Launch of Professional Tennis Coach Association (PTCA)

Written by: Staff on 14th June 2011

Launch of Professional Tennis Coach Association (PTCA)

caption here>> on March 10, 2011 in Indian Wells, California. |

After two years of preparatory work the profession of tennis coaches has been living a historic moment during this first weekend at the French Open Grand Slam tournament: the Professional Tennis Coaches Association (PTCA), the first organisation to set professional standards for Tennis Coaches and promoting their interest on the tour has been officially launched.

PTCA is a non-for-profit organisation registered in Luxembourg and operating globally. Its aim is to set and defend standards to be met by tennis coaches to be certified as professional coaches. These standards comprise educational requirements, professional experience and also the commitment to ethical standards to be respected by the members of the organisation.

But not only the coaching community will benefit from the work of this association: Players will see greater transparency and higher quality from a more professionally organised coach profession. The tennis tour associations will see increased harmony in standards which will facilitate accreditation processes. In its interest to further the tennis sport as a whole PTCA intends to seek close cooperation with all stakeholders including the tennis associations ATP, WTA and ITF.

The Executive Board of the Association comprises prominent figures from the community of ATP/WTA tour coaches including: Sven Groeneveld, Håkan Dahlbo, Dirk Hordorff, Claudio Pistolesi, Roger Rasheed and Vlado Platenik. As president, the Association has, however, chosen a person from the business world, with Uli Grabenwarter, former head of equity fund investments in private equity at European Investment Fund. It’s first vice-president is the 8-times Grand-Slam winner Mats Wilander, one of the most prominent ambassadors for the tennis sport since he retired from active playing on the tour in 1996.

Sven Groeneveld, one of the initiators of this association said:” We want to have this association run in a business-like manner, voicing the views of the coaching profession in the most professional way. This is why we have chosen Mats and Uli at the top of our association. Uli knows how to build a professional organisation around what is close to our hearts as a coaches community. And Mats is probably the most uncontested figure on the tour when it comes to rethinking the world of tennis beyond counting the points of a game.”

Mats Wilander commented:”I wouldn’t have taken on this role if I wasn’t convinced that being a tennis coach is more than a means for paying for the living of a few people. There is a give and take in this profession. The community of tennis coaches has a lot to give to the tennis sport. But it also deserves a great deal of respect for what people in this profession deliver and under what conditions. It is time to get this into the spotlight too.”