International size Tiff-dwarf Grass Court

I recall:

I was at a function at West Park Lodge (Cockfosters, London) and meet this gentlemen who was the head grounds man of Wimbledon and I mentioned to him - I'd like to make a grass court and he said "if you water, fertilise, mow,scarify, core regularly and roll to get a nice flat surface ... in four hundred years it will be like Wimbledon".

Not quite there yet !!
John Forrester

Grass courts were once among the most common tennis surfaces. However, due to high maintenance costs, grass courts are now rare as they must be watered and mowed often, and take a longer time to dry after rain than hard courts.

About Grass courts

Grass courts are the fastest type of tennis court in common use. They consist of grass grown on very hard-packed soil, similar to golf greens, which adds an additional variable: bounces depend on how healthy the grass is, how recently it has been mown, and the wear and tear of recent play.

Points are usually very quick where fast, low bounces keep rallies short, and the serve plays a more important role than on other surfaces. Grass courts tend to favour serve-and-volley tennis players, such as John McEnroe and Pete Sampras among men and Martina Navratilova among women.

The surface is less firm and more slippery than hard courts, causing the ball to slide and bounce lower, and so players must reach the ball faster. Serve and volley players take advantage of the surface by serving the ball (usually a slice serve because of its effectiveness on grass) and then running to the net to cut off the return of serve, leaving their opponent with little time to reach the low-bouncing, fast-moving ball.

Movement on grass courts is somewhat different from movement on any other surface. Even the way one's foot lands on grass which is a light dab, is rather different from the full-weight landing and sliding as one does on clay. Also the slipperiness demands using a lot of small adjustment steps to get in to the correct position. You will probably need to lower your centre of gravity to get down to the low or bad bounce. However playing on grass is easier on the knees due to a natural surface, but you cannot slide as you can on clay.

Quick adjustments in the swing pattern and footwork are constantly needed so any movement or co-ordination weaknesses will show up immediately. In addition most grass court players also succeed on hard courts, although there are some exceptions.

Players often hit flatter shots to increase power and allow the ball to travel faster after and before the ball hits the ground. However, Wimbledon, the most famous grass tournament, has slowed down its grass courts as early as 2001. Players have said that the courts of Wimbledon have become slower, heavier, and high bouncing.

In 2001, Wimbledon organizers had changed the grass to 100% perennial rye in addition to changing to a harder and denser soil with both providing for a higher bounce to the ball. Grass specialist, Tim Henman, voiced out against this change in 2002 by stating, "What on earth is going on here? I'm on a grass court and it's the slowest court I've played on this year". As a result, serving and volleying has become rare at Wimbledon and dominant base liners such as Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal have won the most recent titles.

article sourced wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennis_court