	Barefoot with Friends in Aspen...
Barefoot with friends in Aspen: For the 7th year, I entered the popular Aspen, CO tournament called the Motherlode over Labor Day weekend. This was the 1st sand tourney I ever played in and it was the catalyst for my move to CA to play professionally. It’s interesting looking back to when I first started and to think of all the adventures I have now been through. How times flies! Luckily this year I was so blessed to be sponsored by BAREFOOT wine again and boy do they know how to spoil me! It’s so great to be apart of a great company and meet the people involved. Abby the main rep wasn’t able to be there this year and was deeply missed. She is the type of girl who can inspire you and is so fun to be around. But Dan, a friend of Abby was great in taking her place to cheer us on. We definitely had the best cheering section, especially thanks to my mom and dad who flew out! I just LOVE having them up there with me. What a difference it makes for me when I can play with those I love around. A couple friends from Fort Collins (David R, David A, and a new friend) even made the drive up to cheer me on, so I was definitely thankful for all the support! One of my friends told me that he thought that my parents got more nervous than I did! The other amazing thing, and if you know my parents at all you would be nodding your head in agreement, is my parents have the most incredible ability to make new friends. I think that everyone in this world is a friend to my mom, she just hasn’t met them all yet. So with those kinds of parents around, they definitely recruited some more voices to cheer for us. One of my prayers was to meet some new friends and we definitely were able to meet some great people this weekend. We started playing on Saturday and it was a bit scary when Carrie (my teammate) called me the night before saying that United had cancelled her flight and wouldn’t be able to get her into Aspen until Saturday morning. That was a little nerve racking on top of the fact that she also had food poisoning that same night too. So going into the weekend was already interesting. Luckily we didn’t have to play until Saturday afternoon so she was able to get in okay for our first game. With our Barefoot cheering team behind us we were able to win the first match against a good Minnesota team 21-15, 21-13. I felt a little rusty playing with Carrie again since we hadn’t been in the sand together in over 3 years. Luckily our chemistry came back and we played well together again. In all the years I have been playing this tournament this year was BY FAR the most difficult in terms of the level of play and number of AVP teams that flew in for it. There were 5 AVP teams and many other great players who came out for this tourney. So Carrie and I needed to be on top of our game to really win this. The next day, we played a scrappy Colorado team, things were clicking and we won 21-16, 21-14. This set up a match again with one of the best Colorado teams. This game was an intense game. Every point was back and forth and we lost the first one 20-22 before barely winning the 2nd game 22-20 to force a game three to 15 points. In the third game, they got off to a big lead and we weren’t able to close the gap in time and lost 12-15 to put us in the “contenders bracket,” since it was a double elimination tournament. Monday morning was the big day. We had to fight back from the contenders bracket knowing that if we would lose again we would be done and it was only ONE game to 25 points. Our first opponent actually had upset the #2 team and AVP team the day before, but Carrie and I were on a mission and came out playing well to win 25-9. Right after that we played a good team out of Chicago and although close in the first part of the game, we pulled away in the end to win it 25-15. With less than 5 minutes to rest, our next opponent had almost beaten the #1 team and was a great team. Carrie and I kept rolling and knew a win here would put us back in the semifinals. Both teams fought hard, but Carrie and I came out with a win 25-18 and ready for the semifinals. It’s amazing how you are able to keep going when you have such a great fan club cheering you on. I was so grateful for all the support everyone showed us. It REALLY pushed us through! In both semifinals it was ALL AVP players except for my partner, and the team we had to play did well this past season on the AVP. We knew it was going to be a battle and it was. Each point was back and forth, back and forth. We had the lead 18-17 and then ended up losing game one 20-22. The second game went the same way and we lost 22-24 in a tough battle. When they had been sitting all day we played 4 games in row but I really wish we could have pulled off that comeback. This gave us a 3rd place finish and I was happy how we played on Monday. It’s such a great tournament to play in and I really do love playing this game! Not only do I love playing but I really had a great time being around the Barefoot crew and meeting new people. I even have these 3 boys who always come down on the last day and only shagged balls for our team. They were so so cute! With the end of the Motherlode it always marks the end of my playing season and this year was unique in that after the tournament I got to drive HOME back to Fort Collins. It’s great to live in Colorado again and being in such an amazing community. The last time I had driven that route was almost a year ago when I moved back from CA. It was a reminder of my new life. J Thanks again for all your support and prayers throughout the season, it means so much to me! What NOW? New Business: With this season done, I am now really excited to pursue my other passion of teaching and coaching kids here in Fort Collins. I finally launched my new website this week (www.high5tutoring.com) thanks to my AMAZING and CREATIVE little brother Eric Knopf. Eric and his business (www.visionlaunchers.com) is outstanding and Eric is responsible for the cool angelaknopf.com website and now High5. I am so very blessed to have such a creative, talented and supportive brother. Now that my site is up, I am hoping to start spreading the word to families around town, so if you know of any kids in need of school tutoring or private coaching, send them my way!! I am so excited to work with the kids in this great community and hopefully teach them some new tools!

Barefoot with Friends in Aspen...

Barefoot with friends in Aspen:

For the 7th year, I entered the popular Aspen, CO tournament called the Motherlode over Labor Day weekend. This was the 1st sand tourney I ever played in and it was the catalyst for my move to CA to play professionally. It’s interesting looking back to when I first started and to think of all the adventures I have now been through. How times flies!

Luckily this year I was so blessed to be sponsored by BAREFOOT wine again and boy do they know how to spoil me! It’s so great to be apart of a great company and meet the people involved. Abby the main rep wasn’t able to be there this year and was deeply missed. She is the type of girl who can inspire you and is so fun to be around. But Dan, a friend of Abby was great in taking her place to cheer us on.

We definitely had the best cheering section, especially thanks to my mom and dad who flew out! I just LOVE having them up there with me. What a difference it makes for me when I can play with those I love around. A couple friends from Fort Collins (David R, David A, and a new friend) even made the drive up to cheer me on, so I was definitely thankful for all the support! One of my friends told me that he thought that my parents got more nervous than I did! The other amazing thing, and if you know my parents at all you would be nodding your head in agreement, is my parents have the most incredible ability to make new friends. I think that everyone in this world is a friend to my mom, she just hasn’t met them all yet. So with those kinds of parents around, they definitely recruited some more voices to cheer for us. One of my prayers was to meet some new friends and we definitely were able to meet some great people this weekend.

We started playing on Saturday and it was a bit scary when Carrie (my teammate) called me the night before saying that United had cancelled her flight and wouldn’t be able to get her into Aspen until Saturday morning. That was a little nerve racking on top of the fact that she also had food poisoning that same night too. So going into the weekend was already interesting. Luckily we didn’t have to play until Saturday afternoon so she was able to get in okay for our first game. With our Barefoot cheering team behind us we were able to win the first match against a good Minnesota team 21-15, 21-13. I felt a little rusty playing with Carrie again since we hadn’t been in the sand together in over 3 years. Luckily our chemistry came back and we played well together again.

In all the years I have been playing this tournament this year was BY FAR the most difficult in terms of the level of play and number of AVP teams that flew in for it. There were 5 AVP teams and many other great players who came out for this tourney. So Carrie and I needed to be on top of our game to really win this. The next day, we played a scrappy Colorado team, things were clicking and we won 21-16, 21-14. This set up a match again with one of the best Colorado teams. This game was an intense game. Every point was back and forth and we lost the first one 20-22 before barely winning the 2nd game 22-20 to force a game three to 15 points. In the third game, they got off to a big lead and we weren’t able to close the gap in time and lost 12-15 to put us in the “contenders bracket,” since it was a double elimination tournament.

Monday morning was the big day. We had to fight back from the contenders bracket knowing that if we would lose again we would be done and it was only ONE game to 25 points. Our first opponent actually had upset the #2 team and AVP team the day before, but Carrie and I were on a mission and came out playing well to win 25-9. Right after that we played a good team out of Chicago and although close in the first part of the game, we pulled away in the end to win it 25-15. With less than 5 minutes to rest, our next opponent had almost beaten the #1 team and was a great team. Carrie and I kept rolling and knew a win here would put us back in the semifinals. Both teams fought hard, but Carrie and I came out with a win 25-18 and ready for the semifinals. It’s amazing how you are able to keep going when you have such a great fan club cheering you on. I was so grateful for all the support everyone showed us. It REALLY pushed us through!

In both semifinals it was ALL AVP players except for my partner, and the team we had to play did well this past season on the AVP. We knew it was going to be a battle and it was. Each point was back and forth, back and forth. We had the lead 18-17 and then ended up losing game one 20-22. The second game went the same way and we lost 22-24 in a tough battle. When they had been sitting all day we played 4 games in row but I really wish we could have pulled off that comeback. This gave us a 3rd place finish and I was happy how we played on Monday. It’s such a great tournament to play in and I really do love playing this game!

Not only do I love playing but I really had a great time being around the Barefoot crew and meeting new people. I even have these 3 boys who always come down on the last day and only shagged balls for our team. They were so so cute!

With the end of the Motherlode it always marks the end of my playing season and this year was unique in that after the tournament I got to drive HOME back to Fort Collins. It’s great to live in Colorado again and being in such an amazing community. The last time I had driven that route was almost a year ago when I moved back from CA. It was a reminder of my new life. J Thanks again for all your support and prayers throughout the season, it means so much to me!

What NOW? New Business:

With this season done, I am now really excited to pursue my other passion of teaching and coaching kids here in Fort Collins. I finally launched my new website this week (www.high5tutoring.com) thanks to my AMAZING and CREATIVE little brother Eric Knopf. Eric and his business (www.visionlaunchers.com) is outstanding and Eric is responsible for the cool angelaknopf.com website and now High5. I am so very blessed to have such a creative, talented and supportive brother.

Now that my site is up, I am hoping to start spreading the word to families around town, so if you know of any kids in need of school tutoring or private coaching, send them my way!! I am so excited to work with the kids in this great community and hopefully teach them some new tools!