Respite
Respite
Updated 06:20am (Mla time) Jan 20, 2005
By Conrado de Quiros
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A12 of the January 20, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
I'M a little blurry-eyed from having spent last Monday watching Day One of the Australian Open. For those who don't know it yet, or care, this is the 100th anniversary of that event -- "100 Years In The Making" goes its title -- a milestone for tennis and for the country Down Under. It sort of makes up for that Bush clone, John Howard, or makes you forget he's Up Over.
Not too many surprises on opening day, except that fifth-ranked Carlos Moya got booted out by countryman Guillermo Garcia-Lopez in four sets. In the course of the match, Moya repeatedly did to his racket what he probably wanted to do with himself, if not his opponent, which was to fling it violently to the ground out of disgust. Also, Ai Sugiyama of Japan and Mary Pierce of France lost to their foes, but neither has really been playing well over the last few years, so their loss stoked more sadness than shock.
Otherwise, it was par for the course. The only drama was offered by Paradorn Srichaphan of Thailand who played woefully but still managed to subdue an energetic but temperamental Potito Starace of Italy. I rooted for Paradorn, of course, the first Southeast Asian to have gotten this far in tennis -- he's currently 28th in the world -- though his game has gone up and down over the last couple of years. He can change from brilliant to clumsy in the blink of an eye. He was in his usual erratic form last Monday (our time) committing one unforced error after another. But he emerged victorious anyway when the smoke cleared.
I know someone said (I forget now what sport he was referring to -- might have been billiards) that a champion's mettle isn't shown by how he wins with his best game but how he wins with his worst. That's the real test of character. But you wish some people would spend more time fighting their opponents than themselves.
My sentimental favorite Andre Agassi won in straight sets against German qualifier Dieter Kindlmann, showing he was none the worse for a hip injury that threatened to prevent him from joining his favorite Open: he's been champion there several times. The lopsided score, as the announcers pointed out throughout the match, did not reflect the long rallies and brilliant exchanges that marked it. Agassi by no means breezed through it, but he showed he was in fine form and still posed a threat to the junior citizens.
The ones who did breeze through and showed awesome form were Roger Federer and Marat Safin. Federer, in particular, by demolishing Fabrice Santoro 6-1, 6-1, 6-2. He's No. 1, and I think he'll be so for many years. He's only 23. I believed him when he said he was playing at another level right now and felt there was no one that could touch him. He was invincible last year, failing to add only the French Open to his Grand Slam bid. Neither Andy Roddick nor Lleyton Hewitt nor Safin, the second-, third- and fourth-ranked players respectively, gave him any trouble. He crushed Roddick and Hewitt a couple of times. Hewitt might have his countrymen smiling at him at the Australian Open, but Federer has the gods of Olympus doing so. His game is simply, well, at another level, the way Tiger Woods' and Michael Jordan's were. I personally think he'll surpass Pete Sampras before he fades into the sunset.
So I'll be a little more blurry-eyed in the next few days. I have cable TV to thank, or curse, for that. It's the only thing I'm keeping it for actually, apart from BBC and CNN. It's opened up new vistas on sports, including football. There's only one football, as one reader wrote me, which is the European one. "American football," which has little to do with the feet, is as much a misnomer as "Filipino restraint." But that's another story.
I wasn't always into sports. I hated Physical Education when I was a kid, thanks in no small way to being asthmatic and preferring the world of books to the world of exertion. I thought then, with no small help from my elders but not necessarily betters, that Cassius Clay was just a loudmouth who did not know his place. His place being what White America said it was. It was only later that I would realize how great a sportsman he was: when he became Muhammad Ali and became champion in a game far beyond boxing, which was the game of life. To this day, I get goose pimples when I recall him lighting the torch at the Atlanta Olympics, his hands trembling violently and his clothes flapping in the wind, while all the world's athletes stood still, some with tears streaming down their cheeks.
That was what got me into sports, the beauty, drama and transcendence of it. A man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's heaven for, as Robert Browning said, and nowhere does the striving seem mightier and purer than in sports. It's human beings tugging at the limits of the possible, straining to go beyond what their bodies allow. The horse is swifter, the elephant stronger and the tiger more agile, but it's the human being that has the capacity to go beyond himself, and grow. It's the human being whose effort to be swifter, stronger and more agile-or be better than what he is -- makes him, well, human.
I wasn't drawn to sports for the escape it offered, though heaven knows these days that can be reason enough. I was drawn to sports, if only largely as a spectator, for the hope it offered that human beings could be better. The final struggle isn't really between one athlete and another, it is between one athlete and himself. At its best, sports show not what humanity is but what it could be.
But that is getting too grand. Right now, all I want is some respite from work so I can spend nights watching that small ball whacked from side to side across the net by furious competitors. It helps, too, that the Russian belles add to the aesthetics....
Updated 06:20am (Mla time) Jan 20, 2005
By Conrado de Quiros
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A12 of the January 20, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
I'M a little blurry-eyed from having spent last Monday watching Day One of the Australian Open. For those who don't know it yet, or care, this is the 100th anniversary of that event -- "100 Years In The Making" goes its title -- a milestone for tennis and for the country Down Under. It sort of makes up for that Bush clone, John Howard, or makes you forget he's Up Over.
Not too many surprises on opening day, except that fifth-ranked Carlos Moya got booted out by countryman Guillermo Garcia-Lopez in four sets. In the course of the match, Moya repeatedly did to his racket what he probably wanted to do with himself, if not his opponent, which was to fling it violently to the ground out of disgust. Also, Ai Sugiyama of Japan and Mary Pierce of France lost to their foes, but neither has really been playing well over the last few years, so their loss stoked more sadness than shock.
Otherwise, it was par for the course. The only drama was offered by Paradorn Srichaphan of Thailand who played woefully but still managed to subdue an energetic but temperamental Potito Starace of Italy. I rooted for Paradorn, of course, the first Southeast Asian to have gotten this far in tennis -- he's currently 28th in the world -- though his game has gone up and down over the last couple of years. He can change from brilliant to clumsy in the blink of an eye. He was in his usual erratic form last Monday (our time) committing one unforced error after another. But he emerged victorious anyway when the smoke cleared.
I know someone said (I forget now what sport he was referring to -- might have been billiards) that a champion's mettle isn't shown by how he wins with his best game but how he wins with his worst. That's the real test of character. But you wish some people would spend more time fighting their opponents than themselves.
My sentimental favorite Andre Agassi won in straight sets against German qualifier Dieter Kindlmann, showing he was none the worse for a hip injury that threatened to prevent him from joining his favorite Open: he's been champion there several times. The lopsided score, as the announcers pointed out throughout the match, did not reflect the long rallies and brilliant exchanges that marked it. Agassi by no means breezed through it, but he showed he was in fine form and still posed a threat to the junior citizens.
The ones who did breeze through and showed awesome form were Roger Federer and Marat Safin. Federer, in particular, by demolishing Fabrice Santoro 6-1, 6-1, 6-2. He's No. 1, and I think he'll be so for many years. He's only 23. I believed him when he said he was playing at another level right now and felt there was no one that could touch him. He was invincible last year, failing to add only the French Open to his Grand Slam bid. Neither Andy Roddick nor Lleyton Hewitt nor Safin, the second-, third- and fourth-ranked players respectively, gave him any trouble. He crushed Roddick and Hewitt a couple of times. Hewitt might have his countrymen smiling at him at the Australian Open, but Federer has the gods of Olympus doing so. His game is simply, well, at another level, the way Tiger Woods' and Michael Jordan's were. I personally think he'll surpass Pete Sampras before he fades into the sunset.
So I'll be a little more blurry-eyed in the next few days. I have cable TV to thank, or curse, for that. It's the only thing I'm keeping it for actually, apart from BBC and CNN. It's opened up new vistas on sports, including football. There's only one football, as one reader wrote me, which is the European one. "American football," which has little to do with the feet, is as much a misnomer as "Filipino restraint." But that's another story.
I wasn't always into sports. I hated Physical Education when I was a kid, thanks in no small way to being asthmatic and preferring the world of books to the world of exertion. I thought then, with no small help from my elders but not necessarily betters, that Cassius Clay was just a loudmouth who did not know his place. His place being what White America said it was. It was only later that I would realize how great a sportsman he was: when he became Muhammad Ali and became champion in a game far beyond boxing, which was the game of life. To this day, I get goose pimples when I recall him lighting the torch at the Atlanta Olympics, his hands trembling violently and his clothes flapping in the wind, while all the world's athletes stood still, some with tears streaming down their cheeks.
That was what got me into sports, the beauty, drama and transcendence of it. A man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's heaven for, as Robert Browning said, and nowhere does the striving seem mightier and purer than in sports. It's human beings tugging at the limits of the possible, straining to go beyond what their bodies allow. The horse is swifter, the elephant stronger and the tiger more agile, but it's the human being that has the capacity to go beyond himself, and grow. It's the human being whose effort to be swifter, stronger and more agile-or be better than what he is -- makes him, well, human.
I wasn't drawn to sports for the escape it offered, though heaven knows these days that can be reason enough. I was drawn to sports, if only largely as a spectator, for the hope it offered that human beings could be better. The final struggle isn't really between one athlete and another, it is between one athlete and himself. At its best, sports show not what humanity is but what it could be.
But that is getting too grand. Right now, all I want is some respite from work so I can spend nights watching that small ball whacked from side to side across the net by furious competitors. It helps, too, that the Russian belles add to the aesthetics....
posted by Dante at 3:30 PM
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