Parentingaces - The Junior Tennis And College Tennis Podcast

Welcome to Season 14, Episode 1, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This is just a quick episode to kick off the year!In case you're looking for them, our previous 13 seasons are available on our website at https://parentingaces.com/podcasts/. You can also do a search there for specific guests or topics.We still have a few spots available for our upcoming trip to Spain! More info at https://parentingaces.com/articles/join-us-for-10-days-in-spain/. You don't want to miss this incredible opportunity!If you’re so inclined, please share this – and all our episodes! – with your fellow tennis players, parents, and coaches. You can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or via your favorite podcast app. Please be sure to check out our logo’d merch as well as our a la carte personal consultations in our online shop.CREDITSIntro & Outro Music: Morgan Stone aka STØNEAudio & Video Editing: Lisa Stone Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoic

Welcome to Season 13 Episode 44 of the ParentingAces Podcast - our final episode of the Season! - a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, Lisa talks with Doctor of Physical Therapy and Strength & Conditioning Coach, Kait Ireland, about why a physical therapist should be part of a junior athlete's team.Kait is a soccer player turned strength & conditioning coach turned physical therapist. She has several degrees including both a Masters degree in Kinesiology (studying exercise & sports conditioning) & a Doctorate in Physical Therapy. She's worked for many years as a strength & conditioning coach and completed internships at notable facilities like EXOS in Arizona and Cressey Sports Performance in Massachusetts where she worked with athletes from most sports and levels including the NFL, MBA, and NHL.Like many entrepreneurs, Kait went into physical therapy after feeling frustrated by the quality of care her strength & conditioning athletes were receiving from tra

Welcome to Season 13 Episode 43 of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, Lisa talks with former touring pro and current WTA coach of Marta Kostyuk, Sandra Zaniewska. Be sure to check out the video version of this episode for a peek at Marta's 6-month-old Maltipoo puppy named Mandar!Sandra, a professional tennis coach born in Warsaw, Poland and based in Southern France, shared her journey into coaching and her coaching philosophy, emphasizing the importance of understanding and nurturing the growth of junior tennis players. She also discussed the challenges and importance of guiding parents through the journey of raising a junior tennis player, and the need for collaboration and sharing experiences among coaches. Sandra started playing tennis at age 10 and became a professional player, reaching a singles high ranking of 142. After retiring at 26, she began coaching and found it to be a fulfilling experience. Sandra credits her success to her willingness to

Welcome to Season 13 Episode 42 of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, Lisa talks with former touring pro and current coach, Thomas Drouet.Thomas started playing tennis at a young age when his grandfather introduced him to the sport at age 3. He was naturally drawn to the game and would spend hours hitting against a wall. At age 12, he entered the National Sports Center in France, where the top junior players trained together. At 18, Thomas transitioned from junior to professional tennis, playing for Monaco and later becoming a coach. His coaching philosophy developed as he worked with young players in Monaco, focusing on technique and tactics. He aimed to push the kids beyond their limits, despite their comfortable lifestyle.Lisa and Thomas discussed the recent announcement by the ITF allowing coaching for junior events and the potential impact on the sport. Thomas expressed his support for the decision, highlighting the importance of coaching in tennis

Welcome to Season 13 Episode 41 of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, Colette Lewis of ZooTennis joins me to discuss upcoming changes to junior tennis at both the ITF and USTA levels.This episode was born out of an email I received from a member of the ParentingAces community asking about the potential trickle-down effect of a recent ITF announcement that coaching will be allowed at ITF Junior tournaments beginning in 2025. Who better to discuss this topic than Colette who attends several ITF Junior events throughout the year in addition to the Junior Grand Slams. She spends a good amount of her time at those events talking with coaches, federation insiders, and others about the state of junior tennis and what may be coming down the pike.Colette and I discuss the potential impact of allowing coaching at junior tournaments as well as today's announcement from the USTA that it will be using electronic line calling (ELC) at the upcoming National Indoor tou

Welcome to Season 13 Episode 40 of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, two guests join Lisa to discuss the value and importance of journaling matches.Those of you who have been following the pod for a while are familiar with coach JY Aubone. As he mentioned in our last episode together, he has created a hard-copy journal for junior players that incorporates a range of questions, tips, and suggestions to help players reflect on and record thoughts about their matches.Mike Rogers is a life-long tennis player who has recently decided to train for and play Senior Tournaments. As part of his preparation, he realized the value of keeping notes on each match and each opponent which he was doing via an Excel spreadsheet. It occurred to Mike, though, that it would be much easier to have an app on his phone where he could record his thoughts immediately following a match, so he brought in developers to create Match Recall.The Match Recall app will launch November

Welcome to Season 13 Episode 39 of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, Lisa chats with John O'Sullivan and Jerry Lynch, authors of the newly-released book, THE CHAMPION SPORTS PARENT.Jerry Lynch and John O’Sullivan are leadership, performance, and team culture specialists. Their work has received global acclaim in youth, high school, collegiate, and professional athletics. They are highly sought after by teams, schools, and sport governing bodies around the world for their work in athletic performance, coach education, and parent engagement. Jerry and John cohost the Way of Champions Podcast, as well as the Way of Champions Transformational Leadership Events, and both are national advisory board members of the Positive Coaching Alliance. Their first book together, The Champion Teammate: Timeless Lessons to Connect, Compete and Lead in Sports and Life received international acclaim and is used by high-performing teams and athletes on the youth, high schoo

Welcome to Season 13 Episode 38 of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, we take an inside look at Intennse, a new team format that was recently showcased as a junior event in the Atlanta area. Lisa chats with two of the players, Sadira Ouyang and Connor Mowrey, as well as their parents about their experience.NOTE: To watch/listen to our earlier podcast with Intennse founders, go to https://parentingaces.com/podcasts/its-time-for-time-tennis-ft-charles-allen-yannick-yoshizawa/Intennse is a new way to compete in our sport. Per the Atlanta event website, 18 participants (9 boys and 9 girls) were selected by WTN to compete in this event. Participants were divided into 3 teams of 3 boys and 3 girls; each team had a professional coach who was present on court during play. There were round robins in the categories of Boys' singles, Girls' singles and Mixed Doubles. Each team played each other once in each category and accumulated points. The winning team receive

Welcome to Season 13 of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, we address the topic that seems to be discussed over and over among junior tennis parents and coaches: CHEATING.What if we shifted our mindset around what is commonly called Cheating? What if we recognized it for what it is in the majority of cases: a mistake? That's the crux of this week's episode.As a top junior and professional coach, JY recognizes that bad line calls are part and parcel of the game, at all levels of the game from juniors to college to pro. As he took a deeper look into it, he came to realize that it's not the bad line call itself that is the problem but rather the player's response to it that can change the outcome of a match.In this episode, and in a new blog post on his website, JY outlines specific tools junior players can use to keep their focus even when they think a line call error has been made. He and I also discuss how parents can do a better job of choosing languag

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 36, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, Lisa chats with the mom behind Raising Happy Champs, a UK-based enterprise to help parents in all youth sports as they navigate through the obstacles of their children's chosen passion.Jen Harris was sitting at her daughter's gymnastics meet when another parent asked her for advice with her own child. After chatting with the parent, Jen realized that with her psychology training and degree, she might be able to offer something to other sports parents that wasn't available in the UK. She decided to go back to school to pursue a Master's degree in sport and exercise psychology. For her final dissertation she developed and tested an approach to sports parenting she calls the Super-P approach. Jen is now pursuing a PhD so she can further refine and test Super-P. Says Jen, "It is very important to me that my support program was designed using sport psychology research."What will you gain

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 34, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, Ben Shapiro of Atlas Tennis shares their inaugural European tennis trip and plans for the 2024-25 school year.Atlas Tennis creates youth tennis camp experiences for teenagers to travel, compete, and grow both on and off the court. Its trips are designed to maximize player and personal development through travel and different tennis environments.The team behind Atlas Tennis includes not only Ben as the Director, but also former top ATP pro Eric Butorac, president of TopNotch Management Sam Duvall, former WTA pro Megan Moulton-Levy, and Andrew Chmura of Grand Slam Tennis Tours. Among them, they have decades of experience developing young tennis players, managing player travel and other needs, and competing themselves on the world stage.We have published a first-hand account of one junior player's experience on our website at https://parentingaces.com/articles/my-experience-with-atlas-

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 33, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, we dive into a new way to play our sport that is time-limited, team-based, and provides a guaranteed income with benefits for players at the pro level.Time Tennis seeks to rethink the game to make it more fan-friendly, more player-friendly, and more tv-friendly. This is how it works . . .Players are drafted onto co-ed teams where they can compete in singles, doubles, and mixed doubles. Each match is 30 minutes of play, with a two-minute half-time show for entertainment and fan engagement. Coaches are allowed on court and may make one player substitution per half. The scoring is simple point accumulation: 1, 2, 3, 4, ... making it easier for casual fans to understand; clean winners are worth 2 points. At the end of 30 minutes, whoever leads is the winner, with a sudden death point played in the case of a tie.At the professional level, players are paid an annual salary with full benef

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 32, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, tennis parent and entrepreneur, Anirban Dutta, shares his journey through junior tennis with his twins, Maya and Jai, and the creation of Tennis Wizard.This episode all started with a Facebook post (see below) Anirban made in one of our groups about his recent experience at Junior Wimbledon as Maya competed there. As he and Lisa spoke, he was able to share details about the differences in his two kids' pathways, which are both leading them successfully to play college tennis.Anirban Dutta has been a tennis player, coach, administrator, and entrepreneur. As a player, he played DI and DII college tennis and represented India in Junior Team events.As a coach, he was a junior development coach at Midtown Tennis Club in Chicago, Canyon Creek Country Club in Dallas and The Sports Club at Four Seasons, Irving. He was also DI men’s assistant tennis coach at Chicago State University. Recentl

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 31, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, we are joined by coach Marcelo Ferreira, former Men's Tennis Coach at Texas Tech and Pepperdine and High Performance Manager at the Windy Hill Athletic Club in Atlanta, GA.Marcelo recently returned from a European Adventure with several of his players and their families where the kids trained, watched some incredible professional tennis, and had the opportunity to interact with some of the pros. As you will hear, Marcelo had several goals for this trip, not the least of which was to show his players how their peers are training and competing in other countries and to appreciate the setting in which they are privileged to train.Growing up in Brazil, Marcelo was brought up with a lot of discipline when it came to his own tennis training and development. His hope is to instill that same work ethic in the juniors he works with at Windy Hill.If you are a junior coach interested in taking

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 30, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. In this Bonus Episode, incoming ITA CEO, Dave Mullins, walks us through last week's House Settlement regarding NCAA Division I Tennis and how it could impact recruiting across all divisions of college tennis.Dave will be stepping in as the ITA CEO on January 1, 2025, but he has been involved in college tennis as a player, coach, and on the governance side for decades now. He has appeared on this podcast numerous times over the years and has always been forthcoming with us about what's happening in the college tennis landscape.Please watch/listen to this episode if you have a child entering their recruiting years or already in the midst of it all. As Dave notes, these changes won't go into effect until the 2025-26 academic year, and we could see many tweaks between now and then. He has promised to come back on the pod as this storyline progresses.If you have further questions, you can reach Dav

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 29, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, we dive into the high cost of junior tennis and what one Tennis Parent did to ensure her family could support their kids throughout their junior tennis journey.As the mom of a tennis player, Erinn Murray struggled to find courts and coaching that her family could afford. In her pursuit, she discovered she wasn’t the only one and far more than just her children could benefit from her efforts to bring tennis to her Texas community.Since 2006, she has been in the pursuit of affordable, accessible tennis for anyone who wants to play. She has learned how to speak at a council meeting, written more grants than she could have ever imagined and has created a facility in her community that will hopefully live in perpetuity. The 6-court facility is set and ready for 4 more courts and even 2 pickleball courts.Erinn and her staff work with hundreds of kids annually. From the littles who are jus

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 28, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, Coach Joey Blake shares how parents and junior coaches can best use match charting throughout the junior development journey.Joey Blake is a former world-ranked professional tennis player and was one of the best junior tennis players in the 1980’s. Blake was raised in Las Vegas, NV. Blake was a U.S. Open Junior Doubles Champion as well as a finalist in singles. He attended the University of Arkansas on a full tennis scholarship, where he became the first freshmen since John McEnroe to win the prestigious NCAA National Indoor singles title and went on to be ranked as high as #1 in the United States in the NCAA Division 1 national rankings in 1986. Blake was an NCAA All-American. Blake turned professional after one of the greatest seasons of any freshman in NCAA tennis history Blake went on to play the professional men’s tennis tour. Life changing tennis related injuries saw the talen

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 27, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, we learn about a new product to enhance on- and off-court training with a portable and wearable apparatus.WearBands is an innovative tool to make your workouts more effective while avoiding over-stressing growing bones and connective tissue. The WearBands system is designed to increase the results of any workout or activity via the proven training benefits of time under tension and neuromuscular stimulation. WearBands come in four sock sizes, three lower-body band sizes, and 3 upper-body band sizes, which together accommodate almost anyone of any shoe size, height, and fitness level. The website has a sizing tool that will help you figure out what is correct for your player or yourself.Unlike all other resistance bands, WearBands allows unrestricted movement under variable resistance. Typical resistance bands are either tied to a stationary object, held by another person, or held in

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 26, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, Lisa chats with former top junior player and collegiate All-American and current tennis-specific nutritionist, Erika Villalobos.Erika Villalobos has transitioned from the courts to become a board-certified nutritionist with a master's in nutrition, specializing in the dietary needs of tennis players. Currently, she collaborates with elite junior and professional players, leveraging her comprehensive understanding of sports nutrition to enhance their performance. In this episode, Erika shares specific tips and guidelines for growing junior tennis players to maximize their performance through better food and hydration choices. She discusses how and what to eat on training days as well as at the various points throughout a tournament week or weekend.Her invaluable contributions on CoachLife cover essential topics like optimal pre-training and tournament nutrition, strategies for hydrat

Welcome to Season 13, Episode 25, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, coach Todd Widom is back to help all of us better understand what is meant by the term "High Performance" when it comes to junior tennis."High Performance" is something that gets thrown around much too casually in the junior tennis world. Coaches of varying degrees of experience and expertise will call their training environment "high performance" when, in reality, they are showing no signs of understanding or implementing "high performance" methods. Similarly, junior players and their parents will claim to be "high performance" when, in reality, their day-to-day commitment to tennis lacks the focus and intensity to deserve that moniker.So, what is "high performance" when it comes to junior tennis development? Give this week's podcast a watch/listen and find out!To contact Todd or to get information on his training, you can reach him at todd@twtennis.com. If you aren’t already, be s