Yet another competition today marks the third in the last five days. After some exhausting travel over the last two days I can actually say I am not too surprise that I was a little flat today on the runway. I was in 5^th most of the competition with a best of 75.70m until the last round where I was passed yet again.

Even after all the travel I was feeling pretty good. I think jetlag is kind of a mental thing and not taking care of yourself when traveling multiple time zones. I crossed ten time zones to Finland and in doing so I stayed hydrated, slept when it was nighttime and was awake in the day.

But even though I felt good I was definitely losing some explosiveness in my throws.

In round one multiple guys hit almost 83m so I was excited that this would be a great competition. The stadium wasn’t huge but the fans seemed very excited and well aware of the events and who was important to watch.

I knew I had what it takes to compete with these guys. Even though they have personal bests of over 85m I know they don’t throw it every day. So who was to say that today couldn’t be my day?

I opened at 75m and was relatively happy with it. It was the strongest opening throw of my last three competitions so I assumed I would make progress as the meet went on.

But after round two around the same distance I started to wonder what I could work on technically. I had a couple of guys say I am throwing really low. As if it was a big problem and that I was losing a lot on my throws. I was literally flat.

I am used to the Hayward Headwind I face every day at practice in Eugene, Oregon. Throwing low keeps the javelin under the wind and tends to actually gain lift if you throw it clean. But in a headwind even the slightest amount of drag or high release can really kill your throws.

I have almost perfected throwing in a headwind but in the tailwind at Kuortane I was struggling. Putting the tip of the javelin up isn’t enough. You need your hand to travel at a higher angle as well, and changing the muscle memory of thousands of throws isn’t exactly easy to do.

I focused on attacking my throws on the runway, adjusting my focal point in the distance slightly higher and pulling over the top. But nothing seemed to work. I consistently threw 73 high to 75 high every single throw.

At the end of the day I am healthy and I can throw another day. And that makes me happy. All these competitions may not be ideal to throw far, but I am teaching my beat up old body that it can handle anything I throw at it. The mental toughness I am developing in these hard weeks will one day pay off big at a competition where I wouldn’t otherwise think I could keep going.

So overall I am gaining a lot of experience. Not throwing as far as I know I am capable of, but the season is far from over for me. I have a meet in Karlstad Sweden in three days and I know I can throw farther. I just saw the startlist and it is stacked with great throwers!

There is a big throw just waiting for me. I can almost taste it. And if I keep it up, if I keep persevering, I know I will find it.