Winner of the women’s singles event at the XXIX Pan American squash championships in Guatemala, Guyana’s Nicolette Fernandes said the win was surprising and unexpected.
“It’s quite surprising to me because I just didn’t expect it you know. I didn’t know what to expect. I still can’t believe it,” she said in an interview with the media following her triumph Wednesday evening.
“There were lots of times I played this tournament when I was a professional squash player and this title was elusive and I thought that my days for winning tournaments or events like this was long gone. It’s kinda sweeter now because I didn’t think it would even be possible you know,” she added.
Fernandes dropped only one set en route to winning the Pan Am Games gold medal and that was to Colombia’s Lucia Bautista, whom she defeated 11/9, 8/11, 11/2, 11/8.
In the semi- final she defeated Canada’s Hanna Blatt, the number two seed, 11/2, 11/9, 11/3 and in the final she made light work of Laura Tovar, the number one seed winning 11/9, 11/4, 11/5.
“Nicolette is outstanding! She knew what she had to do and went out there and did it! I knew from her performance leading up to the finals that this was within her grasp, and I was confident she would give her all and bring home the trophy. I have always admired her discipline, her determination and her spirit and am so pleased to see her on top in her performance- she is an inspiration to athletes in Guyana and around the world,” said coach Carl Ince of Fernandes, who retired from professional squash in 2017.
Despite the one sided nature of the finals and her dominance of the tournament Fernandes said it was not as easy as it looked.
“It’s been a really challenging physical tournament with each match my body kind of deteriorated a little bit. It was all about management for me with each match, making sure I get the right recovery and you know just doing the kinds of things I needed to keep my body in one piece. That was one of my biggest concerns with nationals a few weeks ago my body didn’t hold up too well. I was really conscious of making sure I did the right things with the younger girls that I play there all like up and coming and you know I was once there,” she said.
“I remember playing the more experienced ladies and you know it’s a cliché but you can’t buy experience and it counts for so much, my experience was an advantage more than a hindrance and luckily my body held up well which could have been another hindrance. It worked out well but I definitely felt the squash schedule, the last few days,” she declared.
According to Fernandes, she was asked what were the team’s goals, prior to departure and she said the goal was for the team to qualify.
“Our goals were to qualify you know at no point did I think that this would be possible.”
Concerning the team events which start today Fernandes was cautiously optimistic. “I have a rest day today so I’m very grateful for that and I don’t think the schedule will be as compact as the individuals so I think I’ll be in a nicer schedule for me being an old girl but we still have our work to do because or objective really coming here was not for me to win this tournament, our objective was to do really well in the teams. That’s actually our objective so we still have work to do and we just have to put or heads down to achieve that objective
Asked what were the chances of the Guyana team winning a medal, Fernandes said:”I’ll use the same philosophy as I used in the singles. You know you just have to look at the process. You know we play Argentina tomorrow (today). It’s a three-woman format and you have to win two out of the three, so our focus right now is not medaling but its Argentina tomorrow and we’ll take it match-by-match and see how it goes. The girls have been really like even though they lost in the second round, they’ve been really competitive and the fact that they’ve been training and getting used to the conditions, the altitude, you know I think we have a good chance. Let’s just take it one tie at a time.
