Prediction: Coby Iwaasa Will Beat Kane Waselenchuk within 18 Tries (Racquetball) [Archive]

Parture

06-10-2015, 05:41 AM

Second prediction: If I started playing racquetball when I was 2 years old, I would have won at least one IRT season. I first picked up a racquet when I was 14. The basis for my prediction are as follows...

I played racquetball on and off throughout the years, going through some lengthy stretches off for 3, 5 and 7 years of not playing at all that I could remember. The main problem was my shoulder. I quit each time because I did not figure out a way to manage the inflammation.
My shoulder and arm seized up for 6 months in the late 80's after diving into the left side wall, playing against Joe Morin, at Body Quest in Edmonton (formerly called something else). I had surgery on my shoulder. It mostly affects my forehand shots to this day limiting the range of motion and inflames easily. I can only play 3 or 4 matches per tournament and no doubles. But I love racquetball. It's only since 2012 that I have learned how to manage it. The rule is: no more than twice a week, separated by 3 or 4 days, and never more than 5 games. Drive serving also inflames my shoulder so no DB, DF, DFZ, DBZ, GB, GF and not even any MBZ or MFZ. That leaves just the HBL, HFL, MBL, MFL, HBZ, HFZ, HBN, HFN. But I only like the HFL and HBL which have a higher success rate than the other serves for my game style.
Typically, I only played 1 or 2 local tournaments per year when I did play.
At 17, I was the Alberta Junior Champion with the free trip to the first Canadian Junior Nationals in 1985. I was convinced I was going to win seeing whom my contenders were, but the skin peeled off my thumb down to the blood vessels and could barely hold my racquet so I lost out in the Quarters to the person who won it. I did not go to the Juniors the following year, but pursued my B.Comm. at the U of A instead. The Alberta Racquetball Association forgot to enter me in the Team Event representing Alberta in singles after paying for my hotel and flight to Saskatoon, so I played in just the Individual Event. It didn't really matter to me since I quit racquetball at that point. I don't remember the name of the incompetent person who did that back then except that they were from Calgary. Imagine my surprise when I arrived at the Canadian Junior Nationals to look for my name in the draw and it wasn't there.
I played Drew Kachtik twice. Once under Troy Krakiwsky (birth name) and once under Troy Brooks (mother's maiden name). http://www.bossconsulting.com/cgi-bin/results_front.pl In that Portland IRT pro stop 1993 I lost to Drew then played a drop down division. The #1 player in Portland in 1993 lost to Cliff Swain 11-9 in the tiebreaker. I played him next and beat him 11-3 tiebreaker. Then I played the #2 player in Portland and beat him. Hank Marcus was the tournament director and ran the IRT back then. He said to me I beat all his top players in Portland. Drew said to me the secret is just playing every pro stop possible. I didn't have the money to do that. So it can be tough. After Kane finished school he only played 2 pro stops at 18 (1999-0 season) and 4 at 19 (2000-01) because he didn't have the money.
At the age of 34, I almost beat Kane in the finals of the 2001 Klondike (11-8 tiebreaker) in Edmonton after he won the Canadian Nationals 3 years in a row and the year he won his first IRT (also went to the tiebreaker in the 2000 Klondike finals against Kane). To my knowledge, no Canadian player has done this since, and I did it twice.
Within months after the 2001 Klondike I found out I had a tumor attached to my spinal cord in my neck which explained lots of neck pain. And I had almost no feeling in my right arm. Fortunately the God sent surgeon removed the tumor, but I stopped playing for 7 years. The doctor said I should never play racquetball again, but apparently the body grows tissue to replace half the missing vertebrae in my neck. The surgeon said there are 3 kinds of tumors: medium, large and extra large. Mine was he said extra large. He said they can either be plopped out with a scalpel or need to be carefully scrapped off the spinal cord. Mine was the latter. And apparently the tumor was growing for at least 10 years so that's from 1991 to 2001.
In 2009 I took 3 years off. The inflammation was too much. When I came back in 2012 within 10 months of playing again at the age of 45, I played the 9th and 5th ranked players in Canada and beat them (very briefly ranked 9th in Canada). Still to this day, I remain ranked 2nd in Alberta in 2015.
My theory is that I have a strong ability to kill the ball even though I am not the strongest player out there physically.

I'm going to play 6 tournaments in the 2015-16 season (3 Saskatoon and 3 National events) in Canada (no Alberta tournaments because I am banned for life since 2009 by John Halko and Barbara May due to their evil and abusive contriving (http://biblocality.com/forums/showthread.php?5016-Banned-for-Life-from-the-Alberta-Racquetball-Association)) to see if I can improve my ranking from 20th in Canada at the age of 48. It's fun trying. I noticed at the age of 47 things seem much more difficult than when I was 45. And the Alberta Racquetball Association (namely, John Halko and Barbara May on the board) for the past 10 years has done a terrible job of attracting kids to the sport to challenge us older folk after Kane Waselenchuk wanted nothing to do with Alberta Racquetball even now. But thanks to the players I do play with they challenge me 2 on 1. I recall Kane saying a year or two ago that he enjoys playing two B players 2 on 1 at his home club. I share the same sentiment.

Troy Brooks