2015 JGP Austria Blog #2: Our ‘Off’ Day

Friday- “Off Day”

I fell asleep way before the end of the ladies event last night. After the short, our U.S. ladies are in 9th (Bradie Tennell) and 14th (Anna Grace Davidson). They compete their free tonight.

Last night was very weird for me. I fell asleep and woke up about an hour later. The night before I did not wake up a single time and I had a feeling that I would last night. Usually if I get jet-lagged, it’s every other night for some reason. Anyway, after being up for about an hour last night I finally fell back to sleep… that is for about another hour.

My hotel room is set up weird, and there are three beds for two people. My roommate, Brian Johnson, decided to take the single bed and I was left with two single beds awkwardly pushed together. Last night I got hot and must have decided to switch from one half of the bed to another. That resulted in me falling between the beds and pushing them apart. I woke up on the ground, in the dark, and completely unaware of where I was. After figuring out that I had fallen in between the two beds, I quietly pushed them together hoping that Brian would not hear me and humiliate me. 

Julia and I decided that we were going to wake up early to get breakfast and then have time to go back to bed. Surprisingly, that plan actually worked out and we had an early breakfast at the hotel. While we slept, the pairs event was on. The Americans are in fifth (Chelsea Liu and Brian Johnson) and ninth (Lindsay Weinstein and Jacob Simon). After waking up the second time, I met Julia in the lobby and we went for a walk along side the Danube river. There’s a trail the runs parallel to our hotel and it’s such a peaceful walk with an awesome breeze from the water.

We then went back to the hotel to eat and get ready for our practice. The mens short event went on with the U.S. finishing in third (Vincent Zhou) and sixth (Oleksiy Melnyk). Julia and I went to the rink to start warming up and were able to watch some of the ladies event while stretching. The event started at 5:00pm and will not end until after 10:00pm. It’s always crazy to see how many ladies are competing in JGP events. Julia and I then went to practice which went extremely well. We feel strong and excited to compete tomorrow!

I’m heading off to bed now, but I will be reporting back in tomorrow for our final day here in Linz. Good night!!!

~Damian