Noah Rubin’s “Behind The Racquet” • With • Alize Lim | Tennis 10sBalls

 

Editor’s note: 10sBalls thanks Noah Rubin for giving us permission to repost these great stories. We wish him and this endeavor the best of luck. Great seeing Noah wearing K-Swiss and playing Solinco Strings.

 

“I started playing professionally in the summer 2010, after finishing university and turning 20. I didn’t have any family member pushing me or traveling with me, this was my own choice because I loved tennis so much. I finally had more time to train and travel and went up pretty fast to around 280 WTA. I thought ‘great this is going to go fast’. Two years later I was still in the exact same spot. I was traveling alone every week, struggling to improve as I had no one to watch my matches and tell me what to work on. The academy I trained at was charging 1500€ for one week of coach salary on tour, meaning 6k a month, plus expenses. There was no way I would ask my parents to pay that. My boyfriend at the time was top 30 ATP and told me those words I will never forget, ‘Alize, no one can make it alone, and if I’d been alone, I would still be playing National tournaments by now.’ He fought for me and found a sponsor so I could finally travel with the coach he thought was best for me. I was so happy and felt a big difference straightaway, broke the top 200 in just a few weeks, and finished the season around 150 WTA six months later, with only about ten weeks on tour with that coach. I decided to hire him full time when the new season in 2013 started, paying for a monthly salary. I thought this will go even faster now, but everything started going downhill. He had never traveled full time, was missing his family a lot, was clearly miserable on the tour and we had a really bad relationship off the court. I was feeling terrible and my results started getting worse. We split when I reached my highest ranking of 135 and got my first Wild Card for Roland Garros and had to play against Serena Williams on center court alone. It was my first main draw slam and I had no one in my box to look at. The two people I were confiding in at that time were the director of my academy, and my fitness coach, who were also helping Serena. I was literally looking at my opponent’s box during that match. We lost the sponsor, but luckily I started making more money so I could invest some into coaching. The academy found me another coach to try right after and I was super excited about it…” -Alizé Lim

 

****

 

You can follow Alize Lim on the links below:

Facebook | Alize Lim

Twitter | @AlizeLim

Instagram | @alizelim

You can check out more Behind The Racquet stories on the link below:

Facebook | Behind The Racquet

Twitter | @BehindTRacquet

Instagram | @behindtheracquet