Nadal’s push for 21st Slam over for now
MELBOURNE, Australia — Rafael Nadal entered his Australian Open quarterfinal with a 223-1 record when grabbing the first two sets of a Grand Slam match. Thanks to his own mistakes — and some spirited play by Stefanos Tsitsipas — that mark is now 223-2. A couple of uncharacteristically sloppy overheads and a framed backhand in a third-set tiebreaker began Nadal’s undoing, and his bid for a record-breaking 21st men’s singles major championship eventually ended Wednesday with a 3-6, 2-6, 7-6 (4), 6-4, 7-5 loss to the younger, sharper Tsitsipas. Nadal won the 2009 Australian Open, but it is the only major he hasn’t won at least twice, with 13 titles at the French Open, four at the U.S. Open and two at Wimbledon. “Sometimes the things go well, and sometimes the things go worse,” said the 34-year-old Spaniard, who briefly left the Spanish portion of his post-match news conference after clutching at his cramping right hamstring. Nadal went ahead rather easily early against Tsitipas, winning 27 consecutive points on his serve in one stretch and running his streak of consecutive sets won at major tournaments to 35, one shy of Roger Federer’s record for the professional era. Nadal and Federer are currently tied at 20 Grand Slam singles titles, more than any other man in the history of a sport that dates to the late 1800s. The fifth-seeded Tsitsipas never wavered, though, and that surprisingly poor tiebreaker by Nadal helped hand over the third set and begin the epic comeback for the 22-year-old from Greece. “I started very nervous, I won’t lie,” Tsitsipas said. “But I don’t know what happened after the third set. I just flied like a little bird.”
FOOTBALL
› PITTSBURGH — Ben Roethlisberger is still a member of the Pittsburgh Steelers. Yet despite optimistic overtones from both the team and its longtime franchise quarterback, Roethlisberger’s return for an 18th season hardly looks like a given. While stressing Roethlisberger “did a lot of really good things” in 2020, Steelers general manager Kevin Colbert on Wednesday stopped short of wholeheartedly endorsing the idea of the two-time Super Bowl winner — who turns 39 on March 2 — being in the fold in 2021. “We have to do what’s best for the organization, do what’s best for Ben,” Colbert said. “But there’s a lot of work that needs to be done, not only with Ben but with the whole unrestricted free agent situation.” The Steelers have 19 players who will soon be free agents, and Roethlisberger currently will cause a $41.25 million salary cap hit in 2021, the highest of any player in the league. Both sides have taken turns in recent weeks talking about the need to lower that number considerably.
GOLF
› Mike Whan spent 11 years rebuilding the LPGA Tour to be strong enough to survive a pandemic. His next job is to keep the United States Golf Association at the forefront of the sport in rapidly changing times. The USGA announced Wednesday it has hired Whan as its next CEO, making him the eighth top executive in its 127-year history. USGA president Stu Francis said the ruling body of golf in America wanted a leader who was well versed in and loved the game, along with someone with a business perspective that “allowed you to think about where is golf is going — where is the USGA going and how do we position ourselves the best? We kept coming back to the perfect person as Mike Whan.” Whan announced in January that he was leaving as LPGA commissioner. It was a surprising decision coming off a year in which the women’s professional tour without guaranteed TV contracts shut down for nearly five months and managed to play 16 tournaments and four majors. That was followed by a 34-tournament schedule set for this year with record prize money. Whan, 56, replaces Mike Davis, who is leaving to start a golf architecture firm.
The ravages of the dreaded COVID-19 pandemic seem to have no end. I’m sure all of my brothers and sisters in camo out there are as tired of all this as I am. Besides all the missed events such as family gatherings and many other social events, if we are honest, it has taken away from our outdoors endeavors as well.
Traveling for distant hunting or fishing trips has certainly been curtailed, and related events like the SHOT Show, the NRA convention and the National Wild Turkey Federation Convention & Sport Show have all been canceled, postponed or moved to virtual status for the time being due to the nasty little bug from China.
One of the events I look forward to every year is the Squirrel Master Classic, which is held at the Southern Sportsman’s Hunting Lodge in Alabama. Sponsored by the air rifle company Gamo, this event draws outdoors personalities, industry writers and editors, 4-H shooters and squirrel dog handlers from all over the country. The event is the brainchild of Buckmasters founder Jackie Bushman and was his idea on how to solve the dilemma of falling hunter numbers and bring awareness to the value of small game hunting.
Mr. Bushman looked at the problem like this: How do we get more new hunters, young and old, into hunting? What kind of hunting has easy access, lots of opportunities for success and not a lot of fancy gear required? Squirrel hunting! Many of us grew up with it and learned how to hunt that way.
Now how to have an event and draw attention to this type of hunting? The Squirrel Master Classic was born, Bushman was joined in this idea by Gamo and the rest is history.
The basic drill for the Squirrel Master Classic is this: Have a squirrel hunt in a fun competition atmosphere. Teams are made up of outdoors television personalities, outdoors writers and editors, a dog handler with a squirrel dog to find the game for them, and — most important of all — a young person from 4-H, which has a very extensive shooting program. Young people can learn and compete in several different shooting sports categories, including air rifle and pistol, .22 rifle and pistol, shotgun, recurve and compound archery, muzzle loader and hunting skills. The 4-H shooters in the Montgomery area get the extra benefit of the chance
to participate in the Squirrel Master Classic.
Gamo sponsors the event and supplies all hunters with a Gamo Swarm Maxxim pellet rifle. The Swarm Maxxim (now in a Gen2 version) is the world’s only 10-shot break-barrel air rifle. The 10X Quick Shot magazine allows the shooter to load 10 pellets in the magazine, insert it into the rifle and fire 10 quick shots before reloading is necessary. Believe me — you need those quick second and third shots on this hunt because these squirrels have their running shoes on. Once they start scampering in the treetops, sometimes with spectacular leaps from tree to tree, you have to be quick or you come up empty-handed.
The Gamo Swarm Maxxim is capable of a pellet speed of 1,300 feet per second due to the new IGT Mach 1 technology. In short, Gamo put a large inert gas cylinder on this air gun to deliver speed and power unheard of in a manually operated air rifle.
As for the Southern Sportsman’s Hunting Lodge, it’s a hunter’s haven in the famous Black Belt region of Alabama. I’m pretty sure if you look up Southern hospitality in Webster’s, you will see a picture of this lodge with a rich 35-year history for hosting deer and turkey hunters and now squirrel chasers. The walls of the lodge are adorned with rows of pictures of hunters, outdoors personalities, writers, sports figures and entertainers who have stayed here. (And the ladies in the kitchen there make the best barbecue this side of Memphis.)
In case you haven’t figured it out yet, squirrel hunting is a heck of a lot of fun. These little tree rodents are found in most every state in the nation and are often plentiful on public grounds. You don’t need a lot of fancy gear and expensive leases to get you going on squirrels. Another bonus here is squirrel hunting will get you in the woods and you can do a lot of scouting
for those big bucks next deer season. The woods are bare right now, so rubs, scrapes and deer trails will be obvious to you. You can also look for shed antlers while you chase those bushy tails!
Grab your GAMO air rifle (or your second-best squirrel gun!), take a youngster with you and see what the February squirrel woods in your area have to offer. Post your pics on your social media channels with the following hash tags for identification and be a part of the fun: #Gamo, #Gamooutdoorusa, #Gamoswarm, #Gogamo, #huntsquirrels, #Squirrelmasterclassic and #Swarmnation.
You can also check out GAMO’s Facebook and Instagram posts to see how your favorite TV show hosts are doing with their squirrel pursuits. The 2021 Virtual Squirrel Master Classic teams include Bone Collector, Buck Commander, Buckmasters, Raised Hunting, Realtree and “The Choice” with Ralph and Vicki Cianciarulo.
The traditional, in-person Squirrel Master Classic is canceled this year, but that doesn’t keep us from hitting the squirrel woods. Grab the Gamo air rifle, find some sheds and scout for your buck this fall.
The COVID-19 bug can’t take that away from us.