Day 4 Sunday 21 August
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Woke up at 1.30am this morning. Could not go back to sleep. At 5.30 am decided to get dressed and go to the gym. Today was my first day stringing. We met downstairs in the lobby at 8am and caught the shuttle bus in.
The stringing room is in the player services area. Unlike Melbourne there is no public viewing area of the stringers room. The stringers room here looks out over the player’s courtyard so the players and officials are the only ones who can see us string. It is a bit more relaxed in that respect.
I received my uniform today. They look great. Shirts, shorts, tracksuit, bag and the most comfortable tennis shoes I have ever worn.
We expected today to be pretty slow. We did 170 racquets all up. There were 10 stringers on today. We have another 2 stringers joining us tomorrow. I started stringing at 10am and went through until 6.30.
I strung one of Verdasco’s practice racquets today. If he is given to me as one of my players it could be interesting. He often needs racquets in a hurry and does send in on- court racquets when he plays. When a player send in a racquet during a match we have 18 minutes from the time it hits the front desk to have it back in the hands of the runner. So we must have the strings cut out, string the racquet, straighten strings, stencil and bag it all inside 18 minutes. To complete an on-court racquet on time you really need to be stringing it in around 10 – 12 minutes.
We left the room at 7.30 and went out for dinner to a Mexican restaurant. It was a long, long dinner with the best nachos ever. Each nacho was a single corn chip with cheese, a dollop of guacamole and a cube of the most perfectly cooked beef. Amazing.
We are expecting tomorrow to be very busy. It rained late this afternoon which means we will be hit by a lot of players who did not get to the courts to practice today.
Shane Mikic is the proshop manager for the Tennis Gear stores and their online store www.tennisgear.com.au in Brisbane. He has over 16 years racquet stringing experience and is currently part of the Wilson Global Stringing Team at the 2011 US Open. The following blog shares his experiences during his time in the Wilson Stringing room.
