Tennis and All That

When I watched  this  video on the Women in Sport Facebook page, I couldn't believe what I was listening to. Although I was also recently shocked to learn in  this  Instagram post that the amazing England Red Roses Rugby player, Sarah Bern, shared how she has struggled with negative self-talk and feeling too unattractively masculine instead of petite and feminine and therefore attractive in the way a woman should be, according to society. For instance, wondering before she posts on social media: "Do I look too broad?" "Do my arms look too manly?"  This pressure to look pretty and feminine while exercising and playing tennis, as well as this negative self-talk and bodily self-image as a muscular sportswoman all passed me by, thankfully! I've always played sports, especially tennis, but I don't remember anyone, coaches or peer group, telling me how I should look or behave. Not that I would have taken any notice if they had. It's almost the equivalent o...

Just about everyone is wading in on this year's doping cases in tennis. But there's no doubt that players are treated inconsistently and illogically. Tara Moore was banned for 19 months after eating contaminated meat in Columbia. She can't look that up on a website and see a 'don't eat this meat you'll fail a doping test' attached to the menu. Although the organisers knew about it but oh dear didn't quite inform the players soon enough. In which case it's the organisers fault and she shouldn't have been banned. Using common sense would help. I can understand Halep being rather annoyed because it's a parallel case with Swiatek. Both she and Swiatek take something which should be doping safe but has been cross contaminated and they fail a doping test. In both cases the amount is negligible so I don't see the need for banning players like this.  To ban a player due to a failed doping test should only happen when it's clear that the amoun...

According to Pink News, there's 5 gay women in the French Open providing us with LGBT+ representation in tennis. Click  here  to see their Facebook video of them. 🏳️‍🌈🎾 So, we have 5 sapphic women out of how many in the Grand Slam women's draw? There's 128 women in just the singles main draw alone!! But there are 240 singles players between the main draw and qualifiers. So the percentage is much worse than that because it's 4 out of 240 and 1 more, Demi Schuurs, from the doubles draw. The main draw is comprised of 104 women who, simply through their ranking, go straight to the main draw. The qualifying draw is also a draw of 128 players, 16 of whom won all their matches to become the qualifiers who go forwards to the main draw. Then there's 8 women who gain entry through gaining wild cards. That's called LGBT+ representation? 🤣  Yes, generically, it's LGBT+ representation 🏳️‍🌈, albeit miniscule, but they are only representing one category within the LG...

  Image from SMART-Servier Medical Art, Servier Laboratoires; freely reusable under Creative Commons Licence Here we have very nice diagrams of different levels of severity of ankle sprains: Top left: healthy Top right: grade 1 strain Bottom left: grade 2, depicting a partial tear of around 50%  Bottom right: grade 3: surgery level because the tear is 100%  Alcaraz stated that he was told that an MRI scan showed he has a grade 2 lateral ankle sprain.  Lateral means the outside of the ankle, near the ankle joint, as opposed to the ligaments on the inner side of the foot. These outside ligaments are vital for strength, stability, flexibility and mobility. Typically, the lateral ligaments sprain and tear more easily. As you can see in the chart, the lateral ankle ligaments are a combination of three connecting ligaments: posterior talofibular ligament (PTFL, top left of the three), anterior talofibular ligament (ATFL, top right of the three) and the calcaneofibular liga...

Today I read an article, which sensationalises some so-called fan comments that attacked Swiatek's analysis of her suprise loss to Kalinskaya. The article even repeats totally unacceptable, untrue, nasty comments made about Swiatek such as: she hates women. While it may be true that someone somewhere posted that comment, it doesn't mean that it's your job as a writer or journalist to amplify it, normalise it uncritically and potentially encourage others to read it and perhaps then see Swiatek in a different light, simply because you picked out that comment instead of the supportive ones I'm sure she would have also received from fans.  See  here  to read it.  I think Swiatek is right. It probably did have more to do with her than the opponent. We sometimes see a top 10 player suddenly lose to a much lower ranked player and we wonder why. The answer lies in 1) did someone other than their coach help them beat the top player by giving them certain tips 2) lower ranked ...

© Jana Kaucky 2023 All Rights Reserved Caption: 'What on Earth?!' "Alcaraz stated that the Czech-American tennis legend’s advice came in handy as was seen promptly implementing the strategy during his Wimbledon final against Djokovic. “(The advice helped me) a lot,” he said on Tennis Channel. The 20-year-old said that he thanked Martina Navratilova for her advice when they crossed paths after his victory. “I saw her after I got out from the court. And I told her, ‘It was your advice! The key.’ I sliced. I tried to do everything she told me. I mean, nine times champion – You have to do whatever she tells you. And I think it was great,” he said." Quoted from  sportskeeda Not again. Every time Martina gives a player advice before a final they win at Wimbledon and this has happened on several occasions now. She 'advised' Kerber in an article right before that Wimbledon final and she won, denying Serena her 24th Grand Slam by using her tactics. It's unfair she ...

Who on earth legislates about underwear especially women's underwear? There's a word for that obsession.  Wow! Women tennis players are allowed to wear non-white lower-half underwear at Wimbledon. I'm stoked 😁🤣. It was a stupid rule to start with! 🤦Azarenka calls it a thoughtful decision. So now women are supposed to be grateful that Wimbledon officials are no longer checking the colour of their knickers?!  Garments that are the norm elsewhere around the world (colourful or white) at every tournament are somehow suddenly in need of strict regulation and judged wrong or more special simply because it's Wimbledon. 🤯🤷 Surely a huge percentage of professional women tennis players are on the pill which merely gives you a fake period which is hardly noticeable anyway. Or there's something called a tampon which can cause TSS but since all-whites is only a Wimbledon issue it's doubtful you'll be affected that quickly. Besides you can take it out straight after ...

What was Venus Williams thinking! 😱 I was mid-writing my previous post when I saw news of Venus lying, screaming on Centre Court with a knee injury. I felt the pain! I gasped and exclaimed - oh no!!!!! out loud in public! Why oh why did she carry on? ☹️😓 I hope there's no permanent damage. Where there's a scream, there's a serious, massive tear, usually a tendon or ligament that doesn't recover in a hurry.  I limped on to finish my match in France with a knee injury, which was sprayed and taped by the trainer mid-match. But it didn't heal for ages and I was left with an oval burn mark under my knee, where he sprayed it, for years after! I hadn't slipped, hadn't fallen, wasn't screaming, it was just a standard knee pain/injury. But even so, it took too long to heal and so interrupted my rhythm, training and run of tournaments. So it was a bad decision to carry on. My mother didn't want me to carry on with the match but I did it anyway. It ended up b...

It's been ages since I've written about tennis, nearly a year. But over the past year or so I have been busy setting up and videoing my exercise routines that I did from an early age and continued into my tennis career and current fitness regime. Here's a photo from my fitness video I posted today on Instagram: Fitness Wellness Instagram Fitness Wellness Facebook I have continued to be interested in and  following what's been going on in both the women's and men's tours. Djokovic is finally allowed to play the full tour which is something he should have been allowed to do anyway, every year. That's the good news.  The bad news is the ATP and WTA should never have hounded Wimbledon for taking a stand against the invasion of the Ukraine last year and forcing them to reverse it this year. I don't think their unfair action against Wimbledon was necessary under Tour anti-discrimination rules and has simply resulted in depriving lower ranked ITF players of mon...

In my second video uploaded to my Facebook page on fitness and wellness (see post here ), I build on the first section of my first video, mainly how to use floor exercises to develop foot muscles in all three parts of the foot, termed the hindfoot (back), midfoot (connecting middle) and the forefoot (front). I try not to overcomplicate my videos with too much terminology as I'm chatting about things, so I'll be supplementing my fitness and wellness vlogging with further information on this blog.  For a quick visual of what the three parts of the foot look like anatomically, inside the foot, and where they are located, see the picture provided at the top of the page  here  . If you'd like to read an in-depth entry on this and more about foot and ankle anatomy, see  here  . For a fun, fascinating and complete explanation with 3D moving visuals, designed with fitness in mind, see this excellent video  here  .  The focus of this video was flexing...

I've just uploaded a video to my Facebook profile demonstrating and talking about an aspect of my fitness routine that I created for myself around 20 years ago when I was both preparing to start my tennis career on tour while at the same time training in Jazz dance. It was at this point it struck me how dance warm-ups and exercises can form part of general fitness as well as help athletes to strengthen all the muscles, tendons and ligaments and protect joints. I combined this with starting to learn about sports and dance injury prevention and treatment and later sports psychology.  You can watch the video on my personal Facebook,  here . And on my dedicated fitness Facebook page's post,  here. My tennis, fitness and wellness Facebook page is available at:  https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100084693246282   My fitness and wellness website, where you can keep up-to-date and find all my related blogs, vlogs and official fitness and well-being social media a...

Last day of Wimbledon and Novak Djokovic has done it! He's won the men's championship. Well done!👏👏👏👏👏 He's pulled away from Federer with his now 21 Grand Slam titles.🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆Congratulations, Novak! What can one say? Djokovic certainly deserves this one after the trials he's been through this year. He's an amazing player who isn't appreciated for his talent and athleticism. Like Federer, he's an all-court player. Hope he wins many more. A worthy winner. Legends were won by my favourites including, of course, one of the greats, Martina Hingis partnering Clijsters and Bartoli (partnering Zimonjic) in the legends mixed. 👏👏👏👏🎾All the legends were not just awesome players but also highly entertaining. Congratulations to all! 🏆🏆🏆🏆🌠🌠🌠🌠🎾🎾🎾🎾🎾🎾🎾🎾🤗🤗🤗🤗🍸🍸🍸🍸🍾 And the women's doubles were also won by my favourites: Krejcikova and Siniakova. Congratulations to both!👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏🏆🏆🎾🎾🌠🌠🤗🤗🍸🍸...

What a great final! Congratulations to Elena Rybakina! 🏆🌠🎆🎉🎊🎉🎊🎾She's an exciting player and I'm delighted she won the Wimbledon title! I think many were surprised by the result but I wasn't when I saw her bio. Rybakina has had some serious training in both tennis and fitness since a child. That's bound to help and keep you in good stead later on in your career. She's possibly better off that she didn't peak in her teens but rather in her early twenties. I think she's just 23 and ranked 23 although she has been as high as 12 in the world. With only a couple of titles to date this is a big one. Yes, she's Russian born but doesn't live there or play for Russia but rather for Kazakhstan. In 2018 she became a citizen of Kazakhstan, switched tennis federation and started to represent that country. This is an historic day for tennis in Kazakhstan and puts the country on the map. Hands up those who know where Kazakhstan is and can point it out on a m...

Krejcikova and Siniakova beat Ostapenko and Kichenok in style to reach the final against Mertens and Zhang Shuai. They played awesome tennis. The rest day obviously did them a lot of good. I think they both went for a trip to London which is always energizing. The Legends kicked off with Schiavone and Pennetta against Molik and Dellacqua. That was a fascinating match. It looked as if Dellacqua and Molik were on course to win but the Italians came storming back.  (I think you can get playback on iPlayer for Wimbledon, I checked and found they include Invitational matches (available for a month) as opposed to BBC Sport Live Catch-Up. Now why didn't I think of that earlier?🤦🤷Mind you that will only work if you know which court they were on.🤔 ) Schiavone and Pennetta are such an exciting pair and their tennis is top class. Schiavone is a wonderful coach to Martic. Flavia Pennetta has three children, (5 year old Federico, 2 year old Farah, and a 7+ month year old baby Flaminia) when ...

Bartoli excelled herself again in her Invitational Doubles match partnering Zimonjic against Pierce and Ivanisevic. I've always enjoyed watching Bartoli and learning from her matches because her style of game is very much like Monica Seles. I modelled my game on Seles complete with being two handed on both sides. It worked well for me until I played competitive matches. Then I felt I needed to be able to hit a can-opener when taken out-wide (although it helps if there isn't a hanging net to divide the courts on your forehand side stopping you from running the extra distance needed!) and that requires a one-handed forehand. Luckily, it was easy for me to incorporate a one-handed forehand into my main game because I had spent several years during childhood playing only one-handed forehands and continued practising them after reverting back to my original double-handed game. But Bartoli, like Seles, makes the double-handed shots on both sides look so effortless and natural. Bartol...

For me, the match of the day has already been played in the Women's  Invitational doubles between Schiavone/Pennetta and Hantuchova/Robson. This was main draw quality! No question. Schiavone played as well as I remember despite having cancer only a few years back but she is a Grand Slam winner at Roland Garros reaching number 4 in the world. Her signature backhand is always a thing of beauty! Lucky the player who has her as coach. At the moment it's Martic. Her doubles partner, Pennetta is also a Grand Slam winner having won the Australian Open, reached number 6 in the world, number 1 in doubles, and fitted in 3 kids, the last one born last year! They won their doubles match as one would expect. Pennetta served very well and hit some amazing downliners. But they complemented each other perfectly, yet both can do everything and are speedy around the court. I particular loved their team spirit! They weren't afraid to be physically demonstrative with each other!🤗 And their se...

Legends: What made today different was the variety of legends playing by invitation. It's wonderful to see so many legends (not just the usual few) producing a great standard of play this year - sometimes you forget it's not a main draw doubles match! This was down to a broad age bracket (30+ years old to 60+ years old, with the exception of Laura Robson who is 28). Of course, Bahrami is an essential ingredient of the Invitational Events😍. But it's still nice to see some new faces from the past who don't normally play the legends at Wimbledon e.g. Mary Pierce, Casey Dellacqua, Natalie Dechy, Flavia Pennetta, Agnieszka Radwanska, Jelena Jankovic. Martina Hingis is as though she's never left! Today I noticed her excellent shoulder rotation on her groundstrokes, perhaps I didn't fully appreciate before how that aspect of her technique gives her strength, accuracy and control.  The best point in an Invitational match today was Bartoli 👏👏👏👏👏 (partnering Zimonji...

I was cheering on Watson and Dart in the Women's Doubles today, but Ostapenko and Kichenok beat them in three sets. The last game of the first set went on for over 10 nail-biting minutes and was won by Watson and Dart which gave them the set. Nevertheless, they went on to lose the next two sets. I didn't realise that Ostapenko and Kichenok have played doubles together since ITF days! This helps them really understand each other without having to constantly bolster the other's confidence routinely after every point. Mind you, I'm not sure Eastern Europeans feel the need to over-encourage their partner. That's an American style of doubles and a good one, especially if you don't know your doubles partner very well, to create a team spirit 👊💪or if your doubles partner is stressed and feeling down. 😣🎾🙂🎾 I played doubles with my mother in practice (no bolstering up just pressure to do better!) partly because I tended to train under pressure recreating match cond...

Today is the first middle Sunday in Wimbledon's history which saw play. It's no longer a day off!🙂👏👏👏👏👏❤ That's the good news. Today was also a celebration of 100 years of Centre Court.  Happy Centenary to Centre Court. 🎾🍸🍸🍸🍸🍾🎆 There was a roll call of past players but not all were present. Most importantly, Virginia Wade was absent and considering she's the past Silver Jubilee winner (1977, the year that also celebrated the centenary of the founding of the Wimbledon Championships with full status granted in 1913) and this year we are celebrating the Platinum Jubilee, I think that is a pity! Wade won 3 Grand Slam singles titles (all GS's except RG) all on grass in those days except RG and 4 Grand Slam doubles (with the exception of Wimbledon) with Margaret Court, and accumulated 55 titles overall reaching world number 2 in 1975. At the age of 37 Wade won the Italian Open with Ruzici, who has been a long-term manager of Halep, but now isn't after 14...