Tiffany Le roux ‘20 Recruiting Profile

Personal Statement

My name is Tiffany le Roux and I have just finished high school at Curro Durbanville Independent School and obtained my National Senior Certificate (NSC) at the end of 2019 with a B average. I attended school full time until the end of grade 12, missing a few days here and there for tennis tours and tournaments. My typical grade 12 school day consisted of tennis in the mornings before class, 5-6 hours of class and then training in the afternoons. I trained on average 5-6 times a week on and off the court.

Throughout my high school career, I had to find balance between tennis, academics and me time and I have learned to switch off completely when I decide that I need to get some school work done, even if it meant studying in a car or next to a tennis court. I have learned to manage my time well, in order to make sure that I still get free time and get enough rest and sleep while training and studying.

I’m used to traveling and during my final school year I went on multiple tours to go play ITF’s, which meant being away from home for weeks at a time. I am used to being on my own away from home and doing everything for myself.

I attended an International Spanish Training Camp, organized by Frans Cronje in February 2019 and it made me realized my passion is tennis and I actually want to play professional tennis. As I was a late starter to serious tennis, I will have to work a lot harder than most players on my game now. I trained for two weeks with a strong group of international players who went on tour with us and during these tours I had to keep up with my school work and make sure that I met all my project deadlines, while increasing my training to a much higher level. I was the oldest on many of the tours and would be put in charge of checking on all the other players and make sure that they had everything that they needed.

I know how to handle unforeseen circumstances whilst being very far from home. In February 2019, I injured my left ankle off court and almost tore one of my ligaments, but it ended up being a stretch and not a tear, which put me in a moonboot for 4 days until I could get a sonar and an ankle brace. This happened whilst being far away from home and just before I was supposed to start a tournament. I had to handle looking after my ankle by myself, with some help from coaches and friends, but basically managing on my own.

I have a big passion for tennis and business, and I would like to someday make a living from a combination of the two. In other words, I am thinking about going into a business course or sport science, as I have a passion to working with people and am a very social person. I communicate well and I love meeting and working with new people. I am a hard worker when it comes to my academics and my tennis, and once I have decided to do something, I’ll stick with it until I achieve success.

During high school I was awarded many different sporting and academic awards. Some of these included subject awards, best tennis player awards and a provincial gold medal for a science project named “How to hit a tennis ball the correct way”, just to name a few. I have represented my school as their number 1 player for the last 5 years and I won nationwide tournaments at this position and represented my province since I was 15 years old, playing South African Trials twice.

I started playing tennis at the age of 5 and started playing a few tournaments at 8. I competed in many sports up until the age of 13, which means I know how to compete individually and in a team. I have played on more than one surface and I have some experience on clay courts. In the last year and half, I realized that I wanted to be more serious about tennis and started to play a few ITF tournaments, inside and outside of South Africa and went on tour with Frans Cronje (Well Known South African Tennis Coach).

When it comes to tennis, I see myself as a well-rounded player, who has a massive passion for the game. I am a single-handed backhander, which is not something that you often see in South Africa. I normally use my more than average serve to open the court and then use a big forehand or a ripper of backhand to finish the point after a weak return. (Opponents often under estimate the severity of my singlehanded backhand). When on tour I love to find people from different countries and levels to train with to improve the variety of my tennis. I love training on the court, working on my skills and I also enjoy running and going to gym. I like to compete and battle for the win every time I’m on court and in the past, I had many long hard battles, that lasted well over 3 hours as I battled until the bitter end.

I would love to find a home away from home, with a good tennis program, a high level of education and integrity and become a part of a tennis family. I love a challenge and if given the opportunity, I will prove myself worthy and work on becoming a better tennis player and person every day. I believe that I will be an asset to any team, as I’m dedicated to tennis and I can work very hard and still have a balance in life and work well in a team and individually.