Tennis Tournament

Today, Ashley and I played hooky from work. Well, legal hooky in that we both took leave. It just isn't as fun doing something legally, but oh well :-) We took Bode to daycare, and then we headed down to Cincinnati to see the tennis tournament. There are some pretty big names at this particular event, so we (Ashley) were looking forward to seeing some high profile players (Nadal's a*s).

The venue is pretty impressive. The center court is big (pictures below), and there are probably 10-15 smaller side courts. Here's a picture of Ashley on the grounds.

When we got there, Vera Zvonareva (a highly ranked Russian player) was going through a practice session. We watched for a bit. For a girl, she could hit the ball pretty hard, but I think I could take her. If only I'd brought my racket.

Following her warmup session was a match between Andy Murray and some French dude. What struck me was how lanky Andy Murray is. I was also impressed by how fast and hard his serve can be. Some were clocked at 130+ mph, which simply doesn't translate when watching on television. Here are some pics of the Brit.

While the Murray match was going on, Maria Sharapova was playing (screeching) on the court next to us. She's loud.

We watched about a set of the Murray match (he eventually won), grabbed some lunch, and then headed to Center Court to watch Rafael Nadal play Marty Fish. Andy is an American, so even though Rafa is a big crowd favorite, there was also a significant portion pulling for Fish. I thought the cheers, "Go Fish!" were a bit silly and reminiscent of a card game, but I'm getting sidetracked. First, here's a shot of me. Yes, our seats are waaay up high.

Next, we have Nadal in various aspects of some points. Note how stretched out he is--he's quite agile and fast. Reminds me of a young Pat McGuirk on the court.

Finally, here's a good shot I got on camera--Fish had a really nice touch.

It's a good thing we went to the quarterfinals, because Fish played outside his mind and won 6-3, 6-4. He had very few unforced errors, hit a ton of winners, and had an unreal first serve percentage. In the court interview afterwards, he was asked to rank how he played on a scale from 1-10. He said, "Eleven." Roger Federer played in the match following this one, but sadly, we had to head back and get the dude from daycare.

Slightly cooler temperatures here. As the Starks would say, "Winter is coming." (A Game of Thrones reference for you fantasy readers). This also means football is near. Pleasant weekend to all, and let me be the first to say Wareagle!