Not Good Enough

Sets 102-104 (of 365):

Stuart vs. G. at Travis Country. Winner: G. 2-6, 6-3, 6-4.
Ladder Match #10

My Mojo: Struggling

Today I felt like I had to fight really hard to get any points at all. Though the score was lopsided in the first set, it was still a tough contest. The difference was that my serve was working for me. In the next couple of sets, I think he got more used to my serve and my game and was able to edge me out.

Also, whenever I moved to the sunny side of the court, I could not see at all when I was serving, especially on the deuce side, because the sun was right in my eyes. I ended up serving from the far side of the court on the deuce side, like a doubles serve, just to try to get an angle where I was out of the sun. And on the ad side, I just served weakly. I won very few of these points on the sunny side.

I have noticed that sometimes when the sun is in my eyes, it really bothers me, and sometimes I hardly notice it. But when it is bothering me, I can hardly figure out what to do about it, and I usually lose. I haven't figured out the cause-and-effect direction yet, though; I don't know whether I get bothered because my game is struggling, or my game is struggling because I get bothered. Either way, it sucks when it doesn't work. I can't put all the fault on my inability to deal with the sun, though, as my strokes were tentative and my placement was not good. An a lot of my edge shots seemed to be going out, which is a sign of a lost cause unless I can figure out how to pull it together. So I lost my second match in a row, after having that hot streak.