ANDY MURRAY hopes his hot yoga habit can help him handle the pressure cooker environment of his first Wimbledon semi-final.
By Stewart Fisher
ANDY MURRAY hopes his hot yoga habit can help him handle the pressure cooker environment of his first Wimbledon semi-final.
The Scot takes on No.6 seed Andy Roddick today with a place in Sunday's men's singles final awaiting the winner.
Temperatures have been soaring all fortnight at SW19, but Murray believes the hours he spent in Florida this winter practising a relaxation tech-nique in a specially heated conditions can help him cope on Centre Court.
"It is basically similar to yoga, but in a hot room," Murray explained. "It is something like 45 degrees in there. Just mentally it does help getting used to being in those conditions.
"I normally just do it in December when I am training," he added, "because it is good when you're training hard and doing a lot of weights and stuff and it is easy to stiffen up.
"In there you do a lot of stretching and whatnot just to loosen off the muscles.
"I don't do it that much throughout the year because you get dehydrated being in a hot room like that.
"I haven't done it for about six months but I am sure it has helped in some way."
Murray has been hot stuff so far at this Wimbledon but faces a stern examination against the 26-year-old American, who came through an epic quarter- final against Lleyton Hewitt on Wednesday night.
Like Murray's previous opponent Juan Carlos Ferrero, Roddick is a former world No.1 and Grand Slam champion, although the Scot's confidence will be boosted by his 6-2 record in head-to-head clashes against the American.
Their only previous meeting at SW19, back in 2006, ended in a straight sets win to the Scot.
The big-serving Roddick, however, produced 43 aces against Hewitt, and the Scot knows the outcome is likely to be decided by very few points.
"He has beaten me a couple of times, in Cincinnati and in Memphis," Murray said.
"I have played well against him but the thing about playing him is that he is tough.
"It can come down to a few points and how you play them that determines how the match will go. He is a very tough guy to beat, especially on this surface because of his serve.
"If he serves great, he can go into tie-breaks and a little bit of luck here and there can change the match," he added.
"But if I play well and serve well, I know I have a chance of winning and that is what I will be focusing on.
"You could say a lot of it will come down to how I serve and he returns but then also a lot of it will come down to how I serve and he returns, because I don't want him to give any opportunities to get ahead in the sets and go a break up. That is when he plays his best tennis, when he is ahead and he can really go for his serve.
"Likewise he is going to have to return well to break me because I have been serving well."
Murray is the first British man to make it into the last four at Wimbledon since Tim Henman lost to Goran Ivanisevic back in 2002. But he is far from satisfied yet.
"For me it is not about what Tim did," Murray said. "I am trying to do something I have never done before. Obviously making the semis is very good but now I am going to try and go one step further.
"Making the final of a Grand Slam, whether it is Wimbledon or any of the other ones, is a great achievement. But I have got to focus on the next match.
"The one semi-final of Tim's which I saw bits of was when he played Ivanisevic because it was spread over quite a few days, but I was travelling on the day that the majority of the match was played.
"I obviously knew what was going on but I didn't see that much of it."
Almost 12 million viewers did see Murray's last 16 victory over Stanislas Wawrinka on Monday night, and Britain will unite again this afternoon as the Scot attempts to become the first British male to reach a singles final since Bunny Austin in 1938.
