After a rather lengthy hiatus No Easy Games returns with its first full interview. Marco Tschudi is a very nice man and professional pool player. I asked Marco about how he first fell in love with pool, how his career has developed and the pressures he faces as a mid-ranked player in a comparitively poor sport. Here are his answers. Enjoy.
Q1. I understand you tried a few sports before pool, but what was it that first attracted you to the sport and was it difficult to juggle pool and academic studies? When did you decide a professional career was for you?
Like everyone - I guess - I played pool in the beginning just for fun. Hammering balls around, get a ball in the pocket now and then... It was 100% fun. But just after a few months, when I improved just because I played more often, I wanted to play better. Suddenly I was unhappy if a ball didn't go in. I've realized that there was high performance and perfection needed to be one on the top.
Fortunatelly my school supported me as good as they could. Sometimes it was tough for them to find the balance between what I need for the sport and what I need to be good at school. The whole thing got easier when I became better at school. My marks were great and so the teachers didn't have lots of reasons left to not let me go whenever I need.
After school I had to go to the army for a few months. After that I had a break till the studies at the University started. In that time I played whatever I could and I've seen that there was more to reach - and I realized that I wanted more!
Q2. What is your proudest sporting moment?
My proudest moment was when I reached the finals of the 9-Ball European Championship. I didn't only reach the final again Ralf Souquet, I played fantastic matches before against Facquet, Feijen etc. It was an unbelievable day for me to play like that in the swiss colours.
That was the first time that I felt really swiss. Just one month after the EC I moved from my beloved Zurich to Sindelfingen in Germany. That changed a lot of my thinking and feeling. From now onwards I felt more swiss than before. Probably because I was "alone" (there aren't many swiss people in Germany). Today I love to play for my country. I try to represent it as good as possible and I am always proud to be known as a swiss player!
Q3. Something I've asked all respondents is the pressure of competing for their livelihoods. With competitive pool is their extra pressure knowing that a missed pot costs prize money, or do you try not to think about it?
When I was younger I had to win to get to the next tournament. You are right, that's a whole lot of pressure. But somehow I needed that pressure. Without - when I had a good sponsor - I lost really early in the tournaments. After I lost the sponsor I played much more successfully!
Q4. A lot of my friends say that pool and snooker are pub games and not sports- what would you say to this?
First of all I don't like to compare pool and snooker. In my opinion these are completely different sports.
Pool is a pub game?! ... I think they are right. It is! But they take about the game... the pool I do is sport. As soon as you want to get to a certain level you have to play pool as a sport. That means you have to take care of your nutrition, you have to improve your mental/physical health and strengh. If you play pool as a sport it's not only playing balls on a green table anymore. There is suddenly much more and comparable with every other sport.
Q5. And finally what are your sporting goals in 2009?
I just make a break in the meaning that I don't play tournaments at the moment. The fire hasn't gone but it's not really burning strong and I like to do a lot in my job at the moment. I still play the German league though - that's definitely my goal for this season - defend our title in Germany's premier league!
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