Austin Tennis Academy News

January 15, 2007

Life Lessons from Tennis: Making the Most of Your Opportunities

This weekend was a challenging one for our players as the weather wrecked a number of tournaments.

Part of being a competitive athlete is putting yourself into as many opportunities as you can to make a jump in performance. One part of that is preparing for competitions as well as you can. Our players spent the last week (when we could get on court) playing 2-2 sets with no ad scoring, in anticipation that the weekend's competition would be delayed by weather. When they were not on court, our players were preparing at practice by doing fitness or preparing mentally for the competition. This off court preparation is often as important or more important than the on court work we do.

Another part of making a jump in performance is putting yourself in position to take advantage of an opportunity. That is one reason why myself and 3 coaches traveled to Waco Friday evening, hoping our players would get the chance to play on Saturday. They did not, nor did they get to play on Sunday. But we were ready for the opportunity.

Two other ATA players really were great examples of putting yourself in position to take advantage of opportunity. At 5pm on Friday evening Claire Cahill got a call from the Houston Excellence tournament (top 12 get a spot in the main draw, another 16 players get into the qualifying draw for the remaining 4 main draw spots). This is an extremely high level and important superchamp tournament. Claire immediately organized, with her mom Deb, the trip down to Houston Friday evening. She did not get on the court (indoors-2-2 no-ad scoring) until late in the day on Saturday. She lost 6-7, 5-7 to the #3 seed, but played with courage and showed herself that she can definitely compete at that level. She went out of her way to take advantage of that competitive opportunity. Este Kaufmann also took advantage of an opportunity this weekend. He was scheduled to play in an Open tournament in Amarillo. Given the weather this weekend, you can imagine the chance he took going. He went. The tournament was weather delayed, but played (with short sets 2-2 no-ad) on three covered courts. The tournament took a while to finish only playing on three courts. But at the conclusion of the tournament, Este came away as Boys 14s winner. This will improve his ranking, give him a better chance of staying in superchamp 16s when he ages up in a few months, but most importantly will give him confidence in his abilities and positive energy knowing he did everything he could to take advantage of that opportunity. Thank-yous go to Deb Cahill and Pete Kaufmann, parents going above and beyond the call of duty, to help their child get these competitive opportunities.

Two of the character traits that champions show are commitment and determination. I am very proud of Claire Cahill and Este Kaufmann, and the rest of the ATA players who prepared well last week and who gave themselves the opportunity to compete this weekend. Not all got the chance, but all were ready, willing and able. The commitment and determination of giving yourself an opportunity is a great life lesson for our students.

What I have found in my many years of coaching high level tennis athletes is that you do not know when or where a breakthrough will occur. Tennis is a hard sport, only one person in each draw comes home a winner. You have to put yourself in many situations to get the situation that works for you and helps you to the next level. It could happen at a major zone, an open tournament, at a national tournament or even in a team tennis match. It could happen in a lesson, at practice, at an early morning workout or in conversation in the car ride to a tournament...we don't know when or where a breakthrough will happen. But, by giving our students as many of these sorts of opportunities as possible, we give each player a chance to breakthrough.

Coach Newman

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