2022 SEASON ENDING WITH A 5TH… FITTING.
Our 2023 tournament experience started off with some exciting news… We were slated to fly out of LAX at around 3:30pm on Saturday, January 21. On Thursday, January 19, while sitting on the couch in between our workout and practice, Taryn checked our flight reservation on the American Airlines app. She immediately turned to me and excitedly but also hesitantly said, “I think we got upgraded.” I immediately opened the app, clicked seats, and holy crap, we were able to select seats in the business class section for our 12 hour flight from JFK to Doha. We both screamed, probably alarming our neighbors but we were so freaking excited! And at that moment, we did not even realize how much of a difference that would make.
We got off the plane after our 24hr travel day but we were both a little confused. Having been able to be completely horizontal or at least legs elevated for our entire trip was an absolute game changer. It did not feel like we had been flying literally all day. We now understand how once you fly that way you can never go back. It is 100% the way to fly. *ps… we did not pay to fly business (we do not have that kind of money). All our miles that we racked up in 2022 finally paid off.
We rolled up to the beautifully lit up Torch Hotel around midnight on Sunday. This hotel was one of the nicest ones that we have stayed in internationally. Everything was very modern, and their use of lights just makes everything look 10x cooler. The bellman brought our bags up to our room and then showed us the Ipad that controlled everything in the room… from the colors of the lights on the wall, to the curtains, and down to the temperature. Taryn did not really care about all the technology, so she quickly hoped into the shower while I did some button pushing to see what happened.
Sugar and Spice + our hotel in the background.
Taryn woke up around 4am the next morning while I was able to sleep until around 8am. To really wake ourselves up I rolled over and clicked a button that opened up the sheer and curtain letting in the bright light of the Doha sun. Since Taryn had been up for a couple hours she was ravenous, so she as patiently as hungry Taryn could be, waited for me to get ready (which can take a little while). We enjoyed a quaint breakfast at a place called Sugar and Spice which was a convenient 5 min walk from the hotel. After we tried to find the competition courts based on the map that was emailed to us. However, we pretty much walked around aimlessly and didn’t even find a place that resembled sand courts… we figured better luck tomorrow so gave up and ubered to the Souq Waqif which is a very popular place to visit in Doha. It’s a giant marketplace, so we walked around soaking in all the different scenes, scents, and sounds. We hit a coffee shop to do some people watching and then headed to the Corniche (a long walking path along the water). The views were absolutely incredible! You look across the water to what looks like a futuristic city – buildings with exotic architecture and none that look the same or like something we had seen before. We took some pictures and then decided to head back to the hotel.
The sun was VERY bright.
Our room was a disaster. We had suitcases, clothes, and shoes just kind of everywhere and that does not usually last long with two people who could be classified as neat freaks. We had already let it stay like that for a couple hours, so when we got back we both went into organizing mode. After a quick 15-20 minute clean, we headed to the gym to get a workout in (something new for us this year). We decided this year that it was important to try and maintain our muscle and gym routine as best as possible while on the road. Last year, we never even walked into a gym while on the road. Little things like that are things you learn after year 1 (we told you we learned A LOT). Of course, in between all our sets, we were looking for the best food places around us and trying to decide which would be best for dinner. We ended up at a place in the Villaggio Mall called Sushi Library. Side note: our hotel is connected to the Villaggio Mall which is a MASSIVE mall with a freaking body of water in the middle of which you can ride a gondola… crazy. Neither one of us had ever tried a ramen bowl and we are both starting to explore more of the sushi world which is how our adventurous selves decided on Sushi Library. We now know we are ramen fans – it was delicious!
Even after a big exploration day, Taryn still woke up at 6am while I was able to sleep until 8am. We hit breakfast at another place in the mall called Rue de Rose, and we were joined by our travel coach Jakob Fleming – another new addition to 2023. We figured it was time to have a coach with us on the road for warmups and also a male presence is always nice to have internationally. After breakfast we hit a coffee shop that actually had almond milk (semi hard to find) where we enjoyed a very delicious vanilla bean latte.
Practice time! The competition courts were a quick 3-5 minute golf cart ride. We had a productive hour practice with Stam/Schoon from the Netherlands. It’s nice to practice with another team before the tourney because it forces you to get the body moving. It also allows you to see how the sands plays. This sand was pretty shallow, especially in comparison to the Hermosa Beach sand that we had been training in, so there were more angles and just the overall speed of the game is a little faster. We walked back to the hotel just in time before the rain came… “it never rains in Doha”, “it never rains in California” – we just bring the rain to wherever we go.
Rinsed off, chilled in the hotel room and then headed to another spot right next to our hotel… Grams. This place was amazing! One side was a healthy restaurant and the other side was a little market that sold a bunch of high protein and low calorie snacks like donuts, brownies, bars, cookies, and so on. I was in heaven, so after eating we spent a decent amount of time roaming around and checking out the protein bars that we do not have in the US. We excitedly picked out a couple options to try throughout our trip and then headed back to the hotel to do some stretching before bed.
By day 3, T was done waiting for me to wake up. She headed to Grams for breakfast and coffee and then I headed over to meet her once I was ready. After eating we sipped our delicious coffee while immersing ourselves into our books before we had to head to the courts for another light practice. Another addition to 2023… a light serve receive practice with our new travel coach Jake the day before the tournament. We never practiced the day before events last year. Something that did not change in 2023 was the FIVB being a little behind on set up. We were supposed to practice on court 2, however, they were still setting things up, so they told us to practice on center court, but even on center court they were still playing with the net. They were legit fixing the net while we were trying to practice on it. Like c’mon guys… the tournament starts tomorrow. We should have the courts completely set up.
We rinsed off and then headed back to our place, Grams, for lunch and to chill. Taryn did some more reading while I started on this blog and organizing the vlog videos. The same waiter we had for breakfast said to us on the way out, “so I’ll see y’all at dinner,” and if the tournament did not start providing us dinner that night we would have definitely gone back.
During tournaments we have A TON of down time. Usually just chilling in the hotel room. There’s only so many books you can read and scrolling through social media gets boring. We decided we need something that we can either try and learn or just something to take up time. We brainstormed but came up empty, so please if you have any suggestions SEND THEM OUR WAY! We ended up asking each other thought provoking questions, we played the date, marry, kill game with different celebrities and athletes, and we made predictions for what we think each other’s lives would look like in 5 years.. married, kids, location (we were very bored). 7 o’clock finally came around which meant we could head down to dinner that was provided for us at the hotel. We ate, showered, tried one of treats that we had purchases from Grams the day before and then passed out because the next day was gameday.
We did not play till 2pm so we had some time to kill. T led us through a nice stretching routine after breakfast, we did some reading, I played some solitaire, we got ready for the match and then headed to lunch. For the first time internationally, we actually looked more like we fit in on the warm up court. There’s typically only 1 warm up court for the next 4 teams to warmup on, and everyone has a coach that serves them balls or whatever. Taryn and I would hop on when it was our turn and just hit two balls like a hitting line and then we would serve each other. It looked nothing like what the other teams were doing. This time, we were able to cycle through our turn and do normal serve receive along with transition defense. We were feeling good heading into match #1 and that carried over leading us to a two-set victory for the first match in 2023. Last year we started our year in a Futures event in Coolangatta, Australia. This year we started our year at the World Tour Finals in Doha, Qatar… wild!
While rinsing off in the shower between matches we did some laundry. We brought soap since we knew were going to have to and then we hung our clothes up all around the room. The cleaners were probably a little confused. Our next match was at 7pm which was an awkward eating time. Dinner did not start until 7 so we had to figure out what we were going to eat before the match. Jake was able to run to the grocery store to get us some bread so we could make a protein peanut butter and banana sandwich which was actually delicious. Not sure what everyone can see while watching on TV but before matches on center court they make you go into this back area while they start a 12 min clock. We had to just awkwardly stand in there with our Brazilian opponents until the clock reached 8 minutes. Those 4 minutes feel like forever. You want to be out on the court warming up but instead you just have to stand in there just for them to say Team USA and then we run out for what’s left of the short warmup. In my opinion, it’s dumb. Like the last time we played Duda/Anna Patricia, the match did not go our way. Falling 15-13 in the third set. Too many errors and not enough execution.
Friday’s morning routine was the same as the day before except we were playing Australia. We came out flat and again gave away way too many points. I was not doing any of the small things right which led to poor execution. While walking off the courts, a guy came up to me and said, “you are Ms.Nuss right?”. I confirmed and then he broke the terrible news, “you have been selected for a doping test. You will have to provide a urine sample.” If you know me well, you know this is the worst possible thing someone could say. My bladder is very shy when it comes to someone watching me pee in a cup. We had to do one or two every year at LSU and the person in charge of drug testing literally told me he hated when my name came up because he knew it was going to be an all-day affair. After we debriefed as a team, (side note - a lady had to follow me around so she was just standing off to the side while we were discussing how poorly we had just played) I told the lady I was going to watch the end of other women’s game and then I would try to go. While walking to the doping building, I could feel the anxiety rising in me. I knew attempt number 1 was not going to go well – I just did not have to go the bathroom and after having to sit there and fill out all the forms anxiety was at a peak. I was correct – attempt number 1 was unsuccessful. I sat in the bathroom with the drug testing guys drinking water, chatting about his life of traveling around the world collecting urine samples from athletes, scrolling through social media, and mentally trying to talk my bladder into having to pee. After about 2 hours it was starting to hit me. I let the guy finish his story about his craziest experience with a Russian hand ball athlete and then said, “alright, I’m going to give it another go!”. I PEED! Everyone joined in on my excitement, I signed the papers, and then got the heck out of there.
Sooooo good!
I was pumped to finally shower… I smelt terrible. We chilled for about 2 hours and then it was dinner time. The night before I had been telling Taryn how much I loved mozzarella cheese, so when we got to dinner, and they had homemade cheese egg rolls that were stuffed with mozzarella cheese I was thrilled. It was basically a mozzarella stick but in egg roll form – so good!
Again, Saturday morning looked identical to Thursday and Friday except this was a MUST win game. If we wanted a shot at advancing, we had to win and we thought it had to be in two sets. With that being said, we did not come out playing well at all. The volleyball felt terrible and I am sure watching it looked terrible. We dropped the first set. In my head, I thought that meant we were out but we were not about to lose and possibly come out last in out pool so we fought. We fought through the ugly volleyball and tried to get back to volleyball that we were more familiar with – clean, precise, fun. After a shaky beginning to the 2nd set things started to look a little better and we carried that all the way to the third pulling out the big W. We still had no idea if we made it through. We found out from our TKN supporters back home sending a message with a picture of our matchup against fellow Americans Cheng/Hughes.
Game was at 7 so at 5:20 we enjoyed our same peanut butter and banana sandwich, finished packing our bags and then headed down to the lobby to hop on a golf cart. It was very windy which made the air crisp and cold, but once we got moving it was not bad at all. We started off strong. Taking a big lead in the first set. Everything was clicking. 2nd set was rough. Everything was not clicking. 3rd set was back and forth. I had an opportunity to transition a ball for match point and send us to the semifinals but instead, I hit a crappy angle ball right into Hughes’ platform of which she one balled back over for the point. I replayed that point over and over and over again in my head before going to sleep that night. Of all the shots I could have hit, why did I choose that one?? Those are the kind of dumb decisions that we had in 2022. I would like to think that with more and more experience those dumb decisions will keep dwindling down but only time will tell.
Right as we were walking off the court, the same drug testing guy came up to “Ms.Kloth” telling her she had a to do a doping test. What poor timing. Thank goodness I had already done mine or I would have been there all night. Worst of all, Cheng and Hughes also got hit with a drug test so Taryn had to spend the next 30-40 minutes with the team that was high on excitement from just beating us… NOT FUN.
With our 2022 season officially wrapped up in a nice bow with a huge 5th place balloon flying above, we hold our heads high knowing we have a lot to be thankful for and knowing that we are in full control of our goals. In a couple days, the race for 2024 Paris Olympics begins and it’s surely going to be a good one.
Till then, exploration Doha!
By: Kristen Nuss
