{"id":5015,"date":"2015-08-05T10:08:12","date_gmt":"2015-08-05T14:08:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/?p=5015"},"modified":"2015-08-05T10:08:12","modified_gmt":"2015-08-05T14:08:12","slug":"penn-oaks-seeks-to-help-young-tennis-players","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/?p=5015","title":{"rendered":"Penn Oaks seeks to help young tennis players"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"88ad4686-ff8a-4582-8706-e2ab9bc285f0\"<\/a>WEST CHESTER \u2014 As New York prepares for the U.S. Open in Flushing, N.Y., Penn Oaks Tennis and Fitness Center has their eyes on introducing the game to future stars.<\/span><\/p>\n

Joining with the organization that sponsors the U.S. Open– the United States Tennis Association (USTA) — on August 31 Penn Oaks is beginning a quick-start program for junior players between the ages of 5 and 12. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Club owner, James Sulzman, says that among great players, tennis professionals Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal both went through this program. \u00a0\u201cTennis is first about developing strong fundamentals, footwork, and body positioning.\u00a0\u00a0Then, a player can learn the strategies of the game.\u00a0\u00a0This teaching approach helps youngsters succeed and ideally instills in them a love of the game.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The methodology uses special decompressed balls, which grant players extra time to track the ball, learn the fundamentals, and use them repeatedly, all without feeling rushed or frustrated.\u00a0\u00a0The slightly smaller courts allows the younger smaller player to play a version of tennis more comparable to the actual game they will be playing ten years down the road.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cInstead of responding to the oncoming ball with a swat and need to hit it hard, children will be able to move into the right position and really learn the stroke.\u00a0\u00a0It will teach patience and focus but give kids the groundwork for becoming excellent players in the future,\u201d says Sulzman.<\/span><\/p>\n

In a sport that often was only for country club players and the wealthy, Penn Oaks is determined to introduce it to all children.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cOur goal is to price the program so all kids can learn about the game without a huge monetary commitment.\u00a0 It can be stressful as a parent to put financial resources toward a sport, just to hear a child say they don\u2019t like it,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

In response, Penn Oaks is offering eight-week sessions throughout the year with special pricing as low as $20 per hour so younger kids can try the game.\u00a0 For information, go to\u00a0www.pennoakstennisandfitness.com<\/span><\/a>\u00a0.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve had a lot of great tennis players come out of Penn Oaks.\u00a0\u00a0They started young and became top players in high school and college,\u201d Sulzman said, naming Penn Oaks\u2019 own pro, Christ Louis, along with more recent Max Kane at Bucknell and Zaina Zaki at University of Connecticut.\u00a0\u00a0The club will continue to give top-notch training to the athletes with tennis experience and to adults of all levels and abilities, \u201cBut this program is just one more opportunity to introduce a life-time sport to our youngest players.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WEST CHESTER \u2014 As New York prepares for the U.S. Open in Flushing, N.Y., Penn Oaks Tennis and Fitness Center has their eyes on introducing the game to future stars. Joining with the organization that sponsors the U.S. Open– the United States Tennis Association (USTA) — on August 31 Penn Oaks is beginning a quick-start […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5014,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[3274,3275],"class_list":["post-5015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-penn-oaks","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5015","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5015"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5015\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5014"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}