“Welcome to Houston”. Those aren’t the words you want to hear when you are flying to a volleyball tournament that’s being held in Siesta Keys, Florida. My partner, Ola, and I exchange terrified faces, which quickly morph into a stifled medley of tears, shock, and laughter as the passenger seatbelt sign turns off and people shuffle for their belongings.
As it turns out, it only takes two Polish blondes to think that they booked a non-stop flight to the other side of the country. No worries mates — we made our connecting flight from Texas to Tampa and vowed that we’d both take a closer look the next time we purchased a plane ticket.
Several local South Bay teams also made the trip to the Corona Light Wide Open’s (CLWO) season opener, including Kelly Schumacher/Angela Bryan, Layryssa Mereszczak/Jennifer Corral, and Erin Gray/Jen Snyder.
I had been to Siesta Keys once before — two summers ago — and completely fell victim to the wind…but this time would be different. I’m a better player than I was back then. It had to be different. Us girls were eager to get our feet sandy to prepare for the big day ahead of us, so we left the air-conditioned hotel and headed to the tournament site.
Well, they call it “jumpers sand” for a reason, because the surface is hard packed, enabling even the most vertically-challenged to get some quality air time on the ball. The fine, white sand rests in the palm of your hand like confectioner’s sugar. Am I at the beach, or caught up in a baker’s ultimate dreamland?
In short, our playing field was completely different from the coarse, dense sand we have here in Hermosa and Manhattan Beach. Add to that the humidity and calm, warm waves and for a moment I was Jack Sparrow marooned on yet another deserted island. But what about the rum?
Fast forward one shower, one baked potato, and one solid night’s sleep and I’m in the car on my way back to this beach, wondering who Ola and I are going to face off against first. We end up losing that first match to a team out of Florida, which was frustrating because a handful of their points were because of our careless serves.
That “L” put us in the consolation bracket where we ended up waiting nearly five hours for our second match of the day to begin. Not the worst thing in the world though when you are lying under an umbrella watching number one seeded Sean Scott/John Hyden play a bounty match on center court.
The CLWO tour has this feature they call “Karch’s cash” where the number one seeds on both the men’s and women’s side have a $5,000 bounty on their heads. Anyone who beats them automatically gets $5,000, unless no one beats them, in which case they get to keep the bounty for themselves. Ingenious idea, in my opinion, because it really riles up the crowd and puts an exciting spin on the entire tournament. I begin daydreaming about the day when I could have a bounty on my head…
Then our second match commences and we squeeze out a win in three; not pretty by any means, but it certainly scared me shitless because there was no way I was going to lose this early in the tournament after having traveled 3,000 miles to compete. I had a new surge of energy, a “lets take care of business” attitude.
Our third match was against a team we were familiar with but had yet to play against. The wind had picked up significantly by this point, a factor we didn’t embrace but didn’t fear either. Ola and my sense of urgency was strong and we comfortably beat them in two.
Next up was an elimination match. We would have to play Kelly Schumacher/Angela Bryan to see who would advance to Sunday and who would get knocked out of the tournament. The wind had acquiesced and so had the sun, though still beaming with bright orange vibrancy against a blue canvas.
It was one of the best matches that Ola and I have had together, but we fell to Kelly and her partner in a close third game. A couple better sets here and there and I believe it would’ve gone the other way. I was happy with our performance, though, and watching the sun set as you battle your way to advance to playoffs has a way of easing the pain of defeat. Good Lord this sport has its perks.
The entire weekend made me fall in love with beach volleyball all over again. The players, the talent, the stage – I yearned to get back to Hermosa and train harder. I also wanted to go to another CLWO tournament and advance to Sunday playoffs. When I got on that plane to return to LAX, I knew my mind had already been made up: I would travel to Chicago for the CLWO tour stop at the end of July.
I broke the news to members of my Sixman team over dinner at The Post in Manhattan Beach. To nobody’s surprise, it didn’t go over well. They say that the only reason I am willingly choosing to leave town over playing in Sixman is because I don’t know what I’m missing (I haven’t participated in the annual festival yet). Maybe they are right. Maybe no one in their right mind would give up an opportunity to spend two days on the beach frolicking with ballerinas, cowboys, and the like over smuggled Jello shots. You do crazy things when you’re in love.
Katrina Zawojski lives in Hermosa Beach and is chasing her dream of a career in professional beach volleyball. Follow her on Twitter at sandinmysuit1.
