I love tennis.
written: 5:35 p.m. on Tuesday, May. 26, 2009

1. The joint between my thumb and palm on my left hand is hurting. Badly. Badly. It's this strange numbing, stinging pain which appeared out of nowhere. Shit. How am I going to play tennis in an hour and a half's time?

2. I had this stupid dream in which both Roger and Nadal crashed out of the French Open before the final (Roger lost in a five-setter somewhere around the QF stage, with the last set being something like 3-6, or 2-6), and Novak Djokovic won because, for some weird reason, he had no opponent in the final. Clearly I'm spending way too much time on this tennis thing.

3. Speaking of spending too much time on tennis, I just spent my entire afternoon watching the 2001 Round 4 Wimbledon match between Roger and Pete Sampras. Which Roger won. After which he proceeded to lose the next round and only won Wimbledon two years later (and then some). It was crazy - lots of serving. A lot, a lot of serving. Both players hit over 20 aces and in the last set their first serve percentages were both over 80. Which is crazy. There were maybe 5 groundstrokes rallies throughout the whole five-set match, and the longest rally of the match was something like, 6 shots. It was weird seeing Roger rush the net virtually after every serve, and the few times he stayed back to hit from the back of the court, he lost as many points as he won (if memory serves). It was a really long match, and match point was a return-of-serve winner Roger hit from his forehand side. I waited over three hours to see his winning moment and it was over in less than three seconds. Isn't that great? I actually would've preferred more baseline rallies; there were too much serving and volleying. In contrast, though, tennis as it's played today has too many baseline rallies, and seeing all these serving and volleying was a tad strange. I can't wait for Wimbledon to start.

4. I have concluded from my two successful attempts at hitting passing winners that it's much easier to hit a passing winner than a winning volley. I played with this young dude on Sunday who thought I was some pro or something and kept rushing the net, attempting to win the point with a volley, as if he thought I could keep up or whatever. But you know what? Amazingly, I kind of did. Maybe his volley wasn't deep or crisp enough or whatever but the absolute highlight of that afternoon was this WTF forehand pass I hit which the young dude couldn't return. Unfortunately, I honestly can't remember how I did it, if I even turned on my brain as I did it. Maybe it just happened randomly. But it was still a winning pass - from my forehand. The damn forehand which I so hated a few months ago. Gah, this is wonderful.

***

Eating now. Playing tennis soon. Yay.

before sunrise // before sunset


Previously:
- - Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017
I'm moving. - Sunday, Jul. 11, 2010
In all honesty - Tuesday, Jul. 06, 2010
What I want for my birthday... - Sunday, Jul. 04, 2010
On Roger's behalf. - Friday, Jul. 02, 2010