My two-day Wimbledon experience: part 1

[jazzyg]

In the middle of a two-week trip to England with my wife and son (sadly, my very first experience overseas at age 57), we spent three days at an Air B&B in the Wimbledon Village and I went to Wimbledon Thursday and Friday, queueing by myself the first day and having tickets to No. 1 Court the second day. The experience on day 1, though cool, was not what I expected.

Was told I needed to be in the queueing area around 6 a.m. to guarantee entry at a reasonable time. Chose to walk on a relatively cool morning and got there in about 35 minutes at 6:05 with nothing but my phone and sunscreen. The 20-something Australian native right in front of me offered her blanket to me and the older man behind me, and about 10 minutes after we sat down, I was assigned No. 7308. The man, who had queued multiple times before in previous years, said for that time it was at least 1,000 numbers higher than any other year he had been there but we were safe to get in. The long wait started, and even though it was cool in the morning after three brutally hot days in London, I soon regretted wearing jeans instead of shorts as the sun beat down on us in the open field. The whole process was orderly but very long. I had assumed I would get in the grounds when they opened at 10 but quickly learned we probably would not get in until the afternoon. That turned out to be the case. I entered the grounds at 12:30.

My other mistake was assuming the crowd would be similar to my US Open experience in 2003 and 2004, when I had Ashe tickets but spent little time there, going to any match I wanted. Wimbledon was jam packed. I looked for something to eat, and the lines were long everywhere, so I settled for some caramel popcorn from a grab and go because my goal was to watch as much tennis as possible. Unfortunately, it took me nearly an hour to get into any court with my grounds pass. After queueing hopelessly at a couple of courts, I remained patient at court 18 after no one left in the first few changeovers when I arrived. I got in near the end of the third set of Struff-Auger Aliassime. It turned out to be the side of the court where there are only three rows, and the open seat was in the front row. What an unbelievable view. I watched Struff, an odd personal favorite of mine who has been on the struggle bus for the past 12 months, break to finish off the third set. He then hit five aces in his first two service games of the fourth set, and i checked my phone to see if he already had racked up 20-plus. Nope. He had a total of two aces through the first three sets, which is a commentary on how A-A just can't seem to play well when it matters. How could he possibly have been down in the match? Struff saved break points in three straight service games before breaking to win in the fourth.

I stayed in my seat for Alexandrova-Lamens. Lamens went up an early break but Alexandrova, by far the most talented player who has not done diddly squat in any slam, won 10 of the last 11 games and won in 55 minutes. It was still fun to watch because she was on fire, and have I mentioned how great the seat was?

If I had not been so hungry by then, I would have sat there all day, but I was not very interested in the upcominig Samsonova match, so I left, missing the highly entertaining four-set battle between Monfils and Fucsovics later. Court 18 is the best spot on the grounds in my view.

The rest of the day was a bit of a struggle getting into a court. I got into Nakashima-Opelka on tiny Court 16 and watched the end of the third set (which Opelka thankfully won in a tiebreak or the match would have been over) and the fourth set from the second row. Not compelling stuff, but Nakashima put his towel about two feet away from me every time he was at my end of the court.

Tennis-wise, the highlight of the day came from an unexpected source. I made it into Court 12 for the fifth set of Holmgren-Machac, with rowdy Danish fans making plenty of noise in an incredible tight match. Holmgren ended up winning 10-5 in the match tiebreak for potentially a career-altering win. The quality and intensity was high on both ends of the court.

The rest of the evening was spent trying unsuccessfully to watch another match. Tried to see Monfils-Fucsovics from the standing-only spots above the court, but could not see behind the pack of people. Tried to get into Sonego-Basilashvile on Court 17, but no one was leaving, so I decided to walk back to the B&B.

When I got on the grounds, I had circled five matches I wanted to see. Did not catch any of them, but it's OK. Just getting to experience Wimbledon for the first time was worth it. I do think they offer too many grounds passes. You had to queue to get a pass to get in the queue at Court 3 (The top three courts were off limits for anyone with a grounds pass). The flip side is I might not have gotten in at all if they offered fewer.

[ponchi101]

I did WImbledon in 1995. It was great.
Glad you were able to enjoy it.

[dryrunguy]

I'm so glad you had a great time in spite of all the challenges. But I'm a lazy sort, so my takeaway from your experience is pretty simple--don't even think about bothering with Wimbledon unless something unexpected happens and I can afford to sit next to royalty to avoid the inconvenience.

[Suliso]

I'm sure jazzyg did just that on day 2