Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1915-04-25

This is the season Of the year for
new theories and new ideas in tennis,
says Parmly Paret in the New YORK
Sun After the long winters htberna-
ton the players are deep In study OF
new methods Of play wherever an open
ing for Improvement offers in the'r
play. During the last month or two
there has been a good deal of discus
sion of the backhand stroke and the
different grips Of the racket that az
feet the play on this side of the body
Dwight Douglas, a western profes-
sional now engaged at Los Angeles,
has precipitated the whole discussion
once more by proposing a return TO
the generally discarded English method
of holding the racket for the back
hand stroke This requires the thumb
to he wrapped around the handle in
stead of being used as a brace or
prop behind It, Tennis is as full of
presidents as law book. says
Douglass, with some wisdom. "A WIN
ner is always initiated. Then some
one beats him. and is in turn initiated,
and so on down the line
The success of Norman Brookes, the
great Australian who made such
Wonderful record last season, winning
every match he played but the one
against Mclaughlin in the lnterna-
tionals, seems to have furnished the
excuse for urging players to go back
to old methods that have been gener-
ally discarded. Brookes does use the
English style of gripping the racket
for the backhand. but that IN itself
does not vindicate the style. McLough-
lin, Wilding and Williams all use their
thuNbs up the handle and Brookes has
been conceded even by his stanchest
admirers to be freak player, He
uses a short grip on many of his
strokes, he uses light racket with
an exceptionally small handle, and his
| play has many other peculiarities.
But the success of the great Austria
liam has laid the ground work for a SER
mon on the advantage of the thumb
around the handle style of holding the
racket for backhand strokes. and Doug
! lass argues that we have all drlfteo
/ into the other style because of sue
! cessful precedent. This argument IS
not convincing, since early English
players, almost without exception. and
even some of the first Americans to
play the game well, all carried their
thumbs in this position. SO if prece-
dent could have brought to any
style we would never have gone away
| from the style recommended.
On the contrary, precedent was vio-
lated first by the American players
who found a better support for the
along the handle than the older style
afforded and DR.. Dwight, the father
of American lawn tennis first ad-
vocated publicly the other style, which
has since become the prevailing one
the world over. Some English players
still use the thumb around method, and
a few scattering players in other sec
lions of the world. but the majority
of the Australians are against 1t, and
| in America not more than 10 or Is per
cent of the players adopt that grip.
But Douglass offers an ingenious ar
gument against the prevailing method
that bears study. He claims that a
large percentage of the errors made in
backhand play comes from this defec-
tive grip that is SO prevalent, and says
that the reason for this weakness is
the inability to prevent the rack from
turning in the grasp when held with
the thumb up the handle. 1t is true
| that the thumb wrapped around gives
a much firmer grip on the handle
and does prevent the racket from turn
| ing, but this affects only such strokes
as are made when the ball is not hit
| off the center of the strings for when
| the blow is directly in the center there
| is no twisting strain. When the play
| er's eye is inaccurate he often hits the
| ball little off the central longitudl-
nal axis" as the scientists call the
straight playing strip down the CEN
ter of the strings, and then there is
| tendency to twist the racket in the
hand of the player which can be offset
| only by the tightness of the grasp.
| With the thumb up the handle there
| is gap between the tips of the fingers
! and the base of the thumb that weak
! ems the ability to resist this turning
! strain. AS Douglas claims. this is COW
| cred by the overlapping fingers in the
! older way of holding the racket. but
| that is only one of several considera-
tions that affect the question. Against
| "a
| around method we have much greater
| forward resisting power to the impact
of the stroke when the thumb is used
| as a brace up the handle. The blow
of a tennis ball when hit by the
| racket making a fast stroke carries a
great deal of concentrated force, and
it must be met with power or the
| stroke will be ruined.
With the thumb upon the handle this