In this video, I will show some of the things I experienced during the 2018 US Open in Orlando. Overall, I think that it was a great experience. It was the first time I had been to the Southeast of America. The weather was very pleasant (in winter).
I took Allegiant Air, which is a budget airline. Carry-ons cost extra, seats are small, the tray table is tiny. However, it got me to the destination quickly and safely, which is what matters the most. I really couldn’t complain about the ticket price.
I managed to fit everything (mainly rackets, shoes, and clothes) into a small backpack, which should be a feat by itself.
I showed a few good players in this video as well. The first player was Bella Goodwin. She is the older one of the Goodwin sisters I mentioned in my previous video. She went from 1567 to 1834 after this tournament. I had a short clip of her warming up. I did not have a chance to record Kayla’s gameplay. She went from 1902 to 2001. Let’s see how high of a level they are going to reach.
The second player was Darcie Proud. She was playing against Emilia Cabrera Mallette, who was a Candian national team member. Darcie won that match. She was a fierce competitor and a cute girl. I had a chance to take a picture with her. Her British accent was so hot. My hand was shaking though when taking the selfie. Now I understand why my friend Jinmo’s hand was shaking as well when he had a chance to take a picture with Mima Ito a few years ago.
The third player was Ivy Liu. She was super young but so good already. She trained at LYTTC in NJ. LYTTC trained many good players (like Amy Wang). I have no doubt that Ivy will make the national team one day if she keeps it up.
I recorded some practice footage of Angie Tan (mainly) backhand looping against underspin/chop. I was so mesmerized by her technique so I started recording. I couldn’t even lift chops with short or long pips for more than one in a row. I don’t know if I will ever be able to do that consecutively with inverted rubbers.
Also, I caught a little bit of practicing between Angela and her mom on the table to the left. I think her mom warms Angela up before matches. I thought that was sweet and interesting.
The last player I showed was Tin-Tin Ho (though no matchplay). She is a multiple-time UK national champion. Her playstyle is traditional short pips on the forehand and inverted on the backhand on a penhold paddle. She serves with inverted and quickly twiddles afterward (like former US champion Jiaqi Zheng). She didn’t advance very far in the single’s event as well as the U21 event. When she walked into the venue to practice on Sunday (Dec. 16th, 2018), I instantly felt an aura around her. She is such a sweetheart off the court. However, when she is on the table, you don’t want to mess with her. It’s like her personality changed 180 degrees. I asked her for a picture after her practice on that day. Good thing my friend Mark was the one who took the picture so I got a good photo. I also expressed that I was such a big fan of her, she was so shy about it after hearing it (it was so cute).
There are a few other things I want to mention that I didn’t have a chance in my previous 2018 US Open videos (due to the 5000-character limitation for the description).
There is one more thing I want to say about the event structure/fee. There was a flat fee of $350 ($275 for the early bird) for the entry fee, which was a lot more than what I paid for the 2017 US Open (I think $120 for two events). With that, I did get 3 days of round-robin events and 1 classic event (men’s sandpaper, which I did win because no one else signed up) because the only age event I qualified for (over 20) happened on Friday and my plane leaves Friday morning. The national this year offers the flat fee or fee per event, which is good because at least we have choices.
One thing I forgot to mention in my last video is I did try to move Christopher around, especially in the later games. However, it was not very effective. I also tried the same thing in my match against Salman Muhammad at the 2019 US Open. It yielded a similar result (close match, but I lost in 5 games).
2018 US Open was the first tournament where I played against a player in a wheelchair (Mohan Vallabhapurapu). They do have different rules. Now if I need to play another player like that, at least I know the rules.
On a side note, I think Sunday was the last day of a cheerleading competition which happened in the same venue. I saw quite a few of them when I went out for lunch on that day, and I certainly didn’t mind that.
This is a relatively short video since I noticed some of you probably didn’t really fancy the super long (20+ minutes) video I uploaded last time.
