Wimbledon 2012

David Jimerson

David Jimerson

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After 30+ years of watching the game, who knew there were still things I've never seen before?

Tonight may have been the first tennis match in history to end in overtime.
 
Has anyone noticed the sound on the Centre Court when the roof is closed, even though it has daylight filtering through it sounds like a big closed hall
and it becomes an indoor tournament.

And the humidity can be a major problem with the hot crowds and it slows the ball down.

http://sports.yahoo.com/tennis/news?slug=ap-wimbledon-roof

Centre court ticket sales have sold faster with the roof, my wife and I saw the mens semis in 08 and the cost was a consideration with the UK weather.
We booked from Sydney and it did rain and we had the privilege of seeing the attendants drag the covers on for about 1/2 an hour .. for the last time.

125 years without a roof and there was a time when they didn't even have covers.

http://www.wimbledondebentureholders.com/articles/what_is_good_about_court_number_one

Cheers.
 
I don't know about "best ever" (2010 is going to be hard to beat), but it surely didn't lack for surprises and excitement.
 
Allan Black said:
Has anyone noticed the sound on the Centre Court when the roof is closed, even though it has daylight filtering through it sounds like a big closed hall
and it becomes an indoor tournament.

And the humidity can be a major problem with the hot crowds and it slows the ball down.

http://sports.yahoo.com/tennis/news?slug=ap-wimbledon-roof

Centre court ticket sales have sold faster with the roof, my wife and I saw the mens semis in 08 and the cost was a consideration with the UK weather.
We booked from Sydney and it did rain and we had the privilege of seeing the attendants drag the covers on for about 1/2 an hour .. for the last time.

125 years without a roof and there was a time when they didn't even have covers.

http://www.wimbledondebentureholders.com/articles/what_is_good_about_court_number_one

Cheers.
Click to expand...

Oh, the cover crew is still their doing their thing, even on Centre Court.

I know Barry thinks the roof should be closed all the time, but I don't think so. Should be as much of an outdoor, daylight tournament as possible. If you want night tennis, you've got the other Slams.
 
I think the roof should be closed when any reasonable person looking at the sky knows for a fact that it's going to end up closed; why go through the charade only to have to stop the match, freeze up the players, delay everything, have 'em warm up again, have 'em have to adjust to playing in a different scenario now, etc...

If it's sunny out, open the roof... grass court tennis is made to be played under the bright open sky. But if the forecast is that it's going to rain all week constantly (as it has been this tournament) and it's already been coming down prior to the start of the match, why on earth would you start the match with the roof open? Seems silly and counterproductive.

Anyway, yeah, best tournament ever, to me. Tomorrow's mens final is so high-stakes and so much pressure on both the contenders, that either one who wins is going to celebrate like nobody's business. Roger has a shot to redeem his goatness, overtake Pete's last two remaining records, reassert his relevancy to the top tier, and really prime his way for his ultimate quest, the gold medal in a few weeks on this same court. And Murray, sheesh, that guy is insanely fast and really does have all the pieces, if he can put them together I don't see why he doesn't have every chance to win, to get the monumental historical monkey off his back, to break his majors finals curse, and to perhaps break the stranglehold of the top three. He would be only the second outsider to win one of the last 30 majors... Maybe I'm romanticizing it, but I can't think of a recent major final with more at stake for each, with the possible exception of the 2011 French.
 
I don't know how you look at that and NOT feel the tug of the heartstrings for Murray. THAT would be a story.

The roof needs to be sussed out, that's for sure; the inconsistency and confusion this year was palpable. It was almost a character. That's not the kind of thing you expect from a Championships.
 
Yeah, that's all I'm saying there.

And Murray has the weight of, what, 90 years of pressure on him... but also, to be fair, he's got lots of years ahead of him, so if he doesn't get it done this time, he will undoubtedly be there again. As I watched that match immediately after Federer's masterful dismantling of Youhzny, I was thinking -- Federer can't beat this guy, look at him! He's awesome! I think it's all down to psychology between those two, whether Federer's years of experience and success will outweigh Murray's 0-3 record and the pressure... on pure ability they're both excellent but it was pretty obvious to me which guy was five years younger, so that could definitely be a factor...

Biggest surprise to me was Djokovic. Gone is the Djoker of 2011, and back is the Djoker of 2010. The Djoker who gets down on himself, who gets frustrated, who bounces the ball twenty times before serving... that ain't the same Djokovic as the guy who started off last year with the best run in history! Maybe he's back on the gluten, I don't know, but that's not the same guy at all.
 
I guess that 6th game in the 3rd set was the turning point. Kind of deflated Murray. Makes you wonder what the match would have been like if it had been a routine hold.

All congrats to Roger; he's certainly earned it.

Last couple of tournaments, though, I've really been thinking about when I first started watching tennis and didn't care about history, records, rivalry, any particular players, and really didn't care who won. I just loved watching the game being played well. There was something fresher about that time, and it was certainly more enjoyable then. :) I've been trying to keep that in mind for a while now.
 
Yep, something's up with Djokovic.

Because of the time difference here, the mens final starts at 11pm Sunday night, my wife and I watched the edited replay on Monday morning local,
after avoiding radio news about the winner.

Incidently it's a slightly different experience watching that version, you do miss the break and change of end times that come in a live show, you get a break too
and they do add to the experience.

But I was interested in the synoptics of the match, the roof in particular. After it closed, on TV the heavy rain completely drowned out the sound of the ball, and I'd say for the players. And when the Oz commentators paused, someones line audio compressor raised the sound way up, unreal.

And they mentioned it, referring to how the players coped. Along with the roof apparently the All England Club installed 'dew point' sensors in the court surface, 32 I believe.

I didn't hear at what point they consider the wet 'dew' a danger to the players, but it seems there's more to it than having a roof over their heads.

Federer is now the alltime champ after he played the new father thing with multiple nannie help.
Also wore a Breitling Blackbird watch for the presentation, scored points there too, beat me.

Cheers.
 
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