Quarterfinal on Friday
Tomorrow, on Friday, I'm facing one of Finland's best players, Juho Paukko. If I play well, I think I have a good chance to win.
More updates to come...
In Finland
I have now been in Vierumäki, the location of the Finnish sports institute 100 miles northeast of Helsinki, for almost one week.
I made the main draw after winning two rounds of qualifying. In the main draw, I managed to beat a German player in the first round 6-3, 6-3. Shortly after i finnished the match, it started to rain and now more than 24 hours later, it is still raining. Hence, the second round which I was supposed to play today got postphoned for Thursday.
The weather really has been miserable for the most part. The temperature has been in between 10-15 degrees C (app. 50-60 Fahrenheit) when it hasn't been raining. The summer here in the north of Europe is coming to an end.
After the tournament here in Finland I am heading back to my new home town Gothenburg and a tournament at my new club Ullevi in central Gothenburg. On Saturday, I get access to my appartment in Gothenburg. Hopefully, I will still be playing the tournament in Finland by then.
As soon as I get my new laptop and move into the appartment, I look forward to write more in the blog.
Lithuania- The second week
Once again, I had to pass through qualifying to make it to the main draw. After winning two matches in straight sets on Saturday and Sunday, I could enjoy a rare day off from playing matches on Monday. Just like in the first tournament, the random draw put me against another qualifier.
It seemed like Vilnius got hotter fort every day. Sleeping at a hotel without AC was a struggle.
I got off to a great start of my first round match against Irdoja from Estonia taking a 5-0 lead. Although he broke my serve back once, I managed to win the first set 6-3 and closed the match by winning the second set 6-3 as well.
In the second round I faced Sabeckis, the Lithuanian player I had had a match point against in the first tournament. I am not sure whether he played better than last week or if I didn't have the same edge, regardless of which, I lost 1-6, 1-6. Vitas Gerulaitis memorial was over for me for this time.
I left Lithuania the same night and felt relieved to get back to "safe ground" again. As a last reminder of the crime in Lithuania, my last 20 Litas bill proved to be false as I tried to use it at the tax free in the airport right before boarding.
Coming from a country where theft, and counterfeiting are less common and where taxi drivers not instinctively try to fool tourists, it is easy to judge Lithuania and its people. I try not to. I believe these aspects of Lithuania are products of a far rougher society and lack of social wellfare compared to Sweden. As conditions in Lithuania become better following the economical growth, one can hope that crime and fraud will decline. Jeffrey Sachs, the world renown economist dedicated to estinguish extreme poverty world wide and an idol of mine carefully made an important point in his book "The end of Poverty". He suggests that corruption (which can be compared with fraud and theft) is a product of poverty, and as conditions improve, corruption will decline.
I am not sure whether I will return to Lituania. Hopefully, if I do well enough on th tennis court, I will no longer play future tournaments in a year from now. If I do get back, I won't leave any of my belongings out of sigth for even a second and check every bill I recieve.
As a whole, the trip was a success. I fulfilled my primary goal which was to get back on the ATP world tennis ranking.
In a few days I'll be leaving for Gotenburg to find a place to live and to train for my next tournament, a $10 000 tournament on clay in Finland starting in two weeks from now.
Lithuania- The first week
I have now spent a week in Vilnius, the booming capital of Lithuania.
This past week, I've been competing in President's Cup, a $10 000 tournament on the so called future tour. Most players on this level call themselves professional players and are ranked between 300 and 1500 in the world . However, we're far from the easy life and glamour of the players ranked in the top 100 in the world. While the prize money on the ATP-tour, where the top 100 players make $ 6000 for loosing in the first round, has nearly doubled the last 15 years, the prize money on the future tour has remained the same. Most players trying to reach the ATP-tour never even manags to establish themselves on the Future tour and of the fortunate ones that do, only a small fraction will ever break into the top 100 in the world.
Making many by playing $10 000 tournaments is not possible. Only the winner of the tournament will leave the site with more money than he came with.
I haven't played any future tournaments since 2004 when I made two second rounds in tournaments in Denmark and Finland. My efforts then awarded me two ATP-points and a ranking around 1300 in the world. The points disappear after one year, so I entered President's Cup last Friday as an unranked player.
After winning three tough matches in the qualifies agains one American and two players from Belarus, I secured a spot in the main draw. Once there, I beat an Italian in the first round and was guaranteed one ATP-point and a world ranking again. In the second round I faced a very good player from the Netherlands. Somehow after three hours of running and fighting on the clay, I won.
Unfortunately I lost today in the quarterfinals to a Lituanian player, supported by an enthusiastic home crowd on the center court. I played really well and fought harder than ever but I didn't take my chance in the second set when I had a match point. Instead I missed a forehand return wide by less than an inch and my opponent came back and won in three sets. It was very dissapointing especially since winning would have meant at least 4 points and a raning around 1050 in the world. Now I made 2 points and will enter the ranking next week somewhere around 1300.
The next tournament, Vitas Gerulaitis Memorial, starts with qualies already on Saturday which gives me one day of rest. Considering I've played 6 tough matches the last 6 days, my body feels suprisingly fresh. Mentally, playing back to back tournaments is tough but so far my mind feels fresh as well.
I wish I could take some pictures, but my camara along with my wallet and mp3 player got stolen this past Sunday while I was taking a shower at the tennis club. I only turned my back for a minute which proved to be enough for somebody to sneak in and out with most of my valuables. Hopefully the insurance will give me most of the money back, but I will never get the pcitures on the camera back. As if steeling my valuables wasn't enough, the thiefs went straight to the hotel and used to key card from the wallet to open the room to steel some clothes and a back pack despite I called the hotel 30 minutes after wallet got stolen.
Crime here is high and theifs will take any opportunity they'll get. Four years ago when I compeeted in the same tournament here in Vilnius, someone broke into the room by kicking the door open and stole an entire bag of clothes.
I've made up my mind to move to Gothenburg in the fall and Ullevi Tennis Club. They have a hungry group of young players hungry to become real professionals as well as a few players ranked in the top 400 hundred. I'm not sure about what I'll do about school. It would definitely be fun to study at Chalmers but that might have to wait for another year to start with.
Vilnius is a city in a fast transition. Since four years ago, several tall buildings and malls have popped up out of nowhere. The contrasts are great though. I wish I could take a picture of the new buildings rising next to old worn down wooden houses.
In general, people here are nice. The girls are actually very good looking. However, very few of them can speak any English.
People are wating to use to computer. I'll write soon again.
Lithuania next
I went there 4 years ago, a few months before coming to Virgina Tech.
I'm not sure if I'll have access to internet over there, but there should be a way to figure that out. If I won't be able to give updates on the blog, the best way to follow my results is probably by going to www.stevegtennis.com and click on Lithuania on the third column.
Enjoy the rest of the summer!
