Even at age 5, Max has gone to both the Tiny Tennis Center and Tennis Zone for tennis lessons. I even gave it a shot last summer with him. Which made Friday's performance all the more disturbing. The kid had forgotten how to play tennis. His strokes were gone, his confidence shaken and it looked like he couldn't even beat Andy Roddick.
A few days rest made all the difference. The competitor in Max needs the tennis to mean something, so I feed him balls at the service line and we play out the points. Max had never won a game from me in our version of mini-tennis. Indeed, he did lose the first set 6-1 teaming up with Ben. Then Max took over by himself and went all 6-0 on me in the second set. In the decisive third set, Max led 6-5 when he decided it was time for a tiebreaker. He tanked it to get to the breaker where he promptly lost 7-1. Still, what a performance and now for his postmatch interview.
"The difference is I slept good," Max said. "I had all sorts of energy. My energy was back."
As for me, almost losing to a 5 year-old has done nothing to shake my confidence. I didn't sleep good, so my energy was low. It all makes sense to me.