Tales from the Practice Courts

librarysteg

Hall of Fame
I need to post about Cincinnati one more time before we all move on to NC and USO. This was my first big tournament, and I ended up spending a lot more time watching the practice courts than the actual matches. It was unreal getting to be so up close and personal with the players. A few favorite moments included:

Seeing all the guys who were out of the tournament sticking around and practicing their butts off all day long. I didn't know they did this, and I was very impressed by the guys I saw doing this. Querrey and Istomin hit all day long with various people on various courts and Matosevic (who wasn't even in the tournament) was on a different court with his coach every time I turned around. He was also making fun of a women's doubles match happening on a nearby court :)

I had also never really thought about the fact that these guys play practice matches together rather than just standard hitting practice. A highlight was watching Dolgopolov and Llodra hitting around then walking to the net, Llodra spinning his racket to see who would serve, and then watching them play a set. They never said the score out loud and used such subtle head motions to indicate close calls, never audibly calling anything in or out but still always apparently on the exact same page with everything that was happening in their match. Dolgopolov seemed to be having a great time, laughing and joking.

What fun things have you seen on the practice courts?
 

RoddickAce

Hall of Fame
I saw Nadal and Djokovic playing soccer-tennis with each other and their coaches at the Rogers Cup before.

In different years I also saw Kirilenko, Melzer, Raonic and Pospisil, amongst others practising close-up and they were very nice about autographing and some stayed behind to take pictures with fans.

This year, Sampras came for an exhibition match and he was giving a lesson to some amateur players on a practise court before the match.
 
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