Our Team - Ellie Appleby

Ellie Appleby

Tennis has so many avenues in which you can get involved and for what is more widely known as a solo sport, my experience is that it is so much more. I have been a tennis ‘player’ since I was 3 when I attended my first tots session pretending I could hit the ball. I have since played for 6 different clubs and have had Hertfordshire and Middlesex tournament/league success in both junior and open categories. I have been coaching for 5 years including tots tennis, mini tennis, adult beginners and cardio sessions. I have coordinated and run mini tennis tournaments as a member of the Junior committee at my previous club. The wider role of this was to encourage juniors into tennis not with the primary reason being commercial, but more so to build a warm and friendly culture for anyone to feel comfortable to be a part of. Particularly, encouraging girls to get involved in tennis as well. I completed Judy Murray’s She Rally’s Little Miss Hits course, a dedicated program to shining a new light on bringing girls through tennis and I am also qualified to deliver this program. 

I am part of the Rickmansworth hockey team and participate in the five counties league (although I cannot claim to hit a hockey ball with as much as much confidence as I do a tennis ball!) I also assisted in tutoring maths GCSE students through their exams. 

My full-time job is in Learning and Development. I design and deliver Leadership and Professional skills training to financial services colleagues. I am additionally qualified as a Lumina Learning practitioner which enables me to explore people’s strengths and development areas in order to further their potential. My professional skills here don’t work in isolation because as you get stronger as a tennis player, (or even as a junior) the sport very much very becomes a mental battle. Building confidence and staying calm under pressure are very much transferable skills that all coaches should champion. 

I am really looking forward to assisting the head coaches at Your Advantage Tennis Academy as a volunteer, through leading coaching sessions, supporting the coordination of the programme and promoting a safe and encouraging environment for all!