
What Tennis Can Teach Us About Technology - colinprince
http://www.jonahlehrer.com/blog/2018/4/18/cxd97kh1cp8cd96msh176ktiueavda
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jaclaz
OT, but not much, the spaghetti racquet which was the actual technological
advance but that was soon prohibited:

[http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~cross/SPAGHETTI%20STRUNG%20R...](http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~cross/SPAGHETTI%20STRUNG%20RACQUETS.htm)

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mroll
The last point about players in their thirties appearing in more professional
matches needs more clarity. It’s not that “older players are dominating the
sport.” It’s that “the two best players of all time happen to be over thirty.”
This is not evidence that older players have gained an edge in professional
tennis.

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addicted
4 of the top 10 are in their 30s. If you include players who are less than 2
months from being 30 that would make 6 of the top 10 (and #11 is also in his
30s).

There isn’t a single grand slam winner who was born after 1988. All the 7
active grand slam winners will be in their 30s in 2 months. Currently 5 of the
7 active grand slam winners are in their 30s with the remaining 2 a couple of
months away.

So it’s not just Nadal and Federer skewing the statistics. Then there is also
the case of someone like Wawrinka, who didn’t win a single grand slam until he
turned 29 after which he won 3.

The ageing effect in tennis is not a statistical anomaly but a real thing. I
do, however, agree that technology’s impact in this has been limited to better
sports medicine and fitness allowing older players to compete longer. However,
the same players who are winning in their old age today are playing
significantly worse games than they were 5-10 years ago. In addition to
technology allowing older players to compete, the ageing of the game seems to
have a lot more to do with the changing demographics of people getting into
the game, cult coaching techniques, which at least in the US have destroyed
any chance of an American competing (US coaches due to parental pressure for
their kids to win so they can get a college scholarship instead of developing
a good game focus on styles of play that work for undeveloped teens, but not
at the professional level), and changes in the surface and balls that have
slowed the game down and eliminated the styles successful in the 90s which
many kids grew up emulating.

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mbajkowski
A good follow on to this study, along the lines of tennis, would be how the
introduction of polyester strings to the pro game about 20 years ago [1]
impacted the game, for younger and older players - to see if similar
conclusions can be reached. For myself as an older tennis player with a well
developed game, I had a much harder time adjusting to this newer type of
strings than many younger players. Even though the theory and what had to be
done made sense, overcoming muscle memory and ingrained habits proved very
difficult - of course I'm just a sample size of 1.

[1] [http://www.tennis.com/pro-game/2017/05/french-open-
polyester...](http://www.tennis.com/pro-game/2017/05/french-open-polyester-
strings-gustavo-kuerten-roland-garros-atp-tennis/65921/)

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kris-s
I wonder if we will ever really break out of being generationally bound for
situations like this. I see this in social issues especially. Seems like the
speed of change is rate limited by older generations dying and newer ones
being born.

