Tennis- An ode to my love!

 Intra apartment Tennis Tournament

After a gap of nearly 7 years I took part in a tennis tournament at my apartment community in Bangalore. Unlike the younger days when I used to participate in league matches, I was a bit rusty on the tournament front. The funny thing is I do not find many women playing in the community. Hence to have a separate women’s tournament at the community is impossible. Therefore I persuaded my tennis male buddies to allow me to participate in the tournament when the idea was first mooted. They did not need much persuasion as they know I am a certified tennis lover like all of them. This brings an important point, most minorities just want to be treated equally and get a seat at the table.

Game,set and match

I knew my shot of winning a tournament like this was a long one. There were several disadvantages like weight, an average serve, weak backhand and inability to have a good court coverage. The thing that was going for me was my enthusiasm with the game and consistently showing up for practice. I enrolled in both the doubles and singles thinking I have nothing to lose and decided to test my level in both. I was able to find a partner Darshan and the preparations started. Since I was managing full time job, children and husband with an equally full career,  I could not fit in time in the evenings for preparation which in hindsight would have helped. The only preparation I did was showing up regularly for morning practice and following HealthifyMe diet but could not resist cheese. This unfortunately did not help. Anyway generally I was feeling fit and fine because of nearly 10000 steps being achieved daily. 

D-Day Support

The D day arrived and I could barely sleep the previous night having all kinds of scenarios play in my head considering the tough draw we had as our opening match of our mixed doubles and I was confident of losing the singles:-)

 This brings me to the topic of having a cheering squad which I felt was important. I kept pestering my husband to show up to support me but forgot that we also had a doctors appointment for my son which had to be attended to in the morning.  I then messaged my mother in law who has recently moved to our community if she could come and see me. She came for one match and it was great to get some support from family. In the evening I bulldozed my two children to show up and they did along with my nanny Akshata who takes care of my younger son Raghu. 

D-Day strategy 

The strategy was to play our natural game and have some fun, targeting the player who were nervous and hitting cross court ground strokes. My armour was my strong forehand which i had to use effectively.   Reflecting on myself I failed in all angles in our first doubles match. It was only after  I managed a fluke drop volley that mentally we improved and that showed in the game and  my partner Darshan was very supportive in encouraging me. Suddenly from down 2-0, we climbed up to make it a 2-2.  In short tennis matches where it’s a best of seven one really needs constant motivation and razor sharp short term focus to win the match. If you start thinking of end results, the game is lost. One needs to think points rather than games. However inspite of all the energy we gained, we lost the focus at the crucial 3-2 game to lose the match 4-2. The next double match due to some outside forces again, we lost the momentum and the match.

For my singles I had mentally lost and hence I had no strategy. One can argue that if you are mentally so low does it make sense to play? I feel it is a catch 22 situation if you don’t play you are never ready, if you play you have to be ready. One can get ready if they have the mental toughness of a yoga guru like BKS iyengar or have that wonderful game that is simply just flawless that can cut across any mental barriers.

The crew!

D-Day final scores and mental toughness

I lost the tournament and all my matches. I was still happy that I had the courage to participate but I was disappointed that I did not play the level of the game that I usually play everyday. Throughout the tournament I noticed a lot of my fellow buddies also choke and lose matches just because of mentally not being strong. The same thing that happens in grand slams could be noticed here. Stefanos Tsitsipas, a player whose groundstrokes I admire a lot, loses consistently because he simply gives away the game. This is also true in real life as we witnessed this weekend.

How does one believe in oneself? Is it your previous track record, ability to rely on one’s strengths, good practice, support of family or just spending more time breathing or meditating. Unfortunately does not seem to be any one thing but a combination of all. 

Gosh!!!If only one could swallow that one magic pill😝

It does teach me though that nothing comes easy and you need to want something badly to go that extra mile. That fire in your belly whether it is winning a tennis match, getting good marks in an exam, getting into a dream college, finding and keeping a job( keeping a job seems tough nowadays) or finding funders for your startup or your idea at work…the list goes on. 

I have decided to invest in meditation and hoping that it will help me with my next match and life. I hope I continue to play well into the sunset of my life. Game on!!!