← Sidebar



By Scoop Malinowski

Next in our new series “Heart of a Champion” is a nice story about Ivan Lendl from my good friend and hitting partner Brian Baxter…

“Growing up in New York as a junior tennis player, I identified with John McEnroe. I loved his fire, attacking style and his cool Mac Attack Nike shoes. Dunlop was my first racket sponsor and I even trained with Tony Palafox for two years. His battles with Ivan Lendl wwere always good vs evil for me. However as I got older, I had the opportunity to run the ballboy program at the Hamlet in Commack. What an experience to be around the greats, McEnroe, Lendl, Connors, Edberg, Forget, Noah, Kafelnikov, Gomez, Sampras etc. To watch them practice and play matches was heaven for a junior then college tennis player like myself.”

“I always remember Lendl and Andres Gomez saying ‘thank you’ whenever I brought them a towel and just talking to the ball boys. I ended up getting a full tennis scholarship, played no. 1 and in my junior year winning ‘Athlete of the Year.’ After graduation, I knew I needed to chase my dreams and take my shot on the Satellite (now Futures circuit). However, it costs money and we were a middle class family. I was lucky enough in my senior year to have Nancy Gill McShea write an article about me in Tennis USTA magazine, supplement to TENNIS magazine. My dad sent out the article and a tennis resume to many prominent people in the tri-state area. One of the few who really went out of there way to try and help was Ivan Lendl. We know for a fact that he sent my stuff to his agent and a few others to try and help and that really showed me what a class act he truly was! Sorry New York but after that day I became a Lendl fan forever. Yup, nothing but Adidas for me after that.”

Heart of a Champion · Ivan Lendl

<< Biofile: Yoshihito Nishioka Interview

The Longest Name In Tennis History >>