Half-way through the tough stuff

This part of the season is the most difficult in many ways. For one, I've only been through a training camp like this for the national team two summers ago, so it's not a normal routine you easily get into. However, on one hand, we are being spoiled like college athletes-- they feed us, put us on a schedule for the entire day, drive us together to practices twice a day, and we are also away from distractions of the press, learning the new city, etc. But on the other hand, what makes it so difficult for me is that I'm very eager to get into a comfortable routine. A big part of that is to be comfortable with my teammates and the rest of the staff we spend the entire day with. Another part of that will be having an established role on the team, whether it's what I want or not, at least I'll know something. And also, I'm waiting for someone else to speak english as a first language!!!!! The team's leading scorer, American guard, Megan, will be coming in about 5 days now, so that will be a big plus as well.

Don't get me wrong though. Our Euroleague games WILL BE DIFFICULT. This is what Wikipedia has to say about Euroleague--"The Euroleague (EL), also known as Euroleague Basketball is the highest level and most important professional basketball competition in Europe, with teams from up to 18 different European countries....Clubs from Israel, entirely within Asia, are also part of the system.
The league usually, but not always, includes domestic champions from the leading countries."

So there you go...That part will be difficult too, but if this is the hardest part of the season besides the games, then I feel much more confident now (especially after my best performance in practice so far!) that this will be another great year of great experience.

Italian word of the blog: Schiffo (Ski-fo) meaning "gross" or "disgusting" (Jodi's favorite saying in Italian so far is "Che schiffo!"... "How gross!")