I played the semis of the singles against Christiane Deryckere from Belgium today. She had a 4 1/2 hour singles match yesterday, and though she didn’t use that as an excuse, her legs seemed a bit weary today. I had a good warm up again with Lieslot Prechtl who is in the 50s. She also won, 63 63 against a good German player who took out the third seed yesterday quite convincingly.  I played well against Christiane, winning 60 60, and play Dorthea Foks of Germany in the final. Foks is new to the 50s and had a good and emotional win over Margreth Beyer today, 61 75. The second set was quite close, Margreth led 5-4 in the second set and it was 30-30, two points from the set, but Dorthea hit her backhand beautifully all day and moved well too. Actually, Margreth also hit her backhand well, but Dorthea hit her backhand down the line better, it was heavy and deep.

The doubles entries closed today at 4pm; at 4:30 we had our first round match. There were 5 teams and we had to play in the women’s 40. The Germans just aren’t much interested in mixed or doubles; also, the doubles entries close late in the week and many players are gone by the time the doubles begins. It would probably help to start it earlier in the week, at the same time as singles, but who knows. There’s no separate entry fee for doubles, so it’s not cost of entry that’s stopping players from playing. However, there are no Germany doubles rankings apparently and many players only care about that ranking, not ITF ranking, I was told.

So we, Margreth and I, played Klartje Van Baarle, who is just 50, and Karina Heck-Elias who is also in the 50s. Klartje is a fantastic player, especially on clay and hits a very heavy ball. We lost 62 63. It was a fun match though and we were happy we got to play any doubles at all!

Tomorrow I play not before 11am, 2nd match on my assigned court.

The weather has moderated nicely and is now very pleasant, low 80s, and cool at night.

Tomorrow after my match, I have to go get a new SD card for my phone (the one that was in the phone I drowned in Florida isn’t working quite right) and hope to go up to the castle, from where you can see Strasberg, France. Sunday I go to Austria for the next tournament, in Poertschach.

Update: SD card found…next task, putting it into phone (that’s what a long train ride is for!)