64. TO WHOOP OR NOT TO WHOOP!

As I mentioned in my earlier blog, ‘Give Them a Chance’, there are currently three governing bodies for tennis and each has its own rules and regulations that players have to abide by. The men’s game is ruled by the ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) and the ITF (International Tennis Federation) and the women’s by the WTA (Women’s Tennis Association) and the ITF. It’s a crazy situation in my opinion, and one which leads to much confusion for the players, as what goes with one governing body may not go with another. It all appears to be organised and good but in reality the presence of three governing bodies just adds to the stress that players experience and which could be avoided if the three governing bodies were to merge to one, or at least one for each of the sexes.

A classic example of this confusion (and unnecessary stress) can be found in the women’s game. The WTA currently has an association with WHOOP (www.whoop.com) – a company which provides products which enable athletes (and regular individuals) to monitor their health and fitness on a new level. An athlete wearing a Whoop band can gather performance data on her sleep patterns, stress levels, recovery rates, heart rate variability, calorie expenditure to name just a few, and can then work with her trainers, doctor etc to adapt her programme to ensure that her body is operating at its maximum capability. They are becoming an increasingly popular tool for athletes.

Whoop bands do not have a screen. They collect data via a sensor placed on the players wrist and this can only be accessed when the player links up to an App on her phone. The Whoop cannot receive or send messages – unlike an Apple Watch for example.

WTA players are being offered Whoop bands to assist them with their training and are permitted to wear them during WTA organised tournaments. A nice gesture and one for which the players are very grateful. However, the crazy thing is that players are not ‘allowed’ to wear them if they are playing in a Grand Slam or in a tournament organised by the ITF. I am unclear as to the reasoning behind this – maybe it is because the Grand Slam/ITF event organisers are simply not up to date with this kind of technology rather than them having made a conscious decision to ban them – who knows? But also, not all ITF event organisers appear to be clear on the rules themselves. One umpire last week permitted my player to wear her Whoop during her match but then in the following game she was asked to remove it (mid match), which was confusing and disrupting to say the least. Surely if the ITF is not going to allow the wearing of a Whoop band (which seems a shortsighted decision) then players wrists should be checked before matches start not mid match when their focus is on the game? But the bigger issue here has to be that all the governing bodies should have the same rules on things like this – the players don’t need to be worrying about which rules are in effect week by week – they should all be the same. But this is the reality of the situation at the moment – three governing bodies which don’t seem to communicate!

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