[Music]

Welcome to the Atlanta Tennis Podcast.

Every episode is titled "It Starts with Tennis" and goes from there.

We talk with coaches, club managers, industry business professionals,

technology experts, and anyone else we find interesting.

We want to have a conversation as long as it starts with tennis.

[Music]

Hey, hey, this is Shaun with the Atlanta Tennis Podcast,

Power by GoTennis. While you're here, please hit that follow button.

And after you listen, please share with your friends and teammates.

Also, let us know if you have questions or topics you would like us to discuss

and we will add them to our schedule.

With that said, let's get started with 10 minutes of tennis.

[Music]

Hey, hey, this is Shaun with the Atlanta Tennis Podcast,

Power by GoTennis. Check out our calendar of Metro Atlanta Tennis events at Let'sGoTennis.com

and be sure to register for the Fall Festival.

It is coming up. It's less than two weeks.

It is going to be awesome.

Today, 10 minutes of tennis with World renowned Tennis Coach, Australian in Puerto Rico.

Of course, who knows where he is today?

Justin, yeo, thank you so much for taking the time.

Today, we're talking about Dominic Thiem, who has retired, I guess last week, he retired.

And just couldn't take it physically.

Justin, is this a warning or is this just an example of how it usually happens?

Yeah, well, Thiem has also been very, I guess, spoken out about how tough and how grueling the tour is.

If you probably just before he even said all that,

Alcharez and Sinner have been saying for quite some time that this is the tour is a lot tough

and a lot longer and a lot further than it ever has before.

So expectations are probably a little too high as well for players.

So it is definitely something that Federer has brought up in the past as well.

And he joined the player association to try to help protect the players

to get them more money at the lower end,

that then they could keep their bodies and we didn't see so many players lose and drop out.

And then the other side of it was just how grueling the tour has become.

So it has been a big conversation about giving them more of an off season.

But I don't think his was necessary an off season.

His was just, he was a hard worker.

He was really, you know, believed in the work ethic.

But I have my questions as a talent development coach from Australia doing this,

from seeing ages from three or four to all the way to pro level.

We always say that you've got to take care of the hips, the shoulders, the wrist.

The knees. And if you don't do a lot of this stuff as a junior because you feel invincible,

there's a lot of things you can catch up with you.

And we've seen Del Potro, we've seen David Nelbandian, we've seen some really good players that

were peaking and doing really well. But, you know, Andrews caught up.

And it's actually can't say Andrews just recurring overdone joints that were tweaking a little bit.

And then eventually just got to the point where he can't do it anymore, which is where Nidalis,

I mean, Federis Neu was.

I want to quote from Dominic Thiem. He says, quote, I think the way we do the sport,

it's not healthy. And at one point, one or more of your parts of your body break down.

He says, you can see it with almost every player. There's no player who comes injury free through

their career. That's just the way of professional sport. And in my case, it was the wrist.

And this is from, so I quoted properly the guardian, I think.

And they've done a good article on what he's doing and why he's done.

And in this case, you mentioned Del Potro wrist as well. And I remember that clearly.

But it's the question then is it's a little bit of a chicken in the egg is probably the wrong example.

But is it bad training or is it just physically, you know, my body couldn't take it.

And Rogers could, we all wish we had the efficiency that Roger even appeared to have,

even though he worked a little bit harder at times than you would have wanted him to.

But the efficiency of winning points has got to be tough because if team wanted to win another

major, he needed to stay healthy and he admits something went wrong somewhere.

Yeah, yeah. Again, we need to learn from it because if we,

if we look at the way that played the ball, the way that struck the ball,

Federer had like Eastern forehand grip. So he used a ton of wrist.

You know, he had a very late lag on Federer's forehand. So you would think, you know, similar to the

team and he's going to have some kind of wrist issues. He hit a big one hand, a backhand just like team.

So where, what was the difference between him going till 39, almost 40 years of age with a still

healthy wrist? It was only his knee that pulled him out. So, you know, but coming back to what he was

saying that there's always one injury or one something that that recurs. Yeah, he's right. I mean,

there's a lot of players that walk on a court, saw an injured every single day. I mean,

Djokovic they called him the rubber man, but if you really look at him, he's got a lot of K-Tape

all over him and it happens a lot. It's just we don't take note to it because they just get out there

and they do it every day. Nadal 2009, 2010, I remember talking Uncle Tony in 2009 and they were saying

if he doesn't stop, if he doesn't slow down, he's going to have all these other long-term injuries,

you know, and it was only till this year, you know, 20 years later, or not 20 years, but 15 years later,

he's only just hanging up the racket. Yeah, and you mentioned the fact that the schedule is long,

but it's not like a team sport where you're forced to play when the coach puts you in. These guys can

manage their own schedule. And I can't, you want to be number one in the world, you got to get the

right number of points. I understand that. But if we look at, you know, the comments here and I

of the article happened to be looking at is about him giving it 100% he was fit, he was a hard worker

and they say he was tireless. He played weak after weak, rarely after coming up for error.

Is that not a red flag right there that you're just not taking the weeks off that you need to?

Maybe. I mean, part of the players now, they say, you know, close to 30 to 40% of their daily

routine is maintenance and it never used to be that way. It used to be, I don't know, 60, 70% on court,

20% or 30% almost was training like gym training and doing all the other stuff. And then your bands

and all the other stuff were just like, oh man, just let me bend over. Okay, I'm good ready to go.

You know, and then even the warmups like, you know, I mean, back in the days, you know, I've talked to

John Newcombe and they used to take a shuttle whiskey. I mean, there's all sorts of stuff that you

can say, the history of the sport to where it is now. And now it is definitely about a real athlete

if you're going to make it in this game. You know, we can't say that there's just talent because

you definitely need talent. There's no question. The hand-eye is, you've got to be invincible on the

hand-eye, but at the same time, physicality and mental is everything now. You've got to be a real

pure athlete now, you know. You need the talent, of course, which talent isn't necessarily something

you're born with. You can earn that. You can go out and practice and become talented.

You need the genetics. Today, these guys are 6'3", 6'4", and that makes a huge difference. You need the

the coach and the team and everybody helping you with everything. And in that case, you need all of

those things to get to the top, so to speak. And just getting there is one thing. Staying there is

the next question then. If the guys are 21 years old and at the top of the game right now,

Sinner and Alcaraz, as you mentioned, if those guys are already complaining about how hard the

season is, well, you know what guys? Take a week off. You are independent contractors. Take a

deep breath when you need one and quit your complaining. Am I missing something?

Well, you may be because there's a lot of endorsements. There's a lot of agents. There's a lot of

other things that you're responsible for. And you feel you're on a roll, so you don't want to stop.

Like, I mean, you know, as any tennis player, if you feel good, you want to get back out of the court.

And, you know, we all still do that. It's, I think the big one, as you said, they need to take a

breath. They need to take some space. It could be also back in the early days where players came up

quick and they just didn't have the team around them. And that's where a lot of things came unseen,

I guess. And then they come out later when you can't really fix something, you know, because

that's already done. So yeah, there's a balancing act there. That's why Federer is talking about,

you know, it's not a fair playing game for a guy who's 500 or a thousand in the world. He's playing

up against guys that have a whole team in their booth. And this guy, you know, can barely, I've always

said it. It's not easy for a tennis pro to bend over and do his shoe laces and take his shoes off

to the end of the day, you know. Even my wife, I get hurt and massage my knee because if I lean

over to bend my knee, to exercise or massage my knee, my hip tightens up and then I'm not loosening

up the muscles correctly that need to loosen up around the knee. So you need a team, you need someone

to support, you need to help, especially to do that many grueling hours on the court right now.

You know, I know you hit that ball so much harder than anybody else, you know. So physical is not

going to stop. It's going to be about maintenance and then obviously longevity of how much you've

got the spirit, you know, I mean, we've got a lot of it. Yeah, I just don't think we're going to see

many love ravi underdyle for a long time. That guy was just the ball. He was called the ball for a reason.

You know, he went through injuries, he went through taping, he went through taking six to eight to

nine months off and then coming back and just showing it again over and over and over. So who knows team

team maybe needs to take a year or two off and maybe he'll do just like Murray and come back again.

That's sort of the thing these days. I'm retiring again. You know, I'm retirement. It's coming up.

Well, Justin, we will definitely miss Dominic Thiem, but you will see you again next week. So this

has been 10 minutes of tennis with Justin. Yo, I appreciate your time and we'll miss Dominic Thiem,

but we always get to see you every week. So thank you, sir. I appreciate it. Good luck Dominic.

Go again. We'll see you when you on retire in a few years. Yeah, yeah, keep it up, buddy. Thanks,

mate. See you later. See you.

Well, there you have it. We want to thank reGeovinate.com for use of the studio and be sure to hit

that follow button for more tennis related content. You can go to Atlantatennispodcast.com. And while

you're there, check out our calendar of tennis events, the best deals on Tecnifibre products,

tennis apparel and more. If you're a coach, director of any racket sports or just someone who wants

to utilize our online shop, contact us about setting up your own shop collection to offer your branded

merchandise to the Atlanta tennis world. And with that, we're out. See you next time.

[MUSIC]

[Music]