Started playing tennis again. Hadn't played in over 10 years. My one racquet says it was last strung in 2001 (wilson prostaff.) Joined a league. Played my matches with a ripstick extender 800 (great name).

First played Daniel B (slightly catty effeminate sociology professor in 30's) and lost 6-2 6-2. Hit a ton of errors playing indoors on a super fast court. Understandable to lose when first playing in over ten years. He was a dinker though. Pretty sure I'd destroy him now.

Then played Art R (nice guy, environmental scientist in 20's). Overweight fellow who hit a lot of unforced errors. We played with brand new balls that were pretty dead straight out of the can, I guess because the can had been left in a hot car for a week or so. (Penn's). That helped me on the unforced errors. Think I won maybe 6-4 6-2.

Then Chi C. (Asian FBI guy in his 50's). Very much a dinker who very rarely hit unforced errors except he couldn't handle my serve. I forfeited 6-4 6-5 as I pulled a leg muscle. I was up 5-3 in the second set when injured. Played impressive at times but hit too many unforced errors. If I had just hit easy slices and ran him, think could have easily won as he wasn't really very mobile. Played at local college courts. Saw Kenny K who I played with a bit 25 years ago. He's been constantly playing ever since. Still only average.

Took a week off and bought a ball machine. Then played Travis S (early 20's engineer). Liked this guy's game, the least dinky of the bunch. We played indoors and I basically blew him off the court. 2-6, 6-2, 6-2. He did strain a neck muscle and that hurt his serve. But when his serve was good it wasn't any big deal anyway. My serve was bad the first set and then awesome the last two. Virtually no double faults. I'd guess hitting 120's... 130's ?? Maybe ten aces. Though my placement needs work. I was hitting huge forehands. I used the ball machine once or twice before this. I think it very quickly is helping me.

Then Buddy M (athletic guy in his 50's). This guy had not much of a game (dinker). Also showed up with one tennis ball in pants and no shirt, lol. But he could run. And actually his serve was really good in the second set (had a weird backwards spin (not an american twist)). I won 6-1 7-5. Had a weird meltdown in the second set where I lost 5 games in a row. Then won like the last 16 points straight almost. Except for those 5 games, just destroyed this guy.

Then Yang S (an athletic PE major). This guy really took a rip at the ball. Tried to put a lot of top spin on it. Kind of a nice serve. Good movement, spin, consistent, although actually quite easy to return. And his ground strokes came nice and slow also really. I had tennis elbow this time. Started to feel the beginnings of it against Buddy, was pretty bad this time. Could barely lift a water bottle to drink in between games with my right hand. So I did a lot of dinking. Lots of slicing. Though not really an issue on the backhand side. Also the balls were incredibly fast (wilson titaniums) so was trying to be careful. He actually hit to my two handed backhand a lot. Which normally would be smart as my forehand is huge. Don't think he realized I was having trouble even lifting my arm. And I did hit the topspin forehand hard here and there. Ultimately he hit a lot of unforced errors. I blasted too many winners to say I dinked him to death, but I was kind of dinky. Prefer to think I mixed things up and he couldn't get a rhythm. 6-4 6-1.

Should take a rest now cause of my arm. Actually it's both my shoulder and my elbow. Trying to dampen vibrations by adding weight in the neck area via duct tape. Against Yang S was the first time I tried it. Not sure if it didn't work or my arm was already so softened up from hitting 200 serves plus the ball machine the day before with the new racquet I bought (Prince Graphite Classic Longbody). Read a lot about racquets/tennis elbow. I guess I need a heavy racket where all the weight isn't just out in the head. So attempted to modify racquets as they're all made too light. Really want a 14 ounce racket. Added about 3 ounces of tape to the ripstick in the neck against Yang (bringing it up to 12 ounces). Previously had only added weight in the head where it wasn't really dampening. Just putting in in the neck really gives me all the power I need. Added a bit more tape just above the two hand grip. And  added cotton balls and nails inside the handle (about 2 ounces) worth. This brings it up to about 14 ounces. Now will rest up a bit. And see if I can get past this....

Had a week off and did a lot of maffetone but since back to work can't run as much and really slowing down at my maffetone HR. So decided to get back to the really long runs. At least two hours twice a week plus the elliptical for two hours once a week. Then a short fast day.....

That was last week. So I did a 140 minute run but just did it at 2% incline the whole way instead of half/half 0%/4%. My weekly fast run wasn't good. 2 miles in 14:26. Previously did 2 in 14:35 but kept going for another half mile.

It could have been that I wasn't used to such a long run and it just took it out of me a bit... but no. I had my PR after a 3 hour and 40 minute run which was more than an hour longer than I'd ever done. No, what it was, was that I ran slower. With the 2% incline I started at 12 min/miles where previously I had been doing some 10min/mile running at the beginning.

So... I decided to do all my running at 0% incline (with a bit of elliptical thrown in). Was curious to see if my hard run would even be faster if I spent so much time running relatively faster (while still at maffetone). So instead of 30 to 40 minutes at 0% and then 30 to 40 minutes more at 4%. I started just going 60 to 100 minutes at 0%.

...and within a few runs I'm only going 10.5 minute miles and slower to beging with instead of 10min/miles for 3.5 or 4 miles.

Why?

Probably because I've suddenly doubled the amount of running I'm doing at 0% incline. NOT because I'm neglecting "hills".

Soooo.... Going to reduce the 0% incline running a bit and patiently increase it. But instead of incline running was thinking of spending the rest of the time on the elliptical. Although the elliptical may be breaking, resistance suddenly changed to very hard on me. Actually though that more simulates waking up stairs, which is more useful.

So whatever really. Being slower at 0% incline at maffetone is most likely just a short term effect because I'm suddenly doing twice as much of it. Surely? But getting rid of 0% incline running earlier, which caused my hard run to be much slower, was not a short term effect. I suspect that would have been a long term trend.

So it's complicated. And I could be quite wrong. Making sure to do a lot of time on the elliptical to simulate incline running just in case taking that away was actually the problem. It could be something entirely different I'm not thinking of though.

In other news I got a tennis ball machine which is kind of wonderful. I would have been a contender if I had one as a kid. (Or someone willing to do drills with me. Or if I had been smart enough to get someone else to do drills with me.) So I don't know. The negative is it takes a while to pick the balls back up and start over again. Getting a metal tennis basket, hopefully that will help.

Used it twice and already finally hitting a one hand topspin backhand decently well. Actually less unforced errors than my forehand. Also changed my backhand slice grip. Hitting it really well now.

Just about finished my second pond. Going to add hooks, etc and put a net entirely over the first. (Something seems to have killed three koi, would be nice to not worry about such things.)

Haven't played cello at all for a long time. Any day now going to get back to it...

Reading The Magician's Land by Lev Grossman. Book three of Magicians trilogy. He's underrated. Really not much I can criticize, like his stuff a lot. Underrated because it's too intelligent. It's not that intelligent, but fantasy fiction has got the bar very low these days.

Did my hard run a day early as under 140 I seem to be slowing down last day or so. Had done 3.5 miles in 35 minutes (on treadmill with no incline). Today after 6 minutes at 6mph HR was 143! Think my anerobic system starts getting undertrained maybe. So decided to run hard instead. Did first two miles in 14:35 and kept the pace for about another half mile. So, a good improvement. That's 15:05, 14:44, 14:35 and did another half mile. Can't complain.

Elsewhere in life, who cares?

..bought a tennis ball machine. Suspect I'm going to enjoy the hell out of that. (As long as it works correctly.) Have wanted one for almost 30 years. Love the idea of trying to hit the same shot over and over again. Can mess around also with a one hand backhand. A left handed forehand. Mastering putting away blobby no pace crap from dinkers. Something I used to really enjoy and I officially have the time now to get back into it. Also joined a league.