Who's In?

But not as late as the All England Club.

The BBC reported late last week:

The Wimbledon Championships will offer women and men equal prize money for the first time at this year's tournament.

The announcement by the All England Club brings the tournament into line with other Grand Slams following criticism from officials and players.

Wimbledon joins the United States and Australia in paying equal money across the board, from the champions down to the first-round losers in all events.

To see more, go here.

But one more quote. "Tim Phillips, chairman of the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, announced that the championship committee had decided 'that the time is right to bring this subject to a logical conclusion and eliminate the difference.'"

I hope they're quite sure the time is right... wouldn't want to be hasty, eh?

I still have a pin from about 20 years ago that says "79c"--representing the amount women earned on the dollar compared to men. Unfortunately, it's probably not too far out of date. Except now at Wimbledon and the other grand slams. Oh. Well, except for Roland Garros. We'll take good news where we can get it anyhow.

Or is it off the wagon? I wish someone would explain to me whether being "on the wagon" means you've given something up, or that you've failed to give it up. This is something that has perplexed me since childhood.

Well, if you'll pardon that aside. It's completely off-base anyway, since I am neither trying to give up tennis, nor failing at trying. But last year I wrote about planning to enter a tournament after a summer of playing one-handed tennis (left hand had been broken). But it was all the vapor of good intentions. I did, however, sign up rather fruitlessly (it was fall in New England) on one of those online partner-finding sites. That in turn (I believe) got me on a mailing list for a locally organized "league" called Tennis Northeast.

It's a good idea, really. For a nominal fee, they do the administrative stuff of finding players, organizing them in divisions based roughly on locality, setting up a match schedule, and recording scores. The players arrange with their opponents where and when to play, and report in scores. At the end I think they organize playoff matches. For $29.95 it seemed a fair deal.

I've had two matches so far, and I'm sad to report, I lost both of them. I so don't have the killer instinct, or it's deeply out of training. There's something awkward in trouncing someone you've just met (not that I could have trounced them, but beating them was certainly not impossible), social niceties being what they are. Guess I've got to get over that. 

The first match, K. and I played best of three sets: She won 1-6, 6-4, 7-6 with a very close tie-breaker. So I actually won more games than she did, just not at the right time! In the second match, T. and I played a 12 game pro set (first to win 12 games, by two, wins). I lost 12-9. I could go into the details on both of these, but will refrain to keep from boring you (myself). On the bright side, I did not double fault very often, which has typically been a problem. But I lack control, and am always on defense. Feel like I play a bit too carefully. It'll be interesting (I expect that's putting it strongly) to see whether I can win any matches (there are 10 of us altogether), develop a more aggressive approach, and improve my game. 

At the very least, I'm meeting more potential people to play with. And we all need playmates, don't we? 

My goal had been to start this blog around the beginning of August. Because shortly before that time I had resolved upon another cockamamie goal: to enter a tennis tournament in the fall. In July, that seemed far away. I thought I would make posts about my progress and methodology of preparation. Hah. Now, presuming I enter a tournament in October, it’s a month away!

Why would I take up this daft notion? I broke my hand in May playing basketball. Annoying, completely nondramatic mishap of contact with a finger at a bad angle. Crack. So I didn’t play basketball for two months (had two screws put in to stabilize the left fifth metacarpal), but as it was my off hand, I started playing tennis again.

Maybe one defining characteristic of the subset of people I think I’m addressing here (in my mind at least, hello ladies and gentlemen) is a tendency toward goal orientation. It’s hard to do something and not think about ways to get better, to look for measurable improvement, to compete. So, I start playing tennis again and think, this is fun, I gotta enter a tournament so I can see how I do, then do it again next year to see if I can get better. Why is that?

Dunno, but so it is. I started playing basketball ten years ago and became obsessed with learning and improving, not just playing. Trouble with tennis is finding people and time and suitable weather and location to play. There are partner matching services online, and I’ve tried one called Gotennis.com, but so far haven’t heard back from anyone I’ve contacted through the site. I’ll report back how it goes, or if I explore the site further and find anything else of use.

While I’ve thought a lot about playing, and still may enter that tournament in October, I really haven’t played even once a week. But, here, with the first day of September, I’ll see if I can make up some lost time. I really have to iron out my backhand. As a kid I used a one-hander, a few years ago I switched to two, with the broken hand I went back to one, and now feel full of confusion.

In any event, I’ll be able to report on how mortifying the whole thing is. Wonder if anyone will play with me before Labor Day….