I'm officially back in Florida now taking a few days off after hurting my knee last week. But I just thought I would let you guys know what happened while in Jackson. So here we go.
Oh and know that I remember I don't think I finished letting you guys know what happened with doubles in Pelham, but we ended up losing to the number 1 seeds I think it was 6-7 4-6. But we played really well, we just made the mistakes on the big points, but the whole time we had chances but we just couldn't capitalized on them. Oh well you live you learn right?
Anyway in Jackson we got to play at this very nice Country Club and when I say 'nice' I mean white tables cloths everywhere, 5 star food, and even had white hand towels in the bathroom to dry your hands with, not paper towels or those air dryers that never work...So to me this place was wicked nice. But back to tennis. They had about 12 clay courts and 3 hard courts. The main court sat next to the club house where members could sit in the shade and watch some tennis while enjoying food and drinks. (I wish I took pictures to show you all, but I didn't, and I don't know why. Next time I'll remember to do so.) But the facility was great. If all tournaments were held at places like this one then I would sign up for each and every one.
The tournament started on Sunday but I was fortunate enough to receive a bye. So I spent my Sunday practicing twice and doing 30 minutes of cardio and after I got to watch a little bit of my opponent. Then I Monday I played my 1st round against a girl from Taipei who didn't hit the ball hard and didn't hit many winners either, she just ran down balls and didn't miss. But I got up an early break 3-0 and then my knee just went. I couldn't jump up to serve nor could I run to get balls. So at 3-2 I called the trainer over who taped it up and that didn't really do much of anything so I decided to give myself another game to see if the pain would go away but it didn't so I really though about retiring but I won that game so I kept playing. (Stupid me.) But the girl I was playing was dumber. She saw that I couldn't move but she just kept me in one corner of the court because that's what her coaches were telling her to do. (Yes they were coaching her, which is not allowed in tennis, so she was cheating.) So I didn't have to move much so I just decided to move her, but again she just kept hitting it to the same side and I just waited for an opportunity to hit my big shot to win the point. I ended up winning 6-4 7-5. Somehow I pulled it out without being able to move or serve, so I guess props to me. Haha.
The best part in that match was I had set point and my opponent was serving. As she goes to the line it starts to rain a little bit, but it's clay so you can keep playing. So she ends up missing her first serve, then looks and me and says and motions that she is stopping so she walks to her bag and is about to sit down. So I'm confused like 'what is happening?' so I find an ref and ask her if we are stopping play because it's raining and asked if the girl only gets one serve when we start up again because she stopped herself. The ref comes on the court and tries to explain to the girl that they didn't stop any matches so play needed to continue. But the girl wanted 2 serves again, and she tried to say I stopped so she needed two serves. I was like 'Are you kidding?' But the ref saw what happened and the girl lost her argument. She ended up double faulting the set away...
The next day I played a girl from the Memphis area. I knew how she played, hits big serves and big groundstrokes, but makes a lot of errors. I saw her watching the day before so I figured she would just run me around the court with my bad knee but she didn't. I ended up feeling pretty good that day after downing a bunch of Advil before the match so I could move around the court. I must have surprised her because I won 6-1 6-1. I was happy about it. I finally got into a main draw after about a 4 month drought. So I finally get to move up in the rankings even if it is a spot or two.
Then later that day Yasmin and I played doubles against Alex Mueller and Nicole Melichar and let's just say I'm close to 5'9'' and I was dwarfed by a good 4 inches. But big trees fall hard right? We won 6-4 6-3. It was a match that had only one break of serve so it was fun to play.
My first round match was against the number 6th seed from Argentina, Molinero. Just from knowing where she was from I knew she was going to be good on clay. I figured she would stay behind the baseline, running shots down, hitting with a lot of spin, well I was right. That is exactly what she did. She made my hit a lot of shots and in the end I made the mistake going after it trying to win the point. But you can't win if you miss. I lost 3-6 6-7. I had so many chances to break her. I think I had about 25 break points and only converted 1. So it was a match I could have won I just didn't. But the girl was good, I'm not taking anything away from her. I just lost it myself.
Later that afternoon I got my second chance to beat her, in doubles. Well we were close but again made mistakes when a big point was on the line. We won the first set, lost the second set, then lost 10-7 in the 10 point breaker that decides the match. Again all you can say is oh well. But it does suck to lose. Now I have 3 weeks until my next tournament so I'll just be practicing, working out, and getting my knee feeling better.
