![]() So when people go on my web site () the written stuff is there for people who buy the Gigi Method, but the videos show me explaining the five steps clearly, which include positioning, serve strategy, and shot selection.” I felt like videos was a better way to present my doubles program. Reading very technical stuff is hard to understand. I thought, I can either write a book, or shoot videos. I just wrote down everything I know about doubles for nine months. “Around that time,” she recalls, “I created the ‘Gigi Method’. At one lasting forty hours across three days, with five speakers slated every hour, Fernandez was amazed that doubles was hardly discussed. What is going on?’ I was shocked.”įernandez started attending USPTA and USPTR conventions in 20. “It was just not how you play doubles," she says. I made a lot of friends when I was teaching in Connecticut.”Īnd yet, she was appalled at the way her beloved game of doubles was being predominantly taught. Tennis was not social when I was playing the tour at all. They took a chance on me, which I really appreciated. "I had never held any type of administrative position and had never managed anything. “I had this wonderful opportunity to become director of tennis at a facility in Stamford, Connecticut called Chelsea Piers," she says. The turning point for Fernandez in that quest came in 2012. You live in a bubble, but at some point you have to come back to the real world and have a normal job working Monday to Friday.” "Frankly, the life of a professional tennis player is not real. It just wasn’t viable for me to continue to travel. You have to go to the doctor like every third day and you have to go through months and months of injections and checkups. "You can’t be traveling much because it is very intense. ![]() “I was trying to become a mom and going through infertility treatments," she says. They are my peers and they don’t talk back.”īut Fernandez was reluctant to travel during that stretch, for personal reasons. "I also taught juniors, but I realized how much I enjoy coaching adults. “Lisa and Sam won a Grand Slam title when I was coaching them, and coaching my college team was fun," Fernandez says. She also coached Rennae Stubbs, another outstanding doubles player. "I finally realized: you know what, tennis is my passion, and tennis is what I love.”įernandez coached the University of South Florida women’s team from 2002-05, and worked with Lisa Raymond and Sam Stosur when they were one the best women’s doubles teams in the world in 20. I was just hellbent on doing something different. "I started some businesses, got my real estate license, finished my undergraduate degree and got my MBA. ![]() “When I retired from tennis at 33, I was just searching for something to be passionate about," she says. To be sure, it took her some time to figure out exactly what made sense for her professionally after retiring in 1997, but this perspicacious woman eventually sorted it out. They have been shielded in many ways from the outside world, becoming prisoners of their private universes, living their own version of reality.Įnter Gigi Fernandez, one of the great doubles players of all time. The toughest task for any athlete is to no longer be out there, fighting for prestigious prizes. ![]()
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