Long Beach Open. Sat. Oct. 7, 2006

Well, not a bad showing for my first tournament of my comeback. I played Joseph Deguzman, an 18 year old kid, who has previously ranked in the top 25 in junior tennis in southern california. According to his birthdate, he's been bumped up to the men's division. He was seeded ninth in the tournament. How did the old man of 38 do in the match? I turned in a respectable score, he won 7-5, 6-2 . At 5-4 in the first set, I had a chance to break his serve but he held. He had very heavy topspin strokes -- even on his serve which I would deem his best stroke. I haven't seen much topspin down at the park as the guys I play against are mostly older fellas who are seasoned good players with usually flat strokes or low topspin and slice. If I could have returned his serve better, I think I could have beaten the kid... my score reflects that I'm now able to hang with the big hitters. In the second set, he got a handle on returning my serve and broke serve twice early on... he was up 4-0 when I then held serve. At 4-1, he held his serve but I pushed him and brought the game to several dueces. Then, at 5-1 my serve... I said to myself... Let's show this kid a big man's serve and proceeded to serve out the game with... 4 STRAIGHT ACES! That service game made the match for me... haven't done that since I played the circuit when I was 20. Anyway... he held his next service game and won the match. I'll get him next time... when I'm 25 pounds lighter. BTW... Lost 18 pounds now.... since August 30th.