Day 11

Today was the day before the first matches at the 2010 Australian Open Juniors. I woke up early to practice with Nick at 9 am under overcast skies. It was a very solid practice and I was feeling very good for the tournament. After practice I went back to the hotel room where I did some homework for a couple of hours. By 12:30 I was getting hungry and I had to wait until 2 pm before we went over to the tennis center. We arrived and quickly found the players cafe and enjoyed a good lunch of pasta, corn, and some rice. Then we saw the draws which was the usual scramble to find my name. I am on the bottom half of the draw and I play a young Aussie by the name of Jay Andrijic tomorrow. He is solid so it should be a good match and I am really looking forward to it. I will be playing on Court 7 starting at 11 am Australian time if anyone wants to follow on Slam tracker! After examining the draws, Nick and I got a chance to practice with Pat Cash, the famous Aussie player. What an experience! He has the most ridiculous volleys I have ever seen; its like hitting against a wall when he gets up to the net. A lot of Aussie fans were watching and it was really fun. He helped me out a bit on my volleys which I saw improvement on just from his advice. Following practice we headed back to the hotel and went out to dinner at Nando's, the Portuguese Barbeque place we had been to in Traralgon. It was solid as usual and after we headed back to the hotel for the night. I feel pretty confident going into my match tomorrow as I have been doing well for the past six months. The kid is obviously going to play well since he has no pressure but I know that I can get it done, its just about executing. Hopefully I will have some good news for tomorrows post!