US Open Stringingoom - Day 7

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Day 7 - Wed 24^th August 2011

My new cutters have tasted blood. I returned from breakfast to find a racquet waiting for me and due to be picked up in 10 minutes. I cut the string a little too hastily and went through my finger. One of the downsides of cutters with razor sharp tips is that they go through skin with ease. My old cutters have blunt tips but they don’t give the sort of finish on the string tip that I like. So there I am stringing away bleeding all over the place but I didn’t have time to stop. One of the guys patched me up while I was stringing. Great start to the day.

We have been busy in patches today.  We work hard for a bit then get to chill out. At 11.55am 2 racquets came in for me which were due in an hour. Easy. Ten minutes later another racquet came in for me also due at 1. So now I have to start working fast. After completing the first 2 another one comes in also due ASAP. At 5 minutes past one I am bagging up the last of the four racquets. Four racquets in just over an hour but I really cruised on the last one.

We have a quality control supervisor here. Yat has trained many of the stringers in this room. If he doesn’t like something or the racquets are not good enough he will let you know and you will have to redo them. The tiniest thing like an imperfect knot or the strings not laying perfectly along the frame is enough to warrant another restring. He checks all series racquets. A series of racquets is 2 or more racquets for the same player. If they are to be at the same tension then they have to ping exactly. If they are at different tensions then have to ping differently. If they are not perfect then they get done again. If the strings are not straight you will know about it. Thus far I have escaped his wrath. As well as being the quality controller he is also there to answer any technical questions we have.  I have had to ask a lot of questions. Knot placement is critical. Although we have a specific pattern to follow, there a lot of exceptions with respect to knot placement. The type of racquet we are stringing and also the type of string we are using affects where the knot will go. We will use different knot placement on the same racquet depending on the string that is going into it.

For the first 4 days of the tournament we have strung 754 racquets. This is 68 more racquets than were done by the same stage last year. Our biggest day so far was Monday. We did 295 racquets that day. I did 26 racquets that day. The most racquets I have done in a day is 46. That was in Sydney a couple of years ago. 20 – 30 racquets a day is comfortable. 15 racquets a day is like a holiday.

I have been stringing a lot of K Blades. There are quite a few of the pink blades being used, even by guys. I have not done a Head Prestige yet. This is a good thing. There a few of them coming in for stringing but none have been allocated to me. The Prestige is my least favourite racquet to string.

It was an early finish for me tonight. I caught the 9pm shuttle back to the hotel and was showered and relaxing by 10.

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Shane Mikic is the pro-shop 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.

US Open Stringing Room - Day 6

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Day 6 - Tuesday 23 August

I had a dream last night that my unit was flooding. I had friends  over and the carpet was all wet. I used a vacuum cleaner to suck the water up.  I expected to be dreaming about stringing.

My index fingers are sore today – on the very tips and along the edges of the nails. I really was pretty rough with them yesterday. I will have to not use those fingers at all and they will be fine by tomorrow.

I have some new bandaids to try out. I am trying blister bandaids today. The adhesive is a bit stronger so it might prevent them from coming off so easily. I am waiting in the hotel lobby now for the bus. I have just had a $3 ham and  cheese croissant and have a drink called Neurogasm. It improves circulation apparently. We’ll see.

No racquets for me from 10am to 11am. I am killing time on Facebook. Feel sleepy. I have some bottles of 5 hour energy in the fridge. I might have to get into that.

Matches are going on now. There are a lot of players outside the stringing room doing their warm-ups. It is a cool day outside. Definitely jumper weather and here I am without a jumper. The walk home tonight is going to be fun.

Slow, slow day. I had a lot of downtime today. This means that my players must be losing. Sitting here doing nothing is hard work. I have no energy. This is not normal. The long days might be catching up with me.

I am stringing for Fernando Gonzales. I strung 2 racquets for him. He does not have string with him so is buying it from us for each racquet he has strung. I did one racquet at 45lbs with Alu Power and the other at 46lbs. He is using a Pure Storm + but his racquet has no specs printed on it. It looks like he has a custom frame.

The new bandaids are working well. They have managed to stay attached for the whole day and my fingers are feeling fresh again. It looks like my thumb, index finger and fourth fingers are the ones that get all of the action so I will continue taping them.

We survived an earthquake today. It happened just before 2pm. I was at the machine and the ground started moving. At first I thought I was passing out. Then I saw the lights moving in the room. It lasted for about 10 seconds or so. Everyone was leaving the building so eventually I joined them. 

We left the courts early tonight. A few stringers stayed for the last matches to finish while the rest of us left at 8pm. I was so tired that I could have gone straight to bed . Instead I went for beers with Joe and Marni. They own Racquet Corner in Omaha. They are fun. Joe is one of the funniest guys I know. After a couple of beers I am back in my room and get to bed just after midnight.

Shane Mikic is the pro-shop 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.

US Open Stringing Room 2011 - Day 5

Day 5 Monday 22nd August 2011

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Slept like a baby last night. I think I am on New York time finally. Had a ham and cheese croissant for breakfast. It was good but the cheese is different. So yellow.  I have never seen cheese that yellow. Maybe I need to get out more. Whenever I order food over here they always look at me like “That’s it? You sure you don’t want more?”

It has been a slow morning. 11.15 am and I have only done one racquet so far. We are expecting  300 racquets today.  Which means we are going to get totally smashed this afternoon.Could be a very late night. I have Powerbars and Red Bull to get me through.

I have taped my fingers today. They were ok after yesterday but I only did about 15 racquets. They will get a much harder workout today. I have found these round bandaids which are perfect to protect the tops of my fingers. I brought a supply with me but I cannot find them anywhere here. When I run out I might be in trouble. We’ll see how that goes.

We left the courts at just after 10pm tonight. Half hour ride home so ready for bed around midnight.

We did 290 racquets for the day. It did not stop from about 1pm onwards. There were a lot of racquets coming in. The bandaids are doing ok. My fingers feel like they have seen some action but are not painful at all. I have done a lot of racquets today. I am in the groove now. It always feels a bit slow the first day, but now I’m just in the groove. The machine is working great. We all have brand new machines. The clamps are working very well. No slippage at all and no crushed string. My machine was out of calibration this morning. It was out by a kilo. I recalibrated and then calibrated it 3 times after that. It was fine and has not needed further calibration.

I have 2 racquets to do first thing tomorrow morning. First round of qualifying starts tomorrow morning at 10 so we expect a morning rush plus there will be  some  on-court racquets as well.

I need to buy red bull on h way to the courts tomorrow. After 2 days stringing I have exhausted my supply. There is this supplement over here called “5 hour energy”. I might try that out tomorrow instead of the red bull. We’ll see how that goes.

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.

US Open Stringing Room 2011 - Day 4

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.

US Open Stringing Room 2011 - Day 3

Day 3 Sat 20th August

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Sleep patterns are an issue. Had 8 hours sleep the previous night and felt great. Last night I went to bed at midnight. Slept through my alarm and woke up at 2.15pm. I think that was my body catching up on the last few days. 

Walked around for a few hours today.Lots of big shops here.Went to the gym for a bit. Really just took it easy. I have an early start tomorrow. It will be my first day stringing.  It should be an easy day. We don’t get really busy with the qualifiers until Mon/Tues. Qualifying starts  Wednesday so we expect Tuesday to be one of the busiest days we will have for the tournament.

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.

US Open String Room 2011 - Day 2

Day 2 Friday 19 August

Things I learned today

1. Lack of sleep leads to headaches.

2. Nurofen Zavance does not act THAT fast.

3. Reese’s peanut Butter Cups are addictive.

4. Reese's Peatut Butter Cups contain 10grams of protein per 100grams which justifies my decision to eat them as a post workout meal.

5. Hotel gyms are really small.

6. Bums over here are really large.

7. Chemists over here are actually grocery stores but without the fruit and veges.

8. Food is really cheap.

9. Pizza from New York Slice in Brisbane is $7.50 a slice. Pizza actually from New York is 99 cents per slice.

10. There are more banks in Manhattan than there are 7 Eleven stores in Melbourne. There is even an Apple Bank - for apples?????

11. Wireless internet with a prepaid stick is lightning fast compared to Australian wireless.

12. The setup instructions provided by T Mobile with their prepaid internet stick are woefully inadequate.

13. When the T Mobile automated helpline cannot help you it just hangs up on you.

14. Wireless internet here is expensive.

15. Pre- paid phone plans are cheap.

16. The guys at Footlocker are really well drilled. Brought out 2 styles of shoes for me when i selected the one i wanted and tried to sell me innersoles as i was trying them on.

17. Times Square is underwhelming.

18. There is an undersupply of wheelie bins in New York.

19. It is ok to leave trash on the ground.

20. It is cheaper to buy new clothes than have them washed with the hotel's laundry service.

21. Homeless people here have mobile phones.

22. The police swat team gears up on Times Square just to impress tourists. Show-offs.

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.

US Open Stringing 2011

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Day 1 18th August

My first day in the States and I'm spending it sitting in the American Airlines terminal. I can think of much better ways to waste 7 hours. So far as airport terminals go this one is pretty average. No good shops, A few food outlets. All of the food outlets have massive queues - US Customs size queues. I have never seen this in an Australian airport. The staffing sucks or these guys can eat. Either way it's not good. I shall have to start queuing at 1030am if I want to eat lunch at a reasonable hour.

The flight over was 13 hours. It's just on 9am now which means I have been awake for 19 hours now. Feeling tired. Although still managing to type with few errors. Note to self - get sleeping pills for the return trip. I cannot sleep in an upright position. No way, no how. I really feel like just lying down on the carpet and going to sleep. Floor space, however, seems to be at a premium. And I'm not confident that I  won't catch something. The warning signs all through customs scream danger at every turn.  The customs voice over guy likes to use the phrase "law abiding citizen". He uses it a lot. "Law abiding citizens are free to go about your business". "Law abiding citizens have nothing to hide. They are true travellers. True travellers are welcome in the United States." The undertone of course being if you mess up we will shoot you -dead. Note to self don't mess around with these guys.

Managed to clear customs in an hour. Pretty good considering I was at the very end of the queue. They bumped me to the front. My passport has had a workout. Had to present to the check in desk in Brisbane, then to customs in Australia, then to again to board the flight, then to customs in the US. before I collected my bag, then again to customs after collecting my bag (sidestepped the body cavity search) then again to drop my bag off for the connecting flight. In the space of 100m I present 3 times to 3 different people. Then it's over to the American Airlines terminal where I join a massive security screening queue and present my passport again.

I have to take my shoes off at this checkpoint and also undergo a full body scan. There is someone in a booth looking at me totally naked as I stand there with my hands behind my head. I saw that pose last night on the plane. I was watching Snowtown. In that movie a pedophile takes photos of a young boy standing in that position wearing only underwear. I feel violated.

I'm watching passengers board a plane right now. The staff here seem very unhappy. They are warning passengers that there will be random ID and baggage checks once they are on board the flight. If they ask me to unpack my bag I will not be thrilled.

The one saving grace so far are the peanut butter cups. Best thing ever. Bought a Nestea thinking it would be the same as in Australia. It sort of is. You can try it out at home. Buy a Nestea from the shop then each time you take a mouthful mix in about 8 teaspoons of sugar and there you have it. American Nestea.

It is just on 930am now. Time to find a spot to snooze.

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.