Tennis Fort Lauderdale Spring Season 2013

TomT

Hall of Fame
The Spring Season league in the Fort Lauderdale affiliate of the Tennis League Network is starting on Tuesday, April 2 and will run till May 26.

I'm very excited to be returning to the courts after a 2 month plus forced absence due to a Crohn's disease flare.

I'm posting this in the hope that any Fort Lauderdale based Talk Tennis members who aren't aware of Tennis Fort Lauderdale might check it out. It's a flex program with partner/ladder and seasonal leagues that I joined in March 2012. The url for it is in my sig.

So far my experience in this program has been very positive. Have met lots of nice people, and I think my tennis is improving as a result of playing and practicing more due to the structure of league play and the feedback provided by the associated website. New players are continually joining both the partner and seasonal league programs.

My first match of the Spring Season league is next Thursday. Will post some video snippets.

Hope that Fort Lauderdale (and adjacent communities) players might see this thread and post something.
 
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I'm on the left coast but have many happy memories of a week I spent at the Lauderdale Tennis Club and hope to return there some day. Noticed your mention of Crohn's disease and you may want to look into the works of Dr. John E. Sarno, MD about stress and its relationship to many "dis-eases" including Crohn's. Good luck on your season, wish I was there, loved my cross country drive to Florida through the snow and putting the top down on the Jeep for a month in sunny Florida, while the rest of the country was experiencing the big blizzard of 05/06.

Cheers
 

TomT

Hall of Fame
I'm on the left coast but have many happy memories of a week I spent at the Lauderdale Tennis Club and hope to return there some day. Noticed your mention of Crohn's disease and you may want to look into the works of Dr. John E. Sarno, MD about stress and its relationship to many "dis-eases" including Crohn's. Good luck on your season, wish I was there, loved my cross country drive to Florida through the snow and putting the top down on the Jeep for a month in sunny Florida, while the rest of the country was experiencing the big blizzard of 05/06.

Cheers
Thanks for the comments Tom. If you get to Florida again then lets hit.

As for stress, my life seems to me to be pretty non-stressful, but thanks for the reference. Maybe I'm stressing sometimes and not realizing it.

Cheers to you also.
 
...If you get to Florida again then lets hit.

....Maybe I'm stressing sometimes and not realizing it.

Thanks for the invite, I hope to do that trip on Ol' US 50 a few more times, every winter would be nice. There was a senior player Raymond Clary who would drive across the country in his VW beetle and took the passenger seat out and camped in it, my kinda' player. I'll look for you at Hardy, they've got a Hardy Park in Palm Springs too, wonder if it's any relation. I think it was donated by Oliver Hardy's wife.

Yes, the book is about unrecognized repressed stress, interesting stuff, much better then being cut.

Happy Easter
 

TomT

Hall of Fame
Thanks for the invite, I hope to do that trip on Ol' US 50 a few more times, every winter would be nice.
I hope you do.
There was a senior player Raymond Clary who would drive across the country in his VW beetle and took the passenger seat out and camped in it, my kinda' player.
I used to have a VW van, among other vehicles, for a short time during my semi, quasi, pseudo hippie days, and had a very short tennis bum period ('75-'76) during which we would do mini road trips, but nothing like Clary's bold adventures. I wonder if he ever played at Hardy Park or Holiday Park.

I'll look for you at Hardy, they've got a Hardy Park in Palm Springs too, wonder if it's any relation. I think it was donated by Oliver Hardy's wife.
No relation as far as I know. The full name of the one in Fort Lauderdale is the Florence C. Hardy Park, I think.

Yes, the book is about unrecognized repressed stress, interesting stuff, much better than being cut.
What do you mean, "being cut"?

Happy Easter
Thanks. I'm not a particularly religious guy, but I do like hard boiled eggs a lot. :)

Thanks for the comments Tom. My first Spring Season league match is this Thursday. I'll be post some video snippets of league match play in this thread and my other thread about trying to become a solid NTRP 3.5 in the Tips/Instruction forum.

Post some vids of your tennis Tom.
 
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TomT

Hall of Fame
Glad to hear you are able to make a return to the court after Crohn's. Good luck to you
Thanks Steve. I wish it was after Crohn's, but unfortunately this is, in my understanding, pretty much a lifetime disease with recurring symptoms for most people who have it.

Currently my Crohn's is still active, ie. flaring. But there's severely debilitating active and more or less functional active. I'm currently experiencing the latter. Then there are also, sometimes quite long, periods when the symptoms of the disease are completely absent.

What does the IA in your username signify? Where are you?
 

TomT

Hall of Fame
Will be playing my first match of the 2013 Spring Season at 9:30 this morning (rescheduled from 4:30 pm due to cancellation by a different opponent -- which is one reason why I really like the flex league format).

Yeah, I know it's late, but I had a really long nap earlier and can't sleep now. :) I'll only need a couple hours more sleep for this, as I'm very excited about this, being my first match of the season and all.

Will try to have some video snippets of the match play posted here by late afternoon, early evening.

I'm playing a guy who's a middling 3.5 who beat me 10-3 in a pro set in our only previous encounter (in the playoffs of the 2012 Fall Season -- he went on to win the 3.0 - 3.5 championship for that season). He's a big guy with nice stroke technique (but doesn't hit anything particularly hard) and great stamina (oh yeah, and he's about 35 years younger than me), but I think if I'm smart about it I might be able to do at least a little better than last time by exploiting what I see as certain movement/mobility deficiencies (which strategy is, I think, perhaps ironically, a significant part of why/how he beat me in our first match).

I hope it's at least somewhat interesting and fairly close and that I don't just sort of fold up the tent mentally because of my current sub par physical condition. However, again perhaps somewhat ironically, I draw inspiriation (rather than embarrassment) from the fact that he beat me 10-3 while he was limping the entire match on an obviously injured ankle. Ya gotta love that competitive spirit, although I must say that it worried me that maybe he shouldn't have been playing on that ankle. But he won, and went on to win the trophy for that season, and he's playing now apparently fully healed and healthy.

Bottom line, I think, is that he's really just basically a better, more solid player than I am. So, wish me luck, 'cause I'm gonna need it. :) I'm just gonna think positive, relax, keep a clear and calm mind, play fairly and have fun. But I really do want to win.
 
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...The full name of the one in Fort Lauderdale is the Florence C. Hardy Park, I think.

...What do you mean, "being cut"?

...Post some vids of your tennis Tom.

Good luck in the match Tom T.

By being "cut", I meant doing something invasive like surgery.

The park in Palm Springs is Ruth Hardy.

No vids of me unless I lose 30 lbs; picture Fed stuck in Rodney Dangerfield's body.

Take a look at a Dr. Sarno's, books, it may unravel the mystery of your Crohns.

G'luck!
 

TomT

Hall of Fame
Good luck in the match Tom T.

By being "cut", I meant doing something invasive like surgery.

The park in Palm Springs is Ruth Hardy.

No vids of me unless I lose 30 lbs; picture Fed stuck in Rodney Dangerfield's body.

Take a look at a Dr. Sarno's, books, it may unravel the mystery of your Crohns.

G'luck!
Ok, thanks Tom. But post some vids. Nobody but you cares if you're 30 lbs. overweight. The only thing I'll be paying attention to is your tennis.
 

TomT

Hall of Fame
Ok, played the match this morning. It was a comedy of errors. Quite possibly the worst match I've ever played since being able to hit the ball with any degree of proficiency.

Lost 6-0, 6-2 but it was a lot closer than that score indicates. Hahahahaha. Ok, but seriously there was only one actual winner hit in the whole match. Therefore, for one of us, I won't say who, the unforced error to winner ratio was mathematically undefined (which is, I think, indicative of an extremely low level of tennis). There were several points that went to many many deuces as we were trying to outdo each other in how bad we could play. This was, at best, maybe 2.5 level tennis.

But I accomplished two things that I wanted to. First, I showed up and played the whole match, and second I played to a point which was, for me, physically uncomfortable. So the experience will help me to grow. It's a long season so stay tuned.

Video snippets of today's match later today.
 
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Turbo-87

G.O.A.T.
Thanks Steve. I wish it was after Crohn's, but unfortunately this is, in my understanding, pretty much a lifetime disease with recurring symptoms for most people who have it.

Currently my Crohn's is still active, ie. flaring. But there's severely debilitating active and more or less functional active. I'm currently experiencing the latter. Then there are also, sometimes quite long, periods when the symptoms of the disease are completely absent.

What does the IA in your username signify? Where are you?

I am located in Iowa. I sure am looking forward to getting back outside since I am not a big fan of indoor play. I am hoping we have just a week or two left of indoor.
 

TomT

Hall of Fame
Played my second match of the Spring 2013 Season today. Lost 6-4 2-6 1-6 to a young guy who I had beaten in two previous league matches in the Fall 2012 Season. I played much better than in my first match, and am glad to have gone 3 sets.

Video at 11 (or maybe sooner). :)
 

mightyrick

Legend
Videos of yesterday's match.

Great videos, Tom.

I can absolutely say after watching video 3... that 100% of your misses in that video were due to late preparation. So you were either late getting into position and rushing the shot... or you were rushing into position and that caused a mechanics problem.

But in that video, every time you prepared early, you made your shot. It was like clockwork.

I myself am going to try to video a part of my next match so that I can point out the same kind of preparation problems I have sometimes. :) I just need to try to get a match during the day so that the light will make the video viewable.
 

TomT

Hall of Fame
Great videos, Tom.

I can absolutely say after watching video 3... that 100% of your misses in that video were due to late preparation. So you were either late getting into position and rushing the shot... or you were rushing into position and that caused a mechanics problem.

But in that video, every time you prepared early, you made your shot. It was like clockwork.

I myself am going to try to video a part of my next match so that I can point out the same kind of preparation problems I have sometimes. :) I just need to try to get a match during the day so that the light will make the video viewable.
I know you're correct mightyrick. The late (lazy) prep and subsequent rushing, or late (lazy) anticipation and subsequent rushing to position before the actual stroke prep is, I think, THE single most important reason why I make SO MANY avoidable, unforced, stupid errors. It's something that I should be able to, and can, I think, get on top of mentally -- and it is a mental thing. Just a matter of staying mindful and focused and practicing it on every stroke until it becomes habit. Easier said than done, but I think it can be done ... even by a relative tennis dunce like myself.

Thanks for your input. By the way, night videos have always turned out ok for me. Have you had a problem with them?
 

TomT

Hall of Fame
love the vids tom! also love that you're playing great tennis at 65.
Thanks tennismonkey. 65's not really that old for these times, but when you're playing people who are, on average, about 30 years younger then it can make a difference. Still, a 3.0 is a 3.0, as they say. So, I should be winning some of my matches before the end of the season.

Not great, or even good for that matter, tennis, but if one can get the ball over the net and into the court much of the time (almost at will? :) ), then the game can be lots of fun.

Got any vids to post? Where are you?
 
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TomT

Hall of Fame
I am located in Iowa.
Never been to Iowa. Been through Illinois, Missouri and Kansas though. :)

I sure am looking forward to getting back outside since I am not a big fan of indoor play. I am hoping we have just a week or two left of indoor.
Looks like it will warm up in your area enough for regular outdoor tennis attire by the latter part of April. Best of luck. Post some vids. :)
 

TomT

Hall of Fame
Have played 22 matches in this season so far. Am 3-19. Need 1 more win by June 2 to get into the playoffs for this particular season. There could be as many as 14 people qualifying for this season's playoffs. Very exciting.

Some video from my match yesterday (which I won 6-3 6-4):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdewm-RAMWA
 
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