Sven is in the net cord. Praise be to Sven, the Grandest of Slammers. He who bringeth us US Open titles and lucky bounces. He who raineth upon us his most glorious of tennis wisdom. For through him, all slams are grand and all draws are cupcakes. Praise be to Sven. Amen.

For those who read this blog regularly, they’ll recognize Sven’s name (pictured above as the fist-pumping badass mofo) as one of importance. Perhaps even in the place of “God” at points. The dude is pretty legendary. (Sven is in the net cord, praise be to Sven).

Anyway, he’s blogging from Madrid! Awesomeness. It’s at his site Orange Coach which is basically his attempt at bringing together tennis coaches online and creating a registry for coaches, hitting partners, on tour or not. Pretty awesome. You can find his latest post here.

He also threw in this gem: “I know a lot of people who would love to be on court with Woziniacki, Cirstea, Morita or Kirilenko .”

Ah, omniscient indeed.

I found this pic on Sven’s Facebook profile right before I left for camp. Smiling Caro, Sven, on the practice courts of Toronto with blue skies and glorious Canadian flags a-wavin’ in the background. I need to make this my wallpaper. Like, of my bedroom. So I’ll be blissfully happy every time I go to bed and wake up in the morning.

My day started wandering around the practice courts around 10:30, and it was fun to see a whole bunch of players. Kuz was front and centre on the big group of practice courts, and I also saw Dani, Vez (above) Gypsy, Eranni, Kanepi, and some other peeps wandering around. Then it was off to Ana frazzle…

My dad said before the match even started “well this should be short but sweet”. I chuckled, and noted that anything can happen with Ana these days, and being a seed doesn’t mean much. The first set was not pretty. Not in the slightest. Ana looked half asleep, and while serving at 71% and having a pretty solid ball toss, she just seemed to be getting the ball back, and Rybawhatever was bringing the heat, and Ana was just sucking all around.

“OK, I take it back”. Indeed. Not short, and not sweet. Ana got down a break early in the set, and I had convinced myself she was going to lose. Things were just not working. But slowly but surely, she got a break back, started cracking forehands, working the angles and using the whole court, and all of a sudden the second set was hers. Fist pumping, ajdes and a whole lot of idemo. And I was in the 300 level seats and hearing all of it.

She opened the third with a break, and by then I was feeling good. Rybwhatever looked tired, Ana was pumping herself, and we were going to town. Still, girl, don’t be pulling this “slow starter” crap anymore, cause against a good player, she would have been blown off the court before she could start. At the same time, she was getting first serves in, about a high 60%, and figuring out ways to control points and use that big forehand we all miss. Don’t want to offer up false hope, but with some consistency, things might not be that bad after all.

After that, my dad and I went to get something to eat. Before heading back to the courts, I decided to hit up the washroom in the stadium. On my way in, I almost literally bumped into Kaia Kanepi (and debated letting her have it for dropping me out of the RG suicide pool in the first round…) and on the way back down the concrete steps, I looked over the edge down to the secluded players’ patio lounge thing (its right beside and below the steps, its weird) and saw Dragana and Sven having a really intense conversation. Sven was leaning on his legs, leaning in, and Dragana was kinda leaning on the table. Couldn’t hear anything, but I tried to take a pic on my phone, didn’t have the camera on me, and it turned out crap, but I kinda freaked regardless. Anyway, happy times, from there, we checked out a little Eranni/Domi (smallest match ever) and then headed over to Dani/Shvedova on the grandstand…

Its safe to say that having Sven on your side is a serious bonus in life. Its another thing when he’s your coach. Ana fought through a serious battle, being up a double break in the first set she blew one, and squeaked out of it 64. She went on to have a tough tight second set, where apparently King’s serve started frustrating her, and lost it 46. But ya gotta fight, and ya gotta fight, and she kicked out the third set pretty easily, thank Sven, 61, and took the match. Tough to expect too much from a first match since Wimbley, especially when her opponent was serving around 70% or the high 60s for a lot of the match. Ana’s serve was unfortunately still causing her tons of problems, serving in the 50s with lots of wonktastic ball tosses. GoToTennis’s total fist pump to wonky ball toss court was 17 vs. 16. That’s a lot of messed up tosses. But better than just wildly hitting them into the net, I suppose.

Lots of other awesome results around the lady draw, with most of the favourites winning. First up, U-Rad (no, I did not have dinner with her in my dream last night…) thrashed Julie Coin (can I start calling her Dubloon?) 1 and 2. Banana also owned up super mega annoying Burrito in straight sets, and will play her BFF Caro tonight, last on centre court, which I will likely miss due to having to be up at an ungodly hour tomorrow, but there’s probably not going to be a stream either, so meh.

Dani knocked out American up and comer Oudin in three, CanWoz dinged out American Bethanie 75 75, and MaKiri actually won a damn match! Bepa, JZ, Superhero, Ms. Licky and Nails all won too.

Mono also showed up for a bit to do some press stuff. Possibly because since she originally said she was going to play it, she has to. That or she wins one tourney, and she’s a celebrity. Either are pretty lame.

All ya need to know, bitches. If you’re crazy and have him on Facebook, like I do, wish him a happy birthday!