|
 |
Golden year: Tennis ace Ben McLachlan
|
A rising Queenstown tennis star’s stellar year has been capped by him being named New Zealand’s top junior player.
Ben McLachlan, 19, was given the honour at Tennis NZ’s annual awards in Auckland last Friday.
McLachlan – back in Queenstown after his first year at the University of California’s Berkeley campus on a tennis scholarship – was on hand to receive the award.
Last year he was rated 45th best junior in the world – the highest ranking for any Kiwi player aged 18 or under.
McLachlan and brother Riki, 20, who’s just finished his second year at Berkeley on a similar scholarship, were also part of a successful college team.
Their California Golden Bears came 14th out of 206 division one college teams this year – the first time they’d been in the “sweet 16” since 2003.
At college the boys train four hours a day, six days a week, and also fit in university studies – Ben’s doing interdisciplinary studies and Riki’s studying political economy.
Ben – who hopes to turn pro when he’s finished college in three years – says his tennis has improved a lot.
“You’re practising every day with good players, which we’re not really used to.”
Till now their biggest influence has been Queenstown tennis coach Lan Bale, who took the boys on when they were 10 and 11.
Bale also pointed them in the direction of Berkeley, where he’d been assistant coach for two years.
Dad Craig McLachlan says it helped that Riki and Ben could practise with each other in Queenstown.
“It’s quite hard for one kid to get through from here.
“Lan’s a great coach but [youngsters] also need someone their own age to practise with.”
Ben says his biggest result was when he played for NZ in a three-boy team that came fourth in a world 14-and-under tournament.
Ironically, though the boys are regular doubles partners, Ben says it’s a long time since he played Riki in a competitive match.
|
Your say
There are no comments on this article.
Have your say
You will need to register or login before you can post a comment.
