Andy Murray‘s coach explains dangers players face after Melbourne quarantine

Andy Murray’s strength and conditioning coach Matt Little has explained the dangers players could face after getting out of a pre-Australian Open quarantine. 

Over 70 players have been put in a strict quarantine ahead of the Australian Open and each one of them will have to complete a full 14-day quarantine period. 

A number of players have shared videos of them doing some work inside of their hotel rooms but that’s far from a real work they do on the practice courts or the gym. 

"Elite tennis players are the opposite of the rest of us in that we all get stiff and sore when we start doing some exercise whereas they get stiff and sore when they stop and don’t keep doing exercise," Little told Metro UK. "So it’s a little bit like a sports car that doesn’t get used, it just starts to seize up.

"Because their bodies are so finely tuned and they put in so much training in the build up to these events that actually if they stop moving and stop doing what they do, that’s when a lot of the problems can arise."

"It’s a disaster for them in this scenario actually. They’ll get most things from a tennis and tactical perspective back quickly but it’s the body’s exposure to this explosive work after a two-week period of enforced rest that’s actually really quite dangerous for them:"

Little says the serve particulary under a threat 

Even after only a week at home, it takes time for the shoulders to get used to serving action. 

In this scenario, players won’t be a resting a week but two weeks.

"What causes the damage there is the deceleration of the arm. So when you throw your arm fast at the serve, you’ve then got to slow it down and the small muscles at the back of the shoulder joint have to pull pretty hard to do that. This makes them pretty sore and can cause problems when players start serving again," Little noted.

from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/3c5RgF6