Report by: Sandeep Juneja,16 Oct :Gary O’Brien, Director Coaching, Chandigarh Lawn Tennis Association, Sector 10, Chandigarh. You will find this young enthusiast in his tees, goggles and tennis shoes on the synthetic court of CLTA. He has been giving his best shots to this association since past one-and-a-half year and given a lot to the academy. A Bachelor of Arts graduate from Jadavpur University, Calcutta. He had been associated with the game since past 14 years of his life. At the age of 38, he has a vigor and stamina of a 20 year old boy.
We had a chance to have one to one tête-à-tête with this charming personality. He keeps on telling about his devotion about lawn tennis and CLTA. He said he had spent 10 years of his life in Leander Paes’ tennis academy (Paes en Sports) in Calcutta. He learnt a lot of back-office paper work out there in the academy as well as got a chance to learn tweak factors and technical points about the game. Having his own Tennis Program and Academy in Calcutta for around 3 years was also a fun and taught him a lot of things.
He says what he is teaching to the trainees of this institution is what he has learnt from his on-the-court and off-the-court mistakes. He tries to make each student a better person in total. You can find him smiling on the court while giving teaching to his trainees on the other hand you find him giving discipline lectures to the miscreants.
He says his job at CLTA, Chandigarh is more challenging than Calcutta’s job. Which includes giving training to approximately 450 students and managing a team of 24 coaches, making their daily rosters, managing hostel activities and other things are on his chart. He says that he has started up a few beneficial training programs since his introduction in CLTA and they were never there before. These programs are helpful for financially weak trainees as well as they increase the morale of players to play better.
He adds that CLTA organizes at least one National tournament in a month and at least 3 International tournaments a year. Which really makes his job more responsible to handle all these tournaments and shuffling of his assistant coaches.
In a very quick question answer round he answered a few questions like this:
Favorite food: Chinese obviously Non-Veg
Favorite movie: Tomb Stone
Favorite Coach in CLTA: No Comments
Turn ONs: Honest People
Turn OFFs: Hypocirtes
He is a proud father of three sons Kemp, Wyatt, and Heath. And, he would love to bring them into lawn tennis but leaves the last decision to the kids. He wishes that he could serve CLTA in a better way for years and years and can produce more resulting trainees from Chandigarh.
Unsung Heroes of Chandigarh
We are starting up with this new column the unsung heroes of Chandigarh and vicinity. And, we will be covering the people who have given their best to the city but this city doesn’t know them. They can be from different fields and streams of professions. This is our first column. Give your comments about this column.