World Championships, Veterans and Tame Tigers!

After the highs and lows of last weekend’s Scottish Parkinson’s International Open I am now looking forward to the ITTF Parkinson’s World Championships which takes place in Crete in early November. Ironically it was in Crete in 2017 that I first noticed the symptoms (right arm not swinging when walking along the promenade at Rethymnon) that led to my Parkinson’s diagnosis in October 2018. This time we will be staying at the Arina Beach Hotel near Heraklion and playing at the nearby Heraklion Arena. All the accommodation, meals, transfers to/from the airport/venue and tournament entry fees are included in the package put together by the ITTF so hopefully it will be as well run as the recent Largs event! The main issue has been travel to and from Glasgow especially the return flight as it is the end of the summer season. Rather than have to make multiple flights we have decided to travel down to my daughter’s in Hertfordshire by train a few days earlier and take a direct flight from Gatwick and return the same way.

In the meantime I have joined the Scottish Veterans Table Tennis Association and have entered their banded event on Sunday 10th September. I was initially a bit wary about entering as despite their age there are some seriously good players involved! But I have been assured that I should be able to give a decent account of myself in the lowest band – we shall see!

On the football front the not so mighty Tigers have made a stuttering start to the season with a 2-1 defeat away to Norwich in the Championship and an exit from the EFL Cup to League Two Doncaster Rovers. I’m already fearing it is going to be a long season! Thank goodness I’ve got table tennis to keep me distracted!