November 19, 2000

Hello Everyone,

I have not posted a journal in quite some time. During the last 2 months so many things have happened in my skating. I will first start off with New England's.

I went to Regionals and didn't have a great skate in the short program. I had lots of mistakes, and a bit of mental failure. I placed 3rd in the short.

I then regained and did a very nice long to win the overall event. I had some extremely high marks for a Regionals event. I had 5.5's for my artistic mark which was great to see.

After having such a mental problem with my short at Regionals, My coach and I had decided to change it and come up with a whole new short program for Sectionals. This had to be done very fast, and very carefully. We completed the short and it is amazing.

I went to sectionals and skated a great short program. I was a bit short on one of my footwork passes, but other than that it was awesome. I was so proud of myself for skating so well with all the pressure and favoritism of the competition. I placed 1st in the short program and got great marks. I had from 5.0 all the way to 5.5 for my second mark. I was so excited.

I then went into my long program with the wrong attitude and it struck back at me. I didn't skate very well, and I ended up falling from 1st place down to 4th. I was in so much shock that I even made nationals with how I skated. Never in my entire life had I been so afraid.

I know that this is not the time to peak, and that the time will be at nationals. I am hometown boy this year, and have a whole new approach to the competition. I have learned not to go into a competition with the favoritism riding on me so bad, that it makes my skating fail.

This sectionals has been a great learning experience for me. I am there to skate like everyone else, and I can't let the people or the media's words get to me.

For the next 5 weeks I will be training for nationals extremely hard and also making a show program. I hope to skate well at nationals and only hard work will do so, and that's my plan. I will post again, and thanks for coming to visit my page!

With love,

Nick