Agony!

Sets 72-73 (of 365):

Stuart vs. C. at Northwest Park. Winner: Stuart 6-1, 6-2.

My Mojo: Physically Depleted, but Calm and Accurate

Well, I got to 70 sets before the end of January. I had been thinking that was going to be my goal for the month. With all the rain that has been happening, I had to scale down what I wanted to get accomplished for the month. I wanted to put some in the bank so when things happened later down the line that caused delay (and I'm sure they will), I would have some credit built up. I'm thinking maybe now I should aim for 74 or 75 by the end of the month, if the weather cooperates.

This morning, it was just hard to roll out of bed. After nearly playing for six hours yesterday, and then going to a party last evening and dancing for much of the time I was there, I was just dead this morning. I did manage to drag myself over to the site, and my opponent called and said he would probably be an hour late because his earlier match had gone long. I had no problem with that as it gave me even more time to recuperate, and also to go to a sporting goods store and get some stuff (see, they could be paying me money to plug them here).

But by the time I started the match, I still was not quite up to par. My legs hurt all the way up and down. I felt like they were made of stone, and every movement I made was laborious. I managed to play pretty well, though, by sort of "relaxing into the pain." This gave me a really good mental attitude and helped me almost completely eliminate my errors so it was up to my opponent to outplay me. And I was also relaxed enough to have some really killer placement of shots, so he couldn't quite get to the place he needed to so he could outplay me. He did get in some really good zingers every once in a while.

For the first three games, I won every point. Then he won the next game, and I only got one point in that game. This was the only game he won in the set. I was still calm, even though in pain, and managed to win the rest of the games. He seemed to get really upset with his play, made someself-deprecating comments, and threw his racquet a couple of times. His attitude helped me in the second set, because, God knows, my physical condition was not going to win the match for me.

In the second set, I won the first four games, and his attitude seemed to diminish his focus. After that, he won the two games he served. He got ahead by a couple points in each of those games, and I thought that I would not fight very hard, and I would save my energy for the games that I served, where I'd have a better chance at maintaining an offense. So I did lose both of those games that he served. I had a couple of tougher rallies with him than I expected in both, considering that I was essentially giving up in both games, though he did usually take the offense with his serve and take the points easily. But I won the two games that I served easily, and won the match.

He seemed to calm down immediately after the match ended, and we had a short and pleasant chat afterward. I told him that normally I would see if he wanted to play more, but today I was just dead. I guess I didn't really realize how much what I did yesterday would take out of me. Well, I have another match at 7:00 tonight, and I'll play it no matter what, probably. But I do have some time to relax, recuperate, invigorate, get some nutrition, and do whatever I need to do to be able to stand up and hit the ball tonight.