DAY 4 COMPETITION

It is now Thursday here in Turkey and we played this morning at 8:30 am in the semifinals vs. Czech Republic. We had the day off yesterday so we just practiced and watched some very exciting USA Men's and Women's matches. I got up very early today (too early for me!!) and got a good warm up in before my 8:30 am match. My opponent was very, very strong (wondering what she is taking????). Huge, huge forehand, stronger than most men I have played with!!! We battled in the first set and with some good deep shots and moonballs I frustrated and she made alot of mistakes enabling me to win the first set in a close 6-3 battle. I thought she may have been a little tired, but I was wrong, and something kicked in. We battled hard alot of deuces and ads, but her forehand was on fire!!! She hit alot of great shots and beat me 6-0 in the second. It was closer than the score though!! The 3rd set was pretty much the same, she rarely missed her forehand and she ran around all of her backhands, so it was very difficult to get it there!! Fran played her match and again she had to battle a big forehand, and a very, very strong Czech!! What are these girls taking??????????????? Look at the pictures and
judge for yourself!!!! Fran did manage to pull it out in the third set, so it came down to the doubles. Myke and I found ourselves again battling forehands the entire 3 sets of doubles. Angle, topspin lob, moonballs you name it and they did it. We were up 4-2 in the first set and lost a close set at 6-4. We changed our strategy, stayed back, and came in together which seemed to throw them off and it worked for a while. We managed to pull out the second set 6-4. THe new ball in the third set did not help us!! They started extremely strong, not missing much of anything and we lost 6-2 in the third. The match was fantastic and we had most of the USA players from the other teams yelling and screaming for us. It was so exciting and intense, and the points were all fabulous. Even though we lost, we felt great about our efforts and they way we hung in there with these lades (or men????). We play tomorrow against France for 3rd and 4th. Overall it was an exciting day of tennis. We started at 8:30 am and got off the court @ 6:00 pm!! A very long day on the courts today!!!! Hope everyone is doing well in the States!!!