The Scarlet & Black

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The Scarlet & Black

The Scarlet & Black

Spotlight: Shirlene Luk

On Saturday, Oct. 5, Shirlene Luk ’15, of Grand Forks, N.D., won her number one singles match against Beloit College 6-1, 6-0. Luk also won her doubles match against Beloit with her partner Sadhana Athreya ’14, beating Beloit 8-0. Grinnell women’s tennis currently has an 8-3 record and will play two home matches against Lake Forest College and Knox College this Saturday, Oct. 12 at 9:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m., respectively.

 

Photograph by Parker Van Nostrand.

How do you get yourself into the proper mentality before a game?

I try to zone everything out and try to focus on staying loose before my match.

 

Did you feel that there was a lot of pressure playing number one singles in your last match?

I had a few opportunities to play number one singles last year, so I was used to the pressure. Last year’s number one singles player, Laura Krull [’13], was injured a few times during the season, so I played her spot in certain matches. So I kind of already had the feel of playing the number one spot.

 

What is the best part about being on Grinnell’s team?

It’s great to have friends to hang out with right away during the school year; we’re really close as a team. It’s also great to have tennis as something to do during the day. It’s nice to be able to play tennis and go outside instead of staying in a room studying.

 

What will you be working on between now and your next match this Saturday?

Definitely my serves, because I just need to get them to be more consistent. I also want to work on my doubles strategy. We lost a few of our doubles games when we were playing against St. Norbert College, so I think we need to improve our doubles playing for Saturday.

 

What are your goals for the team this year?

I hope we win the Midwest Conference again this year. We’ve won conference for the past four or five years, and I want to make sure that we keep going at it this year.

 

When did you start playing tennis?

I started playing tennis when I was in fifth grade. I didn’t want to do gymnastics anymore and the tennis courts were right next to the gymnastics center, so my mom just shipped me off to play tennis [laughs].

 

What is your funniest tennis memory?

It would have to be the time when I played with Clothilde Thirouin ’14, who was my doubles partner last year. We were making jokes during a match and she started laughing so hard. Clo has this great laugh that sounds like she’s crying. The other team just stared at us, shocked [laughs].

 

What do you think tennis has taught you in life?

It has definitely taught me to be more organized. I’ve needed to balance my academics with practice, and I’ve learned to be more organized in order to continue to do well in school.

 

Besides tennis, what other things do you love to do?

I love drawing as a hobby. And I’m also really into cars. I love looking at the specs of certain car models. My dream car is a Bugatti.

 

 

—Compiled by Jenny Chi

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