The Skills Have Been Tested

This weekend I had the first squash tournament of my young career. I've taken up squash and fallen in love. I've made it my personal goal to excel in squash. Most people would be happy to just play and probably just stay at whatever level they are at. After only a few months of squash, I came to the conclusion that mediocrity just won't do for me. I think I got this from golf. In golf I currently play with the best at the club and (some of the time) compete with them, if not work to compete with them. Wether it's tournaments or sunday golf, all I won't to do is be better then all the guys I play with. The same has happened with Squash.

The squash leagues at White Oaks is set up in 4 divisions, and each team has 6 levels of players on it. 1 through 6, A, B, C, and D leagues. Unfortunatly, squash is much more difficult then I thought, and I find myself in the D division, at a level 3. I started in october at a level 5, so I am improving. Obviously my ultimate goal is to be A -1, but for now I'm just shooting for C division and I'll move on from there.

So the tourny.

Started off on friday night. I was to face another D lister and I honestly thought I would breeze right through the match. Unfortunatly, my opponent had a crazy forhand serve that I struggled with. He would hit the ball with a lot of speed and low, so it came screaching to the back corner everytime low and hard to the the one place i struggle on the court, backhand return. Last tuesday at my lesson I worked on this return for the whole time. I know it's my weakness and it's frustrating as hell, but I can't do anything but work on it and get better at the return. To say the least, I wasn't prepared to face someone who's strength was serving to the backhand. I put up a decent fight for this match, but the serve proved to be to much for me and I lost 3 games to 0. Not the start to my tournament experience I was looking for.

Oh well, onto the consolation round of the D league. Atleast winning this bracket would be something to build on. I was to face another guy I've never played or seen. This match was much better. Again playing someone on my own level and feeling good about my game after a good nights sleep I was ready to move on in the win coloum. This match was a real battle. First game he took 10 -8. I was hitting all my shots, serve was good, drop shot was on point, and I was feeling good. I took the next 2 games to go up 2-1. Unfortunatly, I couldn't put him away in the 4th game and we were all tied up at 2. The last game was one of the toughest games I've ever played. My opponent got off to a quick start and I found myself down 6-0. I fought so hard. There had to be 10 points back and forth before I finally got on the board. I started to make a run. Next thing I know we are tied at 6. I'm soooo back in this. I then got up 7-6, but lost my serve on the next point. Unfortunatly, that would be the end of me as he took the next 3 points to win 9-7 and take the match. I took some good things from this match. First off, I should I could battle back. secondly, I played my shots and didn't let him dictate the game or pace. This match really could have gone either way.

So now I find myself in the consolation round of the consolation round. Pretty sad. Playing the losers who were gauranteed 3 games, but suck. So i came back saturday night and played some schmuck. Warming up I knew I was going to kill him. I took the match in about 15 mins. 9-1, 9-0, 9-2. Then in the finals of the shittiest players in the tourny, I was hoping for a decent match atleast, but again found myself up against another weak player. This time is was some 12 or 13 year old kid. Don't get me wrong, there is a few 12-16 year old kids at the club that could be playing in A division, but this kid just sucked. I actually felt kind of bad kicking his ass, but what am I supposed to do? It's a tournament. So i took the first game 9-4, then 9-2, lost my concentration and lost a game 7-9, but then took the last one easily 9-1. So i was the big winner of the biggest losers.

All in all, it was a great time. I got some good experience. My first 2 matches had quite a few people watching, which was pretty cool, even the support after the game everyone telling me how well i did for someone who just started out was good. and it was fun. Definitly looking forward to the next one, just have to work a little harder to make sure I play better.