Tennis Hits the Books
One of the best books on the game of doubles in tennis was written by Stan Smith. Smith was an accomplished professional singles and doubles player. The “Stan Smith” model of tennis shoes is iconic. Smith’s partnership with Bob Lutz formed one of the greatest doubles teams of all time. It should come as no surprise that Smith is able to sharply enumerate the key factors for competing successfully in doubles.
There are a lot of tennis doubles books which have been published throughout the years. I have been spending the past few weeks exploring the titles in my personal collection. Stan Smith’s Winning Doubles stands out against the relatively crowded tennis doubles category. The book excels across many dimensions, but the differentiating factor is the variety and quality of checklists provided. Those lists can be used to quickly develop actionable plans for player development and tactical adjustments.
For example, the opening pages of the book features a list of characteristics of good doubles team. A player working to improve their doubles play can use the list to quickly identify any gaps or weakness that need to be addressed. Another section provides a list of candidate goals and objectives for a doubles team to establish prior to the match. It is good to go into every match with a plan. I have found that many players don’t have any notion of how to formulate one in advance.
Smith also makes sharp observations throughout Winning Doubles on how advancement in equipment and tactics continue to evolve in tennis. Rather than being mired in the past, his sharp analytic skills delve into the why various evolutions have occurred. That insight is key for players to master is understanding the fundamental nature of making in-match tactical adjustments.
Smith is also a strong advocate of conditioning and strength training for tennis. That perhaps isn’t surprising since the publisher of Winning Doubles also promotes books for off-court training. However, it is noteworthy for conditioning to be featured in a doubles book. Many recreational players gravitate to doubles specifically to avoid the more stringent conditioning demands of singles. As it turns out, conditioning is still needed for doubles.
Smith spends more time on how to return the serve than most other books in this genre. The serve and return first strike of the ball for each team are the most critical shots in tennis doubles. It is when initiative can be seized or lost. It has a profound impact on how the remainder of the point unfolds. The book offers specific drills for working on serves and returns as well as detailed information on the strategy and tactics of hitting each shot.
Winning Doubles also provides more comprehensive discussion and coverage of aggressive net play and poaching for the return team than any other book I have encountered up to this point in time. Reading that section this week was one of those moments of realization that my return game in doubles is way to reactive. Smith outlines how to change that.
I am predisposed to like tennis books but Stan Smith’s Winning Doubles stands apart from the other titles I have read on this topic. If you are only going to invest in one book on doubles, this is the one to go with.
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