Squash rallies part 5

best rallies
Infor Windy City Open 2007
Ramy Ashour vs Anthony Ricketts

next parts will follow..

Category:

Sports

Tags:

• squash
• rallies
• rally
• best
• james
• willstrop
• david
• palmer
• ramy
• ashour
• amr
• shabana
• peter
• nicol
• Anthony
• Ricketts

[Roosterhahn92]

in 2005 saudi int open final... if he had won he would be world no.1 but power won and went world number one

[Roosterhahn92]

my fav player jonathan power,john white,james willstrop i like them all

[Roosterhahn92]

yes no problem the next parts will follow:)

[abdiver12]

I think this match demonstrates why squash players are some of the fittest athletes on the planet. Tennis players like Nadal and Federer have got nothing on these guys and wouldn't last a game at this pace.

[Irishidotsquashgod]

i think ricketts could have made it to world number one

does anyone else agree

[thetigerbenji]

@Irishidotsquashgod no bad temprement in my opinion

[abdiver12]

@Irifalchen Last but not least, soon after he retired, I read that Stefan Edberg, one of the fittest guys in tennis, tried a game of squash in Sweden during a tournament there. The reporter made note of how incredibly tired Edberg was during his game, literally dripping with sweat and doubled over with heaving lungs and Edberg doesn't even play at the highest level of squash. I never saw Edberg like that on the tennis court.

[abdiver12]

@Irifalchen I didn't take up squash seriously until the mid 2000's. From the early 80's onwards it was all tennis, high school, college, tournaments. Never stepped foot on a squash court. Only when I started playing at my club did I realize how brutal this sport is, how intense the rallies, how you're doubled over in lung pain after just one game. One rally can last 100 strokes. Give it a try and you'll understand! Tennis definitely requires more upper body strength though.

[abdiver12]

@Irifalchen Unfortunately, I don't know who the badminton and tennis player was. In squash, its not the length of the matches but the intensity of rallies that make it hard. The average length of time between hits is only .6 seconds meaning you have less time to reach the ball. You cannot over run the ball as in tennis, you have to come to a full stop suddenly or you will not recover in time to get the next shot. If you play squash at a high level, you will understand.

[Irifalchen]

@abdiver12 I'm not, in the very least, trying to refute your statement with selective statistics, but that's all I can offer as a counter-argument since I am not fully knowledgeable on the study that you referenced. Just out of curiosity, do you know which tennis players participated in the test?

[Irifalchen]

@abdiver12 I'm sure you've heard of the 11-hour Isner-Mahut match at Wimbledon 2010. and that's not the only long match in tennis. Federer-Nadal in Wimbledon 2008 went about 4:48 hours or something and almost 5 hours at AUS open 2009, and I think you would know that they do play at the highest level, which does require their maximal fitness. It's a hard comparison to make because different muscle groups are used in different sports to do different things, so different reactions are developed.

[Irifalchen]

@abdiver12 In terms of fitness alone, you may have a point. Although you also have to consider that in professional tennis, matches do go to five sets, ( I played one at state level myself, and I can understand fatigue) it uses a different level of fiber involvement. For example, most high-level long squash matches last maybe an hour, hour-and-a-half at the most.

[abdiver12]

@Irifalchen The squash player (Chris Walker) won 15 of the tests outright, and drew 1 with the badminton player. Badminton player won 1 drew 1. Tennis player won none and broke down at the end of testing, exhausted and unable to continue. Again, these results were published in various medical journals and Fitness magazine.

These studies only confirmed what I already knew: Tennis has nothing on squash in terms of fitness requirements.

[abdiver12]

Second, studies at what was once the British Medical Olympic centre concluded that squash was the second hardest physical sport behind Olympic gymnastics using the fitness factors of speed, strength, power, flexibility,agility, aerobic and anaerobic capacities. This evidence was published in medical journals and the Times newspaper. Scientists produced 17 different fitness tests using one of the top badminton, squash and tennis players to battle out to see who was the fittest and strongest.

[abdiver12]

First, from personal experience (6.0 squash when fit, Pac 10 tennis level). Please note I'm talking purely of cardio vascular endurance and foot speed, not upper body strength or racket skills. I put a member of the Cal Tennis team on the squash court once and he could barely get to anything nor last longer than a game endurance wise with me playing at 1/2 pace. Second (see next posting):