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Second Serve - A Tennis Now Blog

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Hello everyone. This will be a short one today.

Started the day off with having a look at the dock next to the O2 Arena. There's a system of ferries all along the Thames,and if you were so inclined you could ride it from one side of London to the other.

Since the O2 is in North Greenwich, which is near the Canary Wharf and other shipyards, there's not much to look at. But I'd imagine there's a lot to look at closer to central London. The cool part is for a small fee of £12,95, you can ride on it all day.

It would be a different way to see the city, so if you ever find your way to London I'd definitely suggest it.

We got an earlier start than usual today. We went to shoot our daily video in front of the O2, but our preferred spot was being used by Sue Barker and the BBC.

You know, Barker and the other professional TV presenters make getting in front of camera look so easy. But she, like any other normal person, flubbed her lines a few times and had to check and recheck her script.

I guess that show that just because someone's on TV doesn't mean their infallible, even if the expectation is there.

Later on, we shot a 10 minute interview with Polish doubles player Mariusz Fyrstenberg, who reached the US Open final with his partner Marcin Matkowski.

In the interview, I asked him about how the players prepare for matches (if they practice particular patterns of play and so on) and he actually admitted they do. Oftentimes, when one of the singles players is asked that, they'll talk about something extremely general and give no details.

The surprises didn't end there. He responded to another question, about what he's been working on to improve his game this year, with some specifics (he said he'd been working on his second serve).

It was great to talk to a player and get such honest responses.

You can see the full interview here:

In my last blog, I mentioned I'd seen Boris Becker numerous times during my stay at the O2. You can add Greg Rusedski to that list. Every time I walked through the media lounge, he was sitting by himself with his laptop on a table. Either he was browsing around on the internet or on the phone, no doubt with a radio station or the like.

I guess Rusedski, Becker and Tim Henman (who I also saw) don't mind the requirements from the media, as they are extensive. I'm sure it helps that they're well compensated for it.

With the final Group A results, we are finally arriving at the second to last day of the tournament.

Although the days have been long, the time has passed pretty quickly. I will say this: although I'm technically in London, the O2 Arena is far enough away from all of the cities landmarks that I could just as well be in Shanghai or Berlin. That's because once I enter the arena in the morning, I don't leave until much later.

It's had a weird affect on my perception of time. I have the clock on my computer set to the time it is at home, so although it's 10:40 at night while I write this, it's 5:40 at home.

So although I've been here for almost one week, I still think it's in the late afternoon even when it's late at night.

It makes me wonder if I'm going to suffer any jet lag when I get back home. Maybe my body is just determined to adjust no matter where I am.


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