My squash club has wonderful squash doubles pro-am that runs over the first few weeks of February. The pro at our club, Eric Baldwin, does a great job organizing and it is well supported by the pros around Toronto, which is an very active squash community. Jonathon Power is now a member, as is Gary Waite, who was #1 doubles player for about 15 years. Both are interesting and personable. Jonathan played in our Pro-Am two years ago and Gary has played in it for about 6 years. It’s a real privilege for the amateurs who get to play. (When recently asked for affiliation in submissions to academic journals, I contemplated saying Badminton and Racquet Club, but decided on Climate Audit instead.)
Eric tries to balance the teams so that the best amateur gets last pick of who he plays with. The losing team in each game gets a 3-point head start in the next game. So that it’s a recipe for 5 game matches. In the first round, 4 of 8 matches were decided 15-14 in the fifth. Squash is one of the few sports where you have 2-way match points – sort of like a buzzer beater in basketball where a team is one point down. (Hockey has sudden death but the puck is only in one end at a time.)
Last night, the proprietor of this blog got to play against Paul Price, currently part of the #1 ranked squash doubles team in the world.
One of the club members made up promotional posters for the various players, one of which featured the proprietor of Climate Audit. To spare the unwary, you are not obliged to look at this poster merely because you came to the blog, but continue reading if you’re brave.
The squash players think that my enterprise into the climate world has been rather fun, but they tease me about it and now I have a new nickname on the squash court (as you can see from the text on the poster). I’ve got a bit of a quirky squash style, as relative to my ability, I hit a lot of winners and kill shots. Meager when you’re on the court with someone like Price, but you go with what you’ve got.
And, oh yes, the match. I played with Alex Carter, an excellent up-and-coming 25 year old amateur (playing as the pro) against Paul Price and his partner, John Hughes. Squash doubles is a wonderful spectator sport. Price is a shot-maker and fun to watch from the gallery. Hey, it was fun to watch him on the court. You feel like clapping.
But strange to relate, your blog proprietor is advancing to the final on Wednesday.
Climate Audit 
93 Comments
Steve, you are a “Tausendsassa” as we say in Swiss. ( Jack of all trades) I enjoy so much all of your work. How in the world do you find the time to play squash. Best regards and thanks for everything. Freddie from the cold, snowy Swiss mountains.
Good Luck!
Was squash something else you picked up at Oxford? Perhaps we could settle some of these debates on the squash court, as in “winner gets the code”!
Steve: My father played squash and I played some as a teenager, but more at University of Toronto. I played for my college team at Oxford, but was not Blue calibre.
Steve, Why don’t you and Anthony challenge Michael Mann and James Hansen to a best of three squash doubles. The losers will concede that their theories are incorrect…
TonyB
Whacking ’em on the court and whacking ’em on the climate blogs.
Makes you a whacker twice over.
Go get ’em.
I like the background pic of vanishing glaciers.
Steve,
So if I understand this right, Alex Carter is the amateur and you the pro. I knew you were good, but I didn’t know you made money at it. Wow. A climste skeptic funded by the squash cabal.
Steve: No, Alex is an amateur but was playing as the pro. Here’s a link to a picture of Alex.
Re: Ron Cram (#7),
Wow… two amateurs beating a team with a top pro. Now I’m really impressed. Still, I have to admit I liked typing “squash cabal.”
I think Alex Carter (Steve’s partner) is listed as playing as a Pro.
I gave up both squash and Badminton because of a torn arm muscle and too much strain on the knees. Like an idiot I took up running instead (mainly off-road), but touch wood the knees are still going strong. Well done and keep doing it as long as you can. There’s nothing better than hard exercise to keep the brain going.
Steve,
It’s nice to hear that you didn’t get “squashed” playing price(I couldn’t help myself). Good luck in the finals.
AJ
geek. nerd.
you rule.
I used to play a lot of handball before my knee went out. Paul Haber, the U.S. champion at that time and maybe the best there ever was, came to play at our Y one weekend. When he was on the court he never took his eye off the ball even during the breaks. I always thought that was a pretty good rule for life.
Well done to “The Professor”. All the best in the final!
You seem to have a halo of confidence in the picture.
Are those foxtail pines in the background?
Re: Ross McKitrick (#14),
Bristlecones.
Good luck, professor.
JimB
I like the phrase “he possesses all the tactics and weapons to dismantle even the best opponent”. We’re fortunate that Steve is similarly skilled in both of his “recreational” activities.
Arrrggghhhh!!!! My eyes!! My eyes!!
Steve: you were warned, but you ignored the warning. 🙂
Time to change the background pic of climate audit.
Good luck with the tournament.
I see it snowing in the background. Was Al Gore spectating?
Congrats on the victory, good luck in the final.
Are those bristlecone pines on the side of that mountain?
After studing tree rings of millenian bristlecones, some of them with damaged bark, this graph has been generated.
The graph is called the squash racquet graph because its shape reflects the uncertainities of temperature reconstruction during the first part of the millenium.
The data and code will be available some time around 2015.
Now Steve’s critics will accuse him of raqueteering and they will be correct.
I don’t get it. The poster says “Steve McIntyre;” who’s that funny looking guy with the scraggly beard?
I wanted to play squash, but never found a “yellow crooked neck” racquet. Keep up
the good work.
Graduate to Real Tennis (?the Elizabethan origin of squash) and maybe you can get to play Real Climate. Maybe they’ll have to acknowledge your existence, Professor.
… the reconstructed image was interpolated using RegEM.
… and the similarity with FBI computer generated records is uncanny. A real smoking gun.
Seeing your poster has moved me to congratulate you on your great site Steve. It has that rare quality of doing three things at once:
Inform
Entertain
Change
Many, many thanks
Re: Stuart Huggett (#26),
Actually:
Inform
Change
Entertain
which yields “ICE” ;*)
The Iceman cometh…
JimB
Re: JimB (#33),
Once the gray shows up, it has to be:
Rest
Inform
Change
Entertain
RICE
Steve: today’s been Rest.
UrederraRe: Urederra (#20), lol, nice work.
glad Steve doesn’t play golf
He.
Could.
Go.
All.
The.
Way!
Not just a court-Jester but a squash court-Jester
and,notwithstanding the beard, you’re a Hansen(sp?)devil too!
🙂
Keep up the ‘Gourd’ work (sry!)
Squash? Squash??? Why, that makes you even less qualified to audit climate science than we though!
Good luck Steve!!
Uhh, was that a joke airbrushing in the grey in the hair and beard?
Long time fan. Nice segway into a hobby of yours. My brother plays doubles out of the RCYC. I’ve watched him play a few interclub finals at the Cricket. You may have been there. Back to climate change, I have been thinking recently that you and Lawrence Solomon need to do a show on CFTR some drive-home show as John Moore is an AGM promoter evn though Mr. Solomon was on and tried to convince him of some inconsistencies in the data.
Cheers.
Steve: Last year, I played on finals day at Cricket Club with Bruce Taylor against Kitchener Waterloo (B-league). We won a marathon match against two young guys after being down 2-0 and down in the third. I probably know your brother from league. He’d know Alex Carter – Alex used to play at RCYC. My brother Sandy sails at RCYC. I really really like the interclub squash league. I played my first interclub league match (singles) in 1965, if you can imagine.
. . . and extrapolated where required by “sub-prime data sets” using sophisticated facial mapping algorithms.
I believe the word you’re looking for is “robust”.
And wouldn’t that be “fingerprint”?
Age and treachery coupled with youth and enthusiasm – sounds like an unbeatable combination.
Yuk! I hate squash!
What?
A game?
Oh.
Never mind!
Good luck Steve!
Re: Jeff Alberts (#37),
I prefer the edible kind, personally. I usually grow acorns, buttercups, and hubbards each summer. I wonder where the name of the squash game came from. I could Google, but someone here will probably tell me.
squash does need to b a lot active! cant be for lazyman
Steve – you appear to have developed your own troposphere in this pic. Either that, or it’s the well-deserved aura of success!
May it continue into, and beyond, the squash final.
There are professional squash players??? 🙂
Anthony should use RegEm with surface stations.
I have a diabolical analysis plan.
So your brother is Sandy. I have sailed/raced with him on Red Jacket/Venture some years back. He has had less time to waste on the water with his recent position. Small world. Again, great work with CA. Brian Spratley.
The text says,
Well put!
Chuckle, chuckle, Ask Gavin if Steve McIntyre knows how to finesse an opponent into serving him up the kill shot.
Re: Hank (#47),
I would. Except that question would never make it past RC’s gatekeepers.
If you lose, don’t feel too bad; we will still value your opinion on sadistics.
Tennis player here but have tried and enjoyed speed-minton.
Many of life’s high achievers in business and academia had athletic success, especially in their younger years. So enjoy your younger years, Steve.
Who won?
I used to play squash a lot more regularly than today. (These days I mostly row on Lady Bird Lake here in Austin.) But when I was really into it I lived in New York City, typically in tiny apartments. I remember the feeling of being on the squash court and thinking, “Ah, space.”
Great game!
And good luck!
Is playing squash in the open air a Canadian thing?
You better get running, it looks like there’s a new ice age coming to Toronto, what with the mountains and glaciers and all.
8^)
I ran a quick Probit analysis on the incomplete data you have presented (but not archived). Near as I can tell you have a .543789 likelihood of winning assuming that the wind is at your back. But I have to admit I spliced some data sets and, for the eighteen year gap in your scores, just made stuff up.
I’d be willing to bet a loonie.
Nice change to the site title.
Steve: that was John A being mischievous during night time here.
Re: jeez (#57),
That title is really going to annoy some people.
When I played squash in Canada (long ago, badly and lazily) they used funny big heavy balls and changed the court markings. Do they still do that in North America?
Steve: Squash doubles is on a completely different court than either singles game. The court is about 4 times bigger than a singles court and way higher. It uses a hard ball and has a low tin like North American singles. The result is that kill shots are way more effective than singles and also you get to use the top of the court in interesting ways. So there are a variety of shots that you don’t see in singles – with their own nomenclature: reverse corners, Philadelphias,… The risk-reward ratio is totally different than singles. There’s a much bigger success rate for winners (at least at the level that I play at.) The top pros really heat the ball up and it becomes more of a power game, but Price hits a lot of winners even against pros. It makes for a far flashier spectator sport than singles. I like watching squash doubles even if the calibre isn’t superb, but don’t watch much squash singles.
Steve
Have you lost weight since the Starbuck trip or has the pic been touched. 🙂
Steve: How nice of you to notice! Yes. Soon sfter the Starbucks trip, I had a checkup and the doctor told me to lose weight, so I promptly put on 10 pounds and at the 2007 AGU was by far the heaviest I’d ever been in my life. I felt bad; my squash was horrible. I was afraid to step on the scales. Finally I weighed myself and couldn’t believe it. For the first time in my life, I went on a serious diet and in the last year, I’ve lost a bit over 25 pounds (about 15 pounds since the Starbucks photo). I haven’t lost anything in the last 5 months or so, but will try for another 10 pounds.
I played squash once (literally one time)….about 23 years ago. I was beaten 20 something nil and never played again!
Great to read this thread I gave up squash about 40 years ago, I guess, but really enjoyed it for many years.
Best of luck (and skill) in the Final.
However, have a care, Steve! It’s been said that there are more heart attacks per square meter on squash courts than anywhere else on earth. We do NOT want to lose you.
Robin
Go get ’em, Steve – best of luck today.
#61. There are defibrillators at our squash, though not at every club. I don’t know whether I mentioned an incident a couple of years ago with our club team in an away game. I was playing the #2 match; the 3s came off the court, I was stretching and one of players look like he’d fainted. Well, he hadn’t. He’d had a massive heart attack; he was only about 38 years old (it was a hereditary problem). He had his heart attack about 6 feet from a defibrillator; one of the guys who was having a drink at the club bar had been trained (tho, unlike Team climate articles, defibrillators are designed to be usable). On went the debrillator within a minute or so and boom, Sam was back to life. This club was downtown, but the ambulance took about 15 minutes to arrive. The attendant said that Sam would have been dead without the defibrillator. By coincidence, we were playing at Paul Price’s club; the two people responsible for saving Sam’s life, John Hickey and Paul, were both given civic awards. My own take right now is that fairly strenuous exercise right by a defibrillator is probably safer than shoveling snow.
Don’t worry about the plateau in weight loss. The slower you lose weight, the more likely it is to stay off. A great trick for many people is to figure out how to eat more slowly. Once your stomach doesn’t think your throat’s been cut satiety ensues. Really, though, you have to give the nutrients time to get through your liver and to your brain.
==========================================
#45. It’s funny that one can, so to speak, bring a similar style to squash doubles and statistics. Monday’s match was really fun for me. I’ll remember it as long as I can remember things. One of my friends sent the following email report on Monday’s match to another friend:
I’d like to think that Climate Audit has the same sort of ambiance.
One big difference between squash and climate is that squash players learn to leave it on the court. It’s grown out of English traditions that I find admirable. Squash leagues are not just about the game, but about dinner and drinks afterwards. College rugby at Oxford was like that; the guy that you tackled the hardest bought you a drink. I was blown away by the civility and thought that this was great.
The NAS presentations in March 2006 had a cocktail reception and I joked that Mann and I were going to sing rugby songs together. Unfortunately, he didn’t show up for the reception. I walked by him at AGU one year and said hello, but he stormed by not even looking at me.
Re: Steve McIntyre (#64), The Oriel College chap who broke my cheekbone playing football didn’t buy me a drink. Admittedly he would have had to visit the Radcliffe Infirmary to find me, but I never saw him again. That was one of a number of unfortunate experiences. Though I’m an Oxford graduate, I wouldn’t call myself an alumnus. I found Oxford snobbish rather than civil. I felt anything but nurtured by Oxford University.
Steve, congrats on another championship! I’ve seen you come up with a quick snap not even a Michael Mann could get to! Too bad Mann doesn’t know any rugby songs.
Steve: not there yet. one more match.
Steve M, nice pix and promo/caption. Someone beat me to it, but your weight loss looks good on you.
I quit smoking (for good) many years ago because I was losing singles tennis matches to opponents I should have beaten (wind factor). Doubles tennis was not so revealing of my smoking related inadequacies. I have progressed in my life from participating in baseball, basketball and track to softball and golf to tennis and now I do gardening, cooking and occasional fishing. I have a son, who attributes the lessening of the competitiveness of my activities to a diminishing supply of testosterone and I tell him, no, it’s that I am at peace with myself.
Once in while, I have to prove to myself that I can still sink a twenty foot jump shot and throw a curve ball and not look like I remember my grandfather throwing a baseball in his later years. From all reports Grandpa was a very good baseball player in his youth, but I always wondered as a youth how that could be with his “restricted” throwing motion when we playing catch. Now I know. So, Steve, keep using it to keep from losing it.
One quick question for you, Steve, how long have you been “the club member making up promotional posters for the various players, one of which featured the proprietor of Climate Audit”.
Steve: Pat McMurrich did the posters and photos. The other ones are fun too. (He’s in the final as well.)
Re: Kenneth Fritsch (#66),
Because you don’t have as much testosterone raging through your body and confusing your brain. 😉
^Steve: Mann was pouting, no doubt.
Mark
Haha! That’s awesome, deadly at statistics and squash!
Steve,
Congrats on the move to the next round..You would think playing this game would definitely keep the weight off but do you play all the time? Also, how’s your Granddaughter doing?
I’ve seen you mention squash from time to time and never knew what it is… I envisioned a laid back game like bowling or billiards or something… I’m surprised to see it’s a racket game, obviously something that requires a bit of exertion for a guy of your extended youth.
Regarding badminton, being a good player could have benefits. Death is a master player, and if you beat him in a game you just might live.
http://videolimbo.blogspot.com/2008/08/madeleine-kahn-in-de-dva-dove-1968.html
This is an oscar nominated, brilliant satire of at least two Ingmar Bergman films, and it’s wonderful to see an uncut copy finally posted on the web. Some may find it in bad taste for very adult dialog and minor nudity, but in wonderful taste involving a pre-Saturday Night Live Madeleine Kahn.
Mooo!
Rock that white beard!!
Ross,
As I am thinking about it Dr. Schmidt (he hasn’t asked me to call him Gavin yet) has a good point. Why would there be any correlation positive or negative between his model data and the temperature anomaly differences? If you treat his model output as essentially random at this scale then you wouldn’t expect correlation except in a small number of cases. This seems too frequent. If the output is non random, I can’t see why it would be affected one way or the other by socioeconomic factors.
I believe you have commented on something like this, but you may have to make it simple for me to understand.
Dear Steve
There may be snow on the mountain top but there’s still a fire in the cave.
Or I think, maybe in both our cases, my father summed it up ” You to can have a body like mine if you let it go”
Who won? Enquiring minds want to know! 🙂
I like Urederra’s (20)squash racket graph. I think much more than a joke. Comparing it to the hockey stick makes a serious point.
The poster is just right for a desktop!
Moving off-topic, the AAAS anual meeting starts this week. Prof James McCarty says ‘The planet will be in “huge trouble” unless Barack Obama makes strides in tackling climate change’ (quote via BBC).
Looking at the programme, there is a mix of ‘serious’ and ‘non-serious’science (eg. ‘Science of kissing’, Math for origami and hip-hop music’) and a ‘Dance your PhD’ contest. Climate Change is in there, with a presentation from Al Gore. But its not clear which camp these are in. I suppose you can make your own judgement.
By the way, the picture of Prof James McCarthy on the front page bares a remarkable resemblance to the picture of Steve above. Are they by any change related??
http://www.aaas.org/
For whatever reason, you look much younger in the photo than I expected. I thought you were retired.
Steve is going to be around for awhile. Much to everyone’s delight!
Re: Pierre Gosselin (#77),
Not quite everyone’s, I think; but certainly to Steve’s many admirers, both here at CA & elsewhere (certain parties are probably breathing a sigh of relief that he was distracted from his auditing for a few days).
Congratulations on your win, Steve. What a kick it must be for a 60-something – to not only hold you own, but to walk off with the trophy.
Your 2009 Pro Am champion is tired and sore and a little hung over. 5 games – 15-12 in the fifth. There must have been about 300 people there for the match, so the atmosphere was very lively. Jeff Lurie’s band, Still Sol, livened things up. Jeff is a fine squash player as well and called his band the “Steve McIntyre Band” for the evening. I felt very cool. Some of the pros, including Paul Price, came for the final. Paul’s band is playing at Loki Lounge on King St W next Tuesday and gave us an invitation. I think that my wife and I will go; it seems a little too cool for people in their 60s, but hey.
Here I am looking grandfatherly with some of the young people. The two girls are both champion squash players and the cell phone photo doesn’t do them justice. I told you it was a great game. My Pro Am partner Alex Carter is on the right.
Re: Steve McIntyre (#78),
I’ll just say a great win for anyone at any age.
I am confused was the young man at the far right in the picture your partner and if so who would drive him to the matches.
Yeah and we get it: jocks and particularly winning jocks are chick magnets.
Wunnerful, wunnerful, wunnerful. I feel like I won.
==================================
I was thinking that my reporting shows some possible confirmation bias. I reported results only after I had won 3 matches. We won 15-14 in the first round with 2 match points against us (the last point was a 2-way match point.) Would I have reported results had we lost in the first round? Probably not. Not that I would have been “withholding” results; it’s just that they wouldn’t have been “interesting”. That left one match for a “validation period” – we had about a 50-50 shot in the final. So “validation” doesn’t mean a whole lot. Sort of like a Team proxy reconstruction – except this was fun.
Re: Steve McIntyre (#80), Reporting-time bias. Should be familiar to any despotic political regime that is allowed to time its elections to coincide with favorable bounces in the polls.
Thought this blog was related to climate issues… What/Whom is this post for? Strange, confusing to a first time visitor at Climate Audit.
Re: Gong (#83),
Is this a joke? Most blogs I’ve ever been to have some social / fun posts as well as the serious threads. Though I do have to say that I wondered if keeping Steve’s squash exploits thread at the top for more than a day might confuse some casual passers by.
If you’re serious, I’d suggest going down the left column to “Favorite Posts” and read the first couple of entries to get a taste for the site.
Re: Gong (#83),
This IS a climate issue, a sporting climate.
Job well done – Congrats!!
Steve (and of course your partner Alex as well)
Congratulations on your obviously very hard and well fought victory. We’ve had several ‘wee small hours of the morning in the UK’ chats about squash, past tournaments you’ve taken part in and of course your tendency for squash name dropping, but hey nothing wrong with that IMO (its just that it makes me very jealous) on unthreaded in the past so I know how much this win means to you.
For fun I used to run a handicapped invitation only (mainly friends) little tournament at my local Squash club (the Northern Club in Crosby, Liverpool which my friends called ‘The KS Classic’) for a while. It was very hard for any of the squash club team players invited to win the tournament because of the handicap system that we employed as their handicap actually increased if they won a previous round and severely if their win was by a large margin in the previous round. It was great fun for all and was rounded off with the (as you already know obligatory best bit the) meal and drinks session afterwards. All in all a great way to spend you spare time in the holiday period between Christmas and New Year when most companies have closed down for the festive period. In the 10 years or so I ran it I only ever won it myself once and was very proud when I did. That year someone else did the handicapping so perhaps slipped up or maybe perhaps I just got lucky :-).
Buoyed by your victory, I really think its time now that you took me up on the offer I made quite sometime ago now to challenge Billy ‘the Wiki’ Connelley and some of his squashing playing Green Party mates to a team match over here in the UK. I’d consider it an honour to be on the same squash team with none other than the famous (infamous to some) Steve McIntyre. Lubos, I wonder if Ms Evets Erytnicm will be on their team :-)?
Well Done!
KevinUK
#88. Doubles squash is a related-to but different game than singles squash. You can compete with younger players a LOT longer in doubles. The risk-reward ratio for kill shots is much better than singles because of the big court and low tin. I’ve found that my hand-eye reflexes have deteriorated less with age than my leg speed (especially the starts and turns that you need in squash). The net result is that you can stay competitive against younger players. In interclub doubles league (not pro am), I can win against players who are 20-35 years younger with a clubmate older than 50 but I wouldn’t be able to win a point any more against them in singles.
Older players at my club gravitate towards doubles. Plus it’s more fun. The game is intrinsically more interesting than singles because of the big court and kill shots and there’s a lot more chit chat and pleasantries on the court, for some reason. Probably like golf foursomes rather than twosomes – they end up being more companionable.
Re: Steve McIntyre (#90),
I find it interesting that most of us as younger athletic participants took our bodies and their functioning for granted (unless we were operating at its limitations) but as we grow older we are very much aware of our limitations and nearly all the time. Compensating for those limitations is the key, but even that has its own limitations.
I used to play basketball, one on one, with my younger sons and used my distant jump shooting and muscle under the boards to prevail. Then my sons grew stronger and taller (than me) and I finally ended my one on one games with them when they frequently blocked my long distance jump shots (how embarrassing that was) and when instead of muscling them out under the basket I would simply get bounced off them.
I have experience playing tennis- singles and doubles – but have only known a few squash players (who approached the game with an almost religious fervor) and only watched matches intermittently. I have heard that squash can be more of a power game than tennis, but when I look at the top squash versus top tennis players I see the body builds of squash players looking like faster, but less powerful versions of their tennis counter parts.
I also understand that squash is on the list as a potential future sport for the Olympics. I am still pouting about their removal of women’s softball – a great athletic sport that was easy on the eyes to watch.
I personally prefer badminton to squash 🙂
To Saina Nehwal above – I wish I could agree with you.
Squash is a lot funnier than badminton! 😀