Articles, Tennis

Hollyburn? I barely know burn! (Am I doing this right?)

After a freebie weekend of qualifying matches, the Vancouver Open officially served up its first round of play on Monday. Pucked in the Head was there to soak up some rays, snap a few pictures, and admire some damned fine athletes under gorgeous summer conditions.

You win some, you lose some

Canadians occupied quite a few qualifying and first round spots on both the men’s and women’s side of the draw. With one of the largest purses on the ATP Challengers Tour, the Vancouver Open (@vanopen on the mighty Twitter) also attracts a high-quality international field, with more than a dozen countries represented up at Hollyburn Country Club this week.

Toronto-born Steven Diez won his first-round match against Australian Matt Reid at the Vancouver Open, 6-4, 6-2. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.
Toronto-born Steven Diez won his first-round match against Australian Matt Reid at the Vancouver Open, 6-4, 6-2. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.

Round one of the men’s draw saw 22-year-old Steven Diez, ranked 218 in the world, defeat #202 Matt Reid of Australia in straight sets, 6–4, 6–2. Reid seemed a little rattled early on in the match, when one of his serves (clocked at 197 km per hour, mind you) hit a young ball girl in the temple. She was forced to withdraw from her duties in the back court. She would be fine, but Reid not so much. Diez broke him in the next service game and never looked back.

Up-and-coming Aussie tennis player Matt Reid lines up a forehand during his first-round loss at the Vancouver Open. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.
Up-and-coming Aussie tennis player Matt Reid lines up a forehand during his first-round loss at the Vancouver Open. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.

The women’s side was still in qualifying rounds on Monday — Canadian Stacey Fung lost in straight sets to Sherazad Benamar, a 24-year-old southpaw from France, 6–1, 6–3. Benamar overpowered the teen with superior net play, more mobility on the baseline, and more passion between points as well.

Sherazad Benamar of France hits a background winner during women's singles qualifying play at the 2013 Vancouver Open. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.
Sherazad Benamar of France hits a background winner during women’s singles qualifying play at the 2013 Vancouver Open. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.

The Vancouver Open is on at Hollyburn all week, with the semis and finals going next Saturday and Sunday. Preliminary rounds offer some great value for tickets, as well, so head out to Hollyburn and enjoy some top flight tennis with some of the best up-and-coming professional players in the world.

Canadian teen Stacey Fung hits a backhand during a first-round loss at the Vancouver Open in West Vancouver. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.
Canadian teen Stacey Fung hits a backhand during a first-round loss at the Vancouver Open in West Vancouver. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.
Articles, Tennis

Hollyburn boasts deep field, beautiful views for Vancouver Open

23-year-old Vasek Pospisil is an important part of the Canadian Davis Cup team. He will challenge for the Vancouver Open at Hollyburn Country Club this week. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.
23-year-old Vasek Pospisil is an important part of the Canadian Davis Cup team. He will challenge for the Vancouver Open at Hollyburn Country Club this week. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.

This weekend sees the Odlum Brown Vancouver Open Tennis Tournament open with qualifying rounds at the scenic Hollyburn Country Club in North Vancouver. While skeptics complain that the field doesn’t include the top personalities in world rankings — no Rafa or Roger, no Martina or Serena, as the OBVO schedule coincides with Canada’s only ATP World Tour event, the Rogers Cup co-hosted in TO and Montreal — but there is plenty of excellent tennis to be seen. And as a venue, Hollyburn is as good as they come.

Canadians Vasek Pospisil (Can #3, World #89), Frank Dancevic (Can #4, World #161) and Felip Peliwo (Can #7, World #434) are among the recognizable names in the men’s draw. Pospisil has taken part in Canada’s historic run to the Davis Cup semifinals, and will continue to play alongside Milos Raonic and Daniel Nestor when they take on Serbia in September. Dancevic, likewise, was a major part of the Canadian win over Spain at UBC; he has been a fixture for Tennis Canada since turning pro in 2003.  Peliwo, for his part, did nothing less than become the first Canadian male to win a single’s title at Wimbledon, bringing home the 2012 junior championship.

More after the jump.

Continue reading Hollyburn boasts deep field, beautiful views for Vancouver Open →

Articles, Hockey

Off-season Hockey Fashion

Harrison Mooney, of the mighty Puck Daddy and the somewhat less threatening Pass It to Bulis, rocks a Ghostbusters jersey from Dave's Geeky Hockey. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.
Harrison Mooney, of the mighty Puck Daddy and the somewhat less threatening Pass It to Bulis, rocks a Ghostbusters jersey from Dave’s Geeky Hockey. Sopranos star and E Street Band guitarist Steven Van Zandt  looks on with stern, Jersey-soaked envy. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.

As any good hockey fan knows, one can never have too many hockey shirts. Dive into those closets and dresser drawers, and you’ll find jerseys, herseys, shirseys, Ts, baby Ts, half Ts, tanks, halters, and hell, even bikini tops.

It is summertime, after all.

The sun brings out any and all of the above, as puck bunnies and puckheads alike lay about yearning for the cool air of the rink and the ardent smell of freshly used hockey gear.

Note that we here at Pucked in the Head do not condone the automatic relegation of every female fan to the title of ‘puck bunny’. We refer to fans of all genders and ages as ‘puckheads’, and only use ‘puck bunnies’ when the persons in question use the term themselves. But that’s another post. On with the fashion, dang it all!

We at Pucked in the Head support summer usage of hockey-themed upper body covering, so we’ve dedicated today’s post to a collection of photos thereof.

Sadly, we didn’t see any of the aforementioned bikini tops on Saturday, but we’ll be happy to accept photos at jason (at) puckedinthehead (dot) com. Strictly for research purposes, of course, honey. It’s for the blog, I swear.

More after the jump.

Continue reading Off-season Hockey Fashion →

Articles, Hockey

Five Hole for Food Finale

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Saturday saw the 2013 edition of Five Hole for Food wrap up in Vancouver with a festival-like atmosphere. Tunes played all afternoon, free snacks and water bottles  roamed the city block  of Granville Street between Robson and Smithe, and hundreds of people gathered to play ball hockey. Let’s not forget the main aim of the event: participants and sponsors combined to donate over 70,000 pounds of food to the Vancouver Food Bank. In just four short years this campaign has turned into a frickin’ juggernaut of charity goodness.

Their impressive run is one of the reasons we’re proud to partner with them to introduce the inaugural Vancouver Table Hockey Extravaganza on September 20-21 at Robson Square.

Five Hole for Food raised over 135 metric tonnes of food for regional food banks this year alone. Along the way, thousands of participants played ball hockey in downtown locales across Canada. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.
Five Hole for Food raised over 135 metric tonnes of food for regional food banks this year alone. Along the way, thousands of participants played ball hockey in downtown locales across Canada. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.

Let’s put this in perspective, shall we? In 2010, Year One of FHFF collected 6,000 pounds of food in nine cities over 11 days. Pretty good for a couple of college guys looking for an interesting alternative to the traditional summer break road trip.

Well, Vancouver’s intake of well-wishing this year has beat that year’s entire tour twelvefold. In all, not even including warmup events in northern BC and as far south as New York City and Autin, TX, Year Four  hit 13 cities in 17 days and collected a whopping 300,000 pounds of food. That’s over 135 metric tonnes going to regional food banks across the country.

More after the jump.

Continue reading Five Hole for Food Finale →

Articles, Soccer

Whitecaps Wednesday – Is It Time To Oust Brad Knighton?

Whitecaps WednesdayProfessional sport can be a cruel business. The Whitecaps have been rolling recently. They’ve lost only one of their last twelve games — winning five of their last six — and a big part of that streak has been the play of goalkeeper Brad Knighton. Yet despite that stellar recent play — two clean sheets in the last four games, another that slipped away on the last kick of the game and an MLS Player of the Week award — Knighton is in very real danger of losing his starting job to incoming Danish goalkeeper David Ousted. It might not be fair, on recent form, but will it make Vancouver a better team? Read on after the jump to find out. Continue reading Whitecaps Wednesday – Is It Time To Oust Brad Knighton? →

Articles, Baseball

Get out to the Nat

Catching a Vancouver Canadians nooner has been a summertime treat for decades. (And hey, those evening games ain’t bad, either.) The weather we’ve had for the past couple of weeks has translated into numerous sellouts at Nat Bailey Stadium, and it doesn’t hurt that the team has been pretty damned good to boot. Okay, the parent Blue Jays club hasn’t lit it up the way they’d promised to, but the Cs are playing .600 ball right now, and have won five straight series — the latest with none other than Wayne Gretzky in the building to watch his son play for the Boise Hawks.

Still need convincing? As I’m writing of this post, the Cs are in the middle of shellacking the Everett Aquasox down in WA-state. In the top of the eighth inning, it’s 11-bagel for the good guys, with LB Danzler hitting a two-run shot and a whole lot of small ball scoring nine more times. On the mound, Eric Brown has tossed seven innings of near-perfect ball, allowing just three hits while counting nine strikeouts. (Note: the final score was 13-1.)

Vancouver Canadians first baseman LB Dantzler went 1-for-4 with a double against the Tri-City Dust Devils Photo by Miles Clark Photography courtesy of Vancouver Canadians Baseball.
Vancouver Canadians first baseman LB Dantzler went 1-for-4 with a double against the Tri-City Dust Devils Photo by Miles Clark Photography courtesy of Vancouver Canadians Baseball.

First baseman / designated hitter Jordan Leyland currently holds the Single A Northwest Division batting lead, going.342 at the dish with a slugging percentage of .465. On the other side of the ball, Jeremy Gabryszwski and the aforementioned Brown are 1-2 in league ERA, and have gone a combined 6-1 in 67 innings pitched. (For the uninitiated, the technical term for those numbers is pretty durned good.)

For crying out loud, they’ve got fireworks after every Saturday game! Like, dude, they send bombs full of fancy coloured powder up into the air and they go boom all over your eye sockets. Get your tailbones out there, people.

Hit up www.canadiansbaseball.com for scheduling and ticket information.

Articles, Soccer

Camilo My Dreams

After last week’s historic win over Cascadia rival Seattle Sounders FC, it was a foregone conclusion that Sunday’s afternoon match against the Chicago Fire was going to be somewhat of a letdown. Even those around the team worried about Whitecaps FC perhaps not giving the last-place Fire enough respect. “More nervous than last week,” tweeted team ambassador Carl Valentine through his @CarlTwoOne Twitter account. “The team really needs to focus and we will get the job done.”

Johnny Leveron keeps a close eye on Chris Rolfe, who was unable to capitalize on an early handball missed by officials. Vancouver Whitecaps FC defeated Chicago Fire 3-1 on 14 July 2013 on the strength of two goals by Camilo de Sanvezzo. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.
Johnny Leveron keeps a close eye on Chris Rolfe, who was unable to capitalize on an early handball missed by officials. Vancouver Whitecaps FC defeated Chicago Fire 3-1 on 14 July 2013 on the strength of two goals by Camilo de Sanvezzo. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.

The game on Sunday, then, lived up to expectations, with the Caps sleepwalking through much of the first half. Don’t believe me? Check the highlights below: there’s not a single play shown between kickoff and the 42nd minute. There were a couple of early chances, but they were both for Chicago. A hand ball missed by the officials allowed Fire forward Chris Rolfe a glorious chance in close, but Whitecaps keeper Brad Knighton continued his recent strong play with a goal line stand. In fact, he would throw 92 minutes and 50 seconds of clean sheet at Chicago before they broke the shutout with mere seconds left in stoppage time.

More after the jump.

Continue reading Camilo My Dreams →

Articles, Hockey

Memorabilia Memories #1

The hot mess that is Pucked in the Head continues to spread its messy, hottie wings this week. Not only will we build on Ross Arbo’s awesome coverage of BC Superweek and introduce our first single-A Vancouver Canadians baseball coverage, we’re proud to bring into the fold a wee bit we like to call

Will DeConto shares with us the story behind his Alex Burrows signed jersey. Image courtesy of Will DeConto. Autograph courtesy of Alex Burrows.
Will DeConto shares with us the story behind his Alex Burrows signed jersey. Image courtesy of Will DeConto. Autograph courtesy of Alex Burrows.

Memorabilia Memories #1 — Alex Burrows Canucks Jersey

My name is Will DeConto and I am hockey memorabilia collector. I collect just about anything to do with hockey, but my main focus is gathering signed memorabilia, which I have been doing for five years now. Pucked in the Head has graciously offered me a place where I can talk about pieces in my collection and how you can get into the hobby and build one of your own.

In a previous job in Vancouver, I had the opportunity to meet many Canucks through dealings at work (as luck would have it, that’s also how I met Jason, the fellow who runs this very website). One of the most prized items in my collection is my signed Alex Burrows jersey. The reason: the story of how it got signed, which took more than four months.

More after the jump.

Continue reading Memorabilia Memories #1 →

Articles, Soccer

The Sound beats the Sounders

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PITH Whitecaps writer Russell Arbuthnot sounds off on the fabulous crowd at BC Place for MLS soccer matches, and laments the fact that this same atmosphere is rarely seen in an arena that sits just metres away. This season, Vancouver Whitecaps FC and their supporters are putting together a remarkable symbiotic relationship. Attending games at BC Place really is a win-win situation these days.

by Russell Arbuthnot

Whitecaps FC keeper Brad Knighton put in his best MLS performance in a 2-0 win over Seattle Sounders FC on 6 July 2013. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.
Spurred on by the most spirited crowd in Vancouver, Whitecaps FC keeper Brad Knighton delivered his best MLS performance to date in a 2-0 win over Seattle Sounders FC on 6 July 2013. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.

Here’s the thing about Vancouver.  The city itself is beautiful; widely  recognized as one of the premiere places to live in the world, Vancouver is the envy of many. It has it all. Cradled in the bosom of lush mountains and caressed by sparkling rivers and oceans, Vancouver is indeed a trendy metropolitan area beloved by nature lovers and urban adventurers alike.

But there’s this other thing about Vancouver. It’s the ugly bridesmaid when it comes to professional sports.

More after the jump.

Continue reading The Sound beats the Sounders →

Articles

BC Superweek – A Crash Course on Local Cycling

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2013 has been a year of expansion for Pucked in the Head, with multiple correspondents and guest bloggers posting here for the first time and coverage moving past our hockey-only beginnings to include soccer, football, baseball, and tennis. Well make room on the bench, folks, because we’ve got one more writer — Ross Arbo — bringing us one more athletic endeavour just perfect for the awesome summer weather that has finally deigned to visit Vancouver: competitive cycling.

A Crash Course on Local Cycling
by Ross Arbo

July should really be renamed ‘Bike-tober’ because around the world, it really is the best month for cycling. That goes double for competitive cycling. The month named for Julius Caesar sees France host ‘le Grand Tour’ (#TdF), of course, which is a premier event even after Lance Armstrong’s travails. Locally, July brings BC Superweek to the Lower Mainland. You may not have heard the name BC Superweek, but I’m willing to bet most locals have heard of the Gastown Grand Prix, the Giro di Burnaby or the Tour de Whiterock. If you live in the Vancouver area, you or someone you know grew up near one of these events. And there’s no shortage of history — the Gastown event alone has been running since 1975.

The peloton banks 180° from Water Street onto West Cordova during the 2012 Gastown Grand Prix, won by Ken Hansen. Photo courtesy of Greg Descantes, BC Superweek.
The peloton banks 180° from Water Street onto West Cordova during the 2012 Gastown Grand Prix, won by Ken Hansen. Photo courtesy of Greg Descantes, BC Superweek.

The latest incarnation of BC Superweek began in 2002 when the Gastown Grand Prix returned to Vancouver and scheduled itself on the Wednesday between the two weekends occupied by the Tour de Delta and Tour de White Rock. The oldest events are the Gastown Grand Prix (started in 1973) and the Tour de White Rock (1979). The other three races that make up BC Superweek are the Giro di Burnaby, Tour de Delta and the UBC Grand Prix.

Most of the races in BC Superweek are Criteriums (or Crits) where racers complete multiple laps around short courses (less than 2km). What does that mean for spectators? Crits are frantic, fast, and finished in less than an hour.

More after the jump. Continue reading BC Superweek – A Crash Course on Local Cycling →

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