Thinking about the good and bad bits of tennis makes me realise what a complicated subject it is with many different aspects. There are all sorts of tennis rackets, each suited to different levels of player. Even the size and stature of the tennis player can change the type of racket that will work best for them. Tennis rackets string tension is also vitally important and some tennis strings last longer than others. Some string tensions are designed for power and others for feel.
Tennis shoes are another interesting topic. There are so many shoes on the market sold by retailers as tennis shoes that are really only designer trainers. They are not at all suited for true tennis play.
Talking about tennis racket string tension reminds me of a famous musician I once coached. He used to drive the people in his local sports shop crazy because he always used to know whether they had strung his racket to the correct tension or not. Each racket has a specific string tension that is designed to work with that racket. Once he had identified the string tension that was right for his racket, through working with me, he immediately demanded that his local sports shop string the racket to that exact tension.
When the sports shop gave each of his rackets back after each re-stringing, he would ping the racket strings with his finger and tell them whether they had strung the racket correctly or not. On one occasion, they incorrectly strung the tennis racket’s string tension to twenty-six lbs instead of twenty-six kilos. One flick of his finger on the tennis racket told him the tennis racket string tension was wrong. He actually explained to the sports shop that the tennis racket was in the wrong key. They checked and found he was absolutely right about the wrong tension. As I said, he was a famous musician and had perfect pitch.
