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| 01 July 2005: "In Lovely 60Hz" |
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| Movement Very hot action at the top spots this week, with #1 Marius Mollenhauer being the one to apply all the heat. #2 Raphael Segas has been missing for almost two weeks, but there is rumour that he has some new PRs ready to report. #3 Jonathan Steel is right up there, sticking close to Segas. Jonathan scored a couple of crazy records this week, so he is alive and well. But Marius scored 10 brand new shiny PRs to lower his AF by half a point, to make it 2.47 vs Segas' 2.59 and Steel's 2.69. This makes him our new champ, and proves that 60Hz is pretty easy after all.  There is heated debate on the reasons behind Marius' at-long-last success. Some say it's because he's very determined and never gives up, while others blame Lady Luck for rendering his two main rivals relatively inactive for some weeks. Then again, a few suggest that because he is holidaying in Holland, he has caught the Crazy Dutch Videogame Player Crazy PR Smash virus, and is automatically guarenteed to wipe the floor with every course standing in his way. I think it might be the beer, but who knows... Marius says that he wants to take a small break from MKDD for a little bit, but we know better than to believe him - he even sent new PRs just today.  A little lower down, Paul Tanney and Vincent van der Fluit are still at each other's throats. Last week, Vince passed Paul. A few weeks before that, Paul passed Vince. This week, Paul passed Vince again, to get the #4 spot. Paul is one of the four "I don't have an ARR" players, so we expect him to be near the top 4 spots. Vince made some great improvments and maintained his #5 position. Both players passed Paul Maes, who has slipped down from 4th to 6th (basically, the two Pauls swapped places this week). You can see in their rivalry that it's pretty tight between them, with Maes having the most wins, Tanney having the lowest ARR, and Vince having the best total times. #9 Tristan Eyma is inside the top 10, following a big 2.1 AF pt cut. In the past few days Tristan reported 12 PRs, having been away for two weeks. Tristan passed #10 Rene Bauer and #11 David Schiering to make the jump. #17 Do you still remember Mike Hartjens? He used to get his name on the news every week, so you've probably heard of him numerous times. I've already told you that the Crazy Dutch Videogame Player Crazy PR Smash virus is strong within this padawan. We had a running joke about Mike making it his quest to beat every Dutch guy, even when Mike was still pretty average in rank. Now he's top 20 with only three guys ahead of him - Luke Mulders, Stefan van Dijke and Vincent van der Fluit. Mike made 13 PRs in the final week of the month, to pass ex-champ Fernando Moritz dos Santos. He also cut 0.5 from his ARR, and is getting mighty close to Titan A. The top USA player, #29 Bo Garman, passed the top Australian player this week (me), and break into the top 30. He also mde Titan C! But Bo doesn't have it too easy, because Dr. Yohan Foog is only three places behind him! Yohan passed 4 players of his own this week, and looks to be catching up  #37 Olivier Peruch, the little Frenchman, finally produced some proper WS times (non-sc) to have a full set of 32 scores. This really helped his ARR, because he was being penalised with Newbie rank for his missing scores. His new scores are both Hero C, and his overall ARR improved by 1.75 points (he instantly become Titan D)! He also now appears in the AF chart. He has been hiding from our sights for months, but now it's clear that he's top 40. Olivier also happens to the highest ranked player without a proof status, so hopefully we can get that sorted out in the near future. #41 Alehandro Hernandez and #42 Gregor Fran are locking horns, vying for the 4th-in-the-USA spot (Garman, Foog and Prentice own the podium for now). Alejandro improved a little this week, but Gregor improved twice as much, to close down the gap to under 2 AF points. Very close behind is #46 David Lalo, who may also be a little hungry for national honours... let's wait and see what happens between these three. #94 Daniel Sloggett is back in fine form, easily breaking back inside the top 100. He raced 20 PRs last week, passed 9 players, and made Expert A. Prince Daniel has resumed his updating duties alongside King Vincent I, so now he holds a lot of royal power and commands respect. But then again.. feel free to tease him and send him threatening messages if he makes some mistakes in updating, since he's not fully familiar with the system yet. #97 Tobias Bauer, relative of #9 Rene, jumped 9 players to make it into the top 100. The Rudmarker brothers, #105 Andreas and #108 Martin, are hoping to do a similar thing by next week. Andreas improved his AF by 7pts, while Martin improved by 37! This seems to tell us that Martin is older and stronger, and must have bullied Andreas so he could use the Gamecube more often  Sitting between the brothers is Peter Toch, who continues to beat his times in all directions. Peter made 15 PRs and cut 14 AF points to close off the month at #107.#121 Michael Rosnitschek returned after two months absence, to report 30 new PRs, improve 16 AF points, and reach Expert B. In a similar manner, #145 Russ Finkle returned after 12 months absence to report 25 PRs, improve 22 AF points and reach Expert C. No such periods of inactivity for #158 Karl Anders, however, who is too new to have been "away". Karl produced 29 new PRs in the last week, to cut a whopping 39 AF points. Karl was already inside the top 200, so he had already broken that barrier before. In a similar manner, #181 Thomas van Leeuwen (also a recent addition) improved all 32 scores to cut a whopping 41 AF points. Thomas definitely broke the top 200, as did #193 Jonas Natanaelsson. Jonas "only" made 29 PRs, but he sliced one quarter of his AF, going from 279 to 209 (65 pts!). Jonas is stepping on the heels of Canadian #194 Benoit Boudreau, who also had a great week, improving 36 positions on the ladder. It must be holidays in North America, because yet another player has made a comeback after a whole year of inactivity. #246 Tom Hummel attempted to join the site, forgetting that he had already joined 12 months ago! Anyway, Tom's 14 PRs helped him break into the top 250, reach Adv C, and pass almost 30 players. The last of the big movers was #292 Jan Klijnstra, who scored 32 PRs and improved almost 60 places! The Crazy Dutch Videogame Player Crazy PR Smash virus strikes again. Honourable mentions: Kristopher Will (Titan D), Tory Waters (starting to make a comeback after 9 months!), Rickard Lindell (Hero C), Nathan Cromwell (Hero D), Arnaud Guepey and Scott Goodell. New Records Vincent van der Fluit continued from last week's WRage on Waluigi Stadium by getting the lap as well - a 31"276, which is 0.02 quicker than David Schiering's record from earlier in the month. Trystan Pugh improved his own Mushroom Bridge record one more time, to 1'19"275. Ten players have raced under 1'20 for this level to date, with Trystan leading Raphael Segas by 0.3. Marius Mollehnauer snagged a 5-month old record from Jonathan Steel in Peach Beach, with a lap of 22"028. Marius leads Steel by 0.03, with Jon Prentice and Raphael just behind. To round off the week, Jonathan reclaimed the two Luigi Circuit records back from Paul Maes. His 1'15"509 leads Maes by a hefty 0.19, and his new 24"542 lap is a 0.01 improvement on Paul's record from late May. New Players Welcome to... Sean Pavlov from Sweden (Intermediate D, ~381st) Josh Hirneisen from the USA (Beginner A, 377th) Richard Lindstrom from Sweden (Beginner B, 385th) Jonathan Eyma from France (Hero B, ~49th) Daniel Sutton-Kane from the USA (Advanced B, 224th) New Movies Pretty much all of the new movies are mentioned in the New Videos topic. |