We had the good fortune of connecting with Amyn Mukadam and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Amyn, alright, let’s jump in with a deep one – what’s you’re definition for success?
This question is a particularly intriguing to me.

It was the final question asked of me by the Vice President of the College I eventually was hired for in 2016. It wasn’t a question that I prepared for (especially in the 3rd round of interviews); however, it was one that I had a very honest and comfortable answer to.

She asked, “If we had a meeting like this in 1 year, how could you define success as the Head Coach for the Tennis Program?”

I thought about it for a moment and realized that my answer lied in the culmination what success meant to me in my tennis career. The answer was exemplified in exactly how I ended up in this very position with the opportunity to have a coaching position I always envisioned my tennis career was poised for.

When I started playing entry level pro tennis, I realized that there are hundreds and thousands of other tennis players just like myself looking to make a name for themselves. 99.9% of us will work hard, push to the limits, and will never see the fame and success that we dreamed of in our youth. This was a difficult pill to swallow and the reality of this crushed my inner dreaming child. In my early 20s, I had a unique opportunity to play tennis at a level that I had never seen before. I wanted to work as hard as possible, learn as much as I could, and be sure to pass all this knowledge along to the young students I currently trained and worked with. I established a premise to absorb as much as I could from my experiences at this level and open up the opportunity for those who had a similar dream.

At the end of the day, the odds of making the pro circuit were of course stacked against me. However, I could take all my experiences from Junior tennis (12-18), college tennis (18-20), and pro tennis (22-26) and transfer that to other aspiring athletes wanting to play scholarship college tennis and beyond. In this time, I realized that coaching not just junior tennis, but managing and training a college team was the next big step for my coaching career. I was a volunteer assistant coach at 2 local NAIA colleges for a combined 3 years before take the chance at a Head Coach position.

I was not “successful” at turning pro, making a lot of money playing competitive tennis (I made a bit though), and living the lifestyle we see those doing on media outlets. My success was in knowledge, experience, and channeling that to others at an early stage in their competitive careers. This was my chance to help shape the youth and give them a chance to dream bigger and see what could happen.

I responded, “Success at the end of the season is not about the number of wins or losses we earned as a team. Success comes from knowing that at the end of the day we positioned ourselves to improve as individuals. We trained, dedicated, and did our very best to become better versions of ourselves. Not only as tennis players, but as a team and students within our college community.”

My success came. I was able to coach 5 students to scholarship tennis (2 on full scholarships). I coached 4 years of College tennis as the Head Coach for the Men’s and Women’s program simultaneously. I Co-Direct a junior tennis academy with my college teammate and have the opportunity to train youth from a young age on fundamentals, work ethic, and discipline within this sport. My success was achieved, but there is more to come.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
You cannot get anywhere worth sharing if you don’t have passion, dedication, & work ethic.

All three makeup a whole. Without any one of them, the success will not come.

I graduated from Georgia Tech with a degree in Architecture. I cannot express (nor remember) the countless times, that sentence raised eyebrows and changed the tone of a conversation. No sooner was it met with confusion as it was followed with, “How did you end up being a tennis Coach?” Or, from those that had no filter, “If you graduated from Tech, why are you a tennis Coach?”

Passion.

“I did not want to spend my early-mid 20s behind a computer with someone telling me what to do.” This was the typical brash answer from my early 20s self. However immature it was, it was the truth. I was young, fit, and had an insatiable desire to continue to compete in the sport of Tennis. My peers were finding jobs, working on their portfolio, and going to Grad school. I wanted to play Tennis, coach tennis and learn more about this sport beyond juniors/college competition. So I did.
It was not easy. There were more frustrating and demoralizing moments than there were happy ones. Nonetheless, the resilience and stubbornness flipped on and I kept going at it. The mentors and coaches I met along the way were extremely helpful and supportive. I can look back now and I know that they came at the exact moments I needed them and played a critical role in my development for that time.

Dedication & Work Ethic

I put in the work. I really put in the work. There were weeks and months where my day started at 6am and ended around 9pm. It was filled with a 4-5hrs of tennis training & fitness, 4-5hrs of coaching tennis, and the rest of the time was daily life norms such as cooking, laundry, cleaning, etc. There was very little time for socializing, or going out like most of everyone was doing in their early 20s. If I wasn’t competing in a local event or a travel tournament, the weekend was filled with more practices, time spent with family and some rest + rehab. The following Monday, I repeated the cycle.

It takes a long time to develop as a professional tennis player. I was prepared for that, I just didn’t know how long I could sustain that lifestyle emotionally or financially. You don’t make a lot of money at the lower levels of the pro circuit, if you make any at all. Time spent travelling for tournaments was time that I didn’t Coach lessons. This meant no income for those days/weeks. Hotel, flights, gas and tournament fees would drain the account as quickly as it was filled.

I realized that I needed to save on what I could. Right at this time, I started a deep dive on nutrition and what else I could do to maximize my 5’9 frame against some of these guys who were comfortably above 6 feet tall and easily had 15-25lbs of muscle over me. I started growing a lot of food on my own (not much but it was a start). I meal prepped in the days leading up to the travel event and took my blender on almost every tournament I went to. I had it down to an art! I could go for events up to 3-4 days long and spend less than $30-40 total just for perishables I couldn’t travel with. I learned to cook and made as many of my meals as I could. This was a big boost to my training as I relied less on packaged, preserved food items and started to eat fresh, nutritionally dense and organic foods.

My friends at events would laugh and poke fun midday at my lunchbox with green juice, protein shakes and homemade flatbread sandwiches. It’s ok, I didn’t mind. It was a process, and it was working! My results were showing season after season and waves were made.

I made the US top 500 list 3 years in a row. It’s a list of the top 500 qualifying Men’s players for pro events. I started making some money as events. Nothing extravagant, but typically enough to cover expenses I incurred + some extra. Confidence was rising and it was happening.

Looking back, here are the 3 lessons I share with students today:

1) Create a plan and go for it.
– Be adaptable as things change, embrace the circumstances.

2) It takes time, be patient with yourself.
– You can put in the work, but improvements almost never show immediately.

3) Have fun, enjoy the work and the suffering.
– You will have a degree of suffering, but don’t make that the life. Take time for the small enjoyments, you won’t get this opportunity to be in this moment again.

In hindsight, I can share these moments now as they are. I didn’t always follow and understand the lessons I learned. To this day, I will struggle to remember and apply what I learned in my life before. But I guess this is what it’s all about, we learn to be better and must constantly remind ourselves to stay in check.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
This is quite the loaded question. Atlanta has A LOT to offer!!

#1 My family home
My wife and baby girl (3yrs) are most important to me and make me who I am. My best friend knows how much my family means to me and that I would not want to spend too much time away from them. There would definitely be some time spent enjoying my wife’s amazing cooking and enjoying my baby’s joyful childish antics.

#2 Ponce City Market/Belt Line
There’s a lot to see and do here for someone visiting for a week. A few hours each day for sure could be spent here. Eating at some of the delicious restaurants and snack/dessert shops. Taking some time to walk, people watch, and get some exercise on the Belt Line.

#3 Piedmont Park
As cliche as it sounds, the biggest park in Atlanta has a lot to offer. Time spent walking around, enjoying the outdoors. and having a snack/picnic at Piedmont would be on the list for sure.

#4 Buford Highway
The massive variety of cuisines and favorite restaurants we enjoy on Buford Highway would take several days to visit. There is something or everyone on this iconic and historic strip of history going from Atlanta till where I grew up in suburban Duluth.

#5 Lenox/Phipps
I’m not a big fan of the mall but it’s worth showing at least once to someone not from here. Nowadays the mall is packed at all times of the day. It’s like no one has day jobs or they do and the hours are ridiculously flexible? I’m not sure, but either way, these locations would be on the list to visit at least once.

#6 Avalon
Similarly to Lenox/Phipps. It would be a fun experience for an afternoon/evening time. There are a lot of stores and something for everyone.

#7 Decatur
I grew up in Decatur and so many food, parks and places to see hold a memorable place in my heart. Downtown Decatur (Glide Pizza) would definitely be a walkable stop for an afternoon.

#8 Inman Park area
Restaurant Delbar. One of our favorites as it has halal options for us. The food has never disappointed and the flavors are consistent every time.

#9 Cheese Foam Tea
Another Buford Hwy spot amongst the many that exist. We have our favorite (Glaze Tea) and the particular drinks there.

#10 Georgia Aquarium/Coke Museum
No explanation needed

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
First and foremost, my Mom.

Her ambition was to see me become something with tennis and her initial inspiration was due to my cousin who she grew up with almost as a sibling. Throughout their childhood and early adult years she saw first-hand what he was achieving and how close he was getting to making it in the pros! She was an athlete in her youth but she was not given the opportunities to fulfill the potential she knew she had. As I was growing up, she wanted me to have a chance at competing in a sport with opportunities here in the US. It is because of her resilience, dedication, working multiple jobs and constant support that I was able to do what I did in this sport. Which eventually turned into a rewarding and wholesome career path.

My first tennis coach, David Matthews. I never knew how awesome it was to train at at David’s tennis academy (DMTA) until I was much older and it hit me repeatedly at different stages of my tennis life. There is a lot of my tennis/fitness accomplishments that I can attribute in my life from what I learned from Coach Dave.

Several Junior Development Coaches in my youth from 12-18 years of age: Dennis Hord and Chris Palmer.

Ashley Hobson made some incredible changes to my ability as a tennis player from 15-18. Under his rigorous coaching and fundamentals, I was able to propel my 16U junior ranking from outside the top 50 in the state to nearly Top 10. I gained a Southern ranking of Top 60 and a National rank inside the top 350.

My college Coach (may he rest in peace), Coach Brennon Sewell. Though we didn’t have much time together, there are many aspects of training and coaching that influence to this day which I can trace back to Coach Sewell’s tennis philosophy.

Bryan Hiner was a mentor, training partner and helped with understanding Pro tennis training, conditioning and lifestyle. We spent a lot of time travelling to competitions, working on projects and creating/operating a tennis company together.

Coach William Crutchfield was the final coach I had before I stopped competition. I was not in a very good place with results when just before meeting Coach Crutchfield. After we spent some time together and he coached me within his tennis framework/philosophy, my results hit limits I didn’t think were possible. My last few months of competing in Pro Tennis were some of my best and most fulfilling under Crutchfield’s guidance. His system worked for me and would have continued to have a lot of success had I made the decision to continue.

My friend, partner, better-half. My wife. Shanta has seen so much of the ups, downs and everything in between when it comes to my coaching career. No matter what I’ve gone through, she has been there for me to listen, support, and give guidance. No man is whole without his wife. She has known me through the majority of my adult coaching career and I here today with her support and patience.

Website: https://www.puretennissense.com/

Instagram: https://instagram.com/puretennissense

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amyn-mukadam-soldier-9354b720/

Twitter: https://x.com/PURETENNISsense

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@PURETENNISsense

Other: puretennissense@gmail.com for email

Image Credits
Bryan Hiner

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