It started before the match where my concentration was not on my opponent, but on my wrist. I've recently run out of Johnson & Johnson athletic tape that I brought from home. A good tape job with J&J tape is the difference between feeling no pain in my wrist during a match and feeling a great deal of pain. They don't sell J&J tape over here, or really athletic tape of any kind, so I've had to use a variety of tapes from the pharmacies. They are vastly inferior to J&J and I haven't found a good combination yet. During warm up every backhand I hit is agony, it feels like I'm being stabbed in the wrist. Not only am I not thinking about winning, I'm not even thinking about tennis, I'm just thinking about what I can do to stop this pain. The answer is a combination of a couple of Advil and scores of wrist circles to get the muscles to loosen up and relax. But this is not a grade A answer, it's a C+ answer at best. And I know that I'm going to have to play this whole match with a mild throbbing in my godforsaken left arm.
We start off trading 3 service breaks to make the score 2-1 in favor of my opponent. Then I squander a 0-40 lead in the next game and before I know I'm down 4-1. The margin in tennis is so slim in this respect. Here I was a simple point away from evening the score at 2-2 and 2 minutes later I'm down 4-1. And this is all I can think about. Not the point I'm playing, not the game I'm playing, but how in the world I missed that sitter volley at 0-40. I'm still thinking about it 4 games later when I concede the first set 1-6.
 |
| During my match I spent much more time thinking about the lovely Hendaye beaches than hitting the tennis ball. |
Now my opponent is a 2/6 Spaniard who plays quite well, but I'm making him look great. If I can just get a few more balls in the court he'll come back down to earth, but I can't focus. Not for 5 shots, hardly for 3. I'm quickly down 0-3 in the second. Now I have a monumental deficit to overcome so I try and decrease the scope of the task at hand. "Just 1 game Max. Just win 1 game. If you win 1 game at least you won't lose 0-6 and be embarrassed. Just 1 game." I win the game. But I only asked my mind for 1 game, so that's all it gives. I quickly shed the next two . Now it's 1-5. My opponent tries to win the next game with flash and makes 4 quick errors to make it 5-2 but he quickly buckles back down and ends the match with an ace. I lose 1-6, 2-6 to an opponent who was good, but oh so beatable.
 |
| Cool hotel overlooking the beach. |
Fortunately the town we're in is a beautiful beach town so right after my match Frankie and I walk to the beach, rent some surfboards, and lounge in the sand all afternoon. The depressing after effects of losing ebb away quite fast paddling into perfect waves. We're headed down to the beach again today and then tomorrow we had to Bunol to try and find the campground we have a reservation at. The campground is apparently in the park right next to where the tomato festival is taking place. But it's hard to really know because the Spaniards aren't as into their camping as the French so their websites are awful and very confusing. In fact I only found the campground on some obscure 'La Tomatina' discussion forum and haphazardly e-mailed the guy last night in hope of a reservation. Despite their being 20,000 people expected at the festival the campground still had openings because it's nearly impossible to even figure out they have a campground in the city. I just got very lucky. I'll try to post tomorrow but if not it probably won't be until post-festival. Wish us luck.
 |
| Frank getting his surf on. |
A quick aside, and I've said this before, if you visit France and want to see more of the country than just Paris (which you should, Paris is nice but has been our least favorite city) you HAVE to come to the southwest corner of the country. It is a little slice of heaven down here. Beautiful beaches, perfect waves, and great weather, not much more you can ask for.
 |
| This morning there was even a rainbow and you could see the end! (Excuse my finger) |
-Max
No comments:
Post a Comment