10 Questions Scott Arlidge

Ok.. so here's the deal... I love hearing what other people have to say.  When I'm with my friends from all over we spend 99% of the time talking about racing anyway.  So I thought to myself, "self, why don't you see if you can get some skaters to answer some questions for you?" ... So I'm starting a little thing I'm going to call "10 questions" where I ask skaters 10 questions and see what they have to say(clever title, huh??)

Today we're interviewing New Zealand's Scott Arlidge.  For those of you that don't know Scott he's a world champion who's known as one of the strongest distance skaters ever.  He recently retired from professional speed skating, despite still being competitive at the highest level of skating.  So here we go

1.  Scott,  you walked away from the sport when you were still one of the best(and maybe arguably the best) distance skater in the world, why and how did you do that, and what do you do now?

Thanks Cheex, but I don't think I was anywhere near the best. I was good on my day, but over the last few years the gaps between the long distance guys at worlds has become very tight. Aside from a few freak performances points races are won and lost by a single point. Anyways I don't know how it happened, but I really just 'enjoyed' the training. For me it was a lot of fun to see how far I could push things. It also became clear to me that I was lacking in the 'start' department so sprinting against the best in the world wasn't going to happen. 

Its was a few months out from the 2011 when Matthias Knoll (PS owner) offered me a job to run the speed division of PS. I knew straight away that it was something for me, but just wasn't sure about the logistics. I mean I'd never had a job. I basically left school and starting coming to Europe to race... One thing I did know is that 2011 was going to be my last full crack at a Worlds so I wanted to give it everything. So here I am know riding a desk more often than I used to ride my bike.

Also too, I don't think I walked away from the sport, actually I'm more involved than before. Previously I was very focused on myself and results, but now I'm focused on a far broader range of things.

2. You were at the world champs last season, skated a few races, but obviously weren't your normal self, did a part of you want to spend this year training to show everyone you still had it?

Kinda, but looking back on it all I'm happy. I actually missed it more during the Europeans, because that was the time when I most motivated in World preparations, watching Bart and Fabio etc every year would motivate me for that final push into worlds, but not this year. Its hard to make a living in our sport, so when the opportunity came up I wasn't going to turn it down

3. What did you miss most about competing on the highest level of our sport?

I do miss the training, and I do miss the racing sometimes, but I'm still pretty involved with the team and I still go to most races so there isn't really a lot to miss out on. I guess I do miss that tension before the races. Any athlete knows how it feels.

4. If you could change one thing you did during your entire career, what would it be?

I've never really thought about it because I was in the game long enough to make changes as I went along. Of course there are the races where I think if I'd done such and such a little different I would have won, but everyone has that. 

5. Everyone always asks about "a normal training day", you were a fitness freak, I want to know about your absolute hardest training days, what did you do, now that you're retired you can let all of your secrets out.  

I did a couple of days that stand out. I remember going out with a bunch of cyclists in my home city of Auckland in NZ. 6+ hours or so later I made it home. I actually must of liked it because I did a couple of other times too, but on skates one day sticks out was in my prep for 2011. In the morning on the track I did about 50km worth of work, some intervals etc. Then in the evening went back down again and did about 40km steady. I guess I didn't do anything super crazy, but it was just accumulated over a few years of work.

However for 2013 I am planning something a little crazy....

6. Who did you look up to as far as athletes, skaters, non skaters... who inspired you.

I grew up through the Chad Hedrick era, so naturally he was impressive to me as a kid.

7. You were one in a group of New Zealand guys that produced so many great skaters, and you always seemed like a tight family, tell me about how you guys grew as skaters, and also remained such good friends.

Yeah the last 10-12 years have been pretty special for NZ skating. I don't really know how it happened. We all grew up together, we all trained together, and we all pretty much lived with each other at one point or another. The NZ scene is pretty small, but I'm sure we produced the best results per capita. Everyone knew everyone, and our families all knew each other. Pete Michael is still going strong, and I hope he can inspire that next batch of kiwis.

8. You've been to some indoor races in the US, and may have the best results of any international skater ever(kicked my butt really bad one year) what did you think about american indoor racing?

I like it. Its not harder or easier than other forms of racing. We do indoor in NZ, however its not like the US. But I lived my whole life about a 5-10min drive from our rink. So I understand the rink culture. I have picked up a couple of wins over the years and I'm pretty proud of them because they are different. Its not just like another marathon or track race in Europe. 

9. You're pretty high up at Powerslide... can you let us know any secrets, rocket power skates??

Maybe, we actually just tested ones with rocket launchers that can be used in races... But seriously we are working on some new stuff. In the last few years wheel technology has really blown up. We do have more development coming in the next couple of months. I admit that I can be too focused on the super high end of the sport, but we are also working on some skate packages that will make it easier for everyone to get out there and have a go.

10. Ok, last question.. who is your favorite 6'4 American skater who currently skates on the Powerslide team, of all time???

Jarrett's not 6'4 is he?

Thanks Scott for being my first interview(even if your last answer was the wrong one).  If you read this and think about someone you want to read and interview of, let me know on Facebook or Twitter and I'll try and make something happen.  Just remember athletes are pretty much the worst people ever at doing stuff like this(I know b/c I'm the absolute worst), Scott is the most reliable skater alive so he went first.  There is some people I would love to interview(like an Italian female sprinter who had a crazy world championships that ended up with a 500 meter gold medal), so hopefully I can keep this interesting.

Ice skating

  The ice season under way, which means a lot of the top inliners trade their wheels for blades and get ready for the Olympic Games which is less than 2 years away.  It's cool to see some inliners qualifying for world cups and getting so much recognition.  But then at the same time it's depressing to realize that the top athletes in our sport get so much more coverage because they've become ice skaters.  I'm biased, but I really do think inline is a lot more exciting than ice, no disrespect but that's just my personal opinion.  And I bet if you showed people who had never seen either sport, and asked them to choose which was more exciting, a lot would chose inline.  At this point it's pretty obvious that inline skaters are just as good athletes as ice skaters, so why doesn't our sport get more attention??? There's way more inliners world wide than Ice skaters... In the end it really boils down to the Olympics, I guess(so c'mon 2020).  

  I do like that trend is becoming more and more for skaters to do an ice season and an inline season.  It's good to see Bart, Ewen, Michel, Alexis, Ferre, Marty, and a lot more doing both very successfully.  Hopefully that caries over to the US guys, b/c we've been WRECKED by the ice world.  I think in the last 10 years we've had over 20 world team members switch to ice, and never come back.  20 in 10 years!!!! That's 2 per year.  So, on average every year for the last 10 years, 2 of our top skaters decided to leave inlines to chase Olympic gold.... that sucks.  And i'm not blaming them individually, you have to do what's best for you.  But for inline, OUCH.  I tend to believe that if inline was Olympic, then that number might be slightly lower.  So, it's simple, lets just get in the Olympic games.... that's easy right??


   This blog went completely off course.  I was planning on writing a congrats to all the inliners that are doing so well on ice(especially to Heather Richardson who skated on the same inline club as me and won the 1000m at the first world cup...woohoo)but then I meandered slightly.  Although I am frustrated that ice gets so much more attention than inline, I do wish all of the inliners the best and hope you win everything,............ and make millions and millions of dollars, and become super famous, and then tell everyone that inlines should be a sport in the Olympic Games(thanks guys, hope that's not too much pressure)

The most confusing thing about our sport

***Indoor people, I'm talking about outdoor racing.  However, it's almost the same thing indoors now.

  Pack starts have always confused me.  When I first learned about them it was explained like this..."the ref will tell everyone to wait for the gun, and then everyone will cheat."  This seemed odd to me.  Some where in the history of our sport, someone decided that as long as the start is close to when the gun goes off, then it's fair. Recently at worlds they have changed the rules slightly in the right direction.  There is now a command, people step in to a box and then the gun goes.  Sometimes they call false starts, sometimes they don't.  Leaning is basically allowed, not by rule, but it's never called as long as you don't cross the line before the gun is fired.  At our national championships I had friends that had never seen our sport before and were there watching the 500 meter.  When someone jumped and it wasn't called they asked "why was that allowed."  I told them about our lax false start rules.  They replied, "so it's ok to move before the gun goes, that's dumb." I couldn't argue. If you look at track, swimming, ice speed, skiing, motocross, horse racing, or basically any other sport that involves racing and the rule is you can't move before the gun is fired.  For some crazy reason our sport isn't like that.  Can anyone explain why we don't have a command, everyone locks into a position, and there can be no movement until the starting gun is fired?  It's not like we don't have the ability to lock into a position and not move.  We all just learn to anticipate the gun, instead of waiting for it to go off.  If you're old and slow footed like me, this isn't such a bad thing... sometimes I can beat faster guys to the corner by leaning and anticipating the gun.  But I feel like the person with the fastest reaction time and quickest speed should win the start, not the one who guessed correctly.

"So how would you do such a thing?" one might ask.  My idea is pretty simple... first you give the "in position" command and everyone steps in to the block.  Then you hold for 2 to 4 seconds.  And here's the kicker... if you move before the gun, you're out.  No second chance, no do over because you guessed wrong.  You lock into your starting position, and you don't move until the gun goes.  Watch how quickly false starts go away.  You'll need an elevated way to watch the start, so you can see entire line and if there is any leaning.  You could also use a camera to review and see if someone is moving or not.  It's 2012, there's technology to see if someone false starts or not, and in events like the world championship it should be completely fair.  It may seem harsh at first, but everyone knows how to lock into position... we have just been conditioned not to.

Sorry that was my rant for the day.. there's other stuff too, but i really wanted to get that off my chest.. .PHEEEEW...



This is the video from the 500 meter final at worlds in 2011.  While there is other things wrong with this race, just watch the start.  I can't be the only thing that sees something terribly wrong with that.. and it's not the skaters fault, that's how we've all learned.  But that is a hard thing to explain to someone seeing our sport for the first time.... or maybe to someone watching our sport deciding if it should be in the Olympic Games... Like someone will be doing in the very near future..

Catching up

So, I disappeared for 2 weeks and you probably thought
1)Cheex blog didn't last long
2)Cheex sure got lazy
3) Oh no I hope Cheex is ok!!!!
4) Who is Cheex??

Anyway, what really happened was I ran away to Seattle for some races, and all I had with me was my ole reliable Iphone.  I planned on writing some blogs while I was there, however using an Iphone to write blogs turned out to be absolutely obnoxious, so I just decided to wait til I got back home.

So, what was I doing in Seattle(well it's not actually Seattle, but I never actually know what city I am in when I'm in Washington state, so I just always say Seattle)??  I went to race my first indoor race of the season and while I was there decided to check out the trials for the next season of the NSC.  Also while I was there I managed to mess up my back pretty good(old people problems), which wasn't really on the "to do" list but it happened.  So with out going into much detail, I'm going to just drop some notes.

NSC TRIALS

Wow the races were super exciting, about 30 guys trying out for 16 spots(with the top 12 already qualified for next year).  And like every year the talent pool keeps getting deeper and deeper.  The sprints were hectic as always, but the distance races were so close.  You had guys winning one race, and then not making it out of the semi's for the next.  I was really impressed with 2 young guys; Caleb Wakefield and Isaiah Oliver who both qualified, and looked really good doing it.  I wouldn't be surprised if in a few years I was sitting back watching these 2 battle for NSC grand championships.  Also, it was good to see Chad Horne return to the NSC after a few years, like always he looked super fast and I'm sure will make racing extra exciting this year.




Turkey Showdown

The next stop was the Turkey Showdown, Hosted by Dennis King.  I'll get to the races in a minute, but first... There was a jumbo-tron in the rink!!!  Look I've seen a million races, seen crazy things happen, seen tons of rinks, but I ain't never seen a jumbo-tron in a rink.  I took a picture of it, but it ended up pretty crummy, but you get the jest of it(and yes that is also a basketball goal in the background, glad I don't own that rink, I would never leave). Like always in the Northwest the racing was really good.  It's always impressive to see the number of quality indoor skaters the Northwest region can turn out.  The floor was fast and it's always good to get some racing in early in the season.  For me, I was struggling with a minor back injury, and probably shouldn't have skated... but I'm stubborn, and I had already flown across the country, so I laced up.  I was ended up winning the champions race, and it was a lot more by experience than skill b/c the guys out there were skating really fast.

So that's whats been going on the last 2 weeks, sorry I've been sluffing on my blogging, hopefully you guys will find a way to forgive me.  Check back in a few days, I already have a rant in my head, just gotta type it out.