| | Wow! Michael Newberry wrote, Thanks for your compliments Bill. You're right about the hand-eye coordination. Your welcome! I love to watch tennis, although I don't play it, even though my mother did. I tried it a couple of times, and noticed that hitting backhand was harder than hitting forehand. I guess hitting forehand was easier, because I was used to swinging a baseball bat that way, but I wasn't a switch hitter, so hitting backhand was kind of awkward. I have a friend who's been playing tennis for quite awhile, so one day I said, serve me a ball and I'll see if I can hit it. He serves about 110 mph. Jesus, I could scarcely see the damn thing, it came over so fast. How do you guys return 130 mph serves?? What do you think of Roger Federer? Rod Laver thinks he's the most talented player the game has ever seen. Of course, Federer's game is somewhat Laver-like, so it doesn't totally surprise me that Laver would say something like that. California State Junior Champion; Ranked 8th in the U.S. Juniors; Full tennis scholarship to U.S.C. (Fine art major); Played #3 on the NCAA championship team; 2nd place U.S. Amateur Mixed Doubles; Quit U.S.C. to become an artist but played part-time professionally to pay the bills; Played pro-tennis in Holland beat 3 guys that were top 100 in the world, went full-time to art school there; Teach tennis part time for a couple of years; Gave over 20 playing lessons to young Pete Sampras, never lost; Coached a 17-year old player to #17 in the world another to win the U.S. National 12 and under championship; Southern California 35's Men’s Champion; 3-days hitting partner with Venus and Serena Williams; Didn’t compete for nine years then represented the U.S. in Barcelona in the Men’s 45's and beat the #3 world ranking in that division.
In my opinion I am a far better artist than tennis player but value in art is determined through aesthetic and critical thought; not like I can beat the shit out of other artists. LOL! But that's that an impressive resume to say the least! Awesome stuff! Do you still play, and are you ranked in any of the older age groups. You're a contemporary of tennis legends, Borg, McEnroe and Connors. I wonder if they're still playing, and did you ever get a chance to play against any of them, or against any of other top players of that era, like Evan Lendl? By the way, who was the #3 player in the 45's division that you beat, if you don't mind my asking?
- Bill
(Edited by William Dwyer
on 4/27, 11:56pm)
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