15 December 2016 | Tennis Victoria

Marc Polmans 

Well done on a fantastic year, your ranking is now 225, has anything changed in your game?

I’m just happy with the way my game is going and how I’m playing. I’ve been telling myself to play more aggressive, I prefer to lose a match on my own racquet rather then my own opponent beating me, so that’s been a little cue that I’ve been trying to change. As long as I keep coming forward to the net and keep attacking, that seems to be working.

I find (doubles) helps me with my singles, working my volley’s and things like that, so I try to play doubles as much as I can because it improves my singles.

What are your goals for the summer?

My goal is to be inside the top 250 in the world that will allow me to play the grand slam qualifying next year. So that’s a little goal in the back of my mind that I’m trying to go towards.

Have you had any words of wisdom from any tennis legends this year?

I was fortunate to have a practice with Lleyton Hewitt, he gave me some advice and he wants me to work on my serve and get a bit physically stronger. I always listen to his advice.

Andrew Whittington has had a great year also and is now the number one ranked Victorian, does this give you confidence when you see your friends doing so well?

What (Andrew) has done has been very good, he was ranked 400 at the start of the year, so to see him jump to 150 in the world in such a short amount of time is a big confidence booster, seeing someone who I thought I was pretty close with can jump that far. It always gives you a bit of confidence to see someone else doing well.

Jaimee Fourlis              

How has your year been? What have you been up to since winning the 25k Futures event in February?

Since then I have been travelling the world playing all the Junior Grand Slams, I was able to get into those with my ITF Junior Ranking, playing a couple of the pro circuits in Australia and training.

What was your experience like overseas?

That was a really great experience, it was my first time playing all the Junior Grand Slams. I played the Junior French Open and the Junior Wimbledon. I really enjoyed playing on the clay and on grass, it was a great experience. Especially to see how the other kids in Europe play and how they go about their tennis was a really great experience.

It was a long trip, it was 9 weeks but I had some Aussie boys and girls there with me which was great.

Congratulations, you were Tennis Victoria’s Junior Athlete of the Year which was announced in June, were you excited to win that award?

I was over the moon! I’ve never won a Junior Athlete of the Year award before, I’ve been nominated a couple of times but I’ve never actually won it. Sadly I wasn’t in Melbourne at the time I was overseas but when mum and dad sent me the message, saying I had won, I was so happy and proud of myself.

Mentally how do you prepare for your matches?

Every person has their own little superstitions, for me I like to re-grip my racquet every match so if I’m winning I can go through quite a lot of grips.

Mentally I think you have to stay focused and stay in the zone and also have a bit of fun with it, you’re meant to enjoy tennis as well.

You can keep up to date with Marc Polmans via his Twitter here, and stay tuned to what Jaimee Fourlis is up to via her Twitter here.