This video of the best moments in international table tennis in 2024 is nine minutes long and, if you’re a bit of a fan, it goes by in no time flat. Most of the segments are narrated in English and German.

Table Tennis Best Points Of 2024 by ttrio2016 (YouTube)

I learned that a behind-the-back shot is sometimes called a “Strawberry Shot”. I have no idea why. There’s also a “Snake Shot”, which is putting so much backspin on the shot from below the table that it winds its way back to your side of the table after briefly touching down on the other... [More]

I do not recommend watching the video below. A friend of mine who thinks that I don’t appreciate Caitlin Clark enough sent me this video. It is pure clickbait. Caitlin Clark just finished up her rookie season in the WNBA. She put some of the best numbers the league has ever seen and has, nearly single-handedly, significantly boosted her not only her own team but the status of the WNBA, in general.

The video breathlessly speculates whether she will come back for another season.

I kid you not:... [More]

The video linked below is a great 1-hour documentary[1] about one guy—Karel Sabbe—who finished the Barkley Marathon (Wikipedia), which is,

“[…] an ultramarathon trail race held each year in Frozen Head State Park in Morgan County, Tennessee, United States. The course, which varies from year to year, consists of five loops of the 20+ mile, off-trail course for a total of 100 miles.”

The video is named #17 because he’s only the 17th person to have finished the race in its 40-year history. And people... [More]

The article Israel and Russia Have No Place in the 2024 Paris Olympics by Jules Boykoff & Dave Zirin (Jacobin) writes,

“In November, an IOC spokesperson insisted that Russia presented “a unique situation and cannot be compared to any other war or conflict in the world.” The statement beggars belief. Both Russia and Israel are engaged in asymmetrical warfare, attacking civic infrastructure and private residences and leaving a long trail of civilian deaths and casualties.”

The authors’ statements beggar belief. Did they write this... [More]

I learned about an exercise called a “Wall Angel” today from a programmer who’d struggled with back, shoulder, and arm pain. I suffer from none of those, but I do have a quick morning stretching routine that I try to stick to. I’m always curious if there’s something I can add to the mix.

What’s a wall angel?

Technically, yes.

The exercise, though, is like a snow angel, but performed up against a wall.

It took me a few search links to find something that would just tell me that, instead of... [More]

I was in the U.S. over the summer and had purchased the U.S. map from Garmin. There wasn’t enough room to store the U.S. map on the device. This article assumes that you’ve tried to sync your maps to your device with Garmin Express, but it failed to copy because you don’t have enough space.

If you have enough space on your device, then why how did you even end up here?

I recently purchased a Garmin Edge 530 biking computer to upgrade from my Edge 500. It had served me well for over ten years, but the battery was no longer holding a charge reliably and wouldn’t last longer than 3 or 4 hours maximum. I also wanted to be able to store routes so that I was no longer the only annoying guy in the group who had no idea where I was going when we left familiar territory.

I got the 530 because it’s compact and doesn’t have a touch-screen.

I’m still trying to figure... [More]

Garmin Venu 2I’ve been noticing for a while that our so-called technological overlords are trying to sell us a vision of meticulously tracked health data that will help us all move toward a fitter, healthier lifestyle—and, hopefully, alert us when things are starting to go awry in these delicate biological machines we inhabit.

Insurance companies are starting to incorporate this data into their decisions on how much to charge you for the pleasure of not losing everything you own should you become ill.
... [More]

This was a pretty good game, unless you like defense. I will leave most of the political commentary in the capable hands of others.[1]

• Zelensky 🇺🇦 video call, of course
• Marine Corps 🎖
• Military Color Guard 🪖
• Jets flying over the stadium 🛩
• Three or four songs to start it off? ✅
• The National Anthem was a very nice rendition by Chris Stapleton 🎸
• Coaches and players crying like bitches? 😭 Oh, yeah.
• Giant American flag? 🇺🇸 Yup.
• Soldiers and wars mentioned all the time in... [More]

Moroccan bicycle kick dead-on to the bottom near-postAs a friend of mine has repeatedly written, “I feel bad for anyone boycotting this World Cup because it’s the best tournament of our lifetimes.” He also felt bad for himself that he would have to “go back to watching shitty premier league and MLS after this.” He’s quite a bit younger than I am, it’s the best tournament I’ve seen as well. The football has been absolutely top-notch.

It may be highly corporatize and corrupt and awful and wrong, but on the field, it’s absolutely amazing. I’ve never... [More]

Crybabies surrounding the refereeWhatever happened to the rule where only the captain is allowed to talk to the referee? Now players fly from across the field to deliver the amazing news to the referee that they don’t think that their teammate committed a foul and that the referee should reconsider and retract the call. Which never happens. But they all line up to tell him anyway. It’s tedious and childish.

A friend clarified for me,

“the point is not to argue that call, its to encourage the ref to reconsider a future... [More]”

Garmin Tacx Flux S SmartIt is November, my friends, which means it’s time to complain about Garmin’s TacX software.

I dragged my trainer out of the basement on Sunday. I test-connected it with BlueTooth to the phone and it looked good. I even have a mount for the phone this year. The bike is, once again, pointing toward my iMac, so it’s perfectly positioned for watching series or movies.

I set up The Boys S03, climbed up and started pedaling. The software wanted to calibrate again.

I figured, what the hell, it only... [More]

The following article is the text of a message I sent to Garmin to start a discussion about improving the UX for saving activities. 🤞

Garmin Venu 2Is there any way to prevent the Venu 2 from auto-saving an activity while I’m still working on it?

My old ForeRunner 235 would simply drop out of tracking mode and wait as long as I liked to restart the activity. This was fantastic for when I would stop for lunch on a hike. Or if I’d hiked or biked somewhere, wanted to stay x hours, but also wanted to... [More]

I cannot emphasize enough how little respect I have for any soccer player who does not stop whining and complaining about calls, even long after the referee has indicated that there will be a VAR.

They are a bunch of puling brats.

No pride. No honor.

They are a whole team full of idiotic children following the referee around like stupid ducklings, all with the most tragic looks on their faces, as if the gravest injustice to ever befall mankind had been perpetrated and they need to prosecute... [More]

Before I quote from any terrible articles below, I’ll give my take on the women’s figure-skating finals (long program).

Trusova was an absolute physical powerhouse, nailing jump after jump after jump, but not exactly linking it all together with very much style. Sarah Van Berken neé Meier, moderating for SRF in Switzerland, said that she would have been in the top 10 for men with those jumps. It was an exciting program, but my viewing partner said it was “ugly”, compared to Sakamoto, who is a... [More]

Every time I want to adjust my ski bindings, I (A) remember how easy it was to adjust them last time and (B) forget how it worked.

It is very easy to adjust the binding for boot length.

1. Get a flathead screwdriver
2. Place the screwdriver under the thick metal tab (found below the large flathead screw)
3. Lever the screwdriver up to lift the tab
4. Slide the binding assembly backward or forward to suit the boot size[1]
5. Make sure that the assembly clicks back into place

Setting Salomon S9 12 TI ski bindings − insert screwdriver

Setting Salomon S9 12 TI ski bindings − lift screwdriver

Click either of the images to... [More]

I caught the last 30 minutes of Chelsea vs. MCI in the Champions League final last week. It showed both sides of football. Both sides played absolutely brilliantly and it was a nail-biter right up until the last seconds.

It also showed what’s wrong with football — the team in the lead started strategically chewing the scenery on several questionable “contacts”. As a long-time hockey fan, I think it’s just shameful and unnecessary to flop around to defend a lead.

The team was... [More]

I wrote the following about a year ago when I first got my TacX. I have struck out the items that no longer apply.

The TacX App is a joke. It barely does what it needs to do.

• It doesn’t remember your login for more than a few days Now it remembers the login, but randomly shows the log in page with a loading circle on it between some screens, looking very much like it’s going to log out and then catching itself just before it does and proceeding to the next screen. It’s like watching a... [More]

Strava recently published new Community Standards. It’s mostly fine, filled with the standard entreaties to avoid “hate speech” (even though that’s a legal term that has a different meaning every country they have users in) and singing paeans about being nice to each other.

Strava also declares its right to terminate the account of anyone they consider to have transgressed against what seem like deliberately vaguely defined rules.

They probably think they’re being precise when they write,

“Hate... [More]”

People put so much stock in the records and trophies and numbers available on Strava, but it just seems so unreliable.

For example, I’d done a long ride a couple of weeks ago: about 140km with 2350m of climbing in just under six hours. Strava “estimated” my average wattage at about 144w.[1] A buddy of mine saw this and went out for one of his own a couple of days later, putting up about 150km with 2350m in about 6:15. My buddy went faster and farther, weighs at least 6-8 kilos more than me and... [More]

Strava makes for strange conversations: I’ve had discussions with nearly non-technical cycling colleagues about “eventual consistency” and caching and shared servers and data regions. It’s a funny old world.

In the two shots below, Strava is telling me that I got my second-best time[1] but the time for each activity is clearly lower than the time that it’s indicating as a PR. Even after recalculation, Strava is adamant. I’m not sure what could cause this as it’s pretty basic math. Maybe the... [More]

This information is available in many videos and forums, but I’ve collected it here so that I don’t have to look it up next time.

Chain is rubbing on other gears

The DI2 does not adjust itself. It does, however, know how far apart your gears are. Once you’ve got one gear—a central one—adjusted, the others are automatically correct, as well.

The DI2 also almost never needs adjustment (at least in my experience).[1]

If you hear the chain rubbing on any of the gears, then you can use the... [More]

Do you need big legs to push watts? A friend asked whether good hill climbers would need giant legs to push big watts—450-500W for a light rider, or 6–6.5W/kg. Apparently not. Phil Gaimon is a very strong hill climber. He looks like this.

Scrawny A.F. Not so huge legs, though. In the next video, you’ll see that he can push 450-500W for minutes at a time.

The first video is of Fabian Cancellara vs. Phil Gaimon. Both can push big watts, but Gaimon is retired and weighs about 20kg less. It... [More]

The article The Corruption of Football by Joshua Sperber (CounterPunch) offers a far better analysis of the final offensive play by the Seahawks—the one that led to an interception—than I could ever have hoped to make.

Sperber starts off by dissecting Emmitt Smith and Dave Zirin’s supposition that foul play must have somehow been involved. That is, “[t]he theory of foul play of course presupposes that Carroll made not only the wrong call but a completely nonsensical one that could only be attributable to corruption […]”.... [More]

Ah, now I can have my life back.[1]

Why are you[2] watching?

I honestly don’t know what comes over me when the Soccer World Cup or the European Championship is on. I never watch club football. I know some of the teams and know where some of the players play, but that’s it. I know many names, but don’t follow assiduously enough to even halfway qualify as a fan.

I am strongly critical of FIFA and their politics, corruption and influence. It’s probably a giant waste of money. At least some of the... [More]

Brazil vs. Croatia (3–1)

Brazil took a little while to get going but showed flashes of brilliance. They got lucky that the momentum didn’t go the other way before getting some fortuitous calls. Brazil almost always gets the benefit of calls. I’m on fence as to whether it’s an in-built, explicit prejudice, an unconscious tendency on the part of referees in awe of their reputation or just a natural outgrowth of their playing so well.

Mexico vs. Cameroon (1–0)

Can’t remember. I think Mexico... [More]

U.S. Olympic Hockey

Patrick Kane has a sadOh my God, what an ass-kicking. Canada put on a clinic for America and then Finland did the same, with even more success.

Patrick Kane never showed up—he missed again and again and took horrible penalties. His face after his second penalty sums things up nicely for the U.S. (see left).

And the US didn’t even both covering the greatest Olympic goal-scorer ever, warming the hearts of 40+ year-old guys everywhere by letting Teemu score not once, but twice.

Continental... [More]

I shelled out CHF8.– for Zattoo for this month so that I can watch the Olympics on my own schedule. It’s pretty sweet, especially for hockey games.

USA/Czech Republic & Canada/Latvia

Zattoo keeps a 7-day buffer for over 100 channels. You can actually watch for free, but you don’t get HD and you have to watch extra, Zattoo-specific commercials. The Olympics coverage is remarkably commercial-free, at least on the Swiss (Swiss-German, German, French and Italian) and Austrian channels. The German channels have more... [More]

BelgiumBermudaLithuaniaGermanyRussiaSloveniaTongaFranceIrelandItalyLithuaniaUnited StatesUkraine

The Super Bowl takes place way too late on a school night for all but the most ardent fans on this side of the pond. This is not to say that there are no such fans over here. The Germans and British both had full coverage, with the British channel Film4 having gotten Terrel Davis and Mike Carlson to assist the Scottish announcer Colin Murray, who started off slowly but got steadily more hilarious as the game unfolded into a slaughter of Denver by Seattle. There were plenty of people willing to... [More]