Thursday, November 11, 2021 (Court Day #433)
It was a stunningly beautiful day today. As I drove to Skypark in the dark, my car read 60°. The time change was last Sunday, so the sun is long set by the time work wraps up these days. When I got to the courts a few minutes after 6:30, parking was overflowing well into the neighboring streets. I parked in an unorthodox fashion next to the walking path. I wasn’t the only one parking weirdly, cars were jammed in next to trees, for example.
There were a couple of dads and two young kids playing tennis. Then there were over 30 pickleball players. What is nutty is I had never seen nearly half of these players before! So many new faces!
Once I got into a game, I was rolling from one to next until the lights went off at 9:30. While I wasn’t perfect, I was playing very, very well. I was pleased.
I got to play in a game with Tim against Mike B. and Mark Dettle. Mark was playing some of his better play tonight. That was a really fun game. It was a battle. Mike is always a formidable opponent.
Maia asked if I’d mind giving her a ride to downtown Santa Cruz, I agreed and that apparently allowed her to play later into the evening. We ended up playing a series of games with Tim and Paul, then with Paul and his friend Eric—me swapping between Maia and Eric as my partners. Maia mentioned to Tim that I had been coaching her and a few others on Tuesday. I was impressed with her progress. “I’m officially addicted,” she shared. I chuckled, “Welcome to the club!”
Analysing Play
When I lose rallies, I try to take a few seconds to figure out what went wrong. Sometimes, it’s obvious, like a dink into the net. (Though I still don’t know why that happens sometimes!) Other times, like on a couple of shots from Mark Dettle tonight, the ball came to my upper paddle arm which is always awkward. A “chicken wing” shot. I have to wonder if I’m missing opportunities by not hitting more to my opponent’s paddle side between the hip and armpit when I’m attacking dinks at the net. Something to keep in mind.
Arm
My right arm felt pretty good. Nonetheless, I iced it anyway.
As I was about to crawl into bed, I checked my phone. There were a few texts—my wife reminding me to take our 6-month-old corgi puppy Pepper to the vet tomorrow morning, my bagpiping mentor saying he’d come by after work tomorrow to play along with me and one of my staff who is a current student of his—and one of those texts was Kristin L. more or less apologizing for her play and telling me that I’m a “great player”. Heck, I have bad days too. All good.
Friday, November 12, 2021 (No Play)
Today, the club sent out a notice that Derby Park will be closed a couple of days—Wednesday and Thursday—next week while the city repairs the cracks in the courts there. The surface definitely needs some TLC!
Number of days on a court: 433
Number of total hours: 2,131.5
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