Somdev!!!!! , Part 4 – Cycling to Tennis – Technical Advantage, Golfing with the Americans

Hello Everyone! Hope everyone is enjoying the kick off to the tennis season like I am.

SOMDEV!!!!

It wasn’t too long ago that I was writing about a new Indian number 1 that had recently finished college at the University of Virginia.  His name? Somdev Devarrman, nicknamed The Chilly Indian. You have to love it when your fun predictions come true so quickly.

Last week at the Chennai Open, Somdev was given a wildcard into the main draw. As I went to one of my favorite sites, www.atptennis.com , the screen read,”Moya loses to Indian Wildcard”. “Hmmm”, I thought to myself, did Prakrash Armitraj finally break through?  Let me read here…” Low and behold, world number 200, Somdev Devarrman upset Spanish Veteran, Carlos Moya. This was great news because now I could follow one of my new favorite players on the tour during the week. For me, the tournament loses some of my attention when some of my players that I like to follow are out.  It was like this for me when I was a Pete Sampras fanatic.  I would watch every single match of his and then if he was to lose, I could care less about the tourney.  Side note:  Years later I would be stretching him out at his house next to his court.

So back to Somdev.  Although he beat lowly ranked American Kevin Kim in the first round, and Schuettler withdrew from a wrist injury, I knew Somdev would be too consistant for Karlovic and would advance to the semis. Great Job Sommy! Said Somdev after the final, “”This was a great week for me and I hope to play more tour events in the upcoming months,” said Devvarman. “It is my goal to move up further in the rankings and to become a better player.”

Cycling to Tennis – Technical Advantages

Coming from cycling ( I was a State Champ Road Race Champ) , I always tried to compare my sport, to the new sport that I was in love was.  As you read above I was Sampras fanatic.  My friends were amazed of how many times I could watch Sampras vcr tapes in slow motion.  I guess one of the reasons I like watching him play so much was because of his gorgeous strokes. Every single shot looked so smooth and effortless.

As a tennis teacher I have always believed in learning sound fundamentals and have studied similarities in all of the good strokes.  There are some great websites out there for this and with the new video features of small handheld cameras, it is very easy to shoot video of strokes, download them on the computer and compare them to your favorite pros.

Everyone knows that everyone starts together in the bike race. But what that don’t know is how difficult it is to move up through the pack once the pace of the race starts getting faster. This takes unreal cornering ability and bike handling skills that a good cyclist must learn in order to win bike races.

There was no one better than this then my buddy, Jonas Carney.  His ability to FLY through corners on his bicycle was second to none.  I remember way back when Lance and Jonas were teamates for Subaru – Montgomery team, it was at the US National Championships that Lance attacked on the final lap. The only person that could stay on Lance’s wheel through the corners was Jonas, who then when on to win that race.

GOLF!!!!

It is no secret that a lot of tennis players are obsessed with golf.  After having some of the American boys over at my home course of Amelia National, I was very impressed at their skills!

As my friend Erik Brumme said, “I’ve been playing golf for 40 years and I really can’t recall anyone striking the ball like this Kendrick kid does.”  It was not a rare to see Kendrick, Oudsema or Kuznetsov go driver , 9 iron into the greens of our long Par 5’s. Birdies were not too uncommon and greens were hit with regularity. I have to say it was a lot of fun golfing with the boys but I better get my skills up or I am going to go broke playing with them!