John Farley Spotlight WTA: Combating the Toll of the Tennis Tour - A Performance Enhancing Technology (PET)

The Toll

When you make your hopeful toasts to the New Year on the eve of January 1, the courts of Brisbane, Shenzhen, Auckland, and Perth will be set to go for the first "ready, play" of the 2018 season. Sydney and Hobart will follow, and then the first major drama of the season will unfold at Melbourne Park, an opening ceremony in Rod Laver Arena, and then we're off and running, acing, lobbing, rallying, volleying, and generally swinging with the New Year.

Very soon the players must be match-ready, hoping their bodies and minds are healed and refreshed and ready for the grind of another season. The rackets are by now back in hand and the trips to the gym more frequent. For the past few weeks the players have been resting their weary bones from the grind of the 2017 season in whatever beautiful, nourishing spots called to them or just nesting, cozily at home.

At the end of the 10-month tennis year there is a lot of healing to do - a recovery that is imperative for starting the new season strong, for going deep into the tournaments, and creating a confidence that will sustain a level of play through the year that may just result in a spot among the top 8 in Singapore in November.

Exhaustion, niggling injuries, and the need for recovery - we witness this phenomenon toward the end of every tennis season - more pounds of physio tape and wraps, more approved pain pills going down, more court-side massages, more retirements by those who were hurting but gave it a try, and more withdrawals by those who couldn't. In Zhuhai, for example this year, in matches that still mattered for pride, money, and ranking points, both Sloane Stephens, the US Open winner, and Elena Vesnina, the victor at Indian Wells, had to submit to the wills of their aching bodies and retire. And so it goes.

As I see it, the major cause of this phenomenon, at the basis of these injuries and the exhaustion, is the desynchronization of the player's physiology with the environment caused by constant travel, which happens from traversing at least 3 time zones in a short period of time multiple times. This speedy movement across time zones messes with the "body clock," the circadian rhythm that regulates many physiological processes among which are those that tell the player's body when to sleep, rise, and eat. A player's body clock is affected by environmental clues and if these clues keep changing, the player's internal rhythms get out of sync with the rhythms of its environment, which, according to research, if done chronically, can lead to a suppressed immune system, chronic fatigue, and memory issues. A disruption in this circadian rhythm can also profoundly affect body temperature, digestion, heart rate, blood pressure, hormones, and state of mind.

So a player, down 0-4 first set, calls for a physio and at the next sit-down just tells her, " I don't feel right." The physio gives her two aspirins and says, "call me at the next sit-down." Maybe a doctor drops by. What are they going to do for her? Her body may be in a state of desynchronization from time-zone jumping and until the body returns to a state of homeostasis or balance she will continue to "not feel right."

This condition, of course, is not just peculiar to tennis. A recent 10-year study found that major league baseball teams that traveled through three time zones have as much as a 60% chance of losing their first game upon arrival. I am reminded of Aga Radwanska's ordeal in trying to get from the Roger's Cup in Montreal to Rio to play for Poland in the 2016 Olympics. The best she could do to get there on time was to fly from Montreal to Lisbon and then on to Rio. After 55 hours (about 2.3 days) on a 3,000 mile detour this top 10 player had so little time to adjust she was comprehensively beaten by 64th ranked Zheng Saisai of China in 99 minutes. Apparently she was a bit out of sorts, although Lisbon sounds like a nice place to visit.

A study on 62 experienced airline cabin crew members found increased secretion of the stress hormone, cortisol, and impaired nonverbal cognitive processing for cabin crew members who flew on more trans-meridian flights with fewer days off. The study found that their bodies could not adapt to the stress of "jet lag" with some participants having as much as four years experience in the field. So it's clear that experience in time-zone jumping isn't going to make you a better time-zone jumper.

To get a more quantitative feel for a player's tour-traveling experience, I took a look at the tennis itinerary of Garbine Muguruza. In 2017 she played 21 tournaments - approximately a tour average. In keeping that schedule, she went through 91 time zones which involved 16 different changes or flights. That figures out to about 5.7 time zones per change, or, approximately, for the 10-month tennis season, one 3-zone time change every 10 days or one 4-zone time change every 13 days. Tough on the body and mind as we've seen. She had, by most accounts, a stellar season but had to retire 5 times, including two at Premier Mandatory events in Miami and Beijing.

In its desperation to come up with solutions to the challenge of keeping the many women playing the 10-month tennis season free from injury, illness, and eventual exhaustion, the WTA looks futilely to the tired options of tinkering with the game and fiddling with the schedule, and Usana of course. Except for match scheduling which doesn't result in players still on court at midnight or later, neither of those options provides for changes that really get to the heart of the matter, which is to maintain balance in the player's physiology over the long haul of the tennis tour, which in turn translates into adjusting and maintaining synchrony of the rhythms of the player's physiology with the circadian rhythms of the environment.

The Technology

What it comes down to is this, (And I'm talking to you, every player on the WTA tour whether you are ranked in the top ten or climbing up out of a three-digit ranking): To be "in-the-zone" you have to handle the effects of "going-through-the-zones." You can't use a PED, but you can use a PET - a Performance Enhancing Technology (PET) and that technology is Transcendental Meditation (TM). By resetting the body's nervous system every time you do TM, you are able to adjust to the new time zone, thereby reducing or eliminating the disorienting affects of a desynchronized rhythm with your environment. This resetting of the body's nervous system from the continuing practice of TM cultures a psychophysiological resilience that spontaneously integrates the psychophysiology with the prevailing circadian environmental rhythms. This psychophysiological resilience is a direct result of the high level of brain integration from meditation. (In my September 11, 2017 blog post entitled Tennis, Peak Performance, and Transcendental Meditation I cited other research that clearly establishes the link between a higher level of brain integration and the high level, in-the-zone performance displayed by world class athletes. A blog post for your reading.)

This relationship of greater resilience from the brain integration produced from TM is well established in scientific research on world-class athletes, which has been published in scientific journals including the International Journal of Psychophysiology, among others.  The researchers found that this greater resilience translates into the following benefits - benefits important to every WTA touring professional:

• Autonomic Stability
• Rapid Recovery from Stress
• Decreased Stress Hormones
• Improved Cardiovascular Functioning
• Increased Vital Capacity
• Neurological Efficiency
• Faster Reactions
• Increased Agility
• Increased Running Speed

Besides the above mostly physical benefits, a higher level of brain integration, research shows, produces a dispositional resilience that nurtures and promotes positive outcomes and successful adaptation in the face of challenging or stressful circumstances (navigating the ups and downs, highs and lows of a tennis season or even a single tournament or match.) This level of functioning is indispensable for your success on tour.

So, what I have established here for each WTA touring professional is a Science and Technology of Maintaining Balance throughout the constant travel of the tennis season.

The Science of Maintaining Balance: A higher level of brain integration creates a higher level of psychophysiological resilience which enables the rhythms of the physiology to adjust quickly to the circadian rhythms of the environment, creating a synchrony that results in a more consistent, higher level of performance.

The Technology for Maintaining Balance: A higher level of brain integration comes about through the practice of Transcendental Meditation, a Performance Enhancing Technology (PET), which results in a level of psychophysiological resilience that spontaneously integrates the rhythms of the physiology with the prevailing circadian rhythms of the environment. It is this level of mind, body, and environmental integration which is at the basis of the elegance of movement, the ultimate expression of being in-the-zone. The practice of TM is effortless and can be done anywhere - on a plane, on a train, in a car, in a bar, on a mountain top, in the locker room, or even, if you want, on-court at a sit-down during an opponent's medical time out.

With this PET of TM you can then "handle the-going-through the zones" so you can be "in-the-zone."  Make it a part of your life for 2018, so when Australia 2019 rolls around, and the hopeful toasts for that year have been made, and you're standing on that deuce court of your first tournament, be it in Australia, China, or New Zealand, refreshed from the need for only minimal recovery, your racket in one hand and a ball in your other ready to serve, and the chair umpire says "ready, play," .... you'll be ready.


Anyway, that's how I see it.

Appendix

(While it was my goal for this blog post to keep the focus on how TM as a Performance Enhancing Technology (PET) can keep each WTA time-zone jumping tennis pro in sync with her environment as she travels, I wanted to include TM research on two conditions that usually accompany the time-zone jumping experience, insomnia and sleep deprivation, so I put them in this appendix for your review.)

I have already mentioned some of the effects of going-through-the-zones  - a suppressed immune system, chronic fatigue, and hormonal imbalances among others. Contributing factors to the effects of time-zone jumping are insomnia and sleep deprivation:

Insomnia: 

• Causes unclear thinking and poor motor performance. 
• According to research, TM reduces insomnia - reducing the time it takes to fall asleep and decreasing waking during sleep.

Sleep Deprivation:

• Exhaustion and extreme muscular weakness are among the most marked effects of sleep deprivation. This suggests a fatigue of the higher levels of the cerebral cortex - the levels that are responsible for the critical analysis of incoming impulses (like a tennis ball for example) and the elaboration of adequate responses of one's previous experience (letting go of the previous point and getting to the next, staying in the moment).
• Research has shown that TM meditators recover more quickly from sleep deprivation. TM stabilizes the sleep-dream cycle by reducing the effect of any disruption to this cycle (like time-zone jumping) thereby restoring the system to its normal level of functioning. A normalized level of functioning is critical for the "in-the-zone" experience.

John Farley Spotlight: Tennis, Peak Performance, and Transcendental Meditation

Accessing and Owning "The Zone"

"On my very best days I have this fantastic, utterly unself-conscious feeling of invincibility...I've got perfect control of the match, my rhythm and movements are excellent, and everything's just in total balance...It's a perfect combination of violent action taking place in an atmosphere of total tranquility."

These are the words of Billie Jean King describing the in-the-zone experience - action within silence, effortless, where the player feels as if overtaken by the elegance of perfect motion. Performance is being conducted exquisitely from an inner state of stillness.

Every professional tennis player has been there, and if she's been there, she wants to get back there. And when she gets back there, she wants to stay there. The question is how to get there and then own it? The great players seem to be in the zone continuously, for that is what makes them great. But what is it that separates the perennial top performers from the rest of the field?

According to research conducted by Dr. Harold Harung, associate professor at Oslo University in Norway and Dr. Fred Travis, director of the Center for Brain, Consciousness, and Cognition at Maharishi University of Management in Fairfield, Iowa, USA, what separates world-class athletes, like the perennial top tennis players competing at the highest levels, from the rest of the field is their neurophysiological status. Their study found that, compared to the other athletes, those competing at the highest levels have higher levels of brain integration, mind-brain development - a totally superior level of neurophysiological functioning. It is this status that is at the basis of peak performance, the zone experience.

In an interview with New Mavericks, an organization with the quest to find out what makes great people tick, Dr. Harung laid out a Unified Theory of Performance that he and Dr. Travis created based on their research of world-class athletes.

This Unified Theory of Performance is comprised of 4 components:

• Brain Integration
• Psychological maturity 
• Frequency of peak performance (fulfilling moments)
• Mind-brain development of the organization or the social context in which the player operates.

Among the four components they found the most important to be brain integration, the level of which is really at the basis of the other three. "We have found that active ingredient, that is mind-brain development, and our research and other research suggest that this is much more important than the other factors...the degree of refinement and sophistication of your brain and your mind is the most important factor," Dr. Harung said.

Greater brain integration means all aspects of the neurophysiology, the mind and the body, are working in collaboration. Peak performers such as world-class athletes have brains that are more orderly, function more economically, and are more awake. In more scientific terms, the brains of peak performers exhibit denser alpha wave activity associated with more basic wakefulness, alertness, and wide-open perception. Dr. Harung emphasized, "If you have an integrated brain, whatever you're doing will come out on a higher level of performance."

The message then to every player on the WTA is that to "own the zone" your brain has to perform in a more refined and a more sophisticated way. This is the key. Greater sophistication and refinement of neurophysiological functioning is at the basis of the elegance of movement, which is the ultimate expression of the experience of peak performance or being in the zone. 

So how does a player create and sustain this higher level of mind-body coordination? Dr. Harung and Dr. Travis have identified three complimentary ways to do this:

• Exercise - moving the body stimulates the brain. OK, the players already got that one.
• Playing and listening to music - trains the brain to think more holistically, integrates the two hemispheres of the brain triggering peak experiences. I guess the players are on to that one too, because I see so many players walking onto court with head phones on - listening to music I presume?
• Meditation - This, our researchers found, has an effect on the brain much greater than exercise or music, but the greater effectiveness comes only from the direct experience of transcendence.

It is at the level of the transcendent where the brain can be most profoundly integrated, for it is at this deep level, beyond the mind, where all parts of the neurophysiology are found functioning in their togetherness. According to Dr. Harung, "Transcending, going beyond even the faintest thought to the level of great alertness, being wide awake - this is the key, systematic transcendence, systematically reaching the deepest level of our mind." Dr. Harung continues, offering a way to do this, "There is a technique called Transcendental Meditation that both experience and research show is the most effective technique for reducing systematically mental activity until you reach the most basic level. Transcendence develops all the qualities that define world-class performers - higher brain integration, higher moral reasoning (psychological maturity), frequent peak experiences, and the social environment in which one operates."

In the interview Dr. Harung also cites very revealing and surprising research quantifying factors that account for an increase in performance. According to this research, the number of years of education, age after 20-25 years, work experience, and incentives account together for less than 5% of performance. And what is definitely interesting for the tennis professional is the research that shows that practice accounts for only 20-30% of performance. So all those repetitive drills on the court and busting your hump in the gym, while important for at least sustaining your level and keeping you fit, statistically will not give you the breakthrough in performance required to make a major move up the rankings. What then accounts for the other 65-75% of performance? It is your level of brain integration. Dr. Harung concludes,"...The brain just has to function in a more refined way. If you can accomplish that, whatever you do, you will be performing on a higher level."

So, players, the research shows that to be more effective you have to change the way your brain works, which is not something you can just do by changing your mood or assuming some attitude. According to the research, this is accomplished through the systematic refinement of the brain from regular transcending through the practice of Transcendental Meditation. Transcending brings into harmony all the different specific aspects of the brain and cultures a spontaneous ease of flow in the player's performance on court - for it has to be spontaneous because there are far too many variables to take into account intellectually. Consider the following:

David Foster Wallace, tennis player, novelist, and in his day a frequent commentator on the tennis scene, in his essay, "Federer Both Flesh and Not," offers the following scenario:

"Imagine that you, a tennis player, are standing just behind your deuce corner's baseline. A ball is served to your forehand - you pivot (or rotate) so that your side is to the ball's incoming path and start to take your racket back for the forehand return. Keep visualizing up to where you're about halfway into the stroke's forward motion; the incoming ball is now just off your front hip, maybe 6 inches from point of impact. Consider some of the variables involved here. On the vertical plane, angling your racket face just a couple degrees forward or back will create topspin or slice, respectively; keeping it perpendicular will produce a flat, spinless drive. Horizontally, adjusting the racket face ever so slightly to the left or right, and hitting the ball a millisecond early or late, will result in a crosscourt versus down-the-line return. Further slight changes in the curves of your groundstroke's motion and follow-through will help determine how high your return passes over the net, which, together with the speed at which you're swinging (along with certain characteristics of the spin you impart), will effect how deep or shallow in the opponent's court your return lands, how high it bounces, etc. These are just the broadest distinctions, of course - like, there's heavy topspin vs. light topspin, sharply crosscourt vs. only slightly crosscourt, etc. There are also the issues of how close you're allowing the ball to get to your body, what grip you're using, the extent to which your knees are bent and/or weights moving forward, and whether you're able simultaneously to watch the ball and to see what your opponent's doing after she serves. These all matter too. Plus there's the fact you're not putting a static object into motion here but rather reversing the flight and (to a varying extent) spin of a projectile coming toward you - coming, in the case of pro tennis, at speeds that make conscious thought impossible."

It is not possible for the human mind to calculate all these variables. Wallace comments on this impossibility: "No CPU yet existent could compute the expansion of variables for even a single exchange - smoke would come out of the mainframe. The sort of thinking involved is the sort that can only be done by a living and highly conscious entity, and then only unconsciously, i.e. by combining talent with repetition to such an extent that variables are combined and controlled without conscious thought. "

Peak performance or being-in-the zone is that level of brain integration where all these variables are spontaneously integrated into a wholeness that conducts the shot for you. You don't have to think about it. You just have to be. It is this level of mind-body coordination that transcends the intellectual notions of tactical maneuvering, leaving the player free to flow in the spontaneity of perfection.

This is what Billie Jean King was experiencing. This is what all the greats of the game experienced and are experiencing. Again from Wallace, "A top athlete's beauty is next to impossible to describe directly. Or to evoke. There is about world-class athletes carving out exemptions from physical laws a transcendent beauty that makes manifest God in man...Great athletes are profundity in motion."

Wallace, commenting on his chances of competing with the top tennis players of his era, wrote: "I could not meaningfully exist on the same court...And it's not just a matter of talent and practice. There's something else."

He was right. There's something else. And now you know what it is.


Anyway, that's how I see it.




(Please note: Dr. Harung and Dr. Travis's book regarding athletic performance is: Excellence Through Mind-Brain Development: The Secret of World Class Performers. Also, I have included here the link to Dr. Harung's interview with New Mavericks:)

http://www.consciousnesstalks.org/the-three-proven-keys-for-peak-performance/

John Farley Spotlight: A Look at the US Open Series Results

With the US Open about to begin this week, I wanted to review the results of the US Open Series (I included Washington) in some quantitative way to see who is going to blow into Flushing Meadows with the most wind in her sails. The winners of each tournament of the series have some obvious momentum: Keys in Stanford, Makarova in DC, Svitolina at the Rogers Cup in Toronto, Muguruza in Cincinnati, and Gavrilova in New Haven. However, to take a broader look at the results in the US Open Series of the WTA top ten plus a few other in-form and possible contenders, I devised this chart below that quantifies these players' results in the series. To be included in the analysis a player had to play in at least two of the tournaments. I awarded points, R32-Winner, to each for each tournament based upon how they fared. Points were awarded accordingly:

Winner - 10
Finalist - 9
Semifinalist - 8
Quarterfinalist - 7
R16 - 6
R32 - 5
R64 - 0

The points were tallied and then a points per tournament figured calculated. Additional points were added to the points per tournament to produce a final index for ranking and comparison. The additional points added were: 0.5 added if the player played 3 tournaments indicating match readiness going into Flushing Meadows and another 0.5 points added if the player made at least the quarterfinals in each tournament played indicating higher consistency in play. The results of these calculations are presented in the table below:

Player/Tourn.	Stanford	Washington	Toronto	Cincinnati	New Haven	Total Points	Pts. per Tourn.	Final Index
Muguruza	Semi		QF	Win		25	8.3	9.3
Halep		QF	Semi	Final		24	8.0	9.0
Wozniacki			Final	QF		16	8.0	8.5
Keys	Win			R16		16	8.0	8.0
Pliskova			QF	Semi		15	7.5	8.0
Svitolina			Win	R16		16	8.0	8.0
Makarova		Win	R16	R16		22	7.3	7.8
Cibulkova			R32	R16	Final	20	6.7	7.2
Kvitova	QF		R32	R32		17	5.7	6.2
Konta			R32	QF		12	6.0	6.0
Kuznetsova			R32	QF		12	6.0	6.0
Kerber			R16	R32		11	5.5	5.5
Williams			R16	R32		11	5.5	5.5
Radwanska			R16	R64	Semi	14	4.7	5.2
Vandeweghe	Final		R64	R64		9	3.0	3.5

(Note: The Connecticut Open final between Gavrilova and Cibulkova was spectacular. They both played well but Gavrilova's play was extraordinarily good. I didn't include Gavrilova in the chart, but if I had she would have 20 points and a 7.2 index, the same as Cibulkova. If she continues that level of play she's a definite candidate for the second week of the US Open fortnight.)

The US Open first-round draw for these players:

Muguruza - Lepchenko
Halep - Sharapova
Wozniacki - Buzarnescu
Keys - Mertens
Pliskova - Linette
Svitolina - Siniakova
Makarova - Bartel
Cibulkova - Cepelova
Kvitova - Jankovic
Konta - Krunic
Kuznetsova - Vondrousova
Kerber - Osaka
Williams - Kuzmova
Radwanska - Martic
Vandeweghe - Riske
(Gavrilova - Kiick)

First, I want to say, I don't make predictions, as enticing as it is to do. Did you pick Kerber to win two slams last year or Ostapenko to win the French this year? Did you pick Muguruza, coming off a disappointing post-Roland Garros 2016 period, to win Wimbledon? Risky business these days making predictions in the WTA. Although the chart indicates various degrees of momentum coming into the US Open and is interesting to see the perspective that it gives, it really means nothing considering recent experience with the slams. So, in a way, this post, like the Seinfeld Show, is a post about nothing. But it does hold some significance for me because in my most recent post, "The End of a Dynasty and the Rise of Garbine Muguruza," I wrote this:

"With the defeat of the matriarch of a dynasty of dominance in women's tennis at Wimbledon 2017, a definitive symbol of the arc of change, the mantle has been formally passed to a new age of players, and, I arguably believe, standing at the peak of the new contours of the landscape of this change is Garbine Muguruza. On the horizon to challenge her are the returns of Serena and Sharapova and the recent return of Azarenka, but I feel them slipping into the dusk of a former time. In her top ten neighborhood are the new #1 Pliskova, Halep, Kerber, Konta, Svitolina, Venus, and others both established and on the rise to test her mettle. And in the upcoming US swing that mettle will be tested. However, if Muguruza can maintain in those tournaments that level she displayed in getting to the Wimbledon final and winning the last nine games to win the title, she will past the test and roll into Flushing Meadows riding a wave that may take her to another title. Those are big ifs, but she has put together now a game that can do it. I really feel she is slowly being blessed with that indomitable specialness we see in the perennial champions - Serena, Venus, Federer, Nadal, and all the others in the past of that ilk, and will emerge as the new dominant force in women's tennis."

So you see the significance for me. Her mettle has been tested during the US Open series and she sits at the top of the chart. If she wins the US Open, I believe she has then unequivocally passed the test of mettle and established herself as the new dominant force in women's tennis. She has drawn Lepchenko, as you read, in the first round of the US Open.

What does it all mean? Ya Da Ya Da Ya Da.

Anyway, that's how I see it.

The End of a Dynasty and The Rise of Garbine Muguruza

On Saturday, July 15 with the roof closed on Center Court and with each ground stroke cracking like an explosion of fireworks, Garbine Muguruza beat Venus Williams for the 2017 Wimbledon Title. At 4-5, 15-40 and serving, Muguruza saved the two set points, swinging match momentum behind her and cruised to a 7-5, 6-0 victory, winning 9 consecutive games. Since Serena won the first Williams Grand Slam in 1999, Venus and Serena have accounted for approximately 45% of Grand Slam victories up to The US Open in 2015. Since then, with wins only at Wimbledon 2016 and the 2017 Australian Open by Serena, that level has dropped to 25%. Over those years they combined for 330 weeks at number one. At this time neither is number one. As Bob Dylan put it in his song, The Times They Are A - Changing, "...the present now will later be past, the order is rapidly fadin'..."

We are in the midst of this change in women's tennis.  It began with Muguruza roaring back to challenge Serena in the second set in the final at Wimbledon in 2015, continued with Serena's loss in the semis at the US Open that year, became more clear with the rise of Angelique Kerber in 2016 to number one, underscored by the surprise victory of Jelena Ostapenko at the French Open this year, and now, with the defeat of the matriarch of a dynasty of dominance in women's tennis at Wimbledon 2017, a definitive symbol of the arc of this change, the mantle has been formally passed to a new age of players, and, I arguably believe, standing at the peak of the new contours of the landscape of this change is Garbine Muguruza.

"Congratulations. Don't be sad. You'll be holding this trophy very, very soon believe me." Little did Serena know that these words she spoke to runner up Muguruza during her ceremonial speech, Wimbledon 2015, would in some way doom her sister to a defeat that would herald this change. Muguruza now proudly holds the trophy and there are indications she may rise to be the next dominant force in women's tennis. Many will point to her inconsistency in performance and lack of mental toughness in the tournaments after her victory at the French Open up to Wimbledon 2017, but as waves on the ocean rise but fall only to gather more water to rise even higher, a player may rise and fall the same way and in doing so learn more. Emerging from months of struggle after her victory at Roland Garros, Muguruza has grown in confidence and stability with a better understanding of her own self-referral dynamics on court, gathering strength to rise even higher. The test is can she keep rising, perhaps falling sometimes, but gathering more strength with each fall to exceed, at some point, a threshold creating a wave with enough majesty and power that just keeps on rolling? I believe she can.

On the horizon to challenge her are the returns of Serena and Sharapova and the recent return of Azarenka, but I feel them slipping into the dusk of a former time. In her top ten neighborhood are the new #1 Pliskova, Halep, Kerber, Konta, Svitolina, Venus, and others both established and on the rise to test her mettle. And in the upcoming US swing that mettle will be tested. However, if Muguruza can maintain in those tournaments that level she displayed in getting to the Wimbledon final and winning the last nine games to win the title, she will past the test and roll into Flushing Meadows riding a wave that may take her to another title. Those are big ifs, but she has put together now a game that can do it. I really feel she is slowly being blessed with that indomitable specialness we see in the perennial champions - Serena, Venus, Federer, Nadal, and all the others in the past of that ilk, and will emerge as the new dominant force in women's tennis.

A few years ago I had just tuned into a match and I watched this player whom I had never seen before
move from the court to her bench for the sit-down. I say move because it wasn't just a walk, it was a strut, that signature strut of an athlete in top form exuding power and confidence. I thought to myself, "She's got it. She's going to be a star." It was Garbine Muguruza. This past Saturday, Day 12 at Wimbledon, with that same strut, I watched her circle Center Court with the Venus Rosewater Dish, sharing her moment of glory with the crowd. I was right.

Epilogue: As we know Venus and Serena brought a new game to women's tennis. They raised the bar. The game of the Williams sisters made the other women on tour better players. Referring to Venus after her defeat in the final, Ben Rothenberg, freelance writer for the NY Times, tweeted in part, "...she didn't need to win to validate anything...she remains a transcendent, ageless champ." And, of course, the same can be said of Serena. Although this dynasty of dominance appears to have ended, they will continue to play, a mother and an aunt, and for that... we are grateful.


Anyway, that's how I see it.