It certainly was a fun and exciting run for me, but all things must come to an end, and today was that day for me. The power of the girl I was playing today was too much for me to overcome as I tried everything in my arsenal, but she just came back with her punishing shots and it was too much for me to handle on this day.
Physically, my opponent was much stronger than me and that is something that I will really be able to work on with strengthening and just my body maturing as I age. My opponent today was two years old than I, and in less than a month she is going to be embarking on a new journey into the NCAA level of her tennis career which I feel she will do very well. I am not there yet and that is okay. I only turned 16 a few months ago and still have time to grow physically and in my game. I know I will get there. I may never have the strength and pace of the shots this girl has, but my game will develop in the next two years where I will become much stronger in a different way.
Now onto the match which lasted about an hour. Quite different from the previous match the day before. I started off the match with the game plan of attempting to change the pace of the shots. Quickly, I saw that was not going to work as my opponent adjusted and right off the bat broke my serve. The next thing you know, I was down 3-0 in the set. The strength of her service game was also extremely difficult to handle, and in the entire match I was unable to break her serve. I believe in all the players other than grown men that I have practiced with, her serve was the hardest serve I have ever faced. I lost the first set 6-2.
In yesterday’s match when I lost the first set, I developed another strategy that worked , but in this match I just could not think of anything. I was as hard as I would have tried not going to hit with as much pace as this girl so that was not going to be my new strategy, and I was already trying to play my game of slowing down the pace with slice and that wasn’t working. I stuck to my game and it basically was more of the same as the first set. My serve was broken right away and I was trying to play catch up on a serve that was very difficult for me to do much on. It was kind of like someone playing John Isner or Nick Kyrgios and playing from behind and having to break their serves. Not really likely to happen. It didn’t happen, and I ended up losing the second set 6-2 and bowing out of the tournament to a girl who played an awesome match.
The remaining players in the tournament for the Semi- Finals are the top 4 seeded players, and they are all 18 years of age. I may go watch some of the matches if I feel like it in the next two days as it should be some good tennis. I had a wonderful time in the tournament and met some great girls and I’m really proud that I made it to the QF’s and was the youngest to make it that far.
I want to thank everyone who supported me through this and read my blog. I am sorry, I could not have won the whole thing, but I did my best and I had fun doing it.
I like that you enjoyed the match, and that the tournament was a good learning experience. Most important, you “lost”, but you were not defeated; you simply ran into a better player, that is ahead on the curve to learning to play this game.
I hope you will play more tournaments and will continue your road towards improvement. And, although this comes from a stranger: be proud of how you played. I am sure those that love you and support you, are.
I really appreciate those kind words. I will most certainly keep playing and learning and improving. I should have asked my opponent what university she was going to be attending in the Fall, but I forgot in the moment. She is going to be very successful. I am quite proud of how I played and I know no matter how I play that that love me will always love me. My coach said to me after the match, that I am still the best kid to coach in the world, but we still have things to work on.
Glad it was a good experience as well as providing feedback on your development. Great job on reaching the QF and thanks for sharing the experience with your blog posts. They were fun to read.
I appreciate your support throughout the tournament and it was not only fun playing in the tournament, but also fun doing the blogs. I hope I get the chance to do it again. I sometimes play in a tournament around the holidays that is an indoor tournament. So we shall see.