So long to Scandinavia

Hello again everybody just so you know I made it back from Norway and am very greatful for everyones support and prays! Things for me this last weeks were very, very exciting. I took the weekend off from training and went back up to Lillehammer, Norway to watch the Norwegian athletics championships, what a weekend! I got to see all my new friends and relax with some great beer and even better people. It was very hard for me to leave after this weekend because Norway became like a second home to me in a way. I honestly can't put in words what those people now mean to me and for what they did for me. Saying goodbye was bitter sweet in few ways obviously because I loved it there and made many friends but at the same time I have a family and friends back home that I feel like I need to see. So im sad and happy all together right this moment. Two months is along time away from home when you've never been away before. That trip happened to be the highlight of my life and I've been blessed to have a very, very good life! Full of Family and friends that love and support me in my journeys as will I in which ever way they choose to go aswell.

The past is the past but memories I have now of Norway will provide a wonderful present day life for me. Well Hopefully next year Ill be able to go back and have even more great memories to bring back to the colonies haha. Till next time I love you all and thanks for your encouragement, support, and prays. Peace!

10 days left

After being here so long its become like another home almost. Having said that I'm ready to come back to the states. 10 days left until my plane leaves for home. I'll be sad to leave all the new friends I have made but at the same time ready to see all the family and friends I haven't seen in 2 months. 

Besides being a little bit home sick I'm very sore after my gymnastics workout yesterday with Andreas Thorkildsen. It was a great workout that was very tough for me but he made it look easy! I believe this is why he is the best javelin throwers in the world, seeing what he could do was a boost to my confidence. He has been doing gymnastics for about 3 years now and has increase in throwing and lifting because of this. 

Well just wanted to let you all know that im still having a great time even though im home sick haha love all you and hope all is well!

Starting Fresh

This summer has been a new journey for me in my life as you all might know. Some days have gone by slow and some fast but the end is soon to come for me here in Norway. The time I have spent here may never be forgotten, I've learned many new things about the sport of javelin throwing. Of course that's why I came here in the first place. But, the one thing that will stick with me forever is the life lessons that I will be taking home with me. First of all, I have learned to live in the present because the future and past is out of the picture... Yes you can learn from the past by using it as a tool to guide the future, but you must live and use the present to make that happen. Secondly, take in all that you can because this will not be here someday. I sit and dwell on the past sometimes. I know I shouldn't and I also think about death quite a bit also, because someday we all have to cope with it. Making the most of what you have and getting the most out of your body is a skill and discipline that most never achieve in life. So, from now on, if you ever see me not getting the most out of myself, remind me, because its my new life goal. Ill also remind you as well if I ever see you getting down on yourself! Last but not least, listening to what others have to say: coaches, elders, people you look up to. This is important to me now, because its how I'm going to get the most out of my body someday. I believe I have one more thing actually... Have fun in the time you are given here in the world, because when you have a smile on your face and are enjoying yourself it will make your goals easier to achieve! At least thats what I think. I see so many serious people out there working so hard for something and never relaxing. And, relaxing is a key ingredient to becoming what you want to become. You will be able to meet more people, talk to people easier, and not get so down on yourself in tough times.

Besides my words of wisdom, haha, I have been enjoying my time at the olympia toppen center learning and breaking down technique a little bit these last few days. Since I'm now finally finished with the longest season ive ever had Im ready to start over with a knew run up and better workout plan to help me become a great thrower someday. Today, Polle and I work on a lot of medicine ball drills and also got into the 5 step rhythm I was telling you all about in my last post. The 5 step rhythm, I believe, is a big step in jumping up maybe another 4 to 5 meters this next year. It will take my full concentration for the next year to really get it right. I'm behind on it because im 20, so that means more work is to be done for me to make it part of my bone marrow. Pray for me! I hope all is well back home love you all and hope you enjoyed the post!

Up and down

After a great week last week in Helsingborg, Sweden this week was a little bit slow. I got back to Magnus' house and sort of took a break from everything that was happening and got back to work in the weight room and in the grass throwing. Even though it's nice staying out in the country with Magnus, its so far away from everything that its hard to do anything exciting when its just the two of us. Although on Thursday I went down to Halden, Norway to do some training in my coaches home town. The weather was nice and we were able to go up to an old Norwegian fortress and then down the the harbor for a beer to relax and watch the sunset. The town was small but very nice the people were wonderful and the food again was very good! I will now concentrate on relaxing and having a good time if I can get out with some of the guys hopefully sometime soon... in the mean time I'm done competing while I'm here so I can concentrate on breaking down the body a little bit and the technique, maybe even get in to do some gymnastics with the best thrower in the world! My coach and I talked about changing my finish into a 5 step instead of 7 step, because its faster and I can transfer the speed better, even though it will take a while to get use to. Its very hard to learn but with time it will happen. Hopefully all is going well all over the States and wherever your reading this from ha. God bless you all!

Hallo again

Hey everybody, sorry for such a long wait for my next post. Things have been very busy here, we just finished our second trip to Sweden. I was gone for a week without internet and just friends to hangout with so it was a good week for me. It was enjoyable to get sometime away from just sitting on the computer all day waiting for people to get on haha. In Helsingerborg, Sweden we stayed in a house of about 20 throwers which was crazy but extremely fun! It was by far the best time ive had sense being in Europe. I got to meet new people and bond with other thrower of similar ages. I believe that spending that time with them created new friendships that will last a very long time. While in Sweden we also went out to the driving range and smashed balls, we drank beer and did other things besides just throwing. The food was amazing, the people great, and my norwegian speaking kinda skeptical haha. They tried teaching me more things but I suppose it didn't sound to well so they got some good laughs outta that ha. Anyways just thought I would tell ya about my great weekend in Sweden and until next time ill be praying for everyone back home and hope everything is going great! 

Happy 4th of July!

A little late sorry I didn't post last night when it was actually the 4th of July. Well Magnus and I had a meet yesterday in Lillestrom, Norway just 2o min away from his house so it was an easy drive. The weather was very nice and we had a slight tale wind but not much to do anything. The meet went ok I ended up throwing 62,53m not my best but getting closer. That was a good result considering having no really adrenaline or power yesterday. My speed into the javelin was good but the block was lazy and im losing a lot of meters just right there. Magnus ended up throwing the discus 49,43m I believe and came in second. We will be traveling to Helsingborg, Sweden next week and staying in a hotel there. Magnus  leaves tomorrow for the trip with a couple of other thrower in the area so I will be on my own until thursday when I leave with my coach Paul to make the 6 hour drive. Hope all is well back home love you all and miss you very much ill be praying for you all! 

                                                                                                Love, Jesse 

Finding hope...

These past few days I have really been looking forward to the up coming events of this weekend. Practice the last few days wasn't what I hoped it would turn out to be even  though towards the end of throwing yesterday things were starting to look up as my coach Paul Solberg and I found something that might be good for me in the long run. It's a secret though so, can't tell ya ;). haha Tomorrow night is the Bislett games where all of the worlds best javelin throwers will be going to throw, also some of the other worlds best in other events. This should be a wonderful experience and well help me to simply find hope in myself that I can one day be a great thrower. Being around this atmosphere is a great feeling! Just the other day as I was walking up the steps out of the weight room I past a popular gothic band lead singer and a man next to him with his hat on and talking his dog. As I looked back I realized that the man I had just pasted was Andreas Thorkildsen the best javelin thrower in the world. A smile arose on my face giving me a glimpse of hope towards the future. I was amazed but not in shock, it was just an amazing feeling to look back and see him and think "wow I love being a javelin thrower and this is what I wanna do!" 

        Days have been going by really slowly because I've been bored waiting for the bislett games and the Javelin Gala on saturday which should be a great contest for me to get back on track and set a PB in scandinavia. Hope all is well and home and training is well here but the days are long haha. I'm missing all my friends back home but will see you soon Love yall have a great time till I speak to you again.

PS pray for me in the javelin gala!

The last couple days were good because we began to get back to work in the weight room and on the runway. Although yesterdays throwing practice wasn't good what so ever because my legs were gone from the day before. On monday we did a lot of jumping and that effected tuesdays practice quite a bit. I have learned that days when my legs aren't bouncy and working are days I shouldn't even try to throw even if im feelin good in the upper body. Through the past 4 weeks my over all throwing ability has grown I believe. This is because the training is directed more towards throwing and also my throwing is becoming more consistent even though the results aren't showing big throws just quite yet. 

 

         Besides the throwing its been good to be home from sweeden and relax and sleep in a room that isn't 90 degrees haha. Yesterday after practice we decided to go down to the docks on the lake that is just behind the lifting and throwing center. The lakes in Norway are very big and they seem to have them everywhere! Magnus, a couple of the other throwers and I took a dip in the lake for about 45 min. I was great to get that bad practice off me and enjoy the water a bit because we haven't really got out to do a lot of stuff like that just yet. 

         Well so long till next time I hope everybody in Oregon, Iowa, Cali and all over that are reading this has a wonder time until till I speak to you again. 

P.S. I wish they had fireworks here but I guess ill have to wait till next year to play with fire.

Goteborg Weekend

Gotebord weekend went really well, Magnus and I made a 4 hour car drive over to Goteborg, Sweden for a 3 day track meet. It started with my competition on friday which went was alright... it was my first time throwing in such a big stadium. I got second with a throw over 62,50m and the rest of my throws were all right around that so im still hoping for a big throw soon. Just have to make some minor corrections and I think 70m shouldn't be out of the picture. On Saturday we went outside of Goteborg an Magnus had a discus comp, then he also threw in the stadium on Sunday. Both competitions he threw around 51m which he has been throwing for the last month or so. 

Besides the throwing the city was amazing and we spent a lot of time walking around. I met a few new throwers from Oslo that were definately not shy and introduced themselves to me. Thing have been going good and this week we will be getting back to training and working basics. Ill be updating on here more often, sorry I didn't have internet access in Goteborg so thats why I haven't posted in a few days. Thanks for reading miss you all and hope everything is going great.

Sincerely, Jesse

HAPPY...

HAPPY FATHERS DAY DAD! and of course HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM! Love you both very much and thank you for everything you have done for me through the 20 years I've been alive. Hope all is going well, this trip for me so far has been worth it and I hope to come back a better person that has learned a lot from this experience I know all of this work will pay off because of the support you have given me and the opportunities you given me like this one right now.  Hope you have a wonderful day!

Love, Jesse

Meet update

Hello again, dedicated readers of my "Scandinavian Summer! I have just finish my second track meet of the trip and it was better, but still nothing close to where I want to be. The day was nice with a mix of sunshine and clouds in Lillehammer, Norway. We had a bit of a tail wind to throw with so it was very good. The competition wasn't so good, I ended the day at 61,50m, which was well off of what I came in thinking I could achieve. The warm ups felt amazing! I had both of my full approach warmup throws at 65m maybe and maybe even almost 66m on the second of the two. They felt very rhythmic and relatively easy, maybe going after them a bit... I stayed in on both of them also. So having said that I still believe I can get a good throw off when I'm here. The meet throws were forced and pulled down on (I went back to my old form)! Magnus threw on Friday, which was also a great day to throw, with a good right hand wind for the discus. He ended up at almost 51m. He has been training very hard and is ready to throw big next week! Besides the throwing, the sites were remarkable in Lillehammer. It's where they held the 1994 winter olympics. They have a massive ski jump looking down at the track. It's a beautiful site! I would post a picture of it, but I'm having a bit of trouble with it right now, so ill have to fix it, but I do have pictures! Well thanks for reading the post today. I'll get back to work and try to get after a big throw soon.

Thank you all

Thank you all for the wonderful comments you have been leaving! I would have thanked you earlier, but I didn't realize you could leave comments on the posts haha, so my fault. Things here are going great and all of the support yall have shown me is more then enough to keep a smile on my face and continue to learn. And yes when there are no clouds it doesn't get dark in the summer time here. It's almost like a light blanket of shade comes over, but you can still see for miles. It's amazing! Well again, thank you all and keep leaving comments, they are very encouraging and I will try and learn some better norwegian so I can send you some words.

Food is great!

The last couple of days the food has been amazing! Today we went over to Magnus grandparents to have lunch at it was absolutely great. Lots of veggies, pork, and Potatoes. His grandparents are very nice folks that always have smiles on their faces! The people here are very nice even though I can't understand what they are saying haha... I learned how to say "Thanks for the food" today, which was nice and it was very easy not something thats to hard to learn. Anyways Magnus and I have been going to practice everyday learning new things and lifting weights. The weather is great just hope it stays around for the meet we are going to this weekend in Norway. Next weekend we will be traveling to Goteberg, Sweden. Well tomorrow is our day off so perhaps I will post again. Hope all is going well back home! And everyone should wish my mom a happy birthday coming up here on the 21st...first day of summer!

Track meet and more

Today Magnus finished up his throwing this weekend with a throw in the shot put of 14.15m. Yesterday he threw the discus 51.37m which is a very good result for him right now. He has been training very hard in the weight room and throwing quite a bit so he was very happy with his throw, also he was consistently over 50m in that competition throwing over 50m 4 times! As for me I have been training and waiting for the next competition which is on Saturday. Im hoping the weather will be nice enough to get a good throw off. In the mean time I will continue to learn and expand my knowledge of the sport. Training today went well, Paul and I did a lot of jumping and tested in the bar jump. I was  able to jump over 165 cm which was a really good result and tomorrow we will be testing in over head and backwards shot, we will also throw tomorrow.

The last couple of days the weather has been very nice here which is good for a change. Magnus and his youngest brother bought an xbox 360 and seem to be very into halo, Video games really aren't my thing so I just sit back and watch haha. The food is still great and they are feeding me a lot so I never feel very hungry! I suppose thats a good thing for me sense I'm so skinny ha. Well I hope everyone is doing great I post back soon enough talk to you all SOON! 

Looking forward

Well hello again! Today I had my first track meet in Oslo, Norway. The meet was a good learning experience for me. I ended up throwing 59m which was not the worst throw in the conditions we had but I was looking forward to throwing around 62 or 63 meters which didn't happen. I felt stiff similar to my first meet of the year back home so I feel like i can for sure improve and throw far once again. The weather was cold and rainy with a light head wind which isn't bad but the rainy weather wasn't good for any of the competition today with everyone throwing well under their best. Although the competition didn't go well I am still having a great time and putting it behind me to look forward to the future and in the mean time have fun in the present because this is all new to me! Magnus throws tomorrow at around 130 so I will be updating on the blog soon enough about his throwing! Hope everyone is doing well back home, hope to hear from you soon!

Hi! Jessie's parents. You have a very great and nice boy. We think it is exciting to have him live with us. Thank you for the beautiful blanket we received from you. It was very pretty and contained much history. We hope Jessie will feel right at home with us. We are going to treat him as the fourth son in the house. This means, that he must endure a little clutter and a lot of sound. We hope he will have a great summer with us, and that it will be a summer he will remember with pleasure for years to come.
Lillan and Jack

Good times in Norway

Though the time change still doesn't like me I am having a good time in Norway. Training is going well and my soreness is going away from the first week. I have my next throwing session tomorrow around 4 p.m. which should be good after todays workout which was mainly focused on jumping which went well and didn't bother my knees much at all. It has been raining a bit here lately but thats okay because I'm use to it I guess haha. My goal in the first meet on friday is to throw over my old PB which was 63m or so. Im hoping to consistently be around 65m and then make the 70m jump sometime while im here or in the early stages of next season. Anyways besides throwing Magnus and I still play the Wii a lot and are both at the pro level in golf haha. Also the last two night Magnus and I have went out on his local golf course with these old clubs that he has and we play about 3 or 4 holes. This has made us want to play every night now...we sneak on the course at around 11 p.m. maybe a bit earlier and its still light out, we can see the balls fly, its really fun! Anyways thats it from me its about 2:30 am here so I better get some sleep. Nata from Norway and I miss and hope everyone is doing well!

Time change

Im still getting use to the time difference. Some nights I will sleep 11 or so hours and others just 5 hours. Its frustrating but I'm trying to get use to it so I'm not tried all the time! Today was my day off of training so Magnus and I took his ll year old brother out to teach im some discus  and I just got some basic stretching and jogging in to loosen up because of the soreness that I have experienced from my first real javelin workout.  Magnus is beginning to teach his brother Henrick the basics in discus which is pretty cool to see. Tomorrow I will be doing my first real throwing session with my coach. I'm very excited and hope to preform well although I probably am not going to be a 100 percent because my body is still recovering from workouts. Magnus and I have been playing a lot of Wii video games, and watching the French Open on TV together haha. Lame but pretty fun and it makes the down time when were not working out go by fast. The food is still very good! Also I've been trying to learn some basic norwegian, things like thanks and goodnight. They are simple but the family seems to like it when I try to speak norwegian. His family is very easy to get along with and we have fun together which is important. Nothing has been boring so far! I can't wait to throw in my first meet next week and am hoping to be consistently at 65 meters or so and PR later in the summer once I start to get more explosive. Least thats what I'm hoping! Keep praying for me and I miss you all back home, hope your having a good time.   

Getting Used To Norway

Today was slow at first but turned out really well. Magnus and I went out for a little warm up at his old high school and there was a track meet going on for about 200 little kids. So that was pretty cool to see. During our afternoon session we did a pretty hard workout that Paul, my javelin coach, made for me. Some of the lifts we do here are different from the American lifts and I believe it will help me after a while. Later, Magnus and I went to the mall with Fredrick who is the best discus thrower in the world for his age. Now we are back home eating great Norwegian food made by Magnus' mom! Hope all is well back home talk to you soon.

Greetings From Jesse's Parents To The Berntsen Family

Mr. and Mrs. Berntsen, We want to extend our greetings to you from Oregon. We are very happy that you have welcomed our son Jesse into your home and we hope that he will be a pleasant addition to your family for a couple of months. Here in Oregon we take a lot of pride in our landscape, so I hope you will enjoy the tapestry from Oregon highlighting some of our most special landmarks. Jesse is very impressed with your own landscape and we knew he would be. When we were Jesse's age we spent 6 weeks in the beautiful countries of Sweden and Finland and enjoyed the people, culture and sights.

May God bless you,

Joe and Pam Staub

First day in Norway

Before the take off from Philly to Oslo I found myself becoming very nervous! The flight wasn't what got to me nervous or worried, or even excited me. I am nervous and excited for the opportunity that has been thrown my way. For a few years now since I have started to throw Javelin I've joked about coming over to Europe to learn and train with the best. Now I have an opportunity to do it. All of this wouldn't be possible if it wasn't for my friend Magnus coming to America and also my parents getting me the plane ticket and giving me the support they have given me. Also the support from my friends and other close family.

Today it is beautiful here in Norway with the temp around 65 degrees and clear sky's. Flying in was amazing, the land here is breathtaking with hills, forest and many lakes. Farming seems to be a big thing here! Every barn is red and the same size... there is way to many to count; its remarkable. Pictures will be posted sometime in the next day. Hope all is well back home!

Leaving Oregon

This is my last day in America for two months, so I have decided to spend it with my close family and friends. We had a BBQ early today with good food and conversations. My packing is still in progress with some laundry and more preparing yet to do for my early morning flight. The excitement is building because its my first trip out of the states! I will be going to train in the javelin over in Oslo, Norway. My fairly new friend Magnus from Norway has offered to put up with me for two months. He is discus thrower in Norway and has been doing very well lately throwing a new PR of over 52 meters. We will have a wonderful time together and share many great memories I hope! Be praying for me and my travels!