NOTE: Please pardon the technical issues with the sound. We did our best to capture all of Lester's stories though some of the audio & video glitched along the way.

Welcome to Season 12 Episode 40 of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week's episode is one that's very special to me as it features my father's college teammate, Lester Sack, who is still competing on the world stage at age 87!

Lester Sack didn't really start developing his tennis game until he showed up at the Tulane tennis courts as an 18-year-old freshman walk-on. He credits coach Emmett Pare with his success on the Tulane team and beyond.

Lester has been competing on the Seniors and Super Seniors tour ever since graduating from Tulane in 1958, earning a ranking in the top 3 nationally in every age group. He is the epitome of a lifelong learner, even now continuing to make changes and improvements to his game.

Here are just a few of his accomplishments in his illustrious tennis life:

• Played number 3 singles and number 1 doubles for Tulane University from 1956 to 1958 when the Green Wave won 3 Southeastern Conference Championships, and he and was ranked number 1 in doubles in the conference with partner Ron Holmberg
• Joined the professional tour and won singles titles in England and Germany, won the 1965 Canadian Open Doubles Championships, and reached the 3rd round of the 1966 French Open
• Mississippi resident until 1977 and one of the most dominant players of his generation, winning the Mississippi Open or Mississippi Closed every year and ranked number 1 in Mississippi Men’s Open Singles and top 10 in the South every year from 1959 to 1975
• Won numerous state and section age group tournaments and ranked 2nd in the nation in Men’s 45 singles in 1984, won the 1984 Men’s 45 Singles National Championship and ranked 7th and was a finalist at the Men’s 55 National Clay Court Singles Championship in 1987
• Represented the United States on the Dubler Cup, Gordon Cup, Gardner Mulloy Cup, Stevens Cup, and World Team Championship teams
• Served as the head coach of the USTA New Orleans Area Training Center and was an assistant pro for the Racquet Club of Memphis and the New Orleans Lawn Tennis Club
• Inducted into the Mississippi Tennis Hall of Fame in 1994, the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame in 1991, the Clarksdale & Cohoma County Mississippi Hall of Fame, the Louisiana Tennis Hall of Fame in 2009, the USTA Southern Tennis Hall of Fame in 2005, Tulane Athletics Hall of Fame in 2000

And Lester isn't even the oldest guy out there competing on the world stage! Take a look at this article on centenarian Henry Young who also played in the recent World Team Championships in Mallorca!

I hope to have the chance to hit with Lester in the near future. In the meantime, I'll continue to follow his tennis journey as he makes his way into his 90's!

If you’re so inclined, please share this – and all our episodes! – with your tennis community. You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes or via your favorite podcast app. If you haven’t already, be sure to become a Member of ParentingAces by visiting https://parentingaces.com/membership-join. And check out our logo’d merch as well as our a la carte personal consultations in our online shop (Premium Members received FREE SHIPPING every day!). To support ParentingAces' work with a financial donation of any size via PayPal, click here.

CREDITS

Intro & Outro Music: Morgan Stone aka STØNE

Audio & Video Editing: Lisa Stone

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