We needed a grass that could hold up for two weeks and not splinter into patches.

In 2001,Wimbledon tore out all its courts and planted a new variety of groundcover.The new grass was 100% perennial rye,the old courts had been a mix of 70% rye and 30% creeping red fescue.The new lawn was more durable,and allowed Wimbledon's groundsmen to keep the soil underneath drier and firmer.A firmer surface caues the ball to bounce higher.A high bounce is anathema to the serve-and-volley player,who relies on approach shots skidding low through the court.What's more,rye,unlike fescue,grow in tufts that stand straight up,these tufts slow a tennis ball down as it lands.


Ivanisevic and Rafter were able to blast their way through the new grass because an exceptionally rainy two weeks had kept the courts soft.But the ground eventually dried,and baseliners have excelled since,in men's tennis,Roger Federer,who serve and volley only around 10% of the time,has reigned superme,And while women have always been more inclined to play from the back of the court,big-hitting groundstrokers such as Maria Sharapova and Serena and Venus Williams have all but shut the door on the serve and volley style ushered in by the now-retired Martina Navratilova and Jana Novotna.


Head groundsman at the All-England Club,Eddie Seaward, says the new grass was developed because the tournament needed a plant that could withstand the wear of the modern game.Grass surfaces that could put up with lightfooted gents in trousers-like Fred Perry,the Englishman who dominated Wimbledon in 1930s-couldn't as easily endure the exertions of ,to test the durability of different varieties,technicians at Britain's Sports Turf Research Institute put a tennis shoe on a massive hydraulic ram and then stomped patches of turf intermittently for 13 days,mimicking the conditions of the Wimbledon fortnight.The hammer was calibrated to two different weights,that of the average female and average male pro.


We needed a grass that could hold up for two weeks and not splinter into patches,which is what causes bad bounces,says Seaward.That was our goal.Any change in the pattern of play,he insists,was just natural byproduct of being able to keep the soil frimer.