Sunday, May 26, 2019 (Court Day #270)

Day 31 playing left-handed. Tennis elbow.

The prediction had been for a 60% chance of rain this morning. And it did rain. We email blasted the club with a delay until 10 a.m. with a possible cancelation. My wife wandered in about 8:30, I was still leisurely lounging in bed, saying that it was sunny outside and even raising the window shade to prove it. Well, what do you know? There was a solid chance that the courts might dry out. With no sun, the courts take many hours to dry.

I had woken up with some mild pain in my right forearm, where my tennis elbow manifests itself. (Aside from the pain on the bone at my elbow.)

I drove down and arrived at the courts at 9:35. Aside from half a dozen small and shallow puddles, the courts were dry. I’d brought two large towels and only had to use one of them to dab the puddles to the point of no standing water. I blew off the courts, but it was quite windy and there was a certain amount of futility in the exercise. Later, at least two nets blew over. That’s gusty!

Tom M. showed up first at about 5 minutes to 10. He offered to help set up and I accepted the offer! And it would be another 10-15 minutes before Eric S. showed up then a trickle of others. We never topped 20 players today. I think the delay and the wind scared off players. Or they didn’t care to check in after the initial delay email.

Play

Mid-morning, three newbies in their 30s showed up. A man named Chris later told me that he’d played before, and his two friends, rank beginners, Steve and a tall Asian woman, Lily. I didn’t play against Steve and Lily, but I did get to play against Chris. Chris was partnered with Tom S. against Binh and me. They went ahead, we battled back, the game went into extra points and I believe lost 13-11.

My play was generally icky. I did get a lefty ATP around the left post, but it was only during warmups.

The best showing of the day was Binh and me playing Eric and John P. Yes, we lost, but it was only 11-9. (Eric and John P. had won bronze at the large Paso Robles tournament a couple of months ago in the 3.5 60+ bracket.)

I told Binh that it would probably be wise if we sign up in 3.0 instead of 3.5 for the tournament. This time he agreed. He pointed out that we’d lost every game we played, including our last two games against Greg (Angie’s husband) and Karen. Games we should have won.

I’ve been so focused on my play, I’ve been neglecting to coach up my partner as I’m the more experienced player. Binh has the ability to dig out low balls and has quick hands at the net. Where he needs work is he lapses into some banger tendencies. At one point, I told him, “You’re not going to drive the ball through them at the net. Sometimes, if they are weak players, you can get away with that, but often they can just drive the ball off the court.” And he did do better. One point stuck in my mind where he played an excellent soft game and we won the point with patience and control. I told him that’s it’s weird for me to give him advice with me having so much work to do on my lefty game!

I counted the donation cash, made sure everything was stowed, then locked the bins. It was 1:24. Time to head home.

Later

I was about email the Monterey/Salinas tournament TD (tournament director) about the timeframe for the 3.0 bracket. Would it be done by 1 p.m.? Or would it be starting later in the morning? Then I noticed that the early cutoff is today! Oops. I texted Binh and told him that the early cutoff is today and we should sign up. Granted, it’s not a big savings, but, hey, $5 is $5!

I signed up and added in the notes that we want to playing 3.0 since I’m playing left-handed. (PickleballTournaments.com has me entered with my “Legacy Rating”, which is 3.5, as opposed to my official UTPR of 3.469, which rounds down to 3.0.)

Tomorrow

Tomorrow is Memorial Day. There will be play at Brommer Park. It’ll be great to play four times in five days. I just hope I play better.

Number of days on a court: 270
Number of total hours: 742.5

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