SQUASH (2)

This post is about squash the racket sport, not squash the vegetable. Today I played it for the first time in about 12 years. Squash is not very popular in Denmark, where badminton is king. But I know someone who is keen on it, and he asked me to play a game, even though we had to drive to Odense, which is about 30km away.

After learning to play in my late teens, I played squash for about 20 years as my main form of exercise. In Tanzania, it was regularly three times a week. Yet since I came to Denmark in 2000, I have played just once.

Tonight I am both knackered and sore in the whole of my upper body. It's amazing how you can get out of the habit of something. My positioning was poor, I didn't watch the ball enough (in badminton, it's always coming from in front of you, whereas in squash, it is often coming from behind you), and I had no power or timing. Worst of all, I tweaked a muscle in the back of my thigh when lunging for a forehand down the line.

Still, I loved it. I had to work a lot harder than in any badminton game, and that can only be good.

Walter Blotscher