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CHICKEN SOUP FOR THE SQUASH SOUL |
This
spring was punctuated by the return of the J.P. Morgan Tournament of
Champions. It has been over 800 days since the previous ToC in
January 2020 and there was nothing better – chicken soup for the
squash soul – than standing in the Grand Central midway again, the
Gotham energy, the commuters, the marble, the chandeliers and the
world’s best smashing balls next to you.
Just like before, old friends regularly popped out of the stream of
people. New York is famously a city where you don’t bump into
people, and after 23 ToCs in Vanderbilt Hall, I’ve still not gotten
over the thrill of it.
But it was a pretty different ToC. Instead of icy gusts of winter
wind and snow adhering to my shoes, it was mid-spring and warm.
Luckily it wasn’t brutally hot like the last time the ToC was in
Grand Central in a non-winter week, in June 1995. That year, John
Nimick and Melissa Winstanley had to spend thousands of dollars
piping air-conditioning into Vanderbilt Hall.
Compared to previous iterations, there were far fewer coaches
loitering around, due to the PSA pandemic rule about no coaching
during a match. A few players told me they had adjusted to the new
rule: they were forced to figure out themselves what was working and
not working, a skill that some were obviously better at than others.
And everyone was wearing a mask – or were supposed to, at least.
This became crucially appropriate only in hindsight, as half a dozen
behind-the-scenes staffers later tested positive for Covid.
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Coming Up:
POLAR SQUASH – What is the most exclusive squash club in the world?
There is a clue in the Headline.
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FROM:
Squash Player magazine 2022 Issue 2
See the full Gallery and magazine Contents
here
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