I do have ambition – I can dress up for a premiere, get in a limousine, but it’s not my life. My life is wearing jeans and tennis shoes and travelling on the metro. I have to do that because otherwise my acting is going to be false.
As a tennis player, you have a record, and that is what counts. I feel like I enjoyed myself, and I’m proud of what I accomplished.
You don’t need to know who’s playing on the White House tennis court to be a good president.
In corporate levels, it’s all about tailoring your shirt and which tennis club you belong to and which watch you are wearing and what did you shoot last week?
Anything over-handed, I do left-handed. Like throwing a ball or serving in tennis. Otherwise, right-handed, like writing and shaving.
For me, motivation is easy. I enjoy what I’m doing, and I’m lucky to play tennis. I enjoy the suffering. It’s something quite natural for me to go on the court and suffer, and to go in the gym and to suffer, and to know the only way to get better is to work out – that’s what I like.
I get bored easily, so in general, I tend to mix up my workouts. I exercise in the gym with a trainer once a week when I’m in town, and I love yoga, golf and tennis.
In these days of modern tennis a player is as strong as his weakest stroke.
It wasn’t my tennis that made me lose, it was a lot of different things going on, high drama, high emotion.
I was cycling until I was 68. I used to play football, cricket, tennis, table tennis. I was into road walking – heel and toe.
Tennis doesn’t owe me anything. Tennis is one of the fairest sports. It’s given me so many extraordinary feelings.
I let my racket do the talking. That’s what I am all about, really. I just go out and win tennis matches.
When I was younger, I was a robot. Wind her up and she plays tennis.
I was very, very shy as a younger girl, just petrified of people. Tennis helped give me an identity and made me feel like somebody.
Trying to learn to be a good man is like learning to play tennis against a wall. You are only a good man – a competent, capable, interesting and lovable man – when you’re doing it for, or with, other people.
I think I’m realising that careers for tennis players are very short. On the women’s side now, players are starting to peak later on, but the average age is about 31, 32 when you finish playing, so I want to make the most of it while I’m young, fit, and healthy. I don’t want to waste any time.
I still play a bit of tennis, but only a knockabout to help with my recovery after a game.
I love swimming, tennis, and I am taking up golf. I am not serious about it, I just go to the range and practice. Other than that, I enjoy going to the movies and hanging out with my friends.
I haven’t seen the film yet because I just got in from London. In the scenes where the two characters are bantering with each other, it is like bobbing at the net in tennis.
It occurred to me that it would benefit me to play without emotion – well, without emotion others could see, anyway. Card players profited from having a poker face so opponents wouldn’t know how good or bad their hand was, and I figured a deadpan expression would work in tennis, too.
Is only a tennis match. At the end, that’s life. There is much more important things.
I would love to have been a tennis player simply because of Serena Williams.
My grandmother was whip smart as well as an incredible athlete. She played tennis in her sari, cheered on the Indian team in cricket matches, and tried to convince us that her made-up words were real so she could win a Scrabble game.
Tennis, at times, I follow, but not much.
Maybe sometimes I don’t look like that I’m really enjoying being on the court and playing tennis, but inside, I’m really enjoying it.
I always show up to the office sweaty! I’ll come in between workouts in a tennis skirt drenched in sweat. The only time that I actually look presentable is at meetings.
From the outside, Rick Rubin’s house above Zuma Beach is a generic millionaire beach home. There’s a rarely used tennis court and a circular drive.
I don’t like running that much, and during the off-season, I have to do it, but if I can replace it with tennis, it is better.
I can’t wear the same outfit twice without washing it. And tennis is a grueling occupation.
Tennis is what I do and is part of who I am.
If I was the type of person who had tennis, tennis, tennis all the time and I went to bed and ended up dreaming about tennis, I would go nuts.
Kids in the city can play cricket, badminton, tennis or football. Athletics is not their cup of tea.
But, I would say when I was four years old and I was at the Alan King Tennis Tournament and I was hitting with all the pros that would come to town. They would get me on the court or take notice and that stayed with me.
I think, in general, when you’re doing comedy, you’re having a good time regardless of the comedy table tennis that you’re playing. I think you want that, too: you’re rooting for two characters to be together, and you should feel that even when they’re angry at each other, they’re still in synch with each other.
I want to show who I am, show my best tennis, show why I’m there, why I belong.
I want to play my best tennis at the Grand Slams.
I started when I was 8 years old, which is obviously nowadays pretty late, but I guess in my generation it was all right. I had plenty of other interests and I didn’t do only tennis.
The days of a tennis champion as a gender rights leader are over.
Tennis has to become everything to you if you’re going to make it to the top. You have to live it.
I was in the tennis bubble. I wasn’t thinking about the big picture. I didn’t notice what they said on television, I wasn’t reading any papers. I had a coach and a manager, and they kept me in the bubble.
I have always believed that my job is to try and give my best on the tennis courts.
I couldn’t be accepted into tennis school because I was too young. I had to wait a year until I was four before they’d accept me.
I’ve played this game from 12-under to the over-70s. So when they say tennis is a game from the cradle to the grave, you truly have it right.
It was brilliant in LA. The kids were young enough for it not to disturb their education and it was an incredibly healthy lifestyle. The weather’s so good that you’re up every morning, walking in the canyons, playing tennis three times a week.
At the end of the day, it’s just a tennis match. It’s not the end of the world.
I once started tennis lessons and turned some poor man grey overnight. Now I feign injuries when I’m asked for a game.
I’d love to see all the guys play their best because I think it’s better for tennis.
I obviously wasn’t a normal tennis story.
As a kid, I wanted to be a pro tennis player. I was pretty good; at the tennis academies I attended, I always ‘played up’ against older age groups.
I was sporty in high school. I played tennis and hockey, and was basketball captain. Then I went to university and stopped doing sport and started eating ice cream.
I have never cared especially for outdoor sports and have no desire to excel at tennis, swimming, or golf. I’ll leave those things to the men.
In tennis ball cricket, even it’s hit from the toe of the bat, the ball still travels a lot, but in normal cricket, it has to be the middle part of the bat, so it requires a lot of work.
There are still going to be great players that are baseliners. That’s the way tennis – courts, balls, everything – has shifted. But everyone has to find their own way to win. Not everyone can run around the baseline for five hours. I can’t.
I really enjoy tennis, but football’s the game for me.
I love jeans, T-shirts, boots, and tennis shoes.
My mom, she’s from Ireland, coached tennis in Nigeria when she was a missionary and turned me on to it when I was young.
All I cared about in tennis was winning.
I have a TV Soap Boomerang award, and I always start my year with the Australian Open tennis! Tennis, soccer, you name it.
Tennis players are very fortunate that unlike some disciplines of sport, in mega-sporting events like the Grand Slams, they have a huge platform to showcase their talents on the world stage once every few months.
It’s so much nicer to be able to do your job with someone who’s helping you, and you’re helping them. Then, it becomes a tennis match where you’re hitting the ball back and forth, and you’re a team.
I was super sporty in high school. I played tennis, field hockey, and lacrosse.
I thought about tennis. But the more I thought about the whole thing – lessons, equipment, going to the courts – I said screw it, I’m just going to go buy a pair of sneakers and go running.
When you meet someone, ask about what hobby they have, not what they do. People always ask me about cooking, but I prefer to talk about tennis or boxing.
When I was 12, every little girl in Russia was trying to wear her hair like mine and playing tennis.
I’m more in that Rafa Nadal high-energy high-octane mold out there. I wear that emotion on the court. That’s how I play my best tennis. People either like that or not. And I can’t change that: that’s who I am on a tennis court.
I don’t need to come back to Wimbledon every year because I can’t live without it. I’d be totally cool without tennis.
