New York, concrete jungle where dreams are made of, thanks Alicia Keys… but the songs are true, the energy in this city is remarkable, and if you can imagine what it’s like when you throw the worlds top Tennis players, and many of the worlds top coaches all within a few square blocks of each other in the middle of Manhatten, it’s an experience like no other.
Arriving at the Marriot East Side and meeting up with fellow coaches and mentors from the previous year, already gets the energy going… bumping into sponsors setting up their booths and realizing that you’re having a mini reunion from 2008 $10ks in Portugal is highly entertaining, thanks to Nicola Slater with the Tennis Locker App and Emily Fraser with Cross Court Threads .
Over the course of the next couple of days, many thoughts, ideas and concepts were discussed and explored, (see schedule below) but the underlying theme was of course, leading positive change in women’s tennis.
The WTCA, ably led by Sarah Stone, has created a phenomenal network of people all striving to make positive changes in our sport by empowering and supporting each other. TOGETHER as a team we can lead more young girls to our sport and more young ladies into the world of coaching or supporting roles in Tennis.
My turn to motivate an inspire some people… Thanks AJ Cotter for the photo.
The energy at this conference was phenomenal, I came away motivated and inspired to keep working hard towards our goals within the sport, goals to help each individual as best we can, and goals to build and grow the community.
Enjoy the gallery of pics below... rolling around Manhattan and bumping into people I used to see in junior tournaments in England, people I used to compete with in College Tennis, and also on the Pro Tour was an amazing experience, and hopefully now using our collective knowledge to make a change in our sport is something I look forward to for hopefully, many years to come.
