Is Federer not 100%?

First topic message reminder :

Federer: I feel good about myself, about my body. I've recovered. The last week, you know, was vital for me to recover from my groin injury. I feel like I'm almost back at 100% again, which is a really good sign for Wimbledon.

I must say that during the FO, even before the final, I saw Federer briefly touching his groin muscles while playing. We know that was his problem last year during the Halle final which prevented him to be 100% for Wimbledon. That coudl also explain his collapse in the final set of the FO too.

I find it bizarre that the player who does his best to hide injuries in GSs (don;t we all remember the "I am perfect" after his Falla match) is telling us here that he is "almost 100%".

Sure, it might be a polite way to confirm his excuse to the Halle organiser but who knows?

The fact he is not starting on Monday might confirm he wants to buy some time.

I don't know if anyone else remembers, but during wimbledon 2008 they showed a comparison of the average ball trajectory on the federer serve, comparing between 2003 and 2008.

It showed that the ball used to bounce lower and move through the court faster in 2003, i.e they put both trajectories side by side and the 2003 trajectory reached the baseline earlier and the bounce was lower.

I think this clearly shows that conditions have become slower with higher bounces.

Additionally, how many players and commentators have mentioned that the conditions are playing incredibly slowly. Only yesterday, Lindsey Davenport said the same thing.

here's the link for the serve comparison:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soJ_FVnijAw

Who is to say that if wimbeldon was as lightening fast now as it was lets say 20 years ago that Federer wouldn't lose to lets say Andy Roddick in 09 when their final was a hair away from going the other way.
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Sure no guarantee...but I haven;t seen Federer being beaten on faster surfaces regularly, certainly not by Roddick, nor by Sampras when Fed was still pretty young. It may happen but the odds are not as good as him being beaten by Rafa, Djoko or Murray with slow balls. Isn't it?

Well he couldn't beat the career baseliner Monfils on the fastest surface on tour, Paris indoors, could he? It's all hypothethical.

Yes emancipator, I know about this video but though it supports my point, I am not convinced by it as it only takes 2 seperate serves without knowing how much spin there is, the wind, and so on.

An average of pace towards the baseline woudl have been crucial.

To me what this video shows is that the new ball drags down towards the baseline and that is essentially due to the size of the ball:

1 - bigger ball means larger friction on impact.
2 - slows down faster.

And that is what allows Nadal to play closer to the baseline than he would elswhere. And this is why he did not have to adapt his game as much as people think. His strength is to be able to whack the ball and have enough time to inject his spin while retrieving balls that would be winners in faster conds.

This is why we have more rallies nowadays and not because of change to reyegrass as 2003 and 2008 have the same grass.

It's obvious that a smaller ball of the same weight woudl be flying much more. They do fly on French clay so they would fly even much faster on grass.

Simple_Analyst wrote:Well he couldn't beat the career baseliner Monfils on the fastest surface on tour, Paris indoors, could he? It's all hypothethical.

Not a very useful and accurate comment as usual SA, you are so biased, it should make Lydian ashamed to have you on his side. Fed coudl have beaten Monfils cause he had 5 MPs if I remember so it was certainly in his strings despite a delirious crowd. PLus he had just played every possible match in Shanghai, Stockholm, Basel and had had very little rest when plaing Monfils.

But hey it would hurt you to say, isn;t it?

Lol I wouldn't care whether Federer could win everything on faster conditions. You call me bias and inaccurate for pointing to one match last year when your hypothesis on Federer's fast court superiority is always pointed to his match against Sampras even though losing to another fast court player Henman next game.
Who cares how many MP's he had? He lost.

Fedal debate du jour.

laverfan wrote:Fedal debate du jour.

No. There is no debate. I am just explaining court pace evolution without smileys.

Wish you could bring something useful to a discussion instead of making fun of an important subject.

Simple analyst you must be the only person on the planet who thinks Fed plays better on slower courts than faster ones. He plays attacking, first strike tennis; obviously fast conditions would suit him. Besides, his resume attests to his excellence on faster courts.

Tenez wrote:

laverfan wrote:Fedal debate du jour.

No. There is no debate. I am just explaining court pace evolution without smileys.

Wish you could bring something useful to a discussion instead of making fun of an important subject.

Rye Grass/Moisture Retention/Hard Surface discussion has been done to death on 606v1.

This article was about Fed being 100%, look where it is now.

Have nothing to add to surface discussion. Henman's comments in the Time magazine article clearly state what he has issues with. Very few players play S&V now, which shows that the returner now has more time to chose where the ball goes. Does this mean the returners are better, courts are slow, <pick your favourite reason>,... ?

BTW, PE, CP, SA, UE, .... interesting choices for poster names? What does the 606 Index say?

You can continue this debate. and happy

I think Laverfan fan is getting paranoid.

Tenez wrote:I am at a loss.

Finally you say something useful Tenez

It doesnt take a rocket scientist to work out that if you take grass away in the service area you will be left with compacted earth. Compacted bare earth acts like a hardcourt. Therefore, like USO (USO being faster than Wimbledon grass), it shoots tennis balls through.

I'm still waiting for the reference to more clay being added every year after 2003

Seems to me that you dont so much explain court speed evolution as make it up as you go along - all to justify your Federer bias.

Tenez you say it yourself it is all hypothetical, what if the courts were faster the balls are quicker, or they banned modern racquets for that matter. Nobody can 100 percent predict the outcome. Wimbeldon can't be that slow as Roger a fast court player has won it 6 times. The fact is that in the real world, Roger has won 16 grandslams and has won many match because of his speed, movement, and defense. It isn't as cut and dry as you make it. Speed, fitness and athleticism has been an intergral part of his success. We can't live in hypotheticals and what if. What if other fast court players like Lopez, Llodra, Tsonga, or Roddick would have benefitted more than Federer if conditions were faster. Its all maybe, but the fact is Roger won a record haul of grandslams and for most of his career the conditions have been very consistent. Look at Borg, part of the reason borg never managed any success was that he never adapted to the modern racquet frame. He was one of the last holdouts to wood and never won a grandslam in the modern racquet era. Its part of the evolution of the game.

Simple_Analyst wrote:I think Laverfan fan is getting paranoid.

Your ability to "recognise" the two-letter acronyms, but feign ignorance, has already confirmed, that, which I hazarded to guess.

Welcome to 606v2 and your usual. Waiting for your favourite nicks to come out.

lydian wrote:It doesnt take a rocket scientist to work out that if you take grass away in the service area you will be left with compacted earth. Compacted bare earth acts like a hardcourt. Therefore, like USO (USO being faster than Wimbledon grass), it shoots tennis balls through.

It was certainly courageous of you to reappear on this thread and try to defend your ridiculous point. "Compacted bare earth acts like a hard court"! YOu right you ain't a rocket scientist!

Tenez and laverfan why don't you

No don't bother it wouldn't be the same if you did

Lol Laverfan. All the argument here has been on what players should or shouldn't do when injured and players should get over changes in surface conditions, you are rambling over things like Fedal debate no one is talking about. And what is it about favourite nicks.

Yes Wimbledon isnt SLOW, just slower.

I did some analysis of relativity for court speeds for the major ATP/ITF events on 606...happy to paste it again if people want to see it.

The key thing here is homogenisation...surfaces are being slowed down (USO, SW19) or sped up (FO - less dressing, AO - ACE to Plexi), plus they use Size 1 balls on clay to speed up and Size 3 on grass to slow down...and why? So we can watch the same style of tennis on all surfaces? We may as well DecoTurf the lot!
This makes it easier for one player to dominate all slams now because they dont have to vary their game as much as before...

I did some analysis of relativity for court speeds for the major ATP/ITF events on 606...happy to paste it again if people want to see it.

Go on...let's have a laugh.

Oh dear Tenez...you do realise that the earth is compacted everyday with 1000lb weights and will be highly fibrous underneath with grass roots meshing it together?
We're not talking flower bed earth here

I dont need any courage to appear on here, but it would appear you use dutch courage to post your ramblings!

Still waiting for the clay reference Tenez - another of your fallacies?

Tenez wrote: Go on...let's have a laugh.

...and all because the man supports Federer....pathetic.

You would find division in a point of singularity.

Oh dear Tenez...you do realise that the earth is compacted everyday with 1000lb weights
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Any reference to that? Another product of your fertile imagination?

Right. made up once again!

I am pretty sure they use 2 tons rollers (4500lb) and certainly not everyday.

I know this cause they gave our club a very old one ton roller they used to use but then upgraded to 2 tons rollers.

Locking this one too.