Paws for thought
Dabrowski misses home, and her cats
Gabriela Dabrowski professes much love for her hometown.
Ottawa is not conducive to yearround outdoor preparation for world-class tennis, though, so the 26-year-old has made Tampa, Fla., her training base and home away from home.
Saddlebrook resort coaches are supportive, plus she knows the fitness trainers well. People she stays with when the Women’s Tennis Association Tour schedule doesn’t have her flying around the world are tennis-loving friends.
“I do miss home. I don’t get to see my parents too often and just be in the house I grew up in. I miss our cats,” says Dabrowski, who visited Ottawa before Canadian Fed Cup team play in Montreal in late April, but likely won’t return to Canada until July or August. “Sometimes there are definitely moments on the road where you’re just like, ‘Oh, I wish I could be home and relax and do my own thing,’ but that’s just part of the sacrifice. Right?”
The tour’s perpetual motion also complicates scheduling of a ceremony to name outdoor courts in Russell Boyd Park after Dabrowski.
The tribute was first suggested after she and Rohan Bopanna of India won the French Open mixed doubles title last June, and arguments in its favour gained additional support when she and Mate Pavic of Croatia won Australian Open mixed doubles in January.
However, the City of Ottawa public-consultation process for naming civic assets, plans to resurface the outdoor courts this summer and Dabrowski’s travel schedule mean the next windows of opportunity for the naming ceremony only open before or after the Rogers Cup (Aug. 3-12) in Montreal and the U.S. Open (Aug. 27- Sept. 11) in New York.
Presumably she’ll also spend quality time at home with parents Yurek and Wanda and their three cats. Based on these gushing descriptions, she might miss the pets as much as she misses her father and mother.
Heidi: Faded Calico, Heidi was to provide company for Wanda Dabrowski, who worked full-time while Yurek accompanied their teen daughter on the junior tennis circuit. “She’s a beautiful kitty. A little bit shy, but she’s sweet.”
Charlie: Part Maine Coon, he’s an orange fluffball. “We got him a few years in, thinking that Heidi would want a playmate, which was not the case. Actually, we were very wrong about that. … But Charlie’s a supercool cat.
Yeti: An “accidental” arrival, he was the lone male in a litter of five born on the back deck after a feral cat mated with a neighbour’s pet. The Dabrowskis took in the newborns, ensured they were safe and healthy and found homes for the females. However, the male had polydactyl paws, “so they look kind of like mittens. My dad, he didn’t want anybody to make fun of them, so he was like, ‘We’re going to keep this one because he’s different.’ ”