TRAINING THE S***T OUT OF THEM: THE BAT TRIALS

Marina Beach, Chennai, India

Every year at the Britannia Amritraj Tennis Scheme (BAT) we conducted trials to find new trainees for the coming year.  The tennis program had the lofty goal of producing India’s next crop of Davis Cup players and some boys from the previous year either couldn’t handle the level of training we put them through or their tournament results were not good enough.  This meant that each year we looked at other prospects. Vijay Amritraj usually came in from the US to help with selections and it became a big occasion for boys from throughout India who would turn up with their parents for the 2 day trials.

We had often picked boys who later could not handle the high level of physical training we put them through. Leander Paes, still one of the best doubles specialists in the world today was a BAT boy who thrived on the work load.  Many however could not.  Indian boys tend to be more spoilt and allowed to get their own way.  This leads to laziness and many Indian boys are overweight.

It was for this reason that I decided that the trials should be tougher physically so that we could see the level of commitment of each boy and hopefully avoid some of our previous mistakes with our selections. I decided that we would include our traditional run on Marina Beach in Chennai, something the BAT boys did 2-3 times every week.  Marina Beach is the worlds 2^nd longest beach and the sand is quite soft, making it hard to gain traction.  It’s a killer on the legs!

This particular year we had around 50 boys show up for trials.  We put them through the usual hitting sessions to gauge their on-court ability.

Finally the time came for the notorious beach run and we loaded as many players, parents, sisters and grandmothers in our small van as possible and traveled to Marina Beach to begin the run.  We had to make 3 trips that morning just to get everyone there.  I organized the first running group of about 15 boys and started to explain the run.  We would run the entire length of the beach, touch a fence at the far end, turn around and run back.  I pointed to a distant lighthouse just barely visible on the horizon and asked “everyone see that lighthouse”?  They all nodded in unison.  “Well that’s half way to the fence” I said, looking at the group and sensing that none of the runners understood the enormity of the task ahead of them. 

When everyone was ready I called “Go” and off they sprinted.  Sprinting this early in the run was ill-advised but I guess they were trying to impress!  I remember watching a few boys sprinting off down the beach at the start of what would be a 45 minute run and thinking these boys have probably never run like this before, they were that green.

I ran with the boys that day so no one got lost and remember waiting at the fence at the half way point of the run and directing each boy to turn around and run the exact same distance back.  Several thought I was joking and looked forlornly towards the roadside for the van.  There was no van.  Most of the boys were now walking while the best of them would jog some distance and then walk to recover.  They were spread out the entire distance of Marina Beach.  I ran ahead again and waited at the finish point. Eventually the boys began to come in totally exhausted. 

The last few stragglers were arriving now but the last boy caught my eye.  He was running a few steps then stopping to hold his leg.  It seemed to me he had injured himself somehow so I went toward him to see what his problem was.  As I got closer I realized that he was not injured but had unfortunately had a bowel accident during the run.  His bowels had released and it was now running freely down his legs and into his socks!  As he finished the run his mother whisked him away down to the waterfront to wash him up.

The training at BAT was known to be extremely tough but I guess on this occasion it had proven too much for one of our prospective trainees.