Mombasa U18 ITF Grade 5 (week 1), Day 1

Friday 23rd November 2012

This time last year I was heading out to Bujumbura in Burundi for the East Africa ITF Circuit but this year the circuit has moved to Mombasa in Kenya and has a total of 3 events of which I will have players competing in the 2nd and 3rd weeks.

Due to travelling to a lot of Men’s Futures events over the summer I hadn’t been out of the UK since May for an event so I was really excited about travelling back out to Mombasa for these two U18 ITFs. I was here in February 2011 and despite the courts at the Mombasa Sports Club being quite run down we had a great week and it enabled me to establish links with some players, coaches and most importantly a good cheap hotel which will save the players a lot of money over the next two weeks.

I met up with Holly Hutchinson (Everyball Academy in Halton), Mason Recci (Edgbaston Priory Academy in Birmingham) and Mia Smith (Bath Academy) at around 4pm yesterday afternoon at Terminal 4 (well … Mia actually fancied a tour around Terminal 5 before joining us in Terminal 4 but she eventually got there!). I then had a quick chat with their parents before we checked in and went through the long queue at security. We originally had loads of time before we were due to board but due to Holly’s hand luggage being selected for a random search, and it taking 35 minutes to get searched, we ended up getting to the gate just as they were starting to close it.

The flight went very smoothly; Mia, Holly and I managed to get a little bit of sleep while Mason had a good hour at the start of the flight and then managed to get 3 seats to himself at the back of the plane to sleep for another 3 or 4 hours more.

We landed in Nairobi at 6.15am local time and after obtaining our visas we walked over to the domestic terminal to catch our next flight to Mombasa at just before 9am. It was again a good flight and I just about managed to stay awake long enough to get the picture I’d been waiting for of Mount Kilimanjaro:

After arriving in Mombasa at around 10am we were met by our taxi driver and taken straight to the hotel. On the way the players had a chance to get a feel for the place and witness some of the locals hard at work. Holly later commented to me about how gruelling some of labour was as she saw a few men pulling carts filled with barrels of oil along the side of the road. It does make you appreciate the life that you have and realise that when things get difficult in our lives it’s never as difficult as some of the things others have to do just to earn a living.

By 11.30am we were all checked in and we decided to try and catch up on some sleep before meeting again at 1pm for lunch. There was then time to get out and about in Mombasa and get used to the heat and humidity before going over to the club to go through a long physical warm up to get the flights out of our systems. We then trained from 4.15 – 5.30pm on the newly painted courts and I was very pleased with how well everyone applied themselves to the training considering they were all very tired. We cooled down around the cricket pitch and then had a thorough stretch out to end a very good first training session.

We had dinner tonight with Dave Bandelin and the Swedish / Danish team at the Royal Court Hotel which had become a favourite of ours last year. Once again the flat bread was a winner but Dave and his team made a big unforced error by ordering 9 pizzas which could only be cooked 2 at a time in the small oven!!

Everyone was exhausted by 9pm so they retired early to their rooms to get ready for a full days training tomorrow. Holly has one more day of preparation before she starts in Qualifying on Sunday while Mason and Mia have an extra day of training as they start their campaigns in the Main Draw on Monday.