Thursday, June 28, 2012

Don't feed the monkeys!!!


Været i Gibraltar

26°C | °Ftor.fre.lør.søn.
KlartKlartFor det meste solKlart
For det meste skyet
Vind: 10 km/t fra NV
Fuktighet: 57%33°20°31°18°29°17°28°19°




This is going to be a terrible week :P


Just arrived yesterday in Gibraltar. Flew in to Malaga from Amsterdam. Jumped on a bus and after 3 hours through south of Spain at the same time as Spain played Portugal in the semifinal of the European championship we can definitely conclude that Spanish football commentators are slightly more enthusiastic than Norwegian ones. The match was blasting over the radio on the bus aaaaaaaaaaall the way.

I made it to the squash club just in time for the second half and enjoyed my indian chicken while Spain took it on penalties 4-2. Luckily Gibraltar is on British soil, so things were not too crazy.

For you geographical newbies out there Gibraltar is British and is located at the very south tip of Spain.

In Spain...looking at Gibraltar over the boarder














The tournament is played in a club w squashcourts fitted wherever there was room. It has a quite interesting construction, but seems very cosy, with a small restaurant/bar downstairs, a gym upstairs and well...squashcourts everywhere... think there is 3 or 4 of them. Courts seem fine, but according to the drenched players already trying them out is was quite hot and bouncy....hydrate well is the gameplan for the weekend then.

I am  1st seed in the qualification and play a local player in the first match today at 2pm. There is a chance I will play a player from the British Virgin Islands in second round at 7pm if we both win, which would be fun. My goal (From January to January) is still to make at least main draw in all tournaments I play. I have managed so far, and I am feeling better now than I did for a while, so I am hoping to end before the summer really well.

Don't feed the apes (Warning on our balcony :P)

Follow the tournament on : http://www.squashsite.co.uk/2009/gibraltaropen2012.htm

The first match was won in ordelry fashion as my opponent was hungover. It could, however become  a quite good match, as he was skillful enough with the racket, but with the lumberjacks workin on yo noggin......

Second match was against Joe Chapman from the British Virgin Islands, and was a match I was really looking forward to. Unfortunatelly there were some incidents during the match that shortly put did not favour me or squash in general, sop I found myself 0-2 down.
My opponent gained confidence, and played some good lengths and drops towards the end and he deserved the third game.
I have not much to be disappointed over except the result on paper. I am hitting the ball better and my work is paying off, I hardly did any mistakes and felt in control for most of the match. Which made the loss very bizarr for me.

The remaining days on this half-island has been used for punishment training and some games at the club with some of the other professionals. Barry Brindle and his crew has done a great job here, organizing around 10 tournaments at once in this last week, and it has been flawless to my impression. Social, fun and well organized. This is definitely a tournament PSA players will like to return to.

There has also been some time for sightseeing, and I have climbed the big rock that Gibraltar is, seen the 100 ton gun, chilling with the monkeys, visited the great caves and taken the cablecart from top to bottom of the island.

Unfortunatelly we had an incident with burglars in our hotelroom. See how it went down in the video below:


Sunday, June 3, 2012

100% squash

Follow the link below and vote for squash in the 2020 Olympics!!

Its "Just" a Canadian newspaper, but we need an impact wherever we can, and if 100 000 people vote for squash, than it can not go unseen...

We currently only have 92% of the votes, so we really need to spread the word people. A squasher never quits at 92%

http://www.torontosun.com/2012/05/30/sports-that-should-be-in-the-olympics