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Cori, Jill, Adnan, and Stuart, veterans of Aix-les-Bains, were all there but there were set-backs. John, our coach, the only person who could successfully shame us into turning up for practice, couldn’t come back from duty travel in time. Julia, one-third of our “Flirty Flights” was unavoidably detained but, with the new talents of Dan, a.k.a. “Rabbit” (now there’s a story!) and Steve, a.k.a. the “Floater”, we were in bullish mood as we sped along in Cori’s team “bus” listening to Blondie, the Boomtown Rats and, very briefly, a Burt Bacharach instrumental tribute CD.
The hours went by but still we seemed to be getting no closer to Turin – the Captain’s shortcut. Finally, starved, squashed and dying for a pee, we reached Pisa in time for a late lunch. After feasting on antelope and barollo, after taking pictures of each other holding up the leaning tower, we got back into the “bus”, reacquainting our knees with our chins and set-off again. Everyone, bar the Captain who was driving and Adnan who was studiously sharpening his darts, was snoring soundly as we hit the worst rush-hour traffic in the civilised world.
A mere 14 hours later, we arrived at the hotel. Beer, food and wine were followed by Stuart leading a splinter group to a local nightclub, hoping that it would bring back some feeling into the legs. If only the coach had been there to send us all to bed to prepare for the tournament. It is small wonder then, that we lost our opening exchange the next morning 6-0.
Although we played much better from that sobering moment on, seeing old friends again, making new friends, enjoying the convivial atmosphere and simply having so much fun as a team, we re-evaluated our objective and decided that being able to go away together with friends and have such a good time, was prize enough.
We were also happy to be formally labeled the “young and fun” team. And the icing on the cake? We, like all the other teams, got to take home a small trophy. It doesn’t get much better than that!
