A Beautiful Day for Tennis

It didn't start out that way, but it did end up being a beautiful day for the Fremont tennis tournament.  We had packed for all types of weather and when we arrived at 8:15 this morning we wondered if we should have brought winter attire.  The temperature in the Pilot read an unseasonable 36 degrees.  Thankfully, the weather did not affect Cam's first match of the day.  Cam stayed plenty warm while playing and I was able to watch from the shelter of the car.  Doug braved the cold, but by the time the match ended he had warmed up a little.

Cam played extremely well against his Angola opponent.  He served well, moved the ball around the court and kept his errors to a minimum.  We were impressed with his 8-2 victory.  Cameron had to wait quite awhile before his second match on the day.  He spent it cheering on his teammates while I watched tennis and read The Hunchback of Notre Dame.  Doug watched other matches, worked for awhile and then read some as well.  The time went by quickly and the weather warmed up enough for me to get out of the car by Cam's second match.  

Cameron's second opponent had a big serve which took some adjusting for Cam to get used to at first.  He lost several deuce games early and quickly found himself down 4-0 in the second match.  He rallied well, firgured out the DeKalb player's serve, and started hitting a big serve of his own.  Cameron brought the match back to 4-5 before losing 8-4 overall.  He was disappointed to have lost, but was extremely happy with his play.  

Doug walked down to Subway to get everyone something for lunch afterward.  It wasn't too long after we ate that Cameron was called back on the court for his third match of the day.  Since he finished 1-1 in the round robin matches, he would be playing for third place overall.  Cameron started off really well getting out to a 2-0 lead.  Something changed in the third game for him, however, and he struggled to get back in rhythm. He wasn't sure why, but he just lost focus.  I wondered if it was because of the poor attitude of the Fremont player.  I also knew from previous tournaments that it can be difficult to get pumped up for a consolation match when you felt that you could definitely be a contender for a championship.  Cam's coach, Daniel, gave him a great pep talk when the score was 6-7 and Cameron played his best game on the day to even the score.  Unfortunately, the tiebreak didn't go his way and Cameron finished the day in 4th place overall.  It wasn't quite what he wanted when the day began, but he felt pretty good about it.  In the end t was a great learning experience and gave him some specific goals to work on for next year.