After getting back to Toronto from Guatemala, I only had 1 week to train with Caleigh for our 2 big upcoming tournaments in China. The preparation wasn't ideal, but we worked hard and did what we could. Luckily, Caleigh and I seem to click and playing together seems to come pretty naturally.
We left for our first stop, Sanya, on April 21. We got there a few days before the tournament started in order to train and get used to the 12 hour time change. We also met up with our friends, the owners of the Fat Daddy's restaurant we found last year. As always, they hooked us up with some delicious (american) food and came to cheer us on during the games.
Caleigh and I played France in the first round. I wasn't sure what to expect, because this was our first time competing together, and it was also Caleigh's first FIVB qualifier match! The game ended up going very well for us, once we got over some nerves at the beginning. We played a solid match, winning 21-17, 21-15.
After that we moved on to play in the second round. We faced a team from Italy ranked 3rd (we're ranked 35th). The game took place on Centre Court in the middle of the day with the sun blaring down at us and no wind to cool us down. We battled through the match, but ended up falling to the Italians in a tight third set (17-21, 24-22, 14-16). This was a tough loss because it was so close! But Caleigh and I played really well, and keeping pace with a good team like this was encouraging for us.
Next we went on to play in Shanghai. The weather was much cooler there, which I actually preferred (even though we had to play some games in tights to stay warm!). Same as in Sanya, we had to win three Qualification matches in a row to be able to make the Main Draw. When we looked up who we were supposed to play in the first round, we were bummed to find out we were up against our friends (and my former partner) Kacie and Julie. It's unfortunate that the draw worked out this way, and one Canadian team was guaranteed to be knocked out first round. Regardless, Caleigh and I treated it as any other 1st round match. We came up with a good game plan and fought hard throughout the game. We ended up winning the match 16-21, 21-15, 15-12.
In the 2nd round we faced another Italian team (this one was ranked 5th). We pulled off an upset, winning the match 21-16, 21-18. (We were ranked 37th this time).
Our final match was against a team from the Netherlands. By this point in the day, we were pretty tired and I think that affected our play a little bit. This was a solid team that made very few errors so it was important that we stayed focused the entire time. We were up almost the entire first set, but we lost some steam and they took the set 21-19. The wind picked up in the second set and we had a lot of difficulty with that, losing 14-21. It was exiting to make it this far in the tournament, but disappointing because we got so close to the Main Draw. At least Caleigh and I are moving up with each tournament we play. I'm really looking forward to training with Caleigh this summer and becoming an even stronger team.
For now, we're off to Hermosa Beach in California for a week of training outdoors before heading back home! Life is pretty good!!
