Day 2 - PPA Tour Round Up, Frisco
So today started well. I worked up the courage to work the scary-looking waffle machine at the breakfast buffet and hey, they turned out great!! I put the batter in the right place, I worked out how to flip the machine over and they didn’t stick! The best part was that they tasted AMAZING. I will definitely be carb loading tomorrow. Breakfast of champions! 💪🏼
With a full belly, I jumped into a ‘Lyft’ (which is similar to an Uber) and headed back to Lifetime. Riley and I managed to squeeze in a good warm up before our first women’s doubles match. I was a little daunted when I heard that we were to play Parenteau and Dizon-Sheehan (#2 seeds) followed by Irvine and Jansen (#1 seeds) as our first two pool matches. Talk about a baptism of fire. 🔥
We gave it a shot but it was not our best display of pickleball. The nerves coupled with a tricky, swirling wind made it hard for me to reign in my third shot drops and these two teams pounced on it. But hey, we had some great early battles and lots of side outs. The scoreboard didn’t reflect the quality of the matches and I was impressed by how gracious Parenteau and Dizon-Sheehan were after the ass whooping.
Next up we faced off against David and Zilveti. We got off to a really slow start in this one. We trailed 8-2 at the end change but really turned things around when we got out of the blinding sun and were playing with the wind against us. Riley set up some beautiful points for us and we took the game 15-10. We were really stoked to chalk up our first win together. 🥳
The next match was against Rettger and Bates. They came out firing from the start. We did our best but found it really hard to establish ourselves at the kitchen. We won some great hand battles once we got to the NVZ. It was a 15-8 loss in the end.
With the pool matches done and dusted, we headed into the semi finals. We scored Lea Jansen and Jessie Irvine again. This time on Centre Court and with a best of 3 games to 11 format. Gulp… We had quite a good start to game one. We levelled it a 2-2 and had some great rallies. The highlight here for me was an ATP on what I now realize was an ‘out ball’ anyway 🤭. We tried, we had fun, then we headed to the bronze medal playoffs against Rettger and Bates. (Match Video)
They had a solid start, taking the first set 11-3 and being 5-2 up in the second. I decided to stop being so BLOODY TENTATIVE and started to go for a few drives and poaches and this really helped us to turn things around. I think the shift in energy levels by both Riley and I forced Rachel and Shelby to take more risks and we did well to capitalize on this. We took charge of the second set, bringing it home 11-6. We continued on with the same aggressive strategy in game 3. It was working a treat and we quickly found ourselves with a 6-2 lead. We could almost feel the bronze medals dangling around our necks. Alas, It was not to be….. A couple of close line calls, a couple of lousy errors and before we knew it, those medals were around the necks of Rettger and Bates who made an epic comeback. (Match Video)
I decided that a cold beer and a burger were the next best things to a bronze medal. They were fresh out of Coronas so I tried a Blue Moon. I recommend trying them if you like the taste of battery fluid! 🧪🔋Now, about the burger… Well, I should have known better than to order a ‘sometimes’ food at a health club. They probably expect you to throw away the bun at places like this. It doesn’t look like anyone here has eaten carbs for at least a decade. 😆
I headed down to Slim Chicken tonight for a meal and another life lesson. Dinner was DELICIOUS but I learned not to order wings when you are dining alone…. When I got back to my hotel room, I looked in the mirror and was horrified to see that half of the wing sauce was still all over my face. I looked like the Joker! 🤣 I had walked all the way back to the hotel, making small talk with people and NO ONE HAD SAID A THING about the mess all over my face! 🤣
So as you can see, day 2 had its ups and downs. I had a great time playing with Riley and learnt a lot. I learned that the Durafast balls play very differently to the Franklin X40 and that it is probably a good idea to practise with them BEFORE the tournament. 🙈
Looking forward to seeing what tomorrow brings…..#SarahsPickleballDiaries
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