Madrid and beyond

Well I popped over to Madrid on 15th May - it was Andy’s 22nd birthday and he was due to play Juan Martin Del Potro in the quarter-final at around 10pm. So I made a hasty booking and took Granny with me. This was the third successive year I’ve taken my mum over for Andy’s birthday and he has lost each time. So she’s clearly a jinx and I’m not taking her again!!

The Madrid tourney was a strange one as it was a new venue - the Caja Magica (Magic Box). As we arrived late in the evening, the floodlights were on at this massive stadium which could best be described as a tin box. The stands around the centre court were so high that it really felt like an indoor event rather than outdoor!

There had been a few problems with logistics and the courts during the week as you might expect with a brand new tourney, which hosted a womens Tour event at the same time. Not enough practice courts and a lot of bad bounces - which you probably saw that on the tv.

The venue had just been officially opened on May 8th and Lenny Kravitz had performed on the centre court. Andy’s match didn’t go on until about 10.30pm, which makes it a really long day for the players. Needless to say, the player lounge and restaurant were pretty much deserted and much of the crowd disappeared after Nadal had polished off Verdasco.
 
We had a bit of a problem with our seats for some reason. We were given 2 tickets and when we tried to find the seats, they were way up high and behind a glass screen which made it really difficult to see. Granny doesn’t like heights, so I had to ask a steward if it was possible to move us a bit closer to the court. There weren’t enough seats in the player box for all of us but there were loads of empty boxes courtside.

We were relocated to one of the boxes which was a bit like an aluminium cage. And although it was one of those seats where you are constantly moving your head to follow the ball, it was much better than being so far away!
 
Spent the morning in Madrid, had a Spanish lunch in a little restaurant on the Plaza Mayor. Did you see that film Vantage Point where the US president gets assassinated in Madrid? Well it was in the Plaza Mayor, so I was checking for snipers while we ate!
 
The other week I was in Saltcoats on the Ayrshire coast. This is one of the highest unemployment and low income areas in Scotland.

They have four poor quality (bumpy and dangerous) shale courts in a public park and a small local group of tennis enthusiasts are trying to raise funds to resurface them to all weather. There’s no pavilion and the nearest loos are in the local library but there’s about 200 locals all playing regularly.

They have been given £50k from the Irvine Bay Regeneration Group and need another £30k to be able to get the work done. It’s a council run facility, and although the Council are supportive of the venture, they don’t have funds to assist. The group have approached Sport Scotland but have hit a bit of a wall because they don’t want to become a club. They want the courts to remain open, accessible and free to the local people because of the financial situation in the area.

So, I put them in touch with the Tennis Foundation and they are trying to get some support from them as the Tennis Foundation is the charitable arm of the LTA and supports tennis in parks and schools.

Meanwhile I thought I would try and raise awareness of what they were trying to do by going down there and doing a morning with the local kids on Bank Holiday Monday! Well the sun shone, the kids came out in force and so did the ladies who form the tennis committee!

The Glasgow Herald came down to cover the story and I spoke to them about the importance of kids having somewhere local to play. There's a massive interest in tennis in Scotland just now but we are struggling to capitalise on it because of lack of facilities - local, accessible and affordable courts plus indoor courts. We are still struggling with only 29 indoor courts available to the public across the entire country. Anyway fingers crossed someone can help them!

Two days later I was hosting a ladies tennis clinic with posh pink afternoon tea at Newlands Tennis Club in Glasgow to raise funds for Breast Cancer Care. The event was sponsored by Highland Spring who work with me, Jamie and Andy and are just fabulous on the marketing and public relations side. Needless to say it rained so we abandoned the seven outdoor courts and transferred indoors. Just thirty-four ladies on four courts with seven coaches. Ha ha. Quick re-plan and off we went. Brilliant fun!

We overran as always and were late for the posh pink lunch! Waiting upstairs for us was Libby MacArthur (actress from Scottish soap River City - which I am a huge fan of). She had lost her mum to cancer twenty-five years ago, and one of her sisters had had a scare too so she was happy to help us promote the event. We ran a silent auction and a raffle then did a wee Q & A where I shared a few ‘Tales from the Tour’ and Libby talked about some of the characters on River City. We raised about £4.2k - so it was a great day.

I’ve also been down to the NTC for the Talent ID day for the kids born in 2000. Pleased to report that there were several very promising kids in this year of birth. We put twenty-six players through a series of physical and tennis tests plus a little bit of match play and the scores were entered in to an on court laptop.

We will watch the kids in match play over the summer and allocate competitive scores against tactical awareness, fighting spirit and positioning before a final average score is allocated. That score will form the basis of the funding allocated for the following season.

It needs a lot of manpower to make these days function and there were probably as many coaches as kids there. It’s good for all of the field team to get an overview of the level across the country and to start to get to know the next batch of young players!
 
Then off to Queenswood to watch the 9 & under and 10 & under invitational events. What a beautiful venue that is for tennis and the sun shone for the 2 days I was there. The beginning of the week saw players, coaches and parents being shunted to Gosling (indoor centre) to complete matches.

The 9 & under event was played on the artificial grass courts so that the orange lines would stay in place - well they did, most of the time. It was fab to watch these little tinies competing and there are definitely more kids playing with good technique and control of the ball than there might have been in the past.

I would have preferred that the matches lasted a bit longer though. One champions tie break in the round robin groups was a bit short for my liking and some of the kids were finished before they even got into the match. A computer had done the draw for the 9 & under and the 10 & under event - which might explain why players from the same regions ended up in the same groups or playing each other in the first round. Human input would have picked this up and ensured that the kids got jumbled up. You live and learn, and next years event will be better for sure.
 
ESPN have been in Dunblane this week doing a feature on Andy and his impact on the town. Don’t think their film crew had ever experienced a village club before. "Quaint" I think one of them said.

They were gobsmacked when I told them virtually all of the clubs in Scotland are three or four court, artificial grass clubs, in residential areas with no room to expand. That’s one of the reasons that tennis is still predominantly a summer sport up here and why it ranks only 17th in terms of participation and popularity!

They have been talking to lots of the locals including Miss Scotland, Katherine Brown who is from Dunblane and a former classmate of Andy’s at High School. She was a very good county level tennis player and now coaches quite a bit, or she did until she won this beauty queen title.  She is off to Miss World in November, but not before she helps me with a kid’s session in the playground at Dunblane Primary on 19th June.

They are having a Health Week at the school that week and as it’s the Friday before Wimbledon we though we would go in and set up tennis in the playground for primary three and four. We will be advocating playing outdoors, drinking water and the benefits of exercise! I’ll take the barrier tape, the playground chalk and the chat and she can take her tiara! Can’t wait.