Off-season fun

October. The start of autumn. A very beautiful time of the year here in the USA, with mild temperatures, colourful foliage, and brilliant sunsets. October also marks the end of the summer cricket season in most of the USA. For myself and a few others though, the season continues. There are no games left, no scheduled club team practices, but there is the small matter of the USA National Championships at Fort Lauderdale, Florida, between November 19 and 21. I was fortunate to have been selected to represent the Northwest Region, runners-up of the USA Western Conference this year, at the National Championships. The other three teams involved will be the Southwest Region (winners of the USA Western Conference), the New York Region (winners of the USA Eastern Conference), and the Atlantic Region (runners-up of the USA Eastern Conference). New York Region are defending champions, and have won the national championship several times over the last decade. We are clearly the underdogs.

It strikes me as odd that the US National Championships, which should be the pinnacle of the season, are held six to seven weeks after the regular season has ended in most local leagues in the US. But I'm not complaining. In the US, any cricket is good, at any time and in any place. If the best players in the country are meeting at the best venue, the time of year is irrelevant. The weather in Florida in November is terrific anyway, provided it's not raining. I was in Florida during the same time, last year, for the USA national team trials, and I had a ball, so to speak.

My team, the Northwest Region, comprises players from three different metropolitan areas along the west coast of the USA: the San Francisco Bay Area in northern California, Portland in Oregon, and Seattle in Washington state. The distance between the homes of the northern-most and southern-most player in our team is 850 miles. That's roughly the distance from Mumbai to Delhi in India, or twice the distance between Glasgow and Southampton in the United Kingdom. None of the other teams at the USA National Championships are spread out over this large an area. Furthermore, one of our players is currently playing first-grade cricket in Australia.

One can imagine how hard it is to prepare for such a big tournament, given that you cannot see your team-mates even on a weekly, let alone daily, basis. But this is not a unique problem. Other regional teams in the USA, and in fact the USA and Canada national squads, face the same problem. The fact that USA and Canada are such massive countries makes organisation of big tournaments, and training of representative teams (including the national squad), a nightmare. Most of the other associate nations are tiny in comparison, which is actually a blessing, in terms of organising tournaments and training camps.

We practice separately in groups, and exchange progress reports online. Four of the squad members are from Seattle. If USA is the backwaters of world cricket, Seattle - home to Boeing, Microsoft, and Starbucks - is the tiny, nameless creek that even those familiar with the backwaters haven't heard of.

We Seattle-ites leave work at 5pm - not an easy task wiggling out early – to get at least an hour of cricket in before the sun sets at 6.30. Occasionally, one has to return to work at this point, since one skipped out early. If this hour-long window is lost, one has to compensate by bowling at a single stump in a public park either early in the morning or under the lights, late at night. The looks one gets when bowling a cricket ball at one stump, on a makeshift pitch in a public park, on a rainy Seattle evening, are just priceless. But if you are a cricketer in the USA, you can't be self-conscious.

Up north, here in Seattle, it starts getting cold and rainy as we get into November. Last year, my club team-mate Saurabh Verma (a leg-spinner in the USA national team last year), and myself, actually practiced one evening in 32 F (0 C) weather, with frost covering the astro-turf surface. That was the most turn I've ever extracted from any wicket, anywhere. Who knew frost could afford turn? I kept my bowling hand warm by wrapping it in a woollen sweater between deliveries. This time around though, we also hope to have a weekend training camp in the Bay Area a week prior to the tournament. It should be warmer and drier there in California, even in November.

Not just practicing, staying in shape in the off season can be a challenge. We expatriate Indians in the US will be celebrating both sets of festivals, Indian and American, thus doubling candy intake. Last week was Dussehra, next week is Halloween, and the week after next is Diwali - all of which involve sweets. So, one has to keep working on one's fitness. This involves checking out the inside of a gym a couple of times a week, and also taking the stairs instead of the elevator at work. I ran a three-mile race last week, ostensibly for charity, but also to improve my fitness for the November tournament.

Amidt preparing to be left-arm orthodox cannon-fodder for USA's best batsmen, I also managed to catch the Champions League Twenty20 final and parts of the India-Australia Test series on TV. What better way to spend the time between 9pm and 4am than to watch 14 wickets fall on a topsy-turvy day at Mohali? Easy: watch VVS Laxman snatch a thrilling victory for India, same time, the following night, of course.

Overall though, I am extremely fortunate to be playing cricket at this time of the year, when for most others in the USA, the season is over. In addition, I am extremely proud to be representing this vast region, and its talented cricketers, at the national level. I look forward to giving the tournament my best shot, through the weeks of preparation preceding it, to the three all-important days in sunny Florida.