StarTalk Radio - #ICYMI - Tennis: Inside the Royal Game

Episode Date: August 31, 2017

Chuck Nice and Gary O’Reilly serve up some of the surprising science surrounding the sport of tennis, with a little help from astrophysicist Charles Liu, professional tennis player Jared Donaldson, and Ron Rocchi, the Advanced Innovation Manager at Wilson.Don’t miss an episode of Playing with Science. Subscribe to our channels on:Apple Podcasts: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/playing-with-science/id1198280360?mt=2GooglePlay Music: https://play.google.com/music/listen?u=0#/ps/Iimke5bwpoh2nb25swchmw6kzjqSoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/startalk_playing-with-scienceStitcher: http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/startalk/playing-with-scienceTuneIn: http://www.tunein.com/playingwithscienceNOTE: StarTalk All-Access subscribers can watch/listen to this entire episode commercial-free. Find out more at https://www.startalkradio.net/startalk-all-access/ Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ on Apple Podcasts to listen to new episodes ad-free and a whole week early.

I'm Gary O'Reilly and I'm Chuck Nice and this is Playing With Science. Today we are going to smash it, ace it, chip it and lob it. And remember, when it's out, it's out. Unless, of course, Hawkeye says otherwise. We are certainly talking about tennis, a sport that has its origins in the 12th century and patronized by none other than King Henry VIII back in the 15th century when he wasn't getting married and chopping off heads. Yeah, busy man. Yeah, busy man. Back then it was actually called real tennis as in real or royal. Yeah, busy man. Back then it was actually called real tennis, as in real or royal. Yeah, for sure. And helping us keep it real is a rising star of U.S. men's tennis, Jared Donaldson.

And breaking down the physics is our good friend, astrophysicist Charles Liu. Yes, and we're also going to be getting the lowdown on the evolution of the tennis racket. Did you like that? Yeah, I did. Evolution. I know, I like that. Thank you. That's right.

I know. Yeah, but that's for later. Right now, why don't we welcome in our first two guests, Jared Donaldson and astrophysicist Chuck Liu. Guys, how are you? Great. How about everyone else? That's cool.

That's very good. Great to have you. Why don't we jump into, we'll start with Jared. You are nationally ranked. Why don't we jump into, we'll start with Jared. You are nationally ranked. I've seen you play, and you're known as perhaps the answer to the vacuum left by Roddick. Does that put pressure on you, man? Well, I would say I'm considered one of the answers, not the only one.

There's a lot of great young U.S. men's tennis players out there and obviously a lot of very good established men's tennis players out there as well. But, you know, I get asked that question quite a lot, as I'm sure other players do. And for me personally um obviously it's really it's obviously really special that I'm thought of in in those terms but for me I didn't start playing tennis um because I you know there was a hole in American tennis you know obviously when I was when I first started Roddick was the best uh American tennis player so I I started playing tennis because I really enjoyed it. I loved it. And I wanted to want to be a great tennis player. So obviously,

it's cool to be thought of in those terms, but that's not my priority. What got you into the sport? Because, you know, there's a lot of other sports out there to get into. You were a guy where you're six foot two, you're well built. So you could have taken a choice of other sports. But why tennis um you know that's a great question i actually got myself started in tennis my mom my mom brought me and my little sister up to the country club every morning in rhode island i wandered over to the tennis courts one day and um and obviously so that's kind of how i got my start in tennis but i played almost every single sport you could think of. And, you know, tennis kind of I gravitated towards tennis, just for the simple fact that it was an individual sport. And I guess selfishly, I liked when I got the credit. And also, I liked when I got the blame, but not I didn't want to get the blame for losing, but, you know, it was all on me.

I didn't have to rely on teammates or anything like that. I wanted to rely only on myself. So that's kind of the competitive nature of one-on-one really attracted me to tennis. Do you know where I've heard that story before? Well, go ahead. Roger Federer. Roger Federer was a talented young soccer player. And he didn't like it when his team lost because it wasn't down to him.

So he went to tennis because when it lost it was him when it won it was him exact same words this young man's mouth it's what it's about I control my destiny we're gonna try and go through different compartments of a players game and where better to start yeah with the serve so Jared now and one of the things that I noticed is the mechanics of the serve looks pretty much the same for every tennis player. I might be wrong because I'm not like a coach, but the actual mechanics, you see every single player, male or female, regardless of height, they kind of go through the same mechanics. So, can you break down the mechanics of a serve and why is it? Why

are those the mechanics that you see every single player kind of serve in the same way? Tennis is a very technical sport. And I think that kind of, you know, you see everyone play similar on TV and there's a reason for that. Obviously you see slight differences maybe in certain ways. People take the racket back on the serve. Some people bring the foot up to get their feet closer together. Some people, such as myself, stay back with their foot. But there are certain things in a serve that every great or good server has to do in order to hit a good serve and that's from contact just before contact point to after contact point which is really important obviously for a serve you need a good ball toss not too far out in front of you i've i've always a coach told me uh right above your eyes which

makes sense i think that's a that's a really good uh tool um in terms of in terms of where to place it uh you don't want it too far out in front because then you have to lean forward you want good tool in terms of where to place it. You don't want it too far out in front because then you have to lean forward. You want it right above your eyes so you can go up after and get it and hit down on the ball with spin. So I think that's the most important of how you can hit the ball at contact point because every great player hits the ball at contact point the same way. For takebacks, obviously there are

slightly different variations. Roddick obviously had a very short motion. I have a little bit of a longer motion, but honestly it's right before contact and right after contact because you need to get the spin to quickly bring the ball down into the court. Chuck Luke, can you break down the physics of what we just heard? So many fun things to talk about. Fundamentally, what you're doing is using every joint you can to provide as much of a flip, a lever, and hinge in order to send as much force as you can to the ball through the racket. So your wrists have something to do with it, your elbow, your shoulder, even down low, your legs, depending on how you kick off the ground with your toes or with your feet or your knees, every little extra hinge you can pop in there

gives a little more force to the ball. I often think of Pete Sampras as the person, a great American tennis player, that sort of made the serve a devastating weapon beyond what anybody else had seen up to that point. His economy of motion, the way that he was able to leverage power from the rest of his body into the ball through the racket was just a beautiful sight to see. And here's a piece of reference you can use. beautiful sight to see. And here's a piece of reference you can use. If you think about in baseball, a hundred mile an hour fastball is so fast, a batter has to almost start swinging before the ball leaves the pitcher's hand, right? Now, these days, serves in tennis will reach 150 miles an hour. Which means that, yeah, for a person reacting to a tennis serve, it's as if the person receiving was looking at 120 mile an hour fastball. You just don't have any time to react. Not to mention that the strike zone

isn't just the width of the plate. It's 13 feet wide. So your ability to react to a devastating, powerful serve is really, really limited. And so you are counting on that serve as a way to really set dominance on any given point when you're playing tennis. I never, I did not know that. So Jared, how do you, when you're going up against what Chuck just said, somebody who has this devastatingly high-velocity serve, what is your mindset when you're on the receiving end of a great serve, and how do you react to it? What's going through your mind as a player? Chuck definitely brings up a good point when he talks about the speed, which is very difficult to handle.

point when he talks about the speed, which is very difficult to handle. But I think for any professional tennis player, when you're talking about serve, obviously, as Chuck just said, when they hit the ball at 130, 140, or even some of the guys 150, and they hit their spot, it's almost impossible to return it. It just is. Unless you're guessing, and at that point, you're going to be 50-50 anyways probably, unless you have some sort of read on the serve. But most guys now, they toss the ball in the same spot to hit every serve. So that's difficult. But honestly, it's a lot about location.

No matter how fast, obviously if you can hit a serve very fast and have great location, I mean, those are the best servers in the world. And it also depends on how tall your opponent is. So as Chuck pointed out, Sampras. Sampras wasn't a guy who was 6'10", 6'8", 6'6". He was my height, 6'2", maybe 6'1", a little bit shorter than me. So he had a great serve without the added advantage of being so tall. And, you know, you combine power and accuracy. I mean, that's when you're talking about one of the best serves in the game. And as a returner, what you really have to try to do is think about what your

opponent's best serve is. And at least for me, I try to take that do is think about what your opponent's best serve is and try and at least for me i try to take that away from them and make me beat and make them beat me in other spots and it's difficult but i think that the more matches you play against better servers the more used to it you get who's got the best boxer tricks when it comes to serving because we know the guys can slam them down there and get a speeding find having done so. But there's the spin. There's all sorts of different things. Who's got the best array of serves for you? I mean, there's so many guys out there now that have great serves. I mean, it's almost kind of a you almost kind of need it now into the end today's game. Well, you need to be able to hold.

Right. Yeah. So so most guys have great serves out there um for me obviously the best serve out there is probably john isner but i don't you know he's got an amazing serve i don't like to use him as an example too often just because he has an advantage that not everybody has right he's 610 yeah you know so they're just by um his angle that he's going to get on the serve is just too much. For me, I like to use Federer. I mean, I think he's got probably, for a guy my height, the best serve out there, in my opinion. I mean, Roddick, obviously, when he was playing also. But I think for Federer, I mean, he hits every location.

His serve percentage is in the 60s, 70%, every match. And that's tough to beat when you're thinking that, when you're saying that, you know, I mean, he's winning like 80% of his first serve points, and on top of that he's serving 70% first serve. That's tough to beat. Wow, that is tough to beat. That's pretty cool. Let's bring Chuck back in.

Chuck, so we've got Isner there at 6'10". Just how much, and don't forget he's throwing that ball up just how much an advantage has he got in terms of force that he can apply to a ball from that altitude and and why why is it so much of an advantage when you have these taller players doing that if you are trying to hit a ball into the court in a legal serve you have to get it downward yeah right? You can whack it at some arbitrary speed, but if it doesn't land the little box, then it doesn't count. So having the height allows someone like John to bring it down and your force going down gives you that

extra advantage because now you are leveraging this way compared with say a 6'1", 6'2", player like Jared, right? John's got a 6'10", that's eight extra inches in the head, but that translates usually to some level in the arms as well. And so you're able to bring it down further, you snap harder, you get a longer lever arm and you can transfer force, and it's more likely to go downward. So conservatively, if you're talking physics, you might get anywhere from a 5% to a 15% advantage in the power that you'll be able to get on your serves. So it's about generating more power. You're able to generate more force and therefore more velocity, which is, that's pretty cool. But remember that Jared said, too, it's also a matter of location.

Right. Where exactly you hit it. And also the spin, which is something we haven't talked about yet, but is probably almost, if not just. Let's talk about that. Let's put a little bit of spin on the subject. Yeah, why not? So, Jared, you know, spin and placement. Can you talk about those two things in a volley? How you're using topspin, backspin and how you're actually placement of the ball on the court?

Slice is kind of less of a factor in today's game, I would say, than it was maybe 30 years ago. Just because this technology is different, I'm sure Chuck can point to this also. The strings are a lot different. They grip the ball a lot more, the modern-day string. So players today are able to put a lot more spin on the ball. so we're able players today are able to put a lot more spin on the ball um i just being that this is a science show i know that uh sampras in his day when you talk about revolutions per minute i think sampras's forehand had 1800 when he played and today today guys are hitting getting i know i think federer's is like 3700 rpms wow and and nadal's up to 4200 and that's all down to the

strings because i'm guessing they're technically they're quite equivalent so the strings help yes and i think it's also a fact of when you grow up with something you kind of know you you're used to it better so guys got used to the new strings and were able to then use those strings and put more spin on the ball and hit the ball more spin right grips got a little bit different obviously 30 years ago you're talking about an eastern grip which is almost holding it like a hammer yes picking up a racket hammer now we hold it a little bit with the face a little bit closed um with semi-western or even western I would say most guys are probably in between semi-western and western so that and it just allows you to hit the ball harder but also

give yourself more margin because you can then have the ability for the ball to clear the net by three feet and then bring it down where back back 30 years ago you hit the ball a lot lower, the ball stayed a lot low, and you came to net, which is when you volley, you put backspin on the ball. And the reason why guys don't come to net as much anymore is because players have the ability to maneuver the ball around players, so put spin on the ball and get it low or kind of whip it around them. So it's a lot different now.

It's more about spin than power, to be honest with you. More about spin than power. Oh, let's get Chuck back in because that sounds a lot – I mean, Jared's just discussed basically a curveball. Yeah, it's amazing. So we've got to find out from Chuck, Luke. Chuck, what is happening? It's amazing.

So we've got to find out from Chuck, Luke. Chuck, what is happening? Just how are the strings imparting so much spin onto this little fluffy ball? Well, let's just start with the ball itself. Right. It's a little bit more than two ounces heavy. It's made of a kind of flexible material, and it's hollow. Right. It also has this fuzzy stuff around the outside.

Yep. Right. And so the result is when you hit it as long as you're not hitting it directly dead on there's going to be some rotation of the ball that's just a natural occurrence of transfer what we call angular momentum as i heard is saying depending on how the strings are how the grip is and the power to the deformation of the ball as it is being hit by the racket all right so compression of the shape of the ball itself yes deformation of the ball as it is being hit by the racket. All right, so compression of the shape of the ball itself.

Yes. All of the things that remove spherical shape cause additional spin. All the extra fuzzy stuff around the outside, like, say, the laces on a ball in baseball or something, causes additional interaction with the air, creating spin. And then the power that we were talking about that's much greater nowadays. Jared is 100% right when he says the slice is much less effective than it used to be. Realize that when he's talking about

the professionals of the day now getting the ball to be able to spin at 3,000, 4,000 RPM, that's a car engine. Okay. So you've got your tennis ball moving, spinning as fast as a car engine spinning in the inside with it moving towards you. And then you just add all these things together. It is essentially unpredictable to some extent where the ball is going to go when it's spitting at that rate. It's really amazing. dive rapidly. How is a player mentally starting to vector their position across the court to deal with that? Because as you said, the reaction time is particularly limited. That's right. The human brain is still the greatest physics calculator yet on land,

or at sea for that matter, here on earth.. So really when people like Jared are practicing, and Jared, you should respond to this directly if I'm wrong or right. When you're practicing, a lot of practice isn't just about hitting the ball. It's about seeing how the ball comes towards you. And you file that away into your neural net called your brain. And over time, over dozens, hundreds, thousands of repetitions, if you have good enough eyesight to see where the ball is coming off the racket and it's coming in your direction, you can see the spin to some extent. You can't calculate exactly how many RPM there are in the ball, but you can certainly calculate that it's heading in this direction

that way. And then your body automatically moves in that direction faster than you can actually consciously calculate. Because you know now your neural net has been stored with enough information, the learning set, we call it, right, in artificial intelligence studies, to know where to go and give yourself that little extra fraction of a second to be able to react physically when the ball actually does hit the ground and come back up towards you. That's amazing. So, Jared. Okay, Jared, return of serve here. Are you actually able to see spin, or have you trained that way? I mean, Chuck's absolutely right.

Like, when I – I mean, I'm practicing three, four hours a day for tennis and then obviously doing off-court stuff and fitness. So, for me i you still need to follow the ball uh for me that's obviously natural because i've done it since i was four and a half years old but i think if you get a guy out onto the court who's never played tennis before the thing that that trips them up the most is a second serve i mean they just look foolish because they think that the ball will come to them but it actually goes away from them much much like a curveball or a curveball but think of it if it's going the opposite direction so it hits before and then explodes up instead

of going right to them they've never seen it before so but for me i've obviously seen this countless times so i'm able to um to I know what what to expect but obviously if I don't see the ball come off the racket very well I don't know what type of spin is going to be on it um I don't know there's a lot of things I don't know and I still make mistakes where I misread a ball or or whatever and that causes me to miss so you you Chuck's absolutely right that you have to be spot on with just looking at the ball. I mean, that's why you look at the ball through contact, or most players look at the ball through contact,

just so they can really see the ball and feel where it's going to go and how it's coming off your opponent's racket. You know, if it's a mishit, if not, what type. And, I mean, you have to follow the ball. It's imperative in tennis it's interesting joe because some of the things when we've discussed with baseball players and particularly the batters they train to identify certain types of ball and that's a cognitive skill development do you do you practice because like you said you spend time on the court you spend

time off the court you've got your conditioning nutritionist, and you've got game tape. Have you gone through that cognitive skill development with learning to read shots, learning to read spin? Yeah, it's interesting you bring up baseball. I remember I used to have a video on baseball players and Mark McGuire used to, I'm pretty sure it was Mark McGuire, used to have someone throw him tennis balls, and they would write little digits on the ball, and he would have to tell the batting coach which number was on the ball. Was it a four, five, six, seven? So it's obviously a skill that you have to practice. In tennis, I would say when I train off court, I do neurological adaptation, right?

But that has to do a lot with moving because in baseball, you're standing still to hit the ball. In tennis, you have to move. So your movement has to be connected to your hand-eye coordination. So I do a little bit of that. Well, I do a lot of that actually. And obviously, you're getting so much of that already when you're practicing, right? Because you're the move, see the ball and hit the ball. So there's a lot that's going on and it's going extremely fast.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Let's let's switch courts, if I say. Yeah. Jared, let me ask you, what is your favorite surface to play on and why? Um, you know, I think I play, I think my game translates pretty well to all surfaces. Um, my favorite surface is, is, is hardcore, um, playing. I've, that's a service I've, I've played the most on. Um, but I'm also, I mean, so that, that's a surface I've played the most on um but I'm also I mean so that that's the game

that's what I'm most comfortable on I would say but I play well on clay I spent two and a half years in Argentina playing um you know almost exclusively on red clay wow yeah I can I can play I'm very good on clay hardcore it's my best surface I don't have the most experience on grass but um right now before Wimbledonon, I'm happy with my preparations. But hardcore is my favorite surface. And Chuck, what does that do to the sport, like when you change the surface? What's the chief difference of playing on these different surfaces, clay, hardcore, grass? Imagine playing basketball on your backyard as opposed to on a court, right?

It's as big a difference as that. Play, grass, and hard, they all have different ways of absorbing the amount of energy that the ball hits with. And it imparts its own spin as well as it comes off, right? Depending on the texture of the surface and the hardness of the surface. So you can hit exactly the same serve at the French Open at Roland Garros, which is clay, or at Wimbledon, which is grass,

or at the US Open, which is hardcore. And the way it comes back up will be completely different. You really do have to adjust, which is kind of, the Grand Slam is such a special thing. Which is why Jared's going to attest to this. When the guys win multiple

majors on all different, so you win Roland Garros, you win Wimbledon, you win the US Open. Three different surfaces and the same person walks away with all three trophies. That's a game that is ultimate. Not just for one surface only.

It's as if you're a basketball player and you could both go in for the slam dunk and hit the three-pointer and do perfect free throws and play great defense all at the same time. Oh, well, you just described my game. You just described my game. Well, thanks.

Thank you, Chuck. Clearly, you've been watching me play basketball. Yeah. Hey, Jarrett, let me just ask you this. So our friend john mackinrow yes made some comments and it doesn't have a book coming out yeah and he never has anything controversial to say which is what i love about him but um you know i'm not going to get into his whole thing about serena but jared i want to ask you do you think you could take serena in a three-set match uh if i didn't um i could never

face my my peers ever again good answer i like that that's a nice diplomatic answer all right do you have a question for chuck lu is anything that's bouncing around that you want to ask him? You know, I would say one of the biggest things that I think is quite interesting is just the reaction time in relation to the serve. So obviously the serve is getting – is there a limit to how fast the brain can process information? Does it get more receptive if the ball is going faster so for example if it's going 150 miles an hour if you see that more could your brain get trained to react quicker to that um and if so by how much and and and if not is there is there a kind of a restraint on how fast the brain can pick up information, read it, and then react to it?

Good question. Neuroscience continues to advance at a breakneck pace. So the answer that I give now may not be accurate tomorrow. But the answer about the physics of the neuron is indeed that conscious thought at this moment does have an upper limit. And that upper limit doesn't seem like it can be pushed more than a few percent in the coming period of time. But what can be pushed forward, Jared, is that training that's unconscious, right? The thought that reacts directly from their muscles and your eyes, which don't have to go through the thinking process,

the rational thought prefrontal cortex, but actually wires have to go through the thinking process, the rational thought prefrontal cortex, but actually wires directly to the rest of your brain that gets your body into motion. So that part can be trained. And the thing is, we don't really know yet how that part is optimally trained. The things that you described, just looking at serves hours and hours a day and moving to them and reacting to them and other kinds of things, seem to help but the exact amount is still uncertain and so that next breakthrough of neuroscience will get us to that next point but the bottom line really is that

nowadays as you said with just even one or two break opportunities per match sometimes right you just have to get lucky enough or get not even lucky but train that tiny tiny little bit which can make a big difference in the overall course of the match. Wow, very cool. So there's hope. There's hope. There's hope. You don't have to be a Jedi. You could actually do all this yourself. Yeah. So that's cool. It's a great question, Jared. Fabulous. We're up against the break, right? We are. We are up against the break. We're sorry to lose you, but we wish you the very best of luck with your career, young man.

Yes. Absolutely. We'll be watching and rooting for you, Jared, man. Sure. Keep it up, brother. I appreciate it. Keep practicing. Thanks for joining us, and hopefully we'll be able to have you on the show again.

Okay, man? Sounds great. I look forward to being back. All right. You take care. Thank you. And to Charles Liu, as always a superstar yeah yeah this guy's a man in the hawaiian shirt we are so lucky science of superman there you go all right always land gentlemen have a great day all right there

you go that's how nice these people are so we're going to take that break um if you've enjoyed jared and charles stick around because we will be taking a look at the evolution of the tennis racket and there has been plenty yeah so stay tuned we'll be back shortly i'm gary o'reilly and chuck nice and this of course is playing with science and we're talking about the physics of tennis and we're actually having a really good time, which is no surprise, no? Yes, sir. It is, yeah. Joining us now by video call is Ron Roche, Advanced Innovation Manager at Wilson. Ron, great for joining us.

Thank you. Oh, thanks for having me, guys. Such a pleasure. All right, let's get on to the rackets. Being a man of a certain vintage, rackets were made of wood and that goes back quite some time what was the step up from coming away from wooden rackets and what did it actually bring to the game well you know you're right rackets historically have been made of wood um but somewhere around the late 60s uh the the leap was made to steel and what's

and what steel gave us was the ability to get rid of some of the weight so they got a little bit lighter uh but the downside uh and i have one right here the downside is that the head of the racket still remained very small so it was about the same size as a wooden racket. So players got a little benefit. It got a little lighter, but it wasn't a huge leap forward. With the steel frames, you get a little bit more strength. And therefore, is it right that you can get tighter strings and that then affects the type of game that you can play with that particular racket? Yeah, that's true. But the main benefit of the steel was that the racket got a little lighter

and a little stiffer. And so by getting stiffer, players got a little more power with an easier way to get it. So now what are most rackets made of now? Is it more like some kind of composite, or is it more carbon fiber? What is it? Yeah, so you actually missed one. So we had the steel, which was a step forward. And then shortly thereafter, we got into an era where we got aluminum rackets. Ah, I remember that. Oh, that wonderful thing, aluminum. Aluminium, you mean. Aluminium, yes. Don't forget I'm British, Ron. He's British, so it's... But that's a bigger head. I mean, our listeners can't see this, but Ron is holding up an aluminum, thank you, framed racket, and it's a larger head on the racket. Is that right?

Right. So going from steel to aluminum, you're cutting a lot of weight out, which then enabled the racket designers to create these larger head sizes. That was really a big leap forward because now the average player can get this larger headed racket and actually have some success on the tennis court. Right. Does that make the sweet spot that we've heard so much about that much bigger on the racket? Yeah, for sure. It creates a larger, more powerful sweet spot. And that really contributed to the tennis boom in the early 70s. There was controversy at the time when the larger head came out because the devotee of the smaller head racket said it was akin to cheating. But it has been fully embraced right now, hasn't it? Absolutely. There's no question. So where are we now? Chuck was saying we've got the graphite carbon fiber rackets.

But am I wrong in thinking it's not just one thing, it's a composite of several different elements or materials? Yes. So the next major leap forward was to the composite rackets or carbon fiber or what a lot of people just call graphite rackets. Yeah. And so this again took a lot of weight out, got the rackets very stiff, and put the rackets in a very lightweight category. So if you're just playing tennis, this is so easy to play compared to the rackets of yesterday. And so while we're still in the construction of the racket, I remember when, and I don't know if this was just a wives' tale or something, where people would say like, oh yeah, tennis strings are made of cat guts. No, that's right. One, is that true?

And two, what are they made of now? And three, are there any cats, like, strays wandering around Wilson right now that are missing? You went there, didn't you? You went there. Wow, that's, yeah, okay. Let me clear this up once and for all. Please. That is a myth.

Okay. Cats were never used to produce tennis string. Okay. In fact, the string that you're referring to is called natural gut, which I have a set here. Okay. called natural gut, which I have a set here. Okay. This particular string is made from the intestine,

the intestine lining of cows. Ah, well, that's so much better than cats, because cows are delicious. Nothing goes to waste. There you go. Now, here's a very little known fact. This one set of string that I'm holding, this one set that goes into a tennis racket, it takes three cows to make this one set of string.

Now, why is that? They're not very good with their hoofs. Don't start. Excellent. Excellent. So what does that do to hitting the ball? The difference between the cow intestine and the synthetic material that's used now. Well, they're both still very popular. Oh, really?

In fact, a lot of players put both in the same racket. Interesting. Oh, one going the mainstream and a lot of players put both in the same racket. Interesting. Oh, one going the mainstream and one the cross string? Correct. Oh, how interesting. So that's called a hybrid. And you get sort of the benefits of both products, a natural gut component and a monofilament component in the same racket.

And now why is that? Is there some kind of tempered quality that one of these strings has that will offer balance instead of using both? Or is it just some kind of, I don't know, superstition? Like, I've got to have guts and synthetic or I can't win. What would make you do that? Well, it's really a performance benefit. So the natural gut feels great when you impact the ball, it provides a lot of feel and a lot of power. Okay. But the downside is it loses tension pretty quickly and it's susceptible to

moisture. So if you're playing on a humid day, it's going to lose tension pretty quickly. to moisture. So if you're playing on a humid day, it's going to lose tension pretty quickly. Gotcha. The monofilament string, on the other hand, doesn't have a lot of feel, but it doesn't lose tension. So when you combine the two, you sort of get this magic combination of pretty good feel, and I keep the same tension for a longer period of time. Does it actually depend on an individual player's game, the style of game that they bring, that will depend on the nature of the strings, whether they're 100% synthetic or they become, as you said, a hybrid racket? Yeah, there's thousands of strings on the market, and some are engineered towards certain styles of play. So whatever your normal swing or your natural swing is like, there's going to be sort of products geared towards you. So it's, you know, one thing is difficult to find the right tennis racket to play.

But even when you do that, now you've got to go to the next step and you've got to find the right string to put in that tennis racket. Right. So let me ask you this. I've seen, I don't play, but my brother is just a huge, I mean, I can't tell you, just an avid player. And when I'm out on the courts, just watching these guys play, I see these different shaped heads. Some are more oval. Some are slightly squared at the top. I mean, they all seem to have the same shaft and all that. But what is up with the shape of the head and what allows you on a professional level,

are there any restrictions to how the tennis racket can be constructed? Well, that's a lot on that question. Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't realize. I was really just being curious. I didn't realize. What he wants to do is beat his brother at tennis. And he's looking for any angle he can get. And that's the part I didn't put in, like,

and how can I beat my brother at tennis, which will never happen. So my question is, how long is the show? Oh, wow. So it's that involved, huh? What do you got? Bring it on. All right. So the, you know, generally speaking at the professional level, everybody uses about the same head size. They're all right around a hundred square inches. Um, some are, you know, a few players are a little bigger, a few players are smaller,

but generally speaking, they're all about the same size head. Uh, that size is very much below the actual limit. It could be. So they're at a hundred square inches. Uh, the ITF for governing body sort of limits the head size to 134 square inches. Okay. So no one's ever going to play that big of a racket professionally. So the rule doesn't really come into play that much. Why wouldn't they play a racket that size? Just to clear that up. Why wouldn't you go to a larger racket head? It would be too powerful for them.

Ah, okay. So do you lose control? Is that the deal? You lose control when you have that larger head? Is that it? Well, again, a professional player who swings very aggressively at the ball, that racket's just going to give them so much power. Yes, they will lose all the control of directing the ball. Gotcha. Gotcha. OK. This sounds like the game Chuck wants to watch. Now, by the way, so part of what we do on this show is no matter who we talk to, athlete or expert, I figure out a way to change that sport so it can be more to my liking. is that every player must play with 134 square inch head so that I can watch balls fly into the

stands and hit people in the forehead. That to me is a much better sport. I want to see that at Wimbledon on NBC. This is what I have to work with. We've had Ron, so as you know, we've had no breaks NASCAR, right? No brake NASCAR. Come on, Ron. Tell me you don't want to watch no brake NASCAR. And he wants to see cyborgs play golf so he can see 600-yard drives. This is what I deal with. I think my ideas are awesome, okay? By the way, we spoke to our friend who's a physicist for Eric Goff who does modeling for the Tour de France.

I found out that they have brakes. I'm like, take the brakes off the Tour de France so that when they're coming down the mountain, I mean, that's the part I want to watch. So I'm telling you right now, 134 square inch racket heads on all. And then you get Federer making a line drive, breaking a camera lens. We'll be back. Technical difficulties. I'm staying tuned. Really, it's just as well Chuck's brother plays and not Chuck.

All right. Anyway. Enough of that silliness. Okay. So, Ron, here we go. You've got a racket right now where you have, okay, you have played with the alignment of the strings in the sense that you have the same amount of main strings that are going from shaft to the racket, through the racket head, but you've diminished the number of cross strings. Now, that must be for some really good scientific reasons. Could you explain?

Yes, that's called spin effect technology. All right. And it's a technology where you can actually use, again, your normal swing that you play tennis with. But because of the string configuration and the spaces between them, you will get up to 22% more spin on the ball. Oh, wow. Wow. Spin is critical, guys. Spin's big. It's everything. When you spin the ball, it stays in the court. You can control much better what your shot's going to do. Absolutely. Yeah. That makes sense. And I know how important spin is. I used to work in the White House. No, you didn't. I don't believe a word. the White House. No, you didn't. I don't believe a word. So when, because you have a stable of such elite top end tennis professionals, is this the sort of thing they've come back to you as a racket

supplier, manufacturer and said, I need something that gives me X amount of more spin. And have they colluded with you to develop this kind of a product, this kind of racket? Great question. How much do you use your talent to develop your technology? We work with our players very closely to develop technologies. Uh, in fact, uh, uh, Grigor Dimitrov, who, uh, unfortunately lost to Roger Federer the other day, uh, yay, Roger. Uh, unfortunately lost to Roger Federer the other day. Yay, Roger. He actually plays spin effect technology.

So it was on court at Wimbledon on display. Yeah, so to answer the question, of course, we're constantly working with our players. One of the players that we work the most with is Serena Williams. She and I have a standing. Who is she? I'm sorry, can you tell me who that is? Ignore him. It's a little-known player from the U.S. You might not have heard of her. All right, good.

I think she won a challenger event somewhere along the line. Well, I'm glad that you guys are developing new talent. We hope it pays off in her case. Yes. She can be good. Yes, we do hope so. It's always good to take a gamble on people, Ron. So, okay, is there anything you can tell us that might be arriving to a tennis racket sometime soon? Hold on one second. I'm looking off camera here. That's a big no. You know it. Hold on, hold on.

What can I tell them? What can I tell them? I'm getting a lot of corporate speak. Well, I can tell you this. I've been doing this a long time at Wilson, and there are some interesting things on the horizon that are really going to make players excited about new technology in tennis rackets. Now who works in the White House?

Ron, talk about spin. Absolutely. I respect that. See, what it means now is if our listeners are interested in tennis and they like the idea of spin effect that your configuration of the racket head brings them, they've only got to stay tuned and keep a weather eye out on tennis courts to see what your team of technicians are going to bring forward next. So that's the sort of thing that

we like here on this show. The way that science, the way that technology is being applied to the benefit of not just elite athletes, but to being rolled out down to just guys who play tennis for fun at the weekend. It's just wonderful the way that sport gets a chance to benefit from all of these ideas and knowledge and how it kind of evolves together in a lovely symbiosis there you go on my word for the day so before you cut me off can i uh i'll mention a technology that uh your listeners might find interesting please so after spin effect technology we sort of rolled out a material technology in some of our products, which was actually from a Department of Defense contractor that we partnered with. Nice.

And the material is called countervail. One word, countervail. Okay. And this is as close to a magic material that I've seen in a very long time. magic material that I've seen in a very long time. This is geared towards any player, whether you're just the average Joe or playing on tour. This material in a very friendly way helps your body with the impacts and the shocks and the vibration of playing tennis. It's considerate more of like a Gatorade for your racket, if you will, an energy bar where it's going to help you absorb all those impacts and shocks, and you can actually

play longer and with less discomfort in your life. Interesting. You know, that makes perfect sense because there is a new technology that takes the opposite of what you just said to fatigue your muscles quicker. So, for instance, consider doing an exercise while standing on a vibrating plate. Yes. It fatigues your muscles by a significant percentage more. So what you're saying is reducing that vibration actually does the opposite. So instead of fatiguing your muscles, which we know in certain workouts, that actually vibration fatigues your muscles even more. By reducing that, you give the player more longevity. That's absolutely

right. That's awesome. And we noticed this with a lot of the younger players at the academies, the 12- and 14-year-olds. There was this concept of overtraining. Young players were just getting injured and couldn't play tennis because they were hitting so many balls and playing so many hours. And that really led us to sort of finding material that could help in that in those cases interesting that's great stuff yeah that is because obviously i hadn't thought about it but baseball hitters guys who play tennis the vibration through the racket if you're not hitting it perfectly each time on that point of percussion that sweet spot you are going to suffer from that and the muscle strength must diminish accordingly.

So I applaud you for being able to partner with someone like that and bring it forward. Ron, we're going to have to let you go, and I'm really quite sad because... Yeah, it's good stuff. Yeah, fabulous. We must bring you back, sir. Would you do that?

I'd be happy to any time. Oh, man, that's great. We'll take you up. Been a pleasure. Thank you to Ron Roche from Wilson Tennis. Been an absolute pleasure. I learned a lot. Countervail.

I was thinking some point there was a cloak of invisibility, but it wasn't that, was it? It was something more practical. No, that's Harry Potter. I know you're British, but calm down. No, I'm calm. I'm there. I'm back in the room.

No, that really is good stuff, and I love that. That makes sense. I'm going to have to buy my brother a racket that does just the opposite, and then I'll play him. And then Jared Donaldson, a player who got a real chance of emerging as an up-and-coming, well, he's already an up-and-coming men's player in the

U.S. tennis, so great to have him on board. Unfortunately, at the time that people will hear this, he will have lost in Wimbledon. But there we go. That's it for now. Well, that's our show. That is our show. I hope you've enjoyed it.

A brief look, an all too brief look at the wonderful game of tennis and the physics therein. So from me, Gary O'Reilly. And me, Chuck Nice. It's goodbye from Playing With Science. We'll see you all soon.