Gail Falkenberg is 79 and on Tuesday she was in the first round of qualifying at the W35 in Orlando, Florida. She lost 6-0, 6-0 to Aspen Schuman, 19, the number 6 seed. Sixty years between them. I read it last night, my statistics folder open on the kitchen table, and I got the calculator out.
Because here’s the thing. She turned pro at 38. I’m 34. So, technically, I still have four years on her. She reached world number 360 in December 1987. Me, I’m C30.4, a club-level ranking, a transitional one, and my season really starts in May.
I ran the numbers three times. If she’s still playing at 79, I have forty-five years ahead of me. At two practice sessions a week, that’s a lot of Tuesday evenings on court 4. Even if court 4 is never free.
And then there’s 2016. At 69, in Pelham, Alabama, she beats Rosalyn Small, 22, 6-0, 6-1. Guinness World Records: oldest woman to win a match on the ITF circuit. Six-love, six-one. One game dropped. Me, in club league (interclubs, Belgium’s weekend team league), I drop more than that in the warm-up.
In the next round she took a 6-0, 6-0 from Taylor Townsend. In 2013, in Rock Hill, another 6-0, 6-0, against Naomi Osaka, 15. What I see is a woman who accepts double bagels in public, and comes back. That’s a pattern. There are intentions in there.
Céline, you’ve never taken a 6-0, 6-0. You retire at 0-4 saying it’s the strings.
It was the strings. And it was pouring. Anyway, I wrote “W35 Orlando” in my folder, on the objectives page, just under “record”. Two practice sessions away, mind you.
It’s true, we checked: Tennis Actu.
