The balls of contention: the US Open and an unexpected debate

Tennis players are the characters of Golden curls of sport.

The balls are too big or too small. Courts are either too fast or too slow. It’s too cold, or too hot, or too sticky or too sunny.

“Some weeks you don’t play well and you have to blame something”joked David Witt, who coaches Jessica Pegula, the American who made it to the quarter-finals until she met Iga Swiatek from Poland.

And so it was at this year’s US Open, when the women – well, some of them – rebelled against the Wilson balls they’ve used at the tournament for years. This is the only Grand Slam event where men and women use different balls.

These yellow spheres are loved and hated.

Pegula, who had only lost one set in four games, and the one at the tie break, loved balls. The Polish Swiatek, number 1 in the world, described them as “horrible”. So is tennis. There is rarely a consensus. Players often make mixed complaints in the same tournament, or even on the same day, about the same thing.

You are officially forgiven if you have lived your life thinking that all tennis balls are created the same but with different names and numbers printed on them. But now, a short tutorial on tennis ball technology.

The men of the US Open use what is known as a ball “extra duty”which means that the felt on the outside of the ball is slightly wider than the ball itself. “regular duty” that women use.

All other balls are the same: their core structure, size and weight, how they bounce and how quickly they deform, according to Jason Collins, senior product manager for racquet sports at Wilson Sporting Goods.

However, regular use balls “play faster”Collins said through a company spokesperson. The more tightly woven felt doesn’t swell as much and can wear out, so there’s not as much friction when those balls make contact with the ground or the strings of a racquet.

The added friction of a soft ball allows players to create maximum spin. Those who rely heavily on spin may have a hard time rolling a ball of regular use the way they want, especially after a few games when the ball starts to shed the lint it had just come out of the jar and gets smaller.

Players who hit a flatter ball, like Coco Gauff, Pegula, or Madison Keys, don’t have this problem as much. But some still do. Seeded fourth Paula Badosa, who lost in the second round, hits flat like anyone else. He said he hated balls.

“Sometimes you feel more like you’re playing ping-pong”Badosa said after his first round victory. Two days later, he was out of the tournament.

Another point of complication and confusion: Regular balls are always used on slow courts and other wet surfaces because they don’t pick up moisture as well as the looser felt of the extra balls. Extra service balls are preferred for outdoor hard courts, such as those in the US Open, except when they are not.

And there is another factor that complicates things: tennis is run by seven different organizations, with tournaments around the world, many of which have different companies paying for the right to supply the balls. This means that players can end up playing a different ball from a different manufacturer from week to week. And each ball is slightly different, behaving differently depending on the heat, humidity and atmospheric pressure.

According to the United States Tennis Association (USTA), owner and organizer of the US Open, women have played with a ball different from that of men since ever; the WTA Tour has always intended it to be this way and the tournament respects the tour preferences.

Stacey Allasterwho is director of the US Open and was executive director of the WTA from 2009 to 2015, said sports science experts on the women’s circuit have long believed that the faster, leaner ball helps limit arm and shoulder injuries. .

Every year, Allaster said, the USTA asks the WTA which balls it wants to use and the answer has always been the same. “As far as we know, most people like it, so we might end up trading one problem for another.”

amy binderthe chief spokesperson for the WTA, confirmed that the sport’s female players and scientific teams have gravitated towards the fastest balls in regular use, but the executives have heard “a select number of our athletes who would like to consider a change”.

“The WTA will continue to monitor and discuss the issue”Binder said, although he said the decision on the ball was ultimately up to the USTA.

The football controversy has already had other versions. After Ashleigh Barty won the Australian Open in January, her coach, Craig Tyzzer, said he would never win the US Open as long as the tournament used Wilson balls on regular duty. (Barty retired in March, aged 25, when she was number 1 in the world.) The latest complaints began her summer as players started playing with these balls ahead of the US. Open.

Tennis, however, is all about making adjustments and finding solutions as conditions change throughout a match, tournament and season. The challenge can be both mental and physical.

Pegula switched racquets in the round of 16 match against Kvitova on Monday, experimenting with different string tensions in search of one that felt right when the humidity and ball conditions changed. Wider strings hold the ball longer (think trampoline effect) and offer more time to spin.

“Something is wrong, you have to make a change,” Pegula said. “It’s important not to get too frustrated.”

This was the challenge for Swiatek, who travels with his sports psychologist, Daria Abramowicz. They talked a lot about all the challenges created by these balls that Swiatek despises so much. Abramowicz doesn’t tell Swiatek not to think about balls because then the first thing he’ll think about will be them.

“It’s like I’m telling you right now not to think about a blue elephant for a minute, and literally the first thing that comes to mind is this blue elephant,” Abramowicz said. “You accept the thought, because it is already there, and you go on, you refocus, you find the anchor in something else.”

Pegula and Swiatek met Wednesday in the quarter-finals, a match that could have become a test of Pegula’s flexibility and Swiatek’s ability to think about things other than footballs. The balls had nothing to do with the outcome. Swiatek won.

Nobody knows what will happen to the balls next year, but Allaster said the WTA should decide what to do soon. Wilson has already asked which balls the USTA needs in 2023.

Someone will not be happy.

The New York Times. Special for Clarin.