Listen to Gilly Lane discuss his experience at the 2013 Men’s World Team Championship
Transcript
Give me an Overview of your experience at the World Championships
The experience as a whole obviously was great, playing for the US is always at the top of my list in terms of when I was playing. And even now, wearing the red white and blue is always a high point for me and I think it should be for any athlete.
I thought we were actually pretty successful given the circumstances with Julian being injured on the second day and the big match against Germany. Germany ended up finishing 5th, and if Julian hadn’t gotten hurt we would of beaten them in the pool play. So to finish 12th, with myself having to push up and playing two and playing every match, and with Dylan who was as you know a junior player playing in the men’s championships, I thought it was pretty successful for us to beat Mexico, and to get into that 9-12 bracket start. It was a great experience.
It was tough to lose Julian after the first round. Did that affect the team’s motivation and attitude at all?
It was definitely kind of a downer in terms of the fact that we had an opportunity to better our placement from the championships before. But at the same time I think everyone kind of took it on their back to step up and step into the situation as it presented itself.
Dylan was amazing. If he was nervous you couldn’t tell, and he took the challenge on – he took it head on. He obviously had some tough matches but he stepped up and played to the best of his ability, and that’s all you can ask for.
Chris was awesome at number one. He put in everyday, I’m sure he was tired but he never showed it during the entire week. He stepped in and played the best players in the world. He’s had the best year of his career and he’s showing why.
You yourself played some amazing squash, coming of retirement and not playing pro anymore, winning 4 out of 5 matches. Was it beyond what you were hoping?
Yeah. I ended up actually playing 6 matches, which was probably four more than I thought I was actually going to play originally when Todd was scheduled to come on the trip as well. I think I was definitely more relaxed than I’ve ever been.
I don’t know, it’s funny, I think some things happen for a reason. I wanted to go out and make up for the last world teams where I only played one match because of my back. I think I got beat up for that this time around.
I think when it all comes down to it you don’t want to lose a match for your team, and so I was just thinking about the team in general. I mean , it was important for us, we needed those wins at the time, so I didn’t look at them individually, just that we needed the wins for the team and I was just hoping that my win could help put us over the top in those circumstances.
Has it motivated you to consider coming out of retirement?
No, still not going to come out of retirement, but I may play a little bit more. There’s no chance of me playing full time, but maybe to play for the team if they need me or something along those lines.
I think it has definitely motivated me to maybe train more, but not to train for anything in particular. I’ve just got that motivation and that passion for playing back, which is great, and that kind of excitement and the thrill of playing and the level of competitiveness that I haven’t experience in a while.
I have no plans to unretire for the PSA tour, but if the team comes calling to me and they need me then I’ll be there.