By Boak Ferris
Coaching Center Doubles Strategy I HERE
Coaching Center Doubles Strategy II HERE
The WPH Coaching Center Doubles Strategy I discussed what doubles teams need to do pre-match, who should play front and back, what is the best serve in doubles, doubles strategy, the recipe for tournament success in doubles, and the importance of supporting your partner. The WPH Coaching Center Doubles Strategy II discussed if a team can be stronger with mismatched abilities and the role of the right-side player. In the WPH Coaching Center Doubles Strategy III, Boak Ferris elaborates on the concepts from Doubles Strategy I and II, while adding strategies, concepts, and tactics to improve your doubles game.
The Coaching Center Doubles Strategy III, by Boak Ferris
- Every doubles team must have a captain, while the partner might best be termed a lieutenant or a sergeant. The reasons for this become apparent when you consider everybody’s scoring options in the court. A master team, with a kill-artist, can kill the ball and make the front part of the court a scoring zone, so someone on the opposite team needs to be within a few steps’ range of attempted kills and corner passes that threaten to double-bounce before the service line. However, any player dedicated to staying within a few steps of the front-court domain has a limited view of the entire court, while also requiring time to turn the head and survey the action in back, while simultaneously reacting swiftly enough to manage fast low balls in the front. In addition, being so close to the front, the front-court defender often cannot see both opponents in one peripheral glance. Thus, the captain of the team, the one with the best view of the entire court, tends to work closer to the restraining line, and farther back. This must be the captain, the one who makes the majority of calls on who hits what. The captain sees the whole large-scale map, while the lieutenant covers the local hedgerow. Most of the time the court division involves the famous 1/4–3/4 rule, where the lieutenant takes the front 1/4 corner of the court, while the captain covers the remaining 3/4 of the court. Very strong teammates with good off-hands, or lefty-righty teams, can change this to the Chinese-Drum rule, a la The Karate Kid, where they split the court down the middle both vertically and horizontally, and each drums on one side. Elite teams hammer out the duties and alterations to the principles herein with complete communication before any matches or before specific scouted opponents. What a team really needs to acquire as soon as possible during a match is momentum. And momentum arrives with complete communication and harmony of purpose about who the captain is and who the lieutenant is between the partners.
- In regards to preventing any confusion, thus, teams must always have a captain and a lieutenant. Doubles partners lose matches when confusion, second-guessing, and loss of confidence arise. To prevent such loss-threatening negativity, the captain must make the majority of, if not all of, the audible calls, as the captain sees the rallies unfold with greater dimension and clarity. The captain also sees the movements of both opponents during rallies, with better speed and clarity. Rarely will the lieutenant need to talk. Ninety percent of the calls will come from the captain, and the lieutenant need say very little, except as to yell “You!” as soon as the lieutenant recognizes an inability to make a retrieve, cut a shot, or recognizes being navigated too far out of position such that the rally will be doomed, or the joint-positioning will be compromised. If you listen to young David Chapman playing with Naty Jr., for example, at the World’s or elsewhere, you will hear TGO making all the calls for the ball, or for yielding the ball to his partner. “Me!” “You.” The only times Naty calls occur when he is maneuvered out of position or can’t make a controlled retrieve. “You! You! You!”
3a. The lieutenant’s job is often thankless, because that is grunt work, where the service is all aimed to serve the captain, who does most of the scoring. I’ve never seen it discussed anywhere, but the lieutenant’s number one job is to never make a mistake, to never err, nor floor the ball! The captain needs the greater leeway to make errors when controlling the larger campaign. This was Coach Lew Morales’ single most important piece of advice to me, and, with his permission, I pass it on here. This single-minded oath, taken on any stack of sacred texts, is the mission-statement for the lieutenant: “My one and only job is to keep the ball in play, so as to get my partner a set-up, or a replay, and so as not to leave the opponents a scoring opportunity.” If the lieutenant tries to take charge of rallies, (the job of the captain), or go for “quick” unearned points, or shoot intemperately, thinking, “Hey this is my favorite shot,” then the captain, the control-freak, will lose confidence, lose rhythm, and will now have to second-guess when and how the lieutenant might “get creative.” The lieutenant might get rewarded for taking charge of a rally temporarily, when a shot succeeds, but at the cost of the dual-confidence and smooth unconscious harmony of a perfectly synchronized TEAM. Why? Well, you have to know how dominator-captains think: “I’ve worked this rally and got it going just as I want it, as the opponents are more and more stretched out on a string. NO! Lieutenant, please don’t shoot that! I know you had an opportunity, but now I’ve got to cover your shot, and maybe restart the rally! Gad, now what do I do next time I’m building a rally-sequence?” The captain is the imagination, while the lieutenant is a tool—in the best sense of the word. The captain is the “sword” or the “artist,” while the lieutenant is the “shield” or a “brush” that paints only one stroke: keeping the ball in play for the captain. The only time this advice can be controverted occurs when the captain is building a rally-sequence to get the lieutenant a set-up on offense. And this game-plan must be discussed quietly ahead of the game or the match under contest.
As an example of how important these roles are, please allow me to refer to one of the most historically amazing master’s championship teams from Southern California: Danny Carrillo and Tom Fitzwater. I remember watching these two compete in tournaments long before I understood what comprised a successful doubles team. As I spectated, I noted that Danny executed the kill shots, the pass shots, the hops and serves/shots, and flied the ball. But Fitz did nothing fancy, no flashy “Oooh” shots, from him, it seemed to me, but I also noticed that he never floored the ball. A spectator standing next to me in the balcony, unknown to me at the time, a guy I learned later was a doubles hall-of-famer, Skip McDowell, said, ignoring Danny’s incredible fireworks during service innings, “Tom is so steady. I love it when my partners set me up.” Skip wasn’t even watching Danny that closely. I had no appreciation at that time for the apparent thanklessness of Tom’s role, whereby all he did was get the ball back, even though the opponents were likely to return his shots. Yet, these two teammates racked up innumerable championships. I recently had the good learning experience to be beaten by Tom’s steady play as he teamed with Greg Sizemore in the semis at the USHA Nationals in 2019, even though our team lacked just three points from winning the tiebreaker. Sizemore executed; Tom kept the ball in play. Well-done.
3b. If the captain needs the lieutenant to start killing or putting the ball away, because of stamina or tactical issues, then that conversation needs to take place sotto voce before games, during timeouts, between service innings and serves. Otherwise, the lieutenant must know exactly the captain’s strengths and weaknesses, and know exactly how the captain best scores, or else how the captain best gets control of a rally. A slower-footed captain needs a lieutenant who can get the ball to the ceiling and pass the ball—or hop it into and away from opponents, or to send the ball at heights and around walls to prevent the opponents from acquiring rally-control, ALL to buy the captain time to move into and control the next shot. A faster-footed captain needs a lieutenant who will tempt opponents into hitting mid-court and mid-range rally-extending shots, as Fitzwater did for the speedy Danny. And a lieutenant must protect the front corner farthest from the captain’s floor-position. What this usually means is that the lieutenant, recognizing that opponents have gotten control of a rally’s tempo, needs to move closer to the weak-side corner, and then legally-block, while off angle from a shooting opponent, or else hit a low-but-not-bottom-board shot back to the body, for a replay, to restart the rally. A replay shot might occur, for example, when the opponents hit a left-sidewall-front-wall corner kill away from the captain on the left, and the receiving lieutenant has to step toward the middle-front, to sweep the dig back into a corner and back at the lieutenant’s own body, so as to earn a replay. If the lieutenant gets creative and tries for a rekill, good opponents will surge into the front, and if the lieutenant has missed, now he/she is trapped, and vulnerable to power and hops into the body, and the dominator-captain has lost control of the rally and now will have to cover almost the entire court, while thinking lots of distracting thoughts.
- The only time these principles above might be altered occurs if an elite team like Watkins/Robles or Dan Zimet’s, for examples, really understands the differences between being on offense or defense. The lieutenant can take more chances and shoot on offense, with the captain’s agreement and say-so, but should never “get creative” on defense because the penalties of giving a free point to the offense, or of losing momentum are just too great. All your team loses is the serve with lieutenants’ errors on offense. But your team gives away possible double free momentum points if lieutenants risk low-percentage shots on defense, because they give up a point with an error, and their team still doesn’t have the serve. TGO and Naty Jr. were very disciplined in these regards. David controlled offense, and took the duty of making the rallies go just as he pleased until he earned a scoring opportunity or forced an error. He also knew when Naty had a better opportunity, and when TGO called for him, you will see Naty go only for blistering passes when his team received serve, or else take a high-percentage kill opportunity, but only when his team served. Naty Jr. may wish to correct me on these observations, but that’s the way I saw it when I spectated during those matches or watched the videos.
5a. As far as more grunt-work is concerned, lieutenants can cost matches by not knowing their captain’s strengths and weaknesses, by not knowing their captain’s best shots from certain court-domains. All of TGO’s partners, for example, recognized instantly, if their opponents left a backwall set-up, David would take it. He had the best backwall shot ever in the game of four-wall handball. Emmett Peixoto, for example, has a dominating back-wall kill, but when he played with David, he often let David have it, or David called him off, and POINT! Sideout! [Emmett may wish to remark here.] Similarly, a captain with a superior defense-of-serve might have to return serves directed to the lieutenant’s side, if the opponents start earning points over there, for example. And the team may have to move into a modified “I” position for receipt of serve. A lieutenant with a weak overhand to the ceiling will know to leave those shots to the captain. All superior right-side players and lieutenants know that a passing ball angling to the lieutenant’s right shoulder will contact the right wall, and become a set up for the left-side captain, so they never swing at these passes. Similarly, the best lefty-righty partners, with a counterintuitive lefty on the right, and righty on the left, know that a pass angling to a sidewall will be well-retrieved by the partner, who can fade back and address the pass through the deep center. Which is one reason repositioned lefty-righty teams can often dominate the front, for as the partner retrieves the deep pass, the other can comfortably stay close to the center of the service line. Meanwhile, returning to momentum, a captain’s confidence goes up, knowing which shots belong to the captain only, and the captain can strike with calm and assuredness. Perhaps most importantly, to protect the captain, lieutenants have to read if opponents’ passed balls to the walls will contact the floor between the lieutenant’s body and the sidewall, with hop on it, and maybe never contact the wall, and must have a reliable and uniform answer to any and all of those attempts that the captain can count on, to keep the ball in play, or to hit something into play that will disadvantage the opponents. One good consistent reply, off the fly, for lieutenants to loft, to prevent this classic “sliding-pass,” is a hard, head-high shot across the court, sharp into the front wall, aimed about three to five feet away from the opposite sidewall. This shot will carom back head-high off the sidewall, deep and vectoring across opponents’ faces and chests, without leaving a back wall setup. Most opponents cannot do much with this shot, (excepting for short-swing, punch-artists like Hall-of-Famer Mike Bock), and if it’s programmed, this defensive shot keeps both teams neutral in a rally.
5b. On offense, the lieutenant must read the opponents’ shots and know exactly when the captain has a scoring or side-out opportunity. Not only will lieutenants need to recognize the captain’s opportunities to shoot, so as to follow those shots in, but they will also need to leave open free avenues of shot-execution for the captain to exploit. My partners, for example, have all known when to get away from my line of sight to the right corner when I earn a set up. If I’m closer to the front wall, my lieutenant can step in closer to the front line, so as to provide a legal block if my fly or touch shots stay up too high, as I will be aiming these shots to roll back toward my lieutenant. If they roll out great, if not, replay, because the play is quick, and there’s no real time for the lieutenant to move. If I’m farther back, however, my lieutenant has to turn profile and give me a confident look into his side-corner, so I can hit my three options: a straight-in-squash to the corner, a sidewall-front-wall three-inch-high kill-attempt, or a waist-high pass up the right. If my lieutenant just parks with his back to me, then he becomes a huge wall–for me, and now I have to risk hitting him during one of my best three-way shot opportunities, or else go to a safe and defensive, but disappointing, fourth shot: as doubt creeps in, and I am tempted to think ‘unforgiveable’! (Though I would never say so in negative terms at any time: “Hey, when you get a chance, maybe turn profile on my setups, so I can see the corner, and we can win!”) Also, if my lieutenant keeps his back to the opponents on my setups, then the opponents can climb up his back during my shot, because he’s not facing them; whereas, if he is facing into the court, showing a nice profile to me over on the left, then opponents tend to yield more space.
- Doubles teams might benefit from strongly considering the “Dig-and-Bail” principle: when partners dig balls or dig kill-attempts in the front court, they must immediately bail on trying to return any next shot, (i.e., avoid trying to return any next shot), while staying vigilant. Instead, they should try to return to position if feasible, as quickly as possible, after each tough dig. The opponents will be looking to exploit the trapped, digging partner in the front—a common shot-sequence-play in top-flight doubles, and the opponents will drive merciless power and hop shots toward that off-balance player, especially if there’s a lot of open court behind that same trapped player. The trapped player’s partner ordinarily has to worry about backing up the trapped partner, but if the trapped player thinks “I have to maybe get anything blasted at me” and stays there, then now the trapped partner’s body ends up in the pathway the freer partner needs to get to, to return the opponents’ next series of likely shots. With the “dig and bail” principle, however, the trapped partner digs, with only a shot designed to buy positioning time, and then takes her/his body out of the equation, immediately, so that the free partner knows, “I have freedom and responsibility for getting any next ball into play.” With no confusion of roles, in this situation, and with no hesitation, a smart doubles team can reverse the likely outcome of a formerly disadvantaged rally. Momentum can be maintained! Hesitation, the enemy of momentum, costs points throughout doubles matches, because mental hesitation equates to temporal hesitation, resulting from a lag in demanding efficient motor-responses to evolving situations. And increasing bouts of mental hesitation add up to huge deficits in time- and reflex-control. We’re not talking about a deliberate lag or feint being used to draw in/out the opponents, but the kind of hesitation that comes from doubt about what our partners will be doing.
- Both captain and lieutenant have to know when the other is breaking down in some way, or has forgotten something, and must correct while encouraging. “Hey, we made all our points and won game two with Z-serves, but now we’re hitting serves straight in. Let’s get back to the winning serve.” “You hit well when you watch the ball into your hand. You’re looking at the corner when you shoot.” “The opponents have pushed you back, and now you’ve abandoned the restraining line to them. Maybe put your front foot down on that line as soon as the opponent hits, captain.” “Hey, I can see you’re holding your breath on shots, and scattering the ball now. Just breathe and exhale through your shots.” “You need to hydrate.” These are positive corrective comments that help cement and confirm the alliance between elite doubles partners.
8a. The commonest tactics for winning doubles competitions, of course, are also the most obvious and necessary. Exploit the perceived or scouted weaker of the two players on the other team; and avoid hitting to the stronger player. This tactic shortens matches, ramps up pressure, and wins points and sideouts the fastest. Against two strong and well-coordinated players, however, the next tactic is to freeze out one of the players. Play your two teammates against one. Send all shots and serves to the captain’s domain or to the lieutenant’s domain. Four hands can tire two hands faster than can four against four.
8b. Rarely, the perceived weaker opponent has a better serve-return on some types of serves than the perceived stronger player, so, serving to an opponent with a serve that produces a setup from that player may override the “freeze-out” principle 8a above. Good doubles teams try a variety of serves early on in a match to both sides to see what’re getting errors and setups on any given day. Varieties of serves are typically categorized by their speeds and heights: lob or overhand serves; chest- or shoulder-high serves (usually very effective, as Merv suggests, when aimed deep through the court, or to bounce near the door); and low power serves with spin. Many elite doubles teams like to go for the hard serve to the crotches of the walls and floor, with lots of sidespin, or at the wall just above the crotch, to mix it up, no matter who’s receiving on any side, because the serve is usually aimed at one of the “weak” hands, or cuts hard and fast and low between the opponents, and the serve-returns from those return spots are easier to predict. Little discussed, however, is the apparent low-power-serve, delivered actually with only 2/3 power, as the biomechanics look similar, which can be effective because opponents expect the server to be ramped up, hitting low-drive serves with adrenaline. So, taking 1/3 speed off a low-power serve, but ensuring it clears the service line with your follow-through, often leads to a run of a bunch of points and weak returns, with the opponents standing farthest back in their receiving positions.
- Now comes an exception to the rules. It’s called the “Hot-Hand” rule. I once heard a partner say to his teammate, “Either of us can hit the ball at any time.” From nearby I objected, “What if one of you gets real hot?” “Makes no difference,” came the answer; “It’s doubles!” Sorry, dude, but if LeBron is scoring, and he has converted four in a row, I don’t care how good you are; give him the flying ball until he misses. If you become a greedy-hoggy-pistol, you cost your teammate Zen-like momentum, you cost your team points, and you cost LeBron confidence and rhythm. You extend the game unnecessarily. Partnering is about getting and maintaining rhythm and getting into the Zone. If the lieutenant surges on fire, and is killing and scoring left and right, the duties must switch. Now the captain needs to do all the grunt-work to buy the lieutenant any and every setup. We’ve all seen this occur during David Chapman’s partnerings with Vince Munoz, my favorite pro of all time. When Vince crossed the reality dimension into Vince-Land, there was nothing anybody could do. (Tati was like that as well.) Vince flattened the ball with both hands from anywhere on the court. I’ve been on the receiving end of Vince-Whirlwind Performances—the VinceNado, and those were “friendly” games. TGO knew it too, and you can find the Nationals videos where David simply yields the scoring opportunities to Vince, and Vince runs away with a game or the whole match. Bingo, bingo, bingo! (The sound of points racking up.) Heck, yeah, they’re hot, let ’em shoot! What’s John Cleese’s great line from Silverado? “He’s hit everything he aimed at!” Afterward? Celebrate at the bar with, “Line up them sugarless, hydration-sports-performance beverages!”
- Another exception to the rules above is the “Prima-Server” rule: The partner-serving on offense automatically handles any serve-return from the opponents, no matter the lieutenant served or the captain did. Why? Well, during service the server has that rare, full control of the ball, and knows exactly what the ball will do as soon as it leaves the hand. “Did I miss it a bit?” “Was it perfect?” “Will it go right where I intended?” “How good was that hop?” “What can that opponent do with that serve from there while I know exactly how my serve will end up?” All this instant knowledge at point-of-contact gives servers a head-start on the very next shot over their own partners. Having this principle in place removes all doubts about who will hit next, while allowing serving teams to stay in front court. If lieutenants and captains prefer their partners field specific service-returns, make or signal or communicate that agreement before the match/game/rally in question. It’s useful to know who has the role to field the opponents’ service returns–which removes doubts and hesitations, while adding confidence, calm, and centeredness to the service routines.
11a. When all else fails. Sometimes all a team can do is keep the ball in play, until such time as good things may happen. We’ve all been there. Leave no back wall opportunities, and find the heights and speeds and walls and angles, where the opponents cannot lean down and blast the ball. This is doubles. Go to the long game, deepen your lungs and your breathing, as you are in a marathon, not a sprint, so lean back into your calm, concentrate on even breaths, and just keep gliding to your best court-coverage areas. What are some focus and thoughts that may help against a better team? “You guys are going to hit one more ball. We’re denying you all setups today. You will feel it later today or tomorrow. You may beat us, but you won’t win the next match. Who knows, your shots may collapse, and we can step in?” Our team once played against an elite, multi-championship team, in the semis, as we slowly sank toward a certain match loss. We had nothing but the burnt-earth ploy remaining, and our team did all we could to make them hit one more shot. After the match, the victors congratulated us, saying, “Excellent play. You beat us. We won in points, but we’re done.” They were good sports, and champions many times over, and we told them, “You guys were too good, and so much more experienced than we were, that’s all we had.” Indeed, they did not win the next match. And we gained some cred, some confidence, and a donation to our reputation. An evolving reputation can earn in-game points down the road.
11b. Another tip or technique to try, when your team is down and slipping, is for both teammates to focus on hitting just one type of shot, whether it be a ceiling ball, a two-wall pass, or a hop through the center, whatever type of shot that will not leave a setup or a rally-controlling shot to the opponents. Recall which shot, so far, has given the opponents the most trouble, and just hit this one shot! This singular-focus has a beneficial effect, as it can return teammates to rhythm, and to the shot-making that may have disappeared a little while ago, while also calming the mind, and reunifying the teamwork. Teammates may find a renewed core-unity from having a united, single, joint-focus that’s attainable, kind of like enjoying a mini-game within the larger competition, that cements the bond: “Hey, how many times can you and I hit that one spot on the wall/ceiling with the ball?” As a result, positive moods and feelings of confidence may return, after agreeing to such a tactical choice.
12a. The mortal risk to a doubles-team’s chances for a championship involves one kind of human pride. If one or the other or both partners think they are too good for the other, or are selfish players, or don’t understand captain-lieutenant, then the horse pulls in an opposite direction to the one needed by the carriage driver. Doubles is about service to the partnership and service to the captain. In the best relationships, duties alternate during the course of a match, and sometimes partners will have to switch sides, duties, and roles—and they will win when they accept their instant promotions or demotions, and if they know the difference between executing on offense or protecting on defense. The best way to execute on offense is to score by hitting a defensive shot. It doesn’t have to roll if it’s in the farthest corner from the opponents.
12b. (The “I’ve got to roll it hard here/flatten it” attitude is top-heavy and imbalances the shooter. It’s kind of a wrong target, mentally, so to speak, as if the game is solely about kill-shots, and not about knowing the difference in a geographical campaign-arena between offense and defense. By contrast, the thought, “I’ll direct a low-shot to that corner or a pass or ceiling to that distant corner which should earn a point about now since we served” is a centered attitude that allows teams to maintain being smoothly in the zone. With the former, you are not that ready for a return off your flattened shot, if you err even a tiny bit. With the latter, you are scoring, but still ready for the dig, so still vigilant, respecting the opponents, as you return to center. With the former, you think in only one “speed”; but with the latter, you can use any “speed” for success. Think of all the times during doubles when TGO won points with a paddle shot or soft kill to a corner. He wasn’t aiming one-inch high, going for the rollout, though his skills produced very low shots. He was going for the right (defensive-don’t-hit-the-floor) shot at the right speed at the right time farthest from the opponents’ floor positions–or hitting low back at his partner or himself with a safe execution. Even though his defensive, high-percentage, low shots, even on-serve, were much lower than the rest of ours, he rarely, if ever, was beaten by the floor. And even though he had the best back-wall kill in the game, notice that he directed most of his back-wall kills as passes or hops aimed to confuse, disbalance, or wrong-foot the opponents, especially in doubles when he recognized that there were two retrievers. If teams allow the “flat-kill-shot” risk-mentality, then they invite a third opponent into the game, the floor. Fred Lewis, Kelly Green, and many many other experts repeat, ad nauseam, “Don’t let the floor beat you.” In this way, executing on offense, but with a defensive-shot mindset, your team gains control of the opponents’ time, as well.)
12c. A superior defensive team will always beat a superior offensive team, according to the rule of top-heaviness. To go on offense means to commence an attack. To commence an attack, you move from a position of centered calm and stability, into a forward, tilted motion—at which point you become vulnerable to your own momentum, power, and instability. Really, the only time an offensive team wins occurs when a defense-minded team is not really prepared and has no actual defensive skills or wisdom. The calmly centered team, focused on playing consistent defense, knowing their duties, will remain stable, confident, and will gather momentum and win–over time.
Boak Ferris Bio
When Boak grew up overseas, Boak’s dad insisted he learn martial arts while attending boarding schools, and so Boak studied Boxing (his dad’s sport), Aikido, and a bit of Kendo over a period of twelve years. He also competed at tennis, golf, soccer, swimming, and handball between elementary school, and then in High School competed at Handball and Track. In college he took handball classes and also traveled with the track team, specializing in the hurdles and the long-jump, while keeping up with martial arts at his local dojos. After graduate school. Boak joined a professional jazz-ballet company, and toured and performed both nationally and internationally over a period of four years. After the company scaled back, Boak found and became addicted to competitive four-wall handball in 1983, and never looked back. In 1989, Boak first befriended David Chapman, without involvement in any coaching. In 1991, Boak was recruited as a faculty mentor into CSULB’s TEAMWIN project to help university athletes excel in sports and academics. Among his university clients, he coached various members of the university’s tennis, water-polo, and volleyball teams, as the university directed to him, about 16 in all, including James Cotton in basketball and Jered Weaver in baseball—both of whom enrolled in Boak’s courses. Among his topics of engagement, he included sports psychology, cognitive psychology, analytical skills, and lifestyle issues. The TEAMWIN project, though successful, lapsed as a result of a loss of funding, about 1995. Around 1991, Boak also engaged in contributing coaching tips to Steffi Graf’s team and agency, while also joining David Chapman’s team as a bona-fide coach. He traveled on and off with David’s team until about the year 2000, at which point David’s travel schedule became too hectic for Boak, who had since been promoted to Coordinator of Graduate-Required Testing and Evaluation of CSULB students. Today, he is a number-two ranked handball competitor in the USHA Veteran Golden Masters Division, and has six handball clients, ranging from 16 up to 70 years of age.