It was better than I expected:)
The main changes came from a few simple suggestions of my coach: keeping patient in rally; making percentage shoots and reducing unforced errors as many as possible; warming up longer than I used to; and balance myself while serving. That was it.
Meanwhile, I suppose my working out in gym also pays off. Several months ago, I started to divide the strength training to smaller parts as upper/lower/core body, along with cardio exercise. For each part, there are several different approaches to work out. Specifically for tennis, the back and core muscles are more important than those of chest and shoulder for ground strokes. A little bit exercises for the forearm could improve the penetration of serving a lot. Lower muscles are much much more important than I expected–they could provide more explosive strength, let running faster, and more importantly, protect the knee joints. Besides, pilate and stretch are indispensable parts for every workout. These last-30-minutes cooling down process help the body relax and keep up with everyday’s progress.
Of course, I still have plenty of REALLY weak aspects, such as lousy serving, bad backspin and volley, and getting lost in the mid-court…
Anyway, I am happy to get this level:) and wish myself could be the champion one day.
[UPDATE] 09/03/2014. I just saw the greatest match in this year, Murray vs. Djokovic. There are some interesting facts.
- Both of them slided their feet together while hitting the serving, but when I did that way, my upper body would become unstable which in turn makes my serving even worse…
- Percentage shoots are the mainstream responses, and they would more inclined to approach to the net when hitting down the line.
- Both of them use lots of backspin for defense, but their movements seemed to have more “chopping” than I did. And if I did that way, the ball would float very high and sail…
- Drop shots are effective means to explore the depth of the court. Making the opponents running is almost always a good strategy to disrupt the tempo as well as actively draining off the energy.
- Mental toughness is the key to win the match.
[UPDATE] 09/09/2014. I won’t sign up for any 3.0 League in this year since I’ve began to play the tournament in the university. It has less challenging mentally, but more physically. The strategic play is still useful, but I would also expect longer rally and have more cadio-/HIIT training correspondingly.