Winning a Three Day Tournament

     One of my greatest accomplishments so far in my tennis career was winning a tournament with a 64-person draw. I was a freshman in high school and and was playing in the USTA Boys' 14's division. This was the first tournament that I ever got to the third day in because all of the other tournaments I either won or finished in 2nd place were only over the weekend.
     I got a bye through the first round and I won my next four matches. The first match was tough for me because I was playing somebody I knew but I won 7-5, 6-3. I handled my next three matches much easier, cruising to the finals.
     The final match was much tougher. I went back to the facility after school for my match at 4:30. My opponent was the top seeded player in the tournament. He had very odd form on his backhand and his serve, but his shots were very effective. The match was neck and neck the whole time, but I managed to pull it out in the end. For a quick breakdown of the final match and my strategy, you can watch the video below. I won the match in the 3rd set, which was actually played as a 10-point tiebreaker. Being able to keep my game on a high level for three straight days is why I consider this to be one of my greatest accomplishments.

Video Link: Pictures and Analysis

Keeping Up Your Endurance in the Middle of a Match

           Have you ever been in the middle of a match and you just felt like you couldn't keep playing because you were so out of breath? About a month ago I was playing in a USTA tournament and the first set of my quarterfinal match took about 1 hour and 10 minutes. Luckily, it was at night so the sun wasn't an issue. However, I live in Florida and we always have to deal with humidity here. To get through that grueling first set and play through the rest of the match, I had to find a way to "grind it out." By this of course I mean I had to play through the fatigue and rally the ball. Here are the two ways that I fought the fatigue:

1. The drink: The key to having your drink keep up your endurance is limiting your sugar intake. All sports drinks have sugar in them. Sugar is a great source of energy, until it wears off. Then, your body just shuts down. In order to keep down the sugar intake, you can try diluting your Powerade or Gatorade with water. It may not taste as good, but it will be more beneficial to you and lower the amount of sugar you drink per sip. Another alternative would be to put fruit into your water. Fruits have natural sugars which are better for you than the processed sugars in sports drinks. In my match, I used the diluted Powerade method, and it worked wonders.

2. Heart Rate: You know that when people get nervous, their heart rate skyrockets. Well that also happens when you're running around on the tennis court for 2+ hours. If your heart rate stays that high, you are going to make sloppy errors and your body is going to feel more tired than it really is. In the short period between points, you need to get your heart rate back to a relatively normal pace. To do this, take a deep breath in, but exhale in short bursts. If you have trouble doing that, you can also breathe out slowly while saying "Shuh Shuh Shuh Shuh Shuh," very fast. The latter method is the way I prefer.

   I used both of these strategies in my match and the effects kept me physically in the game. I pulled out the first set in a tiebreaker and won the second set 6-2 in a match that lasted 2.5 hours.When you step on to the court, you want to feel that the length of the match will not be an issue for you the same way that it wasn't for me.
  

The Second Serve Ace

        The second serve could be one of the most important shots in tennis. If you can't start the point, you definitely can't win the point. At the lower levels of tennis, you were probably a "pusher" and just tapped the ball in. However, you eventually get to the point where you can't do that because your opponent will win the point straight off the return. As you advance, you get to the point where your second serve is still not as hard as your first serve, but you can feel confident about not being pulverized by your opponent off the return. In order to prevent that from happening, I bet that most of your coaches have probably told you to hit your second serve to your opponents backhand to increase your chances of starting the point on offense. That is generally the "safe" thing to do, but what you may not have known is that you can actually sneak an ace off your second serve one or two times in a match!
        The key to hitting the ace here is understanding that your opponent is probably expecting the "safe" serve to their backhand. In many instances, they will try to run around your second serve and hit a forehand because that is a generally a player's stronger shot. If you anticipate this move, you will notice that their forehand side is left wide open. I used the term "sneak" earlier because after you do this once or twice, your opponent will most likely stop trying to run around your serves. However, if they don't stop you can rack up even more aces!
       The best opportunity to do this for a right-handed player is when you are serving on the deuce side against another right-handed player. Your opponent will try running around towards the middle of the court so you can serve it to the outside. For a left-handed player against a left-handed player it is the same situation just on the ad side. This strategy is not as effective if you play someone who uses the opposite hand (right against left, left against right) because it is harder to serve to the outside in these situations.

Here you can watch tennis star Maria Sharapova employ this strategy:
Second Serve Ace Example

Whack those aces!

Introduction

Hello to my fellow amateur tennis players ,

       I love the game of tennis. I've trained with many different coaches, including former pros from South America and Australia. I've also trained at Chris Evert's tennis academy in Boca Raton, FL. I've seen tennis from many different points of view. I'd like to share what I've learned from all of these different greats with anybody who is like me, somebody who has a passion for tennis and is always trying to get better at it. Stay tuned for pointers to help you win more points in tennis.