Tennis Temperament

by SARAH PALFREY COOKE

1

ANYONE who has played tennis at Wimbledon has a special and sentimental feeling about the lines from Kipling’s “If” which are printed on a placard just over the entrance to the center court: —

I have often wondered how many famous players from how many countries have glanced up at them. Sometimes they flash by as you hurry past. Sometimes they penetrate more deeply. You are always conscious of their presence.

They suggest to me what all of us, whether or not we play at Wimbledon or in tournaments anywhere, must learn sooner or later: perspective. The world, and particularly this country, seems full of people who ruin their pleasure in a sport by taking it too seriously. Don’t do this to your tennis! The gloom you can create for yourself on a sunny afternoon just because you’ve lost a tennis match — or missed a few setups!

The only person I can think of who is less attractive than a sullen loser is a gloating winner. Fortunately for all of us, tennis has a way of ironing out temperamental wrinkles. You may find an occasional dub who will “call his own shots” (call a ball out when it’s good) or “accidentally” make a mistake in the scoring. There are mediocre golfers too who edge their balls out of bad lies and forget to count how many shots it took to get out of the trap. But the top-notch golfers are inevitably keen and honest competitors, and so are tennis players who have been subjected to the discipline of the game at its best.

Matches aren’t won by racquet-throwers. Players who have never been taught to control their tempers are likely to learn on the tennis court through bitter experience. I remember seeing a player once at Pinehurst, North Carolina, lose both his match and his racquet in a way he’s not likely to forget. In a furious moment he heaved his racquet over the fence and onto the golf course. By the time he’d finished sulking and slowly made his way out back after his racquet, no racquet was in sight. He spotted it finally, disappearing across the fairway under the arm of a very small caddy. The punishment for losing your temper on a tennis court isn’t often so vivid as this, but punished in one way or another you will certainly be.

It’s hard, of course, to preserve this competitive spirit if you’re a consistent loser. You can’t love trying to win if you don’t expect to succeed, sometimes. Losing may be good exercise, but it’s not very stimulating from any other point of view. My sister Mianne once said after a string of defeats, “I’m getting to be the most graceful loser in tennis, but I’d like a little practice in winning gracefully too!” (This can’t have been the year she won the National Indoor Singles.) I know how she felt: I’ve had plenty of practice in losing gracefully myself.

Hardest to analyze, intangible and yet decisive, is the quality in a winning temperament which we call the will to win. You must have seen it in action; I hope you’ll feel it rising in yourself when you need it. It shows itself in many ways, but I think it’s most vividly apparent in a determined last-ditch refusal to admit defeat. Think of Bobby Riggs, Bitsy Grant, and Pauline Betz. A real competitor is never beaten till the last ball has bounced.

A match point dramatizes another vital quality: concentration. Good tennis demands it constantly, not merely at one critical moment, but throughout your match. In the best players concentration is a good deal more than the negative refusal to be bothered: it’s a positive process of narrowing down, of shutting out everything extraneous. Helen Wills’s unusual concentration was a fascinating study. You too, through conscious effort, can train your eyes not to wander off the tennis court, and your mind to devote itself only to what’s going on inside those white lines.

The better your tennis, the more certainly you will realize you have to bide your time and wait for the openings. You will often face a cool, steady opponent who tempts you to hurry things. Don’t be drawn into the trap! He knows that tennis matches are won and lost on errors, and he hopes you will end by beating yourself. Don’t oblige him.

But patience is not caution. There are chances to be taken in tennis — at the right moment — and matches to be lost by hanging back. These are the psychological moments in a match when the tide is ready to turn either way. Remember, if you are tired, that your opponent is probably tired too. Remember, if you’re discouraged, that he’s had his reverses. Experience in these crises will help you to call on your reserves and rise to the occasion.

The final round of the Davis Cup matches played at Wimbledon in 1937, between Germany and the United States, produced one of the finest examples of “nerve in the pinch” I have ever heard of. I wish I had seen it. Don Budge was trailing Gottfried von Cramm 1-4 in the fifth and final set of the deciding match of the series. It had been one of those amazing matches in which more placements than errors were made. This doesn’t often happen. Von Cramm was hitting so hard and so deep in the final set that Budge had no chance to get in to the net. It was then, at 1-4, that he decided, since he wasn’t winning from the backcourt, that he must run in at all costs. And he did. He ran in on practically anything. He even volleyed deep drives and followed them to the net. The tide turned. Budge managed to pull out the set and the match.

At Forest Hills in the semifinals of the National Singles in 1938 I saw this kind of daring at very close quarters. In fact it was on the other side of the net from me. I was leading Alice Marble 5—2 in the second set, having won the first. The score was 15-40 on Alice’s serve: two match points for me coming up. Then Alice started an attack of net rushing and putting on the pressure which I could find no way to stop. She won the match 5-7, 7-5, 7-5. But the turning point came at the first match point, when she dared to take a chance.

2

A CRISIS suggests nerves, and nerves are closely allied to tennis temperament. Nerves and the damage they do. Nerves and the need to govern them. I used to think my own nerves were unique, and made the mistake of supposing that no one else knew anything about the dreadful sensations they could produce. Actually, of course, many people know what I’m talking about: the paralysis that tightens your arm and turns your feet into great gobs of lead; the nightmare slowness of all your movements; the weakening of the knees which makes your legs feel like two overcooked pieces of macaroni; the butterflies dancing around in your stomach — and incidentally blurring your vision; your mind gone blank, as if it could never function for you again. It’s all very sinister, and enough to make you ask yourself if it’s worth playing tournament tennis when such things can happen.

I was so young when I began to play in tournaments that novelty and unfamiliarity weren’t my problems. Crowds never disturbed me; on the contrary, I’ve usually found them stimulating. A small group of friends, sitting so close to the court that I could hear their remarks, has sometimes been more upsetting to my concentration. As a junior I think I was nearly always confident and at ease, because I could hold my own with other juniors and not much was expected of me in senior events. Then when I was seventeen I was chosen to play in the third position on the Wightman Cup team, representing the United States against Great Britain. For the first time, something really impressive was demanded of me. But my game wasn’t equal to the demand, and I found myself on the center court at Wimbledon completely out of my depth. The match itself was over very quickly, but the effect on my nerves of this first shattering of self-confidence lasted for many years. Lasted, in fact, until I did two things: until I recognized my nerves as nerves, to be understood and used; and, even more important, until I set about improving my strokes.

If, therefore, you are a high-strung person whose nerves are likely to cause trouble, I hope a few suggestions of mine will help you. First of all, don’t make a secret of your nervousness. Talking about it helps, and laughing, if possible. It strikes me that many of the young players today are very sensible about such things. Last summer I heard some boys and girls singing a song they’d invented, called “The Steel Elbow.” That means what you might guess: paralysis of the arm, on match point or at some other inconvenient moment. I’m sorry I’ve forgotten the words of the song; they were very funny. I thought at the time that jokes like this must be a fine antidote for the jitters, if not a complete preventive.

The value of experience and the mysterious ways of temperament are to me the essence of a behind-thescenes story about Suzanne Lenglen. It’s the tale of a night before a match, the match between her and Helen Wills. They played, once only, at Cannes, in 1926. Most tennis players know what happened on the court: that Suzanne won in two fine, hard-fought sets, 8-6, 6-3. But not many people have been told what happened the night before, how the two players prepared for the encounter.

As far as we know, Helen was in bed at nine-thirty, as she should have been. But things were not so peaceful at the Lenglen headquarters. One of the French Tennis Association officials stopped by at eleven o’clock to make sure that Suzanne was safely in bed and resting for the honor of France. To his horror he found bedlam instead. Suzanne s father and mother were deep in exhortations. In turn they reiterated what was at stake tomorrow; on and on they said all the things it’s unwise to say, even to the most phlegmatic player, the night before an important match. Suzanne, not unnaturally, was in hysterics. It took the hastily summoned help of Suzanne’s friend Mr. Butler, the donor of the Butler trophy in Monte Carlo and a man who understood her particularly well, to quiet the parents and get the exhausted girl to bed at last by two-thirty in the morning. It’s hard to imagine a worse way to get ready for a match.

But Suzanne played beautifully the next day. So did Helen; the moral of this tale is not that she should have stayed up late too! What the story seems to prove is that someone like Suzanne, a great player and a dramatic one, has nervous energy to spare. What looked like a dangerous crisis to others did her no harm on the tennis court. Her skill and experience, the discipline of the game, and the drama of the occasion all enabled her to play with calmness and control — and no signs of fatigue. But I don’t advise this kind of training.

3

IT’S a firm conviction of mine that you can’t begin too early to play in as many tournaments as possible. This is easiest, of course, if you live in California or Florida, but during the outdoor season it’s possible in many other parts of the country. Most clubs and schools and public parks nowadays have at least one tournament a year and sometimes more. My four sisters and I used to play in the spring and fall tournaments run by Mrs. Wightman at the Longwood Cricket Club. We played in every event we were allowed to enter. In the junior tournaments there were usually two age groups, one for the fifteen-year-olds and under, and the other for juniors up to eighteen. My sister Mianne and I used to enter both tournaments, for practice and experience. There were times when she won the older tournament and I the younger. One year, I had to play in five finals in one day. I was quite busy.

To illustrate what playing in so many tournaments can do for you, I can point with open pride to my own family’s record. Each one of the five sisters finally won a National Junior title. It seems to me this is a record it would be hard to equal. (I think we made another record in 1942, when each sister produced a baby daughter!) What interests me especially as I look back on our family tennis is that we were all so different: you don’t, apparently, need one particular type of temperament to win. Polly, the oldest, was talented in everything; she was especially gifted scholastically. Lee, the second, was a dreamer: she wrote poetry and loved music, and her music was something we all took pride in; she composed, and played both the piano and the violin. Mianne, the third, was the one w ith the angelic disposition— and a beautiful dancer, graceful and dainty. But she played tennis with a punch. Sarah, the fourth, was a rascal and a tomboy who enjoyed everything and everybody. Joanna, the fifth, was a bubble of joy. She sometimes had to be coaxed to play tennis on a hot day when swimming and golf seemed more relaxing — but she was the only one of us to win the All-Around Athletic Cup at school. Our pride and joy, our only brother, Johnny, who brought up the rear, became an excellent player, but a boy s many interests kept him from concentrating on tennis as his sisters had. lie did manage to win a State Boys title or two and play on the Harvard team which went to England, with Yale, to play against Oxford and Cambridge.

Mianne and I were the only members of the family who continued serious tennis after becoming seniors. The others occupied themselves with college and jobs and had time to play only in occasional near-by tournaments. But Mianne and I had a wonderful time traveling around in the East and playing in the big summer tournaments. Finally she deserted me to start raising a family, and I was left to carry on alone.

I am often asked what the so-called tennis circuit is. The summer circuit, first of all, consists of seven or eight tournaments played on grass courts, ending with the grand finale of the National Singles Championshipat Forest Hills, L. I. The tournaments usually start in July and continue through August. “Lawn tennis” of course meant originally tennis played only on lawn or grass. The grass-court summer tournaments are still the major tournaments in American tennis. And they are held, as they must be, in the East, where grass flourishes, and at clubs which can afford to maintain such courts. This presented no problem to someone like me who lived in the East: the expenses of traveling were not great and I always had friends to visit who lived conveniently within reach of the tournaments.

But for players who must come East from California or other distant parts of the country to play, and who must live among strangers, the summer circuit presents difficulties of all kinds. The financial problem is usually greatest. Modern tennis has expanded; it’s being played, I’m glad to say, by people from all walks of life. I’ve boasted that it’s no longer a rich man’s game. One result, however, is that very few players today can afford, as the amateur players of yesterday could, to travel at their own expense from tournament to tournament. You need to be not only good but lucky.

Fortunately tournaments are being held more and more widely throughout the country, and tournament committees everywhere are naturally anxious to improve the caliber of tennis in their localities. A good enough player, therefore, may be invited to play in such a tournament and be offered, at the same time, traveling and living expenses. But the major tournaments are necessarily limited to anywhere from thirty-two to sixty-four players. Many of these are “Invitation tournaments,” which means that the committee invites players of known ability.

The players invited may be put up at private houses or at hotels; but sometimes they are not put up at all. The putting-up situation presents its own difficulties. To spend the tournament week, or (an equally ticklish problem) the days until you are eliminated, as the guest of a club member or of some hospitable friend of the tennis committee sounds like an ideal arrangement from every point of view. Too often, unfortunately, it is not — for a variety of reasons. If the hostess really likes and understands tennis, understands not only the unpredictability of tournament timetables, five-set matches that last through mealtimes, but also the strain of tournament tennis on a player, his need to enforce some schedule of his own — diet, perhaps, or rest, or privacy — if she understands, also, that it may be not tennis but the customs of another part of the country which make her guest seem a little strange to her, troublesome problems are less likely to arise.

The tennis guest, at the same time, must remember constantly that he is a guest and not a boarder, that all guests have important concessions to make to a household’s routine, and that there are after all more important things in life than tomorrow’s tennis match. I needn’t describe to you what happens when neither set of conditions prevails. All too often tennis players have found their “visiting impossibly difficult, and hostesses have decided that all tennis players are barbarians. Occasionally, I’m sorry to say, these feelings are justified. More often a little sympathy and humor would have clarified everything.

4

THERE is considerable disagreement among tennis players as to what kind of training works best. I don’t believe in too much rigidity. If you can cultivate sensible habits throughout the year you won’t, at a particular moment, need to do anything drastic to get yourself into shape.

A month before the tournaments begin I start fairly serious training. I grow careful about my diet: wellbalanced food, no pastries. Rich, heavy foods make you feel sluggish on the court. Then, during tournaments, I take normal precautions. I’m careful never to eat just before playing: I like to allow an hour and a half to two hours for digestion. I’m a person who can’t eat much before a match anyway. I have a fairly good-sized breakfast, then a very light lunch, usually tea in the afternoon, and a big dinner at night. Some people, however, seem to need fuel before playing. My husband, for instance, says he feels weak if he tries to play on an empty stomach.

Players vary also in the amount of rest they need. Helen Wills, as I’ve said, used to go to bed at ninethirty. If a lot of sleep is what you need, be sure that you get it. Others, like me, would toss about all night if we started so early. Yet even I like nine hours’ sleep during a tournament (eight are enough for me usually) and I feel better if I take a rest during the day, even if only for half an hour.

Smoking in moderation won’t hurt you or your wind; but you’ll suffer for it if you smoke too much. (During my most important tournaments I usually cut out smoking entirely, just to be on the safe side.) The same thing is true of drinking. A cocktail once in a while before dinner won’t hurt you, but beware of many — if you want a clear eye and a cool head tomorrow. Alcohol and first-class tennis don’t mix.

As to special exercises, I don’t know many players who undergo any strenuous regular routine. There are exceptions, however: Don Budge used to do considerable “road work” during the winter in California, to build up his endurance. Alice Marble used to skip rope. I’ve done some rope-skipping myself, never very religiously. Many players find that the winter tournaments in Florida and California and the Midwestern tournaments that follow are enough to build up endurance Some enter all of them just for this reason.

However else you may neglect your health, don’t neglect your feet. No tennis player can afford to. In tournaments it’s wise to wear two pairs of socks, one heavy and one light. The light pair should be worn next to your foot and the heavy pair outside; thus the friction caused by quick starting and stopping and changing direction comes on the socks instead of against the skin. If your feet get sore, soak them in hot water and Epsom salts at night.

And the treatment of blisters is very important. If you play much tennis you will often have to do a little surgery on yourself, to remove the liquid inside a blister. Don’t burst the blister by putting the needle right into the bubble. I can suggest a better way, which will leave no soreness: after sterilizing the needle, insert it about one sixteenth of an inch away from the edge of the blister, coming at it from the bottom. This allows the liquid to escape through the needle-hole made in the surrounding skin. After this operation, take proper precautions against infection. And decide, if you can, what caused the blister: Shoe too tight? Sock with rough edges? Or just a stone in your shoe? Sometimes the only cause is that your feet are tender and must be toughened gradually. This is one more reason why it’s important not to overdo tennis, in the beginning or early each season.

There are innumerable hot-weather problems. One of the first is that your racquet will start slipping around. I usually carry a small piece of rosin to use if necessary. But be careful of rosin: it cakes if you put too much on. Sawdust, which the tournament sometimes provides, is also useful. And often, on an especially muggy day, I wind a handkerchief or piece of gauze or tape around my right wrist to prevent perspiration from running down my arm. (When you do this, you must expect questions: “Heavens! How did you sprain your wrist?”)

On a hot day it’s sometimes hard not to drink too much water, but water, during a match, can cause trouble. The more you drink, the more you perspire, and if you drink a great deal you may get cramps. It’s a good idea, since one reason for cramps is the shortage of salt in your system, to take salt tablets before you begin to play. It’s a good idea also to suck half a lemon, as you change sides (lemons, too, are provided occasionally). This seems to neutralize any acids which may form under nervous tension. Many players also find that a lump of sugar, chewed every so often, replaces lost energy. The best drink for you after a match is a glass of orange juice, taken slowly, or a cup of hot tea. But don’t let tea or anything else keep you from that hot shower — as soon as possible!

As you walk out to your match, armed with all these necessities, be sure to resist the temptation to stop and watch some other match that’s going on. Watching tennis is a sure way to strain your eyes (spectators know it): you’ll find later that they won’t focus clearly. Even movies, the night before, can be dangerously tiring.

5

You and your opponent must make a few decisions before the match begins. First, you must come to some agreement about bad decisions and what to do about them. It’s best to face the fact that there’ll be some, and if you both agree to take the decisions as they come (they usually even up) and not to throw any points, there won’t be hard feeling. Throwing a point really does no good, anyway. It’s not much more than a gesture — chiefly for the benefit of galleries, who love it — because actually, to counteract a bad decision, to arrange the score as it would have been with the right decision, you would have to throw two points. It works badly either way. You’ll upset yourself needlessly if you expect your opponent to throw a point and he doesn’t.

You and your opponent must also discover before the match how often you are to be allowed to change balls. It may be once a set; it may be after a certain number of games. On damp days you should be allowed to change oftener, because the balls get heavy and soggy. Whatever you are allowed, be sure you both know about it.

Come to an understanding also about what to do in case of rain, whether to continue the next day where you left off, whether to play the set over, or whether to play the whole match over from the beginning. You and your opponent have the right to choose any one of these alternatives. Make sure you settle the matter even though the sky looks clear.

Once the match is in progress you may run into other problems. Doubtful situations arise: Was the ball hit on the first or second bounce? Did a player lean over the net before he hit the ball or afterwards? Did he tick the net with his racquet or any part of his body? The umpire or the net-cord judge decides, and if you are an experienced player you won’t let the facts or the decisions bother you.

Once in a great while you will find yourself playing against an opponent who seems to be trying to annoy you. Don’t waste time asking yourself whether he does it deliberately or from habit: it shouldn’t matter to you. The main thing is not to be annoyed. If his mannerisms are nervous, if he rushes to pick up balls and hurries back into position, don’t let him hurry you. Take it easy. If you aren’t ready when he starts to serve, hold up your hand and make no attempt to swing, as a signal that you’re not ready. Take your time getting back into position. Don’t stall, of course; simply move with deliberation.

At some time or other you’ll probably have to play against a staller too. Don’t let him bother you either. If he takes what seems to be an eternity to mop his forehead, keep calm. You can always find a way to use extra breathing space yourself, even if you spend it all tying and retying both shoelaces! You may also run into a particularly dangerous possum, the “exhausted,” “can’t go any further” kind, who looks dead tired between points — only to revive and run after everything once the ball’s in play. Don’t let him fool you — ever. He will probably hang on to the bitter end, with more endurance than you have.

Try to be oblivious of the gallery, especially of one that’s prejudiced against you. It’s hard enough not to be bothered when a great many people want your opponent to win; it’s even harder when your opponent’s friends are so enthusiastic that they cheer your errors. But your concentration ought to be so dependable that you hardly notice, and your attitude toward galleries so philosophical that you wouldn’t mind if you did. You will need this attitude if you happen to be playing against a local champion in his home state, or a team match in a foreign country where the audience naturally is pulling for its own team.

One last warning. You will find, after not very long experience in tournaments, that all points are not quite equal — and that if they were, it would be impossible to concentrate equally on all of them. This will lead you from one discovery to another: the significance of certain points and the value of playing to the score. Consider the difference between 40love and 30-15, for instance. The first is quite a lead — the second a very little one. Think of the difference between 40-15 and 30-all. Again only one point made that difference. Games behave in the same way. Compare 4-1 and 3-2, two results of the fifth game in a set. Or 5-2 and 4-3, results of the important seventh. Playing to the score means knowing on what point in a game, on what game in a set, these great differences hinge and being alert and ready to focus all your efforts on them. In tournament tennis you must sometimes decide it’s worth your while to fight for a point or a game if it takes all night! Any beginner knows that you must try to win a match point. It takes experience to learn w’hat earlier moments may be just as critical.