Commitment Announcement
Fall Signing Week '16: Wan Decides on Columbia
by
Gary Curreri, 9 November 2016
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Christie Wan plans to study business in college, and that is appropriate since she is all business on the tennis court.
The 17-year-old blue chip prospect from Fullerton, Calif., has spent the past two years at Sunny Hills High School after she transferred from Whittier Christian High School. And today she is excited to announce her decision to continue her career at
Columbia University.
Wan's been playing tennis for a dozen years. When she first began playing, the older players complained she wasn't good enough to participate in the group clinics.
"I tried all different types of sports when I was younger and tried playing instruments, dance, art, etc. One day we got a brochure promoting a small tennis clinic, and so I tried it out," Wan said. "It was a group clinic, and I was the youngest with no experience, so the parents of the older kids complained to the coach that I wasn't good enough to be there. Because of that, my mom (Sharon) decided to put me in private lessons until I started training at the USTA."
Wan started private lessons less than six months after the group clinic experience, and those lessons helped her hone her fundamentals.
"It was basic hand feeding and fundamentals," Wan recalled. "It really stressed the fundamentals."
Her experience with the USTA at the Stubhub Center in Carson, California was challenging. She began training there at the age of 10.
"I initially went in the summer and then continued to the fall," said Wan, who went through drills in the morning and match play and fitness in the afternoon. There was a break for lunch between.
"Some things I initially worked on were my serve and consistency," Wan said. "It was really tough as a 10 year old until I was 14. Over the summer there was a huge workload and grueling hours."
There was also discipline needed when the fall rolled along.
