This week to speak to former pro Sebastian Lavie who has recently setup the Lavie Tennis Academy at the Nextgen arena in Auckland New Zealand. As a 9 year living in New Zealand he relocated with his family to train in Australia and then at 10 they all moved to France where he spent most of his teenage years training at he Mouratoglou Tennis Academy and living with Patrick Mouratoglou. We hear about the challenges and fun along the way as well as bringing his learnings from the setup and Team at the Mouratoglou academy to his own Academy. Some of the areas we cover:
- Packing everything into a container and moving to Europe
- Stay in France or move back home to NZ?
- Living with Patrick Mouratoglou
- When Grigor Dimitrov arrived at Mouratoglou
- Cost of training at the Academy
- What would he do differently as a kid today
- Was there a Plan b?
- Failure at pro tour
- Great coaches
- Best / favourite match
- Going from top junior to a senior player
- Junior with sponsorship deals
- Getting his first point
- Dream of a tennis academy
- College tennis versus direct route
- Life at The Lavie Tennis Academy