Saturday, September 7, 2019
This morning was all about racquetball from 8-1. Ari Brown and I partnered up for this bi-annual club staple tournament that I hadn't won in more than five or so years.
I knew we'd be dangerous; the question was how dangerous. I've been playing well lately and my drive serves to the lefthand side have been tough to return, especially when the courts get humid. Ari’s serves on the righthand side have also caused problems for players. They're hard to handle and he puts nice spin on the ball that makes it tough to anticipate. Ari also does a nice job mixing things up. George struggled with Ari's serves Thursday night. We have a nice one-two punch that we bring to our game, along with total aggression and a killer instinct. Now that I also have Tom’s RunFar pre-workout energy powder...
...I was hopeful I would last through round robin play and playoffs into the finals. I gave Ari two words to consider: win and terrorize. We did both today. We won our first three of four matches, losing 14-15 against a tough Joel/Luis team and beating Roger and John 15-10, Tyrone and Heather 15-7, and Jim and Kevin 15-3. In our last round robin match we faced Freddy and Mike. Freddy is a phenomenal player and Ari got to experience for the first time the speed, accuracy, spin, and pure athleticism of a gifted open level player. But it was Mike’s great lob serves that threw Ari off. They killed us 3-15. Luckily, we still had enough points to make the playoffs as third seed in our division. We faced Steve and Kirk in our quarter final match, our fellow morning crew mates. Ari and I had beaten Steve and Kirk in our last two outings, and I saw no reason why things would change today. Also, Steve's wife Linda and his parents were in the gym watching, so I thought that might actually give us the edge (because sometimes players get nervous when their loved ones watch them play).
Ari and I jumped to an early lead and kept the pressure up, winning 15-7 and advancing to the semis. Ari was pumped! He felt good and was determined to win the whole thing. I liked our chances, considering the playoff pairings. We'd already beaten John and Roger once and I liked how we matched up against them. They took a quick lead and we were playing catch-up all the way, falling behind 11-14. Luckily, we got the serve back, but I didn't score any points against John. So it was up to Ari to get four points in-a-row...which he did! Four great ace serves did it for us and we were in the finals! Kim and Will beat Freddy and Mike, so we were up against the other open player team (Will). I'd never played with Kim before but I know she's very good and keeps the ball in play. Will, a lefty, is also phenomenal, as fine a player as Freddy and really smart with his shot selection. We took an early 5-0 lead, then were ahead 12-4, before Will started serving these outrageously difficult cross-court serves that had both me and Ari tied in knots. Before we knew it, we were behind 13-14. They had five match points serves against us, but somehow we dodged all the bullets. Again, Ari served up two incredible, difficult serves to Kim and the final point gave us our championship.
This may be the sweetest win I've ever had at the club.
The level of competition was ridiculous, and Ari had never played in one these before, We had a blast all morning long and played really well to accomplish our objective, which was to win and terrorize. Lunch at La Cheval never tasted so good!
I texted Ari later, asking him if he wanted a big ass trophy...
... or a big wall plaque.
Ari responded, "How about a monument in front of the club."
I love it! Thanks to Tom's magical energy formula, I wasn't too sore and could still move around enough to do a load of all my wet racquetball laundry. There was a party at Richard and Lisa's, so Alice took BART over and I picked her up at 5. We headed over to the Youngs around 6. Everyone was there but unfortunately Miles had to leave for school earlier today.
Lisa made the best fried chicken ever! It was so delicious!
We stayed until 10 or so, then headed back to SF. Wow, what a day!
This morning was all about racquetball from 8-1. Ari Brown and I partnered up for this bi-annual club staple tournament that I hadn't won in more than five or so years.
I knew we'd be dangerous; the question was how dangerous. I've been playing well lately and my drive serves to the lefthand side have been tough to return, especially when the courts get humid. Ari’s serves on the righthand side have also caused problems for players. They're hard to handle and he puts nice spin on the ball that makes it tough to anticipate. Ari also does a nice job mixing things up. George struggled with Ari's serves Thursday night. We have a nice one-two punch that we bring to our game, along with total aggression and a killer instinct. Now that I also have Tom’s RunFar pre-workout energy powder...
...I was hopeful I would last through round robin play and playoffs into the finals. I gave Ari two words to consider: win and terrorize. We did both today. We won our first three of four matches, losing 14-15 against a tough Joel/Luis team and beating Roger and John 15-10, Tyrone and Heather 15-7, and Jim and Kevin 15-3. In our last round robin match we faced Freddy and Mike. Freddy is a phenomenal player and Ari got to experience for the first time the speed, accuracy, spin, and pure athleticism of a gifted open level player. But it was Mike’s great lob serves that threw Ari off. They killed us 3-15. Luckily, we still had enough points to make the playoffs as third seed in our division. We faced Steve and Kirk in our quarter final match, our fellow morning crew mates. Ari and I had beaten Steve and Kirk in our last two outings, and I saw no reason why things would change today. Also, Steve's wife Linda and his parents were in the gym watching, so I thought that might actually give us the edge (because sometimes players get nervous when their loved ones watch them play).
Ari and I jumped to an early lead and kept the pressure up, winning 15-7 and advancing to the semis. Ari was pumped! He felt good and was determined to win the whole thing. I liked our chances, considering the playoff pairings. We'd already beaten John and Roger once and I liked how we matched up against them. They took a quick lead and we were playing catch-up all the way, falling behind 11-14. Luckily, we got the serve back, but I didn't score any points against John. So it was up to Ari to get four points in-a-row...which he did! Four great ace serves did it for us and we were in the finals! Kim and Will beat Freddy and Mike, so we were up against the other open player team (Will). I'd never played with Kim before but I know she's very good and keeps the ball in play. Will, a lefty, is also phenomenal, as fine a player as Freddy and really smart with his shot selection. We took an early 5-0 lead, then were ahead 12-4, before Will started serving these outrageously difficult cross-court serves that had both me and Ari tied in knots. Before we knew it, we were behind 13-14. They had five match points serves against us, but somehow we dodged all the bullets. Again, Ari served up two incredible, difficult serves to Kim and the final point gave us our championship.
This may be the sweetest win I've ever had at the club.
 |
| Active Sports Doubles Tournament Champions - Summer 2019! |
I texted Ari later, asking him if he wanted a big ass trophy...
... or a big wall plaque.
Ari responded, "How about a monument in front of the club."
I love it! Thanks to Tom's magical energy formula, I wasn't too sore and could still move around enough to do a load of all my wet racquetball laundry. There was a party at Richard and Lisa's, so Alice took BART over and I picked her up at 5. We headed over to the Youngs around 6. Everyone was there but unfortunately Miles had to leave for school earlier today.
Lisa made the best fried chicken ever! It was so delicious!
We stayed until 10 or so, then headed back to SF. Wow, what a day!
No comments:
Post a Comment