Wet

Wet - the best way to describe today. Before work, Brad and I went to Peet's Coffee House to enjoy a tasty beverage and we were pelted by relentless rain! Good thing I finished my run super early this morning before the downpour began. Brad is running the Green Mountain Relay this weekend up in Vermont and the forecast is for warm rain all weekend. The relay is intense - 12 runners run a total of 200 miles in a 24 hour period, starting at 7 am tomorrow morning.

My weekend is full of fun and work...plans with friends, dissertating, and business building. I am also in the middle of a couple of projects related to sport psychology...writing a few papers for publication and recruiting some people to serve as ambassadors for the Junior World Cup in Field Hockey next month.

Happy Weekend!

HPC's logo design by For the Muse

The incredible logo design to the left is designed by For the Muse.

I explained HPC's philosophy to Theresa Redmond, owner of For the Muse:
Hayden performance consulting (HPC) is dedicated to developing and maintaining optimal athletic performance through facilitating the development of cognitive skills, techniques, perspectives, and processes. HPC incorporates into its practice Arete, the ancient Greek’s notion of striving for excellence with courage and strength. HPC’s goal is to help performers strive for excellence in their chosen craft.

From this philosophy, Theresa took the idea of pursuing excellence and "developed it further to include the ideas of 'reaching goals' and 'striving for unity of mind and body'". From here, the ring concept emerged as a symbol of growth, and completeness.

Hayden Performance Consulting (HPC)

I am starting my own performance consulting business, using a sport psychology model, to serve athletes and other performers (including businesses, coaches, musicians, doctors, etc). I hired someone to create my website, which is currently under construction, another person to create my business logo, which is currently in the works, and plan to officially get the business rolling within the next 2-3 weeks. To start, however, I have created a blog that will serve a different purpose than that of the website. While the website is informative in relation to services provided, the field of sport psychology, the nature of HPC, the blog is more organic and ever changing in nature. It will include entries with sport psychology tips and tricks, current events, conferences and other happenings in the field, etc... it will also link to related businesses as I hope to develop a network of young professionals in the sport business trying to 'make it'. So, check it out for yourselves by linking to the blog on the right side of this webpage. Any comments or questions you have about any material you see (or don't see) on the site should be asked via the comment section of the site, not via my email, as I'm sure if you have questions about something, other readers have similar questions. I want the most information to reach the most people possible. Enjoy!

Quite a weekend

We had an incredibly fun weekend! On Friday night, we went out to dinner with Katie and Ted and watched Hangover, one of the funniest movies I've seen in a long time. On Saturday, Brad watched the track races over at Bentley College and I went to a bachelorette party. Without giving away details, lets just say there were drag queens, gobs of very happy gay men (end of Gay Pride week in Boston), a mechanical bull, and lots of pole dancing (not by me, of course). Whew! On Sunday, Brad, Kit, Chris and I went to Rockport, up the coast, and spent the day scouring the rocky cliff, enjoying lobster on the water, eating strudel and salt water taffy, and watching the rain pelt the ocean's surface. It was THE New England day.

Over the years

At Mike's Pastrys in the North End with Brad's college friends


An Indoor 5K at the Harvard Track


Hiking in Kauai


Hiking in Amherst, MA


Laura and Katie at Oishii


Laura and Luke in Central Park, NY


Emily and Brad at the Olympic Marathon Trials in NYC


Laura running



Thanksgiving in Boston with the Aulies


Our 'hood


Post 10K in Michigan


Brad overlooking the Charles River and Boston


Brad working hard in our crib


Luke's high school graduation


Dinner at Laura and Brad's pad


Laura and friends at Top of the Hub in Boston


Our anniversary


Day 1 of homeownership


Hayley and Claire, childhood friends, visiting in NYC


Brad skiing in Vermont


New Years Eve in Holly, MI


New Years Eve at Fox and the Hound, Michigan


Skiing in Up North Michigan


Mark and Luke


Laura in the Boston Commons


Brad and Laura in Cape Cod


Our engagement party

Laura's 29th Birthday Weekend

Thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes and pressies and celebrations! I had a great birthday weekend. On Friday, 97 of my closest friends showed up for a joint birthday party thrown by Tanyika and me. We started at the Field Pub in Cambridge, a great Irish pub complete with darts, pool tables, crazy accents, and fantastic beers. Then, after a few hours, we moved over to The Middlesex, a minimalist urban lounge with the best dancing in the city. DJ Knife spun Fresh Produce all night and we "dropped it and popped it like its hot" (direct quote from our party invitation). It was incredible to see so many of my friends from different times in my life over the past 6 years...all in the same room!

On Sunday, Brad and I opted for a relaxing, quiet day. Brad packed a picnic, blanket, soccer ball, and birthday chocolate cupcakes and we went to the best beach I've been to in Boston. For you Bostonians, its the Nantasket Beach in Hull, South of Boston. We read, played soccer, ate cheese and fruit, dipped our toes in the freezing water... We left the beach to visit World's End, a natural reservation in Hingham. Here is the description of it from a website:
"World's End comprises four coastal drumlins -- Pine Hill, Planter's Hill, and the double drumlins of World's End proper -- all connected by over four miles of walking paths that offer dramatic views of the Weir River, Hingham Harbor, and the Boston skyline. The Reservation's hills are traversed by tree-lined roads and dotted with tree groves. In between are broad grassy fields that attract butterflies and are managed to provide habitat for grassland-nesting birds."
This description does nothing to capture the beauty of this place. I guess Olmsted (who designed a bunch of parks in Boston and Central Park in New York) was hired to design a development at World's End so he put in cart paths and trees...however, buildings were never built, for whatever reason. Brad and I hiked until it was dark, changed into fancy clothes, and headed to Tosca, a modern American-Italian restaurant in town, for dynamite salmon, mussels, and beef. Yum.

Wow

This picture is of Brad in 2001. I just like it. It is taken in my bedroom in my family's old house. I like yellow.