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6 CAVALIER CORNER cavalier sports P lay tennis, see the world. At least, that is how it has been for second-year Hibah Shaikh. Growing up in Teaneck, N.J., Shaikh began her sporting life swimming, playing soccer and skating before a trip to the U.S. Open changed her emphasis. "I watched Sania Mirza, who is the No. 1 doubles player in India," Shaikh said, re- calling her experience as an 8-year-old. "I watched her, and I was like, 'Okay, this is re- ally cool. I want to play tennis. I want to play the U.S. Open.'" Her parents, Riyaz Shaikh and Shirin Khan, were willing to indulge her interest, though they knew nothing about the sport. Her father did research and got her on the right track for training and development, which led her to training at the very place that had fueled her initial interest: the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. However, with her skills and success, Shaikh soon outgrew that program. Her father again did his research and signed his daughter up to play in ITF tournaments. The ITF is the International Tennis Federa- tion, with an emphasis on international. She won the first two tournaments she played in, giving her enough points to earn a ranking and push her up another level into ITF junior tennis competition. She then won her first two ITF Juniors tournaments, a Grade 5 tournament in Anti- gua and a Grade 4 in Jalisco, Mexico, which prompted her father to once again research how to best support his daughter's burgeon- ing talent. The answer was sending Shaikh to Spain to train at the BTT Tennis Academy in Pamplona for her junior and senior years of high school. She took online classes from Laurel Springs in the United States but trained before and after. While at BTT, she also continued to play in Juniors tournaments across the globe. She takes a deep breath before trying to rattle off the list of places she has been. "I've been to Australia. I've been to Costa Rica, Ecuador, Spain, obviously," she said. "I've been to a lot of places in the States, Canada, Mexico. I've been to Italy, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Brazil, Argentina. The list is pretty long." The summer between her first and second years at UVA, the list got even longer. Her fa- ther again researched ITF World Tennis Tour tournaments for his daughter to compete in to try to pick up points at the senior level. Off she headed to Tunisia and Turkey. As was often the case, her father did the research, but it was her mother who made the trips to Northern Africa and Eastern Eu- rope with her. "My mom loves to travel so much," Shaikh said. "We always go to tournaments together when I'm not with a coach. She tries to make space for some sort of tourist thing after the tournament is done. "She might book the flight a day later as we did in the Netherlands. She was like, I think you're going to want to see Amster- dam, so then we got to hang out, which is a nice break when you're tired and exhausted from whatever tournament. "Tennis players normally don't get to see much. They're only looking at the court and the hotel. You have to practice, then you have to take a day off, and you have to work out. You don't have time to go see stuff." — Melissa Dudek getting to know Second-Year Tennis Player Hibah Shaikh Shaikh was inspired to take up tennis by a trip to the U.S. Open when she was 8 years old. (Photo courtesy UVA)