Watch the video introduction of the MIT study of Oscar Wegner's Method of Modern Tennis

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May, 2009

Oscar and Tennis History, by John Carpenter, continued ...

... adopt the Davis Cup “home and away” rule for the American Zone. This rule change which Oscar argued successfully is credited with helping spread tennis in Latin America. Yet he was not done. In 1968, Oscar Wegner retired from the tour and started coaching as an assistant to Pancho Segura at the Beverly Hills Tennis Club. He came up with the idea to teach tennis to everyone applying the same basics common to all top pros.

From carefully extrapolating those basics from the best players of all time, he found that tennis was an easy sport to learn He called his system Modern Tennis Methodology. Today, everyone in the pros and top junior tennis play per the tenets in accordance with Oscar’s principles. His first book Tennis in 2 Hours ended up in Russia in Dec 1989 and marveled Russian Coaches who quickly adopted this book’s principles for their player development. November 2004, the USPTA announced the application of those same principles for a five year phase out of conventional tennis teaching.

I have personally witnessed at the Tennis Teacher Conference in 2005, PTR Founder Dennis Van der Meer congratulating Oscar on his developments and telling him he used Oscar’s stuff with all my players. He also praised Oscar’s videos as “great stuff.” Furthermore, Oscar’s materials made an impact in Asia when Chan Schrichaphan bought Oscar’s videos to coach his young son. Even Richard Williams told Oscar he used to tape all of Oscar’s appearances on the New Tennis Magazine show and used them to coach his daughter. On a personal note, the Galex Tennis Academy in St. Petersburg, Russia emailed me wrote me asking if I had more of Oscar’s materials as they confided they translated all of Oscar’s materials into Russian. I have even seen a copy of his book translated into Vietnamese,

From Bud Collins: In his 1991 visit to Russia for the Kremlin Cup, Bud was astounded to discover Oscar’s Tennis in 2 Hours book in Russian coaches’ hands and asking him for more copies. Bud, skeptical of the title, challenged Oscar to prove his claims. Bud was astounded by his family’s immediate on court results and agreed to write the foreword to Oscar’s 1992 book including, and I quote: “I think you’ll find it worthwhile to dump the past the past and join Oscar in your tennis future. In listening to him I’ve unlearned a few things myself that I’ve long considered gospel.”

Oscar worked for ESPN international from 1994 through 1999 as a Spanish tennis commentator for Davis Cup, Grand Slam, and ATP tournaments. Oscar’s famous Play Like the Pros Tips were broadcast daily over two years during all major sports and seen by hundreds of millions of viewers in close to 170 countries. These revolutionary tips played over and over changed the view of tennis as a difficult sport to learn across the globe. ESPN domestic refused to air them as they were deemed too unorthodox. Today, Oscar is very popular overseas, including Eastern Europe.

Latest acceptance in the USA includes Turbo Tennis’ Ron Waite, who praised him as the “forerunner to the modern game,” noted coach Bill Mountford, who acknowledged Oscar for being “light years ahead of most teaching professionals in the industry”, Tennis Warrior’s Tom Venenziano, copying Oscar in his Myth section and noted player/coach Kelly Jones of the LMS Institute. Tennisone.com, the largest tennis internet subscription site in the world, wrote in May 2006 “a lot has been written about the modern forehand with its natural movements, open stance, windshield-wiper swing, and most importantly, tracking the ball and waiting before taking the racquet back. Much of this has been pioneered by Oscar Wegner, who has been teaching this method since 1968. Back then, this was very controversial, however, history has proved him right.”

Oscar Wegner is the founder of Modern Tennis Methodology, Author, Coach, USPTA Professional 1