Welcome to Season 11, Episode 25, of the ParentingAces Podcast, a proud member of the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. This week, Lisa chats with Erik Kortland, former college and professional player and current coach and business person, about his latest venture, RKT Group, Inc.

After his playing career, Erik started at the Riviera Country Club in Los Angeles as Head of Elite Player and Academy Development, where he was responsible for developing a Top-10 national player in every age group of boys and girls. After much success as a private coach, Erik was hired in 2013 by USTA Player Development as National Coach, Junior Development. His primary responsibility was to implement USTA PD philosophy at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, site of the annual US Open Tennis Championships, directly developing USA’s very best prospects and creating programming for all juniors.  

In 2016 Erik coached Amanda Anisimova (pictured with Erik) to her first junior French Open final and first WTA grand slam win at the US Open. In 2017 he coached Whitney Osuigwe and Claire Liu to the finals of the Junior French open and Claire Liu and Ann Li to the finals of Junior Wimbledon. 

In 2017 and 2018 USA recaptured the Junior Fed Cup title twice in Budapest, Hungary with 2017 team of Amanda Anisimova, Whitney Osuigwe, Caty McNally and 2018 team Coco Gauff, Alexa Noel, and Connie Ma. In 2018, Erik was promoted to Lead National coach for men’s and women’s tennis and was in charge of all women’s and junior boys programming at Training Center West in Carson, CA. In 2021 Erik resigned from USTA and joined the Tecnifibre/Lacoste Performance Team as part of their sports marketing and player development department. With all Erik’s tennis expertise and business industry experience it was a natural fit to team up with Ryan Redondo and Khuong Tien to form RKT Group, Inc.

RKT Group's mission is to grow the game of tennis by working with municipalities, private clubs, coaches, and families to provide educational and funding opportunities through consulting. Erik, Ryan, and Khuong each bring a unique perspective to our sport as players, industry representatives, business owners, and tennis parents.

To learn more about RKT, visit its website at http://www.rkt3.com. You can reach out to Erik directly via his email: ekortland@rkt3.com.

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CREDITS

Intro & Outro Music: Morgan Stone aka STØNE

Audio & Video Editing: Lisa Stone

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