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April 2, 2009

Ashley's Latest Update from Italy

Hi Everyone!

We’ve been getting a lot of rain here the last couple of days. It’s warm and sunny at the moment so hopefully it stays that way. Neda and I lost our doubles match 3-6, 5-7. I didn’t play too well the 1st set, but I made a few corrections and played better in the 2nd set. We were in a position to win the 2nd set being up 5-4 with me serving, but they started attacking my partner more and we had some loose points with too many unforced errors. Other than the last three games she played pretty solid. I’m happy with the way I served throughout the entire match, my placement and consistency was the best it’s been since I’ve been here. I also returned pretty well the whole match. I still need to keep working on my net play and aggressiveness.

The last couple of days I’ve been trying to figure out my tournament schedule for the rest of my time over here. I’m 8th alternate for qualifying of a $100k in Belgium on indoor hard courts. I could take the risk and go there to sign in and hope for the best. But I don’t really see 8 people dropping out or not showing up when the tournament starts in 2 ½ days. So I decided not to go and stay here in Italy to train on the clay until I go to the WTA event in Barcelona. Since I haven’t been getting as many matches as I expected up to this point I decided to add two additional tournaments to my schedule. After I try to get into the WTA event in Barcelona I’ll be going to Croatia for two 10ks. I’ve never been to Croatia so I’m looking forward to that trip and playing more matches.

One of my good friends and ATA alum, Lindsey Pereira, is going to come visit me in Italy over the weekend. She’s living in Ireland at the moment and has some free time so I’m very excited to see her. We’re going to stay in Rome and do some exploring together, it should be fun!

I practiced three times today and got a fitness session in also, it was a good day. Now I’m ready for a nap! We may go bowling tonight with a couple of the baseball players that are here for a tournament also. Last night we shot some pool and I was definitely a little rusty, hopefully my bowling will be better! That’s about all for now. Ciao ciao,

Ashley

Posted by Jack Newman at April 2, 2009 2:55 PM