9th Day in Nanjing

Today a complete change of roles for me in Nanjing at the 2nd Summer Youth Olympic Games. The Rugby Sevens has finished so today my commentary roster had me heading out to the tennis complex for some broadcasts there. I worked with Auckland Glen Larmer (he's a great bloke - though he calls himself a 'former - Wellingtonian' which is interesting as he went to Naenae College)

We had a nice day. Seeing there were only three matches on the Show Court we split them up 50/50%. Glen took the men's singles semi-final and I opted for the women's. Then we both decided to share the call on the Mixed doubles. My female winner was a very powerful Chinese women by the name of Xu Shilin - known as 'Coco' to her friends - and my word she could play. As a 17 year old she was hardly likely to be in the top ranked 'adult' players in China but I will be looking out for her in the future. Today she bulllied past Kristina Schmiedlova of Slovakia 6-1 6-1 in less than an hour. That puts her into the medal rounds (the semi finals to put it another way) I wouldn't put it past her to win the Gold Medal. Coco has a tough game.

I must say the temperatures seemed vastly hotter today than out at the rugby. It was so exhaustingly hot when I climbed to the top of the commentary tower that i immediately seemed to get what I would call a 'heat headache.' Mind you, a couple of panadols fixed that though.

Then later I had to put my rain jacket on to keep out the cold as the night swept in. So it is crazy here.

Anyway who cares about the weather? Nobody really does? Especially about commentators - its always a bit 'OK' so we cope.

Soon enough the tennis today was over and Glen and I battled back in the train (for 15 stops - an hour's ride) to the hotel. A couple of Heinie's downstairs and now I'm off to bed.

Tomorrow it's weightlifting which is on my roster. Funny how things work eh? One has to be ready for anything.

Talk to you here tomorrow.