The Brenckle Family Foundation: Tennis Tournament #1

Since the beginning of school tennis season this year, John and I have grown to love tennis more and more each day. We've been playing for roughly five months now, and it has been great. A couple weeks ago we had the opportunity to play in our first tournament, in which we played doubles. Our first round match was awesome, as we got to play another brother team from Timpview High School. As the first set began, we each held our serve through the first rotation, making the score 2-2. However, John and I then broke and held two times in a row as we won the first set 6-2. The second set began, and the same kind of thing happened. When we were up 3-2, however, they broke our service game, tying the set up. We held our heads high through this, and were able to finish the second set 6-3.

The second round did not quite go as well for us. We played two varsity singles players from East High School, who are also brothers. We really couldn't handle the pace of the game, and we went down 1-6, 0-6 to them. They did end up winning the final 6-1, 6-2, so that definitely gave us some reassurance. The results and everything else about the tournament is listed on the page HERE.

Although we didn't win this tournament, it was a great start to tournament play for both of us. We will be continuing to play in tournaments that we can, including one coming up in less than two weeks. Hopefully we can show some improvement in this next one. We will definitely have more posts about these tournaments, and hopefully pictures as well. Thanks for reading everyone!

Update: Drum Recording and Original Writing

In the past couple of months I've acquired some needed gear for recording drums. I started with and interface. I needed something that could run enough mics for my drums, so I got a Presonus Firepod with 8 preamps. Then I got my mics and cords, and with some learning on the audio software, I was recording in no time. Since then I have recorded two full length drum covers with video and audio, and several solos with audio only. HERE is the first cover, and HERE is the second.

John and I have also taken on writing original pieces of music, and we have one piece fully tracked HERE.

We hope to be getting several more original songs and covers out on YouTube, so subscribe if you'd like those updates, and even if you wouldn't we'd appreciate it. Thanks!

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You can also follow us on Google+ HERE!

Thanks everyone! We really appreciate all you do for us and we hope to give back to you through the music we play and write.

John's first bass cover!

Hey this is my first bass cover!  Give it a listen! It's "The Trooper" by Iron Maiden.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrkM09y6HME&feature=youtu.be

Cross Country 2013: Cedar City Inviational

This weekend I had the privilege to go down to Cedar City with my cross country team for a race. Even though it was fairly short, it was packed with activities that I enjoyed. We took a scenic route on the way up, which included a stop at the highest village in the USA, called Brian Head. We also took a stop at Cedar Breaks. After that, we had a long lunch and headed to the race. It was a really windy day, and the wind chill brought the weather to freezing temperatures, so you can imagine how cold we all felt with the skimpy shorts and uniforms on. I ran my race, and got a 19:25 5k, which is roughly 3 miles depending on the course. After that, we got to our hotel and watched the BYU vs. Utah State game while eating our dinner. BYU played a great game and won 31-14. We went to bed shortly after that, and I slept too well. I woke up at about 7:15, and we were leaving at 8. I had to throw everything together and go down to get breakfast. Once we got on the road, it was a smooth trip back because we only stopped once. I'm really looking forward to the California trip coming up in December!

 

Here are just 2 pictures, so you can look on my Google+ for more.

Reed's Top 10: August/September

10: Evolution (The Grand Design) - Symphony X

9: The Divine Wings of Tragedy (last song) - Symphony X

8: Blind Faith - Dream Theater

7: Home - Dream Theater

6: The Trooper - Iron Maiden

5: Strange Deja Vu - Dream Theater

4: The Wicker Man - Iron Maiden

3: Fatal Tragedy - Dream Theater

2: Rediscovery - Symphony X

1: Hallowed Be Thy Name - Iron Maiden

High School Update

Since school started, neither of us have had very much free time at all. Homework, cross country, and lawn mowing have taken up pretty much all of our time. High school is going really well, and I'm enjoying the freedom of it. Everything has taken a bit of getting used to, but I'm adjusting fast. This weekend we had a merit badge activity where we had the opportunity to earn 3 merit badges in an overnight trip. That helped me a lot to progress towards my eagle. I'll be trying to post a little more often now, and hopefully that works out.

Reed's Top 10: July 2013

10: Far Cry Live Cleveland - Rush

I had been looking for the name of this song and when I saw it live I knew it was the one. It's a great softer Rush song in a way but also very progressive.

9: The Root of All Evil - Dream Theater

This song was written in behalf of Mike Portnoy's road to recovery from alcohol and drug addiction. The song is executed very well and written great, because it has the perfect heavy tones to match the meaning.

8: Shine On American Dreamer - Joe Satriani

This is a great instrumental with very catchy riffs in it. I would recommend this song to anyone who is getting into the metal genre because it is a way to slowly progress into the genre.

7: Forsaken - Dream Theater

This song is written from a fictional standpoint, but the musicality is great. The piano intro from the first second is a perfect way to grab whoever is listening.

6: Can't Go Back - Joe Satriani -

Not only does this song highlight Joe Satriani's songwriting ability, it also is accompanied by great drum tracks.

5: Light Up The Night - Symphony X

Coming from a very heavy album, this song is the perfect "break" from that. I love how Symphony X executes their music because there is no "boring part" in their songs.

4: Harper Lewis - Russian Circles

A new band that was introduced to me this month, and they did not let me down. They are instrumental, and they can keep you hooked even without vocals.

3: I Walk Beside You - Dream Theater

This is a great catchy song with very meaningful lyrics. This is one of those songs that will send chills down your spine in a good way.

2: Station - Russian Circles

This track is very good, but it is even better when you listen to the full album in a row, because it starts great and only gets better.

1: These Walls - Dream Theater

I had known about this song for awhile, but only really listened to it a few weeks ago. This song is perfectly written, with great vocals and instrumentation. The mood changing is great as well, because all the instruments fit together exceptionally well.

Fourth of July pictures

I tried posting the pictures on the post about our Fourth of July trip but it didn't work so here are a few.

There's a deer

July 4th Weekend at the Cabin

These past few days have been filled with tons of action, surprise, and fun for the whole family. On Thursday (the 4th) we left for the cabin at about 1:30. We arrived at around 4:00. At first we unpacked everything, and then we played a few games of Kubb. We then had some fun playing paintball for the first time, which we ended up doing all three days. Dinner was great, even though it was just simple tin-foil dinners. During that night, we decided to all sleep on the deck. Well, it was just our luck when it started raining at about 2 in the morning, forcing us to sleep inside where it was stuffy. The worst part was that we couldn't open the windows because the rain got inside. Well, once we braved that through, we slept well and woke up the next morning. Our breakfast was a nice mountain man breakfast, which was very filling. That was followed by more paintball and such. We then went to our cousin's house in Springville to have lunch and take them all back to spend time with us at the cabin. During the time they were there, a huge storm cam through in two waves and was pretty booming. After that, several of our cousins left, and only two of them slept over with their dad. That next day, we played some more paintball before we left, and if was pretty awesome. There were welts and everything all around, especially because John and I decided to play with just a t-shirt and shorts. Anyway, it was great to spend the weekend down at the cabin, even through all the rough storms.

Gold Cup Doubleheader at Rio Tinto Stadium

Cameron (a friend of ours) invited us to the gold cup at rio tinto.  It was a doubleheader with the first game being the US men's national team reserves vs Cuba national team.  We got there just before halftime and as we were driving up the score was 1-0 for Cuba.  When we walked in everyone started cheering and we soon discovered that Landon Donovan from team USA had scored.  So that left it tied 1-1 at halftime.  A couple minutes later, a field crasher jumped the wall and ran over to our side of the stadium.  Everyone was cheering him on and it was really funny!  Soon after, the security came and got him.  Shortly after the game started up again, corona from team USA ( I don't know his first name) send a dart right into the back of the net. 2-1 for USA.  It went all downhill for Cuba after that.  Chris wondolowski scored (assist from Kyle beckerman from real salt lake) and later scored another.  He also had two more opportunities to score but didn't finish.  Final score 4-1 for USA.  The next game was Costa Rica vs Belize.  It was a very boring game to be honest.  I don't have much to say about it except for that the only goal scored was an own goal in favor of Costa Rica.  I was cheering for Costa Rica because Alvaro saborio from real salt lake was on the team, so I was pretty happy, but didn't care too much for the game overall. Here are some pictures.

The field crasher in the middle of the picture