WORLD CHAMPIONS!

FINA rejected all protest proposals....now we can celebrate although our win has already been tainted.

we won....I think

USA won the final of World Championships tonight, but Canada is protesting their loss.

Unfortunately, we are now in an emotional state of confusion. We are trying to settle down to sleep in case we do have to replay our game tomorrow at 6. I will post an update as I receive it....10 am tomorrow.


Additionally, Maggie is currently in Holland preparing for Junior World Championships in Siberia. I gave her permission to post to this blog, so she may be doing that soon, hopefully.

Final!

We beat Greece in the Semifinal tonight. Elsie, who played in Greece this past year, lit them up! With 5 goals she led the team and also played almost the whole game as Alison and I both had 2 kickouts.

Friday we play Canada, two North American teams in the finals...pretty cool!

Happy Birthday dad, who busted out the USA flag for the fourth quarter....nice

9 pm - for gold

Spain 6 - USA 9

Playing Greece again in the semis....playing for a medal is always a good place to be!

As of now we are playing the 9 pm game, but that could change if the organizers decide to switch it....which they sometimes do.

Dad filled up the camera, but he almost broke it trying to upload to his computer, hopefully I can talk him through it.....

Pizza Night On the Town

Last night we left the hotel and had dinner had a little restaurant tucked away from the street in between houses. It was a perfect getaway from the monotony of the hotel.

The restaurant’s cars came and picked us up from the Crown Plaza and dropped us off right in front, we felt like celebrities. We drank plain and gassy water as we chose from the pizza and pasta menu. I have been pretty adventurous with my pizzas on this trip and last night I just wanted a margherita pizza, but I also ordered prosciutto and mozzarella for an appetizer, they have so many meats with cheese here….its delicious!


Game Tonight 9 pm vs. Spain
sorry heritage, but I'm about to destroy you

Moving on to Quartfinals

Game Update:

Bracket play
Kazakastan (w)
Russia (l)
Greece (w)

Result: 2nd in bracket so we had to play against 3rd place of another bracket in the knockout round in order to conitnue towards medals.
We played China, a very good team and therefore a tough knockout game match, and we won with a great performance from the whole team. We came out strong, something we had been holding out on until today...and finished strong, always a positive.

Moving forward, we are playing Spain in the quarterfinal on Monday and we'll go from there. Only 3 more games and only 3 more wins.

Sidenote: I gave dad my flipcam to hang out with during his adventures out in Rome, so I'm excited to see what he comes out with....an inside look into the spectator's life.....

A message from our staff

Latest from Universal Sports. They say they will be live webcasting every game from the early rounds, I take that to mean group play. From there one game a day, likely the USA game, and then the semi-finals and finals. According to their tv schedule they will broadcast one quarterfinal game, the two semi-final games, and the two medal games.

Also keep in mind only computer in the United States can view most video on universal sports.

More pics of Rome

More pics of our practice pools, we had a game here against the Italians as a practice game before the tournament. Its on a hill in the middle of a random town.







Us taking strange emotion pictures on our first day in the Worlds venue.

OK here are some pictures:


We've been playing in some nice, almost brand new pools. I liked the one with the wood roof, it smelled so nice in there.

Trevie Fountain coin tossing, 1 for happiness? 2 for something else, 3 for something, I guess 3 coins over your left shoulder is the new fashion, but I have no idea why or what they are for.

And our cool mascots are awesome statues.

Pantheon

The view from our dinner with the Italians after we played the Italians. (and beat them)

Roma Update: Worlds 2009

Day off in Rome/Tour guide for anyone wanting to travel here on your own:

Apparently I like to hang out with the staff. I met in the lobby at 7 am with Alison, team manager, team trainer, USA water polo organizer, and 2 coaches (Brandon & Chaney). We didn’t actually leave until 7:30 because when traveling with the staff there’s always something more they need to do/grab before we leave. Anyway, we took the 98 bus to St. Peter’s Basilica (where the Pope hangs out) in Vatican City and it was essentially empty so early in the morning, which was very calming. It is beautiful inside and I was listening and watching an Asian mass going on as I wandered through. P.S. scene in Angels & Demons where the Priest or Pope burns himself alive….saw that spot in real life.

Next we followed the outside wall to the museums inside where we found the Sistine Chapel. It was already 10:30ish by then and the 2 coaches seemed ready for naps as they dozed off in the angled seats lining the walls of the Chapel. At first when I walked in, it seemed like a pretty large place but not really what I was expecting, but the more time I spent in there, the more details I saw and was awed by. The inside is completely painted with not only biblical scenes, but the walls really look like there are curtains even when you’re standing right in front of them….anyway, it is very cool. Don’t be fooled, there’s a LOT going on in that room.

Then we tried to go up to the top of the Dome of St. Peters, but we weren’t about to wait in line to get in there again….so we moved on to bus 98 again then switched to the 571 heading towards the Coliseum. By this point we were pretty tired and hungry and decided not to meet up with some of the girls at the Spanish steps because we needed lunch and wanted to get in all the sites we wanted to see. But we passed this huge white building and it seemed there were some fancy steps and we all thought they were THE SPANISH STEPS….as we frantically were jumping off the bus a woman called us back in and said no, those are not Spanish steps that is the cake….the building is called the wedding cake because it is white and huge and has statues…..strange, but true.

We made it to the Coliseum but the long line sent us towards the ancient Rome ruins where we could get into the Coliseum for free. This was cool. We saw buildings 20 centuries old that were partly still standing….we traded in the market, held court, and found ancient air conditioning in a dark room with a fountain. We continued on in the million degree heat towards the Coliseum where we staged a fight on the bottom level. That place is huge and they are beginning to reconstruct the sitting areas that were once there….but the stairs, think Great Wall! Yikes-o-rama

We were tired, but still wanted to make it to the touristy Trevie Fountain and eat delicious Gelato, which I did, then go to the Pantheon. We learned from our tour guide, coach Chaney (with his tour book), that it is really old and I think was the tallest free standing dome until the Superdome or some big football stadium was built somewhere….very specific. But also he told us that its diameter and its height are the same size….math people, check it out.

Lastly, we ended our day in Piaza Rumano for some pizza and people watching. One guitar man played an amazing acoustic rendition of Stairway to Heaven pretty sweet ending to a long, exhausting, yet wonderful day out.

Games start tomorrow…..Kazakstan, Russia, Greece

Check USAWATERPOLO.com for updates