Bill Tilden said:
I think tennis need a rule that show what a pro are using in a mach. After a macht you can see: Mr Federer won with a Wilson ncode 15 oz. and 4 pts hedlight, for example. The opponent Mr Roddick used a Babolat of 4 oz. and 34 pts head heavy, for example.
Is it a problem for Mr Federer? and Why?
Is it a problem for Mr Roddick? and why?
Is it a problem for constuctors? and why?
There are not any rules that I know of that forces the players' frame specs to be made available to the public. The official governing body of tennis, however, is required to inspect all players' frames. Players' frames do get inspected but they are not made available to the public. It's a "requirement" so that they can determine whether or not the equipment is legal. For instance, you are not allowed to have a frame that has an inertia that moves around inside/on the frame while a point is in play. My point is, the governing bodies already knows the frame specs of the players before matches.
Now, as far as making it a requirement that player's frame specs be made public, I would have to
oppose that idea.
You asked,
"'Is it a problem for Federer?,' and,
'Is it a problem for Roddick?'" Well, I would see that it could be a problem for "any player," if such a rule was made to require that all players' racquet specs be made publc. I know that if I was a pro then I certainly wouldn't want other people to fathom my racquet specs/concepts.
Why am I against your idea, Mr. Tilden? Because the players's with the best customizations would have their secrets and or ideal concepts exposed to their opponents. It's like in a war, would you want to inform the enemy general the positions of your units? Same with race car driving. If you were on team
Renault, would you want to inform your competitors (team
Ferrari etc.) about your engine setup for a particular race course?
In a lot of competitions, technology is also a factor in attaining an edge; be it a slight edge or a huge advantage. Since you mentioned the
"Venus', Serena's And Roddick's" thread,
MackSamuelHustovisics' posts just came to mind. I think Mack explains this whole technology thing best. Here are a couple of his posts that explains some points that I agree with entirely:
MackSamuelHustovisics said:
post #14 A huge part of the competition among pro tennis is technology warefare. It's not the type of tech that you see manufacturers use for promoting their new designs, such as "Flexpoint", "Nano", "Intelligence Chip" etc. It's a technology that has to do with manipulating power points, control, flex, maneuverablity, and most importantly....swing dynamics.
This trade secret of having the ideal racquet is very much like secrets that different militaries of different countries have. It is kept away from the public. Part of the race in pro tennis is not just being a better conditioned and skilled player, having world-class coaches, having more money, etc. It also has to do with either being smart enough to discover the best techology or being lucky enough to have someone(s) offer the player the tech. So John is not out of his mind for stating certain pro players being disadvantaged due to their equipment. He's also not saying that equipement alone carries a player either. When he mentions these things, being a great player is already a given. He's saying it in a way that the players are already highly talented and highly skilled. That's why it comes down to, "the use of inferior equipment causes losses" -- in the way that John implies it (Of course having a bad day is part of it and just not being the better player that day as well, but the right tech might have enabled a losing player to win more key points in a match that could have been a turning point in momentum, enabling the said player to make come-backs.).
I am the same way. When I refer to players needing a better frame to improve their play, I am not talking about Joe down the street the amature. A lot of people, especially other teaching pros will say that players need to improve techniques and strategy in order to win more. Well of course that is true, but when I speak, all of that is already a given. The player is as elite as he/she can possibly be at the moment and so that's why having the ideal racquet design is the winning-factor advantage, the same way as how John sees it.
If you spend enough time experimenting with different customizations then perhaps you will learn a thing or two.
MackSamuelHustovisics said:
post # 36 From my experiences working with people and customizing frames, as far as superior racquets being kept away from the public and certain peoples, that is very real in my belief. I do not however think that the tennis industry is intentionally preventing the public from getting their hands on these frames. It's more like how I described things in an earlier post.
Sometimes what happened (or is still happening on an ongoing basis) is that different teams (or individuals) have researched and developed their "ideal" frame for their particular individual player(s) (or themselves). It's like a race car team that keeps their secrets out of the hands of their competitors. I don't reveal some secrets for the same reasons. You don't want the other team (or other individual competitor)to get freebies off of you after what you had to do to get the advantage in the first place.
Besides striving to be the better player, part of the competition is also having more and better knowledge about the physics of the ideal racquet and sometimes one may not even need to be doing the actual research and development to attain that knowledge of creating the ideal racquet because the ideal racquet could just simply be handed to him or her.
Your last question,
"Is it a problem for the constructors?," I would have to answer: yes it seems that it would be a problem for them.
Why? Because, if the public knew what made racquets ideal then they wouldn't be
"buying into/fooled into" the racquet science gimmicks that the racquet manufacturers invent that are utilize to increase sales by luring the mindless Joes and Janes.
Paint jobs are part of the racquet manufacturers "marketing plan," a brilliant one to! Just be glad that you are among the ones who know about the gimmicks/PJs.
(Of course, knowing about PJs doesn't make you special or unique because if you were truly a tennis junkie in the first place then you would know that all of this isn't really a big secret afterall!)
As far as the "ethics" of such a marketing ploy by the racquet companies going on beneath our very own eyes, I won't get into politics! I'll leave that to others.
Good day now. 8)
