Englishman in New York

In Print

12 Responses to “In Print”

1. on 18 Oct 2007 at 2:32 pm   Cretin regnant
   
   

   You’re into Tennis now? What happened to the birdwatching?

2. on 18 Oct 2007 at 4:15 pm   William
   
   

   Cool! I especially like that you wrote an article about Federer, my favorite tennis player.

   I didn’t quite understand the paragraph, “… a full arsenal of customized Federer rackets would cost about $3,500, including the cost of the rackets.”

   What do you mean by the customized rackets cost $3,500 including the cost of the rackets? Do you mean including the original cost of the store-bought rackets, pre-customization?

3. on 18 Oct 2007 at 4:34 pm   pdberger
   
   

   That’s right, William.

   It’s a quirk of tennis that the rackets the pros use are actually a little bit cheaper than beginner “game improvement” rackets.

   You can buy Federer’s racket, the Wilson K Factor Six-One Tour, for about $190 in a store. Then it would cost you a further $100 or so for the customization.

   The $3,500 figure is the total ($290) multiplied by 12 and rounded up.

4. on 18 Oct 2007 at 4:34 pm   pdberger
   
   

   Cretin, can’t a man have more than one passion?

5. on 18 Oct 2007 at 5:03 pm   William
   
   

   Funny, I imagined these custom rackets for pros would cost a heck of a lot more than mere civilian rackets.

6. on 18 Oct 2007 at 5:20 pm   pdberger
   
   

   It does. The $3,500 figure is for a mere mortal like you or I to have our racket customized to as near to Federer’s specs as possible.

   But if you’re Roger Federer, and you want someone to follow you to all the tournaments to customize and string your rackets, you’re looking at a lot more than $3,500.

   Federer’s customizer and stringer, Nate Ferguson, told me that his company’s Gold Service “generally costs less than $50,000 per man, and it varies depending on the specific requirements of the player.”

   Ferguson’s current clients are: Federer, Djokovic, F. Gonzalez, A. Murray, M. Baghdatis, G. Canas, L. Hewitt, M. Fish, and M. Safin.

   His first Gold service client, in 2001, was Tim Henman, who he strung for until his retirement last month.

7. on 18 Oct 2007 at 8:27 pm   Cretin Regnant
   
   

   No.

8. on 19 Oct 2007 at 2:58 am   beau
   
   

   This sort of stuff goes down real smooth with in-flight magazines… have you approached any?

9. on 20 Oct 2007 at 11:31 pm   pdberger
   
   

   Nope, but it’s a good idea. Do you have any particular airline magazines in mind?

10. on 23 Oct 2007 at 6:55 pm   Selma
    
    

    How anyone could think Federer, a boorish eurosnob who makes tennis tired, is exciting is beyong me.

11. on 24 Oct 2007 at 2:56 am   beau
    
    

    But The USD 50k covers, I assume, the cost of some fellow attending every match in the tour series and being on hand constantly to tweek the strings when necessary. Right?

    So if the guy has to pay for his hotels, flights, beer and lapdances all from this USD 50K then actually it’s hardly anything…

12. on 24 Oct 2007 at 7:46 am   pdberger
    
    

    I didn’t ask about expenses.

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