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| 02 May 2007: "Go go ManU! I mean, Go go AC! Argh, can't decide." |
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| Movement His Royal Dutchiness the First Duke of Dutchland (#1 Aron Langerak) was active this week, scoring 1 WR. Expectedly, #6 Marijn Jongbloed attempted -- but failed -- to slip ahead of #5 Vincent van der Fluit and become the second-in-line to the Dutch duchy's dux. Vince, a nobleman of the House of Fluit, has held that position for some time now. Some people still like to call him 'King Vince', despite no longer being top. We suspect that Vince does not wish to marry Aron to keep his second-in-line safe, while Marijn's has marryaron written all over his name. Expect Marijn to complete the coup by next week. #7 Jean-Christophe Lacastaignerate made twice as large a cut as Marijn, but is still out by 1.7 AF pts. At least, he is building a lead over #9 Konsta Jukka. Despite already making the top-10, Konsta clearly doesn't wish to spot just yet -- he made 5 PRs this week. Another 0.2 AF pts will take him ahead of #8 Marius Mollenhauer. On the western front, #15 Bo Garman seems to be the only active Myth A-D player, but #14 Jonathan Steel continues to elude him. He won't be from now on, because #23 Andrew Math has now reached Myth D. Andrew passed a hurdle in #28 Alejandro Hernandez, a player who joined slightly before Bo and who has been inactive since December. With this, Andrew has become the #3 player in the USA, and replaces Jake as the owner of the the only records Bo doesn't have. He currently trails Bo (of course), and Bo's Chicago training buddy, #21 Jake Sopcak. Andrew scored 18 PRs that ranged from Myth+ to Titan D. That's a big range, so he may have untapped potential in some courses. Bo improved 5 PRs, hitting two god times. The second-half of the top-50 had some good action, starting with #32 Alex Hantson tying #32 Michael Duerr in AF. Alex passed #34-37 Rodolphe, Trystan, Stefan and Stephen with his 11 PRs and 4.1pt AF cut. Also also made it to Titan+, while Michael needs just two more standards. About ten steps behind, #41 Kevin Borne made an equally nice 4.8pt AF cut to pass 5 players, including #42 Thomas van Leeuwen, #43 Benoit Boudreau and #46 David Grard. These three players would have had bigger cuts had it not been for the introduction of #50 Jeremy Malartre, a French player who has supposedly been following the site for some but avoided officially joining. #48 Matt Tanzer sent in a handful of PRs in the final days of the month to pass Jeremy's high debut and ensure a safe placement in the top-50. Matt also reached Titan B. #82 Scott Abbey lost a rival in Andres dos Santos because he was suspected of being a JCM faker. Scott seems to have made the most of it, scoring 8 PRs for a 6pt AF cut. He moved up 8 places and passed three fellow Americans, with the next ones located at #71-72: Rob Chastain and Jon Prentice. #73 Jerrol Hoppenbrouwers joined the top-75 this week, and should be able pass those two particular players, himself. #112 Florian Vaz continues his comeback from last week, this time scoring a 6pt AF cut. It's not very big, but he's warming up. Florian is one position behind fellow Frenchman and former world champ, #111 Cesar Martin. Another player on a possible comeback track is #120 Dan Furst. Apart from his 13 new PRs this week, his others date to mid-2006. He passed 8 players, including countryman #125 Matt Flees. The rivalry between the girl and guys is still quite active. #148 Andrew Johnson made it to the top-150 and may soon reach Hero in ARR. #134 Andrew Manning couldn't run very far from #135 Alessandra Martinelli, who made up 3 positions on him. But they both made it to Hero D! #139 Kenny Cott feels reborn after a 9 month break from the game, and came out with some big PRs within 30 minutes of picking up his controller (or so he says). Kenny didn't specify the stimulus, but it's possible that he didn't like a girl reaching Hero (Heroine?) while he was still Expert A. Kenny narrowly missed out on the rank promotion, but should get it with his next few PRs. Whether he will keep up with Alessandra is a different story: she's beaten up lots of men. Kenny's 13 PRs included his strongest time so far, a Hero A top-100 lap in Mush Bridge. #223 Patrick Hewson is picking up a little bit of pace. He's PRing almost every day now, and gathered 12 PRs over the week. They were enough for an 18pt AF cut, or about 21 places in the ranks. He's yet to score his first Hero time, but he wasn't far from it with his twin Exp A in Wario Colosseum. Pat should be able to get to the top-200 within two weeks if he maintains the pace of daily PRs, but he will probably not get there before #210 Ryan Stevens. Ryan made a huge 48 pt cut to end the month, almost pulling himself into the top-200. Ryan's highlight PR was a Titan B lap in Peach Beach that ranks 71st on the charts. Ryan promises to make a movie of it soon. #273 Mark Engelsman became the latest Expert, skipping Adv A entirely to jump into Exp D. His 1.8pt ARR cut was big, but his 79pt AF cut puts his week into better perspective. He moved up from being over 350th last week, and tripled his AF cut. Being a Dutchie, you never know how long he will keep up such a crazy PR smashing pace. Mark scored 30 PRs, twenty of which were Expert level. No Hero times yet, but you can tell they're coming. Honourable mentions: #401 Julien Cloutier-Brassard (Adv C), #423 Jacob McMillin (Adv D), #514 Alvaro Fababu (Int B). New Records There was 1 record this week. Aron beat his own 27"79 lap of Mario Circuit with a 27"781. It's still a G+4 time, but makes a 0.02 lead on Richard. New Players Welcome to... Tomas Vo, Vietnam (~849, Newbie... only two scores so far). Emeric Gosselin, France (654th, Beg B) Jeremy Malartre, France (50th, Titan B) Zach Tabak, USA (409th, Adv D) Caleb McMillin, USA (657th, Beg B) |