Sunday, January 10, 2016

Why David Palmer is full off S**t

In 2011 the World Open Squash was held in Rotterdam. After the first few days of qualifying I was one of the players not making it into the main draw, losing to Davide Bianchetti. A few days later, as the squash nerd I am, I arranged a hit at the same club as the championship was being held with a friend who also participated but did not qualify.

Before starting a friendly game to relieve any frustration pressure from losing the match a few days before, I went to the toilet to relieve myself of a different kind of pressure.

Midst of my pressure session (squash pun intended), someone fiercely jabbed the handle of the toilet door, scaring me into cutting my project in half.

He said he needed to go really bad.

I said he could use the other toilet upstairs.

He said he was playing a really important match and he did not have time to run upstairs as he just finished his knock up and only had a 90 second poo break.

Now I can not perform under pressure like that, so I left my project half done.

Now how am I going to react to a situation like this. Start an argument with a heavy methane odour in the air. Complain about invasion of my privacy and cosytitme. Am I going to tell him off through the toilet door?

I opened the door and saw a familiar face, and before I could figure out who he was, he rushed past me. This giant of a squash player probably something in the lines of:"I really had to go, mate", I let it be, because seeing who it was, I am sure it really WAS an important match.


"Gotta go, really gotta go"


David Palmer just chased me out of a private toilet to take advantage of a warm seat and a lack of toilet paper. How he solved that problem, I dont know as I am pretty sure he played his match with both socks on.

Luckily theres a kind of happy end to this story of dirty socks and unfinished business.

Because of my gentleman like behaviour, I am sure 2 kgs or more left Mr.Palmer in those 90 seconds, giving him the perfect Weight-to-Strength ratio to scrape the few last points in an epic 5 game thriller against Thierry Lincou. This set him up to play in The Luxor theatre on the glasscourt in the quarterfinals against Karim Darwish.

David lost the quarterfinals. After the match he announced his retirement from professional squash. I was lucky enough to experience it from the front row A small tear left my eye after his speech, because I knew even though he did not thanked me in his speech, I knew I had something to do with bringing him onto the big stage for his grand finale. no shit

You're welcome Dave