Ouch!

Sets 7-9 (of 365)

Stuart vs. A. at Pharr. Winner: A. 6-0, 6-0, 6-1.

My mojo: Average

The guy I played was really good (probably the best I have played against yet in this series), but I was not anticipating well, not getting good bite on the ball, hitting out too much, then undercompensating and hitting the net. I was not anticipating that his topspin would bounce the ball so high (duh). I could definitely have won more games in this series, IMHO. On the plus side, I didn’t tire at all, and got better as I went along. Once I started getting farther behind the baseline, I did much better.

Promising signs are: I have several matches set up in the next couple of weeks (though they are mostly clustered on the weekends, I need to work on the weekdays). Also, I have made a table of all the people I have contacted, and graded the responses I have gotten from "not promising" to "really enthusiastic" based on whether I think the opponents are likely to blow me off or play me repeatedly. Five sets in three days moves me along a little better.

One big bad is the weather, which threatens to pour rain over the weekend and the first part of next week. So I may lose some of the weekend matches and probably should not make any plans for Monday or Tuesday.