I continue to write about the best tennis programs for junior tennis players. I found that the most successful tennis coaches/programs do not advertise. But how tennis parent can discover them? Because only a few coaches can say that they have developed dozens of successful professional tennis players. A few more can state that they have produced at least one tennis pro.

Living legends like Nick Bollettieri or Robert Lansdorp do not need additional publicity. Everyone in the tennis world knows them. But wait, last year I was at a tennis tournament while my son was playing a match and I saw Robert Lansdorp. He was watching his player on the next court. I came up to him just to say “hello” and exchange a couple of words. After the short talk I returned to my son’s court and was asked by another tennis parent “who is that guy you just talked to?” I answered that it was the great Robert Lansdorp. “Lansdorp?”, repeated the parent, “who is that?” I was confused; I didn’t think there existed a tennis parent who didn’t know who Robert Lansdorp is. I thought maybe I pronounced the name incorrectly. So, I repeated slowly R-o-b-e-r-t L-a-n-s-do-r-p, the coach who developed many legendary tennis players, including Maria Sharapova. I remember that moment because it was a big surprise for me that some tennis parents whose kids have played tennis for ten years did not recognize one of the greatest tennis coaches.

Now back to the question: how to define really good coaches if most of them can never say that they developed Maria Sharapova or Pete Sampras. One of the ways to do that is to use statistics. You can go online and look at the USTA or tennisrecruiting sites. Find top 100 players in your kid’s division and look at locations.

In many cases this approach works well. For example, your kid plays boys 18s. If you look at  the usta.com and tennisrecruiting.net rankings for this age division, you will find that among American top players, four kids play tennis in the same city: Gage Brymer, Stefan Menichella, Drew Dawson and Tyler Lu. Then you can figure out that all of them train at the same club,Woodbridge Tennis Club, and attend University High School in Irvine. After that you can continue your research and look at the other age divisions, and you know what, you will find several more very strong tennis players. All these kids go to a very competitive high school and play tennis after school hours. All these kids are going to very good universities, which means they are good students with decent SATs and GPAs. How is it possible?

The answer is obvious: Woodbridge Tennis Club has very good coaches who have developed many very good junior tennis players for many years. It’s not easy to be accepted to the club. Two years ago I wanted to send my kid there, but they were not able to accept him because all the groups were full. It shows that great coaches are in high demand.

I can therefore assume that Woodbridge Tennis Club is the best tennis club for junior tennis players in the U.S. I did not find any other tennis club in America which constantly develops local players into blue chips and five-star players. If you know another tennis club with a similarly impressive record, please send me information about the club/coach and I will write about it.

I hope that using this simple methodology you will be able to find the best tennis coach or club for your kid in your area.