Another week over

Another week here in Florida is over. Another week filled with such promise, gone. Tennis is such a cruel sport sometimes. You can practice for hours on end but once you get into a match it can be a whole different story. You can play the best match of your life but you can still lose. The outcome is uncontrollable. Someone must win and someone must lose. It's just tough going week to week not playing the way I am in practice. I'm too focused on results right now and that needs to change. Maybe the next go around I need to just think screw it, I'm going to go for it and I don't care what the result is. Nobody wants to lose, but playing not to lose can be detrimental to anyone's game. Case in point this weeks match in Orlando. I played a former teammate of mine. I get out to a good lead then back off by playing not to lose. And guess what happened I lost. But now that I've calmed down about it I realized what I did and I can only try to fix the problem which is something I can control. But here's a recap.

First set I was nervous the entire time. My legs were tingling the whole time. Somehow I was still able to move. My first serve was complete crap. I probably made 5 first serves the whole set. I guess my 2nd serve was effective though. I was playing my game plan but still didn't feel relaxed. Still felt like I was holding back. I won the first 6-3.

In the second I continued to play my game and found myself up 4-2 when she called a trainer because she fell on the clay. So I sat down waiting for the treatment to be completed and then that next game I was up 40-15 on her serve. I get a forehand return which I hit cross court, she hits it to my backhand I run around to hit a forehand inside out and went after it but missed it long. Then the next point she aces me out wide. Then lose the game. Now 4-3. And lose the next 3 games. Still getting treatment and moving her wrist back and forth in between points can really screw with your head too. But I don't think that had anything to do with my loss. 

Then in the third set we change ends at 0-1 and I asked the umpire for a bag of ice because it was hot and humid, I wanted to try to cool down during change overs. But as I'm asking some other official comes over and asks her "Just real quick, what do you want for lunch?" They go back and forth about what's on the menu and I just walk to the other side of the court... I didn't get my bag of ice until 2 change overs later. When I had to ask again on the first changeover. Like really?!  Don't worry about us players busting our ass out here. I hope your lunch was delicious though! But in the match I got broken and that was enough. She didn't do anything to hurt me, nothing at all. I just over played everything because there was no pace and the balls landed up the middle and I tried to do too much. I'm kicking myself now because it's something simple to fix. And I was telling myself in the match what was happening I just couldn't physically do it. I did everything right until the middle of the second set but just stopped doing what was right because I wanted to protect my lead and not really win it. I had an aggressive game plan but I had a doubtful mindset. I wasn't fully 100% commited to playing aggressive. Tennis isn't like any other sport. Without a clock you have to win the last point, you can't just run out the clock like basketball of football. And that's something I need to work on. That killer instinct to finish off my opponents. I'm near the finish line in my matches I just need to sprint to the end. I have another tournament next week and I'm barely in the qualifying so it's a tough tournament but screw it right? I've already lost early in the past two tournaments so what's the worst I can do, break even. Time to just swing for the fences and stay focused on each point. One at a time.