World No. 3 Dominic Thiem Resumes Training in Austria

World no. 3 Dominic Thiem says resumed practice earlier this week in Austria after the government permitted tennis players to resume training while keeping social distancing guidelines in place.

Thiem started his training on Tuesday in  Vienna Alt-Erlaa, his new base. Thiem relocated his training base from Südstadt to Alt-Erlaa in Vienna, where he trained with fellow Austrian players Denis Novak,  Sebastian Ofner and Jurij Rodionov at the Better Tennis Center.  The facility in Alt-Erlaa has 13 outdoor clay courts, a hard court is available in a hall in Traiskirchen. The Austrian says,  “I want to stay there for at least the next two or three years. I am considering whether I might make myself an outdoor hard court in the medium term. I want to position myself there in such a way that you have a good basis for professionals there."

Thiem's manager Herwig Straka spoke to APA and said that they will not train on a full scale basis for now.  "It won't be anything spectacular. A slow start. In any case, we welcome this regulation, which gives the top players the opportunity to pursue their profession again."

Thiem's father Wolfgang, who is leading the training for the group of Austrian players, says, "The difficult thing now is to have a goal because it is not clear when it will go on. You have to do it so that you train once and then maybe do nothing again for two weeks. You can't train until the end of the year and you can't play matches. "

Wolfgang Thiem says he is also keen on Dominic taking part in the tournament being proposed by Serena Williams' coach Patrick Mouratoglou at the Mouratoglou tennis camp and would not be surprised by the cancellation of the entire 2020 season. "I think that the America tour will not work, that is my feeling. There are so many questions. I can already imagine that there will be nothing this year - I wouldn't be extremely surprised. If things get a bit more agile in Europe again, they will surely come up with something. I don’t think there will be any matches, but maybe you’ll create a regional tournament series for which there’s no ATP points."

from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/2VZBq5A