All entries for February 2006

Fame at last…

Amit Sood : 28 Feb 2006 23:56 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Tennis in the snow

I wonder which is more common. Snow falling on the last day of February, or people playing tennis on the last day of February. I would guess that snow would be the more likely, since February is after all a winter month; but we don't get snow all that often actually, and there are lots of tennis players out there…

Today the somewhat more rare occurence took place: playing tennis in the snow, on the last day of February. In a blizzard of sorts, no less, such was the strength of the wind this afternoon. An unexpected blast of snow that came down after I started playing, and was gone before I left. Made the game rather more interesting.

I found that I had to strike the ball at a 30 degree angle against the snow, in order to give a fighting chance of it landing within bounds on the opposite side of the net. Even more interesting was when the wind changed direction mid-stroke, meaning that the calculation of angles had a delay-factor to it. This often led to me squinting through the horizontal snowfall so I could make out Bryony scurrying across court to reach my latest mishit.

On the more relevant aspect of the experience, we managed a 73% increase in the length of our longest rally. This, ironically, came when the snow was at its worst, when previously our best was being incremented in margins of two strokes or so.

End result is that I have a small friction burn on my right thumb from gripping the racket too hard. No writing tomorrow then.

Amit Sood : 28 Feb 2006 23:54 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Retirement

I hereby announce my retirement from amateur athletics on 2nd May 2006, precisely 65 days from now. This decision has been made on the following grounds:

• Running is painful
• Running is time-consuming
• Running can get monotonous in the long term
• Running is painful
• etc

This leaves me with just the two races remaining:

• The London Marathon (23rd April)
• The Silverstone 10K (2nd May)

I aim to finish off with a PB in each. That will be all.

Amit Sood : 26 Feb 2006 17:25 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Work in progress

Amit Sood : 21 Feb 2006 15:30 |  Comments (4) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Birthday Ox

There was a party.
The FatBoy number one was crowned.
Some idiot was making a hand gesture.
Some photos were taken.
And then we went to Metamorphosis.

Oh and how could I forget the birthday boy!

Amit Sood : 18 Feb 2006 15:53 |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Captain Courageous

On the face of it, one might be quick to draw conclusions about the fact that my most extensive 5-a-side game this season (think I played at least 30mins out of 40) coincided with our heaviest defeat (we lost 14–0). However, looking beneath the surface, the true fact of the day is that I am officially the squad's best goalkeeper, having only conceded two goals in the 10mins I spent with the gloves on (our regular keeper conceded 12 goals in 30mins). This power shift has been endorsed by the squad's captain and also by its lead scorer.

The good news therefore, is that if I had been between the sticks from the first whistle (assuming there is an imaginary whistle since there really isn't one in amateur 5-a-side) we would have conceded a mere eight goals over the duration of the match.

Amit Sood : 09 Feb 2006 22:23 |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Cruel ballot

It appears, alas, that I will not be going to the World Cup in Germany this summer. Fifa held a ballot last week to determine how to allocate tickets since demand far exceeded supply. I had my name in the hat for four games: England vs Paraguay, Portugal vs Angola, USA vs Czech Republic, and Brazil vs Croatia. I knew the England game was gonna be a long shot but I though I had a decent chance of getting into the other three.

Sadly I wasn't allocated tickets for any of the four games. Came as a bit of a surprise, but evidently those Angolans, Croatians, and Czechs must have a lot of fans. Would have been the perfect way to sign off my student life; a dream trip to experience arguably my greatest passion live.

There is another ticketing phase for snapping up returns, but the more likely truth is that I will be watching the World Cup from Claycroft kitchen 20.

Amit Sood : 08 Feb 2006 15:38 |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Half way there (sort of)

How many people, having had enough alcohol in their system the previous night to kill a small rabbit, could have shaken off the after effects by spontaneously running 10 miles on a Sunday afternoon?

This is looking good, we're on schedule now. Given that I'm only gonna train up to 20 miles, in some sense we could say that I'm already half way there…

Amit Sood : 05 Feb 2006 16:28 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Time to get a move on

In 10 days time, at 2.30pm on the 15th Feb, I'm giving a half-hour presentation at the maths undergraduate open day. The subject of my presentation will be my 4th year project, which I need to communicate in such a way that it is accessible to someone with school-leaving mathematical knowledge.

This presents me with a number of issues:

1. I haven't done much of my 4th year project yet.
2. My project is expected to contain a significant proportion of undergraduate level material.
3. I don't know how to communicate this to a non-mathematician without first teaching them most of the degree.
4. I have never previously given a presentation of longer than ten minutes.

Anyone who has nothing better to do with their Wednesday afternoon is welcome to come and attend. Please do not laugh at me.

Amit Sood : 05 Feb 2006 11:48 |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Alternative badminton

Vick claims that he is unable to come ice-skating this evening because he "has too much work to do". On the other hand, he has enough spare time to spend 10 minutes slapping a wet bag of lettuce around in the corridor.

Hmm.

Amit Sood : 01 Feb 2006 16:39 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem