Back at Work

Hello all. After taking an unpaid full summer leave of absence I am back with a new blog and an update on all things relevant to me! Seeing as its been a full three months since my last post, I will spent a lot time discussing what occurred during that time but I will also reflect on the very exciting opportunities both Men’s and Women’s National Teams will be facing in the upcoming months. So sit back and relax (men, don’t put your laptop on your lap, it’s not healthy for baby making) and enjoy.

Let’s start with the biggest tournament of my handball career. The first week of June, I and 18 others, flew to Guatemala for the Second Chance Tournament. After a short couple of days of practicing together, a USA team without standout Adam El Zoghby faced off against tough opponent Uruguay. After 60 hard fought minutes, the game ended in a tie. While I thought we could have played a better game, we did enough to give ourselves a chance against Guatemala, who had lost to Uruguay the previous day by eight goals. The player of the match in my opinion was long time star goalie Danny Capparelli, without some amazing stops and his always consistent play, we would not have tied that game and our dreams would have ended that night. Going into the next night knowing we had to win by eight plus goals gave us something to set on our minds on. We started the game hot and never looked back and won by a sizable margin, the outcome never really in doubt. Gary Hines and Martin Clemons Axelsson again led us in scoring, both putting away numerous goals. Newcomers Mike Williams and Gio Aceuvado, under the tutelage of Mark Ortega, both put in significant time at middle back and boosted our back court performance to another level. The tournament wasn’t without its setbacks however. Hans Self, who played very well on the left wing in the first game, broke his foot towards the end of that game and couldn’t play in the second game and I, in a rare display of stellar athleticism, managed to break my left thumb by smashing it between the floor and my knee with no one else in the vicinity. However, I did score a goal on the play. Hans has since been cleared to play again and will join the team in Mexico. My thumb has fully recovered as well and is no longer a factor.


With the exception of the Second Chance Tournament, the month of June was boring. Jen and I both worked at the school daily, enjoying the kids and the all that comes with a classroom full of three, four and five year olds. Our German seasons both finished at the end of May on positive notes, as both teams were able to garner positive points, something that had not happened almost the entirety of the year 2011. That said, June was filled with training, the kind that is not very enjoyable. For example, many of those training sessions did not include balls, much less a gym, only running shoes and streets or a track. I wasn’t able to participate in any handball practice anyway due to my thumb injury and therefore turned into a long distance runner for the month. Not fun. I am not a huge fan of running just to run, I find no enjoyment in it.

School ended the last week of June, finally. Jen and I than worked the first week of summer school together. Basically just baby sitting 20 kids during the day. The first week went well and I enjoyed being able to work next to my wife. After the first week was finished, Jen flew to the States to attend the women’s selection camp in Oklahoma, which left me alone to work the next two weeks of summer school. Those two weeks did not go as well as the first one. It is amazingly boring to baby-sit the same kids over and over again every day, especially in a school without air conditioning and without much to do. Needless to say, as soon as those two weeks were over I couldn’t wait to fly to the States and join my wife for some vacation time.

Jen returned from Oklahoma feeling good about the work the women were able to accomplish during the camp. She was thrilled to see the steps some of the girls have made and she is very excited about being named to the team that will compete in Pan Am Games! We met back in New Hampshire after being away from each other for the better part of two weeks. It was the longest we have been apart since getting married and I hated it, but it was good practice for what we are dealing with now.

We than spent a month in paradise. It’s actually a small town named Bow in the state of New Hampshire. It’s not the town itself, but the people there who make it so special. We intruded on Jen’s parents again and they were nice enough to let us stay at their house, eat their food, watch their TV, use their internet, drink their beer and basically make ourselves at home. My drill instructor wife knows about my tendency to become lazy over break and refused to let it happen this time around. We spent every morning either on the track of her old high school (where she holds like every record possible in multiple sports) or the pool/weight room at her Grandmother’s house. With Pan Am’s in both our sights, it really wasn’t difficult to stay motivated and we even had friends join us for a few workouts (they didn’t come again too often).

The best part of vacation this summer was the wedding of two good friends of ours. It was a four day extravaganza filled with golf, delicious food, cold beer, friendly people and even 50+ Brits (the groom is from England). The wedding reception was held at the bride’s parents house, who live just up the block from the Haubrich’s. I spent the weeks leading up to the wedding working on the house (see: drinking beer) with the bride’s brothers and I must say, it looked great on the night of the reception. The wedding went off without a hitch and it was a beautiful thing to see. I managed to sweat through two shirts on the dance floor and was lucky enough to have the honor of dancing with the Groom’s grandmother, who is possibly the sweetest lady this side of the Atlantic.

The highlight of the wedding for me came the next morning. Another good friend of the Haubrich’s and the wedding couple built a bar in his back yard and held a huge brunch on Sunday for everybody that had come to the wedding and I was allowed to man the bar, something I had not done since before finding Handball. After a few minutes reacquainting myself, I found the flow and served drinks for the better part of 4 hours straight, thoroughly enjoying myself.

The last week of vacation was spent in another form of paradise; at Jen’s grandparents camp on Great East Lake. There isn’t a whole lot better in life than to wake up, enjoy a cup of coffee on a dock, than take a boat out and do some skiing, spend the day on the dock, drinking cold brews, discussing everything from politics to handball, enjoying a cocktail hour that invariably turns into three, eating lobster and than watching the sun set over the lake and doing it all with people that you love. Life is beautiful.

I returned, without my wife, to Germany two weeks ago. I missed the first three weeks of the handball season, which left my teammates, coach and management more than a little bitter and I don’t blame them, but time spent with family is very special to me and I think they understand that. TV Gelnhausen has been working hard to prepare for the new season and I am excited about our chances. We dropped down a league to the 4th league this year but our team is full of young, dedicated athletes and I believe we have a good chance of winning the league. Everybody has a positive attitude and we are more of a team this year, everybody wants to work together to accomplish our goals. Our first league game is the 9th of September against our rivals, who also dropped down a league last year. Their whole team stayed together in order to try and win the league and move back up this year, we plan on not allowing that to happen. I am pumped about the possibilities the new season brings and can’t wait to get started.

The first week back was preparation at school. Boring but necessary. This past week was our first week with the kids. My class has no new kids which has made it easy, we don’t have to teach anybody how the school works or our rules and routines. Our kids are pretty awesome for the most part and they make it easy on us. My head teacher is a very hard worker and therefore makes my job a lot easier.

It is very difficult being away from Jen. The apartment is lonely without her and I am stuck doing all the cooking and cleaning, etc. She is currently in Colorado Springs training with some of the women on the squad. Between work and training we don’t have the ability to speak too often on the phone which makes things even worse. I am counting down the days until we meet up again in Lake Placid. Only 4 more weeks!

It’s game day in Gelnhausen, we play a Pokal game against a third league team tonight. There is nothing better than game day, the build-up, the excitement. Food tastes better, the sun feels better, everything is better on game day. That said, I must run, time to fuel the machine and than catch my train. Peace!