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:

JALLA JALLA



European 3d division squash championships

 The european 3d division squash championships is this year held at the Marsa squash club in Malta from the 18th until the 21st of April. Slightly sunnier and warmer than Holland and Norway at the moment. We are travelling with the mens team, womans team, referee David Løite and coach Mark Hornby. The men are divided into 2 pools where the top 2 play semifinals and finals on Saturday. Our pool is relatively tough with challengers like Luxembourg and Croatia. The team spirit is good within the team and we are going for the win this year. Personally I am slightly short on sleep, but I will catch up now to be ready to hand out some cans of whoop-ass tomorrow

This is how  Italians do it in Malta:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAFQFvSPhQ8

Norwegians:

Day 1:

- Start of with a 4-0 team win over Turkey on the first day. I started off on court 5 and our no2 Kristian played on court 4. I kept focused even with little sleep and heavy legs and pulled through 11-4, 11-4, 11-2. I did 1 or 2 personal errors throughout the match, and is quite happy with my performance. Kristian struggled slightly more, but still pulled through 3-0. Ronny and Eddy on 3 and 4 followed up with some good squash to put us into the lead of the group and a good start before we take on the rest tomorrow.

Day 2

- After a strong start of this years event, we were ready to perform in the same fashion in the beginning of day 2 against Gibraltar who were the top seed in our group. Myself and Håkon Standal started playing as respectively no1 and no4 string. Håkon started with a strong 3-0 victory and i needed to perform in the same fashion, not to disappoint, so I continued my good form and played well to take it 3-0 against a descent opponent Anthony Brindle who seemed to get fatigued in the end of the match.

Kristian and Ronny followed up with respectively a 3-1 and a 3-2  to take the team victory 4-0

- Our second match of the day was against Croatia who also is a relatively strong team in our group. Myself and Edvard got off to a bad start as the unsportsmanlike behavior of the Croatian team got to his head in a match I think all of us think that he should and normally would win. Playing conditions were very tough in this environment.

I took on the no1 Manuel Fistonic and the referee, in a comedy/tragedy musical and a pure repeat of the match we played last year, where the situation was exactly the same. It is unfortunate for squash as a sport to experience this stuff, but you face these players from time to time, and you just have to deal with it.
I proved I was the better player, and did well. Did not play perfect, but quite well. He took the match 3-1. For me it did not matter much, but it is a real shame since this is a team event. Kristian won easily 3-0 versus the second string, and Ronny took the thriller of a last match 3-2 after a great performance in the last game. He had a tough one earlier in the day but the HSK "no complaining" rule still applied, so the team captain pulled through without a frown. AND its his birthday. Happy birthday Ronny!!!!

The girls played Sweden this morning as the only match, and the Swedes proved to be slightly stronger as they won 3-1, 3-0, 3-0. Now they need to win the rest to save some face, glory and all that. The spirit is still strong and  it is great to also have both teams here for support and good fun. It is also fun to see that they are all improving well and are learning and gaining heaps of experience playing these tournaments :)))


The chilling in the sun before the match did the job. Luxembourg played 2-2 against Gibraltar, so we have good chances to finish as number 1 in the group if we win tomorrow. For now: Poker with all of us to change the euros around the table. Tomorrow is the most important match so far and the semifinal will follow after, most lightly against Poland if we win and Ukraine if we finish 2nd.

Alvilde e kul!

Edvard e ogsaa kul

Men Alvilde e kiulere

Edvard sier det absolutt ikke er sant


Cmooooooon Norwaay!!!

Day 3:

The first match of the day was the last one in the group stages against our mates from Luxembourg. We have memories of losing to luxembourg in the B pool 3 years ago in Malmø. Then I lost my match 2-3 against Sanjay. I was looking forward for my revenge for 3 years, and this would be the day, as we once against med as both no1 strings for our respective countrys. I continued my form from this week, and even though I felt the last few days in my legs, I pulled through 3-0. Ronny did his job on the other court and with those two victories we finished as no1 in our group avoiding the best team in the other group.



Later in the day we played the semifinals against Poland who finished second in group A. Ronny as captain continued his unbeaten record this weekend and won 3-1. I played at the same time on the other court and got a horrible start. Even though I felt fit, ready and motivated, some hidden nerves somewhere must have jumped up and bitten me in the ass as in the first game I hit 5 balls out of court. I had no idea what was going on, but I quickly found myself 1 and then 2 games down, in a match I would expect to perform better in. I was a mere shadow of my former self this week. However I was able to put together some descent squash and take the next 2 games. I felt physically fine and though this would go my way, but in the final game I twitched impatiently from time to time and  hit 4-5 boasts from nowhere down :(((((( That was the game, match and end of the Norwegian fairytale. As Edvard and Kristian both lost 3-1 and 3-2 we were out of the fight for the gold medal after a huge blunder from my side, that will not be forgotten in a long time. The rest of the boys did a great job and played some great squash. Unfortunatelly it was not good enough this time.


Day 4:

On the last day of squash at the Marsa squash club in Malta we repeated our win over Luxembourg 4-0 to take the bronze medal, as they lost to Ukraine in the semifinals.
Ukraine went on to beat Poland 3-0 in the finals. This means Poland and Ukraine move up to the seconddivision next year in Amsterdam, while we have to do it all again in third division :/

The girls won their remaining matches to end up on a good 4th place. after Denmark, Sweden and host nation Malta. The norwegian girls were all hungry for a medal this year, and will come back 10 times stronger next year to hopefully take the double gold with the mens team ;)

On behalf of the players I would like to thank the Norwegian squash federation, with sponsors diadora and dunlop, Malta squash federation with sponsors for a great tournament and Mark Hornby as coach and manager for taking care of all the players, organizing and updates.

Personally I would like to thank my team compatriots Ronny Aasbø, Kristian Solhaug, Edvard Hegbom, Håkon Standal, Karoline Hegbom, Lotte Eriksen and Alvilde Sønju for a great trip and great effort and team spirit!!!!

Some action:

Norway versus Turkey

Norway vs Sweden

Squash NM 2012

It is once again ready for the Norwegian national champioships.
This year it will be held at Richard Larsson's squash centre in the middle of Oslo, and the home of Centrum squash club, Condis Fredensborg.
If I remember correctly, it houses 6 plaster squashcourts, and this year, just under 100 players signed up in a winner-takes-all format to fight for the most honorable achievement in norwegian sports, the kings trophy.

I am reigning champion the last 2 years, and it is a very important tournament for me personally. This years approach has been, however a lot different from former years. Previous years I have been more active on the norwegian tour, as opposed to this year, where the profesional tour has been more in focus. I have not really competed with my fellow countrymen in a while, so I do not know their exact standard at the moment. This goes both ways naturally, and I know many are also wondering about my level.

I always feel the most amount of pressure to perform during this tournament, and I feel it gets more and more every year as people expect more and more from me. This year I have chosen to look away from all this commotion. I have put all the training down, prepared as well as possible and will act as professional as possible during the weekend. I will play my very best in every match and give nothing away for free. It is naturally not given that I win, as 85 players have the same goal as me, but I feel I have a good chance if I play well. This year I will look to have a lot of fun, seeing old friends, coaches and squashplayers again as well as enjoying playing the greatest sport in the world against good players.

I have a good draw, where I face top 10 players and former champions from the very first match, and hopefully until the very finish. i can not wait to get started :))
This year I will travel with a big company as Squash Jordan from Haarlem in Netherlands will send 8 players to have a look as well as play some squash themselves. My girlfriend with her parents will be there, as well as my biggest fan: MUM!!!

Let's do it!!!!

Links:

-Trashtalk from the former no1 Richard Larsson conserning a possible 3d round encounter. (NO)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcullm7VCog

- The draw:

http://tournamentsoftware.com/sport/draw.aspx?id=66FCCCAD-CAFA-4F52-BCD5-974A35A1387F&draw=4

Updates will follow ;)

Day 1:

- My first opponent was Simon Nordstad, who won his match against Even Berg in the first round, while I got a bye. Simon is a former top junior from Norway as well as based in Germany at the moment. He is a technically good player and will take in every lose ball well. However I stayed focused and did not give him a lot to work with and got through comfortably 3-0. He went on to win the plate, so congrats to Simon! :)

- Second round took place straight after my first match, and here I met former triple (senior, 35+ and team) norwegian champion a few years ago. Length and debth worked well and I got through 3-0.

Day 2:

- Preperations through the weekend was really good, both diet, sleep and preperations. I finished my carbing and cooldown and went home for a good nights rest to take on tournament organizor and local youtube hero Richard Larsson the next morning. I ended up losing the first game 10-12 to the referee, and it was an intense and mentally tough match. I got frustrated and angry, but used this to my advantage in hitting the living daylight out of the ball and eventually winning it 3-1. Richard is 4 times former national champion.

- The quarter finals were played against Lasse Klæning from my squashclub in Stavanger. He just beat former national champion Hans Olav Torgersen 3-2 in a marathon match, and should be really proud of his performance this weekend (also at the party I heard ;) I took advantage of this, and even though Lasse played really well it was a bit too much in the end, and I took it 3-0.





- The matches were scheduled with 3 hours break in between, so semi finals were soon around the corner. I was facing my good friend and team mate for the norwegian team and hafrsfjord squash club, Ronny Aasbø, who got through a tough 3-2 versus Audun Thronæs. It was a close match point for point up to 6-6, 7-7, but in every game I pulled away in the end, and in the last game, Ronnys former match caught up to him, and I noticed his tiredness. I also won this match 3-0.


Day 3:

Last day, and as expected my opponent was the second seed Kristian Solhaug from Stavanger. He has been in the last 5 National finals, and won most of the Norwegian tournaments he played. He has been 1 in Norway and is the no2 player on the Norwegian team. I was well prepared and focused, played better than the day before and kept sharp through the whole match to take it 3-0. More relieved than anything to take my 3d consecutive title in front of my girlfriend, mum, friends, support and sponsor :D and naturally veryvery happy.

I would like to direct great thanks to
- the best shoe company in the world ASICS,
- the greatest rackets in the world DUNLOP
- the Norwegian squash federation
- a great group of training partners in Netherlands (you know who you are ;)
- Liz Irving and Mark Hornby
- Jordan squash fan club
- Karen Sierveld and Jeannotje van Diem
- My girlfriend Cigany
- MUUUUUM!!! Hilde Marie :)

and great photographies by Trond Ottesen and Steven Frische

Below is also a video (1930 style) from the final. From Marinka Meilink ;)