Softball Time

I had my first game a couple days ago with the team below us in order to get some practice. The game went pretty smoothly and we won in 5 innings, but I did have to get used to the fact that we throw off of a rubber mat instead of dirt! Pretty strange but luckily it didn't effect me much. The girls on the team were pretty fun to play with. To spice up the game they would choose a letter or category for the inning, then when we were on the field they could only cheer for me with words that started with that letter or were in the category.  I had to focus extra hard to block out my aussie 3rd baseman yelling "strike 'em out asparagas". 

Then last night I had my first practice with the West Australia national team. The practice brought me back to the college days minus coach Y and 15 x 80's, thankfully! The head coach was the assistant coach for the Australia olympic team and I really like him! I met with the coach before practice to get on the same page and he was so knowledgable about the game. He was really interested to hear what my softball goals were and I think I thoroughly dissapointed him when I explained that college was my pinnacle and now I'm just wrapping up and having fun. After giving me a long shpeel about how you peak until late 20's and there are still opportunities, we decided to agree to disagree for now on the topic. Little does he know that I was putting it lightly when I said I'm planning on leaving my cleats in Australia.

With a new team again came another list of names and faces that are already slipping my mind. It was pretty cool that two of the girls on the team played for Coastal Carolina and Louisville, so I have faced them during college. During practice I went off with the other two pitchers for the first half then threw a little BP while the players worked on their short game.  It was so nice to be back in my comfort zone where I just deal with pitching and hanging out in the bull pen.