What's next? --> India!

After the National Championships Liz and I took part in the selection camp for the 2011 National Team.  It was an exhausting week, after 3 days of playing at nationals and 3 days of tryouts.  To also add on that we had been on the road for the past month and a half, you could say we were tired!  Liz and I took about 10 days off to recover and relax, a much needed break if I may say, and well spent at our respective cottages.  We got back into training and had just over a week to prepare for our next tournament.  Our training for the week included the opportunity to train with one of Canada's greatest beach volleyball athletes, John Child, a bronze medalist at the 1996 Olympian Games in Sydney.  I always enjoy working with new and knowledgeable coaches, and getting different perspectives on the game.  John's feedback and approach was refreshing, I really appreciated his emphasis on competitiveness and the desire to win.  Training with John helped us prepare for the last 2 months of our season, and our next event, an FIVB Challenger in Chennai, India.  Challengers are different than FIVB Opens in that the top 32 teams according to the world rankings are not allowed to participate.  They are a great opportunity for developing teams to gain international experience.

That brings us to India!  Liz and I arrived after training in Hamburg for a few days with a few of the German girls that we made friends with last time we were in Germany.  It was also a great way to break up the long flight to India (about 18 hours).  Since arriving in India, it has been quite an interesting experience, mostly one of culture shock.  A majority of the country is severely impoverished, there is dirt/rubble/garbage lining the streets, the driving of the cars is definitely 3rd world, with no one obeying any sort of traffic laws, cars, bikes, scooters share the roads, and weave in and out of one another, and there is an incessant honking of the horns.  The people are all very nice, willing to help and interested in knowing where we come from, but we get stared at a lot because we look so different.  It is also not customary for the women to practice in bathing suits here.  The set up of the courts is very different than what we are used to.  The grand stand is made entirely out of tree branches, twine and maybe a few nails.  Architecturally it is very impressive!

The grand stand made of twigs!

Centre Court in Chennai

The courts are then blocked off with sheets of metal painted blue, so that every time a ball hits these walls they end up with blue paint on them.  Then you end up with blue paint all over yourself.  The sand is very shallow, and although it's been sifted through, there is still a lot of glass and rocks in it.  And of course it is extremely hot here!!  I've played in hot places such as Central America and Thailand, but nothing like India.  It's exhausting!

Liz and I arrived early Sunday morning, and have been practicing for the past 3 days.  Today was the qualification tournament to get into the main draw.  Because not all of the top teams on the World Tour are in India, Liz and I got into the main draw based on points!  Tomorrow we will start the main draw tournament.  As a result of the heat, the matches will be from 9am-12pm in the morning, then a brake until 4pm, when the matches will start and go until 11pm.  This means we will have night games, which will be a nice break from the direct sun (it will still be hot because it is so humid here), but also a challenge to stay awake and motivated to play that late in the day!  There are lots of different and challenging factors in India, but Liz and I are adaptable and are well prepared to play!  I am excited to be back in a competitive environment and look forward to playing this week.

Canadian National Champions!!

Coming home from Scandinavia was bitter sweet.  Liz and I were disappointed that we would be missing the next stop on the FIVB World Tour in The Hague, Netherlands.  We were playing great, being successful, and competitive against really strong teams, and we felt that we had a really good shot at qualifying in The Hague.  Unfortunately the Canadian National Championships were at the same as The Hague and we were forced to come home to fulfill our National team carding agreement and play in the Canadian National Championships.  We made the most of it, and it was nice to be home after being on the road for 6 weeks.

Liz and I with the Canadian National
Championship plaque!

Coming home for Nationals worked in our favour; after three long and hot days we were crowned the new Canadian National Champions!  The first day and a half was pool play, we went undefeated in pool play against the teams of Frawley/Pothaar, Mancini/Paulsen, and Mondor/Savoi.  After pool play we started the single elimination playoff round, defeating the teams Thomas/ Vlcek and Frawley/Pothaar again to make it to the semi's.  In our semi final game we matched up against Mondor/ Savoi again, defeating them 2-0 (21-18, 21-16), giving us a spot in the final!  For the final we were set to play against Broder/ Cordonier, a good team we hadn't played since early June.  We won the first set 21-16.  In the second set we were feeling the effects of the heat, and got down a couple points and couldn't work our way back, we lost 17-21.  In the 3rd and final set, we were both running on adrenaline.  Tied at 9-9, Liz and I made some key plays on defense that put as ahead.  From there we kept the lead, and won 15-10, and claiming the 2010 Canadian National Championships!!  What a feeling!  Liz and I were ecstatic to say the least!  The weather was great the whole weekend, and a crowd had formed in the stands and around the court, it was exhilarating to win in front of all our the fans, our loyal friends and family!  Thank you to everyone who came out.

Scandinavia and our first Main Draw!

I must admit that I have been a little negligent towards my blog the last month, but that's not because I have had a lack of news.  I have lots of good news to share about me and Liz, so I will get right to it, starting where I left off!

Kristiansand
In Kristiansand Liz and I qualified for the main draw!  Our first game in the qualifier was against a strong Germany team of Laboureur/ Lehmann.  Lucky for us we had played one of the girls the week prior in St.Peter-Ording, so we knew a little bit about her.  It was a tough battle, but we came out on top winning 2-1 (20-22, 21-17, 16-14).  Our last game of the qualifier was against Mexico (Reyes/ Virgen), a team that we have come across a couple times while playing in the Norcecas.  We had beaten them in the past, so we had the confidence that we could win again, but our toughest task was to not be over-confident.  We managed to stay focused, and won easily 2-0 (21-14, 21-12) to qualifier for our first time as a team in the main draw!  What does this mean?  It meant that we now had the opportunity to play in the double elimination tournament of the main draw, earn more points for our international ranking and seeding, and we didn't have to pay for hotels or food for the rest of the week (a huge help considering Norway is one of the most expensive places we've ever visited)!

Because it was our first time qualifying for the main draw, Liz and I were ranked pretty low, and our first game of the day matched us up against the number 3 seeded team of China (and eventual silver medalists).  The Chinese team is a really strong team, with lots of experience (one of them winning the silver medal at the 2008 Olympics in China), and we lost 2-0 (21-13, 21-12).  Our loss, while discouraging, was also eye opening.  After reflecting on the game, it gave us a better idea about what we needed to work on as a team to get better.  Our second game of the tournament we were matched up against Great Britain, another team that we had played before (in Marseille).  We were able to turn ourselves around after our loss in the morning to play consistent and win in the afternoon 2-0 (21-17, 21-11).  The next day we were matched up with the fourth seeded team of Brazil.  We went into the game a little intimidated and without much confidence and lost the first set 21-12.  After the first set, we realized that we could be competitive with this team.  We started executing our game plan more effectively, and making plays on defense.  We ended up loosing the second set 23-21, but we proved to ourselves that we could compete with a top team.  I also learned that we have to be confident going into all of our games, thinking that we can win, something I lost sight of before that match.  Because it was our second loss of the tournament, we were done, placing 17th.  A very good result for us!  Overall it was a great experience playing in my first main draw!

Aland
After Norway, we flew to Stockholm where we spent one night.  From Stockholm we took a ferry to the small island of Aland, Finland where our next tournament was.  The ferry was a lot of fun, it was about the size of a small cruise ship.  It was a really nice day, and we sat on the back deck where there was a live band playing and people sitting all around.  The landscape looked a lot like Muskoka, it was beautiful.  Being an island, Aland was a really small, quaint town.  We spent the first couple of days practicing prior to the tournament.

The qualification tournament for Aland had a lot of teams, so we had to play 3 rounds.  Our first game was against a young Chinese team, we won 2-0 (21-13, 21-12).  Our second round we played the same Great Britain team again.  Once again we were faced with the challenge of knowing that we could beat a team, but not being overly confident.  We were able to keep our focus and edge and we beat them again 21-18, 21-9).  Our last game of the qualifier was against a really solid German team.  We were playing really well, and serving tough in the wind.  The game was very close, and could have gone either way.  A couple unforced errors in the game cost us, and we lost by 2 in the last set 2-1 (19-21, 21-17, 13-15).  It was a heartbreaker for me because I know that we could have won that game, the only difference being a couple of points.  We played great, but sometimes its hard to keep that in mind!

After a couple more days of training and watching games in Finland we flew home to prepare for the Canadian National Championships.