Day 1 Russian Nationals

Today was a wrestling fan's dream come true.  We got VIP seats to the Russian National Championships that are being held here in Yakutsk.  Sam Adamov, our host, really had to pull some strings to first get us free tickets for a tournament that is selling out for $300 per day, then get us priority seating on top is amazing. Today's tournament featured the 55kg and 84kg weight classes.  The 55kg weight class in particular was very exciting.  I think a lot of this had to do with the fact that there were several wrestlers from Sahka that did well today.  If you go to Flowrestling.org you should be able to see many of the matches we are watching. After the prelims, we headed back to the dorms for lunch and training!  At the end of the session, we were given a lesson on hopsigai (Hop-sig-guy?).  The kids had a lot of fun with this and I think are having a blast.  I do think we're all tired at this point, and of course missing home and our families.

Back to Civilization

After three days in the country we are back in Yakutsk. We left two days ago beginning with a ferry ride across the sixth largest river in the world, the Lena river.

We were greeted in the village Maya by a group of elders who sang to us and gave us a blessing. We then went and wrestled a very tough team. After the dual we continued onto the village of Amga which took quite a long drive on a gravel road. We were greeted again by local officials and then taken to the city hall to be addressed by the mayor. After that we went to a summer camp for kids where we spent the next two nights. This was in the village of Bitun.

We had a practice the next day where we rolled around with our host team. We then wrestled the team from Amga. This was a great dual. First, we were the first Americans to visit this village so there was a real buzz in the gym. The gum was packed and the crowd was well educated.

We spent most of today returning to Yakutsk. While we really enjoyed having such a unique experience it is nice to return to the city. One of the things that is striking about the experience so far is how proud these people are and how hard they are working to welcome us. It is truly an honor to be apart of it.

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Local girls singing for the team in Amga

On the ferry

Picture of team with 1978 Olympic champ Pavel Pinigan

Waterballoon volleyball in forest grove

They were calling their team "The Kyle Smith Experience"....nice height advantage!



Return volley





Isaac gets a little wet on the miss.......



VICTORY!



I COULD NOT get the serious face on these wrestlers!



Pics for fun

While Team Oregon is out of internet/WIFI availability, wrestling through the villages of Eastern Siberia, I thought I would upload a few more pics from the team at Forest Grove.  I am sure we will hear from Team Oregon again soon as they return to Yakutsk for the Russian National Championships this weekend.


Gage works the rope.




Working on strength



Mike Clock, Kyle and his training partner Brian Hendrickson, Thanks Brian!

3-time Iranian Olympian Ahad Javansalehi instructs Jacob on some strength exercises

Greetings from Yakutsk!  We arrived on time here in Yakutsk after a long flight by any measure.  We got off the aircraft and were taken by bus to the area for departures.  There we were met in grand fashion by a local contingent complete with traditional local dress.  We were given a drink from a large bowl of fermented horse milk which is a traditional greeting in their culture!  The boys were given a English/Russian/Yakut dictionary and were serenaded by a woman in traditional garb.  Very cool! We went to our dorm where we made our living arrangements and then had lunch.  After lunch, we had our first dual meet with a local club.  The boys made a good showing although we seemed a bit sluggish.  We lost the dual 6 matches to 7 but competed very well.  Tomorrow we are leaving Yakutsk to tour and wrestle in the outlying villages.  This will prove to be a very interesting experience to say the least.  We will be doing some camping.  Needless to say we won't have much opportunity to communicate with the outside world, so don't worry. As soon as I get an opportunity I will post some pictures.  Lack of WIFI is limiting what we can do.

We are at Gate 35 waiting for flight 179 on Transaero Airlines from Moscow to Yakutsk. I think we are universally tired. We kept the team moving from one thing to the next to keep them from sleeping a long time and waking up in the middle of the night. Kyle Smith woke up around midnight and hasn't gone to sleep since. I've been up since 3 and am starting to hit the wall. Hopefully we get plenty of sleep on the plane.

Our flight departs around 12am tonight and is scheduled for 6 hours. We will be leaving at 6am Yakutsk time so we'll end up there around noon local time. We will get off the plane and wrestle our first dual here in Russia. More updates when we get the Internet again.

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A number of us are still adjusting to Moscow time. A few of us went to bed after lunch yesterday at around 3 or 4 and then woke up at about 3am. The nice thing about this is that it allowed some of us to make calls etc at a decent hour back home.

The plan today is to take boys to a large public market here in Moscow and return before lunch. After lunch we will go on a run to a park that runs by the river and get a workout in. Our goal will be to simulate two matches. Not exactly a grind match, but you have to adjust to what's available and make the best of it.

We leave for the airport at 6pm and will arrive in Yakutsk early Monday morning (finally).

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An old Soviet mural near our hotel

After training we took the boys on the Metro to Red Square. We didn't go into anything since we have a tour planned at the end of our trip. Regardless it was an amazing experience. For starters to walk across Red Square was fairly surreal for someone who came of age during the Cold War. Second, St. Basil's cathedral was amazing and looked like something out of Disneyland.

The kids were told to not to buy anything yet since they'd have more time later and in less expensive locations. The baubles of Red Square proved to be too difficult to resist apparently as several fur hats, boxes, Soviet era souvenirs found their way with us on the train trip home.

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Red Square

Our hotel at 10 PM

We are scheduled to depart Moscow on Sunday. We have e-tickets confirmed and on my email. We are still trying to find an earlier flight but it doesn't look good.

The boys did a lot of sleeping yesterday so they are feeling pretty good today. We had breakfast at 7am and then got a workout in. We ran the stairs of our hotel, then completed our "warm up" with a three round dumb bell complex with swings, clean and presses, snatches, square, bent rows and two handed swings. Its a Russian workout so I guess the circle is complete.

We finished outside with a Greco style wrestling workout consisting of hand fighting, pummeling, binding, counters and offense such as ducks, drags, etc.

We are planning on heading to Red Square today. We talked a little today about representing their country and how this is an awesome opportunity for them to experience a part of the world very few Westerners have seen.

More updates tonight (tomorrow AM for you)

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Tony Chay with the hip toss

Working out in the parking lot of the hotel.

We are currently staying at the Milan Hotel in Moscow. Singapore Air is putting us up until we connect to Yakutsk. We are desperately trying to find another flight other than the on Sunday night they have us booked on.

The kids are eating well. I took a group of 9 on the Metro to kill some time today and two of the wrestlers fell asleep on our way hone. Needless to say they/ we are tired.

Having travelled to Germany, Britain, the Netherlands, etc, Moscow is very comparable to other large cities I've been to. It seems to me that the city has undergone a lot of Westernization over the past 20 years. Case in point I am making this post from a Starbucks. Dress in particular is not as different as it was even 10 years ago. My hunch is that because of globalization we've moved a little there way as well. Lots of smart phones and people with earbuds in listening to their mp3 players.

We will try and train tomorrow and do some sight seeing if we can't get a flight. The kids have a great sense of humor and remained positive throughout the trip.

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We have arrived in Moscow. We are currently trying to arrange for travel to Yakutsk. More to follow when we have the 411.

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Getting Singapore Air to fix our travel arrangements.

Landed in moscow safely, negotiating with singapore airlines for flight to yakutsk

Flight Tracker

Boys are well into the flight over the middle of the Providence of Quebec Canada, 3,984 miles from Moscow and 1,943 miles out of Houston, travelling at 575 mph!

Layover Post

This post didn't upload last night with the video.  I don't have the video but here were Frank's remarks....

The flight from Houston to Moscow got cancelled and Team Oregon was shuttled to the Comfort Inn and Suites in Houston, provided with rooms for the night and dinner (Domino's Pizza). The guys are discovering that Singapore Airlines is much more generous than the average wrestling coach--two guys to a room and everyone gets his own bed. Colton Schilling and Josh Johnson ended up landing the "Suitest" room on the team. A shuttle will be back at 8:00 AM to take everyone back to the airport for a noon flight to Moscow. The adventure now includes trying to get the team on a different flight to Yakutsk. Nathan Stanley is communicating regularly with our travel agent, trying to avoid a multiple day layover in Moscow. The guys on the team have been outstanding in terms of going with the flow.

Travel update

We have checked for our flight to Moscow. We're scheduled to depart at 10am Oregon time. It's an 11.5 hour flight so we will arrive at 9:30pm Oregon time. That's 8:30am Moscow time. Once we have arrived in Moscow we will have to arrange for a different flight to Yakutsk. Because of it's remoteness, there aren't daily flights to our destination. We may have to travel to another airport in Moscow in order to get there earlier. We will try and keep you posted.

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Keeping the air safe from suspicious characters.

Waiting for hotel rooms with the other passengers.

What do you mean our flight is cancelled?

Layover continues

Delay

The coaches are impressed with how well the boys are rolling with the punches...as Coach Clock told them Monday night, "Be part of the solution, not part of the problem!" Of course it could  be worse as Coach Clock has been delayed sitting on the runway in New York for 2 hours due to weather....

Layover fun

Houston Flight Delay

Team Oregon's flight has been delayed out of Houston until 9:00 pm tonight. They had quite a bit of layover scheduled in Moscow, so they should still be on track to hit Yakutsk on schedule. 

We've landed in Houston and have a five hour layover until we leave for Moscow.