14-yr old Izyan Ahmad has had a formidable rise in Juniors Tennis over the past year. Based out of NYC, young Izyan caught the global attention in 2017 at the US Open for his pinky promise conversation with the great Roger Federer.
He has been hard at work since then, rising up the world junior tennis ladder. A few of his many accomplishments include:
- USTA No. 1 in the 12s in both singles and doubles
- 2XITF J30 El Salvadore Champion and ITF 30 Mexico Champion 🏆
- 2023 Wimbledon U14 participant
- Easter Bowl U14 Singles Finalist
- 2023 Les Petits As USA Playoffs Champion 🏆
- 2024 Les Petits As Doubles Champion 🏆
- Current World No. 4 in the UTR U14 ratings
Vishnu had an opportunity to catch up with his proud dad Mr Farooq Ahmad during the Wimbledon Championships U14 event last year to understand the journey of his family so far!
The excerpts from the conversation are given below:
Journey from Kashmir to the US and the family background.
I’m from District Baramulla in Kashmir. I did my schooling, my Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Kashmir itself. After finishing my Master’s degree in Mass Communication and Journalism, my first job out of the university was in Ramoji Film City in Hyderabad. I worked for Eenadu Television for a bit and from there I moved to Bangalore.
I joined Yahoo and during that time I met my wife, Nida and we got married.
My wife and I, we’re like crazy sports fans. We played sports. I played soccer, cricket and volleyball growing up. My wife was brought up in Dubai, she did her schooling there and played multiple sports – basketball, swimming, cricket and track and field, but basketball was her main sport. She moved to Bangalore, India to attend college and played basketball for Jyoti Nivas College in Bangalore/Bangalore University.
So in a nutshell, we’re a crazy sports family. It’s very important in our household to play sports.
In 2009, one of Nida’s work projects brought us to USA.
Entry of Izyan Ahmad
We were based in Cincinnati, Ohio for a while and Zizou was born there. After a while we moved to the San Francisco Bay Area.
Izyan was born in 2010 on June 3rd, please note that he shares birthday with the King of clay, Rafa Nadal. Before Izyan was born, my wife started looking for names and after months long search we both agreed upon the name IZYAN AHMAD as the name and ZIZOU as the nickname. Being the sports fanatics that we are, the nickname was very important, because both our favourite footballer is the legend Zinedine Zidane. So that’s where ZIZOU comes from and not many people know Zizou’s actual name now. Given the name, we thought Zizou would end up playing football/soccer.
Formative years in sports
Zizou’s first toys were soccer balls and basketballs. He had a mini-basketball hoop and a little soccer goal post in his room before his first birthday. Around 2 years old, I would take him out in the park to kick the soccer ball around and he loved it. I still remember that little baby boy, running behind the ball and kicking it only with his left foot. He started showing great interest in soccer and would wait the whole day to go to the park in the evening. During the day, he would either throw the basketball in the mini-hoop or kick the soccer ball in the mini-goal post in his room. He had a ton of energy and refused to sit down. At the park, he would play for 45 mins to an hour when he was really young, and when it was time to go home, he would start crying. He just wanted to continue playing. He’s sort of obsessed with running around and playing with a ball.
Entry into Tennis
Nida and I started playing tennis with a few friends. I never played tennis before, but I loved it the very first time I played. One day, we took Zizou to the tennis court, and while we were playing, he was walking around the court. One of our friends had bought a small tennis racket for him, we put the racquet in his hand and I slowly threw a ball towards him. We were surprised to see that he didn’t only hit the ball, he hit it over the net. He was not even 3 years old. That was the first ball he ever hit. Nida and I looked at each other with a smile on our faces. Later that evening, we discussed it at home and thought at such a young age, it’s not easy to judge the bounce of the ball, have the hand-eye coordination, and make contact with the ball. We thought he might be good at it.
So from that time onwards, we would actually do 45 minutes of soccer on one side of the park, and 45 minutes of tennis with a tennis wall located on the other end of the park. Zizou started playing for Boca Juniors youth soccer when he was 4 years old. His main sport at that time was Soccer. Tennis was like a secondary sport, but he was obsessed with both.
At age 7, it was getting too difficult to manage schedules because both the tennis and the soccer folks wanted extra time. We gave him a choice and he chose to play tennis, even though at that time he was better at soccer. I might even argue that he may be still better at soccer, he had a gifted left foot, unbelievable ball control and dribbling skills.
Till age 7, he trained with me. He didn’t go to any academy or take lessons with a tennis coach. When we saw how interested and passionate he was about this sport, I started doing a lot of research and learning about tennis/coaching from a lot of videos and books. So, I coached him till 2017, till he was seven. I enjoy every minute of it because his energy and passion was contagious, even when he was 4. Taking him to the tennis court was a family affair, all 4 of us, including his little sister came along. We would all spend 2-3 hours on the town courts every evening and it was great.
Move to the John McEnroe Tennis Academy
We moved to the East Coast and there was a scholarship tryout at the John McEnroe Tennis Academy, courtesy of Johnny Mac Tennis Project (JMTP). I took him there for the tryouts and he actually ended up getting the scholarship out of a huge group of kids. There were more than 100 kids who participated and they had maybe one or two scholarships to give and he was one of the kids chosen. He was not even seven yet. So, since then he’s been training at the John McEnroe Tennis Academy. Most of the days he’s at the Academy and then the days he doesn’t go, we just do some light training at the local tennis courts.
He started competing in the tournaments at a very young age, right around when he turned 7 and he did very well right from the get go. I think in the first ever tournament he played, he got to the semis and he ended up winning the 2nd one.
The Academy has been taking great care of him and it’s like a 2nd home to him. He was ranked No. 1 in the country in 12s in both singles and doubles, when he had just turned 11..
On what kept them going
I wouldn’t say early results are criteria of how you’re going to do later on and grow and progress to tougher competition. I think it has more to do with motivation and that’s what we and his coaching team saw in him very early on. He showed a lot of dedication and motivation towards the sport. He loved it. He didn’t want to go home. He never said, I’m tired, instead he always wanted to play more and loved every bit of it.
I think these are the better criterias – the motivation, the passion and the will to work harder and not the results you see early. No doubt, the results give you a lot of confidence.
Zizou showed a lot of grit and passion from the beginning and it was evident that he has that athletic/sports bug in him. We were not sure whether it was going to be soccer or tennis but he ended up choosing tennis.
On the game structure of Izyan Zizou Ahmad
He’s an all-court player. All surfaces, all courts. He can play really solid from the baseline. One of his strengths is he’s really good at the net, which a lot of kids of his age are not. He loves to come into the court and he’s very solid at the net or inside the court. He has a really good serve for his age and height.
One of the biggest strengths is his athleticism. He’s super fast. He can grind for hours and you might think that you hit a winner and he’ll bring that ball and make you hit an extra shot. We’re trying to incorporate different elements from all good players into him. So it’s a work in progress so far.
He’s 5’9″right now. He loves fitness. There’re a lot of really good junior tennis players around and a lot of times, fitness level plays a huge part. Zizou loves fitness and enjoys his time in the gym. I consider that a big thing because fitness is a huge part of this sport.
In tennis we get to a level, when most of the players almost hit with similar pace and consistency and that’s when tennis IQ ends up being a differentiating factor. Zizou has a good understanding of the sport, he can analyze his opponents game and problem solve.
On the journey ahead
Tennis is a precision sport. Unlike other sports, you have to train a lot and progress every day. So, it’s wise to take it day by day, month by month and year by year. As a team we set up mini goals in front of him and as long as he’s achieving those mini goals, we are on the right track. The key is to achieve those small goals to get to the bigger ones.
On the John McEnroe Tennis Academy
John McEnroe, Patrick McEnroe and the whole team at Johnny Mac Tennis Project (JMTP) and John McEnroe Tennis Academy (JMTA) have been vital in this whole process. It’s very difficult to raise a tennis player given how expensive this sport is. You need to have a solid team around you and it takes a village to raise a tennis player.
John, Patrick and other coaching and performance training staff are heavily involved in Zizou development and day to day training. At times, John hits with Zizou and gives him feedback. Without JMTP and JMTA, this won’t be possible.
Pinky promise question to Roger Federer
As a 7 yr old, Zizou was part of a USTA group called Net Generation Ambassadors. So, because of that association, he got to go to a press conference during the US Open and ask a question. As luck would have it, the press conference that Zizou went to, his tennis idol Roger Federer was scheduled at that time.
Zizou is a voracious reader and somewhere he had read that Switzerland is very cold. He thought because it’s cold, there won’t be much livestock there. So, when they asked him that you have to come up with a question, he came up with the GOAT question. His mom loved the question and to be honest, I was skeptical, because I was wondering if it would be appropriate to ask this particular question to a living legend. Nida insisted that it was an awesome question and we stuck with it. Thankfully, Roger really loved it and that’s when the PINKY PROMISE was made.
On meeting the great Roger Federer in Switzerland!
Just around the time when Zizou got to USTA No. 1 ranking in 12s, we got a call that Federer wants to actually make good on that pinky promise. They contacted me through the academy and that’s how this whole thing was planned. Zizou had no idea what was going on and what was going to happen. Nida and I were aware of the whole situation, but Zizou and my daughter, Inara had no clue. We didn’t want to tell Inara, because there was a chance that she might share it with Zizou.
We told the kids that we are going to meet our best friends in Basel. We let them know that we will spend some time with our friends in Basel and then we will travel to Zurich, where Zizou will be attending a training camp along with some European junior players.
He was all set for the training camp and at the site after the awkward encounter with the Chef and seeing a huge crowd of kids on the sideline, he was totally shell shocked when he saw Federer. We could see him shaking from a distance, he just couldn’t believe that his tennis idol was right in front of him. I am myself one of the biggest RF fans, I was in a state of shock as well and I couldn’t believe what was happening right in front of my eyes. My son was on the same tennis court with Roger Federer.I still can’t believe it happened, but it did happen. It was an unbelievable experience just to get some feedback about Zizou’s tennis from Roger. He sat with us and we had dinner together. He talked about his family and his growing up years as a young tennis player.
We got to see that greatness and humility first hand and it was undoubtedly one of the best days of our lives!
Kashmiri community reaction on the rise of Izyan Zizou Ahmad
There is definitely support from people back home. Tennis is not a big sport there so not many people know about it. But the people that know about tennis, know about Zizou and are always rooting for him.