The Body Serve

The Body Serve Tennis Podcast
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The Body Serve

Tennis podcast featuring casual, semi-respectable conversations about the ATP & WTA.

  1. 4 DAYS AGO

    Mercury Rising: Australian Open Preview

    And just like that, the 2025 Australian Open is nearly underway. It’s the 40th major we’ve covered as a podcast, and our draw previews are still as prediction-free as always. We touch on a few of the themes to watch out for in Melbourne – Sinner’s emotional state, Rybakina’s coaching situation, Novak as #7 seed and poisonee – but mostly this is a lighthearted preview with draw breakdowns and our most intriguing first rounds.  GoFundMe: help fund our 2025 season! 3:15 Stories to follow: heavy metals, jumping ants 13:50 Comebacks and withdrawals 18:50 Women’s draw analysis: a tough one for Coco 27:40 Women’s bottom half: will Iga reverse her luck in Australia? 38:05 Men’s draw analysis: the top tier and the middlemen 54:50 Men’s bottom half: Djokovic as a #7 seed sounds wrong

    1h 6m

  2. 7 JAN

    Obsessed

    Welcome to season 11 of The Body Serve! We're catching you up on the barely existent off-season, including the most important Joaos, Max Purcell turning himself in, and Jenson Broosky’s brave statement about autism. Even though one of us rejects any “2025” tennis that occurs before January 1, 2025, we talk through the season’s early results, including the United Cup fracas, the Opelka and Nishikori comebacks, and the shifting Big 4 allegiances due to the Murravic pairing. We also take on the decidedly more serious situation with Elena Rybakina’s former and would-be current coach, Stefano Vukov, who is currently under investigation by the WTA. Finally, we end with our 2025 breakout picks and a game that James was entirely unprepared for. Happy 2025! 1:05 GoFundMe update 4:05 First week results: Reilly, Kei, the pairing from hell, plus the top tier of the WTA smashes their first week 14:00 United Cup: the “drama” is honestly not that serious 23:30 Rybakina, Vukov, WTA safeguarding, and the childishness of “I told you so” 31:25 Max Purcell turns himself in for an anti-doping oopsie 35:55 Kyrgios’ obsession + Osaka’s allegiance to him (aka: I knew things would get rocky when he came for the nepo baby) 40:45 Jenson Brooksby tells the world that he has autism spectrum disorder 44:50 The Year of the Joao: Reis da Silva comes out as gay + Fonseca wins Next Gen Finals 50:15 Our breakout picks for 2025 54:50 James plays a game! Play along at home

    1h 7m

  3. 23/12/2024

    Adiós a Todos

    We never knew how much we’d miss “hola a todos” until it turned into an adiós. Rafael Nadal Parera ended his tennis career at this year’s Davis Cup, leaving with with 22 major singles titles, a Career Golden Slam, every clay record you can think of, and a litany of quotable moments. We’ve been Rafa fans since the early days, when they said he was a dirtballer whose body would force him into retirement in his 30s. But it turned out Rafa was nothing if not adaptable -- a rational thinker whose love for the game made him a global superstar and helped build two of the sport’s most enduring rivalries. In this episode, we’re less interested in a chronological retelling of his career than complicating some of the cliches about him and talking about our favorite moments, Rafa’s inimitable Rafa-isms, and what made Nadal an athlete like no other.     1:55 How we became fans 4:45 It’s not about stats, but here are some stats 10:00 Adaptability: the key to understanding Rafa as an athlete? 12:55 A quick career recap - the notable eras 32:35 Rafa as sufferer  37:30 Fedal & Rafole: the cliches eventually fell away 43:45 Rafa as sex symbol  52:05 (Not) talking about the GOAT conversation 62:25 Our favorite Rafa moments: the 2022 Australian Open was a gift 65:40 Rafa-isms : if if if …

    1h 18m

  4. 05/12/2024

    Sinners and Ain'ts: 2024 ATP Wrap

    Finally our 2024 season is coming to a close! Although bonus December content is coming soon, we finish regular coverage by wrapping the ATP season: it was basically the proof that Jannik Sinner’s late-2023 rise was for real, and that he and Carlos have taken the reins of the (mostly) post-Big 4 ATP. Just like the women’s wrap, we’ll take you through the events of the 2024 season, evaluate our picks for 2024 breakout players, and choose our ATP Award winners. We finish up with your memorable/funny/enraging moments (“do you want to change the lady?,” Indian Wells bee attack) and the many players saying goodbye to the sport.  GoFundMe   3:10 Where were we at the beginning of 2024? 10:30 Starting in Australia: Sinner risen 16:30 Clay: Rafa’s brief return, Watergate, and Carlos’ apology-fist pump-championship pipeline 22:20 Channel Slam and Novak’s white whale 29:20 Rafa’s retirement at Davis Cup 37:55 Off-court “drama”  41:55 Our 2024 breakout players + thoughts on the ATP Awards 50:00 What will you remember? Bees. 53:25 Moments that pissed you off / made you laugh (sometimes both) 57:55 A ton of retirements this year, even beyond the big names

    1h 3m

  5. 01/12/2024

    Receipts! Proof! Timeline! Screenshots!

    We were soooo close to wrapping this season, but we’ll always change the schedule for a doping story. The news of Iga Swiatek testing positive for a banned substance provoked shock, confusion, and even resignation among tennis watchers who are, by the day, becoming more versed on the fine details of doping cases. Our immediate questions were: Is the story plausible? Why is the suspension broken into pieces? When should news like this be made public? As always, we like to dive into the report itself, making sure we’ve got the facts straight before offering any hot takes. Later, we try to answer a few of our own questions, touching on player reactions and the danger of comparing one case to another.  1:35 GoFundMe Update 3:25 Iga Swiatek tests positive for trimetazidine in Cincinnati, gets a 1-month non-consecutive suspension 9:05 A timeline to make sense of things 13:10 Iga’s team sends a boatload of evidence to the ITIA 17:30 What’s the difference between No Fault or Negligence and No Significant Fault of Negligence? 31:30 Public disclosure: balancing a player’s privacy with building transparency and trust  36:05 Tara Moore has a more legitimate beef than most  42:30 Simona said this case is identical to hers (it is not)

    50 min

  6. 25/11/2024

    Bookends: 2024 WTA Wrap

    This year in women’s tennis, the top tier took further steps to entrench themselves but the WTA retained its signature depth. Sabalenka, Swiatek, and surprise – Krejcikova – added majors to their hauls; Paolini and Zheng broke out in a big way; and Gauff managed to rewrite her season in the fall. We’ll take you through the highlights, the comebacks, the ‘remember whens,’ and moments both infuriating and hilarious. As usual, we also choose our WTA Award winners and do a self-assessment on our 2024 WTA breakout picks. Thanks for a great WTA season! 0:55 Launching our crowdfunding campaign! 3:00 The season’s major themes: Steadiness at the top (+ Babs!), the Zheng and Paolini breakthroughs, Coco’s two seasons, and many comebacks of varying success 12:20 Picture it: Australia, January 2024 17:20 Danielle makes a career-best run, Iga dominates clay 26:25 Babs snatches Wimbledon, Zheng ascendant 33:20 Aryna bookends her year at the US Open 38:30 Our choices for the 2024 WTA Awards 44:10 How did our 2024 breakout picks do? 47:55 Your most memorable moments: our listeners love Jasmine 50:55 Moments that pissed you off and moments that made you laugh: Babs and Qinwen keeping the girlies entertained   64:35 Farewells and farewells for now

    1h 9m

  7. 19/11/2024

    Get a Grip(MD)

    Coco writes a new story to end her year -- beating the bad season allegations, as she said -- by taking out Swiatek, Sabalenka, and finally Zheng Qinwen to win the WTA Finals. (Barbie K tried to shake the table, as usual.) In Turin, Jannik Sinner showed that anything you can do, he can do better. He won his first year-end title and notched a 70-win season, the first since 2016. After that, we talk about the retirement of legendary umpire Carlos Bernardes, Frances Tiafoe’s big fine, Jon Wertheim’s hot mic incident, and more. 0:30 Housekeeping: a transition to BlueSky? 6:40 Coco beats the bad season allegations! 19:55 Barbora Krejcikova will f*** it up if you invite her (respectfully) 24:45 ATP Finals: starting with the group photo 29:55 Nice job, Taylor! But Sinner does it better 41:35 #NameTheTennisPlayer is back! 45:15 Umpire Carlos Bernardes retires from tennis 48:00 Wertheim’s hot mic moment  53:15 Tiafoe fined $120,000 for tirade

    1h 3m

  8. 05/11/2024

    And Another Thing

    The top women descend upon Riyadh, the photoshoot is a smash, and #1 Sabalenka sails into the semis. There are still questions around this business decision, and players have varying success in answering them. Paris, as always, suffers from late-season malaise, and the ATP Finals qualifiers start to firm up (almost), but we wonder about the value of grinding it out this late in the season. Plus, lot of et ceteras, including: Dev Patel is the next Zendaya(!), and off-court coaching is no longer a trial but still a tribulation (heh).  0:30 And another thing about Sinner 2:55 Some meta-commentary on the show and getting older and less stan-oriented  8:15 The WTA Finals looks: great job everybody! 16:10 Players answer inevitable questions on Saudi Arabia, some better than others 26:35 If a tree falls in Paris 38:10 ATP Finals qualifications: not many scenarios are left 44:55 WTA results: Shnaider wins #4 of the year and Somnez enters the top 100  47:05 Sloane on protecting your peace 52:20 Et ceteras: Diego Forlan to play pro tennis, the incomparable Dev Patel to make a tennis movie 57:20 Off-court coaching is now the law

    1h 2m
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About

Tennis podcast featuring casual, semi-respectable conversations about the ATP & WTA.

Information

  • Creator
    The Body Serve Tennis Podcast
  • Years Active
    2015 - 2025
  • Episodes
    300
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Copyright 2021 The Body Serve Tennis Podcast. All rights reserved.
  • Show Website
    The Body Serve

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