The Daily Bagel is your dose of the interesting reporting, writing and quipping from around the Internet.

• Much like Mardy Fish, I do not speak French. But I’m fairly certain that in the video above, Albano Olivetti, who beat Fish on Thursday, says his serve has been clocked at 254 kmh, which converts to 158 mph. Ivo Karlovic holds the record for the fastest serve at 156 mph.

• Caroline Wozniacki and Rory McIlroy have a bet going that requires them to give up their favorite snacks. What’s the reward? ”Let’s just put it this way,” Wozniacki said. ”I wouldn’t do it for a pair of sunglasses.” Let your imaginations run wild, folks.

• Jelena Jankovic believes that the constant travel due to Fed Cup is contributing to the number of injuries and withdrawals early this season. “Sometimes we wish we didn’t have to fly from one part of the world to another, going from hot to cold,” Jankovic said. “It’s not easy and you are at risk to get injured.” Got this on your iPod, JJ?

• Lleyton Hewitt is out of competition for four months because of foot surgery, but a campaign has already begun to get Hewitt a wild card into the London Olympics. That would be an interesting decision for the ITF.

• Ana Ivanovic feels middle-aged now that the younger generation is making its presence known. ”I think they’re playing great,” the 24-year-old Ivanovic said. “It’s a great challenge for us, for players that have been around for a while. They’re pushing us to improve and get better.”

• Variety summarizes the Tennis Channel/Comcast dispute. “We didn’t wake up and force Comcast to put Tennis Channel on the air,” CEO of Tennis Channel Ken Solomon said. “They elected to do so on their own volition. What they have to do, once they make that determination, they have to give us fair treatment once they get similar situated networks.”

• Non-tennis: David Foster Wallace would have been 50 years old this week. Here’s an uncut, 84-minute interview with him from 2003.

• See or read something that you enjoyed and want to share? Feel free to email or tweet us links to pieces from around the Internet that may have slipped past our radar.

• Roger Federer and dubstep? I never thought I’d see the day.

• The Economist looks at the Olympics and how tennis can carve its own niche: “For Mr [Rafael] Nadal and his closest rivals, the Olympics is now much preferred to the Davis Cup as an opportunity to represent one’s country. Unlike the Davis Cup, it does not sprawl across the season, intruding on other competitions and wearing players down. For spectators, it is an occasional treat, not a never-ending saga. Its knockout format mirrors that of the slams (although uses best-of-three-sets matches, rather than best-of-fives, until the final) and is much more accessible to the general public. … This year, the famous venue is a further boon. No other sport set to feature at London 2012 will take place on such hallowed turf (organisers have built new facilities for most of them). That is bound to raise the profile of the event, and the relaxation of some traditions, allowing players to compete in national colours instead of Wimbledon whites, will be an additional attraction. Interest in Olympic tennis has never matched that in Wimbledon itself. But this year it is likely to come a lot closer.”

• Serena Williams joins her sister and confirms for the Family Circle Cup in Charleston, S.C., in early April. We’ll see if that actually pans out.

• Former British No. 1 and Davis Cup captain John Lloyd probably isn’t on Andy Murray’s Christmas card list and I’m not sure these comments to TCPalm.com’s Ray McNulty will do anything to change that. While Lloyd says that Murray is handling the pressure better than he did when he was the British No. 1, he also believes that it’s easier these days because players can have entourages to manage off-court demands and distractions. He also doesn’t buy into the idea that the caliber of today’s players makes it more difficult for Murray to win a Grand Slam. ”That’s all a bit exaggerated,” he said.

• John Isner is the talk of the town at the moment and it looks like he’s embraced his status as a late bloomer. “Isner isn’t shocked by his recent success, though,” USA Today‘s Stephanie Kuzydym writes. “From girls to growth spurts, he said, he’s always been a late bloomer. ‘To this day, I only shave once a week,’ Isner said.”

• I admit, I was skeptical when I heard that the Dubai tournament gave Israeli Shahar Peer a wild card. But it sounds like the past controversy is all water under the bridge.

• I’m very disappointed in myself for not making The Royal Tenenbaums connection. I promise to be better.

• Non-tennis: A modernization of Abbott and Costello’s famous “Who’s on First?” routine.

The Daily Bagel is your dose of the interesting reporting, writing and quipping from around the Internet.

• Check out Romanian Alexandra Dulgheru, who upset Petra Kvitova at the U.S. Open last year, dance to Billie Jean at the Monterrey Open player party. The woman has moves, folks. Unfortunately, she may have burned too much energy dancing. The fourth seed lost in the first round on Tuesday.

• Here’s a fashion Q&A with Maria Sharapova. “I think once I won Wimbledon at age 17, many people started to notice my tennis and I did get some attention for my physical appearance,” Sharapova said. “All I can say is that I want to be remembered as a great tennis champion, nothing else.”

• Victoria Azarenka continues to get asked about grunting, and she keeps coming up with “creative” ways of answering the question. Last week she compared it to snoring and said players who complain about her grunting are “weak people.” All right then.

• Richard Evans raises a good point in this piece for Fox Sports: Why should Davis Cup award rankings points only for World Group wins, leaving those players confined in the lower tiers unrewarded for their efforts?

• Did you know former Baltimore Ravens coach Brian Billick is a big tennis fan? I didn’t. On this week’s SI Tennis Podcast, Jon Wertheim talks to Billick about why he loves tennis and how he views the mental side of the sport. It’s worth a listen. You can also subscribe to the podcast here.

• Errol Flynn almost played doubles at the U.S. Open.

• It’s old but new to me: John Isner posing in W magazine in 2010.

• Non-tennis: Everyone’s favorite rebel chef du jour, Momofuku’s David Chang, lists his 10 essential things.

See or read something that you enjoyed and want to share? Feel free to email or tweet us links to pieces from around the Internet that may have slipped past our radar.

The Daily Bagel is your dose of the interesting reporting, writing and quipping from around the Internet.

• Enjoy some highlights from Roger Federer’s 6-1, 6-4 win over Juan Martin del Potro in Sunday’s Rotterdam final.

• The withdrawals continue in Dubai. Petra Kvitova, Vera Zvonareva and Li Na already pulled out, and Dominika Cibulkova on Tuesday retired with a hamstring injury and Maria Kirilenko withdrew from doubles. It’s way too early in a jam-packed season for this many withdrawals to affect these draws.

• SI.com’s Bruce Jenkins evaluates the Americans’ performances at last week’s SAP Open. Of 19-year-old Ryan Harrison, Jenkins writes: “He’s developed his own penetrating serve, a looming threat for anyone he plays. His groundstrokes are solid, as well as his all-court movement. As Davis Cup captain Jim Courier noted during Harrison’s stint with the team in Switzerland, he just needs some time.”

• WTA Backspin takes an in-depth look at Victoria Azarenka’s surge. “Since the end of the ’11 season, there has been much talk of Petra Kvitova being ‘The One,’ the player of her generation,” Todd Spiker writes. “It’s an open title that has been floating around aimlessly without any serious takers since the Serena Slam settled the previous argument a decade ago. The money is still on Kvitova being that player, but… maybe it’s Vika.”

• I missed this earlier, but Kimiko Date-Krumm was a great blogger while she was at the Pattaya Open in Thailand. She even writes in the third person. “The present Kimiko is stronger than before,” she writes in response to a question about her current form. “In 1996 I had a young body and bigger muscles, but I was not so strong mentally. Now I have more experience and more mental strength. So I guess the answer is yes, I can beat the 1996 Kimiko, but only for a short time, it won’t be always!”

• Non-tennis: Olympus is no longer the sponsor of the U.S. Open Series (having been replaced by Emirates Airlines). This read about its recent accounting scandal sheds some light on the unique nature of  Japanese business culture.

See or read something that you enjoyed and want to share? Feel free to email or tweet us links to pieces from around the Internet that may have slipped past our radar.

The Daily Bagel is your dose of the interesting reporting, writing and quipping from around the Internet.

• Have you ever wanted to hear Milos Raonic quote a very famous (and relevant) quote from Seinfeld? Well you can thank Canadian sports network TSN. Now if only they had him saying “Another SAP Open title for Milos!”

• The tantrums are annoying and his recent trend toward baseline bashing is unfortunate, but you can’t knock Ryan Harrison’s approach to the game. He wants to beat you because he’s better than you, not because he gamed the system. “My dad never taught me to take bathroom breaks like you see other coaches trying to tell people to do that to try and disrupt rhythm,” Harrison said last week in San Jose. “I always have had the approach that my game is better than yours and I don’t need to disrupt yours because I’m going to do what I can do and that’s going to be good enough.” If only more players, from juniors to the pros, subscribed to the Harrison school of thought.

• Is Sam Querrey going to start winning ugly? Tennis.com reports he’s hired Brad Gilbert to serve as a part-time coach. Gilbert is still committed to his role as a commentator for ESPN.

• The last time there were four Germans in the Top 20 of the WTA rankings, Andrea Petkovic was 10 months old, Angelique Kerber was 6 months old, and Julia Goerges and Sabine Lisicki weren’t born yet. That changes on Monday, when Angelique Kerber made her Top 20 debut.

• Petra Kvitova is planning to play mixed doubles with Radek Stepanek at the Olympics.

• Jelena Jankovic suffered a muscle tear during Fed Cup. But she’s still in the draw in Dubai so it’s unclear how serious it is.

• Non-tennis: This great longform piece published in GQ, about the Zanesville Zoo escape, has one of the best titles I’ve seen: “18 Tigers, 17 Lions, 8 Bears, 3 Cougars, 2 Wolves, 1 Baboon, 1 Macaque, and 1 Man Dead in Ohio.” It’s well worth your time.

See or read something that you enjoyed and want to share? Feel free to email or tweet us links to pieces from around the Internet that may have slipped past our radar.

• Nicolas Almagro is trying to sell his custom-built house in Murcia, Spain. Unfortunately for Almagro, the real-estate market is the last place you want to be in Spain right now. So he’s taken to the Internet in hopes that this video goes viral.

• Nice piece from Grantland using the Williams sisters to talk about how Asian-Americans feel watching Jeremy Lin. “In black Atlanta, we wanted people to celebrate the Williams sisters for their talent, sure,” writes Rembert Browne. “But we also didn’t want anyone to ever forget that these were two black girls doing it big in the predominantly white sport of tennis.”

• Andre Agassi and his longtime trainer, Gil Reyes, have launched BILT, a series of workout machines. The website is a fun scroll. It’s all hardcore jock talk until the end when it answers “Why BILT?” with “Skinny Jeans.”

• Want to know how Milos Raonic’s knee injury went from ruling him out of a live Davis Cup rubber to confidently defending his SAP Open title less than a week later? Dr. Spaceman ain’t got nothing on the Vancouver doctor who misdiagnosed Raonic’s injury.

• The letter from Mike and Bob Bryan’s father, Wayne, to the USTA has spawned an intense but professional and illuminating debate about the role of the national governing body in the development of young American talent. Now USTA general manager of player development Patrick McEnroe has weighed in. “Mr. Bryan wants the USTA out of the player development business, out of the coaching business and out of the rule-making business,” McEnroe writes in a statement. “OK, he’s entitled to his opinion. But if the governing body of the sport isn’t making the rules, then who will? Doesn’t someone have to take the lead? Doesn’t someone have to organize and promote the sport?”

• A very humorous (a dead-on) take on the “What I really do” Internet meme, starring tennis fans.

• Non-tennis: Nine minutes of memorable line readings by one of the greatest (if not the greatest) actors of our generation: Nicolas Cage.

See or read something that you enjoyed and want to share? Feel free to email or tweet us links to pieces from around the Internet that may have slipped past our radar.

• Ladies Love Cool Jocks. That’s what LL Cool J meant, right? Watch Gael Monfils, Grigor Dimitrov and Ryan Harrison entertain some female fans at a luncheon sponsored by the SAP Open.

• Say it with me: The Emirates U.S. Open Series. Emirates Airlines has entered into a seven-year, $90 million deal for naming rights of the summer U.S. Open Series. It’ll replace Olympus Corp. as the main title sponsor.

• Chris Evert says it’s up to the players to stop grunters by notifying the umpire that the noise is a hindrance. “I had a habit where, if my first serve went in, I would drop the second ball back along the ground and Billie Jean King said if I did it again, she’d stop play because it was rolling in her line of sight,” Evert said. “I did it, she stopped play and complained and that started the ball tucked in the pants. Someone’s got to put the heat on.”

• The tennis world, at least the American tennis world, is still buzzing over the events of last weekend. Here are Peter Bodo’s thoughts on why Davis Cup matters: “In Davis Cup, the journeyman gets a rare opportunity to be someone other than his usual self, the guy who loses in the second or third round at a tournament to a high seed — or some guy ranked No. 56 in the world. He gets the chance to step into the spotlight and he’s given three or four hours to show his stuff, all that stuff that can be so maddeningly difficult to pull up week-after-week, round-by-round in tournament play. Do it twice, and you’re a national hero. Do it twice at a tournament and then lose to Benjamin Becker and who cares?”

• Novak Djokovic’s image was used as propaganda in a referendum vote in northern Kosovo.

• A fond farewell to the two-man team behind Tennis Served Fresh, an influential blog that kept the sport light and fun. Best of luck to Nicholas McCarvel and Erwin C. Ong.

• Non-tennis: Former Rutgers student Dharun Ravi on trial for invasion of privacy in New Jersey. This New Yorker piece on the events that led to his indictment and trial is worth a read. It’s a complex case.

• Behind-the-scenes video of the Sports Illustrated photo shoot for Rafael Nadal and Bar Refaeli. Is it just me or did Rafa look stressed out? You would be too if you suddenly realized that your girlfriend was going to see these pictures.

• Great new feature at Tennis.com: Steve Tignor tries to figure out the complex psychology of a tennis fan by interviewing supporters of specific players to see what makes them tick. This week: Rafael Nadal.

• Christopher Clarey on John Isner’s coming of age, so to speak. “[U.S. Davis Cup captain Jim] Courier, who has called Isner ‘probably the most disruptive force in the men’s game,’ has long been convinced that he needs to impose himself more with consistent aggression,” Clarey writes. “Mission accomplished in Fribourg, but in an 11-month season, there are so many more missions to come. ‘The way I played today,’ Isner said Friday as he stood on the red clay, ‘is the way I need to play in all of my matches.’”

• How tough is it being a tennis mom? Ask Judy Murray, Andy’s mother. Support your kid too much and you’re “overbearing,” but take a step back when your child needs your support and you’re failing your duties. “‘I was watching the press conference in the players’ lounge [after Murray lost to Roger Federer in the 2010 Australian Open final] and I could see in his face that he was devastated,” Judy told the Daily Mail. “I will never forget him looking at me and saying, ‘I’m so sorry, mum’. I pushed him away and said, ‘Andy, don’t ever tell me you are sorry. Have you any idea how great that is for me, watching you on one of the best courts in the world, playing against the best player of all time? Your time will come, never forget that.’” Moms gotta be moms, folks.

• What happens when you rank players according to their average results at majors and the WTA Championships? You get results that are fairly consistent with how many people rank these players in their heads.

• This is great news: Alisa Kleybanova has finished chemotherapy and resumed her off-court training.

• Non-tennis: If you missed it Tuesday night, or if you’re confused or curious about all this “Linsanity” business, check out what the Harvard grad and Knicks guard did against the Toronto Raptors.

The Daily Bagel is your dose of the interesting reporting, writing and quipping from around the Internet.

• The ladies of the WTA describe their perfect date. Raise your hand if you miss Andrea Petkovic.

• Tennis gets a shout-out in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue: Rafael Nadal and Bar Refaeli. Smolder on, Rafa.

• France is looking to host the Americans outdoors in the Davis Cup quarterfinals in April.

• What’s it like to travel the world with the tennis tour? On The Go Tennis’ Q&A with WTA videographer Robin Fenlon offers some great insight. “Life on the road is hard,” says Fenlon. “I think it’s easy to forget that when you come home every day.  The most important thing I’ve learned being on tour is how tough a lack of routine can be. The pressure of having the basics of eating and drinking so up in the air, and then having to perform on the tennis court, has given me a huge amount of respect for the players.” Still, sounds like a good gig.

• Do Petra Kvitova and Tomas Berdych come as a two-for-one deal? Both are sponsored by Nike and now they’ve both landed sponsorships with BMW. Time to trade in that Skoda, Petra.

• Petr Korda, who won the 1998 Australian Open, is keeping the champion genes going. His daughter Jessica just won the Australian Open golf title, scissor kick included.

• Non-tennis: Nerve.com lists the 50 greatest love songs of all time. So Happy Valentine’s Day, I guess.

The Daily Bagel is your dose of the interesting reporting, writing and quipping from around the Internet.

• In case you missed it, some highlights from John Isner’s victory against Roger Federer in Davis Cup.

• Matt Cronin examines the U.S. Davis Cup team’s best road wins.

• The New York Times profiles Roscoe Tanner’s attempt to get his life back on track after financial troubles led to prison time. “I know I let everyone down,” he said. “I didn’t represent the sport the way I should have. Getting into the trouble that I’ve been in, and the things that I’ve done, haven’t represented the sport well. I’m not proud of myself for that.”

• Martina Navratilova is high on Victoria Azarenka and Petra Kvitova, but wonders about Maria Sharapova’s ability to keep up. “I don’t know if she can be fit to compete with those two because they’re stronger physically,” Navratilova said.

• Jelena Jankovic’s purse was stolen from a Paris boutique last week. “You know what they say, a women’s bag is like a woman’s soul,” her mother, Snezana, said. People say that?

• Non-tennis: If you read one long-form piece this week, make it this one.