Week of November 2nd - 8th, 2020 We continue to be diligent in following all the protocols and are grateful for your cooperation. We thank you all for your patronage, and your diligence in helping us make the tennis training possible for all our junior players! Below find your weekly update from your head coach, and if you have any questions for me, I can be reached at craig@acetennis.ca. Craig Mercer Tennis Director and Assistant General Manager, Toronto Tennis City

MINI TENNIS TEAM Head Coach John Cairns john@acetennis.ca

This week in the Little Ace’s we began the volley focus phase of training. The main technical elements we worked on were the grip, racquet angle and set up for the volley. It started with the racquet skills warm up where they now “pop” the ball with no bounce or with a combination of no bounce and with an understanding that there is a comfy zone for the volley while they are challenged to get 10x in the volley comfy zone. The send and receive ready ready split were done from behind the approach line and timed moving forward and calling+ hit back “forehand” or “backhand”. The competitive game was the approach game, where the server is the person who approached. Fantastic game for play oriented learning. For the serve we continued hammer / continental grip work and racquet skill pre serve and allowed to spin for serve straight out of the racquet skills.

FUTURES / CHAMPIONS TEAMS Head Coach Adam Dykes adam@acetennis.ca

This week went well. We had a couple great days of training with the intensity and focus very high. We are continuing our theme of taking time away and we are working on a specific footwork pattern (Left to Right footwork) in order to get to the net. This is a new skill and as the week progressed the players are starting to get better at the pattern and understanding when to use it.

PROVINCIAL / NATIONAL U12 PROVINCIAL INTERNATIONAL TEAMS Head Coach Sam Jonas sam@acetennis.ca

This week we continued to focus on the players winning the cross court battle. In other words trying to increase consistency and quality by encouraging big/safe targets while encouraging a faster tempo. Proper height (second window) and spin are a must while positioning and recovery remains a priority and are strictly enforced while all this is being taught. Point play largely revolved around proper decision making; when to rally and when to attack. Coaches prioritized feedback around making sure the players have a plan and proper structure to the points they play. We focus on making sure the points are played well and with quality rather than on only winning the points.