At 69 years old, Graham Ross is one of Scotland’s oldest qualified padel coaches – and he has his sights set on earning a spot on the national team for the first time.
Graham believes he may be the only certified padel coach in the north east of Scotland, having completed the PadelMBA coaching course last year. He has also nearly finished the LTA Padel Instructor course.
He coaches five 90-minute sessions per week at the two-court padel venue at Aberdeen Tennis Centre, which opened last June, and relishes playing competitive padel as often as possible.
Graham has played tennis for 50 years but first picked up padel whilst making regular trips to visit his son in Barcelona. He has worked in the oil industry as an engineer for the last 45 years and plans to retire later this year.
But before he leaves the world of industry, Graham will spend a week at the Hello Padel Academy in Sant Andreu de Llavaneres, Spain, in February, receiving world-class coaching and matchplay. “I really can’t wait,” he tells The Padel Paper. “I’ll hopefully improve my game and learn even more while I’m there about tactics and strategy. I’d quite happily play padel 12 hours a day!”
As well as embracing all opportunities to learn more about the game, Graham has ambitions to represent his country. This weekend (13-14 January) he will travel to West of Scotland Padel to take part in Scottish team trials for the second Super Seniors Four Nations competition at Rocket Padel in Bristol in March.
“I’m going to give it a good go and see if there’s a place for me,” said Graham. “I’m a left-hander so that may give me an advantage! It will be good to play with people of a similar age because I’m always playing with younger folks up here.
“Being the age I am does not make me any less competitive, but am just not able to compete with the young superstars of today. But don’t get me wrong, I will play anyone that wants a game.
“I would like to get involved [with the national super seniors set-up], if not as a player then maybe on the coaching side of things, taking training sessions and working on tactics.”
Graham is hard of hearing and has to wear hearing aids, but that doesn’t prevent him coaching social, intermediate and over-55s sessions on Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays – even in the depths of the north-east coast winter!
He jokes: “Some folks who turn up for padel lessons look like they’re going skiing!. I have to keep them running about. We do lots of games but we do that to keep warm more than anything!”
Best of luck to Graham and all players at this weekend’s Scottish team trials. We look forward to covering the Four Nations Super Seniors event in March.
