Tennis Past 50

Tennis is indeed a true lifetime sport—just ask any tennis player over 50! However, as you get older you may need to adjust your stroke technique and strategy to stay on top of your game.

Tennis Past 50 is the only book to address mature players’ specific needs with proven strategies that adjust stroke technique, positioning, injuries, and equipment. Tennis Past 50 shows you how to

• modify your stroke to gain more power without sacrificing control;
  
• play smarter with adjustments to position on the court and style of play;
  
• improve your doubles and mixed doubles game;
  
• choose the right equipment for your style of play, ability, and fitness level;
  
• eat right for better performance on the court; and
  
• avoid injury and improve your conditioning for better performance.

Tennis Past 50 shares the winning insights and tips that the authors have learned from decades of coaching and playing. Tony Trabert was ranked No. 1 in the world in the 1950s and is a popular TV commentator, and Ron Witchey is a well-known biomechanist with a specialization in aging and tennis.

Trabert and Witchey teach how to play smarter, so you can be successful without trying to run down every ball, learn how to use spin and adapt traditional shots to your advantage, and handle different playing styles of your opponents.

Tennis Past 50 will provide winning instruction that will have you playing better than ever. This book will improve the game of any mature player—male or female, competitive or recreational.

Chapter 1. Playing Smarter, Not Harder
Chapter 2. Upgrading Your Equipment
Chapter 3. Hitting Your Best Strokes
Chapter 4. Assessing Your Fitness and Your Game
Chapter 5. Conditioning for a Stronger Game
Chapter 6. Eating for Competition
Chapter 7. Winning Strategies for Different Opponents
Chapter 8. Improving Your Doubles Play

Now a 50-plus player himself, Tony Trabert has been playing tennis since he was six years old. He was the top-ranked player in the world in 1953 and 1955 and was just named president of the International Tennis Hall of Fame. Trabert won three of four grand slams, missing only the Australian Championships, and 10 majors in singles and doubles including Wimbledon and the U.S. and French Championships (now referred to as Opens). Trabert played for the Davis Cup team five times with one win and later served as Davis Cup captain for five years with the team winning twice.

He currently works as a television commentator for CBS Sports and Nine Network Australia. He has covered the U.S. Open since 1973 and Wimbledon since 1986, as well as the French Open at Roland Garros, and he's written two books on tennis. He knows many other players of renown who've continued playing into their 70s and 80s—some of whom are featured in this book.

Trabert and his wife, Vicki, are residents of Ponte Vedra, Florida.

Ronald L. Witchey is a biomechanist with a specialization in aging and tennis. His research on the benefits of tennis playing on functional fitness in older adults has been presented at the United States Tennis Association (USTA) Teachers Conference, the annual meeting of the Society of Tennis Medicine and Science, and the National Strength and Conditioning Association's Sport-Specific Training Conference. He has also given numerous talks on circuit training, sports medicine, and biomechanics.

A lifetime member of USTA and a former member of the USTA Sport Science Committee, Witchey is the former head men's tennis coach at California State University at Fullerton, where he has been a professor in the division of kinesiology and health promotion for the past 37 years. He's currently the fitness director at SeaCliff Golf and Tennis Club, and he continues to teach biomechanics and anatomy at California State University.

Witchey holds a PhD in kinesiology from the University of Southern California. He lives in Placentia, California, with his wife, Ceci.

Our definition of great tennis changes as we grow older. Tony Trabert's book will teach you how to play your best tennis at any age and retain—or rekindle—your love for the sport.

Billie Jean King

Aging doesn't have to mean losing your edge. Tony Trabert has been at or among the top throughout the years, and he will teach anyone how to play their best, not just past 50, but at any age.

Chris Evert