New Partner

I am very happy to announce that Røynstrand Entrepenører have made themselves willing to support me this season with funding for travelling and training.

Røynstrand have a base in Odda, Hardanger, on the west coast of Norway, in one of the most beautiful Fjords. Their quality have lead them to success and they take on grand as well as smaller projects within entrepeneuring, engineering and evaluations. Their homepage:

http://www.roynstrand.com/



These sponsorships are what keeps the sport of squash alive, and the funny thing is that they probably do not know the positive spiralling effects this may have. Even with smaller funding, it all helps. It helps me focus and progress as a player, which elevates Norwegian squash in general and helps us all raise the bar in nationally. Especially in these crucial times towards the bid for the Olympics 2020, all help that can push our sport forward will help.

If I am able to do this fulltime until the Olympics and compete..............................
There are really no words for it.
To be the first ever representative for Norway in squash. I think my life would be complete :P

So many great thanks to Røynstrand for this help and support.


I am adding a picture from Hardangerfjorden in Norway, where I have spent many a summer chillaxing in the cherry trees, looking over the fjord :))) Looking forward to a return this summer.

Don't quit your dayjob

Lactate for breakfast. taste of blood by lunch....repeat  in the afternoon. Then most of us go to school or work after.  Every day, every week. Hitting endless balls up and down the wall, getting turned down 999 out of 1000 times for sponsorships, travel across Europe for one match, get 50 USD and then travel back to train and then do it again. 99% of squashplayers do not reap any financial benefits from squash. The professionals in this sport do not receive the status or funding of  the level of Olympic athletes...

Still I would give anything to keep this as my dayjob......

National team championship 2012

Hafrsfjord squash club (Try pronouncing that one!!) is the club I have been representing in Norway the last 6 years. This is a club based in Stavanger, Norway and have produced several national champions in all age groups over the years.
I joined this club when I moved to Stavanger in 2006 to train with the best players in Norway. It is located at Toppform Treningssenter  at Sola (http://toppform-treningssenter.no/) where they house 8 squash courts. This team has won the Norwegian team championships 6 years in a row, and I believe I have been a part of 5 or 6 of these...hard to keep count :P
But with the Norwegian no1, 2, 5 and 9 on the team as well as the by far best female player in Norway in the team, nothing less is expected.

This year as well as last year, the National team championships were held at Ås squash centre, put together by Roddy "Machine" Mcleod. In this years version, due to lazyness, fright, bad luck or other reasons, only 3 teams signed up to play for the title. This was us (HSK), Oslo and Ås. This was highly unfortunate and especially disappointing for Roddy who always puts together a great tournament and atmosphere at his centre.

But apparently this year it was quality over quantity as these three teams were more than worthy for the top 3 spots. There were many great players participating, old as well as new heroes, champions and national team players. We even had a few comeback kings that were out of the squash scene for a few years which made it all very enjoyable.

Our team consisted of myself as number 1 string, Kristian Solhaug as 2nd string, Thomas E Gjerde as 3d string, and Majken Bie as our lovely female representative.

Oslo startet playing Ås, and it was an extremely close affair as Oslo barely clinched it with almost only 3-2 matches.
Straight after we played Ås. Majken lost her match 0-3 after a super close match, Thomas won his match fairly easy 3-0, and I played former junior hero Christian Bakke and won in a tough 3-0 match with great squash and high tempo 17-15 in the 3. game :) Our 2. string Kristian played Roddy McLoud and did not drop a game for us to play Oslo for the gold.

Oslo hired hitman "Svante" for the occasion on the 3. spot. He used to be a former Norwegian junior champion and national team player from he was 17!! Unfortunatelly for Oslo the HSK no3 was a bit too much for him as we won 3-0 on this spot. Majken lost her match 0-3 so it was up to the first 2 spots to decide it.
Kristian and myself were playing at the same time. Kristian was the unlucky one this weekend having to catch a later flight due to work, only to get delayed, only to take the bus to Ås, only to find out it did not go, only to take a giant detour with the train via Oslo, only to FALL ASLEEP!!! and pass Ås. ONLY to be 3,5 hours late and did not eat for 10 hours.
This leading to an overly exciting match against Oslo's Knut Erik Løvig where he clinched it 11-9 in the 5th game *puuuh

On the other court I was 2-0 up against Patrick Hansen from Oslo SK. As he took the 3d game there was still hope for Oslo, but it seemed as it took a lot out of him taking that game, and he was a bit too fatigued in the 4th game to pose a severe threat. However it was a great high intensity match with good shots, tempo and quality. I am glad to pull through for the team and get us qualifyed for this years European teams in Prague in September, where we did HSK proud last year in Belfast.

All this happened on the Friday. On Saturday we took time for the newspapers (:P) and played a social tournament where the top 3 spots were the exact order of the HSK team. Just to prove a point.

Saturday evening was celebrated at casa de Løvig with great food, drinks, dance and beautiful people, and continued at TGI Fridays into the late hours :D

Great thanks to Roddy for his hospitality and great work over the weekend. Taco/Jacuzzi master ++, His wife Anette and her kids for housing us, Majken for housing me, a hottie for housing Thomas, a friend for housing Kristian, Knut Erik for the dinner/party and Oslo city for being owned by 3,5 Siddiser this weekend.

Life as we know it...

Squash players do not have the financial benefits of some of the other major sports, and can naturally not be compared at all to golf, soccer or tennis, where the athletes are getting overly spoiled with million dollar salaries.....weekly. Are you top 300 in the world in tennis, you can still make descent sponsorship contracts and good money. In squash you need to make around top 50 in the world as a male player to be able to make some dollars. For the women it is even harder. But you still have to perform constantly, as the money is in the tournaments you play as well as league matches. And if you get injured......

One often see squashplayers funded by mum and dad, studying or working full time next to full time training, or if they are lucky enough to get a good sponsor it is often from someone that has a particular love for the sport, or can appreciate what we do. The sponsors know that we can only do so much in return to the funding we get. And to all of these we owe a great thanks. It is what a friend of mine mentioned as people with "Squash heart". Those are also the people in your community that put down so much time, energy and money into helping youngsters get interested in squash, promoting, coaching and facilitating the sport with little personal gain. In Norway we witness in general that squash is an alternative offer to the members of the gym. The aim is money, and if not enough money comes in. BOOM, tear down the squash courts for Zumba instead.
There is often no coaches around, and the local squash club are constantly struggling working together with the managers of the gym who owns the squash courts. Living in Holland for 3 years now, I am happy to inform that there are a few squash hearts still alive. But it is still hard as this sport is still in the shadow of other racket sports. If we got the olympic spot in 2020 things might change... and it is exactly what we need at this moment.

http://squash2020.com/

A squash player that can pay his bills, food and travel throughout the year is a happy squash player. He can live of the sport he loves, travel to interact with other cultures and compete with the greatest athletes, hard workers and talents of the world.

To manage daily life, several professionals still live with moms and pops. Or you can do like myself and manymany other professionals. There is a lot of "squash houses" around where several squash players live together in appartments/houses to split the costs of todays expensive housing facilities. In the Amsterdam ghetto you find myself sharing a small appartment with my girlfriend Cigany Sillevis, Dutch player Mellisa Meulenbelt and Australian top100 player Steve Finitsis.
4 people on such a small space will be difficult you might think, but luckily squash players travel a lot and we are rearly all here at the same time. Cigany is out with an achilles rupture injury, and is staying with her parents at the moment, Melissa has family in Holland as well, and trains a lot in Rotterdam, while Steve is often on tour or with Melissa.

Cleaning the appartment the other day I realized really in a way how fanatic it is. I dug up all the squash gear in me and Ciganys room. Old sponsor rackets, new rackets, ancient rackets, 5 backs, backpacks, squash shoes, posters, player passes, balls and grips everywhere. I'll show you a bit what its all about ;)

Closet.....














                                                           


Cigany's Harrow
campaign:

She is now
sponsored by Prince

My Asics
squash shoe collection: