Tennis Europe has announced that Pancho Alvariño and Carl Maes will be amongst the keynote speakers at the forthcoming Tennis Europe Coaches Conference, where they will join the previously-announced coach of 23-time Grand Slam champion Serena Williams, Patrick Mouratoglou.
The theme of this year’s conference is Women’s Tennis and the two latest names to be confirmed have a wealth of experience in the field. Owner of his eponymous academy in Valencia, Spain, Alvariño has travelled the WTA Tour as a coach of pro players for over 15 years and captained Spain to Fed Cup victory. Maes coached Kim Clijsters from the age of 12 until she reached the top of rankings, captained the Belgian Fed Cup team and served as Head of Women’s Tennis at Britain’s LTA.
Vitor Cabral, ITF Development Officer for Europe, explained that the conference will focus on the practical challenge of developing successful female tennis players: “We want to provide high-level coaches with applicable and relevant information and there are no experts more qualified than our first three confirmed speakers, whose first-hand experience is incomparable. The venue is perfect to provide a great experience and there will be a lot to learn.”
The conference will be held at the Mouratoglou Tennis Academy near Nice in southern France on 19th and 20th October. The event will be hosted by the French Tennis Federation and is targeted to technical directors and Fed Cup coaches from Tennis Europe’s constituent national tennis associations. This year, all 50 Tennis Europe member nations are entitled to apply for an accommodation grant for participants. Nations are encouraged to apply as soon as possible, as there are a limited number of grants available.
This year’s event will also accept 100 additional entries on a first-come, first-served basis, subject to the approval of their national association of the coaches concerned. Ideally, coaches should be working with elite girls and women, and/or national teams. For further information regarding the entry procedure, please click here. The full program for the event will be announced in due course.