Happy New Year's B)

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Feliz Navidad!!

18

Söderhamn this weekend, kids played Lucia Cupen!
Söderhamn is indeed one of my favorite places to bring the kids to, the club is always welcoming and cozy, a bigger variety of players as many southerners attend, the hostel is right next door, and the best reason of all, all ages compete during one weekend rather than the norm: 2 two weekends.
What made me glad?
-the girls were hitting the crap out of that yellow ball! .. so fun to see them applying what we've been training!
-all my players are playing more relaxed, that is, not under the constant pressure of thinking: I should not loose! The shift towards: "It is OK to loose" is, in my opinion, vital for a player's development -as it is only then that he/she will apply what we practice as well as develop his own tennis identity and tactic.
-from youngest to the oldest, all showed how well they take care of themselves, without their parents.
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Niiice, As I write this, Rami has managed to turn around a 2-5 score, win the set and the match in 3 sets. She is in the final now. A great victory for our Rami :D
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Rami got cramps 3 times during the final, her previous 3 hour battle took all her energy depot. Anyhow, very proud of you little girl!
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Emilia time now, we gonna get the Christmas tree up, play a little tennis, her new favorite lacrosse and then build some puzzles. Tomorrow she has Lucia at her kindergarden :D

17

As the end of the year gets closer, there are many things to look back to,
starting with my favorite in the tour level - all of the following from different sites i like:
- The success of the ATP World Tour Finals has been well documented: already recognised as the best- attended indoor tennis event in history, the ATP has confirmed that the event, which was screened in 180 countries, had the most ever traffic for an ATP tournament.
- Players that retire: Amèlie Mauresmo , two time Grand Slam champion, former ATP #1 Marat Safin (RUS), Fabrice Santoro (FRA), Frederic Niemeyer (CAN) and 35 year old Spanish former doubles #1 Virginia Ruano Pascual - doubles only.
- players coming back: Carlos Moyá, with a protected ranking of #50, Martina Hingis, and the all time favorite Justine Henin who said her main reason to come back was her desire to conquer Wimbledon :)
- The best excuse - if you need one- to just take it easy on new year's eve: Five of the world’s top ten players; Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Nikolay Davydenko, Robin Soderling and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, plus 20th-ranked Stanislas Wawrinka will begin their 2010 season at the Abu Dhabi Capitala World Tennis Championship exhibition - 31st December.
Now we know that Abu Dhabi aint cheap when it comes to player incentives or having a world class venue!
- Someone asked me how much money Söderling has made playing tennis.. the answer is 7.5 million. American dollars...just under 2009. 2010 should be as generous, specially since he is gonna start at Abu Dhabi!

16

Just got back form the courts, I had the chance to play after coaching today. Hard training and a set to top it off. We went head to head not being able to break each other's serve until the tiebreak. I love this sport!!

A great weekend for my players..
I saw development, good spirits and the good sense of looking at a defeat from the big perspective.
Results are always the easiest way to notice that a players is improving, although it can also be a very deceiving way. In that matter, I am very proud of the boys and girls that played the SJCup this past weekend not only for the results but mostly for how they played, behaved, thought, spoke about their matches and even kept me informed at all times by text messages :)

Andreas Kibe made his comeback into the tournament life, a second place was a good incentive to keep him "coming for more"!

15 - mixed feelings

4 semifinals tomorrow morning. kids have been playing so well this weekend! Even the ones that did not make it this far. I am so proud.. mainly because they have been playing as we have practiced, rather than their own way :)
whatever the results in the morning, this has been the ATA's best tournament this semester :D
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3 am saturday/sunday night
"pst, man" .... "pst afro" .. I heard a voice on the distance as I walked home tonight. Experience told me: walk fast towards the taxi stop where there is always a crowd, unless you want 5 racist idiots jumping on your head. But I turned around, and what I saw hurt more than someone punching me hard.
One of my players selling hot dogs at 3am in the middle of the city. It was raining and he had been out for 5 hours in the same spot. Cold? Freaking freezing!!!
reality kicks in.
everything is relative.
I know all about picking up extra work as a kid to save cash for the next international tour or to get the new Nike Air Max, but never at 3am under the rain. !!!!??
:'(

14

the P11 team that came 4th in the playoffs this weekend. the kids deserved a better placing, but they sure did a good job, had a fun weekend and above all, FAIR PLAY :)

13

Saturday night glued to the screen watching the semis.. Söderling lost in the final tie break :/ it was a great day anyhow, my princess turned 2.5 :) I spend all afternoon with her, she sat on my lap and listen and sang her favorite songs for about 2 hours; had her favorite food, she poured milk all over me, called me her "sweet little daddy" and kissed me twice, once in the nose and once in my eye. I wish I could spend more time with her!

12

the difference between Söderling & Del Potro is that Robin cant turn a defensive position into an offensive one... and Martin can. Damn well too!

10

Master's week! Thank you Robin :)


I have been streaming some of the action on my MacBook and I can tell you, this is is a great investment.
-the commentators are the human version of google, also, they have been players, referees and ballboys at some point, experience!
-the technology blows my mind, or better , the way they use the technology!
slow motion and time warp plays mixed with all kinds of play and ball bounce analysis, and I mean ALL type of ball bounce analysis!! The game becomes so much more interesting, alive, and inspirational when one can see computerized images of where, statistically, the ball bounces: 1 & 2nd serve, crucial points and break points.
The height where the players hit the ball at different times of the match, early rise or late, behind or in front of the baseline.
----
off to cheer for Nadal, if he wins, Robin will surely pass on to the semis as number 1 of group B and meet Federer earliest on the finals...

8

Robin Söderling showing that he deserved his place on the Masters Final.
a great day for Swedish tennis... do we dare to dream in a semifinal spot?
Vamos Robin!!!



and, secrets from a stringer..

7

What a tennis weekend, a great one indeed.
Elin G came in 2n place after playing strong tennis.
Luise and Nadja came in 3 place both in the 11 class. Long and quite developing matches for the youngsters :)


The coaches education went well as always. It is so much fun to hold this seminars and help young coaches along in their development.. what it is even more giving is when the participants are eager about the subject and energetic to earn experience and develop their players.

6

1500kr gets you a one day ticket to the Barclay's Masters in London. 200kr an unlimited pass to stream all of the matches live an even watch them on demand. For 500kr all of the Masters tournaments for a year. I know now what I'm gonna get myself for Christmas :)

Robin starts tomorrow, the odds for him into making the semifinals are agaisnt him, but a tennis party will take take this week regardless :)

5

this match was doubtless one the most emotionally filled ones this year..
it gives me chiils just thinking about how it would feel to be in Monfils place, a finalist playing a homematch!

4

hmmm... I was googling a little of everything - too keep my thoughts of my itching tattoo - when I came across this article about a colleague of mine who works in Vallentuna - where the ATA was gonna train under the Björn Borg weekend.
Crazy Board I say!!

3 back in business!!

alright, was up half the night, not at Oscar's this time, but fixing the blog-which is finally up, NOT thanks to you Daniela :P
Best with the blog and the new settings is that now i can Iphone the entries and update all 3 accounts at once, Facebook, twitter and blogger. To the right you will find the twitter updates, which are most often news on coming up events, posts on what's going on, and tournaments pics.
enjoy :)

. The 11 year old team made us all proud yesterday at the seriespel sammandrag in Ljusdal. 22 wins out of 36 against 3 teams :) Joel Andreasson, Nadja and Jack Ydehall played great tennis!

. Halloween party at Sköns TK yesteday as well, busy weekend! We had a great time, Rami and the boys did a good job as always entertaining the kids and allowed me to just be a dad while at the club and spend some time with Emilia :)

2

So what is The American Tennis Academy? It is not a club, but a business, and we are in the tennis business!

The ATA is a strategic tennis network that includes 4 national team coaches both in tennis and track and field, 4 well known national coaches, Sweden’s strongest man, 2 of the biggest and renown clubs in the country, 2 smaller clubs in the region and TennisNorr, the northern tennis federation.

Our main goal is to develop tennis in a smart way, not by reinventing the wheel all over or by trying to do everything ourselves. We are not interested into competing with other clubs in the area; we are interested into stating a system that will allow our northern players to reach higher development levels and be able to compete nationally.

Numero 1

Hola! I decided to change my blog from "my tennis day to "my tennis week" so as to have a more realistic goal about how often to write. The main purpose with this blog is to express my ideas, frustrations and thoughts around my lifestyle: tennis.

In 5 days a very ambitious project is about to set sail, The American Tennis Academy …by Richie. The Academy started to take shape January the 17^th right after I met my former’s club accountant. It was on that day when I realized that there was not much I could do to affect the positive development of my tennis club. We had stagnated.