interesting story about McEnroe and his tennis academy

[Amy in AZ.]

I find these stories curious, about the prodigies that leave home at age 12, to go live at an academy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/08/sports/tennis/08mcenroe.html?_r=1&smid=tw-nytimes&seid=auto

 

[amanda_cake]

Do they have academies like that for softball, I wonder?

 

[FPMark]

What I found interesting was them saying she was too young at 12 to focus on just tennis. She plays hockey and the piano at school.

 

[starsnuffer]

Do they have academies like that for softball, I wonder?

I suspect that this phenomena happens sometime after women achieve multi-million dollar salaries and endorsements playing professional softball.

-W

 

[PEPPERS]

A book called The Talent Code was mentioned by I think it was Straightleg, I checked into the book and it is a writer who visits a number of facilities that routinely turns out a number of talented people in different sports, musicians and singers. He gives his opinion on how and why these places seem to be able to accomplish this when others are not, he advised it is not the shiny new facilities that turn out the talent, but the small run down facilities that are the successful ones and what he calls deep practice.

A link below and you can Google and find more on the book. There is a few chapters on line, I've orderd the book and have not recieved it yet, but it looks like an interesting book.

Nightline: The Talent Factories « The Talent Code

 

[Amy in AZ.]

I searched for boarding schools that offered softball and there are 100s. I know nothing about the boarding school/ day school life though, as most are on the East coast. Reading about them, though, I found the statement that boarding schools offer some of the best facilities available.

Peppers, thanks. I ordered the book. I have a 14 month old granddaughter that was carrying a ball with her, everywhere, yesterday.
Of course, the day before it was a monkey - but hey, I can dream.

 

[HollowMan]

An interesting take on the tennis boarding school is offered up in Andre Agassi's autobiography "Open". At age 13 he started attending the Bollettieri Tennis Academy. The kids attended school only a few hours a day, and played tennis starting after lunch. Andre was also allowed to drop out of school completely in 9th grade. That all works fine when you actually become a rich pro tennis player someday - not sure how well it turns out for the kids who never quite make it.

P.S. He also states that he hates tennis, and always has from the time his psycho dad started making him practice every day for hour after hour after hour...

 

[obbay]

I have a 14 month old granddaughter that was carrying a ball with her, everywhere, yesterday.

how did her grip look? was she keeping her wrist loose?

 

[Amy in AZ.]

I believe that you would hear a similar story from Greg Louganis.

Also, think of Jennifer Capriati. She is another former tennis star that was destined to crash.

 

[3'sDad]

they have the same academies for budding male & female golfers, mainly in Florida. As DD is not the next coming of Jenny Finch, Lisa F, Katie Cochran, etc, she will be working on her homework after she returns home from school ball practice at 4:30 this afternoon.