Friday, October 19, 2018 (Court Day #216)

Being that I’d be working six days this week and staffing was ok for a change, I opted to take the morning off and play. I arrived at Brommer Park at 9:35 under sunny skies. It would be a beautiful day. A game was already underway.

Tom Sherwood, Christine (I think) and Terry Long. Tish on the nearside of the right court.

I played a number of games. My play was mixed. Pretty good, but I did make some boneheaded mistakes. Execution errors mostly. My shot selection was generally pretty good.

The game of the day was Eric and David against me and Ted/Theo. After an early very contested point, David exclaimed, “What kind of game did I get myself into?” Eric made an uncharacteristic number of errors and Ted went on a lobbing spree—at least half a dozen in the game—most of which resulted in a lost point. Ted knew it wasn’t working: “There I did it again. I can’t help myself.” I get it, I was popping up dinks randomly recently with no explanation. Play autopilot. Reprogramming is necessary. It was a good game—ok, Ted and I led the whole game. David is a good, consistent player. Sure, he made some errors, but, boy, solid player.

Eric resting his eyes, David Sewell from Bakersfield, and sweaty me. Ted B. took the photo for me and told us to take off our caps so our faces wouldn’t be in shadow.

I left at 12:30 to head to home then to work. This was a good day of play and an overall good day of my performance.

Delamination!

Between games, I noticed my paddle’s face was delaminating from the core. There are parts of your paddle that you never want to see!

I emailed Paddletek with photos of my Tempest Wave to see if they’d be willing to send me a replacement under warranty. I guess that would solve the autographs on the face versus santioning! I was listening to the Pickleball Kitchen podcast and Barrett Kincheloe—who is a Tempest Wave fan—and he bought a Prince paddle to test out. He’s a paddle nerd and tries a lot of paddles, but has always come back to the Tempest. This time though, he said he really likes the Prince and might just stick with it.

Number of days on a court: 216
Number of total hours: 592.5

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Thursday, October 18, 2018 (Court Day #215)

Is it bad if one of your staff cuts himself pretty good and you are worried that you might have to take him to the doctor and miss part or all of pickleball? Yep, that was me today. Turned out his mom took him in and not even stitches were required. Excellent.

I haven’t played since Sunday’s tournament. My back has been sore, so I decided to take it easy.

I got to Skypark a few minutes before the 6:30 starting time. I had to leave work 5 minues before closing to pull it off.

Craig and Leah on the left. Plus Paul, Beth, Eddy and Lauren.

Sue and I played a game against Paul—who I met last week—and Eddy, We were losing 8-1 but made a game of it and lost 11-9 or 11-8.

The game of the night was Sharyl and me against Oleg and Beth Black. “This will be a tough one,” I told a smiling partner before the game. It was much closer than I was expecting. They did win, but by only two points, 11-9. Good game.

Mark Dettle had to leave early, so we all pulled down nets at 8:30 to head home.

My take away from tonight. I hit a slam into the net. My serving was very reliable. I hit two backhand drives into the net. I played pretty overall, but made some poorly executed shots. I hit a couple of high shots toward the net and my partner had to pay the price. Not good.

I will say, where others will duck or wince in the face of a slam, I’ll be right there ready to take it on. So I get a little credit there!

Number of days on a court: 215
Number of total hours: 589

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Sunday, October 14, 2018 (Court Day #214)
San Juan Bautista Tournament

I arrived at John P.’s house at 7:45 a.m. John was driving this time. On the way, he shared that he thought we might be able to win this tournament. After about 45 minutes on the road, we got to the school where the courts are at about 8:25, it appeared that we were late arrivers as there were plenty of people there already. It was overcast, but burned off after a couple games to warm temperatures.

The sign later after the sun came out.

Jennifer, behind the table, ran the tournament with the help of the young man in red.

Players warming up before the tournament started.

There would be six teams participating in our 3.5 skill bracket, with games to 15 points, win by 2.

Game #1

John and I went up fast in this first game against Jack and Mark, to a 5-0 lead. (Jack looked familiar and, in fact, had visited Santa Cruz once to play.) Jack and Mark dialed it in though and came back. They—especially Mark—were lobbing John a lot, maybe half a dozen times. Being it’s a difficult shot to deal with, sometimes John would make a good return on those and sometimes not. Once I got into a battle with Mark; I was at the net and he was back. I would blast the ball and he’d manage to return it. This went on for 3-4 exchanges but even with his disadvantage, he won the point. Drat. John and I lost 15-12. After, it overheard a woman describing our game as “a really good one”.

Game #2

We went up against Santa Cruz locals (English) Alan and Karl. It was back and forth. Karl was our target, but Karl was playing pretty well—he’s gotten much better in recent months. John and I were down 10-13, but came back and won 16-14.

Game #3

Dave D. and Bob got absolutely clobbered by John and me. The final was 15-0. After this game, Jennifer asked the result. I told her and she shared that Dave and Bob started a mere 3 months ago and that they would have been in 3.0 but there weren’t enough players for a 3.0 bracket.

Shockingly, later, Dave and Bob beat Alan and Karl! Alan and Karl lost every game—I would have bet cold hard cash that that dubious honor would have gone to Dave D. and Bob.

Game #4

SCPC members Dave Cox and Art would be our opponents for this one. In this game, Art would be our target as John was clearly theirs. Art dinked crosscourt to my forehand, and I thought it’d be wide enough, but my “around the post” attempt bounced off the post. I couldn’t help but think of Terry Long’s admonishment of me some weeks back at a club drill day when I missed such a shot wide, “You tried to be the hero, but now you’re off the court!” (Players were rotating off after an unforced error.)

When Dave’s service gave them several points in a row, we called time out. We set our paddles in place down on the court and walked to the baseline. “So. What are you having for dinner?” We’d called time out just to see if we could break Dave’s service. “I’m not sure what we’re having for dinner. What are you having for dinner?” This went on for a minute then we walked back to our places. “Are you guys ready”, asked Dave. “We have our dinner plans all worked out,” I called back. Dave was the second server. We won that point. Side out.

A few of John’s drop shots ended up in the net and two of my overhead smashes also ended up in the net. *sigh*

After I personally gave up two points in a row with unforced errors, I dropped my paddle from my hand onto the court, absolutely disgusted. (It’s the only time I’ve ever dropped my paddle.) “Time out!” John consoled me and we went back to playing.

This game was a surprise. I wasn’t expecting the one that we got. Art did all right. It was back and forth but, in the end, we lost 16–14.

Game #5

Our final game was against the team to beat, Alex and Dave. They hadn’t lost a match. They took a quick 2-0 lead and it looked bad. But we flipped that around and lead 4-2. It was back and forth. Soon it was 8-8. Then they went on a run to 13-8. In the end, it was a 15-9 loss, but it was a great game of some awesome rallies. After one such contested point, a woman watching while waiting clapped in appreciation. John missed an ATP shot, hitting it about 3-4 feet too deep and wide. A few points later, I got what Alex called the “shot of the day”—an ATP winner off the right side. I teased John, “I got mine!” I also got Dave with a body shot. Of course, those were all for naught.

Oh, and mid-game, during a brief dink rally, Alex leap to the side of the kitchen (my forehand side). I recognized immediately that he was attempting an erne shot. I dinked crosscourt away from him and he returned to his spot behind the kitchen line. This was the first time I’d even seen an attempted erne in a game that I was playing. Kudos to Alex. Kudos to me for not falling for it!

Results

Being the eternal optimist, I figured we were likely out of the running, but was hoping we’d still somehow be in the mix for a medal, but no dice. We finished 4th out of the 6 teams. If we’d beaten Dave Cox and Art—a 4 point swing—we would have ended up with bronze. Alas.

The medalists. Dave & Art (bronze), Alex & Dave (gold), Jack & Mark (silver).

We were on the road home by noon. We made a stop at an ice cream shop on the way through town, that was relished!

I didn’t feel that I played particularly badly, but I did mess up some shots. Too many, regardless. I left a gap once or twice between John and me that lead to points for the other team. I slammed two overheads into the net. A few of my crosscourt dinks were too high. Two of my body shots attempts got dodged. I was depressed afterward. Yes, still work to do.

“I guess we’re still 3.5s.”, confided John on the drive home. Me? I had no doubt we were still 3.5 players. (Of course, the USAPA even considers me a 3.0—3.446 rounded down.) I think John got his hopes up since he’s been playing in older age brackets. “We didn’t bring our ‘A game’ today,” he added.

On that the upside, I think I only missed 2-3 of my serves all morning. I think John may have even missed more than me. I made some highlight shots and was part of some highlight rallies.

I desperately wish that I’d recorded the games for analysis. It would have been so valuable.

Paddle

Toward the end of the morning, in the waiting area, Jack pointed out something important: “You want to be careful with the paddle in a sanctioned tournament, they won’t let you play with it.” Drat! I’d forgotten that rule! That is, the autographs on my paddle exceeded the limits of markings on the face. The USAPA only allows 1/2″ around the edges and 1″ at the bottom by the handle. I have to start thinking about a new paddle.

Number of days on a court: 214
Number of total hours: 587

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