During Tennis Match, Jim Courier Is All A Twitter

Ever wondered what tennis pros are thinking during changeovers as they're burying their head in a towel, gobbling a banana or simply staring blankly into space?

Former world No. 1 Jim Courier will give fans a peek Saturday when he becomes the first tennis player to twitter during a match -- in this case, an exhibition against longtime rival John McEnroe.

Courier, 38, only recently started fiddling with Twitter -- the social networking Web site that allows celebrities and commoners alike to share their deepest thoughts and daily banalities with anyone who cares.

With a following of 611, Courier hardly claims the cult status of Hollywood's most ardently followed Twitter-holic, Ashton Kutcher, whose audience tops 1.5 million.

But who knows? Particularly after Saturday, when Courier takes fans with him onto the court against McEnroe, who, at 50, has lost neither his blistering serve nor his combustible temperament.

"I'm going to be pretty candid about what just happened -- whatever strategy changes I'm thinking about, if I got a bad call, whether he's getting into my head," said Courier, who plans to start posting at http://www.twitter.com/jimcourier from the locker room before the match, which starts at 7 p.m., and continue posting during changeovers.

He figures that each 60-second changeover should give him plenty of time to towel off, chug some water and type a quick thought on his BlackBerry.

Then he'll answer questions posted by readers after the doubles match that follows, pitting him and Anna Kournikova against McEnroe and Tracy Austin.

Retired from the pro tour, Courier competes on the Outback Series for players 30 and older. He started posting tweets this spring from such glamorous tour stops as Rio de Janeiro and the Cayman Islands.

By rule, a tweet is a message -- whether fully fleshed out or a partial thought -- of no more than 140 characters.

Some of Courier's early posts have reported match results.

"Had 4+2 win in a 25 mph windstorm. Grind-a-rama!" Courier wrote after a 6-4, 6-2 victory over Jimmy Arias.

Others have offered snapshots of life on the senior tour: "Had a good run/lift this a.m. to shake off the effects of beer pong."

He also posts a weekly trivia question -- such as "Who was first male player to popularize the polyester string most players use on the tour these days?" -- and awards the tweeter with the first correct answer a pair of tickets to a Champions Tour match of their choosing.

[Answer: Brazil's Gustavo Kuerten.]

Twittering, of course, isn't allowed on the pro tour. Not only would it flout the sport's code of decorum, it could be used as a conduit for surreptitious coaching -- which is banned in the men's game and allowed on a limited basis in the women's game and Davis Cup and Fed Cup play.

But there's nothing to bar it during an exhibition like Saturday's "Legendary Night" at Turning Stone Resort in Verona, N.Y.

"So why not give people something a little bit different?" Courier asks. "It can be a very effective tool to communicate with people. And it has a very good cost-benefit ratio because it doesn't cost anything."