Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Hitting Session with John

I must say, this is probably the best I've hit in quite a long time. I just wish I would of brought the camera. Hit with John today and boy was it exhausting. Why? We hit tons of 10+ ball rallies. No more unforced areas keeping the hitting sessions short. I finally noticed more speed and quickness on my movement... p90x to thank?

My forehand was a machine. I fired off multiple blasts from that wing. Ample power, ample spin. The only issue was on my approach shot I wasn't getting low enough and in effect, I hit a few FH approaches into the net.

My backhand was another story... My shoulder is about 80% right now, still can't push it too hard, but for tennis its ok. I've actually improved my slice BH as a result. I don't have power anymore on the BH wing. The timings just been off, but I can slap a few back with little spin. I just need to get the timing back to make contact in front of me, and get a little earlier on my preparation.

My movement like I said was great. John sent me running more than a few times and I was able to streak up, down, left and right on the court to get to it. I was caught flat footed a few times but less often than usually. I actually won a few points at the net... while John was at the net already. Volley to volley is something I never win points off of.

Though my shoulder hasn't healed, I'm going to be returning to the p90x routine. I'll just skip the push up exercises, but I feel ok doing pull ups and overhead presses. If I feel I didn't get a good enough workout, I'll just tack on a run at the end.

Monday, March 23, 2009

Shoulder Issues


Well I pushed it a bit too hard and hurt my shoulder pretty badly during my p90x workout. Luckily its supposed to be my recovery week anyways, so I'm safe for now. Not too happy but I can still run a little bit. Took about a week but I have almost full range of motion and almost no pain. Not sure when its safe to start working out again, but I'm anxious to get back on the routine.

Tennis wise last week as a funk, but this week with only 1 arm, I was hitting much better. Its funny, with the plyo, I've yet to see an improvement with my quickness but I guess I'm being a little over anxious. With the week off from p90x, I power was definitely there. I'm having issues hitting into the net, need to work on my footwork, maybe some footspeed drills will get me on track. I hilariously tried to hit a 1 handed backhand but that was pathetic. I didn't have ability to really hit my 2 hander thanks to my shoulder, so I basically hit the slice on my backhand wing. The rallies with John was alot of fun. He was hitting well and with a lot of confidence. Let me tell you, the bastard is FAST. He chipped and charged and just put everything away at the net. We had some nice rallies going back and forth today.

Going to be a crazy few weeks coming up so hopefully I manage to get SOME tennis in. Oh well I guess my shoulder could use the break though...

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Hitting with John, p90x effects

Hit with John today, we were both a bit rusty with the weeklong layoff. Compared to last time I wasn't as sore as before, but my muscles felt lazy. I wasn't able to get maximum power from my strokes as I'm used to. I would of thought I'd be faster on the court, but I felt lazier than usual. I'm going to give it a few more weeks, and definitely on the recovery week I'll really gauge if I see any noticeable improvement.

Fitness wise I'm down 8 lbs, and p90x is going well. I feel myself getting a little lazy and have to keep motivated to keep with the routine. Today I do chest and back with maybe some running afterwards. Hope I can get a little more court time though.

Monday, March 16, 2009

P90x Week 2

Just a quick update. So last week was rather uneventful. Lots of cancellations, didn't get to hit. Not happy about that but oh well. This week should be good, hoping to hit at least 3 times.

Fitness wise, I got week 2 in the bag. I'm suprisingly NOT sored up and can't believe I upped my reps and weight on the program. Down 7 lbs too. Get to play with John today, I'll find out if the plyo routine make me faster. I'm more limber thanks to the yoga though and I do feel stronger... we'll see if that translates to the court.

Friday, March 6, 2009

Hitting with Franco and more p90x...

I'm so sore. 2nd day soreness is usually the worst and the plyo i did on Tuesday is really flaring up. But since my upperbody soreness had gone away, I was ok to go.

Its really interesting not being able to use my power in tennis. My game revolves so much around racquet headspeed for pace and topspin, I was a bit offput to adjust. Luckily I was able to deal with most of Franco's spins (I think he was going easy on me) and not misshit too much. Actually aside from having no juice and therefore a weak backhand, I was pretty consistent (relative term). My legs though were shot. Every run, sprint or split step caused intense burning sensations on my qauds, hips and glutes. My right calf is still very tender and it made change of direction almost impossible. When I did try and focus though, I felt fluid and even ran down a ball or two; albeit, i gave up coming back the other way on the follow up.

I've decided to also post about my fitness instead of creating a 2nd blog. I'm not bothering to ask my readers their opinion b/c well... I don't exactly have a fanbase... haha.

Onto the workouts, the shoulder and arms routine was pretty easy. Easy being that it didn't involve murderous amounts of push ups and pull ups. I'm very very adept at lifting dumbells and I actually have extremely strong triceps (8 dips with 135 lbs hanging on my belt). I wish I would of done the yoga routine earlier. It was about an hour and a half of being completely uncomfortable and actually breaking a sweat!



I have no flexibility and hopefully this will change that. What it did do was alleviate about 50% of all the soreness. In fact post yoga, I was pretty pain free, with exception to my right calf. I've always been pretty down on yoga, but I guess it does have its place. Today is the back and legs which I heard is pretty hellacious, and instead of the kempo, I'll be running on saturday.

I hope for week 2 to be less sore, and see some athletic gains soon enough. But for right now I'll be happy with being less sore.

Thursday, March 5, 2009

Workout and Tennis?


I spent the last several months, focusing mainly on tennis and neglecting my strength training and running routines. I didn't want my soreness and fatigue to interfere with my tennis game. I've come to a point where I think, regaining some of my strength and stamina will do me some good. Don't get me wrong, I think I'm still plenty strong (200+ bench, 20+ consecutive pull ups).

Ok to be honest, I'm doing the p90x routine.

Its pretty intense. In fact I'm pretty sored up right now. But its combination of strength training, yoga (flexibility), and plyometrics (explosiveness) will pay dividends to my tennis game. I'm currently in week 1 and its kicking my butt pretty badly actually. The routine is relentless and bc of my ego I'm trying my best to keep pace with the DVD.

I played today with John. My shots definitely had no pop, especially my backhand wing. After warming up a bit, I decided some match play would be a good idea. I've always played very aggressively, but in terms of power and spin. Without my strength I wanted to see if I could win points with my control and placement. Me and John played a 10 point tie breaker and after surging to a 7-3 lead. John just broke back and too it 8 - 10.

For the most part, I could see the ball ok, but I really had to try to end points quickly (legs were dead from the previous nights plyometric routine). This lead to more unforced errors, but on a whole I guess it wasn't so bad of a result.

Definitely going to do some research to see if theres anything I can do to reduce the muscle soreness. I think I just need to get back into the swing of things. I'm really hoping the yoga will increase my range of motion and the plyometrics will make me more explosive and agile on the court.