Saturday 14th May 2011

Two days to go until our first round match in the Delray Beach ITF and everything’s tightening up ready to compete.

We arrived at the Academy this morning at 9am and it was straight into the gym to warm up and go through some movement exercises before we joined Mandy Wilson, the Women’s Tennis Director, and the other main draw girls for our squad session. We spent the first 45 minutes drilling and then Devan played two tie breaks; one against Anna Wierda which she won 8-6 and then one against Daria Sharapova which she won 7-5. She performed well in both tie breaks but really upped her game against Daria and proved to herself that she can compete and beat top 300 players. After all of the other girls were done Devan wanted to stay on and drill some more backhands and by around 11.15am we were done. We then went into the gym to complete some core and band work before heading back to the hotel for some lunch.

Ladder work in the gym

It was quite quiet at Evert’s today as Saturday and Sunday are normally rest days for the Academy players but it was interesting to see how many players still wanted to get on court and do some training even though there weren’t any coaches around. All of the players that did train took it very seriously both on the court and in the gym which was great to see.

As I said yesterday I want Devan to do exactly what she wants to do in these few days leading up to her main draw match and she decided this afternoon that she wanted to hit some more so we headed back out to the Academy. We hit from the back of the court until Devan felt as though she was striking the ball well and then we ended the session with some serves and returns – it’s not about volume anymore, we’ve done that in the last week, it’s now just about tightening up any loose areas and making sure Devan is happy with the way she’s feeling on the court.

This evening Devan headed out to dinner with her Aunt and Uncle who have come down to Boca Raton for the weekend so it was “dinner for 1” for me at Villagio’s Italian restaurant in Mizner Park. The food there is great and tonight it was made even better by eating outside undercover while a huge thunder and lightening storm surrounded the town.

Tomorrow is our final day of preparation so we’re going to join the squad again in the morning before heading over to the tournament site in the afternoon.

Friday 13th May 2011

After a day and a half rest we were back on court today, the wrist held up and we had two great training sessions with the team at the Evert Tennis Academy.

We were in the gym just after 9.15am and once we had completed our warm up we were out on the running track to complete some specific movement work before going through some 5 second on / 20 second off energy system development work. We then started our on court session at 10am and it wasn’t long before Devan was back up to the level that she found earlier in the week and the huge plus was that her wrist was feeling much better. We spent most of the session working on Devan’s level from the back of the court but we also worked on her stability when coming forward and finished the session with lots of volleys. We decided not to serve this morning and to ice the wrist to make sure it was up to the pressure of playing points in the afternoon.

This week the USTA have given us breakfast vouchers for each morning but as we’ve already bought cereal we decided to use the vouchers to buy sandwiches from the restaurant and save it for lunch. Problem was the car gets pretty hot during the day so by lunch the sandwiches weren’t looking the best! It was quite nice to have melted cheese with my ham sandwich though!!

After lunch we warmed up at 2.45pm and the matches again started at 3pm. We didn’t catch the name of the girl that Devan played but she was the strongest player that Devan has faced on the trip so far and started the first set unbelievably well. The set was over in 30 minutes as the girl took everything on and hardly made an unforced error to take the set 6-2. In the second set Devan found a much better depth and managed to stay with her opponent for longer in the rally; this usually ended with Devan getting a shorter ball that she could attack and either win the point from directly or set herself up with volley to finish the point on the next shot. The girls exchanged a few breaks but at 6-5 Devan played a great returning game and took the set 7-5 – it was definitely the best she has played, competed and focused since we’ve been away so we were both very pleased. We then headed into the gym to cool down on the bike and then the foam roll came out to put us both through some pain!!

Devan in action this afternoon

Tomorrow we’re joining in with the Evert Academy players for a squad at 9.45am and depending on how Devan’s feeling about her game we’ll probably reduce the hours on court over the weekend to make sure she’s really fresh for her first match on Monday.

Thursday 12th May 2011 – REST DAY!

Today was our first proper day off on the trip, we did have one last week but as there was travel involved it didn’t really count as a full rest day.

So . . . what do players get up to on their day’s off? Simple answer is not much, most of the time they’re pretty tired so don’t want to do anything too energetic like walking around the shops or spending too much time in the sun but at the same time they don’t want a day that’s too boring. I always want the players to choose exactly what they want to do as it is “their day”, sometimes I’m not always a fan of what they choose but I’m sure they all get sick of me telling them what to do all day so I’m happy for them to boss me around for the day!!

Devan woke early so called my room and we had breakfast at the “earlier than I expected” time of 8am! We bought some breakfast from the supermarket a couple of days ago so now we just have to buy milk from the restaurant and make sure they don’t see us eating our own food (always a good challenge!). We had a bit of a break after breakfast and headed to the Mall at 10am so that Devan could attend her appointment at the Apple store. She’s been having a problem with her phone so she was very happy when they gave her a brand new one, just a shame she lost all of her contacts!

Next up was a trip to Boomers which is a huge amusement park right next to the airport. We played some of the arcade games, had a good game of mini-golf (which, after choking on a few 20cm putts, I just about managed to win!) and I had a my first ever go in a Baseball batting cage – great fun, the speed of the ball is a little scary but a great buzz when you finally make contact (and actually hit the ball forwards!!).

Finally got one! (Hope you can see the ball on the bat!)

After a good lunch at Whole Foods we were of to the Cinema to watch “Something Borrowed” – as I said earlier it was Devan’s day and this was one of the things I had to tough out! The film was ok, bit of a chick flick but I’ve seen a lot worse. It was then back to the hotel to chill out before dinner next door to the hotel at the Cheesecake Factory.

When we got back I loosened the tightness in Devan’s forearm and then she iced both her forearm and wrist so hopefully she’ll be ok for training tomorrow. She’s now moved into main draw so we’ll keep monitoring the wrist over the next three days to make sure she’s fit to play on Monday.

Wednesday 11th May 2011

Tough day today as the problem with Devan’s wrist flared up again and stopped us from doing as much as we would have liked to do.

We arrived at the Academy today just after 9.15am and hit the gym as usual to warm up.  We did an extended warm up this morning as we knew we wouldn’t get a court before 10am so we added in some movement, reaction and balance work to Devan’s normal bike and dynamic stretching routine. Before we started on court we also made sure that Devan’s wrist was fully warmed up and then bang on 10am Carlos managed to get us a court. The session started well and the wrist was holding up but as we added a little more pressure it started to ache so Devan made the very professional decision to stop and ice it. We tried to go back on court and hit some serves but again as she went into a harder flatter 1st serve it hurt again so we decided to stop and rest it. The USTA then allowed Devan to see one of their physiotherapist; he diagnosed it as slight wrist tendonitis and recommended that she rested it and got a massage on her arm and shoulders.

After showering and changing we headed off site to get some lunch before returning back to the hotel to rest and ice her wrist and forearm again. After we’d had a break it was still aching so we decided to not hit again but to go back to the Academy to go into the gym and also book a sports massage. We completed a very tough 3 sets of abdominal Planks and Supermans and then Devan completed all of her per-hab band exercises before she had her massage appointment. The therapist said that she was very tight in her forearm and that’s causing the pain in her wrist so she needs to keep warming it up and stretching thoroughly as well as icing it at the end of every session.

Tomorrow is our planned rest day so it’s probably come just at the right time to give her a break and hopefully let her body recover. She’s now moved up to number 1 on the Delray Beach qualies list so if she can move up 1 more place she’ll be in the main draw and it’ll give her a couple of more days before she needs to compete.

Tuesday 10th May 2011

Another great day’s training today as we spent the whole day at the USTA Headquarters / Chris Everts Tennis Academy and got involved with all the players and coaches there.

We were told yesterday that we might struggle to get a court before 11.15am as every court is either taken with the Academy programme or with the USTA programme so our plan was to get there for 9.30am to warm up and if we could get on then great, if not we’d hit the gym until one freed up. When we arrived we went straight into the gym to warm up on the bike first followed by completing all of our dynamic stretches – the coaches there were again fantastic and basically said we could use whatever we wanted! When we were all warmed up and ready to go we headed out and Carlos Zapata, the academy programme director, pointed us immediately in the direction of an empty court. We started the session just after 10am but it wasn’t long before we were asked if we wouldn’t mind moving a couple of courts down as Chris Evert was about to come on that court to do a lesson! As it’s her academy we thought we’d move down and let her have the show court!!

Another beautiful day in Boca Raton!

The session was going well but after about 45 minutes of aggressive hitting Devan’s wrist started to hurt so we took a break and iced it. As we were resting the girl from yesterdays video started training on the court next to us; her intensity and focus was again very good even when the first 15 minutes of the session started with her using Mini-Red, Orange and Green balls (oh, we also found out that she’s just turned 13 years old in January and has already had main draw wins in ITFs!). As Devan was planning on playing points in the afternoon we decided to give the wrist a rest and hit the gym. We completed a very tough 35 minutes on the bike followed by some core and injury prevention exercises. By this time it was around 12.15pm so we showered and changed and headed to the supermarket for lunch.

View from the bike!

Can you see us in the mirror?!

At 2.15pm we warmed up again, loosened Devan’s forearm and wrist up and then tested it out with some light hitting. She felt ok to play so at 3pm she joined in with the Academy to play a practise match against Anna Wierda. Anna was at Daytona Beach where she lost in the second round main draw and she played Plantation this week but lost in the last round qualies. It was a competitive match with Anna taking the first set 6-1 mainly down to Devan struggling with consistency but at 3-1 down in the second Devan turned a big corner and found a great balance between aggression and consistency to win the next 4 games to lead 5-3. Anna then upped her level and put more pressure on but Devan played a very strong but solid game to take the set 6-4. We decided to call it a day there as Devan’s wrist was starting to get a little sore so we iced it again before hitting the gym again to cool down on the bike (I think Devan’s sick of that bike now!) and then have a very thorough stretch out.

We ate tonight at Chipotle and even though the food was still “legit” the servers were being very tight with their portions so we weren’t best pleased! To add to it my burrito completely fell apart as it split at the side and then the bottom completely fell out so Devan had a good laugh at me trying to eat it in a civilised way!!!

Back to another full training day tomorrow and hopefully another match in the afternoon.

Monday 9th May 2011

It was a relaxed day today as we got everything packed up and relocated (for the 5th time on the trip!) to Boca Raton where we’ll be spending the next 4 days preparing for the Delray Beach ITF.

After an early start yesterday we had a bit of a lie in today having breakfast at 8.30am. Then it was a chance to sort out all of our clothes and get them all washed and packed up so that everything was clean going into our training week. We made the most of the laundrette on site at the Holiday Inn, it was pretty cheap to wash everything but the dryers took forever! After it was all finally done we packed the car and headed just over an hour north to Boca Raton to our hotel for the next two weeks – it’s going to be nice to spend some time in one place as we were starting to feel like Nomads!

This afternoon we decided to head over to Delray Beach to check out the tournament site and we were really impressed with what we saw; another immaculate park club with 24 green clay courts and a modern clubhouse. What we were rather disappointed with was they want to charge us $21 per session for us to train there this week – if we did 2 sessions a day until Thursday that would cost us almost $150 so we decided to head back to Boca Raton to the USTA Training Centre Headquarters to see if they might be able to help us out.

USTA Headquarters, Boca Raton

It was the first time that I’ve been to any USTA national training centre (apart from Flushing Meadows) and I was very impressed by what I saw. It wasn’t a lavish tennis centre that looked as though it costs tens of millions of pounds but it had everything you needed there including a great atmosphere. There are 14 green clay courts, 9 hard courts, a reasonably sized gym (that had everything you might need) and all of the facilities that players need to live and do school work etc. The most impressive thing was that everywhere you looked there were quotes by top American athletes; every wall in the gym and on the sides and back of every court were reminders about how hard you need to work and how dedicated you need to be to make it.

I wasn’t sure how the staff would react to a foreign coach and a player they didn’t know walking in and asking to use their facility but everyone of them were fantastic; they’ve allowed us to use the courts and the gym all week and we’ve arranged for Devan to play matches every afternoon with the girls based there. It was really nice to be welcomed in that way – I wish it was like that with every national association.

We had a great training session and Devan hit the ball really well – it was hard not to perform well with top ITF ranked players training alongside you and a really positive buzz in the air. As we finished training I couldn’t help but notice a girl training against a wall on the court next to us; she’d been doing it for about 45mins and her intensity didn’t drop one bit – how many juniors do you know that would be as disciplined and work as hard as this when they’re on their own:

The desire and attitude to make it?

After we were done we headed back to the hotel and then out for dinner at The Cheesecake Factory (before you think it, no we didn’t have any cheesecakes!!). While we were waiting for our table we bumped into one of the USTA coaches that I met last week in Daytona Beach, he was again really friendly and offered for his girls to play practise matches too – everyone wants a piece of us!! Our meal was actually really good and the menu was huge so we might be going back a few times in these two weeks (just for your information there are 33 different cheesecakes on the menu as well as a series of “weight management” meals!).

Sunday 8th May 2011

After the disappointment of losing yesterday Devan responded very professionally today and put in a very tough day’s training which marks the start of our preparation for the Delray Beach ITF.

Early start today; breakfast at 7am and we were on the court warming up at 8.10am. This morning we were in a park just opposite the hotel where they had a pretty good acrylic hard court (wouldn’t find them in a park in the UK!) as well as 3 basketball courts. We couldn’t book the court so we just got there early and then stayed on until we were done! It was a great session; we had an extended warm up followed by sprints and then we trained from 8.30am until around 10.15am working on specifics from Devan’s match yesterday. At 10.15am we moved over to the basketball court and Devan took me on in a very intense game of 1 on 1. It lasted over 30 minutes and I just scraped the win so I was happy! It was humid from the start of the session but by this time it was really starting to get hot and we were both absolutely soaked with sweat by the end of the basketball. From there it was straight into the gym back at the hotel and we spent another 30-40 minutes going through some strength and power work before Devan finished off with her pre-hab band exercises. It was a tough morning but very rewarding and I was very pleased with how hard Devan worked.

After a good lunch at Whole Foods we had a few hours off which gave Devan a chance to do some school work and get out of the heat! We then headed over to the Royal Palm Tennis Club to use their clay courts and get in some important point play (due to the tournament we couldn’t train there in the morning). By this time it was around 3.30pm and the heat and humidity were at their highest – it was great to experience that as it might be similar conditions in Delray Beach and you never know when your match will be scheduled. We completed a full pre-match warm-up and then went straight into a set. Devan performed well and even though it was hard for her to find her training level in the set she learnt a lot (without me commenting at all during the set) and mentally she was very good. By the end of the set we both needed a little bit of ice for a couple of twinges (me a lot more than Devan!) but that won’t stop us building on this tomorrow and for the rest of the week.

For dinner tonight we had a bit of a change of scenery and headed 25 minutes down the road to South Beach, Miami. It was very busy there and it was great to be out in such a buzzy atmosphere – the meal in Primetime was also amazing!

Tomorrow we’re on the move again as we’ll pack everything up and head back up the coast to Delray Beach to prepare for next weekend.