What do you do when your opponents are serving and their “net man” is playing on the baseline, with the server? That is what Noble Hendrix and I faced in our second round robin match at Longboat Key on Thursday.

Early December is the time for one of the best senior tournaments in Florida, The Longboat Key Cat II.  Here are some key facts and early activities …

What happens if you play with a ball that loses compression… just replace it or replay the point?  That question comes from good Newk Camp friend Mike “Rambo” Rennels…

Déjà vu all over again …

Your partner is playing poorly and you are losing the match.  What should you do about it?  From the 1988 Bobby McFerrin song title, I suggest, “Don’t Worry.  Be Happy.”

“Accentuate the Positives”

We go through the ritual every time we play tennis… the warmup.  And while there are some official rules governing this five/ten-minute timeframe, most of the “rules” we follow are unwritten.  Here are some to consider …

What is the secret to having the energy at the end of a tennis match to still be able to play your best, without fading away… or to be able to come back the next day?  One of the answers, according to Roy Emerson is to “overdo your preparation.”

It is that time of year… the start of the Florida senior tennis tournaments!  So, if you are here – or planning on coming to the sunny (and warm) south – here is the list (and most links) to the series.

NOTE: the first one is on Longboat Key, and the signup deadline is November 25^th.  Please bookmark this page for future reference.

If you want to improve how you play senior tennis doubles (NOTE: not everyone really wants to enough to do something about it!), here are seven random tips for you to consider …

It is truly amazing to me how the subconscious brain can control what we do or don’t do (on and off the court).  That is why, when you have time to think before you serve, hit a ground stroke, or drive that overhead … what you say to yourself really matters.

This last day of competition, with two teams playing for the Championship (not my Wankers), started cloudy and 64, with rain still forecasted to come later in the day.  There was no morning clinic; so the play started right after Larry Starr’s warmup routine.

Wednesday morning started off chilly, but warmed up nicely — and I am surprisingly pain free!  Our day started with Michael Pernfors and Johan Kriek’s clinic on their observations of what we, and other club players, do on the tennis court.  

Tuesday morning started chilly, but with some great doubles tips from Luke and Murphy Jensen…

How to Play Doubles Better

After overnight rains, Monday morning started off at a comfortable 64 degrees but extremely windy for our morning of training, team positioning, and drills. 

A stated goal for the morning is “don’t work too hard” (save yourself for the afternoon start of the real team matches and two-a-day matches that start on Tuesday). 

It is that time: the start of “the best week of my tennis year!” The travel to my 16^th year at the Fantasy Tennis Camp was once again in the luxury of “AirBerry” (Pelican Bay friend John Berry); so John, Willy Hoffmann, Rich Tarantino, Tom Mackessy and I took off from Naples Airport at 1 p.m. for the 2.5 hour flight to a small airfield in New Braunfels, Texas.