UP WITH A GREAT

QThis event is a bit full circle for you after growing up in FNQ. How did you end up here?

AI grew up in Aloomba, just south of Gordonvale, and played tennis at a young age and slowly gravitated towards Cairns before getting coaching here and from there I moved down to Brisbane and started playing at this level or a bit below and came back and won the FNQ Open Men’s Singles Championships (right) and that’s probably one of the highlights of my tennis life, to be able to win my home tournament and then to still come back here and see my name on the honour board next to Roy Emerson, which for me is pretty special, being on the honour board with one of the legends of the game. Obviously when I get up here I get to see some family and friends and Mum and Dad still live up here and I enjoy coming back.

QWho were the main influences on your tennis career coming through the grades?

AMy coaches were big for me. May Wilkinson and Tom Horn were my two childhood coaches who I guess saw something in me and believed in me and got me going. I’ll never forget my first tennis lesson with May on the Esplanade. She just stood there handing me tennis balls for two hours, teaching me to serve. I’ll be forever grateful to her. If she didn’t take the time to put into me to do that, I don’t go to Brisbane and play tennis and through that avenue get a connection to Tennis Queensland and get the job I’m doing now and up here running this event. Tennis is such a wonderful sport – little things like that seem to shape the way your career goes. I stuck with tennis and it’s great and it’s a sport I’ll be forever involved in.