hey guys so what did i do this for well this was an experiment guys i wanted to gain some weight
and see how i perform because i believe that tennis is a skill-based sport and the weight
of a player doesn't really matter that much this is especially true at the recreational
level but is somewhat true even at the high level however there's limitations to this for example
on the atp tour where the tennis is so physical all the guys are in incredible shape even i
would say the guys with one atp point even those guys have to be in unbelievable shape
or they're gonna have a hard time because it is so physical professional men's tennis however
and they can get away with that because tennis is a skill based sport everywhere except
on the atp tour so i wanted to do an experiment to see basically how badly i was going to perform
against my buddy milan who was a high-level player he played division two and i wanted to see
how my game would react to my new weight so let me tell you normally what i weigh i'm somewhere
between 190 and 200. when i was in college i was around 200 that seems to be the ideal weight for
me right now i'm actually not sure how heavy i am i'm probably somewhere between 220 and 230
and i'm very surprised i have to say i thought i played well and i moved pretty
well now i do have a foot injury so that is actually influencing my movement a little bit
i can't move because of that and my knee hurts a little bit so you take that into consideration but
yes i was a little bit rusty because i have not played a match and probably a year i would say
the last time i played a set was against my buddy reed and i was a lot lighter back then
for some reason maybe the weather today wasn't so hot i felt pretty good physically so even though
i'm out of shape you can see i got some fat around my stomach and on my sides i felt pretty good out
there now this is not gonna mean that you can get out of shape this is unhealthy to gain weight it's
not good everybody has to try to get into the best shape they could possibly possibly be in
and that's exactly what i'm going to do right now i'm going to get myself into tip-top shape and
two or three months from now i'm gonna record another match and see how i play
i'll tell you a quick little story i was always obsessed with weight and
tennis players and when i was in college i was around 200 that was probably my average weight
and then somebody showed me an atp booklet they had booklets back then it was the top 100 or
maybe it was top 200 atp players and all their stats were there and their data and stuff like
that and their weight was also there and i saw guys on tour in the top 100 that were my height
six five for example like a marat safin or guys like that and they were weighing like 180 185
and here i was at 200 and so interestingly i thought that if i dropped 20 pounds that i would
play a lot better and i did it was my senior year i dropped 20 pounds i worked out like a maniac
and i was around 180 and i thought i played well but people from the outside my teammates they
all thought that my serve had lost some pop and i believe there's some truth to that i believe that
when you are a little bit heavier i do feel like you get more power this is just my feelings i have
no data to back that up this is just completely anecdotal but for me personally i do feel that
when when i'm a little bit heavier i serve faster and i definitely served well today
now one more thing that i was afraid of was my stamina but i actually felt like
my stamina was okay you guys only saw one set but we actually continued to play and
i i felt fine maybe it was the weather today since it wasn't so hot but
i felt my stamina was okay of course i'm still on the court a lot i keep myself in pretty good shape
despite my weight gain so anyways guys a little experiment here at intuitive tennis to see
how i perform when i'm at different weights i think i lost my keys but anyway i want to
tell you guys what my plan is so i'm going to get myself in tip-top shape i'm going to lose weight
i'm going to go back to my normal weight and then i'm going to play again and this is going to be
two and a half months from now but you guys are going to see this video
in a couple of days i'm going to be probably 20 pounds lighter and let's see how i perform then
let's see if in fact my buddies in college were right let's see if i lose heat or lose
power on my serve uh or not and let's see if i'm moving a little bit better i'll see you guys then