Here is another post from our contributor Ferenc Ferdinand Weisz, this time he has written an Artengo apparel review. I am often surprised about the pricing of tennis apparel because I think 40-100€ for a T-shirt or a pair of shorts is too much for me. Sometimes I hear on court how this is a former Federer, Djokovic or Nadal model, and I don’t understand why this is important to anybody? For me, functional skills combined with good pricing is much more important. Following this idea, I’m wearing Artengo apparel on the court, mostly with satisfaction. Artengo Soft 100 T-shirt …
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Do you have trouble keeping score during a match? Check out Scoring Right – a scoring tool that attaches to your racquet. Here is my Scoring Right review. Scoring Right is a semi-rigid plastic unit that attaches to the throat of your racquet. It helps to keep score and tells you which side of the court to serve from. It is an interesting tool to teach kids the scoring of tennis but also works well for forgetful recreational players. I have been playing with Scoring Right on two racquets for a while and although some commenters on my Instagram thought …
A while back I reviewed the Functional Tennis Match Journal, a great tool for improving your tennis. Here is the Functional Tennis Practice Journal. You can read more about the Functional Tennis Match Journal here. The Functional Tennis Practice Journal is, as the name implies, is for you who want to keep track of your practice sessions. It comes packed with some great advice, stats and other things to keep you inspired. If you are ambitious about your tennis and want to make sure you practice with quality, this is a really useful guide to make sure you stay on …
I’ve just finished watching a French tennis documentary called “Over the net: Dream or Illusion” on Vimeo (it is a rental) and I can really recommend it you fellow tennis nerds. Over the Net: Dream or Illusion is created by Mehdi Darlis and deals with life on the less glamorous side of the ATP tour, players ranked below the magic 100 number and who are fighting to make a living by playing Futures and Challenger tournaments. It is not such a rosy picture when painted this way and it requires a lot of passion and talent from a player to …
I’ve just finished a great little tennis book on my Kindle that I want to tell you about. It’s called Tennis: Winning the Mental Match and is written by Allen Fox. Here is the blurb so you get what it’s about: THIS IS A BOOK ABOUT THE MENTAL ASPECTS OF TENNIS: Tennis is more difficult mentally than most other sports. It feels more important than it is; it has a diabolical scoring system; drawn-out competitive matches are highly stressful; and losing can be very painful. During competition emotions get out of hand, fears and nerves are hard to control, and confidence …
Wilson Tennis has released a new version of the Burn line (took over from the Steams) with Countervail. The Wilson Burn racquets (including the FST update) were a relatively stiff line of racquets but the reviews talked about a relatively comfortable feel for strung RA ratings around 70(!). The Burn 95 (extended length) and especially the Burn FST 95 received some great feedback from customers and play-testers. Now Wilson is putting the shock-reducing material Countervail into the Burn line and giving them a cleaner look with orange lines on the side, very similar to the green of the new Wilson Blades and …
I’ve been trying out the new line of Snauwaert racquet and strings including the Vitas 100 and the Grinta 98 racquet as well as the Black Beam and White Beam Strings and I want to give my impression of this re-release of the Belgian Snauwaert brand. Snauwaert Grinta 98 specs Length 27 in Weight 315 g Stiffness 65 RA Headsize 98 sq.in. / 632 cm² String Pattern 16×16 Balance 310 mm Swing weight 290 kg x cm² Spec-wise these are similar to for example a Yonex DR or AI 98, except for that the string pattern is even more open …
One of the most popular racquets among promising juniors and more advanced players of late has been the Wilson Blade series. Wilson has managed to find that nice blend between control and power in a racquet that is relatively easy to play with but also not too harsh on your arm, which could be the case with a Babolat Pure Drive for example. Most popular racquet models are updated every two years and a few months ago Wilson released their new Blade line – this time including Countervail technology. Countervail is meant to reduce shock and according to sources top …
Until three days ago I had no idea that Romanian ex-tennis star Ilie “Nasty” Nastase wrote novels. But I was walking around Valletta, the capital city of Malta and found myself in a small used book store. I like those kind of places partly due to the old-book-smell, but also because I genuinely love books and I’m dabbling in writing them myself too (third novel is taking LONG however, which might be a sign that I find writing about tennis more enjoyable than fiction?). I didn’t think I would find anything interesting in store and I already have a decent “to-read-list”, …
When I first heard about the subject of Gerald Marzorati’s book, “Late to the Ball” I was thrilled. A book about someone of age (a writer and an editor in this case) making an attempt at becoming a competitive tennis player is exactly my cup of tea. Partly because I’m no spring chicken myself anymore but still dedicated to improving as a tennis player and also because I come from a writing background. The subject of the book is compelling – can you really aim to push yourself towards a relatively high level in a physically taxing sport at the age …