Tennis

Saturday 6th of July, 2019

ITF Seniors QLD Championships – Day 2

A massive day of tennis today. It starts with my singles match at 9.30 am

Followed by another possible singles at 11.30am if I win my round of 16 match. That match will be against the second seed, Richard D. After that match I have the men’s 45 doubles match at 1.30pm against the top seeds.

My final match of the day is the 35’s mixed doubles match at 7pm

So as much as it will be a long day, I also feel it will be a fun day. Just hoping that the rain stays away.

Friday 5th of July, 2019

ITF Seniors QLD Championships- Day 1

This year I am playing in a new age group in the singles and doubles. However, in the mixed doubles, I will play in the 35’s age group. Both doubles events will be tough challenges. The men’sdoubles will be against the number one seeds who are ranked 4 and 9 in the world for doubles. The mixed doubles will be against a good friend of mine who happens to have a career high of number two in the world. So while the challenge is in front of me, I am looking forward to playing them.

Our first rain delay for the tournament happened before the play even started. The 8am matches were postponed until 10am then delayed further to 12pm. It is starting to feel like last weekends ITF Seniors. Luckily I have my trusty backgammon game on my phone. 😊

After waiting pretty much all day, some play was able to be started at 3pm (7 hour delay) but thankfully I was sent home to return tomorrow for the matches.

Wednesday 3rd of July, 2019

ITF SENIORS – Qld Championships

The draw for the State Championships has come out and it is a little bit of a horror draw for me. But I love a challenge and playing top level players is always fun. While the draws are not the best for me, it does mean that I can go out onto the court without any pressure and play.

I have been hitting with a young gentleman called William who is a big strong lefty hitter the past two days. My focus when training has been working on discipline of my shots. I found in the last tournament, that I was lacking in discipline to hit a shot correctly (especially when I got crazy eyes for a put away shot). This had cost me some important points during my matches.

Another area I am working on is making sure that I prep early on my swing. Shortening my back swing is helping create some time for my prep as well. An added benefit of this is that it allows me to get the ball deeper into the court which makes it harder for my opponent to dictate the play. All I say now is bring it on!!!!

Sunday 30th of June, 2019

ITF Seniors Tweed – Day 3

It was a beautiful sunny start to the day and for the first time this Championships there was no delay. My doubles match today was Todd 🇦🇺 / Hung K 🇦🇺 vs Jamie W 🇦🇺 / Paul S 🇦🇺 (2).

It was a very tight first set but unfortunately we were unable to convert the opportunities we had and the second set was the same as the first set with just a few ill -discipline shots at important points that proved costly to us.

But even though we didn’t win the match, we played some tough amazing tennis. Considering this tournament was our first time teaming up together, both Hung and I continued to get better, gelling together as a team the more we played. It was a lot of fun and really enjoyable. I hope we get to team up again in the future.

I will now take a recovery day tomorrow and then I will have 3 days training of working on my serves, returns and some grooving before the next tournament starts on Friday at the Gold Coast.

Saturday 29th of June, 2019

ITF Seniors Tweed – Day 2

It was another late start to the day with play being delayed 4 hours. While waiting for the start of play, I spent the time sitting on a beanbag in a corner playing backgammon while listening to music on my phone as well as looking over some study notes in preparing for my match.

Once play was underway In the afternoon, there was a couple of further showers that caused the play to be suspended. Thankfully, play quickly resumed after the brief showers.

I was lucky enough to be asked to partner up with a gentleman from Canberra, called Hung, in the 40’s age group. Unfortunately, his partner had to withdraw due to injury before the doubles had started, thus allowing me to be able to play. Hung is a very capable player and a lot of fun to play tennis with.

The doubles match that I was playing in were meant to be at 12 pm and 2.30pm respectively. But with all the delays play for me got underway at 4pm and a short rest the next doubles match started under lights at 5.45pm.

Even though both my partners and I played some quality tennis in both matches, we were outplayed. Seriously felt like we threw everything at them including the kitchen sink. Congratulations to our opponents. Still, it was a lot of fun. Only one more match tomorrow to go. Hopefully, it will be a fine start to the day.

Friday 28th of June, 2019

ITF Seniors Tweed – Day 1

After a long rain delay on the opening day, play finally got underway. The start of play only saw two courts in use as the other courts continued to dry out. However, the first two matches provided some high-quality tennis. Eventually, as the day went on, more courts came into use.

For myself, it was a difficult start to the tournament but there were some massive positives which I took from my singles match into the doubles. My service games was a big positive but the return games were not up to my usual standard. Thankfully, I started to find some returning form in my doubles match.

Tomorrow’s doubles match is Michel H 🇦🇺 / Todd G 🇦🇺 vs Jaime W 🇦🇺 / David M 🇦🇺 (1). It will be a fun match to play.

Wednesday 26th of June, 2019

Back on the Senior Tour

Friday is fast approaching and I am feeling excited about the challenges that lay ahead of me as I start my first ITF Senior circuit tournament for the year. It is a later start than usual for me this year as I was away for the earlier tournaments in Queensland. However, I feel like I am playing some of my best ever tennis but I hope it translates into tournament matches. This last week hasn’t been the best lead-in as the past 2 days have been washed out with rain. But the weather forecast for tomorrow is much more positive for court time. The first tournament starting Friday is the ITF Tweed Coast Championships in New South Wales. It is a grade 4 tournament and is a new addition to the ITF Senior’s calendar this year.

I will be playing singles and doubles as the more match play for me the better. Friday is a 10.30am singles match – Todd (4) 🇦🇺 vs Brett Pardey 🇦🇺 followed by a 1.30pm doubles match – Michel Humair 🇦🇺 / Todd 🇦🇺 vs Tony Golding 🇦🇺 / Glen Pearson 🇦🇺 I am looking forward to the challenge. But as always it is also important to remember that each match is a stepping stone to build on to the next match. Always looking for areas to make improvement in and to learn from.

Sunday 23rd of June, 2019

Historic Day of Tennis

Today has been a historic day for tennis. Ashley Barty becomes the Number 1 Female Tennis Player in the world. She is having an incredible season. Ash recently won the French Open title and secured the World Number 1 spot by winning the Birmingham Title a week later. Ash will be one of the favourites going into next weeks Grand Slam….. Wimbledon.

But Ash’s was not the only success story of the day. Sir Andy Murray made his return to tennis after a long battle with injury. Sir Andy teamed up with Feliciano Lopez in the Doubles to win the Queens Club Title.

Lopez also went onto win the Queens Club singles title. It is the first time since Pete Sampras that this has been done on the ATP circuit. Feliciano’s ranking was not good enough to get him into the singles main draw or qualifying rounds. So he had to rely on receiving a wild card to gain entry. Apparently, he was the seventh player to win a title at the age of 37 and the second oldest to win a title on a grass surface. Lopez would have been the oldest player to win on grass except that he was beaten to that honour three hours earlier by the great Roger Federer.

The Fed also made history again by not only becoming the oldest player to win an ATP singles title on grass but also claiming his 10th Halle singles title and 102nd ATP title. Wow! What a day!!!!

Saturday 15th of June, 2019

The Next Challenge

After playing in Singapore last year (Oct 2018), I felt like I had played some of my best ever tennis. However, I knew I still had a long way to go. So I planned to work hard during my break from the Senior’s circuit and test my progress at the Ipswich Seniors Tournament at Easter time (April 2019). Unfortunately, I missed out on playing that tournament due to having a job interview in Singapore. I wasn’t to upset by this because the trade-off for missing the tournament was that I got to go travelling as well as spending more time working on my tennis progression.

So it is now time to test and challenge myself again. I have entered two tournaments close to home. One at the Tweed Coast (Grade 4) and the other at the Gold Coast (Grade 1). Both tournaments are part of the ITF Senior Circuit.

The Tweed Coast Tournament is being played on clay, which is my least favourite surface but it provides me with some extra match practice. A week later is the Gold Coast Tournament which serves as the Queensland State Titles. This tournament is played on Syn grass and always attracts top quality players from around the world. So this is always a very challenging championship to play but I always love playing against top players as I feel my own game lifts.

For me, each of these tournaments, as well as match play in Shanghai and possibly a tournament in Hong Kong will all be a stepping stone for the big tournament in Shenzhen, China at the end of October. Definitely looking forward to the next few months with the travel, the tennis and catching up with friends from around the world.

Friday Night Training

Friday nights are one of my favourite nights because I get to go out to train and hang out with some of my favourite peeps. I always enjoy my time with them. There is always lots of giggles along the ways. I will truly miss my Friday night hits and giggles. However, last night while I was out at training, I thought I would take some video footage as I have not seen my technique for a very long time. It was very interesting to see the improvement that I have made as well as the difference in my technique.

Another thing I have noticed over the past week is that my consistency feels like it has drastically improved. I think this is due to the fact that I have been playing injured and because of that I have had to really focus on staying smooth, still and relaxed as well as making sure that I am in the correct position. Anyway, here are a few screenshots from last night.