: Big Cat.

And so yesterday, in 43 degree heat, I made my way to Port Melbourne and survived a training session with Lliam Webster at Fluid; remorselessly working my stomach and core and every skating muscle in my legs and butt. I’d only wished I was wearing a Stetson so I could have tugged it meaningfully over my eyes, showing I mean business as I face down a new year.

Because I am going to train like a mothertrucker now my knee is troubling me less.

I am going to get generally super-fit, using the functional movement training ideas, to hit the end of 2014 in better, different shape to now.

I am going to return to the Bang, able to run once more, and kick a footy with that bunch of guys.

I am going to improve my skating on the ice, so that I can play one more summer at least, and really smoke it.

I am going to watch the Red Wings somehow pull themselves together, get healthy when it matters, and storm the 2014 play-offs.

I am going to have non-hockey adventures to add diversity, adventure and different angles to my existence.

I am going to adore every member of my complicated, non-traditional family, and I’m going to fully believe in my two boys and my step-son, even if a misguided Liberal whacko Senator doesn’t.

And I am going to let my brain free, to write fiction and explore new paths for my company and to fully engage in my working life.

Mostly, I’m going to laugh, and have fun. Because in hockey and life, it’s amazing how easy it is to forget that we’re supposed to be enjoying the journey. When I shake off expectations and fretting, and just enjoy, everything is simpler.

These are not New Years resolutions. These are just the wanderings of life, now closing alarmingly on a half century within two years.

‘The world needs more people who have come alive,’ writes Jonathan Harris.

In 2014, on the ice and off, I plan for that to continue to be me.

My first ice-time of 2014: facing Brendan Parssons in a face-off with his girlfriend, Lex, dropping the puck. Life's a loaded deck, folks, but that doesn't mean it can't be fun. Pic: Big Cat.

My first ice-time of 2014: facing Brendan Parsons (right) in a face-off with his girlfriend, Lex, dropping the puck. Life’s a loaded deck, folks, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be fun. Pic: Big Cat.

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Can you feel it? A new NHL season begins.

October 2, 2013 by Leave a Comment

The puck dropped in a new NHL season today and you can feel the energy coursing through the veins of the Australian hockey community. None of last year’s depressing extended lock-out with its owner-player political bullshit. Just a set date for the full season and 30 elite teams ready to go. There’s been no shortage of action on Day One, either, with three games producing 7, 10 and 9 goals.

The Wings play tomorrow, against Buffalo, and I can’t wait to set up my trusty iPad on my desk, and see my team go to it, stopping only for a new year’s range of Belle Tyre adverts and occasional cries of ‘Pizza Pizza!’ Hoping captain Zetterberg and genius Datsyuk can brain ’em from the jump.

Pavel Datsyuk: ready to rock the eastern conference.

Pavel Datsyuk: ready to rock the eastern conference.

It works so beautifully that the AFL season finishes on a Saturday and four days later NHL action streams onto my Gamecenter. It’s not just the Big Show, either. We’re all gearing up for Victoria’s summer league, which is looming fast; ordering jerseys, training, wondering about linemates we haven’t played with yet, secretly hoping we win a C or an A on our jersey, finding a new enthusiasm for stick-and-puck sessions or even general skates at the Icehouse. A bunch of the Melbourne Ice players have headed to North America for a wedding, and so are planning to attend NHL games over there, including most of our coaches, which will make the start of dev league next week kind of interesting. But I can’t wait to talk to them about the experience of walking into the Joe Louis Arena for the first time.

And meanwhile, here in Melbourne, half a world away, I find myself surfing far-flung corners of the interweb, devouring anything I can find about all the levels of hockey underneath the NHL. For example, Australia’s Nathan Walker scored a goal for the Washington Capitals in the pre-season, celebrated wildly by all of us Antipodean skaters – the 19-year-old is the first Australian to make it so far – before he was sent down to the Hershey Bears in the AHL.

The magnificent Youngstown Phantoms jersey.

The magnificent Youngstown Phantoms jersey.

Walker’s continued rise got me looking at the team he was with before the Bears, and so I found myself thinking seriously about spending a hundred bucks on a Youngstown Phantoms jersey. And found myself also checking out the home site of a team Youngstown played – the magnificently-named Green Bay Gamblers.

And over coffee, with old Interceptor friends, tried to come up with the perfect team name (Agreed best effort was ’20 Canadians and a Swede’), and pre-dawn, woken by howling wind, read about the Wings’ top draft pick, Anthony Mantha, scoring four goals and adding an assist for the Les Foreurs de Val-d’Or against the Quebec Remparts. Or watching insane goals like this one.

Or revisiting shenanigans like this:

All between sweating on whether Gustav Nyquist will get his deserved chance soon in the winged wheel, after being shunted back to the Wings’ feeder term, Grand Rapids, because of a roster crunch. And debating the Wings’ defence with fellow fans on Facebook. And hoping my broken toe will fit into a skate at training tonight. Looking forward to a practice match against the

It's not often fans can openly cheer a bunch of gamblers.

It’s not often fans can openly cheer a bunch of gamblers.

Tigersharks, featuring plenty of mates, on the weekend. And watching social media ramp up among fellow local players.

Somewhere I read that Michael Clarke, the Australian Test cricket captain, won’t be going on an Indian tour, as he nurses his bad back for the looming return Ashes series in the Australian summer. I got through maybe one paragraph before his plight sort of ‘keyword-connected’ in my brain and I was flicking the browser over to the Detroit Free Press to see if Darren Helm’s back has improved enough to join general training? Put on injured reserve, to help that roster squeeze; but edging closer to health. OK, that’s cool.

How long until that Red Wings-Sabres game starts at the Joe to start the 2013-14 campaign?

Oh man … one more sleep.

Filed Under: Ice hockey Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Yo, Ranger! Ever heard of a cage?

March 7, 2013 by 9 Comments
Marc Staal wonders if he still has an eye, on Monday.

Marc Staal wonders if he still has an eye, on Monday.

This picture (right) was attached to a story on blueshirtbanter.com, a New York Rangers fan blog. Thankfully, the article explains that Ranger Marc Staal is expected to eventually make a full recovery after copping a full-blooded puck to the eye two days ago, against the Flyers.

My favourite part of the photo is the ref in the background. Because he’s thinking what I was thinking, watching Staal writhe around in severe pain and then staggering off the bloodied ice. Arms folded, head on an angle, the ref is clearly thinking: ‘What a dick.’

Readers of this blog know what a sensitive, new age hockey player I am, usually full of compassion and love for my fellow skaters. But sorry, Staal, I have only one thing to say to you when you can eventually see out of what’s left of your right eye if and when the elephant-man swelling subsides: go buy a fucking face cage.

Staal was lurking in front of his own goal when a Flyers defender did what defenders do on the blue line and drove a hard shot through traffic. All it took was a deflection and suddenly Staal was copping a piece of hard rubber travelling extremely fast to an completely unprotected face. If this description is not graphic enough for you, click here. Watch the injury in all its animated gif gory. It’s way nasty.

In dev league and summer league, the ferociously competitive forms of hockey in which my on-ice adventures exist, many players wear the plastic visors that barely cover your eyes. Not many don’t wear anything but that’s because Ice Hockey Victoria dictates an age range for when you have to wear a cage, or a visor or nothing at all. I’m not kidding: it is clearly stated, in fine print, that while my 17-year-old and 20-year-old sons must wear face cages, hacks my age are not legally required to wear any facial protection, presumably on the basis that if we haven’t picked up a life partner with our looks by now, it really doesn’t matter if they’re ruined at this point.

That was my reading of it anyway.

I wore a full face plastic visor for a few months but found the constant fogging, no matter what demisting potions I attempted to use, to be incredibly distracting. It was actually when I was sitting on the bench, breathing hard but not moving, that I couldn’t see a thing. I’d jump the boards pretty much blind, lost behind a pea-soup fog on the plastic in front of my face, and require quite a few strides for the breeze to clear things up.

Early on in summer league, I switched back to a full face wire cage and have never regretted it, even if yes, it clearly does impair your overall vision somewhat.

That’s a trade-off I’m prepared to make. As I say to anybody when this subject comes up in locker-room discussion: “I’m far too pretty not to wear a cage.”

Or to put it another way, this is one extreme, nasty, potentially dangerous injury that I can avoid with the right equipment, so why the Hell wouldn’t I?

A hard puck to the helmet can give you concussion. So will bumping your head hard against the ice, or into the boards. … basically, if your brain bounces hard enough against your skull, a concussion will happen. There’s no real way to protect that.

"Is he dead?" That's what Drew Miller appears to be wondering after Red Wing Patrick Eaves' face met a puck. Eaves was out for a year. Would a face cage have helped?

“Is he dead?” That’s what Drew Miller appears to be wondering after Red Wing Patrick Eaves’ ear met a puck. Eaves was out for a year. Would a face cage have helped?

But a face cage can stop a puck or, in my experience, a more frequent errant high stick to the face.

Two weeks ago, we finished a game at Oakleigh and were preparing to leave when a guy staggered off the ice, from a team training scrimmage, with blood pouring from his mouth and a big tooth, one of his bottom fangs, in his hand. “What do I do?” he asked us.

I resisted the urge to say: “Well, five minutes ago, I would have said buy a face cage but it’s too late for that.”

Instead, desperately trying to remember the St John’s first aid part of my scuba diving Stress & Rescue training, I suggested he put the tooth back in his mouth and suck it like a lolly. Saliva is actually the best warm, sterile holding material there is. Happily other even more medically qualified people were there and so he was hauled off to the Monash Medical Centre for treatment. I doubt they would have been able to put the tooth back in.

A cage would have stopped that injury ever happening and the case list goes on and on and on, at every level of hockey.

I do recognise that some head injuries are going to happen, no matter what, in a game where bodies, sticks and pucks hurtle around a confined space. The Red Wings’ Patrick Eaves is only just back on the ice after more than a year of “concussion type symptoms” as they call it, having worn a puck to the ear in front of goal. This one was really nasty but actually I’m not sure a cage would have helped him. The puck struck him near the ear as he turned away from it, so I suspect the brain-rattle was unavoidable.

All a cage can do is protect your eyes, nose, teeth and cheekbones. But that’s no small thing. It’s strange that no hockey player would think of heading into a game without elbow and knee protection, yet many skate into battle with unprotected faces.

I firmly believe that most amateur players only wear visors or nothing at all because they watch the NHL and see their heroes manning up in no visor, or a minimal visor. Visors look way cooler, no doubt. Right up until you get hit. I accept that the vision is worse in a cage but I’d counter that all the knee-to-ankle padding impedes your natural skating ability. Yet nobody ventures into a game without leg padding. Imagine the looks we’d give somebody, being helped off the ice with a broken leg, if they said: “I chose not to wear knee padding because it affects my crossovers.”

In two and a bit years of chasing pucks around, I can easily think of seven or eight times where my face cage has been rattled hard ether by a flying or deflected puck, or somebody’s stick waving around, way off the ice, or even an elbow, and I’ve actively thought: “Amen for the cage.”

Now I just need to work out how to protect my inner thigh, having copped a hard drive to that unprotected flesh against the Fighters on Sunday. Between that and my boringly endless troubled left knee, my skating is not at a career peak right now. On Sunday, we Interceptors play our last game of the summer league season, and I think my legs need the rest. Well, actually not rest: I’m getting too much rest, not able to run or ride my bike hard or do any of the usual things that put off-ice miles into my legs. They’re getting sluggish because of this undiagnosed knee. Time to get it sorted, but I wanted to survive the end of the season.

At last, next week, I’ll be able to see the doctors, as they do an MRI. Which puts me ahead of Marc Staal. He’s listed today as out of action indefinitely.

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Puck drops: Too many goals, three fights in four seconds and a UFO.

February 27, 2013 by 3 Comments

Some random hockey threads that I’ve stumbled across in the past few weeks:

LAYING ICE

An awesome timelapse of the Joe Louis Arena rink being established. Auto show venue to Red Wings’ home ice in just 48 hours, when the lockout ended.

How awesome is this shot, by the Detroit News, from Wings v Canucks this week?

How awesome is this shot, by the Detroit News, from Wings v Canucks this week?

A DESERT STORM OF PUCKS

If you think it’s bizarre that we play hockey when it’s a blazing Australian summer outside the rink, spare a thought for the poor desert-based kid who gave up a shot per minute, playing for the United Arab Emirates. (Well found, Jay Hellis, or Dan Dixon, or Puck Podcast, or some guy named Joe, or whoever else originally dug out this story.)

WHICH MADE ME WONDER …

What’s the most goals ever given up in a hockey game?

The rollercoaster that is the Detroit Red Wings season continued on Monday, our time, with an 8-3 smashing of the Canucks, which was very sweet indeed. It’s not often the Wings score 8, especially with our disjointed sum-of-parts line-up at the moment, as injuries continue to ravage the Wings in the lock-out shortened season.

The worst I could find, in terms of number of goals allowed, just to make Alexander Medearis feel better, was the Bulgarian women’s team being smashed 82-0 against Slovakia in a 2010 Winter Olympic qualification game. There are unsubstantiated reported of Thailand beating South Korean, 92-0, in 1988, but I’m not sure that’s accurate.

The Bulgarian horror story in the women’s 2010 Olympic qualifiers definitely happened, however. The Slovakians had led 31-0 at the end of the first period, which is ugly by most definitions, and clearly didn’t feel any need to go easy from there.

Bulgaria had already lost 41-0 to Italy and then 39-0 to Latvia, before the 82-0 demolition. It celebrated the end of the tournament with a morale-boosting 30-1 loss to Croatia.

To add some context, that Bulgarian women’s team surrendered more goals in that one tournament than my Red Wings did in the entire NHL season the same year. Ouch.

Dan Cleary misunderstands the term "crash the net". Pic: Detroit News.

Dan Cleary misunderstands the term “crash the net”. Pic: Detroit News.

But I also like the writer of the account for pointing out: “(Bulgarian) goalie Liubomira Shosheva’s amazing 57-save performance. Considering, you know, she faced 134 shots in 56 minutes.”

In the NHL, the most goals scored in a game is apparently 21, and it’s happened twice. According to Wiki Answers, on Jan.10, 1920, Montreal defeated the Toronto St. Patricks 14-7. On Dec. 11, 1985, the Oilers just edged the Blackhawks 12-9.

And just in case you thought the Canadiens’ effort was some kind of fluke, the team also scored an NHL record 16 goals, in beating the poor Quebec Bulldogs 16-3 on March 3, in the same 1920 season.

OR MAYBE YOU WANT MORE THAN GOALS …

Of course, hockey is about more than remorseless goal-scoring. Which brought me to this game, between the Boston Bruins and the Dallas Stars. Three separate fights in the first four seconds. Then two goals in 45 seconds, once they finally decided to actually, you know, chase a puck.

The commentator is great: “Thirty-five seconds in. Three fights and a goal! Are you having fun yet?”

SPACECRAFT CAUSED CAR CRASH, SAY PAIR

This has nothing to do with hockey but is bloody funny. Good cartoon too.

And yes, those reading from outside Australia, this kind of shit happens around here.

In fact, if you don’t believe me, here is another golden Australian dickheads-drive-cars-too moment caught on camera. This endlessly hot summer is starting to mess with everybody’s minds.

Roll With It - in bookshops from Friday.

Roll With It – in bookshops from Friday.

GRATUITOUS PLUG: Yes, my long-awaited comedy/crime novel hits the shelves later this week. It’s called “Roll With It” and is A LOT different to my earlier kids’ books, in case any unwary parents think: “Oh, wow, a new Nick Place book.” Step away, kiddos! Having said that, the more copies I can sell, the more likely that the publishers will demand a sequel and even turn the adventures of Tony “Rocket” Laver into a series. Just saying …

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Pucks, like life, can bounce randomly. Ask Rodriguez

November 20, 2012 by Leave a Comment

It’s been a patchy couple of weeks, in terms of hockey. The NHL lock-out rolls endlessly on, with occasional flares of optimism that a deal will get done and hockey will be played but then, no, everybody walks off in a huff, like schoolkids fighting over marbles.

I’ve been reduced to watching documentaries about Detroit. A few weeks ago, I watched the mesmeric Detropia, and last night Chloe and I finally hit the Nova to see Searching for Sugar Man, an astonishing and moving documentary about Rodriguez, who you, like the rest of the world, had probably never heard of before this film. Strangely, I had, because of one of my more ridiculous little-known hobbies. It goes like this: sometimes, on a whim, I march into Polyester or one of my other favourite music stores, on a mission. The challenge is to choose a CD or vinyl album that I have never heard of, that purely attracts me on the day. It might be cover art or the name of the band or who knows what “Use the Force, Luke” factor that draws me to it.

I can only choose one.

I can never have heard of the band.

It’s a hobby that has clearly led to some horrible mistakes. There are definitely vinyl albums and CDs sitting on my shelf that have had only earned one or maybe two optimistic listens. (A copy of Fourtet’s “There is love in you” double vinyl album is going way cheap if anybody is interested) but not as many disasters as you’d think, and the wins can be huge. The Herbaliser’s “Same As It Never Was” CD probably remains my single greatest triumph of this game, although local artist Matt Bailey’s first album “The Three I’s” is a rival for Best Ever. (A graphic designer friend of mine, who turned out to have designed the art for a Bailey follow-up album, when I looked at the liner notes, said to me, in amazement: “How did you discover Matt Bailey??” Hopefully sales have picked up. For a down low night at home, it’s up there with Massive Attack.) Other honourable mentions go to The Two Things In One (Together Forever – The Music City Sessions; back cover pic won me) and Delta Swamp Rock (vinyl – the sheer name and the photo of two dweebs sitting awkwardly in a picnic area as the cover shot. How could I not?)

Yes, this back cover photo convinced me to buy an album. I never said the game was smart, or sophisticated. But really, how could you not want to hear this band?

So one day, playing this game, I wandered around a shop on the corner of Gertrude and George Street and stumbled upon a CD, “Cold Fact” by some guy called Rodriguez. It was clearly very old … late Sixties or Seventies old. He was pictured, cross-legged, in big dark glasses and a hat, as though floating.

Dunno. Looking at it now it’s an unremarkable cover. One track, “Sugar Man”, rang a bell but not one that I could isolate and identify. I honestly don’t know why I chose it. There’s every chance it was the title of a song more often known as “The Establishment Blues”. Its full title is: “This Is Not A Song, It’s An Outburst: Or, The Establishment Blues”.

Yeah, actually, that would have won me for sure. Where’s my wallet?

Back in the car, I slotted the CD and Sugar Man, and The Establishment Blues justified the money on their own. Rodriguez went into rotation on my iPad and life moved along. You know, the usual … I worked, I fell in and out of love, I bought other CDs with varying degrees of success, my dog and I grew older, I started playing hockey, I finished a novel, I swam with manta rays, I went to America with my boys, I saw the Red Wings live (but not win). I fell in love again … Rodriguez was part of the soundtrack.

And then this doco came out and the story is mind-blowing. Go see it. I openly cried. If you’re a creative type, it’s the ultimate bittersweet fairytale. Which is quite an achievement for a film that explains before the opening credits that Rodriguez, a commercial musical failure, reportedly died when he poured petrol on himself, on stage, and set himself alight.

But guess where the mystery man, Rodriguez, came from? Yep, good old Detroit. Straight out of the opening credits, I’m looking at a helicopter shot of the city, and having been there a year ago, I was easily able to spot the unglamorous blocky shape of the Joe Louis Arena by the Detroit River. Even better, Chloe (who a year ago may never have heard of ice hockey) squeezed my hand when somebody walked past a shop window with a poster celebrating various Red Wing Stanley Cup championships.

Even if you’re not a Wings fan or an increasingly passionate Detroitophile like me, it’s a brilliant doco.

But that’s as close to the Red Wings as I’ve been able to get lately. Detroit stars are scattered across Europe or training listlessly at minor rinks, waiting for the lock-out to end. The 2012-13 season shrinks and is probably gone. No Datsyuk magic in the winged wheel for another year? Fuck. Although Dats is having fun, making the best players in the top professional league in Russia look like development leaguers up against Lliam Webster:

(Thanks to Zak Wookie for that link)

Luckily, half a world away, on Melbourne ice rinks, hockey is being played, and sometimes by me.

In Rec D, my team lost 7-1 but then won 2-0 over the past fortnight. I missed the loss, because I was making sandcastles at Lorne, which might possibly endanger my claims for Devoted Team Player of the Year.

In between, we had a strangely listless two hours of dev league on the Wednesday night; one of those nights where players were flat-footed, waiting for the puck to come to them, not powering up and down the ice. I was probably as guilty as anybody, it was just a night where mojo was missing, although I did wake up sore the next day, which is always a good sign I’ve skated hard, and I did manage a goal – my third in four games.

The best thing was that when I woke the next morning with my usual Thursday morning hockey hangover, I was unexpectedly aware that I had made a surprise breakthrough in my hockey learning.

I had spent the night, especially the second game, determined to “own the puck”. As in, if it was there on my wing, I was going to win it. There are many better skaters than me in dev league; many better puck-handlers or more experienced players. But that’s what is great about dev league. It’s training, it’s learning, it’s not entirely about the scoreboard, even if we pretend it is. So I  didn’t back off when I would normally think, ‘Oh, that guy’s good; he’ll beat me to it/win it,’; I better go into defensive mode early. Instead, I kept charging. And the shock was that I won a share of pucks. Not always, obviously, but enough that it reminded me all over again how much easier hockey is and how the puck comes to you, when you take this attitude, instead of feeling, in the back of your mind, that you’re somehow making up the numbers. It’s the same in footy, probably the same in most sports. Confidence and commitment leads to good results.

Maybe it’s the fact I’ve managed a few goals lately? Maybe it’s false confidence? Maybe I’m delusional?

I don’t care. It’s been working and tomorrow night, when dev league cranks up again, and this weekend, against the Ice Wolves, I’m looking for that puck.

And after that? As Rodriguez sang, I’ll slip away.

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