Nado Natterings
A weekly column by David Axelson

8 August 2009 Issue #29

Since we last cavorted on these pages, Your Natterer has been puttering around the house, executing important errands like getting the car washed and my hair cut and going to the bank. Proving in the process that there is only so much of that kind of thing you can stand to do in a week’s time.
The Natter Wife and your scribe also ventured off to Las Vegas for some great dining and to see a couple of shows. By next year at this time we should have paid off the bill at L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon, but the food and the dining experience may actually have been worth it. For those of you who, like me, took Spanish instead of French in school, the word ‘L’Atelier’ roughly translates to ‘workshop.’ Or at least that is what our waiter, who probably paid off his kids’ braces with the gratuities from the folks he served that night, told us.
During a trip to Vegas several years ago I performed a feat that many thought impossible, going through $5 worth of nickels at a nickel slot machine in roughly 90 seconds. The takeaway from that moment was that gambling wasn’t my thing and that I was supremely bad at it. That knowledge assisted in turned me into an apprentice foodie. Please see previous paragraph.
Yours truly surprisingly enough, also darkened the doors of a couple of sports books in Vegas, but more on that later.
CHS Fall 2009 Sports Practices Start Next Week
If you haven’t noticed, the 2009-10 school year has an unusually early start this year, as the first day of class for the Coronado Unified School District is Tuesday, August 25th. The early starting date has the added impact of pushing back the athletic calendar, with practice for several of the fall sports starting next week.  Specifically here are the tryout dates, time and points of contact for each CHS fall sport:
Boys and Girls Cross Country – Practice officially starts Tuesday, August 25th at the CHS track at 3 pm. Workouts have already begun for most of the returning runners. Go to www.islandertrack.com for additional details or contact Head Coach George Green at 619-435-3633.
Football – Equipment will be issued Monday, August 10, starting at 1 pm for the returning seniors, followed by the junior class and on down. The site is the football locker room, located near the 6th Street entrance to the CHS football field. The first official day of practice is August 12 at 8 am, also at the football field. For more information, contact Head Coach Bud Mayfield at 522-8907 Ext. 2807.
Girls Golf – According to Head Coach Hanna Cohan, tryouts will be held August 17 and 18 from 3-5 pm at the Coronado Municipal Golf Course. Coach Cohan can be reached at 619-990-8755 for questions.
Girls Tennis – Head Coach Rob LeBuhn will hold tryouts starting Wednesday, August 12 from 7-9 am at the CHS Tennis Courts. A second practice that day will be held from 4:30-6:30 pm. Contact Coach LeBuhn at 619-546-6467.
Girls Volleyball – New varsity Head Coach Leilani Au Hoon will hold tryouts for all teams Thursday, August 13 from 7-8:30 am. That afternoon from 4:30-6:30 pm, varsity candidates will return for another practice, with junior varsity and freshman players holding their second tryout session from 6:30-8:30 pm. Coach Au Hoon can be reached at 858-717-9757.
Boys Water Polo – Tryouts will be held at 8 am on Tuesday, August 18 at the Brian Bent Memorial Aquatics Complex. Please contact Head Coach Randy Burgess at 619-851-9733 for additional information.
Athletic Physicals Scheduled for Today, Aug. 5
Prior to tryouts, all student-athletes must have completed their athletic registration packet, which includes a current physical examination. One avenue to complete the athletic physical requirement is by attending the Doc Eaton’s Sports Physicals event, which is organized by the Islander Sports Foundation.
This year the physicals will be held at the CHS 500 Building on Wednesday, August 5th. Students should line-up on 7th Street behind Niedermeyer Field. There will be a 5:30 pm start for last names which begin with the letters A-L. Last names which begin with the letters M-Z will begin at 6 pm. Last call for students wishing to have physicals is 6:30 pm and the session will conclude at promptly 7 pm.
The cost is $15 per student, or $25 for two students from the same immediate family. The fee drops to $10 per student for three or more students from the same immediate family.
For the past several years more than 20 Coronado physicians combine to help support the CHS athletic department. The physicians provide athletic physicals for all interested Coronado High School and Coronado Middle School student-athletes. A fee for the physicals is collected and 100 per cent of that total dollar amount goes to help fund the athletic training room at CHS.
Please note that at both the high school and the middle school, a current athletic physical is required to be completed and submitted before the student-athlete can begin to practice or tryout for a team.
You may bring cash or checks made payable to the Islander Sports Foundation. The required two-page physical form may be downloaded from www.IslanderSportsFoundation.com. Please answer all of the questions on page one before attending and bring both pages of the form to the physical examination. If you have questions, please direct them via E-mail to info@IslanderSportsFoundation.com.
Callahan Sisters Having Great Sports Summer
Sisters Cassie Callahan and Abigail Callahan are experiencing a great summer of sports competition in 2009. Starting with Cassie (The Elder), the junior-to-be at CHS was a member of the San Diego Surf Soccer Club that recently won the National Championship for the U15 Girls Division. The Surf qualified by winning the State National Championships and then earned a berth in the Regional Championships.
The four regional champions qualify for the Nationals. Confusing, yes, but the upshot is that Cassie played on a high-level National title team. Callahan helped lead the Surf defensive backfield on their title run.
Callahan the Elder is no stranger to the sport of track and field either, as she was a point scoring machine for the Islanders last year, competing in the 300-meter hurdles, the long jump and triple jump events.
That sport segue leads us to Callahan the Younger and CHS Head Track Coach George Green brings us up to date on Abigail’s exploits. “The Coronado Middle School track program was well-represented at the USA Track and Field Junior Olympics in Greensboro, N.C. last week in the person of 13 year old and rising eighth grader Abigail Callahan.
Junior Olympic age divisions are based on year of birth and her division (Youth) consists basically of 13 and 14 year olds.  Thursday she placed seventh in the pole vault clearing 2.4 meters (a little under 8 feet) despite jumping with a rented pole (shipping vaulting poles across the county is now cost prohibitive) and very little practice because of the track's closure to replace the turf at Niedermeyer Field.
Her main event, however, was the high jump on Friday, where she went head-to-head with 6-foot, 2-inch tall Kira Larson jumping for Team Nodak out of North Dakota. Larson's 11-inch height advantage was a bit too much for Abigail to overcome and Larson won the event by clearing 5-5. Abigail and Mylana Hearn from Houston both cleared 5-3 for second and third place respectively, with Abigail taking the silver medal based on fewer misses at that height. Very few 13-year olds do well in the Youth Division and except for Abigail, the medal winners, or the top eight competitors, were all at the top of the age division.
Next year's Junior Olympics will be in Sacramento and Abigail's already looking forward to that event, where she'll still be in the same age division. Giving credit where credit's due, she's coached by our high school high jump and hurdle coach Kerry Elders, a 7-2 high jumper himself.”
Callahan the Younger is also a talented soccer player and played a starring role on last year’s CMS team, as well as on a travel soccer team this summer.  
CHS Cross Country Quick Note
George Green adds the following note regarding the CHS Cross Country program. “The team is taking a CIF-enforced break from coached training because of the no-contact period that the Islander Cross Country coaches are observing. However, if you're interesting in joining the team this season I invite you to visit our website at islandertrack.com.”
Baseball Note
While on vacation last week, watching an extraneous Baltimore Orioles vs. Kansas City Royals baseball game announced by Gary Thorne, the normally listenable Thorne uttered the following line. “The Orioles are one of the best teams in the Major Leagues hitting two-strike breaking balls.”
Who said there are too many statistics in baseball?
Las Vegas Sports Book Part II and the Sport of Kings
The aforementioned Natter Wife and yours truly had lunch at Caesar’s Palace during our Vegas trip, which gave one of us the opportunity to sit in the sports book while the other perused the Forum Shops. You can post your guess now on who did what.
Okay, my excuse to park it in the sports book for a while was to watch the last few innings of a Cub victory, watch some horse racing and closely observe the gambling odds on a variety of sports and wagering opportunities blink and flash before my eyes. Repeatedly and without end.
During my odyssey I found out that the San Diego Chargers are 6.5 point favorites over the Raiders in the regular season opener for both teams. This is a game which is six weeks away and this was two weeks ago.
The Chargers are also 9/2 favorites to win the AFC Championship and 17/2 to win the Super Bowl. The pro football team representing Los Angeles, the USC Trojans are 9/2 to win the NCAA title game.
Watching horse racing at four tracks simultaneously, brought to mind that in my next life my profession will likely be a degenerate, yet successful gambler. This would thereby counter the gambling ineptitude in my current life.
For whatever reason horse racing has always interested me, and as a result I have visited some of the finest tracks in the land. If you have ever stood on the rail during a horse race and watched these beautiful animals run, you understand the attraction.
So, it was with a great deal of trepidation that I read the July 30, 2009 article written by Tanya Mannes in “The San Diego Union-Tribune” headlined, “State urged to hold off on racing contract.”It seems that one or more of the folks who brought us the state budget impasse, namely State Sen. Christine Kehoe (D-San Diego), thinks that awarding a new contract to the racing operators at the Del Mar Fairgrounds should be delayed.
This move will allow the city of Del Mar to explore purchasing the 400-acre fairgrounds tract from the state of California at an estimated cost of between $400 million and $700 million. Clearly the streets in Del Mar are lined with gold or perhaps they have their own printing press.
In another racing-related column in the “Wall Street Journal” by Jim Squires on July 29, 2009, the author noted that betting volume at race tracks declined 7.3 percent last year and another 10 percent this year, resulting in the lowest wagering level in the sport in more than a decade. The profits from the restaurants are nice, the parking concession is good, but the real money at race tracks is found in the daily racing handle or bets made.
Another factor is that two of the major tracks in the Los Angeles area, Santa Anita and Hollywood Park are facing significant financial challenges. If either or both of those tracks closed, the West Coast racing season will go into a steep decline. Few trainers will travel even fewer horses to San Diego. The reason the current Del Mar season schedule was reduced by one day per week, was the lack of horses to compete in the races.
So, join me in calling for the state to get involved in yet another industry facing a major economic downturn. Surely the economic foresight shown by legislators governing the world’s seventh largest economy, will work just as well for the ‘sport of kings.’