Want an insider’s look into the US Open?
Vasiliy Guryanov, Master Stringer in our Pro Shop, strung racquets at the Open with the Wilson Stringing Team, and shares his experience with you here.
Take it away, Vasiliy!
The greatest tennis players live for Grand Slams – the four tournaments a year that put the players through their paces with long matches and grueling conditions.
And none are bigger than the US Open.
It comes at the end of the summer and the athletes are not only fighting each other, but also fatigue from the long professional season. The atmosphere at this event is simply electric – each match is a “Do or Die” test for both players, and all competitors fight to the very end.
As a member of the official Wilson Stringing Team for the US Open, I felt like I became a part of the entire process. When Rafael Nadal comes in to drop off six racquets for his match, everyone in the room knows that his on-court success lies partially in our hands. 
Professional tennis players are fine-tuned machines, and even the slightest change to their equipment will make a difference in the length and control of their shots – tennis is a game of inches.
That is why all members of the Wilson Tour Stringing Team go through hundreds of hours of training and fine-tuning to our stringing technique, to make sure that each racquet we string is perfect.
This year’s US Open was one for the record book! First, on August 23rd, we felt the earthquake that reached us all the way from Virginia. The mighty Arthur Ashe Stadium was swaying from side to side. Then, on the weekend of August 27the, Hurricane Irene threatened the event when it moved up the East Coast and the National Tennis Center was closed for one-and-a-half days.
Little did we know that the worst was yet to come!
Because of Sunday’s NTC closure, players were not able to get their racquets strung for Monday matches. Our 14-member team started the day at 7:30 am and by the time we finished the last racquet at 11:30 pm, we had set a new record for the most racquets strung in one day – 490 racquets!
The previous record was 378. It will be tough to beat our record, because it was created by a perfect storm of events.
It was an amazing experience to be a part of such a well-oiled machine as the Wilson Stringing team. The team is comprised of stringers from all over the world: Czech Republic, Australia, Hong Kong, Croatia, Russia, Japan, France, and the United States. All members of the team are world-class stringers with many years of tour experience. It is at events likes this that I have an opportunity to learn new stringing and racquet customization techniques to better serve our members through the Pro Shop.
Thanks, Vasiliy!
Stop by our Pro Shop and let Vasiliy, Dave, or Sonny string your for your next match.
