CANBERRA AUSTRALIA - 11 November 2000 - This week, Mike
didn't have to coach the juniors but instead had a coach's
clinic. Mike learned a lot about some of the finer details of
baseball. On Sunday morning, the Ainslie games were nearly rained
out. After a bit of work on the field, Ainslie was able to play their
game but the opposition wasn't quite ready: they started with eight
players. The team won. Mike had a bloop hit and a pretty ordinary day
catching. His blocking skills weren't as strong as the previous week
and this included a ball that went through his legs. By the middle of
the game, the sun came out and Mike nearly got sunburned.
Tuesday was the Melbourne Cup. It's called the race that stops a
nation. It's a horse race in Melbourne that everyone watches and
places bets on the winner. There are twenty four horses that run two
miles. The Chemistry School had a sweeps where everyone in the sweep
was drawn a horse and if that horse finished in the top three, the
person won part of the pot. Mike was lucky enough to draw number 24,
Brew. His odds were about 18-1, but he won with a jockey that had just
turned professional. Mike was happy with the tenfold profit of his
horse winning.
Here ends Mike's twenty seventh week in Australia.