| Amidst naysayers, senior defends tennis' manliness (5/08) | | Print | |
| Written by Vietanh Phuong Tran | |
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Tennis is not usually perceived as a manly sport.
This isn’t surprising, since the tennis we see in recreational centers and most high schools consists of high-flying, bouncing balls, accompanied by whiffs and embarrassed giggles as a person misses the fuzzy sphere by a mile. Nothing is more boring than watching players awkwardly tap the ball back and forth amongst the cries of “40-love!” and listening to the noises — the graceless “boing” of the racket and the players exerting themselves in an orgy of grunts and groans, topped off by an occasional “Yeah! Come on!” Some people say that it’s not a sport at all. But there lies the error. Tennis, at the collegiate or professional level, defines sports. First of all, the players have a reason to grunt; they’re swinging their rackets with all the force they can muster in order to produce a 120 mile-per-hour meteorite. And as Newton’s third law says, for every action, there’s an equal and opposite reaction. If you’re on the receiving side, you have to catch up to this meteorite, transfer your weight to reverse the speed of the ball, hold your racket the right way to prevent twisting your arm off, strike the ball in the middle of the racket strings, run back to the middle of the baseline (one of the seven lines drawn on your side of the court) and prepare to run after the ball again. That’s like waltzing on the freeway and kissing the passenger door of every fifth car. High-level tennis, which is mostly about whacking the ball to a place your opponent can’t reach, requires finesse and quickness. A player must also be able to intercept these flashes of light and return them in such a way that the ball doesn’t fly into the next county. And each kind of stroke — backhand, forehand, volley, serve, between-the-legs, slice — requires a different combination of muscles and movements. Tennis is not a mindless sport. Remember those lines I mentioned? In order to win points, you have to aim inside the correct line depending on the situation. But to delve into that and the intricate scoring system would be torturous. What holds true is the fact that competitive tennis players have to strategize and plan a course of action that will force the opponent to “cough up” a point every time the ball is hit. In fact, complex decisions and adjustments have to be made every second of the game since the tables can be completely turned with a single gust of wind or an unexpected spin on the ball. All could be over when a bead of sweat drips into the eye, when the direction of the opponent’s serve is wrongly guessed or when a rowdy fan suddenly yells. What I’ve described is what experienced tennis players must handle. If you don’t appreciate that, you certainly have to recognize the enormous effort that people like Roger Federer and Ana Ivanovic have put into their training to get to this level. In a world where time can’t be stopped, to pursue a certain goal means something else is sacrificed, whether it be another sport, hanging out, hobbies or even an education (though I believe giving up school is a foolish choice). Dedicating themselves to this sport meant they had to run, hit and lift weights for hours every day. And what are they preparing for? The fight itself: the duel in which a warrior squares off against another in a match lasting anywhere from two to five hours. It is the particularly long battle that brings forth a feeling of a great accomplishment, especially for a professional playing a grueling match in the semifinals or finals. When the last point is won, there is a millisecond of silence as everyone wonders if the game is really over. Then the crowd, numbering up to twenty thousand people, erupts in applause and cheers in a standing ovation. To stand on the court, to hear this din brings forth a rush of euphoria — this is the climax of a lifetime of passion. Even if you can’t play professional or collegiate tennis, you can still watch it. You can marvel over the physical fitness of the players, or listen to the crack and wham or try to follow the ball with your eyes (it won’t be easy) as they blast shots back and forth. You can cringe every time someone almost gets a bullet to the head. Maybe you’ll even start to see tennis as something quite beautiful, even sensual — and I’m not talking about the grunting. |
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to listen.
