RafaLint: April 1st

No April Fool’s joke from me…just a wee bit of lint. But the ATP did play a joke…and I have no idea how Andy and Tipsy kept a straight face during it.

Articles:

Nadal visitará al doctor Mikel Sánchez en Vitoria – via diariodemallorca.es – thanks, genny_ss. From the mangle, it seems that Rafa’s been playing with sore knees for 9 months. (Oops. It’s been pointed out to me in the comments that the 9 months quote was related to the 2009 Wimbledon

2 Apr 2012 | by miri | 20 Comments

RafaLint: December 13th

A long weekend in NY and I’m even further behind – sorry! BTW, those waiting on a DC version of the calendar? It might be a while…I haven’t even had a chance to start sorting through photos yet.

Need to fill some time before more RafaTennis? Open, savor and enjoy the Australian Open Vault.

Non-Rafa recommended reading: Taking it to Court by James LaRosa.

Articles:

Picture This: Davis Cup final wrapup by Courtney Nguyen (si.com)
Nadal: “Para el Madrid es un golpe moral” – talking

14 Dec 2011 | by miri | 8 Comments

Shanghia: Pre-tournament presser photos and article

Rafa had his pre-tournament presser today. There’s an article about it on the ATP site (Nadal Embracing Challenge To Improve) with a lot of interesting quotes. Here are some photos:

Photos by AP Photo/Andy Wong, GOH CHAI HIN/AFP/Getty Images, and REUTERS/Aly Song

11 Oct 2011 | by miri | 13 Comments

RafaLint: June 18th

Stuff to read:

Rafa’s on the cover of the latest issue of L’Equipe magazine (thanks, Maria)
Previewing and predicting the men’s field at Wimbledon – by Chris Chase (Roddick? Um. Okay.)
The Big Four, and Any More? – by Steve Tignor
2011 Wimbledon Men’s Draw Preview and Analysis – by Nima Naderi
Roger Federer talks up risk-taking in his rivalry with Rafael Nadal – by Kevin Mitchell. Worth it for the sentence after Rafa not making predictions.
Why Rafa rules

19 Jun 2011 | by miri | 35 Comments

IW: On my way to LA

I’m writing this via my phone while at the airport. I’ll be out of pocket for the next few days since I’ll be at Indian Wells. Updates here will be minimal. Please follow on Twitter for more frequent updates. I’ll do my best to tweet often.

Feel free to start a thread in the IW Community forum if you want to share links, info and talk about matches.

10 Mar 2011 | by miri | 20 Comments

RafaLint: March 6th

Today’s smorgasbord of RafaStuff…

Videos:

Higher quality and more footage of Rafa watching the Feli match. (Thanks, Inés.)
From this year’s AO: shirtless serving and rally practice.

Articles:

Blog – Belgians back Rafa – a nice entry on the DC site
Nadal reúne a su equipo en Charleroi para partir hacia Indian Wells (mangle) – Rafa and Marc! to play doubles at IW…I’ll be camped out on that court
Workers assemble a special surface for tennis stars’ exhibition – about the Oregon

6 Mar 2011 | by miri | 10 Comments

Nic’s AO blog: Day four [Updated]

My final day at the AO, and I had tickets to see Rafa play another day match on Rod Laver Arena. Bought them the day before when the OOP was released. Did it on my iPhone while watching Verdasco’s match. How cool is technology these days? It makes the whole tournament-going experience so much better with Twitter, live scores, internet ticketing, accessing OOPs the second they’re released.

So hopefully this time Rafa would be able to play a full match. And be challenged somewhat by his opponent. I didn’t make an effort to get out to the practice courts that

3 Mar 2011 | by nic | 13 Comments

Nic’s AO blog: Day three

Day 3 was all about Rafa practice!! A full extended session I might add. Not like the previous days’ catching him as he’s about to leave type of sessions. But being right there from start (almost) til end. Lovely :)

But it was almost not to be. I was checking out of my hotel that morning, and about to hop in a cab to my friend’s place, and the cabbie that I hail decides to take someone else as I’m grabbing my luggage. Pfft. At that moment though, I get a call from @zoejrogers telling me that Rafa is practicing on

2 Mar 2011 | by nic | 15 Comments

Nic’s AO blog: Day two

The OOP had come out the night before, and we knew that Rafa was going to be the 2nd day match on Centre Court. With that, the plan was to be at Melbourne Park early, so that we wouldn’t be stuck in a long line and possibly miss Rafa at practice. As it was guaranteed that Rafa would be practicing that morning pre-match, the drive was pretty strong to wake up early and be as ready as I could, fast as I could that morning. I even had time to go buy something near my hotel in advance for lunch,

1 Mar 2011 | by nic | 6 Comments

Nic’s AO blog: Day one

Melbourne Park opens its doors at 10am, so my plan was to get there just before. Waking up was painful that morning after the activities of the previous day, and that very late bed time. I spent more than an hour going through my things before sleeping, checking the weather, OOP, planning matches to see, catching up with tweets, packing my bag and all the stuff I’d already accumulated by then. You can’t believe the list of things to do just to be ready for the day ahead. Especially fitting everything you need into your bag is a feat in

28 Feb 2011 | by nic | 9 Comments