Sybel Boss-Ayme's Yoga Students In The News

Bottom Line Is Return to Baseline

By CHRISTOPHER CLAREY

Published: February 10, 2004 in the New York Times


Tennis has been transformed into a comeback tale, and Tommy Haas is the latest high-level player to add a chapter.

The 25-year-old Haas will play his first match in 15 months tonight when he faces Vince Spadea in a first-round match at the Siebel Open in San Jose, Calif.

He is one of several top-ranked players fighting their way back from injuries. Marat Safin has returned to his previous form, advancing to the final of last month's Australian Open. Goran Ivanisevic is coming back to the circuit this week in Milan. Venus Williams is playing again but struggling, while her younger sister Serena has postponed her return once more after withdrawing from this week's event in Paris.

Haas made it to No. 2 in the ranking in May 2002, having reached the semifinals of the Australian Open and the final of the Tennis Masters Series event in Rome. His complete game and forceful, elegant one-handed backhand were gathering strength, but one month later, his parents were seriously injured in a motorcycle accident in Sarasota, Fla., which left his father, Peter, in a coma for several weeks.

Haas took a break from the game to support his family. His shoulder was already bothering him by then, and in December 2002, when he heard a faint pop during a practice serve, he ended the promising but ultimately disastrous year on the operating table. He had more surgery on the same shoulder in July to break up scar tissue, and he no longer has an official ranking, only the protected ranking that will allow him entry into a handful of tournaments before he has to start fending for himself.

"Now that I've had a 15-month layoff, I'm looking at this as my second career," Haas said in a telephone interview from California. "I reached some things in my first career that I'm really proud of, but there are still a few that I want to achieve or try to achieve in my second one. But I'm going to have to be patient with myself."

Tennis, particularly European tennis, could benefit if Haas succeeds. Roger Federer might speak German, but he is Swiss. And the German market — once the driving force in the sport — has slumped.

Despite the phenomenal example set by Steffi Graf in the 1980's and 1990's, there is no German woman in the top 50. Though Haas's friend Rainer Schuettler had a surprisingly fine season in 2003, reaching No. 6, no other German man finished in the top 50, and the country was knocked out of the Davis Cup's elite world group for the first time in 20 years.

"Roger Federer winning Wimbledon was not a surprise; Andy Roddick winning the U.S. Open was not a surprise, but Germany going to the second division was the biggest surprise and disappointment of my time away," Haas said. "We have to make sure we change that this year."

The German Davis Cup captain, Patrick Kuhnen, who has managed to improve morale and repair relationships on the team, would like nothing more than the opportunity to have Haas play a role in the revival.

"We found out last year how important Tommy Haas is to German tennis," Kuhnen said. "Rainer had an enormous year, but we are still missing Tommy."

For much of the last 15 months, Haas could be found in Bradenton, Fla., at the Bollettieri Tennis Academy, which is now owned and operated by the International Management Group. The academy has been Haas's home base since he was 11, and he and his father, who is Austrian, decided that he should opt out of the centralized German system that had produced Boris Becker and Michael Stich and join the American system that had produced Andre Agassi and Jim Courier.

Haas still has a slight German accent when he speaks English, but he is a fully assimilated Floridian, and though he was unable to play competitive tennis in 2003, he did compete. He participated in the running leg of a triathlon, plunged into advanced yoga and played basketball at the academy with N.B.A. regulars like Detroit point guard Chauncey Billups and Indiana forward Al Harrington.

He also used it to spend time with his parents.

Haas will not be content until he is back in the mix at the top of the game. It will not be easy. He might be a much better basketball player than he was in 2002, but Federer, Roddick, Juan Carlos Ferrero and others are better tennis players than they were in 2002.

Other articles about Sybel's Yoga:
Fruit of the Spirit

Sybel Boss | About Sybel | Yoga Athlete Testimonials | Sybel's Yoga DVD |Sybel's Students in the News | Sitemap
phone: 941-504-1462 | email: sybel at yadalife.com | design: innovativeimpulses.com | marketing: sozo firm