Saturday, July 16, 2022 (Court Day #518)
As I was driving to Apodaca Park, the back of my right hand was mildly hurting. It’s the same injury that forced me to play lefty a month or two ago. But once on the courts, it did not hamper anything today.
I was once again the first person at the courts. The second one was Alicia and we weren’t even at the gate yet when Mike was walking over from another direction. Our fourth would be Mack, who I hadn’t met previously. Mack is not a strong player—a 3.0 probably—but is very friendly.
In a game against Larry and Buddy, after I missed a shot, I turned to Kathleen and said, “I need to bend my knees more”, then I demonstrated with a deep knee bend. Unfortunately, when I did that, my right knee was a bit painful on the outside. Maybe that’s why I subconsciously don’t crouch and get low sometimes, I’ll have to monitor that.
Tough Competition
The level of play got better and better over the three days that I played. Today, a weekend day, I was no longer in the running for the best player on the courts. There was Ramon from El Paso (about 45 minutes away) and his friend Manny. I’d say both are solid 4.0 players. There was also Ron and another good player whom I didn’t get to play against.
Daryl and I played against Manny and Ramon. Daryl and I both played well, but were no match for our opponents. I believe the final score was 11-5. I didn’t feel bad about my play at all, like I said, I played well. Sure, I might want a couple of shots back, but we were simply outclassed.
I had another game against Manny and Ramon, paired with Walt, but Daryl was a stronger player. After the first game, the wind was out of my sails and I made a number of uncharacteristic errors in this game and the result was more lopsided than the previous game. That game I did not feel good about!
Manny and Ramon were looking for different opponents after that game and I don’t blame them. (I wanted another crack, but that wasn’t happening.)
Last Game
My last game was with Jeff against Kathleen and a young Asian fellow named Paul. I’d put Paul as a high 3.5 or a low 4.0. Paul is very quick getting around the court and also accurate. Hats off to him. Frustrating for me, there were three crosscourt dinks from Kathleen to my backhand. In this game, I popped up three of them and Paul put them away each time. Inexcusable. Also, I hit a great low angled shot fully expecting it to be a winner, but Paul was able to race to it and hit an absolutely fantastic ATP. Kudos.
Invitation
Mid-session, Mike asked for my contact information so we could play a tournament together someday. (It’s more likely that he’d come out to California than me traveling elsewhere for a tournament.) I agreed to give it to him but forgot later.
Time Expired
At 9:30, it was time to head back to the hotel. My daughter Charlotte was picking us up at 10 a.m. to take us to a local street fair before we fly back home late this afternoon. I said my goodbyes.
Today, I left the courts a bit frustrated and doing some reflection. I should be able to hang with 4.0 players, that’s a reasonable goal.
Flight
I got the book, History of Pickleball, a couple of years ago but never bothered to read it. During the flights home—there were two legs, kind of like in this photo!—I got a good jump on it. I would have written it differently, but the meat is all there and provides a good overview of the ”growing up” that pickleball has done over the decades.
New Mexico was fun, but it’ll be nice to be home to cooler weather.
Number of days on a court: 518
Number of total hours: 2,391
To start at the beginning of this blog click on “1st Post” in the menu above.
Leave a Reply