{"id":7267,"date":"2016-01-03T22:21:00","date_gmt":"2016-01-04T03:21:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/?p=7267"},"modified":"2016-01-26T14:55:54","modified_gmt":"2016-01-26T19:55:54","slug":"playing-for-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/?p=7267","title":{"rendered":"Playing for Love"},"content":{"rendered":"

Freshmen Henry Nolan and Steven Weeks are taking top spots in\u00a0the Arkansas Athletic Association 7A tennis ranking with their hard work and talent. They recently won 7A conference and state championships as freshman in the tennis doubles category and are poised to be in the hunt for another conference and state title again next year. The question then becomes, \u201cWhat can\u2019t these freshman do?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI have been playing for six or seven years,\u201d said Nolan. \u201cI started playing when I was about seven or eight with some simple classes. Then I just started playing a lot more. I like to see myself get better and beating more people.\u201d<\/span>
\n<\/span>Weeks has a similar story. \u201cI have been playing for seven years and my mom used to play; she is the one who got me into lessons.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

High school athletics are a whole different ball game from middle school. The rise to the top requires extra workouts\u00a0and\u00a0extra time to rise to the top. \u201cI train probably about two hours a day, so about eight hours a week [Monday through Thursday] with private lessons and groups,\u201d said Weeks. Nolan and Weeks both train the same number of hours at the Racket Club.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThey won state,\u201d said junior Patrick Wingfield. \u201cThat is a huge deal. They represented Catholic which is usually thought to be a smaller school, and [they] beat upperclassmen all over the 7A.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0Two freshman winning a conference and state championship almost didn\u2019t happen. Both had serious back injuries that limited workouts and practice time. \u201cI was born with it,\u201d said Nolan, \u201cBut the more I grow and play against bigger people, the worse it gets.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The \u201cit\u201d is a back condition called transitional anatomy. Nolan said the bones in his back are not fully spread out. \u201cThe bones in your back are supposed to spread out. Mine didn\u2019t fully spread out, so they grind on each other and it grinds on the nerves in my back. I am doing physical therapy to get my back stronger, but the more you grow, the worse it gets.\u201d<\/span>
\n<\/span>Weeks has had his own problems. He suffered a fractured back over the summer break. \u201cI couldn\u2019t play at all last summer,\u201d said Weeks. \u201cI did it just playing tennis and basketball. I went to physical therapy for a week, but they ended up just telling me that I needed to strengthen my core and just not do anything that would hurt my back, like playing tennis, basketball, and running.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

With Nolan doing his physical therapy and Weeks recovering over the summer, both were back in time for the season. <\/span><\/p>\n

Nolan and Weeks have\u00a0been playing doubles with each other for only a year, which Nolan doesn\u2019t see as a big problem. \u201cIt helps if you practice with each other. You have a better chemistry but when you get up to a higher level you can be thrown in with anybody and be good.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Weeks enjoys playing doubles because of the dynamic it brings. \u201cIt\u2019s more of a team thing,\u201d said Weeks. \u201cSingles is a lot more stressful and serious, so it is fun to go out there and have fun with your partner. \u201cWe practice with some more older and talented kids so we are used to the competition.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Also Weeks and Nolan play outside of their school team in more competitive tournaments. \u201c[The age classification] goes up by twos, so fourteen, sixteen, eighteen,\u201d said Nolan, \u201cWe play in the sixteens because playing in the fourteens [their age group] isn\u2019t really hard anymore.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

In the 7A state tournament, Weeks and Nolan played almost all older players. Playing older kids at such a high level would get into most players\u2019 heads. <\/span><\/p>\n

But Weeks just goes back to the basics. \u201cI just mainly focus on where to put the ball during games.\u201d \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Both Weeks and Nolan would like to play tennis at the next level, and it seems they are on the right track to do so. Weeks would like to play at an SEC school and Nolan looks to use tennis as a stepping stone. \u201cIf I play tennis in college, it will be a way for me to get into a really good academic school like Virginia.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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Freshmen Henry Nolan and Steven Weeks are taking top spots in\u00a0the Arkansas Athletic Association 7A tennis ranking with their hard work and talent. They recently won 7A conference and state championships as freshman in the tennis doubles category and are poised to be in the hunt for another conference and state title again next year….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":7302,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[210],"tags":[211,143],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/liftoffnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/RRR3456-1-e1450121155922.jpg?fit=683%2C750&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3xfZw-1Td","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7267"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7267"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7267\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7320,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7267\/revisions\/7320"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}