The King of Clay Returns to Full Flight

Rafa and his turnaround two years ago…

Pilgrim on a Long, Long Journey

Uncle Tony recently said Rafa was an injured man playing tennis. Nadal, uncharacteristically, kept losing in the semis of the red clay court season. Many thought his body at almost 33 had suffered one too many injuries.

Rafa had one last chance before Roland Garros to win his first title of the year. That was in Rome. Then something happened. He beat his semis-slayer in Madrid, Tsitsipas. But his recent nemesis stood waiting in the final, Djokovic (Nole).

Rafa started strong and “bageled” Nole in the first set (6-0). The second set was up and down for both. In the end it was Djokovic 6-4.

In the third set Rafa began to dominate. He returned to using his strength fully on defense. His over-sized arms could produce fierce forehands down the line stretching at full tilt. That shot would quickly change defense to offense. His powerful lower body allowed fully…

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A Tad Askew

“Achieving a goal is nothing. The getting there is everything.” James Michelet, a 19th Century French historian

I think Michelet was amiss. Some of the unmitigated joy on the Olympic stands recently, or by the Dodgers after breaking their 32 year championship drought last October showed the delirious joy of some achievements. To describe that as nothing misses the mark from my view.

Neither for the Olympic swimmers, was the process everything in their hours of boredom, swimming lap after lap without human contact. I get it about enjoying the process because I enjoy this. It clearly stops short of “everything.”

Interesting that these remarks got saved for two centuries. Don’t you think?