Kara Lincou: When Everything That Could Go Wrong… Did!
Ok, it has to be said that Kara Lincou – niece of – has just won the Coupe de Stade Français on Sunday afternoon. So it has been a good week overall, but it didn’t go plain sailing, for sure!
Kara was not the favourite in the Stade Francais Cup in Paris, but down in the semis (against Elise Romba) and again in the final (against Ana Munos), the Reunion player imposed her game and takes the title in 4 games.
What makes her victory a bit special is that she lost one piece of luggage as she was coming back from Trinity College in the States. With all her squash clothes and more…
I arrived in Paris without my suitcase”, she explained to Jérôme Elhaïk, French journalist present at the Cup.
“To sum it up, the trip from Hartford to Newark Airport was quite complicated. I had to change trains in a rather sketchy area, and I couldn’t wait to get off and catch the tram.
“As a result, I forgot my suitcase on the tram!
“After a few minutes, I realised something was missing in my hand — and by then it was too late to turn back, otherwise I would have missed my flight.
“Fortunately, I had my rackets in my backpack, but I had to borrow some clothes, and the club kindly found me a brand-new pair of shoes in my size — I’m really grateful to them!
“So now, I’ll have to do some shopping in Monaco, and when I had match ball in the final, I thought to myself that the prize money would come in handy to cover those unexpected expenses.”
Any excuse to do shopping, I’ll say. But the story doesn’t stop there. As I’m having a little chat with Romain Suire, who will present the event, and who is the multi-talented PSA rep for French Squash, past midnight, who arrives from Paris?
“It’s just a nightmare,” she laughs.
“My flight Paris/Nice was first delayed, then cancelled. As I was proposed a replacement flight, I just clicked on it without really looking at the details, only too happy to be able to get a flight tonight.
“Little I knew they put me on a flight one and a half hours later, but in the different airport, I was in Charles de Gaulle (Paris North) and they put me on an Orly flight (South).”
A bit like you go from Heathrow to Stanstead…
So the poor girl had to take a moto-taxi to manage to cross the whole of Paris in a minimum time. She managed to catch the flight, only just!
She is playing today against Wai Yhann Au Yeong from Singapore, with a possible last-16 match against compatriot Lauren Baltayan…
“I took that as a positive challenge, so I hope it’s going to bring me luck for the rest of the week here!”
Well, let’s hope that’s this is the end of the “mésaventures de Kara”…
