April 06, 2010

Tennis Canada

You can hear groans of disgust across North America and Australia, and at the same time screams of joy throughout South America and Europe. It must be clay court season.

Since 1999 there has not been a player outside of Europe in the final of the French Open. It was Andre Agassi who defeated Ukraine’s Andrei Medvedev 12 years ago, and since then, you would have to speak Spanish, Portuguese or Swiss German to converse with the champion in his mother tongue.

The great Roger Federer, who had early exits on the hard courts in Miami and Indian Wells, completed the career slam last year when he defeated Robin Soderling in the final at Paris. He has entered clay court events in Rome, Estoril and Madrid with his sights set on repeating at Roland Garros and adding to his record major trophy haul.

Federer will have to get past a Rafael Nadal who looks healed from his injuries that cost him a run at five straight French Open titles and the No. 1 ranking. Rafa went a respectable 16-4 on hard courts during the first stage of 2010 and seems ready for his favourite surface. He will start his match preparation in Monte Carlo. Last year, Nadal claimed Masters 1000 clay events in Monte Carlo and Rome, while Federer won in Madrid.

Fans have witnessed a mixed bag of champions so far in 2010. While stars like Andy Roddick, Novak Djokovic, Sam Querry and Ivan Ljubicic have raised trophies lately, none of them have been impressive historically on the slow red clay. The biggest threat against the big two may come in the form of last year’s French Open finalist Robin Soderling, who reached the semifinals at both American stops in March.

North Americans, for the most part, grow up playing on hard courts. The climate and cost of maintenance have made red clay courts few and far between. When Tennis Canada hired long-time French Tennis Federation leader Louis Borfiga to run its high performance program, the first declaration was clear, “If we want to compete at the elite level in tennis, we need to start training more on clay.”

It’s like kryptonite for most in the northwestern hemisphere, but the clay court season brings out flair and methodical tennis that many fans can’t wait to see. With 10 tournaments over the next five weeks leading up to Roland Garros, there is not a lot of time for players to switch gears and adapt to the changing, grueling surface.