Azaa Regmi is gearing up to participate in the upcoming International Tennis Federation (ITF) Asia U-12 Team Tennis Championships being held in Kazakhstan in November. She got selected for the tournament after competing in the South Asian Regional Qualifiers in late April this year. While the 12-year-old is preparing for this tournament, her equally skilled 16-year-old sister, Alsha, unfortunately has to take a hiatus from international games because she is starting her first year of A Levels and wants to focus on completing her high school before she moves onto playing at bigger tennis tournaments.
It was their mother who first introduced Alsha and Azaa to tennis. Almost a decade ago, when she was out for her morning walk, their mother came across a bunch of people playing tennis at their local sports club. She was so intrigued by the sport that she insisted her elder daughter – who was just six years old at the time – accompany her the next day during her walk and try playing it. Alsha was just as intrigued with the sport and her initial fascination with lawn tennis has not waned since then.
“Taking up lawn tennis when we reached six years of age almost turned into a tradition in our family. About three years later, Azaa also started playing tennis. Apparently, she had always liked the sport but just assumed she was too young to physically play it,” says Alsha on how her younger sibling got into tennis. The sisters visited the tennis court on a regular basis because they loved the sport so much but, after some time, they realized that they had to move on to better courts if they wanted to advance their skill.
A step forward, but not enough
“They called it a clay court and it was exactly that. International standard ‘clay courts’ are actually built from crushed shale, stone, brick, or other unbound mineral aggregates but this court just uses clay as its base and it’s very unsteady and lumpy. We now practice at tennis courts at Satdobato and Mandikatar,” reveals Azaa who has been regularly training two times a day for the past few weeks. Her days are very hectic trying to manage this intense training sessions and school work at the same time but she is not complaining because all the hard work she is putting into her training sessions have been helping her climb up the ITF rankings.
Although professionally playing a sport that is as physically demanding as tennis requires a lot of hard work and dedication, Alsha says that tennis is 60% dependent on physical fitness and 40% on tactics. Neither Alsha nor Azaa visit the gym. Instead, they perform a number of fitness trainings, stretching, and concentrated warm ups and running at the court.
Also, because they have been participating in tournaments and competitions for so long, neither Alsha nor Azaa feel very nervous before a match. “Our parents always encouraged us to part take in competitions and that has boosted our confidence regarding tennis tournaments,” says Alsha. Both her and Azaa voice out that they are very grateful about the support they receive from their family, friends, coaches and even school teachers. “I can’t always give my 100% at studies because of my trainings but everyone at school has been very understanding about it,” claims Azaa.
Alsha and Azaa both mention that they hope more Nepalis get into playing tennis. “There aren’t many people who play professional tennis in Nepal. So the players who get selected to represent the country at international games aren’t that good. They might rank high in Nepal but they never get a chance to play against very talented players before these international games and this messes up their form. I think if there were to be a little more competition, players could polish their skills so much more. And that can happen only if more people take up the sport,” concludes Azaa.
