{"id":3775,"date":"2019-11-27T14:19:34","date_gmt":"2019-11-27T14:19:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/?p=3775"},"modified":"2019-11-27T14:19:34","modified_gmt":"2019-11-27T14:19:34","slug":"the-speed-of-every-surface-2019-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/2019\/11\/27\/the-speed-of-every-surface-2019-edition\/","title":{"rendered":"The Speed of Every Surface, 2019 Edition"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Fans are constantly talking about surface speed … I have written a lot<\/a> about surface speed … yet somehow, I haven’t published complete surface speed numbers for three years<\/a>. Time to remedy that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you’re interested in the long-form explanation of how these numbers work, what their limitations are, and so on, check out my post from three years ago<\/a>. I’ll give a brief overview here, as well:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I rate<\/a> the playing speed of every ATP surface using ace rate as a proxy for surface characteristics. Ace rate doesn’t tell the whole story, of course, but as you’ll see, it’s a pretty good first- or second-order approximation. For each tournament, I look at the ace rates in every match, and control for the servers and returners in those matches. (The ace rate for every John Isner match will be high, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the surface is fast.) I say “playing speed” because ace rate depends on a wide range of variables (heat, humidity, balls, etc), so it reflects how the court “plays”–not anything inherent about the physical makeup of the surface itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The main advantages of this approach are that it is simple to understand (more aces = higher rating!), and that we can calculate it with limited information–data that is available for ATP matches back to the early 1990s. Court Pace Index and other Hawkeye-based metrics surely have a lot more to add, but they require much more sophisticated tools–tools that federations and tours aren’t about to share with lowly fans like us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A tour-average surface rates 1.0. The usual range for tour events is between 0.50 (slow clay) and 1.50 (fast hard or grass). The following table shows the 2017-19 speed ratings for all tour events on the 2019 calendar, including the Davis Cup Finals:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tournament        Surface  2019 Ace%  2019  2018  2017  \nChengdu              Hard      14.8%  1.57  1.05  1.16  \nAntalya             Grass      14.6%  1.47  1.25  1.74  \nTour Finals          Hard      11.7%  1.31  1.12  0.75  \nMarseille            Hard      11.7%  1.29  1.21  1.34  \nNewport             Grass      12.7%  1.27  0.87  0.76  \nAustralian Open      Hard      12.9%  1.27  1.16  1.14  \nBrisbane             Hard      13.3%  1.26  1.35  0.99  \nAtlanta              Hard      14.3%  1.25  1.01  0.86  \nShanghai             Hard      13.0%  1.24  1.17  1.53  \nSao Paulo            Clay       9.8%  1.24  0.89  0.92  \nHalle               Grass      12.8%  1.23  1.16  1.18  \nStuttgart           Grass      14.5%  1.23  1.42  1.27  \nSofia                Hard      11.1%  1.21  1.14  1.33  \nAntwerp              Hard      11.2%  1.21  1.25  1.06  \nDavis Cup Finals     Hard      11.9%  1.20              \nMetz                 Hard      13.5%  1.20  1.51  1.34  \nParis Bercy          Hard      11.9%  1.19  1.06  1.03  \nMontpellier          Hard      13.4%  1.17  1.13  1.11  \nVienna               Hard      11.4%  1.16  1.16  0.98  \nNew York             Hard      17.0%  1.16  1.05        \n                                                        \nTournament        Surface  2019 Ace%  2019  2018  2017  \nWinston Salem        Hard      12.1%  1.15  1.01  1.07  \nBasel                Hard      14.2%  1.14  1.03  0.77  \nBeijing              Hard      11.6%  1.12  1.03  0.91  \nWashington           Hard      15.5%  1.11  0.99  1.11  \nMoscow               Hard      13.5%  1.11  1.21  1.45  \nDelray Beach         Hard      13.9%  1.10  0.98  0.97  \nDoha                 Hard      10.0%  1.10  0.88  1.02  \nSt. Petersburg       Hard       8.4%  1.09  1.13  0.80  \nStockholm            Hard      11.2%  1.08  1.03  1.05  \nTokyo                Hard      11.6%  1.08  1.34  1.18  \nLondon              Grass      12.8%  1.07  1.25  1.20  \nAuckland             Hard      10.7%  1.06  1.17  1.11  \nPune                 Hard      14.8%  1.05  0.99        \nCincinnati           Hard      11.6%  1.04  0.98  1.22  \nCanada               Hard      10.8%  1.03  1.17  0.97  \nDubai                Hard       8.4%  1.02  1.04  0.91  \nEastbourne          Grass      13.2%  0.99  0.94  1.00  \nWimbledon           Grass      10.5%  0.99  1.14  1.03  \nSydney               Hard       9.3%  0.98  1.25  1.10  \nZhuhai               Hard       6.9%  0.97              \n                                                        \nTournament        Surface  2019 Ace%  2019  2018  2017  \nMarrakech            Clay       8.4%  0.97  0.62  0.77  \nUS Open              Hard      10.2%  0.97  0.98  0.96  \ns'Hertogenbosch     Grass      10.2%  0.95  0.99  0.89  \nCordoba              Clay       6.9%  0.94              \nRotterdam            Hard       8.0%  0.90  1.13  1.09  \nLyon                 Clay       9.9%  0.90  0.89  0.85  \nGstaad               Clay       5.6%  0.88  1.16  0.92  \nAcapulco             Hard      11.1%  0.86  1.03  0.92  \nMiami Masters        Hard       9.5%  0.86  0.78  0.84  \nLos Cabos            Hard       6.5%  0.85  0.80  1.28  \nGeneva               Clay       6.6%  0.81  1.04  0.85  \nBastad               Clay       7.1%  0.80  0.72  0.88  \nKitzbuhel            Clay       6.3%  0.77  0.84  1.02  \nHamburg              Clay       7.7%  0.76  0.69  1.02  \nIndian Wells         Hard       7.6%  0.76  0.84  1.03  \nHouston              Clay       9.2%  0.75  0.81  0.94  \nMadrid               Clay       7.0%  0.71  0.84  0.89  \nRoland Garros        Clay       7.0%  0.71  0.72  0.76  \nRome                 Clay       7.0%  0.69  0.69  0.85  \nMunich               Clay       7.0%  0.67  0.74  0.99  \n                                                        \nTournament        Surface  2019 Ace%  2019  2018  2017  \nUmag                 Clay       5.6%  0.65  0.78  0.61  \nRio de Janeiro       Clay       5.9%  0.63  0.71  0.68  \nBudapest             Clay       7.0%  0.62  0.62  0.59  \nBarcelona            Clay       5.6%  0.59  0.57  0.55  \nEstoril              Clay       4.7%  0.54  0.58  0.53  \nBuenos Aires         Clay       3.9%  0.52  0.65  0.88  \nMonte Carlo          Clay       4.7%  0.50  0.56  0.50<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
The Tour Finals played as fast as it has in years–the 2014-16 ratings were 0.89 and 1.06–suggesting either that the organizers finally laid down a proper hard court, or that 15 matches is an insufficient sample. (It certainly isn’t ideal, and the same can be said for 28- and 32-draw tourneys.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Davis Cup Finals played more like a typical indoor hard court. At the other extreme, Indian Wells was particularly slow this year, even by its own clay-like standards. At least at a few events, surface speed convergence<\/a> may have slowed down.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Fans are constantly talking about surface speed … I have written a lot about surface speed … yet somehow, I haven’t published complete surface speed numbers for three years. Time to remedy that. If you’re interested in the long-form explanation of how these numbers work, what their limitations are, and so on, check out my … Continue reading The Speed of Every Surface, 2019 Edition<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[109],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-surface-speed"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3775"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3775\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}