The Road to Rafa Part 4: London Calling

Wimbledon/London Pictures:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/demiace/sets/72157619262170458/

EuroStar and Chunnel

Taking the Chunnel from Paris, I arrive in London about 2 hours later.

Recommended to me by a fellow tennis coach, I decided to try this instead of another flight - traveling in a business class environment for 30 miles on the undersea rail tunnel.

Personally, I would skip the Chunnel ride as it was not really worth the price over flying. Plus not a lot of scenery along the trip.

It takes you under the English Channel while seeing the French northern country-side. However, the day trip I took to Normandy on that Memorial Day was definitely more exciting. Sites included Tour stops at Pointe du Hoc, American Cemetery, Battery of Longue-sur-Mer, Caen Memorial, plus Juno/Gold/Omaha Beaches.

Wimbledon: The All England Club

Getting on the grounds was pretty exciting. The day before I had arrived in the afternoon and unfortunately was closed just before I could get in.

Can you tell me how to get to Wimbledon?
If you're taking the Underground Tube, just remember that the closest stop is not the one called "Wimbledon". That is actually just a giant shopping mall nor is it the one marked "Wimbledon Park".

You want to get off at the "Southfields" station:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southfields_tube_station.

Guided Grounds Tours

I would definitely check the Wimbledon tour schedule ahead of time. A good time to take a tour is in the morning when the crews are still working on the lawns.

Wimbledon was the crowning star stadium of tennis for me. It is where so many growing up as boys and girls have dreamed of getting to ever since they first hold a racket or watch it on TV.

That year, I was lucky enough to see the center court on the first year that they put up the retractable roof completed.

The Wimbledon Roof Opening took place just days ago I took this picture in late May, with Andre Agassi, Steffi Graf, Tim Henman and Kim Clijsters playing its first ceremonial match of mixed doubles. See the BBC report that actually had Andy Murray meeting with his idol Andre Agassi at that ceremony.

Wimbledon Museum

When you purchase your entrance ticket, you can enter with or without the museum option. I would definitely opt to see it, if you have not been before or are a fan of the game/history. It has many amazing tennis artifacts dating back over a century and a half.

Most Recently when I was there, they added a window display of the clothes/shoes that Nadal and Federer wore during their epic 2008 Final. It was also the last year before the roof was built over center court.

Rafa's Footsteps

As you can see, my shoe size is a bit smaller than Rafa's =)

Yes, I was lucky enough to bring my tennis clothes, shoes and racket with me on the tour. Getting right there on Wimbledon grass with a chance to hit/serve one ball is a dream come true for any tennis player.

The view along the outside courts was also amazing, especially without all the crowds and chewed up grass you will see once the tournament begins.

Player's Conference Room

Olympic Gold

This year in 2012, the Summer Olympics will be held at Wimbledon - using the top 4 courts in the tournament. The Gold Medal match will be held on Centre Court.

Rafael Nadal is only the 2nd man in history to win an Olympic Gold in singles along with the 4 Grand Slams in their career (Andre Agassi is the other).

Best of luck to Roger Federer plus tennis players all around the world who will be playing for international glory this summer in London!

For more sights and places to see while in London, please see the rest of this article below.

Read more about my Tennis Travels

Exploring the City of London...

I would say that even 2-3 days is more than enough to see central London. Even if you leave 1 day to just Wimbledon, it is more than enough. There just is not that much to do there except museums but I did enjoy a few outdoor marketplaces (Piccadilly Circus).

Taxi's are just really expensive and they will not take Euros. Riding around everywhere in the Underground or "Tube" as they call it, can get you to most of the places you need to be at.

Staying in Knightsbridge (London)

My balcony suite view in Knightsbridge. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knightsbridge - near Hyde Park (where I went to find tennis courts) and great if you love shopping.

Sheraton Belgravia -
Redeemed for a very good price of $60 + 4000 points per night. In an area that normally goes for 200-500 GBP /night. They also provided a complimentary gym pass down the street.

What was cool was because it was not a crowded week, I was upgraded with my SPG card to one of the two "Executive Rooms" at the penthouse suite level. Great view! Also, this hotel was just about 2-3 blocks from the nearest Underground station so it was very easy to get around town.

Hyde Park and Tennis Courts

When you walk around London, you realize that there is a surprising amount of green space. Hyde Park is located near Buckingham Palace and offers acres of grass to take you through the city - very much like Central Park in NYC.

Tennis in London

Playing tennis there though, generally seems reserved to mainly the club players as I did not see many public courts available.

I also stopped by Wimbledon Park, just outside of the All England Club which had both hard courts and some astroturf courts but had fixed membership or drop-in fees attached to playing there. I spoke to one parent who had a daughter taking lessons from the pro there.

ITN (International Tennis Number), a tennis rating system used by the ITF - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Tennis_Federation#Player_rating_and_registration

The pro and most players there seemed hesitant to let anyone new play there and declined a friendly match even when I offered to pay for a quick set. Apparently, they have never heard of pick-up games either plus no practice walls I could see. Unfortunately, without better grass-roots tennis organizations, it may be a very long time before they have another tennis champion in the UK.

Here is the British tennis rating sheet and schedule of lessons given at Hyde Park. Notice that the lower the rating number, the better the player...which is the opposite of NTRP ratings in the USTA.

Harrods and British Fashion
Interestingly enough, the Brits actually have many stores that import American brands, as they consider our fashion in style. Ironic that we buy Burryberry and other UK brands for their flare here too.

By the way, it seemed like many of the British women love the sound of an American accent. Not sure why, but was a huge bonus over there.

They have a giant department store near Knightsbridge called Harrods. It even has a dress code and requests backpack holders to carry, not wear their backpack, for fear of knocking over something!

Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, London Eye

Hmm, I was expecting something grander but maybe I had to go on a tour to get the full effect. However, I was not blown away by the sights there, to say the least. It can be a bit exhausting wading through the large crowds of tourists looking to get their pictures taken.

Luckily, it only rained one day while I was there, but definitely check the forecast and pack appropriately!

The London Library with original manuscripts such as the Magma Carte was worth a look though.

Also interesting were all the specialty museums that are everywhere, like one for Transportation (trains), Movies and Cinema (movie props from shows), and Science + Natural History museums.

Some things I noticed in Britain

Taxis
Although very interesting to look at, I think getting around in a Taxi is pretty much too expensive (see receipt)...I went about 1 mile and the cost was about $7 - did it for the experience and souvenir receipt I guess.

Bars and Pubs
Almost every day after work, it seems like their entire working population is at the local pubs. They are around every corner and have names like "Fox and Hounds" or "Bear and Staff". I tried some Fish and Chips at one and it wasn't bad at all. They do love their beer and happy hours in the UK though.

British Underground Tube
Everything in the Underground, including the announcements, was over the top polite - "Please mind the gap", it calls out over the loudspeaker as a subway approaches.

Also, they encourage people to buy "Oyster Cards" or rechargeable fare cards. The card itself costs money too, and unless you really want it for a souvenir, I would skip it.


In the future, I plan to visit a few more of the grass tournaments:

Queen's Club, Halle & Stuttgart - possibly before Federer retires.

I was fortunate enough to see the Hall of Fame tournament in Rhode Island and attended the retirement ceremony of Andy Roddick and Kim Clijsters!

Read more about my Tennis Travels

The Roadmap to Rafa - Summer in Europe

• Prologue: The Journey Begins with a Dream...
  
• Madrid, Spain (Mutua Madrid Open): Nadal vs Federer Final on Clay
• Barcelona (Sanchez-Casal Academy): Training next to a French Open Champion
• Paris (French Open): I sat 3 rows behind Rafa
• London (Wimbledon): Church on Grass
• Rome (Italian Open + Vatican): the Soul of Tennis People

"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the places and moments that take our breath away."
- Anonymous

The Road Toward Rafa's Renaissance

Years have passed since my first summer tennis tour of Europe. Updated in 2020, after Rafa's 20th GS. The memories are still warm.

On this self-guided five-city tennis journey, I flew to Spain, France, and Great Britain to retrace the footsteps of the tennis legend and my personal hero - Rafael Nadal. Along the way, I discover many wonderful cultures and met individuals from all walks of life, all of whom celebrating tennis.

I've had some time now to reflect and recollect my thoughts and memories from my experience.  It was a colorful journey, sharing the road with many friendly characters helping me along the way. Hopefully, my story will inspire you as Rafa has helped inspire me in life.

"We always talk, speculate, dream or maybe even playfully plan about these adventures - but how often do you meet someone who has followed it through in their lifetime and talked about it..."

        

From the red crushed clay of Roland Garros to the freshly mowed lawns of Wimbledon - the boundless empire of tennis stretches. Spanning three countries (Spain, France, UK) with all her tennis territories united together in glorious victory by Rafa, less than a year earlier. 

When seeking the Wise Man atop the mountain - you end up learning more from climbing up that mountain than you ever would from meeting the wise man.

I sought out in an ambitious quest to pay homage to the Nadal Kingdom of Tennis.  This presented an appealing opportunity to see a "Summer in Europe" - centered around tennis, was too good to pass up.

Pictures of Nadal vs Federer at the Madrid Masters 1000

Summer 2019 Update:
I was able to visit Rafael Nadal at his home island of Mallorca for 3 days! I met Uncle Toni and Naomi Osaka for the first time on the same trip.

Part 1: Madrid, Spain

Madrid, Spain

To truly understand someone I knew, could only be done by walking in his shoes...only by sweating on the same soil as the young master. First, it was to the Spanish capital of Madrid. A land of bull rings, beautiful open parks, lots of artists, and Gothic-style buildings from another era.

Being my first time venturing to Europe, I was both anxious and excited - unsure about the language barriers and not knowing what to expect as an American traveling solo in Europe, but excited to be immersed in a new world of tennis, art, and culture.

ATP Masters 1000 on Clay

The Madrid Masters, was oddly the first-ever ATP Masters 1000 level event I had ever attended even though 3 of them are in the USA. The facility was brand new, designed around the Caja Magica (Magic Box) that has a close-able roof and surrounded by water. The metallic seats give a very airy feel, but the echos of that place when Rafa is on-court is like a soccer match.

Caja Magica (Magic Box) in Madrid Spain

The previous day's Semi-Finals was the longest ever 3 set match in Professional Tennis History at the time. Pitting Rafael Nadal against Novak Djokovic 3-6, 7-6 (5), 7-6 (9). I still remember the yelling and cheering and celebrations that went on nearly 20-25 minutes after the last point. Truly an epic. The next day, it was the classic battle - Nadal vs Federer, on clay.

Luckily, I had found 1 single ticket left buried on the online system, and I wisely reserved it in advance. Fans and friends had anticipated this match-up for weeks! I was very fortunate and excited...probably only one of a non-Spainards in that stadium.

Even a Crown Prince of Spain had come to pay tribute to the huge sporting event!

If Tennis were a religion, this trip would be the Holy Pilgrimage every true tennis fan must invoke at least once in your life...

Finding myself with a few weeks between career moves and motivated by a newfound sense of freedom, I set off to see it all but little more than a week with just a rough idea and a tennis dream to plan it all out...

Part 2: Barcelona, Spain

Later, I enrolled for a week alongside other tennis professionals at his former Academy of the Sanchez-Casal in Barcelona for a week. Thereby seeing the life of other young rising juniors could I truly begin to understand how he grew up.

That was where his talents were nurtured to yield his genius, his style, his influences, and development as a player starting out.

The Sanchez-Casal Academy had been featured on Tennis Channel as the premier tennis facility in Europe. I really wanted to go see for myself. After all, the red clay was where most of the great champions had started and Barcelona is just a terrific beach city for young people.

Pictures from inside the Sanchez-Casal Academy - training on the court next to that year's French Open champion.

The camp was located a few kilometers away from my hotel, so every morning I would walk across the main highway and trek down a small road next to a river. This is where students and the local academy bus would pick up and drop off the kids. At the main intersection was the city bus that would take people to the city.

Inside the Academy were acres and acres of Red Clay tennis courts! I had never seen so many before in one place before. Kids as young as 4-5 years old were busy swatting away as their coaches would hand-feed them. A few years later, I would take the coaches program back in the USA at Naples Florida.

For lunch, we would enter the same dining halls as young students. Many of them were teenagers, sent overseas by their parents to train there. Andy Murray's mom had sent Andy there for a few years and helped him develop his patience for the clay, which in turn improved his defense and footwork...a key reason for his win at the US Open and finally Wimbledon.

As you exit the lunchroom, you see overhead the glass frame of the Davis Cup final victory of Spain.

Spanish Davis Cup Jersey - the origin of Nadal's glory, where all of Spain and the rest of the world learned of his name.

After the morning private lessons and workouts. In the afternoon after lunch, I would train with the Spanish Coach (Daniel "Dani" Sorribas). He was the junior coach of Argentina's Canas when he was little, Dani told me. The drills were designed to emphasize footwork and improving dynamic movement, rather than simply racket technique or swing motion that they do in the US.


The 13 drills are laid out very specifically for "X" "V" on the court, and swing volley patterns within the court. Rapid hand acceleration and stamina burning exercises are the norms here. If there was one thing I remember, it was the advice: "Save your feet for tomorrow", Dani said...I knew I would need it!

Overcoming the pedestrian fear of Travel and exploring the World

It seems that every year around this time late in the Spring as the weather is becoming just warm enough to go outside in the morning without a sweater, the idea of travel comes to my mind.

Specifically, it is the idea is seeing the French and Wimbledon grand slams together.  At first, I always envisioned this to take place on the honeymoon trip (Paris / London) or take a leisurely drive on the Autobahn with a factory-ordered BMW.

Over the years, this tennis idea takes many different shapes and forms as in a daydream floating around like a feather on a light summer breeze...re-animated just the slightest whenever there is another exciting ATP event is televised on the air. 

 

But whether it was work or family or other earthly commitments - something more urgent always seemed to always brush aside these well-intended notions; "Europe is too far", "You don't have enough vacation days", "The exchange rate for the Euro is bad this year" - the fears and reality would talk me down like Icarus and his paper wings...not too high now.  Whatever it was, there's always one excuse or another that was able to hold me back.

What surprised me was it took a short monologue on the season finale of "Amazing Race 14"  to trigger the epiphany that would eventually allow me to overcome these previous seemingly un-scalable mountains of time, distance, and price.  It was like Destiny calling through the DVR in replay mode...the timing and relevance were uncanny:

   

"My entire life, I felt like I've done what was expected of me - what was the right thing to do.
This was my opportunity to do something that everyone thinks is a crazy thing to do. And I'm just so grateful! I come out of it feeling there are no sort of "walls" or "rules" in terms of what we have to be.
What's been enlightening to me in the race is you can have a lot of fun! - just doing the crazy, unexpected, and completely unconventional; and it makes life sorta interesting."

- Victor Jih (winner of the Amazing Race season 14) 

So I thought to myself, well if not this year, then you'll wait for another - then another, then another..."So if not now, then when?", I asked myself. How much longer will Rafa and Federer still be competing for 5-sets to win championships in epic fashion. Will you get another chance to go see Nadal on clay if you don't go now?

Damn the torpedoes...I'm going to go for it!

You should too before you get too old to enjoy the adventures of life, remember to live it once.

Plan for it well in advance if you want to maximize your enjoyment but make the leap.

Blog it, selfie it, capture it, share it, but at least you will know that you went for your dreams.

Part 3 - Paris, France...my journey continues at Roland Garros

Editors' note:

My goal is to try to help others in their 20's and 30's plan a tennis vacation of your own.

Travel in Europe is quite affordable by air and staying at AirBnB's can make your stay even more authentic as you learn about the cultures from the natives of Spain, France, England etc.

Read more about my Tennis Travels.

The Roadmap to Rafa - Summer in Europe

• Prologue: The Journey Begins with a Dream...
  
• Madrid, Spain (Mutua Madrid Open): Nadal vs Federer Final on Clay
• Barcelona (Sanchez-Casal Academy): Training next to a French Open Champion
• Paris (French Open): I sat 3 rows behind Rafa
• London (Wimbledon): Church on Grass
• Rome (Italian Open + Vatican): the Soul of Tennis People

One Tennis Pilgrimage - sharing my own chapters...from the modern gospel of Tennis.
Stories from this Tennis Player's "Camino de Santiago" trail.

"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the places and moments that take our breath away."
- Anonymous

The longest tennis match in history

(Jun 22-24, 2010: Wimbledon Court 18)

America's John Isner vs France's Nicolas Mahut

• 11 Hours, 5 Minutes...length of game time
• 6–4, 3–6, 6–7(9–7), 7–6(7–3), 70–68...match score
• 8 hours, 11 Minutes...length of 5th set alone
• 168 consecutive games held on-serve (no breaks since 2nd set)
  
• 113 aces for Isner - at 4 points per game, 6 games per set, that's ...
• ~4.7 sets worth of one shot, zero contact, service Aces!

Ok, so everyone in the world probably heard about this game. I saw ESPN's front page go from World Cup coverage to reading "To Infinity and Beyond!!". It is absolutely incredible what these guys accomplished on the tennis court and will never be repeated again....

I actually attended the same Saddlebrook training academy in Tampa back in '06 that Isner credited for toughing him up to go the distance: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j95b7U3bOgY#t=1m33s