Why Novak Can Do The Splits!?

Ok I love and hate the guy. Love him because he attacks the game with so much passion and hate him because he is so damn good, and if I am honest cos he can do the splits (not a lifetime ambition but it does make me like its something that is missing from my life!). Oh and because he seems to be in the way whenever Murray seems on the verge of winning anything.

As I watched the Aussie Open I was amazed at how the guy can hit a ball with is feet so far apart and his butt almost on the ground still make such a great shot on a hard court. Reaching the almost impossible and making it possible! The question that is always running around in my tiny brain is how did he learn to do that? Did his coach say one day “Hey Novak shall we add some gymnastics to your training just for fun?” Well maybe, fact is I don’t know but one thing I am sure of is that there are three things that every week push Novak to that extra, incredibly bendy, level of flexibility and they are called Roger, Rafael and Andy.

You see the challenge is not solely the ball, the court or the equipment but what the player at the other end of the court can do with it. So what does this have to do with Under 10 Tennis and the balls that we support through Tennis10s and similar programs?  Simply this… There are weekly debates on social media and even in the press around the use of the balls and some even suggest that that the yellow ball provides a greater level of challenge, and challenge is what players need to learn and make maximum progress. That I will not debate. As Darwin said

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.”

But in tennis you have to factor in the opponent. It’s not what the ball does but what the opponent can do with it that provides this challenge! The ball provides no challenge until it is struck from the other end with intention and skill. Give the opponent the opportunity to do more with the ball and you will see the player adapting more and more and as a result developing more skills.

In the recent and highly thorough from Kim Kachel and Rob Leeds at Tennis Australia comparing yellow ball to green ball tennis two things stood out for me.  One that the angles used on the court increased, (remember that green and yellow are played on the same sized court) and the second tempo was faster with green tennis. In short both space and time were used more effectively by the opponent and so provided a greater level of challenge in green tennis, not less, and importantly within the framework of acceptable adaptation. In other words, the child did not have to make extreme modifications in order to solve the problem; fitter, faster and more tactically sound yes but not change to a full western forehand grip.

Tennis is primarily a game of receiving what someone has thrown at you, a game of reaction and emergencies. The skills at your opponent’s disposal make you adapt more than the skills taught from ball fed by the coach.  History has taught us that better opposition makes a player adapt to a higher and higher level of skill. Pro tennis amazingly seems to just keep getting better!

Maybe there will never be any empirical evidence to suggest that one system will produce more players than another but don’t tell this author that the higher bouncing ball is better because it provides more challenge. The pressure of that ball hasn’t changed for decades but Novak has taken athleticism to a whole new level, thanks in part to the guys at the other end of the court!! Let's let the kids be pushed by each other and not by the ball and who knows what the next generation will be able to do!!