CANUCKS, CUMMERBUNDS AND COWBOY BOOTS

Lapham-Grant Tournament, Calgary, April 20-23, 2017

What an honor it was to be asked to represent the USA for the second time in the historic Lapham-Grant Tournament against Canada. The magnificent Glencoe Club in Calgary, was the main host for the weekend, a generously sized facility that offered an array of activities from bowling to tennis to ice-skating to climbing to badminton to swimming to… other stuff… and of course – squash.

The city of Calgary boasts a relatively substantial squash program (compared to Detroit, that wouldn’t be difficult!) with 16 listed clubs coming up from my google search. The Glencoe has 6 singles and 1 doubles of the cleanest, whitest walled courts I have ever seen. Absolutely spotless. Hats off to their cleaning crew for preparing the center to such a degree, I’m surprised some players didn’t require sunglasses.

The secondary host was the Bow Valley Club where I only visited for a short time on the Sunday morning before my departure back to Detroit. A distinguished establishment, cozy and inviting, also offering singles and doubles squash, its smack in the middle of downtown and was only a 3 minute walk from our tournament hotel. Their walls weren’t quite as unblemished, and their doubles court had the ceiling on the red line (so no lobbing!), but their bar was only 10 feet from their singles courts. An unquestionable plus.

The Trophies

Being invited was a thrill and I was determined not to let the team down. The Lapham Grant is actually spread over 4 events, each one with their own trophy and history. I was down to play in two of them. The “Lapham” is for the men’s singles and the “Grant” is for men’s doubles. The other two I don’t qualify for: The “Lawrence Wilkins” is for the 65+, so I have another 20 years to wait there, and the “Crawford” is for the women, so unless I go all Caitlyn Jenner on myself, I guess I’ll never qualify for that one.

I started my campaign on the doubles court on early Saturday morning. Those who know me, know that doubles is not my forte, I do feel a little like a fish out of water when I am not able to be in total control. However, together with my very adept partner from Philadelphia, Will Greer, we started out like superstars and – at least for the first 2 games – felt that this wasn’t awkward or difficult after all. In fact, sign me up for the tour! We were kickin’ it.

Then reality struck us with a 2-by-4 to the head. People will look back on this with awe and shock. They will wonder how it happened, question the validity, and in the end just shake their heads in bewilderment.

I am all for making the history books, and the fact that Will and I were publically presented at the Saturday night black-tie function as the receivers of this rare accomplishment – as we categorically deserved – at least it will be remembered.

We lost the third game 15-0.

Yep. We were bageled. On the doubles court.

In fact, we lost the first 3 points of the 4th game as well, so in total we were skunked 18-0. How we came so unglued was a mystery to say the least, Will and I were clueless. It was almost comical in the end, and if wasn’t for the fact that we actually ended up winning the match 15-5 in the 5^th, we probably wouldn’t be so outwardly laughing about it now.

Later that day, I as able to bring sanity back into my life, feeling more at home on the singles court. I ended up playing against the same fellow I played 2 years ago in this event – Strahan Jarvis from Toronto. And, just like 2 years ago, I won 3-1. The world made sense again.

But, throwing me back on the doubles court for my third match of the day, made me a tad nervous. I felt for my partner – Scott Fuller (New York) – I’m sure he was worried I would drag him downwards into the vortex of infamy as well. However, we meshed well together and we had little trouble taking the match 3-0. My squash was now complete for the weekend, I happily stuffed my doubles racquet deep into my squash bag hoping it would never be found again. It was time to unwind.

Yasser El Halaby (NY), me, Alex Carter (Toronto), Will Gruner

The Friday night function was western themed being that we were in Calgary, so I gleefully donned my jeans that will never see the inside of the DAC and (Calgary authentic!) cowboy boots for the occasion. Many a conversation was had with many people I was meeting for the first time, sharing a laugh and a drink, creating memories of a great time for many moons to come, but finite details of which wouldn’t even last until the following morning. Shout out to Darren Thomson (Calgary) for taking me to the bar for extra-curricular activities and working vigorously on our techniques.

Saturday night was the black tie function and for the second time since my wedding, I was a spitting image of James Bond (if he was 25 years older, had less hair, was grey and wrinkly) in my perfect tuxedo. Horrible memories of 2 years ago surfaced when my (then rented) tuxedo had a broken bow-tie that I couldn’t wear and I stood out like a Sumo Wrestler at the all-you-can-eat-buffet at a super-model convention, but thankfully after 20 minutes of mindless effort and then eventually asking for help, I managed to attach the damn thing around my neck successfully.

Ian Sly (Cleveland), Jay Hatcher (Louisville), James Bond... !

But my cummerbund latch was faulty. For the first part of the evening it held up okay, but as the night lingered and the music was cranked up, the drinks flowing, it was touch and go. By the time the taxi dropped us off at the bar again (thanks, Darren!) I noticed the thing was no longer on my person. Jumping back into the departing cab, I frantically searched for the item to no avail. I sauntered back to the bar rather annoyed when I saw it lying in the middle of the car park. Joy! But did I mention it was raining? Because it was raining. Of course it was now sopping wet, the latch totally unusable. Crap! I nursed it the rest of the night, going over the conversation I was going to have with Men’s Wearhouse when I got back to Detroit. Hopefully it wouldn’t be the same worker who received my wrath after the bow tie incident in 2015.

Sunday morning brunch revealed what kind of damage a Saturday night of over-indulging can do. Nothing scrambled eggs and sausages couldn’t fix however, and the presentation of the competitions commenced and it was announced that the USA had won both the Lapham and the Grant trophies – the first time since the mid-90’s that we had done so on Canadian soil! Selfishly, I was delighted that I was going to get my name etched on the trophies for all eternity!

A huge thank you goes out to the USA captains for all their tediously hard work putting everything together. Also to the Canadians who are repugnantly kind and friendly, hospitality unbounded. Next year’s event is in Chicago and I hope to be invited again.

THE LAPHAM-GRANT TOURNAMENT

London, ON, April 23-26

 For an event as historic and prestigious as the Lapham-Grant, even though I knew of it, I knew very little about it. Apparently, it is one of the oldest running sports competitions between the USA and Canada, dating back to 1922. The countries are actually vying for 4 separate trophies: one for men’s singles (the Lapham Cup), one for men’s doubles (the Grant Trophy), one for the women’s singles and doubles (the Crawford Trophy), and one for the men’s veteran’s doubles for players over 65 (the Lawrence-Wilkins Trophy). Teams are hand selected from across each country by the respective captains and I was honored to be asked to play in the 94^th running of the event which was being hosted by the London Squash and Racquet Club.

The trophies are works of art and the Lapham Cup rivals the Stanley Cup in size – if not even larger. The names of the winning team are etched into each and as the years pass, it grows. Shipping the things between countries year after year is a task in itself (and expense), and if you happen to take the time to read who has played and managed to get their name marked in history, you would be ‘oohing’, aaahing’ and ‘wow-ing’ for a while. The Lapham Cup (the biggest of the four) is valued at over $50,000.

In the spirit of the competition, none of the matches are refereed, players are left to their own devices – much like the DAC Classic – and honesty and sportsmanship is a requirement. (I did not see one solitary dispute all weekend.) Understandably, the home country has the advantage. It is easier to pool many of your players locally, and in this case since we were playing in London – from the Toronto area as well. The US team was a little short staffed since I believe London was a little harder to get to than any major city. It would be an almost impossible task to arrange the match-ups equally, not knowing the exact standard of many of the players. On paper, the Canadian team looked stronger anyway – and they were.

I had my first match on the doubles court, my partner was a fine gentleman from Cincinnati who did have more experience than I. We were definitely up against it, our opponents knew the angles very well. I am not sure we could have won the match, but we certainly could have won the second game (14-15), we simply we not steady enough and found the tin all too often.

More at home on the singles court, I played 2 matches here. I had a tough first outing taking the match 3-1, two of those games went to extra innings. I won my second match 3-0, but it was a lot closer than it looks. My squash was complete by lunch time on Saturday and now I had the luxury of relaxing and resting my already sore body. (The doubles really, really, makes the shoulder ache!)

The DAC had 2 other representatives. Peter Logan played 2 doubles matches and 1 singles match. His singles was an arduous assignment against a young whipper-snapper ready to keep running. Peter lost 3-0, but 2 of the games were tie-break and he was unlucky not to pull at least one of them out. His first doubles was not overly pretty, and it was over 3-0 rather quickly, but the second doubles match was a 15-13 in the 5^th mauling… and again unlucky to be on the wrong side of the result.

Bob Burton was our other flag bearer. Bob played 2 doubles matches and was probably the only American who could claim to have a 100% record for the weekend. (Or one of very few!) He won both of his doubles matches in 5 games and enjoyed his beer a little more than the rest of us.

With all such competitions, the sports component is just half of the formula. Socializing isn’t just recommend, it is a requisite. The simple joy of having a drink, meeting new people, reminiscing with old friends, is what brings these things together and encourages the people to return. I had a blast. The black tie dinner on Saturday was held at the London museum, a beautiful setting. Of course, my rent-a-tux was not working properly and I stood out as the only (male) person there without a bow-tie. (The hook for the bow-tie was broken). Men’s Warehouse received a nasty visit from me on Sunday. We mingled, drank, mingled some more, drank some more, and kept going until being vertical was too hard to maintain.

The following morning was a breakfast buffet at the squash club with some feature doubles matches to entertain our weary heads, and then the obligatory speeches and presentations. For the record, Canada won all four trophies in convincing fashion. There was also a 5^th trophy presented that morning. This one is called the Eric Finkelman Award which goes to the one individual “that dares to contribute more than the bare minimum”. Many candidates were created over the course of the weekend, the winner was a very happy chappy that not even falling off his stool in a bar and lying flat on his back could dampen his spirits – or laughter. He was still laughing that morning.

The Eric Finkleman Award.

A couple (or more) of must mentions: Firstly, the London Squash Racquet Club, their manager Tom Panabaker and one of their biggest supporters, Jay Nash. It must be a monumental undertaking to arrange and run an event of this magnitude. Together with the extensive team of volunteers, I cannot be praiseworthy enough. (See you in September for the Nash Cup!)

And to the US Captains in Liam Culman and Randy Goodleaf from New York. I do not know the amount of work that was required, but it must have been immense. Thank you both so very much. I hope to be invited back for the 2016 edition – in New York.