Tangents

I'm covering the early rounds of the Western and Southern Open for Tennis Buzz, and I have five reports so far at the site. (Several more in progress.) As time permits, and because I can't put all the photos I'm happy with into the posts, I'm also tweeting some snaps (@b_ribbons) and uploading others to Flickr albums. The sets so far:

Sunday practice - Jelena Jankovic
Sunday night doubles - Fognini/Fyrstenberg vs. Garcia-Lopez/Giraldo
Saturday practice - Jelena Jankovic
Friday night - draw party

Over breakfast, I was skimming through the tournament program, which includes a Pete Holtermann interview of Tony Trabert. This paragraph in particular caught my eye (especially in light of Connors's not-too-successful stint with Sharapova last year):

PH: John McEnroe was on your Davis Cup team. What was he like to coach?

TT: John McEnroe played his first Davis Cup ever when I was captain. And he played great. With all sincerity, he was the most coachable player I had on those teams. The only thing I couldn't get him to do was to behave on the court. And I talked to him the whole time about that. He came to all the team meetings, he came to all the team dinners, and when we worked out a strategy for a given match he would use it to a tee. And he was very gifted. Conversely, Connors was not coachable at all.

I am, as always, wishing that I could be in twenty places at once, and at the same time delighted at what I happen to see just running around, even when I don't have my camera handy (or using it wouldn't be appropriate) -- yesterday in the stairwell to/from the players lounge and media center, Stan Wawrinka was walking up (reading his phone, mais oui) as I hurried down. I didn't get to the mixed zone for Monfils because I didn't want to miss Taylor Townsend's conference in the main room:



I also glimpsed her in practice Saturday morning and watched her match against Riske Saturday afternoon. Y'all, she is so much fun to photograph, and a pleasure to listen to, too, what with her great attitude and perspective. She clearly enjoys learning and playing (the gist of her philosophy is that win or lose, she wins, and it's fun), including the figuring out how to keep things basic rather than over-complicating them (as in, during a match, she needs to go for the win rather than riffling through all the options at her disposal). She entered the press room laughing and joking with members of her team, and it ended with laughter as well (someone asked about her hat, and she cheerfully admitted that it was for the look (hadn't gone fishing ever).

Matches start at 11, but there are practices going on even as I type, so it's time to wrap up my prep and head to Lindner. More soon!

This entry was originally posted at http://bronze-ribbons.dreamwidth.org/383767.html. I see comments at DW, IJ, and LJ (when notifications are working, anyway), but not on feeds.