Eloise’s new team at MTSU is made up of students from South Africa, India, Canada, two from Germany, and one American from Georgia. “We’re quite an international team.” Eloise highlights.
The opportunity to play alongside some of the world’s keenest up-and-coming tennis players has been a growing passion for Eloise from a very early age. She believes she first picked up a racket at age 4 to play with her family, who love and live sport. This home culture for physical activity saw Eloise try her hand at a number of competitive sports locally during her early years, including basketball, athletics, tennis, netball, and swimming. Eloise describes her family life as, “If we’re not inside doing our school work, we’re outside playing sport.”
At around 9 years old, Eloise began receiving coaching at the Warrnambool Lawn Tennis Club, and the more she played, the more she loved it and the more committed she became. Under coach Matt Moloney (Class of 2003) her efforts saw her represent the South West at various levels. Then by 14 years of age she was receiving invitations to train in Melbourne with high performance coach Doug Hill, and was successful in attracting a scholarship to support this. While training in Melbourne, Eloise continued her commitment to her other great sporting love – netball, and the Port Fairy Football/Netball Club. “I loved playing netball because it was more of a team sport.” She comments.
By the age of 16, Eloise was presented with a tough choice that ultimately saw her follow the exciting pathway into tennis that continued to emerge. “I started to get some offers from different Colleges when I was in Year 11 at Emmanuel.” She says.
While clearly a very self-motivated athlete, Eloise also takes inspiration from a broad range of tennis players, from professionals to her co-players. She identifies Australian Open winner Ash Barty’s court composure; the resilience of Ballarat talent, Zoe Hives; and the support good friends Amy Stevens and Olivia Symons.
The move to MTSU has seen a significant increase in the intensity of Eloise’s training. A typical day now begins at 5:30am in the gym doing weight sessions before her classes begin at 8am. Classes run all morning and are then followed by three hours of tennis training in the afternoons. “I’ve never really trained for 3 hours straight. So that took a little while for my body to adjust. It definitely was a bit of a shock to the body. I’ve become a lot fitter which has really helped me on the court with my agility.” She comments.
Currently, this gruelling training schedule runs alongside the competitive College tennis season, seeing Eloise playing each weekend as well. Adding to the excitement of her conference matches is that the team gets transported across the country in the College’s private plane. “We’re really lucky, MTSU has an aerospace program, so we’ve actually got our own planes.” She highlights.
The new training regime is not only strengthening her body, but her mental toughness too. “I like to keep the points nice and short and sweet, but in College tennis it’s different. You have to rally and wait for the right shot. Mentally that is exhausting, especially when you’re playing long matches and you’ve had a long week of training and you’ve travelled.”
I’ve never really trained for 3 hours straight. So that took a little while for my body to adjust. It definitely was a bit of a shock to the body. I’ve become a lot fitter which has really helped me on the court with my agility.
Somehow amongst all the training and study, Eloise still finds time to explore and experience her new hometown in Tennessee. “Where I am, it feels like home. I’m not in the city, I’m out in. . . it sort of feels like Geelong. We’re about 30-40 minutes away from Nashville. So, it’s almost like Geelong to Melbourne.”
Eloise has found the College community very welcoming and has quickly built up a group of friends. “I’m a naturally talkative person, I like meeting new people and I like hearing about their stories.” She says.
Eloise also has the support of a host family, who have introduced her to middle-american culture and enjoying an off-campus home-cooked meal.
Eloise explains, “Church is a big thing here. I’ve found it sort of intriguing to see how they do things differently. It depends on the church; some Catholic churches are more traditional and others are more for teenagers. There’s more singing and there’s a lot more yelling out ‘Amen’ or ‘Hallelujah’. They play live music, and they’re singing the music which attracts more of the younger audience as well. So, it is quite interesting.”
In addition to church services, life in Tennessee has presented Eloise with some surprising differences in culture and ways of life. From diet changes, to how tertiary studies are paid for, to the way men and women are addressed, Eloise is experiencing a learning curve well beyond her studies and coaching.
Everywhere she goes, she now gets referred to as Ma’am. “It’s quite funny, you call women of any age Ma’am and men, Sir. Sometimes I still think they are being sarcastic.” She comments.
However, the differences in food have presented the most nuances, with variations in access to non-processed foods, how portion sizes are defined and oddities in the local cuisine. While she was warned about meal sizes before entering the States, she admits that she still sometimes forgets to order small meals or entrees, which in terms of size align much more closely with our version of large meals. “Everything is honestly just like extra. The meals are so big. You sort of have to be careful with what you’re eating.”
Eloise also highlights the amount of processed food available, describing their cereal as looking just like lollies. “We’re very lucky with the variety of healthy food we have (in Australia)”. She is missing ‘proper chocolate’ and is still on the hunt for some of the basic ingredients to whip up some homemade slice. The College residence however boasts a diverse range of meals for students.
“I’ve been trying a few different American foods. Some of them have been good, some have been quite interesting. They love their peanut butter and jelly sandwiches! I’m honestly not a fan.” She says. Other local delicacies Eloise has sampled to mixed reviews are pumpkin pie, s’mores and candied yams.
While Eloise enjoys discovering and learning about all these differences, she equally enjoys learning about her own norms that are now seen as different. As the only Aussie on the team, Eloise occasionally gets pulled up for the way she speaks and is met with ‘What are you saying, Ellie? What does that mean?’ An example of an Australianism that is catching on is ‘See you this arvo!’; another is the shortening of friends’ names, particularly if they are already short - Amy being shortened to Aimz. “They love how I shorten everything!” she admits.
Congratulations Eloise on all your success and adventures so far. Emmanuel alumni can get behind Eloise by watching her matches streamed via the MTSU website goblueraiders.com
