League Set PRACTICE Fast Conditions?

[Tennis Aloha]

We played at our local university's courts and they are fast.
Ball picks up speed off the ground sometimes even skips.
The court of the club we usually play are slow courts so it was great for us
to get some practice in faster courts. I tried to use more of a split step on the return of serve and
tried to not push the ball too much and use the percentages for short points. I know it's easy to
miss so might as well go for a little more than usual.
I double faulted almost a whole game at 4-1, luckily still managed the W but that's a big no no on this
kind of court. The more balls you get in on the serve the more a chance of holding and winning.

Do you have a preference of court speed? I guess we can limit the answer to hard courts since they vary a lot, where as clay tend to be on a similar realm within.

Hard court preference, Fast or Slow?

 

[OnTheLine]

Me? Faster the better. If I can play on cement, my game loves it, although my knees and back don't.

 

[Injured Again]

Our club has three separate indoor court buildings. Two of them, the older ones, have an asphalt base and the newest building has post-tensioned concrete. The asphalt courts are lower bouncing. In one of those buildings, the last time it was resurfaced, it was done first and had a much higher friction surface. The other asphalt building started out with a smoother finish, and because it's the building primarily used by pros and by the big group of junior players, has gotten buffed smooth over the seven or eight years since the resurfacing. So we have a slower, lower bouncing asphalt building, a faster, higher bouncing concrete building, and the fastest, low bouncing asphalt building. Our slowest building is still faster than the outdoor courts in southern California. On a scale of 1 to 10, if Indian Wells is a three, our slow building is a five, our concrete courts are 6.5-7, and the fastest asphalt is between 8-9.

It's easiest to play in the concrete building. The combination of higher bounces and faster surface means almost every groundstroke and volley will carry all the way to the baseline so you can just stand back there and pretty much get everything on one bounce. The slow asphalt is most notable for how short the forward bounce is especially on volleys. Anything not firmly hit will not carry to the baseline on the bounce. So you have to learn to move forwards and backwards. The fast asphalt is really too fast for anyone who can really thump the ball. It skids through low and it seems whoever gets the first firm hit in, is really in control of the point.

I used to prefer the concrete building but after trying to play in southern California, where the majority of tournaments on our coast are, I realized how much it hurt my game. So now I play the vast majority of the time on the slow asphalt courts.

 

[onehandbh]

Our club has three separate indoor court buildings. Two of them, the older ones, have an asphalt base and the newest building has post-tensioned concrete. The asphalt courts are lower bouncing. In one of those buildings, the last time it was resurfaced, it was done first and had a much higher friction surface. The other asphalt building started out with a smoother finish, and because it's the building primarily used by pros and by the big group of junior players, has gotten buffed smooth over the seven or eight years since the resurfacing. So we have a slower, lower bouncing asphalt building, a faster, higher bouncing concrete building, and the fastest, low bouncing asphalt building. Our slowest building is still faster than the outdoor courts in southern California. On a scale of 1 to 10, if Indian Wells is a three, our slow building is a five, our concrete courts are 6.5-7, and the fastest asphalt is between 8-9.

It's easiest to play in the concrete building. The combination of higher bounces and faster surface means almost every groundstroke and volley will carry all the way to the baseline so you can just stand back there and pretty much get everything on one bounce. The slow asphalt is most notable for how short the forward bounce is especially on volleys. Anything not firmly hit will not carry to the baseline on the bounce. So you have to learn to move forwards and backwards. The fast asphalt is really too fast for anyone who can really thump the ball. It skids through low and it seems whoever gets the first firm hit in, is really in control of the point.

I used to prefer the concrete building but after trying to play in southern California, where the majority of tournaments on our coast are, I realized how much it hurt my game. So now I play the vast majority of the time on the slow asphalt courts.

Which court did we hit just hit on? Not sure if it was because of the cold temperatures, but groundstrokes didn't seem to bounce very high and the ball just didn't seem to grab the court much. Might also be your flatter ground strokes. I thought it might be the court at first but then when I practiced a couple serves, they seemed to go thru the court and hit the back wall/backdrop a decent height above the ground after one bounce.

Indian Wells is one of the slower hardcourts I have ever played on.

Not sure if it was because of the cold temperatures

 

[Injured Again]

Which court did we hit just hit on? Not sure if it was because of the cold temperatures, but groundstrokes didn't seem to bounce very high and the ball just didn't seem to grab the court much. Might also be your flatter ground strokes. I thought it might be the court at first but then when I practiced a couple serves, they seemed to go thru the court and hit the back wall/backdrop a decent height above the ground after one bounce.

Indian Wells is one of the slower hardcourts I have ever played on.

Not sure if it was because of the cold temperatures

We played on the slow, asphalt courts. You could tell from some of the shots I hit that landed a bit short - they just don't bounce high or forward much. Want to try the concrete ones the next time? I will tell you that those courts are smooth enough that the hard slices we were hitting to each other are really deadly on those courts, especially the ones I hit with a bit of sidespin to your forehand. Flat hard balls will really skid through as well. The courts we played on are, by far, the grabbiest of all of our indoor courts.

My body was really beat up this last time so many of my swings were pretty funky and inconsistent. I started a hard gym workout regimen to work off the last of the Thanksgiving turkey stuffing, and now am working on the first of many batches of Christmas cookies that have made me look like the Michelin Man. That and we were using once-used Pro Penn Marathons. But the combination of playing a fair amount of tennis plus the gym work is too much for this 61 year old body and I realized that after playing you. I've been resting up a bit more and the body definitely feels better.

There's also a difference in the heat in the buildings. The courts where we played have infrared heating directed down towards the baselines. The concrete court building has air heaters mounted high on the ceiling at each end so the court surface is probably warmer overall because the air temp in that building is higher for the same comfort level. I also think that the really thick concrete underlayer doesn't cool off as much as the asphalt courts and that contributes to the bounce height too.

We'll try some different balls the next time too.

 

[Tennis Aloha]

I wonder if some players like to hit on slower courts. I actually don't mind them but they do sometimes give an advantage to the more fit or fresher player

 

[d-quik]

lol it looks like most of us here like deflecting the opponents pace instead of generating our own

lazy!

 

[socallefty]

I guess I like a medium speed hard court for singles. If it is too slow like Indian Wells, it seems like there is a struggle to hit winners, almost all points end on errors, serve quality is less important and a match becomes a battle of attrition with mostly baseline play. If it is too fast, the points end too quickly with many service winners and +1 winners. On a medium-fast court, the players with good technique can still hit a lot of winners, you see some net play to end points and there are a lot of good rallies.

I guess I like the courts where the power player has an edge due to the extra power, but it is not so fast where any player can end points quickly. My favorite season to play is the summer where the balls are lively in the heat and it is easiest to hit winners on serves and shots.

For doubles, I like it if the court is fast and low bouncing as it favors the team that plays well at the net and you have really good doubles exchanges at the net. Playing doubles in USTA Sectionals at Indian Wells was not fun as there were a lot of breaks with big serves being relatively neutralized and 1-back formation teams prevailed often over 2-at-net teams.

I‘ve never played on indoor courts though and so what I consider a fast outdoor court in Southern California might still be slow or medium for those who play indoors. Most courts here have the same kind of multi-layer (acrylic on asphalt) construction and what decides the court speed is the time period since the court was last resurfaced with a new acrylic (polyurethane) surface - newer courts are slower. My club resurfaces all the courts at least once a year and so we don’t have very fast courts.

 

[Purestriker]

I prefer a fast court in doubles. For singles, I’d rather play in clay first and then a slower court that has a high bounce. That way I can use my topspin to stay in points.

 

[Injured Again]

I guess I like a medium speed hard court for singles. If it is too slow like Indian Wells, it seems like there is a struggle to hit winners, almost all points end on errors, serve quality is less important and a match becomes a battle of attrition with mostly baseline play. If it is too fast, the points end too quickly with many service winners and +1 winners. On a medium-fast court, the players with good technique can still hit a lot of winners, you see some net play to end points and there are a lot of good rallies.

I guess I like the courts where the power player has an edge due to the extra power, but it is not so fast where any player can end points quickly. My favorite season to play is the summer where the balls are lively in the heat and it is easiest to hit winners on serves and shots.

For doubles, I like it if the court is fast and low bouncing as it favors the team that plays well at the net and you have really good doubles exchanges at the net. Playing doubles in USTA Sectionals at Indian Wells was not fun as there were a lot of breaks with big serves being relatively neutralized and 1-back formation teams prevailed often over 2-at-net teams.

I‘ve never played on indoor courts though and so what I consider a fast outdoor court in Southern California might still be slow or medium for those who play indoors. Most courts here have the same kind of multi-layer (acrylic on asphalt) construction and what decides the court speed is the time period since the court was last resurfaced with a new acrylic (polyurethane) surface - newer courts are slower. My club resurfaces all the courts at least once a year and so we don’t have very fast courts.

I hit at Indian Wells in November, 2021 when it was still pretty warm and though the courts were slower than I was used to, the balls bounced up noticeably higher than they do on our asphalt indoor courts. I almost always felt like I got to swing at a ball that was high enough for me to feel comfortable being pretty aggressive, and at least in the group of guys that I was hitting with, all middle 50's or older, no one could really get the ball really jumping with a lot of topspin.

When @onehandbh were trading underspin backhand slices that we were driving through the court on our slow asphalt court, the ball really didn't come up much more than knee height and when we hit them well they probably stayed at mid-shin height or less. I don't recall that being the case down at Indian Wells except for the most driving of underspin shots. Otherwise, the backspin would make the ball check up and bounce almost to waist level where if I was in good position, I felt like I could give it a good whack.

Where I run into problems with the better guys is that I'll eventually hit something weaker and then they start moving me side to side and diagonally forward where any shot I hit won't have enough pace, spin, or placement to really trouble them, and then I'm in a world of hurt trying to defend too many options. I feel like my winner count wouldn't go down much but the weaknesses in my game would be exploited just like they are on the courts up here, only in a slightly different way.

I'm still pretty much an unmitigated disaster playing doubles so I prefer as slow of a court as possible. It gives me more time to figure out that I'm in the wrong effing place on the court and more time to retrieve shots hit to where I should be covering.