The Value of Practice

For the third time in 43 years, an American won the tennis championship of Australia. It was all a rude surprise to Australia--winner of the Davis Cup last fall and supposedly sitting serene in the tennis world for a long time to come. The Aussies figured without Dick Savitt.

Savitt, 23, ranked No. 6 in the U.S., beat the two top Aussies, Frank Sedgman and Ken McGregor, on successive days for the title.*

The person least surprised by this outcome was Savitt's mother, back in Orange, N.J. Said she: "Dick never had much time to practice while he was in college [Cornell], and we don't believe he ever was able to get in shape for a tournament before he went to Australia."

"Big Game." Dick was in shape this time. With U.S. Champion Art Larsen, 25, he had been barnstorming through a succession of Australian provincial tournaments for three months. Moreover, he got some expert informal coaching this trip from Adrian Quist, Davis Cup veteran and three-time Australian champion. In 14 hours of friendly drill, Quist helped Savitt improve his service grip and straighten out his hard, flat drives.

The net of all this was that, by the Australian championship last week, Savitt was playing a "big game" with more style than he had ever shown before. Sedgman and McGregor repeatedly found his serves too hot to handle, and his base-line drives from forehand and backhand kept them more often than not on the defensive. It took him five sets against Sedgman (2-6, 7-5, 1-6, 6-3, 6-4), four against McGregor (6-3, 2-6, 6-3, 6-1).

"Print That!" The Sydney press hailed him as "one of the world's best base-line players," possessed of a "killer spirit" and "the finest backhand we've seen since Donald Budge won our championship in 1938." Said Savitt, making Mother's point again: "At Cornell the weather was too bad for tennis in winter. This is the first time I've ever had an opportunity to play tennis past September."

The opportunity to play extra tennis did little or nothing to help Art Larsen's game. He showed the same jittery nerves that marked his U.S. play last fall (TIME, Sept. 25), became upset by the heckling and "barracking" of the Sydney gallery in the semifinals. When, in the face of established etiquette, the crowd cheered one of Larsen's double-faults, he turned and shouted to the Aussies in the press box: "I think your crowd stinks! Print that!" They did.

* Previous U.S. holders of the Australian championship: Don Budge (1938) and Frederick B. Alexander (1908).

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