The legendary coach has died aged 91. He will have, in his Californian academy, trained a host of champions and profoundly changed the way of teaching tennis.
His daughter had, on social networks, announced on November 20 that he was going to leave. A message that quickly upset the tennis world. Nick Bollettieri, slender, eternal sunglasses placed on his always tanned smiling face, has, for fifty years, surveyed and animated the life of tennis, contributed to the development and influence of the game. The American is registered as one of the most influential figures in modern tennis. In 2008, the Wall Street Journal baptized this self-made-man: “ the most prolific coach in the history of tennis. In 2014, the New York Times posted: Nick Bollettieri’s age: 82 years old. His view of tennis talent: 20/20. »
« Clive Davis is to music what Nick Bollettieri is to tennis. Clive has an ear for talent, whether it’s Aretha Franklin, Steve Wonder or Mariah Carey. Nick has made more tennis players than anyone. It’s hard to sum up Nick. He’s a great motivator. He knows how to push your buttons, to make you do what you need to do. He created an industry. Imagine, having talent come to you, rather than the other way around “, underlined a few years ago, in Espn, Jim Courier, one of his many students.
Nick Bollettieri was born in Pelham, New York, a stone’s throw from the tennis center. But love at first sight will take place later, he who loved US football as a quarterback. A philosophy graduate from Mobile, Alabama, he joined the college tennis team after coming across tennis by accident during his freshman year of high school thanks to an uncle by marriage who offered to exchange a few balls with him. After his service in a US Army parachute unit, he taught at Miami Law School before finally turning to tennis. “ To earn a few dollars, he starts teaching tennis on the courts of North Miami Beach for $1.50 a half-hour lesson. », indique l’International hall of fame.
His first camp arises in Wisconsin, at the Wayland Academy. He then became the tennis manager of a hotel in Puerto Rico. Then in 1978, driven by a vision, he set up his academy, the future factory for champions, in Bradenton, Florida. “ When Nick Bollettieri arrived on the west coast of Florida more than 35 years ago, he brought with him a lot of bravado, boundless energy and budding dreams. “recalls the Herald Tribune. “ It transforms 40 acres of tomato fields into an epicenter of sport and performance known around the world “, as summarized by Espn. His biography will be, in 2014, for title: “ change the game ».
Nick Bollettieri has revolutionized the way of coaching with an aggressive game, driven by ample, violent, devastating forehands unleashed from the baseline. His method is based on the emulation born of a group. The first of his students who will make a career is called Brian Gottfried. Some of the next top contenders include Jimmy Arias, Aaaron Krickstein. Before young prodigies burst the screen: Boris Becker, Monica Seles, Jennifer Capriati, Anna Kournikova, Martia Hingis, Andre Agassi, Jim Courier, Marcelo Rios, Maria Sharapova (arrival at the age of 9 at the Academy), Martina Hingis or Jelena Jankovic. Tommy Haas and Kei Nishikori were also among the boarders. And the academy has seen a parade of prestigious trainees (Pete Sampras or Michael Chang). As for French players, over the years, Nick Bollettieri will have seen Yannick Noah, Mary Pierce, Tatiana Golovin or Paul-Henri Mathieu pass.
The academy, in Florida launched with about thirty young players was quickly taken by storm, released many champions and ten world numbers 1, setting itself up as a reference still copied today.
IMG bought the academy in 1987 (the extended campus includes football, golf, baseball fields) but Nick Bollettieri never moved away. For the picture. He stayed connected to tennis. As close as possible to young shoots, on the lookout for novelties. On the courts, as well as behind the scenes.
True to a proven method. Mixture of work (his detractors reproached him for his severity, his extreme military methods), abnegation and determination. At the service of an ambition. “ I think coaches kind of try to mold players into who they want them to be. It can’t happen like that. You have to make some adjustments, you have to work with them, their talent, their personality. To be part of a team, like the one shared with Venus and Serena Williams. “ He gets results », used to sum up Richard Williams about Bollettieri. In 1980, Sports Illustrated headlined: “ It will make your child a champion, but it won’t be much fun. »
Skilled communicator, endowed with a sense of contact and the formula (“ A good mind is 80% a good physique “), a well-supported businessman, Nick Bollettieri, son of Italian immigrants, knew how to make his crazy success story bear fruit. That of a man who had the art of seizing the potential to polish a jewel and nurture a project, who knew how to make people believe that nothing was impossible. Bollettieri had the art of growing wings. The success of his academy was a source of inspiration for Patrick Mouratoglou, Justine Henin, Rafael Nadal, Sergi Bruguera, Juan Carlos Ferrero, Spartak in Moscow…
Adored or criticized model, Nick Bollettieri who liked to call himself the “ Michelangelo of tennis was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2014. He once summed up in an interview: “ The secret to my success is to say thank you to the critics and to do what my grandmother and father told me: let the results speak for themselves and never argue with a critic. I got so many reviews they could have sunk a warship… »