Noah Rubin’s “Behind The Racquet” • With • Shawn Hatosy | 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.

🎾🎾🎾

#CelebrityBTR– “I am a huge fan and I’m confused why this sport doesn’t feel like it’s growing. I look at things like, even just doubles, and how limited the coverage is. I personally, when I found out Serena and Andy Murray were playing mixed doubles, to me, that’s like the Super Bowl. You couldn’t even find it on TV. You had to get ESPN plus. To me that just blew me away. I was introduced to tennis pretty young because one of my neighbors had put a court in his backyard. I was an athlete. I played soccer and basketball. I’m a fast guy who was able to get by on no fundamental base at first. In Charleston there are a lot of public tennis facilities that anybody can play on. It’s a big tennis town. I was there for a year before I walked into this tennis center and took a lesson. I’m 43 now and I’ve been playing tennis three or four times a week ever since that day, I just caught the bug. I started intros and started doing some clinics. I just improved rather quickly. I don’t think I sought out tennis but it did become this meditative activity for me. When I’m playing I’m not really thinking about anything other than tennis, it’s a great release. I look at it as a very positive thing in my life. There are so many philosophies in tennis. Just trying to be childlike out there is one I resonate with. When you play a match it’s your opponents job to make you feel uncomfortable or to find your weakness, and give you balls that are going to take you out of your comfort zone. What I really enjoy about tennis is that your natural instinct is to tighten up and want to muscle it over, which are all things that are counter to what makes a good tennis player. You have to find a way to be relaxed and as childlike as possible. I gave up alcohol about 12 years ago and needed to find something to put my energy towards. My therapist once recommended that I should take up hitting something in a safe environment and that’s where tennis just fit in perfectly. It’s a part of me now.” @shawnyhats

🎾🎾🎾

You can follow Shawn Hatosy on the links below:

Facebook | Shawn Hatosy

Twitter | @ShawnHatosy

Instagram | @shawnyhats

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

Facebook | Behind The Racquet

Twitter | @BehindTRacquet

Instagram | @behindtheracquet