Tennis Academy
Kilgraston’s tennis academy provides a comprehensive and engaging programme for our most committed and talented players under the guidance of two professional coaches, Adam Brown and Olivia Paisley.
Adam is an award-winning LTA qualified and fully licensed level 4 Senior Performance Coach. He works on a one-to-one with our most gifted players and also offers additional squad training at the National Tennis Centre in Stirling for girls wishing to progress to county level and beyond.
A successful junior player, Adam grew up in Cumbria where he was county champion in the under 14, 16 and 18 age categories. He has represented Cumbria since the age of 14 and is currently the men’s team captain.
At 16, he was awarded a tennis scholarship at Sir Hugh Owen School in Caernarfon, North Wales. From there he moved to Scotland to study at Stirling University where he also held a tennis scholarship.
Since graduating in 2005 with an upper second-class honours degree in Business Law, Adam has worked as a full time tennis coach.
He began his career at Kirkby Stephen in Cumbria as a Community Tennis Coach. After a year and a half in that post, he moved to Hamilton, New Zealand where he worked at a tennis academy as a performance coach with some of the country’s top ranked juniors.
On returning from New Zealand in June 2008, he worked briefly at Linlithgow Tennis Club, West Lothian, before taking up his current post as Central Scotland District Coach in Stirling.
Based at the National Tennis Centre at Stirling University, Adam runs district and regional performance squads for talented individuals and has helped to produce some of
Scotland’s best junior players.
In 2009, he was made Scottish Tennis Coach of the year and was also given a Tennis Scotland participation award for organising the Central Scotland mini tennis tour.
At Kilgraston, Adam is keen to try and increase opportunities for girls to play and compete from the under 8s through to the under 18s.
Olivia is a qualified and fully licensed LTA and UKCC endorsed Level 3 Club Coach. As a youngster she developed a love of tennis on courts next to her childhood home in Moffat in Dumfries and Galloway.
As a junior, she was South West Scotland’s singles and doubles champion in both the under 16 and under 18 age groups. She was also named South of Scotland’s most improved player of the year 2001 to 2002.
Before coming to Kilgraston as academy coach Olivia was head coach at Bridge of Allan Tennis Club in Stirling, where Andy Murray played much of his outdoor tennis as a young junior.
At Kilgraston Olivia works with girls of all ages and abilities, encouraging home-grown talent, particularly amongst the under 10s.
With the help of our two coaches, academy players benefit from individual coaching, squad training and regular opportunities to compete in LTA sanctioned ratings and ranking tournaments alongside interschool competitions.
Our elite players have access to eight new astroturf courts including three specifically for tennis and a five court tennis area also used for fitness, mini hockey, netball, football and basketball. We have an indoor court in the sports hall for when bad weather stops play outside.
Enjoyment of tennis is at the heart of our programme whatever a girl’s age or ability. Our coaches provide individual programmes for each player in a supportive environment, working closely on technique. Squad performance training, strength and conditioning, video analysis, psychology and nutrition also play a key role.
Most importantly Kilgraston hopes to inspire pupils to achieve their goals in tennis and to continue playing the game into the future.
We believe that the game of tennis offers important life skills, helping our girls to both realise their dreams and build resilience by learning to cope with both victory and defeat through competitive match play.
For more information about the Tennis Academy, including scholarships, please contact us via [email protected]