Updated forcast for the morning. Even bigger…

Friday
Northwest gales to 35 knots decreasing to 30 knots in the late morning and afternoon. Blowing snow in the morning. Snow showers in the morning…then numerous snow showers in the afternoon. Waves 12 to 16 feet subsiding to 6 to 10 feet.

Crazy. I guess we’ll find out in the morning if it’s even worth making the trip out. By the that I mean if it’s even posible to make the trip (road conditions) and if it looks safe enough. Crazy.

Let me just say that I love Nike commercials. It’s almost a given that I’ll enjoy any new Nike commercial. Not that I necessarily love the company or even the product they produce, just the commercials. It’s just so easy to get inspired by some peppy ethereal music and shots of an athlete training like there’s no tomorrow. It works for me at least.

Nike broke their usual mold just a little with their latest ad when they tossed in some AC/DC as the backdrop. I think it works though and here’s why. It’s not the lyrics…

Rock and Roll Ain’t Noise Pollution

Hey there, all you middle men
Throw away your fancy clothes
And while you’re out there sittin’ on a fence
So get off your ass and come down here
‘Cause rock ‘n’ roll ain’t no riddle man
To me it makes good, good sense

Good sense
Ow
Oooh yeah

…because it would certainly be a stretch to say that they have anything to day with athletics or the pursuit of physical fitness. And I don’t think it’s overtly the way the music makes you feel (say, if you heard the song without the images). So here it is. It’s the pace of the song and the way it mirrors dragging yourself out of bed and plunging into exercise. It starts slow, almost reluctantly, picks up the pace, picks up the pace some more, then boom, go go go.

I guess I don’t know why exactly this would be inspiring, but I suppose it helps you picture athletes cranking up their day even when you feel like doing the opposite. I think anyone who’s ever done the early morning training thing at least will definitely identify.

Anyway, I looked around on the Internet trying to find the extended 60 second version of this commercial for download and couldn’t find it anywhere (I like the way the ocean swell rolls through in the surfer scene in the long version and I think the build up is more effective) but couldn’t find the commercial even for viewing anywhere but nikeair.com. Long story short, I eventually gave up and just made my own copy of the commercial. So here it is for download if anyone’s interested. The commercial is called Awake.

Download Nike Awake Commercial – WMV format – 3.63 mb (zipped)