Month: May 2019 (Page 2 of 5)

Monday, May 27, 2019 (Court Day #271)
Memorial Day

Day 32 playing left-handed. Tennis elbow.

I arrived at Brommer Park a mere few minutes after 9. The parking lot was already over half full. It was overcast and breezy. One temporary net would blow over more than once during the session.

My back was pretty tired from the start. About an hour in, the temptation of leaving crossed my mind. I powered through. My right ankle also would hurt now and then, but typically not during actual play, but when just walking around.

Tom (visiting from out of town) and Cal take on two players (nearside). Overcast.

With the holiday, it was very busy. Early on, Leslie announced we’d be playing to 9. When I stopped to count players, there were 61 people at the courts, and some had already left!

A big crowd today. Tony (leftmost, tan hat) and Daniel (rightmost, red) don’t mark the limit of waiting people! Alan K. has his hands on his hips while Terry Long (purple) does some managing of the court board. Sun!

Binh and I beat Mark G. and Allen 11-8. (Not be confused with Alan K. or Allan C.)  It was a long game. Mark was having about as much trouble with his drops shots as I was—a lot.

Between games, I sat next to Joe, the new guy whom I’d played singles with a couple of weeks ago. I mentioned the pain in my right shoulder when I raise my elbow and he said it sounds like a rotator cuff problem. He said he’s having rotator cuff surgery and will be out for a few months for recovery. “Today will be my last time playing for a while.” He said I should go see Dr. Warren Scott in Soquel, who diagnoses sports injuries. I didn’t mention this before, but I’d asked my PT on Friday about that pain and she mentioned that it could be my rotator cuff, but she didn’t go beyond that and we didn’t discuss it more.

Binh and I played our our last three games against Aidan and Karen. (Little Karen, not Karen Long.) We won all three, though we had to come back the last game down 8-3.

There was a first in one of those last three games. I hit my first deep forehand slice service return as a lefty. That’s a decently advanced shot that I rarely see from intermediate players. I’ll take whatever little victory I can get right now!

I checked the time, 1:39 p.m. Four and a half hours. No wonder I was so fatigued!

Number of days on a court: 271
Number of total hours: 747

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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

To start at the beginning of this blog click on “1st Post” in the menu above.

Friday, May 24, 2019 (Court Day #269)

Day 30 playing left-handed. Tennis elbow.

I had a physical therapist appointment this morning at 8:30. Ruby, the PT, gave me yet another exercise. Reaching out my straight arm in front of me, with my wrist bent down, and placing the back of my hand against the wall making sure my arm is locked straight. It is to stretch out my wrist—obviously, right?

Brommer Park

It was 9:15 by the time I was a Brommer. As I walked up, Greg and his wife Angie called up from a court asking if I’d be in LA next month. “For the graduation?” (Their daughter Lexi is studying English at UCLA and my son Nicholas is there studying Applied Mathematics.) “Yes, we’ll be there!” “We’ll need to meet up!” “Sounds good!” For good measure, I was co-incidentally wearing my Yoda-themed UCLA Bruins T-shirt! (It was a gift from my wife!)

The view of the courts as I walked up at 9:15. Many more players yet to come.

From one court to another, I called over to George that I needed to talk to him. It was a while, but I got a chance, right before his group got called for an open court. “Do the names Rick Dougherty, Charlie Stokes, and Gary mean anything to you?” By the time I’d gotten to “Stokes”, a smile had broken across his face and he’d interjected, “Sure! How…” “We overlapped on the software engineering team at Mountain Computer in 1989!” So, this George Propper was indeed the George Propper who had been a 42-year-old senior engineer while I was a 22-year-old junior engineer. I told him I had only been there a few months over the summer. (As I mentioned previously, it was a temporary position, and I’d turned down the opportunity to make it permanent.) We reminisced a bit, particularly about the co-worker—my immediate supervisor—who had anger management issues, Gary. Neither of us could remember his last name.

I played an assortment of games. My play was marginal. I missed more than my share of serves. But I improved over the morning.

George and I played against Greg—Angie’s husband—and Allan Cable. There were good games. George and I won the first 11-6 and the second game 11-8. I have to say, looking back hours later, that’s quite an accomplishment. Greg and Allan aren’t fantastic players—though Allan has won medals—but they certainly aren’t weak players. With George, I had just beaten them, twice, playing left-handed. That’s an accomplishment. It’s one thing to beat a weaker team, it’s another to beat to decent players. (At my prime right-handed, I was somewhat better than both, but that’s meaningless right now.)

Those two were my last games for the day. I was done about 12:15.

So?

I played ok today. Not so great to start, but I got better as the morning went on. George commented that I’m overall getting better—“not at the same level” (as my normal righty play)—but improving. He said my footwork is holding me back as well as not using my hips for power for my lefty backhand. He was impressed that I didn’t miss any of my service returns.

In the parking lot, George excitedly and proudly shared the previously forgotten last name: “Williams!” “Yes!”, I confirmed with a pleased smile. I’d been wracking my brain for days, trying to remember!

Number of days on a court: 269
Number of total hours: 739

To start at the beginning of this blog click on “1st Post” in the menu above.