2013 US Open Notes: Federer Express

©2013twmcdermott

Long South Gate security line

Arrival: By now, you've read about delays due to "tighter" security on day one at this year's Open. Our group arrived to see an unprecedentedly long line, all the way back up the boardwalk to the Number 7 elevated line.

It was difficult at first to tell what the line was for, but it turned out to be the "bag" line, which is always longer than the one for people who do not bring bags. But, this was truly weird.

Since one of us had a bag, we were in a quandary, but one of the few Open officials around recommended that we try the South Gate entrance, and we did. Luckily, we hit just before this long conga line formed behind us. Strangely, the bag line and no-bag line moved at the same pace; that is, very slowly. What did our bag-man do? He's an attorney; he cut the line.

After passing through security, we wondered why the USTA hadn't planned this much better, informed fans of possible delays in their pre-Open many ads, or had more people in place to explain what was going on? Had these been baseball or football fans, it would have been much more rowdy. All in all, tennis fans just took it in stride. Lucky for the hapless (on this day) USTA.

The actual security checks, once we got there seemed no more severe than any other year. Delay: 45-60 minutes, and a lot of first-match action missed.

Jamie Hampton

Names: Best name of a player: Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, of Russia, seeded 32nd and ranked 33rd in the world. Prettiest sounding name: Lara Arrubarrena, of Spain, ranked 87th.

Court 17: As we reported last year, the USTA has a winner in the mini-grandstand, Court 17. It is everything Arthur Ashe Stadium is not: intimate, with a great view from every seat, with every fan happy, unlike those in the top section of Ashe, who rightly feel ripped off.

Jamie: What a Catch: The young American player Jamie Hampton is seeded 23rd in the Open and currently ranked 28th in the world.
She dispatched the afore -beautifully- mentioned Arrubarrena in straight sets, but not too easily.

Hampton is a gamer. She hits out, and, I'm not making this up, she goes to net, volleys crisply and accurately and is unafraid to hit big overheads. What's not to like about that! And, thank goodness for these eager young American women, who are all over the draw. There is now only a single American man in the world top twenty, John Isner (we saw him win in 75 minutes on Day 2) and, unlike the women, no group coming up to challenge the best anytime soon.

After the win, Hampton signed a few balls and hit the first one into the crowd and...right at this correspondent, who, it must be said, made a very nice one-handed catch while stretching in front of several other hands. Did I give it away to a younger fan at my friend's suggestion? Yes. Jamie and I had had our moment.

Day Two: One word: hot. Make that two: really hot. And, by arriving an hour later than usual, 12:15p.m., we breezed through security. One reason for that ease: the poor Number 7 line fans had two-hour delays getting to Willets Point station due to a breakdown. Welcome to New York!

Stom & Stommer

Heineken House, Stom Nerve: Most fans are well-used to the lines to buy food at the Open, and the lines were not bad, but we made a discovery this year: Heineken House, which sits atop the food stands and is easily accessible by a stairway around the corner.

The good news: Heineken, the Open's official beer (everything at the open is "official" something) has provided a large airy, shady, comfortable rest stop, with food, beer and soft drinks.

But, why would Heineken go to all the trouble of promoting its brand like this and then charge $13.50 for a modest cup of beer and a bottle of Diet Coke? Who is going to feel positive about a brand that rips them off like that for their own product. After paying a ton to the USTA to be there, why make your customers pay the whole freight? How do you say Duh! in Dutch? Stom! will do.

Still, if you split a Dagwood sandwich and a beer, it's a great place for a break, and maybe it's irrational to even think about money at the Open anyway. Just pretend you're in Moscow or London and pay up, comrades.

Federer, an Even Better Catch: I'm not much for early round stadium matches featuring top seeds vs. someone often playing the same role as the old Washington Generals did for the Harlem Globetrotters (lose, with or without grace).

Roger was looking very fit and like a player with something to prove to the suits who seeded him 7th in a tournament that might easily be named for him. Then, after winning the first two sets easily, he faltered near what we all thought was the end of the third set. Suddenly, we were looking at a possible tie-breaker and 4th set, when Grega Zemlja, the Fed of Slovenian tennis, pulled to 5-5, momentarily forgetting his role.

Federball Express

But, Fed recovered, and afterwards prepared to hit his first autographed ball high into the stands...that's right, fans, directly to me. Only, this time, Fed's aim was slightly off, down and to my left in the
stairwell, just out of reach; but, it ricocheted off a hand rail and popped up to my right a smack nto the outstretched hands of...the DG!...who reached up mightily to grab it to the delight of the crowd.

Two catches in one family in two days. We're buying lottery tickets today!

The Tennis Way: Forest Hills Gardens & The Nationals

 ©twmcdermott2013

Station Square/FH Inn

Every so often, I get the urge to return to my natal stream, so to speak; not to spawn like salmon do, but to wander the streets, closes, crescents, and open greens of my native Forest Hills Gardens and an especially familiar old habitat of mine, the West Side Tennis Club, with its aging Stadium.

The urge is strongest this time of year, just before the U.S. Open.

A little more than 35 years ago, when someone mentioned “Forest Hills,” even people who weren’t tennis fans immediately recognized that place as a Mecca of the international game: Only Wimbledon was better known. But, that was in 1977, the last year the Open was held at WSTC.

One didn’t have to grow up there and attend their first “Nationals,” as the tournament was then called, as I did in 1956, to have distinct memories of the place. Today, when people hear the name, they still fondly recall their trips, perhaps with their parents or grandparents to see the best tennis in the world, played on the soft green lawns on warm, crisp September afternoons: never at night.

C.S. Church For Sale

As much as I’ve come to appreciate the Open’s more public venue at Flushing, I do not think it snooty of me to say the mention of that particular name does not quite approach the same pleasant mental reaction as “Forest Hills” did.

That’s branding for you, and the Russell Sage Foundation, which commissioned landscape architect Frederick Law Olmstead, Jr. and architect Grosvenor Atterbury to design “The Gardens,” knew something about branding. They also knew that, by luring the club to its 10 acres from its old home on Manhattan’s West Side (hence the name), it would make a nice marketing anchor for the new homes going up around it on Exeter, Harrow, Groton, and Dartmouth streets, and the Greenway Terraces.

It worked extraordinarily well, and the 175-acre community spawned about 800 houses and several attractive apartment buildings, all of them topped with the mandatory English-style red-tiled roofs. And, in the middle of it all, was a neighborhood gem of a public school, P.S. 101.

Does that sound perfect? It pretty much was. And, good thing too, because the one thing that WSTC and the stadium did not have much of was parking. So, those who forsook the subway and Long Island Railroad, which is to say just about everybody, had to get there early and desperately search for parking. This was, to say the least, discouraged by the Gardens, whose residents walked to see the matches, probably with free tickets in their pockets.

Greenway South

For old times sake, it might be fun to imagine the path of one of those parking searches and strolls to the club or stadium. This is a trip you can try today, but don’t even think about the parking part, just take a ride around The Gardens, or, better yet, take the subway and walk.

Let’s imagine that our Country Squire or little MG exits a parkway onto Jewel Avenue and south across Queens Boulevard, then under the LIRR trestle across Continental Avenue. Upon entering cobbled Station Square, with the Forest Hills Inn to our left, we’re instantly transported to the English village of the designers’ imaginations.

Since we’ve been here before, we know not to go straight, under the arched bridge by Dartmouth Street; nobody is lucky enough to find a space that close to the club.

Instead, we go left and then right, under another arched bridge to enter the Greenways, then bear left up Greenway North, with its shaded attached homes and the long open green on our right, broken by a circle of benches across from a Moorish church (currently for sale).

We continue as the green widens at Flagpole Park, whose flag still flies atop the mast of the 1899 and 1901 America’s Cup Winner, Columbia. We go right at Slocum Crescent, then a quick left on Standish Road, and, hey, there’s parking in that private driveway for ten bucks!

Tennis Place/"Way"

We hand over the sawbuck to a very young man sporting a crewcut, who assures us that it is indeed his parents’ driveway (fingers crossed on that), then we wander away towards Russell Place, around stately P.S. 101, and down Slocum Crescent the other way across Greenway South and then the same Continental Avenue on to Exeter Street, with its still shady trees despite losing some  to disease years ago and a dozen more to Sandy) and brick and stucco homes.

At Tennis Place, we turn right. Proust had his Guermantes Way, but this is my “way,” as I made hundreds of trips through Tennis Place to and from my home, WSTC, and my grandfather’s house on Fleet Street.

As we come around a soft bend, we head to and across Dartmouth Street, past my old apartment building and the little courtyard where I learned to play tennis against a wall; and, since we have clubhouse passes, into the WSTC itself. Now, we probably need a gin and tonic, Florida Special, or Cock N’ Bull brand (best ever) ginger beer at the terrace bar.

Gold & Blue

There must have been at least a few imperfect days at Forest Hills back then, which were uncomfortably humid or hot. And, I distinctly remember players donning spiked shoes to play (and tear up) the grass courts slick from light rain. But, honestly, it’s hard to summon up memories of anything other than perfect weather, maybe with a light breeze and a hint of autumn in the air.

It was not uncommon for ladies to wear skirts or summer dresses to show off their summer tans. Spectators walking the field court areas or lunching under the gold and blue awnings at the Clubhouse might have even worn Shetland sweaters around their shoulders, an image that seems other-worldly in these days of more advanced global warming (not to mention gym shorts and tank tops); I do not think that I’ll be wearing a sweater next week at Flushing “Meadow.”

1923

Forest Hills stadium has definitely faded over the years and recently survived a plan to turn it into attractive apartments. Instead, there is a move on to revive it as a concert venue, with a sold-out Mumford & Sons show set for late August. The clubhouse itself and surrounding courts look remarkably good, although a ladies’ over-thirty tournament left the grass court baselines scuffed and torn; but that is how it goes with east coast lawn tennis, played atop relatively soft earth, unlike Wimbledon’s fuzzy concrete.

Some might say the club and its stadium are well past their prime. But, who cares? To true tennis aficionados, the WSTC's stadium is hallowed ground, like the old Yankee Stadium (both were built in 1923; only one survives).

What does hold meaning for me, and many others, I think, is that great athletic contests and feats occurred there not so long ago, in a game played on lawns, with grass-stained white balls, mostly with wooden racquets, in a more or less private world, but far less privileged than some of its detractors might imagine.

Their loss, I’d say. Love and love.

All photos by Author/Thanks to WSTC for permission to shoot.

I Saw Real Summer, I Swear

There is such a thing as summer; I’m not making it up. I mean real summer and not the hot, wet, still, cloudy, grumpy-thunder kind that we’ve been having in the northeast this June and July.

I finally found it at 6:57 a.m. July 12. I woke up in our friend’s house, looked up through the skylight, which might be a little annoying to some at 6:57 a.m. on another morning, but not to me on this morning.

I saw a blue sky. If you say, “big deal,” you obviously haven’t been spending time around New York City recently. The blue wasn’t just peeking through gray clouds, and it wasn’t surrounded by haze from high humidity; it filled the frame. I could feel the fresh air coming in through the open skylight and this thing called an open window; open is what some people do with a window, when their air conditioning isn’t running on high 24/7. Amazing, but true.

This was really fresh air with a taste of the sea on it to boot, which makes sense, since we were on an island, Down East, as they say.

The day before my discovery, on our journey here, and I’m not making this up either, the temperature gauge on our Volvo C30 dashboard did not make it to 80’F, not even in the first hour it took to drive from Exit 3 on US95 to Exit 5, which usually takes about four minutes.

An early morning thunder storm (gee, what a surprise) and heavy rain must have softened a slope of earth near Riverside CT, because a tree fell from it onto US95, hit the cab of a passing truck during rush hour and closed two lanes. So, our first four minutes of the journey took an hour and we had to reset our journey clock and then we drove and drove north and east and north again then down east. Luckily, there were no kids in the back to ask, “Are we there yet?” We drove and talked about all the stuff we don't talk about at home for eight more hours. I have a feeling that both the high divorce rate and most long marriages may be directly related to long motor journeys.

We stopped in Yarmouth ME and I dove into a plate-sized harbor full of fried clams on a white flour roll with tarter sauce and waves of vinegar upon it and drank a lemonade that had sugar in it. You know what? I survived. Don’t tell Bloomberg; he won’t believe it. 

On the mail-boat to Little Cranberry Island that we caught in Northeast Harbor, a woman put on a Breton striped sweater. I hadn’t seen a sweater on anyone outdoors in weeks, although I have seen them on people indoors, freezing from arctic air conditioning. It may have been a cotton sweater, but still.

I can see the island’s harbor now from where I’m sitting on the porch and can see Mount Desert Island beyond it. The air is stunningly clear and clean. It’s midday, the sun is shining brightly amid whisps of clouds and it is unmistakably summer here. Real summer. Tomorrow's forecast promises the same.

A man just rode by on a bicycle and he wore an outer shirt over a T-shirt and he was not too hot and he wasn’t racing to beat any thunder and lightning and he did not get drenched, and by all outward appearances he was thoroughly enjoying himself, outside, in summer, in the middle of the day.

I saw it right here. Islesford, Little Cranberry Island, Maine. I swear.

A Little Shot of a Scot with Whiskers

Fred Perry

Greenwich Mean Time occurs a wee-bit downriver from Wimbledon’s Centre Court, and July 7 at 17:54 Zulu (as GMT is known) Great Britain, the U.K., and Scotland finally had a men’s lawn tennis champion, Andy Murray. For England itself, technically, it’s still 77 years and counting, but, cheerio and hip-hip, after Sunday’s final and a heart-thumping three straight championship points served and lost at 40-love, let’s just forget about that, shall we, Old Beans?

This was not exactly an epic, like Murray’s opponent Novak Djokovic’s nearly five-hour- long semi-final against Juan Martín del Potro. Actually, the shadow of that earlier match may have been the only one showing on court Sunday, and at Djokovic’s expense. He simply looked wasted by the third set, and though he made a valiant try, assisted by Murray’s understandable sudden case of nerves, he just didn’t seem to get it going.

Nobody on Henman Hill, named for Britain’s previous best hope to end the gold-cup drought, is likely to remember the horrific thoughts developing in their minds as Murray struggled to get a first serve in during that penultimate game, as his knees seemed to be made of Dundee Marmalade. A net-cord appeared to reach up (assisted by Fred Perry’s ghost?) and save the day, holding back what looked like a winner down the line off Djokovic’s racquet. Then, what passes for pandemonium ensued in dainty Wimbledon.

But, what I want to know in this Age of Kim K, is why doesn’t Andy’s mum ever sit near the other Kim, the much, much better Kim, Andy’s camera friendly girlfriend, Kim Sears. What’s up with that? If they got along better and sat next to each other maybe Andy could have stopped that string at 76 years or even less! Talk about stress: a domestic freeze in front of millions of fans.

Kim Sears

Andy of Mayberry Murray is not, always looking on court as if he is losing, no matter what the score. Perhaps that is just the understated Scot’s way, or the weather up north, or just years of losing the “big ones.” That ended after Ivan Lendl, no stranger to the frown himself, took over as Coach of Andy; so far the tandem has produced two major championships and brought an empire to its knees and maybe its endorsement purse as well. Imagine the Murray brand if he could smile! Well, that might look a lot like…Kim Sears. Did we mention her already? I think so.

So, on we go to the U.S. Open in late August, where the U.S. has begun a run of its own, nine years without a men’s champion (Roddick, 2003). That’s the second longest drought for American men; it took twelve years and the beginning of the open era for Arthur Ashe to succeed Tony Trabert in 1968.

Thanks to the Williams sisters, and Martina adopting our country as her home, American women have experienced only one extended stretch, 1988-1997, without a winner. And, they appear poised to offer up a winner other than Serena before the men offer their own, barring truly profound miracles. After all, a British man has won more U.S. men’s titles than Americans in recent years: one, Andy Murray himself, in 2012. Not to mention a Swiss, a Serbian, a Spaniard, etcetera.

I’ll be there on opening day, having logged over fifty combined U.S. Nationals (“amateur”) and Opens at Forest Hills and Flushing Meadow. There is little likelihood that I will venture into Ashe Stadium, since, in the early rounds, it offers pretty dull stuff. Instead, I’ll be wandering the field courts, as I did once at Wimbledon (2006), looking for a tense battle between the number 115th and 162^nd ranked men or women.

Merion: angina anyone?

If I close my eyes and just listen to the pop-pop from the racuets, I can pretend it’s still happening on our own soft lawns, public lawns to be sure; the mere mention of “private club” might cause USTA and ESPN poobahs major angina.

If Andy Murray can finally succeed, who’s to say we can never have a lawn tennis championship again?

Not I.

Wimbledon 2013: Quirk Defeats Logic in Crooked Sets

Marion Bartoli

The preferred dish at bistros in Genevea by the lake, where Marion Bartoli lives, is perche du lac, and it looks as though the new Wimbledon champion has been adding sides of pasta or pommes de gruyeres. No matter. In what The New York Times’ Christopher Clarey called a “logic-defying” fortnight at All England Club, Bartoli’s win is perhaps the most powerful shot to logic’s broadside. Hallelujah!, we sing.

Logic has created a game in which all court surfaces have been equalized. Clay, grass, and Deco-Turf have been engineered to provide uniformly high and true bounces, with precious little room for idiosyncrasy, as if Microsoft or IBM had been in charge of the project.

Logic dictates that each player have nearly identical groundstrokes, hit every topspin forehand as hard as humanly possible and sometimes even harder. And, logic tells the players to hold fast to the safety of the baseline.

Consequently, rational thinking says, “Don’t rush the net; it’s scary up there.” So, we have worn-out baseline grass at Wimbledon and first-day looking green up near the net, where past greats made thousands of winning volleys.

Federer, of course, is mostly exempt from all this, except for fear of net play. His strokes and versatility are throwbacks to yesteryear and yet, he still hits with enormous power. But, Fed may be fading at last. Hopefully, young players will ignore their coaches and emulate Fed’s style as much as possible.

Marion Bartoli defies all this logic, and we must love her for that. First, her apparently lax dietary regimen, to which many of us can closely relate. Then, her quirky service motion and extra high toss. Her second serve is slower than that of some clubs’ B –Team members, but she wins 60-70% of points when she makes her first serve. She is prone to hit two-handed from both sides, even her volleys, and, yes, she forays into net (Rejoice!). Aside from all that, she is French. Enough said.

Tennis has a huge marketing advantage, which it hides in plain view. It is the only sport in which men and women compete side by side in its major championships; only the Olympics does the same. Thus, we have two-week pageants, rather than four days like The Masters, and we have the potential of seeing a great variety of playing styles.

Once again at Wimbledon, American men were nowhere near good enough to challenge in the singles draw. Thank goodness for the remarkable Bryan Brothers in doubles. The young American women, especially Sloane Stephens, show greater promise, but did not get

perche du lac

beyond the quarters this year (where Bartoli beat Stephens). Logically, the poobahs of the USTA have been yearning for and investing in the next American champions in the "inner-city" for over a decade, one dominated by the Williams sisters, who developed almost entirely outside the USTA system. How long will that quest take to succeed? A couple of more years for the women perhaps, and much longer for the men, if ever.

Marion Bartoli may not ever repeat her Wimbledon accomplishment and may not ever win another major, but we all owe her a debt of gratitude for her logic-defying win. We can only hope that more quirk will sneak into the game, and that the grass courts will once again be soft, instead of being a kind of fuzzy concrete. We can hope for some odd bounces, ground strokes that look as if they were forged in isolation with great creativity; and we can pray that more players will learn the joys of net play.

Friday’s men’s semi-final between Djokovic and del Potro is being called one of the great matches, and much of it was fun to watch. But, it took nearly five hours to complete, a Tolstoyan epic in a Twitter age and the longest semi in Wimbledon history. Now, there’s something funky and noble about that too; however, we should remember that the tie-breaker was put in place largely to shorten men’s matches. But that was in the serve and volley era on grass and hard courts. What are we going to do now?

I watched that semi at the club where I play. At the end, one of the three gents watching with me, all in

their eighties, said to his pals, "Not long ago, this place would have been packed to watch a Wimbledon semi on a holiday weekend." 

The team players march on, as do the pros and the hundreds of free-boat college players, but the everyday players, especially the young ones are disappearing, having chosen other games to play. Perhaps they've come to the logical conclusion that five hours is a bit too long to play a game, even golf.

Sad to say, they may be right about that.