Thursday 10th April 2014
It was another good day in the Desert today as Katie fought a tough opponent and intense heat and humidity to take out the 6th seed and advance to the Quarter-Finals.
Another early start saw us have breakfast at 6.45am before packing up to check out of the house. We arrived on site at the tennis centre at 7.45am and then reviewed some of the analysis of the match yesterday so that we could use it, along with the plan for today, to be ready for the match. After going through her physical warm-up, Katie hit with Mia for about 35 minutes during which time we focussed on some of the pre-match specifics including changing pace and spin to not let her opponent get into a rhythm. Katie was hitting the ball great and by the time we left the court at 9am we were both really happy with the level she had produced.
At 9.40am Katie went on court to face 6th seed Raquel Pedraza from America and, having watched her play yesterday, we were fully prepared with our game plan to expose her weaknesses. Katie started the match very well; her 1st serve percentage was high, she was controlling the points from the back of the court and absorbing the pressure when Raquel took the ball on. At 3-0* up Katie was in complete control but Raquel raised her level of consistency to hold serve and then break Katie to leave the set on serve at 3-2*. Katie responded very professionally to this and stepped up more in the next game breaking Raquel for the second time. Katie then stuck to the game plan but kept increased the pressure on her opponent to win 2 out of the next 3 games and finished the set on a big ace!
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Katie serving over the mountains!
The second set was a real war of attrition with both girls giving it everything they had for an hour and 40 minutes! Firstly Katie took a 3-1 lead with a combination of solid tennis and a lot of errors from her opponent but then Raquel’s mindset changed and she stopped missing while at the same time hitting 5 winners in 2 games to level the set at 3-3*. Once again this didn’t faze Katie who responded immediately by breaking back with 4 winners of her own in one game! The rollercoaster continued in the next two games but this time it was Raquel who was the one dictating the play with 5 more winners resulting in her taking a *4-5 lead. Katie then showed great determination by holding serve at *4-5 and *5-6 and on both occasions Katie was just 2 points away from losing the set! The tie-break was epic . . . both girls were going toe-to-toe with each other and some of the rallies were very brutal. Katie raced to a 4-0 lead and then led 6-3 before Raquel fought extremely hard to save 3 match points. Katie again maintained the belief in her game and, after getting a mini-break at 6-6*, she stayed disciplined and eventually won another long rally to take the match 6-3, 7-6(6). I was exhausted just watching so I can only imagine how Katie felt!
After the match I went straight up to Katie to congratulate her on a very mentally tough performance and, after a bit of treatment from the physio, we got into the air-conditioned gym to cool down and stretch out. I was really proud of how Katie handled the situation as she was not only fighting her opponent, but also the heat and humidity and she did it all extremely well to record her first victory over a top 75 player.
The afternoon was spent relaxing / recovering and then, as it is my last night before I fly home tomorrow to get ready for the London Marathon on Sunday, we all headed out for a lovely dinner.
There will be no Blog tomorrow but I will be posting the results on the Facebook page so to keep updated please click here and like the page.
Schedule for tomorrow:
(11) Katie Swan (GBR) (112) vs Francesca Di Lorenzo (USA) (UNR) – 2nd match after 10.30am, not before 12.30pm
