Travels with a Tennis Racquet

After 34 years as a touring professional tennis coach, Robert Davis has visited a LOT of tennis clubs!

One of the best parts of touring as a coach on the pro tour is all the venues around the world where you get to play. On the tour, there are the titans of tennis stadiums that wow you; like the Foro Italico in Rome, Centre Court at Wimbledon, or the indoor Kungliga Tennis Hall at the Royal Tennis Club of Stockholm that smells of old birch wood and Baltic Sea herring.

At the highest levels of professional tennis, there are large facilities with unlimited courts and maze-filled hallways decorated with glossy player photos mounted on cold cement walls. These mega-facilities are filled with industry booths, food kiosks, kid zones, and corporate cocktail lounges. Yes, tennis needs these venues as they help to grow the game.

Though there can be capacity crowds, something is often missing among the many tennis fans. That missing element, a sense of communal hospitality, is easily found in lesser-known cities at smaller clubs where members and staff volunteer once a year when the pros come to town.

On the European ATP Challenger Tour, tournaments are played at clubs that have a lot fewer courts, locker rooms with faulty showers, and a pro shop that often doubles as a daycare center during a ladies' clinic. The members gather around the clubhouse deck to celebrate birthdays and raise a glass to the dearly departed alike. It is here, in these small-town and village tennis clubs, where social tennis is so loved that tennis introduces everyone.

The summer tennis circuit takes us to places like Heilbron, Germany. I suppose any nation that has been blessed with the likes of Boris Becker and Steffi Graf knows quality tennis when they see it. The tournament site is a local club tucked into a little hamlet along the outskirts of Heilbronn proper. One look around and you can see that this is good earth. The red clay courts are heavy and hard-packed, and if you look up from center court to the surrounding green hills you see nothing but row after row of vineyards. Down the hill from the club is a walking trail that cuts through a thick forest and leads to a little biergarten. It sure is hard to go wrong in a place like this.

Then there are the Challenger events in France. The French call the life of a professional tennis player, ‘la belle vie’, the good life. The Club Villa Primrose in Bordeaux, France first opened one hundred and twenty-two years ago, and is the oldest tennis club in France. The gathering spot of the club is the large outdoor deck overlooking Court One. Members and guests are here milling around iron tables and wine casks stacked with plates of charcuterie, pate, fois gras and baskets of crusted bread. Here in France, the men like to wear fancy scarves that they wrap, twist, or tie around their necks while the women smoke skinny little cigarettes and discuss the latest in politics. Everyone seems to be sporting sunglasses and sipping glasses of champagne or Kir Royale. No wonder many tennis experts feel that in France how you look is often just as important as the result.

The Club Villa Primrose feels like part home and part tennis museum. Oak hardwood floors with buckled planks and a staircase that creaks when you walk up to what may have been a gym a century ago. The walls are adorned with hundreds of photographs of French tennis legends and cabinets are full of dusty old trophies. One gets the feeling that everyone who can play tennis, no matter their age or ability, is honored here at the Club Villa Primrose.

One of my favorite tennis places is the Club International de Football in Lisbon, Portugal. The CIF is a family membership-driven multisport club where good food and fellowship reign. The clubhouse is surrounded by tall majestic pines, centurion cork oaks, and a prosperous garden behind the caretaker’s house. The stadium court is sunk below the restaurant and on windy days the players swear they can smell what is cooking in the kitchen.

Coming to Portugal from France is quite amusing when observing the local customs. In France, the men say hello by kissing each other on the cheeks. Here in Portugal, the men say hello with a shout and a slap on the back. In France, they call the cooking ‘haute cuisine’, which seems to mean that it looks pretty, comes in small portions, and will cost a man more than he cares to pay. Not so in Portugal. Here you get a platter of salted cod and fried potatoes, a bowl of grilled squid swimming in olive oil, a plate of spinach, and a wad of baked bread that is rough around the edges. But the best part is the table wine, vinho douro, as the locals call it. A type of farmer’s red wine that comes with the meal whether you want it or not and is free of charge.

The best place to find a coach at the end of the day is at the bar. He might be having a coffee or a beer, but one thing is for sure he will be talking about his player. The subject of coach-player communication after a loss is a sensitive one. Some players like to get hit with one big blast of analytics. Others want the truth sugar coated and in small doses. Coaches and players tend to view losses through two lenses; a microscope or a telescope. One coach once told me that a mirror might be the better choice.

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