Today was recovery day from two exhilarating days with the family at the Fresh From Florida 12 Hours of Sebring. Being in the racing environment is always fun but what is truly amazing is the cultural diversity that you find. Of course, there are the spring breakers, local rednecks, business execs, and the crowd that loves racing. But I am not talking about the crowd that was the majority. I am speaking about the people that come from all over the world to see this once a year phenomenon that is the 12 Hours. That one thought and the multiple languages that we ran across reminded me it was time to reminisce about another player from years gone by.
Nicolas Bigler epitomized his last name. He is a towering person that most would assume might be a power forward for the college instead of a varsity tennis player. Standing 6’6”, he appeared to be bigger than life and could be menacing but in reality, he was a kind and timid fellow. For those that don’t know about tennis tactics, when you are a big man you can be an imposing figure at the net and can earn many free points by moving forward. This usually causes trouble for opponents because someone that big is hard to get over with a lob or to pass them with a passing shot because of the large reach, usually. For Nic this was not the case. He was much more content to hit large looping groundstrokes from well behind the baseline. He is the only player that I have coached that got stuck in the fence, not once, but three times while he played for me. Yes, you read that correctly, he got his foot wedged in the fence because he played that far behind the baseline. He also had moments where his racket would scrape the fence on his preparation. As big as he was being passive was much more his style. I tried many attempts to get him to become an aggressive baseliner with an attacking dimension. We put him at the net and had players pound balls at him to show how easy it was for him to cover. I stood behind him with a giant swiss ball and made him move forward. The swiss ball did not allow him to retreat and kept me from getting pelted. Everything we did failed. Nailing the coffin closed on my attempts to get him to become what I thought he should be was a particular individual session we had one chilly fall morning. He and I were doing reflex volleys and I was trying to get him to shorten his swing. Well, I pulled him out a little wider hoping he would use his legs and not his reach. He did indeed use his reach, retrieved the shot, but since he had a bad base was not in position for the next shot. I hit a laser of a ball to his midsection to get him to recover and then he was on the court. My shot was a little lower and his reaction was a little slower. My 6’6” project was now about 2’5” at the service tee across from me. Holding himself and moaning in agony he advised me that we were done working on volleys for a while. A while was until his graduation.
Utilizing what someone can do instead of trying to get them to grow is frustrating but at times what a coach must do. With Nic the comprise was that we would not work on being more aggressive at net but that we would try to at least get easier transitions and maybe some shorter points. Nic was French-Swiss and was stereotypical in both. He was smart as could be but also very stubborn with what he thought, how he did things, and what he thought of others. His teammates had a nickname of affection for him that he was called daily. I will not repeat that nickname tonight but it fit and it was hilarious to hear and Nic got to the point that he embraced it. Above I mentioned that not being able to push an athlete to try new things was frustrating but Nic grew. He was a fighter, made strides with his game, and complained about everything. One of the funniest stories, and there are many, about Nic was the day he was going to play a top 10 play0er0 in the country. The kid he was going to play was massively unorthodox, very unimpressive, but was a machine at his game. Nic and I discussed how we were going to play him, as I had previously had two players that were able to beat him, but Nic being Nic told me that he had a strategy because this kid wasn’t that good. I tried with all my heart to get Nic to see my side but he was sure he was just going to beat this guy off the court. Being a good coach, I smirked, pulled up a bench and watched the clinical ass-kicking that took place. Nic was soundly defeated, came off the court and informed me that he knew he could beat him but the guy got lucky. He had another opportunity and you guessed it, the result was the same. Being stubborn is at times a good virtue but there are other times where someone might have knowledge you just know nothing about.
I really liked Nic and was glad that he transferred to play for me. His work ethic was awesome and he gave me everything he had each time he stepped on the court. He was quirky, irritating, and overly obsessed with his own opinions but that is part of dealing with cultures and people that are not common to you. Our women’s coach may not like Nic as much, I kid, because Nic fell in love with a female tennis player and she decided to move to Switzerland and pursue her career there. They are now happily married and both are doing outstanding in their chosen profession. They are both set in their ways and somehow work like a fine Swiss watch. Bigler was a big boy who had a soft heart and hard opinions and I was fortunate to have a guy like that to coach.
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