Carolyn and Erin Updates and Our 2025 Tennis Goals

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Transcript

Podcast Hosts Recap 2025 Plans

Carolyn 0:05

Hi , this is Carolyn and I'm here with Erin and is getting ready to be 2025 . Erin , can you believe that ? Crazy , it's crazy . Okay , so what's been going on in your life , Erin , for the past year ?

Erin 0:17

Right , I know I'm really excited to record today . I'm like kind of giddy about it because it's actually been a little while it has . We've done a lot of reruns lately , but I've told a lot of people this the nice thing about our show is we have so many episodes to over 200 and what are we at ? 230 plus ? Yeah , we're almost at 250 .

Erin 0:38

Yeah , so , oh , 250 , even better , yes . So when we run a rerun , the chances of someone actually hearing it before is , you know , like slim . So people are still getting to them new content because we've done such hard work in the past and done so many episodes that we have not had a chance to record in a long time . But we've been running a lot of reruns that are still super popular and we're still sitting in the top 10 every week .

Carolyn 1:03

I know which we appreciate . Thank you to everyone that listens to the podcast . We greatly appreciate it . Yes , Okay .

Erin 1:09

So what's been going on in my life ? So Carolyn knows this , but I'll tell the listeners so I lived in the same house for 22 plus years and we decided we're empty nesters now . So we decided to make a change this year and decided to do lots and lots of hard work that nobody wants to do , get their house ready for the market . I talked about it for like a year plus and the right house to buy just came up magically in our lap and so we rushed and , in the process of getting our second child off to college and moving her , like out of state for college , we also decided to work on our house and list our house and buy a house and move into a new house and all those things , and it was insanity for the last few months . But I am on the end of that and now I'm sitting in my new house recording with Carolyn .

Carolyn 2:01

Yes , and she and her daughter plays volleyball in Connecticut too .

Erin 2:05

Yeah , she could care less about tennis , although she does tell people about our podcast , which I very much appreciate , but yeah , she does not . To her , there is no other sport that's important enough to talk about or watch or anything other than volleyball . But yeah , so she's playing volleyball in college . She's very happy .

Carolyn 2:26

Yeah , well , maybe she'll play it as an adult . Yeah , she'll play it as an adult . Exactly , she'll be ready , she will yeah , because she's athletic enough .

Erin 2:31

She'll pick up tennis later I'll make her . But yeah , and both my kids actually love our new house . They were both very sad to say goodbye to our old one , but they're very happy here . So , and it's super close to my tennis club , which is a huge bonus .

Carolyn 2:46

Yes , yes , and Aaron and I are no longer at the same tennis club either . So we may end up playing each other , which is really sad , oh gosh .

Erin 2:53

I didn't even think about that . That's terrible . If we do , will you text me if you're in the lineup ahead of time ?

Carolyn 2:58

I don't care what our captain playing . We can't play each other . Yeah , for sure .

Erin 3:06

So how about you tell us I know you've been traveling a ton what else is going on ?

Carolyn 3:11

Yeah , lots of stuff with the kids right now , but , to be completely honest , I went through it was a crazy time with a health issue . It was stage three cancer , but I'm no evidence of disease now . So it's just been a really crazy difficult period of time . But I'm so glad that we've been able to do this podcast together . Erin , I'm so glad about the people that I met through tennis . That helped me throughout this entire process , and it's been I guess it was over two years since I've played tennis for fun , and so I went out for the first time and played a little while ago tennis for fun , you know , just with a group of people , and I lost the first set 0-6 . So I'm rated a 4-0 . But this is with people a level below me . I mean , they're very , very good but , a level below , they're 3-5s .

Carolyn 4:02

And then , like you know how you switch when you're playing for fun , you switch partners every time . Well , every time my team would lose .

Erin 4:09

Yes , so you were the constant losing factor .

Carolyn 4:11

Yes , I felt like that Taylor Swift song hi , it's me . I'm the problem , you know , like when you know it's you , but I had a ball and I had so much fun being out there , Very grateful to be able to play . So it's going to be an interesting time for me , coming back to USTA at the 4-0 level , which I don't think I should be , and I even pressed the appeal button to try to appeal down by the computer and it was denied . So I may try a medical appeal If anybody listening has been through that process and it's actually worked and they were able to do it . But my understanding . I remember I sat through a meeting and I was just listening and it was very rare for medical appeals to get approved . I could be completely wrong , but I thought that's what I remember hearing .

Erin 4:54

I've heard that too , and that's actually a good segue into what we're going to tell our listeners , which are some topics that we want to talk about in 2025 . One of them being urban legends , because we always hear something about tennis and then we just like think that's what the rule is , but I have heard the exact same thing , so we're gonna have to get someone on that actually knows the answer . But I know a tennis player , a male , who had like multiple knee surgeries and he like wrote in letters trying to get a medical appeal and they denied him .

Carolyn 5:27

They denied him too , right , but yeah .

Erin 5:30

I also had a girlfriend I told recently that you tried to appeal and she was like I think if you have cancer and you're coming back to 10s , you should be able to pick whatever rating you want . I know right . I was like , okay , I'll let USTA know that .

Carolyn 5:43

Yeah , but some people do play through it .

Erin 5:45

So I think every situation is different , so I understand that .

Carolyn 5:48

But yeah , we'll see how that goes . I definitely need to have a different mentality going in , because a part of me is like I'm just going to play four singles and see what happens .

Erin 5:57

I'm going to play a lot of singles this year too , so we really better not play each other .

Carolyn 6:01

Yeah , okay , we'll make sure of that . Don't tell our captains , we'll make sure of that , okay . But we're excited about 2025 . Both of us , we're really excited about all the people we get to interview , because we have been putting people off a little bit because we've just not been available , especially me . I haven't been available to record , so now we have the availability . So , erin , do you want to talk about some of the things we're going to interview ?

Erin 6:23

We've got a lot yes , we have a long running list and if anyone anyone wants to email us and give us more topics , we'll just continue to add it to our Google Doc and we may or may not ever get to talk about it , but we do love hearing from people and what they find interesting .

Carolyn 6:38

But yes , please do email us , because that's where we find a lot of our topics and we're constantly I mean , we read all the emails , even if we haven't been able to get back to everybody yet , we are going to do it . I think we have . Oh , we have Okay good job . If we haven't email us again . It's been a hard year . It has . Yeah , give us some grace . We're giving ourselves grace , though . That's right .

Erin 6:59

Okay , some of the topics like we talked about we would love to do this Urban Legends , because there are so many things that you hear in tennis and USTA League that people just take like they hear it and then that's it . Like they just feel like that happens with rules , but it also happens with things like we talked about medical appeals . Remember we interviewed someone a while back that , um , I had heard that in the northeast that you had to play straight up like oh yeah , but . But then we were like but how do you know if you're all four o's , how do you know how to play straight up unless everybody knows ? They're like broken down rating . Like if I'm a , so I'm also . You know Carol and I are both 4.0 . So if we're like a 3.625 or you know whatever , like nobody knows their dynamic rating .

Carolyn 7:46

I guess yeah , like how do you know if someone's better than the other person , if they're the same , if they're both three fives , how do you know which three five is better ? And that ?

Erin 7:53

depends on , like , who your partner is and how you feel that day . I mean , there's too many factors . So I don't even know if that's an urban . I mean , I know that's an urban legend . I don't know if that's true or not , but anyway . So yeah , urban legends

Different Locations Same Tennis Issues

Erin 8:03

. We've been talking to someone for a while out of Wyoming that we want to find out about . You know , we're really interested in like different tennis around the country . When I talked to this woman , peg , about Wyoming tennis , she was saying how different it is because there's like really super wealthy areas and then you know , like parks and recs and stuff like that . So I don't know , I just find different tennis around the country Very interesting . But I also have figured out that we've talked to enough people where they're like oh , we have all the same problems .

Carolyn 8:36

Yes , we talked to people in Michigan , florida and that , even though you know we're in all these different places , the same things , the same things out on the court .

Erin 8:45

Exactly exactly . Another one is I met , actually at the US Open this year . I met a woman who now owns the rights to what is called Impact Team Tennis , which is formerly known as World Team Tennis . So you and I have been interested in World Team Tennis for a while , just like the different rules and how you can sub people in , how you don't use like the traditional scoring system .

Erin 9:11

Points one , two three , two , three , four , you know stuff like that . So we're going to interview people that have a wheelchair tennis non-profit . Uh , so wheelchair tennis in north carolina , uh , what else ? Oh , neurotic tennis players . That's one we've been wanting to do for a long time and that has to do with , like , what line people play , who they , you know . Like one of the big things is , as captains , confirming matches with people and then , like , then they reconfirm and then they're like , where am I playing and who am I playing ? Like just the neurotic .

Carolyn 9:49

Yeah , Like the kind of .

Erin 9:50

I don't , I don't want to say busybody , but just like the people that are just like kind of can't keep everything straight and they're just or they're like super neurotic about whatever , Like I said , their partners where they're playing , what team they're playing against , what line they're playing .

Carolyn 10:06

Even the things they do on the court . You know , like they're bouncing the ball 25 times . There's just we're just all a little crazy . So I think that's good . I'm really looking forward to interviewing her about it , because I think that's a really good topic . I do too .

Erin 10:19

Can you think of some other ones ? We talked about 3.5 to 4.5 or 3.5 to 5.0 .

Carolyn 10:24

There's a player that went from level 3.5 to 5.0 . So I can . I've never heard of that before .

Erin 10:31

Have you heard ? Not in one jump , just so our listeners know she went from 3.5 to 4.0 to 4.5 to 5.0 , literally in those . So I guess I mean it wasn't four years , I guess she was a self-rate 3.5 . So we'll not count that year . So in three years she went from a 4.0 , 4.5 to 5.0 .

Carolyn 10:52

Yeah , I've never heard of anyone making that jump from 4.5 to 5.0 , because that's people that played in college . I mean to do that as an adult recreational player . I can't wait to interview her about that . I mean , if anyone listening has gone from 2.5 to 5.0 , please contact us because I would love to hear that .

Erin 11:12

Yeah , and I think if someone went from a 2 . To a five , oh , just taking lessons and practicing , then that's like a one-off ever .

Carolyn 11:23

Right , yeah , I've just never heard of it . I've never heard of that .

Erin 11:26

But if you've gone from , I think , in this . Um , in our friend's case I think , from three , five to five.0 , that is a huge jump . But she was also a college athlete . She wasn't a college tennis player , but she was a really , you know , really good college athlete . So it makes a little bit of sense .

Erin 11:44

But that jump from 4.5 to 5.0 , I feel like , is the , that's the doozy , that's like we don't know anybody that goes from 4.5 to well I know a few people four or five to five-oh , but that's so rare in adult rec tennis .

Carolyn 11:57

Yeah , you're playing people that played all growing up and yeah , I can't wait . I mean that would be my she's a phenom . Yeah , she's just a phenom . Yeah , I mean my goal would be . I don't know what my goal would be now . Your goal is to be happy at four-oh . My goal is to be happy at 4-0 . My goal is to be happy at whatever level I'm at .

Erin 12:15

That's right . Actually , we should talk about goals . My goal in 2025 is I think I'm going to play a lot more singles again , which I didn't in the last few years and listen , I'm aging . So for me to say , my goal is to play singles at the 4-0 level and like , I'm obviously going to try to win all my matches , you know , but I'm going to try to win all my matches , you know , but I'm going to try to be a lot more consistent this year , I'm actually going to quote take some lessons from my new , my five-oh friend .

Carolyn 12:40

Right , let's hear what she has to say . How do you do it ?

Erin 12:43

Cause she made it . I mean , I don't , and my goal is not to actually even make it to four , five or five-oh , cause it's just not going to happen . But my goal is to play more consistent and she's a very consistent player , so I'm going to try to sneak in some lessons with her and my goal is going to be play singles a lot more in the spring and win at singles by being consistent , because right now I just hit the ball really hard and I usually just lose matches on my own . My opponents don't necessarily have to win .

Carolyn 13:11

But you hit some good shots too .

Erin 13:12

It feels so good when you hit a good shot .

Carolyn 13:14

It doesn't it ? It feels so good . My goal , I think this year especially because I haven't played in two years USTA matches is to just not mentally lose it out on the court and to be like , okay , you know , I mean the worst I can lose is 0-6-0-6 . I mean it doesn't get worse than that . So my goal is just to stay strong and stay in a positive mindset about it .

Erin 13:38

That's a good yeah , that's a really good goal . We'll see if that happens , but I know I can't wait to talk to you throughout the season to see if , like are you just hanging on by a string ? You're like . I know I'm supposed to be positive .

Carolyn 13:49

But it's not working . I haven't learned anything from this podcast .

Erin 13:52

Because , again , though I think you're , you have that mentality because you grew up playing competitive sports at a high level . Like you could have gone to college and played basketball .

Carolyn 14:03

But I think too , you know , we've talked to a lot of people where they said their level's going down . So they were at a 4.5 , and now they're a 4.0 or 3.5 . And they still find joy , even though their rating's going in a different level . So that's my goal .

Carolyn 14:18

So that's what you're going to try to remember Well , to find joy , no matter what Right . That's what we're and we learned a lot . I remember we talked to Eric last year and he won the four or five national championship and I remember him saying that tennis is very humbling , it's a very humbling experience and that you know you get out there and it really tests you . So it will be a big test , I think , this year for me to see how that goes . And you know what I realized too after I played for the first time in forever my entire body was sore . I couldn't even walk down the stairs and that just shows you all the muscles you're using from playing tennis . So I need to think of it more that way . But it's hard . That stuff's hard , I know , I know , but I'm excited for you .

Erin 15:00

Yeah , I know , I know , but . I'm excited for you .

Carolyn 15:04

Yeah , I'm excited too . I'm excited for this year and I mean , I feel like the luckiest person ever , exactly , I'm very , very excited . Okay , who else , erin ? Who else are we going to interview ? Anything else ?

Erin 15:14

Let's see , we have so many , there's so many things on our list . Oh , how about this one ? We had a woman who , at 66 years old , she emailed us and said that they she's on a team , that they have mandatory uniforms and mandatory lunches . We're very interested . Actually , I will say too , this is not an urban legend , this is a heard it from my best friend , directly from her . My best friend plays out of Colorado , in the Denver area , and they also have through USDA , have mandatory I'm assuming the daytime player . She's a nighttime player . I'm assuming the daytime players have a mandatory lunch thing as well , but as a night player , she also had a mandatory like social dinner and she's very successful business wise and she was like I do not have time . She's like I want to socialize with my team , I don't have time to socialize with the other team . So she stopped doing it , but it is a mandatory USTA thing . So I'm wondering at what point she's going to get in trouble or she'll , you know , be the black sheep or whatever .

Carolyn 16:15

Oh , wow . So this is like a local . They say if , what do they say If you're the home team , you're in charge of bringing food .

Erin 16:26

Okay , you're in charge of bringing food . Okay , food , food and drinks , yeah , and she's like , nope , not happening . But I'm sure other people have too . But it's no , she was like it is very much like , do they require it for the men too ?

Carolyn 16:33

I would assume . So I would assume that it's the same . That's a good question .

Player Interviews

Carolyn 16:37

Yeah , to make it more social , do you think is the okay ?

Erin 16:40

that's interesting , fun , but fun with your own teammates , like we had my friend canana on right from New Jersey and that was a thing too in New Jersey , but she was like it was so awkward .

Carolyn 16:52

Because they'd cuss each other out on the court and then they'd be like do you want your chicken salad ? How would you like your chicken salad ?

Erin 16:58

Do you want it on a bun or a croissant ?

Carolyn 17:08

Please let us know your tennis goals for 2025 or any other topic ideas you have . Also , we would like to interview roger federer , so if anyone listening knows him , please let us know . Thanks so much for listening and hope to see you on the court soon . You .