COLLEGE ESSAY!!! TENNIS CHYEAHH

Tennis is life

The rhythmic swing of the racket defines me. Fluid motions cut swiftly through empty space. These actions combine to reach the clear definite goal of hitting a perfect ball. I am an intricate balance of power and finesse.

When I was younger, team sports was a focus of my father. Whether I was playing soccer or basketball he would say, “Understanding your team and others is the key to victory”. He’d run me around the field just day after day. He’d shout advice franticly at official games but all this training for my athletic life really led me nowhere. In the struggle to understand my team, I still didn’t understand myself. Was it odd that I knew others’ actions, motions, and thoughts, yet not my own?

My tenth birthday was my worst birthday. I had moved. Having just arrived in Boston days before, I already had plans with my cousins to be taught in the game of tennis. It was a simple task: hit the ball and get that ball to the other side of the court. Playing this game became second nature to me. It didn’t bother me that I didn’t understand how to hit the ball, I just did it.

I was interested in how to get the ball over the net as quickly and efficiently as possible. The first type of hit I learned was topspin. My spirit merged with that spin, the soaring height the ball would reach and the consistency achieved. The repetition of the swing from low to high became a habit that constantly remained successful. This habit of repetition turned into technique, and this technique is what makes me successful.

As time passed, I found countless hits toward me were surprising and difficult to return back to the striker. To counter this problem, the natural return I used was apparently called slice. The slice was mainly used for fast hits that you weren’t ready for or occasionally handled with brute strength alone. The slice slowed the pace. I’m not always ready for everything that comes, so once in a while, I have to slow it down.

I soon came to realize tennis was more than just a swing and hit. Swinging the netted racket relentlessly and smashing the ball left and right was not the goal of tennis. Learning how to control yourself and learning your own playing style was a step in advancing to a higher stage in performance. Adapting to different situations was key. An adaptation with a will to experiment swings and hits created a player, created a man. Was learning how to control myself first on my agenda, not at all, but overtime precision, control, and practice was focused on and adapted on the tennis court and high school life.