The world's a better place at SW19....

Returned from Wimbledon a few days ago feeling more enthusiastic than i have ever been about this slam. Just one visit for a tennis geek is enough to make it feel like home.

Standing amongst thousands and thousands of enthusiasts, seeing top players in every direction you look, ice creams and strawberries (no matter how overrated they are) and fresh green lawn courts on a bright summers day just wreaks of the thrill of the tennis season.

The trip to Laandan was indeed three days of total tennis intoxication, which Mike aptly called a 'propa tennis getaway this' when i rolled up at his house with tennis racquet and all. Living and breathing of the stuff, from our evening game to the mornings absorption of casual match chit chat while queuing. We rolled our eyes at the Murray articles every day, and spent the rest on courts and walking around the grounds. If that wasn't enough, after a short break of tube journeys home from Southfields station, we hit the t.v. to catch 'Today at Wimbledon' before bed. It was awesome!

Nothing matters at Wimbledon except the tennis. How wonderfully uplifting. The world is a better place temporarily.

I had always thought that getting into Wimbledon was almost impossible without putting yourself through great hardship, but Mike and i found that you can get there for 7.30am in the morning and still get guaranteed entry with a grounds pass by 10 am. Obviously this means a 2 hour long wait, but it is not a shuffling queue because they let you through in batches supposedly, so we only had to 'move' in the queue once. The rest of the time we sat on the grass outside in the sunshine, listening to our ipods and discussing players and matches. They apparently reserve 6000 grounds tickets, but one day we were 6135 and still got in just fine. (it is unwise to leave it too late however).

The trip was very much a success considering we were not really uber prepared or anything and kind of gave up on checking schedules of play for the next day (it is more fun when it is a surprise!). We saw loads of amazing players- Lleyton Hewitt, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, Gilles Simon, James Blake, Andy Roddick, Juan Carlos Ferrero (mike said he saw Andy Murray and David Ferrer walk by), Santorro, Jamie Murray play doubles (he was a bit shit), Jelena Jankovic from a distance, Fernando Gonzalez (total joker, Thiago Alves, Amelie Mauresmo, Kuztensova (french open champ 09... My trip is in digital format here on vimeo

A few very handy tips i picked up on a first visit to Wimby....

1. It is always worth having a nice stroll around the grounds before you do anything to get yourself acquainted with the courts and with the Championship. It's relaxing and very enjoyable. (Also extremely helpful if matches have been moved around to different courts and you want to get there quickly without having to ask around for directions) The place is huge and confusing in crowds, and it is a good idea to kinda know where you are going. We also brought a notebook to keep a mental check of all the good matches on so we had a rough plan of the day....

2. Always make sure you know which court you are cueing for when you don't have reserved seating. The queues can take AGES, since they don't let you on the stands till a game finishes so that the players are not disturbed. This means something up to a hours wait, and you don't want to find that you have actually been queuing for the wrong match/court. (this did happen to us, but luckily we only queued for about 30minutes before realising)

3. If you want to see good players on practise courts, GET ON THERE FROM 12 ONWARDS. About lunchtime all the best players come out to play, not much chance of seeing them past 2pm.

4. Keep your eyes peeled, players just walk past you all the time. This is not to get pictures/signings- they are busy people and probably have a lot of things to get one with, but sometimes they will be walking towards a practise court or a unused match court to warm up. (we saw andy roddick this way). So it is sometimes worth stalking them and seeing where they go.

5. Take food, everyone does and they all munch sandwiches during the matches. It is easier this way, because you won't really have time to actually buy food and sit and eat because the important thing is to get your ass to as many matches as possible and the queues for food are not worth it! It is also of course more expensive to buy on grounds.

6. Don't go overboard with sensible footwear, you can get by just fine in sandals, but try and make it flat. HOWEVER, don't ever wear those primary coloured plastic sandals that are all the craze now, selling at your nearest Topshop. Yea, they look good, but your feet will DIE. DIE!!

7. They do not accept card for grounds passes. Have some cash on you £20 for first week grounds passes...i think 40/50 for show courts..(though you will need to camp)

8. Always check out ticket resale to see if you can grab a £5 show court ticket. When we went, Andy Murray was playing the last match on centre and there was a massive 6 mile queue for tickets at ticket resale, so hardly anyone was queuing for court 1 and we got a ticket on there to see Fernando Gonzalez (awesome player beat Murray at French) within 10 minutes...

9. Don't expect to see top 5 players on your first visit. Expect to see top quality tennis and good players, but not the best. You may just be disappointed, but really, everyone who plays at Wimbledon is a delight to watch even if they are not Rafa and Roger. You will have a guaranteed awesome time if you love tennis anyway, and just go with the flow, because luck is all around at Wimbledon...

10. If you are going as a pair, take someone you can honestly really put up with, i was very lucky, but the last thing you need is to spend an inordinate amount of time with someone who makes you want to fucking kill yourself/ (or kill them). And probably best to take someone who knows as much or more tennis than you, as player spotting is 10x more efficient, and also the whole experience is better spent in the company of a tennis enthusiast who will not get bored and nag you for food in the middle of a match.

Well, that is all i can remember right now... but hopefully it should be pretty helpful, because none of this info is available via the website or otherwise.

I apologise for anyone who is actually following my blog posts and has noticed it hasn't been updated during these Championships too well. I suppose this is not a problem really, but i enjoy keeping it 'up to date'. I just have little time in my life for everything including tennis sometimes. US open will be better organised on here for sure, since it is my favourite championship.

I also thought i would articulate my disappointment that Gael Monfils was not playing at Wimby this yr because of a knee injury. All my best wishes go out to him,i hope he recovers soon enough for US open.