FRIDAY, JAN 12, 2007
I flew into San Fransisco (SFO), where I was met by Clancy Cochran.  I was coming from crew training (just like the last two years), so my departure was in the middle of the afternoon in Florida.  There were some delays and such, but I was rerouted through Houston and arrived late at night in San Fransisco.

Clancy met me at the airport with Frank Morris.  Frank was also staying at Clancy's place for the weekend.  When we got to Clancy's place, we were all hungry, so we went to the In & Out Burger for some food.  We also joked about the Cosby episode when the tap dancer keeps on saying "Challenge!"

SATURDAY, JAN 13, 2007
The next morning, we woke up early for the competition.  Cubesmith drove me to the venue in his pickup truck.  We arrived early and Lucas Garron's father gave Frank and me free passes into the Exploratorium since we traveled from some distance.

At the competition, my results were mediocre.  In the first round, I averaged 23.73 seconds with a best of 18.41 seconds.  I knew that I would make it to the second round because I only needed a thirty second average, but I was very much out of practice.

I did much better in the second round, placing 18th and averaging 22.00 seconds with two sub-20 solves (19.97 and 19.31).  Toby wanted me to get a sub-20 average, but I assured him it was not going to happen.  I told him that I expected sub-10 from him, but that didn't happen either, so it was fair.

In the 5x5x5, I placed 13th with a best solve of 4:49.57.  5x5x5 is certainly not my specialty and that time was one of my best ever, so I was satisfied with that result, even though I did not make it into the final round.

I placed second to last in the 3x3x3 blindfolded competition with a time of 6:14.09.  I was the slowest person to get a successful solve, but it put me ahead of seven other competitors, so that was fine.  The time was not great, but I tried something new--I solved corners first instead of last for the first time.  It worked on the second solve and I think it will bring my times down in the future.

I did pretty decent in the first round of the 3x3x3 one-handed competition, with an average of 45.56 seconds and a best of 39.00 seconds.  I tried to convince Frank to compete, but he insisted he was too slow (though he is faster than me).  Since my average was under 50 seconds, I was moved into the final round.

In the 3x3x3 one-handed final, I did spectacular (at least for me).  My first solve was only 29.89 seconds, beating even my best at home (I got a PLL skip using COLL).  My other solves went pretty well, too, and I finished with an average of 37.60 seconds, good enough for eighth place overall.

The 4x4x4 and Magic events were canceled due to time constraints, but overall I had a great time.  After the competition, I hung out at Clancy's with some other cubers from the competition, including Mike Grimsley and Mateus Moitinho de Almeida (I just called him Mat).  The bunch of us did a lot of races and had a great time.  We killed a bunch of pizzas with various toppings with no problem since we were all very hungry.

SUNDAY, JAN 14, 2007
I woke up early because I had an early flight.  Clancy took me to the airport and Frank came along for the ride.  I thanked him for a great weekend and I was soon on my way back home to Jersey.  As usual, I had a great time and enjoyed my annual stay in the Bay area.  I was very grateful for Clancy to put me up on his floor again; he has the most comfortable air mattress in all of California!