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<span style="font-size:small;">By Blair Henley</span></p>
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<!-- Right Floated Image --><span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">USPTA Master Professional <strong>Jorge Capestany</strong> spoke with <em>Tennis Now</em> about some of his most effective doubles tips. </span><br />
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;"><strong>Tennis Now: You’ve coached a lot of people over the course of your career. What do you think is your most effective </strong><strong>tip for doubles players across the board?</strong></span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;"><strong>Jorge Capestany: </strong>What I tell our doubles players is that doubles is more like chess, and singles is more like checkers. There are so many more things happening in doubles -- angles and positional advantages -- than in singles. It’s cerebral, and if you’re just out there trying to hit balls around without doubles tactics, it’s not a good</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">thing.</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;"><strong>TN: As strategy-oriented as doubles can be, is there something to be said for the doubles basics of getting</strong></span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;"><strong>your first serve, return, and first volley in play? Do you think sometimes people overcomplicate it?</strong></span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;"><strong>JC:</strong> You don’t have to do as many things well to be a good doubles player as you do to be a good singles player. In doubles, if you can do a few things well -- if you can serve well, return well, and volley -- you don’t have to have the world’s best drop shot or the world’s best volley. If you can do those few things well, you can really be a dominant doubles player.</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;"><strong>TN: What can players focus on to keep from getting overwhelmed by the strategy aspect of doubles?</strong></span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;"><strong>JC:</strong> I call them the Doubles Laws: close-to-close and deep-to-deep. This is a generalization, of course, but it’s</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">pretty darn accurate. If you’re the player at the net, you should always hit close to close (i.e. the volleyer</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">should be hitting at the other volleyer because they have less time to react). Deep to deep means that</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">if you’re the player deep in the court, you should be hitting to the other player deep in the court. It’s a</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">very simple way to say don’t go to the net guy.</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">As I coach, I’ll say “Okay, we’re going to play the next two games and after each point, we’re going to</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">see if any of the doubles laws have been violated.” You’d be surprised to see how many times they are;</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">someone hits to the guy in back, and he hits to the net guy who puts it away. So if you want to boil it</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">down to a couple of sentences, you have to obey the doubles laws -- deep-to-deep and close-to-close.</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;"><strong>TN: What do you think is the biggest mistake doubles players make?</strong></span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;"><strong>JC: </strong>One of the biggest mistakes is trying to hit impressive shots vs. effective shots. A lot of times people,</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">especially juniors, don’t know what the difference is. Impressive shots are shots that, to a bystander</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">(maybe a non tennis player), look good. They are usually struck very hard, but they may not be effective.</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">For example, if I wail on my groundstroke, make great contact, and it goes in, but it yields a shoulder-</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">high volley for you, that’s an impressive shot that’s not that effective. Conversely, if I hit a little soft</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">angle that doesn’t look nearly as impressive, and ends up by your feet causing you miss the volley, that’s</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">effective.</span></div>
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<span style="margin-top:15px;font-size: small;">Don’t get suckered into doing what’s impressive. Instead think of what’s effective. <br />
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<strong>Watch:</strong> "Secrets to Better Doubles", <em>On Court with USPTA</em>, Saturday, November 17, 3:00 PM ET.</span><br />
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