The Birth of the Academy
Nick Bollettieri
After leaving Puerto Rico (Click Here) I was back in Miami, and had no concrete plans for my future when I heard of a promising opportunity on the other side of the state. The Colony Beach and Tennis Resort, which was located on Longboat Key, one of the barrier islands on the Gulf Coast by Sarasota and Bradenton, was considering bringing on a new director for its tennis program.
Longboat Key, Bradenton, Sarasota? I had barely heard of any of those places. What little I knew about that part of the state came from Mike DePalmer, Sr., a former basketball and football coach, who was then director of tennis at the Bradenton Country Club.
Mike and I had become friends when his two young children, Michelle and Mike Jr., both terrific players, came to Beaver Dam. They later became pro tour players. Michelle was in the top 100 before injuries halted her promising career.
Mike Jr. also played on the professional circuit, worked as a teaching pro for me later on and coached Boris Becker for a while. His younger sons, David and Joe, worked for me as coaches, too.
This was an athletically talented family and we have remained close ever since I first met them. At the time, Mike Sr. helped me get an appointment with the owner of The Colony, Dr. Murf Klauber.
My assistant Julio Moros and I hopped in my purple Cadillac--a lot of people made fun of me because of the color, but I didn't care—and we drove across Alligator Alley and then headed north on I-75. We arrived at the resort just in time for a beautiful sunset. Julio looked at me and said, "Let's settle down here."
The Handshake
The next morning, we met with Doc Klauber. He was originally from Buffalo, New York, where he'd been a successful orthodontist, and he was crazy like me, wild, passionate, and nuts about tennis.
At The Colony, he owned the recreation rights, the tennis courts, pro shop and the restaurants, but not the 232 villas and condos. That became a problem over the years when hotel management and the condo owners didn't see eye to eye, and today the entire resort is completely closed down, a sad ending to a fabulous facility.
At the time, though, The Colony was very much a happening place. Doc and I talked briefly about what he was looking for and the possibility of me starting a tennis academy while operating programs for guests.
He was happy to support my plans so long as the needs of the guests and their families always came first. I assured him they would, he and I shook hands and I had the job.
In all the time we worked together, we never had a single disagreement, and we have remained close friends over the years. The Colony experience turned out to be another Life changing opportunity for me, and I am forever grateful to Doc for giving it to me.
Mike DePalmer, Sr. knew just about everyone in the area, which helped us get a quick start. My pros and I gave lessons to the guests at the hotel during the day. Several nights a week, I also put on clinics at the Bradenton Country Club. Soon we added clinics for local junior players before and after The Colony guests used the courts.
The guests loved seeing the kids play and many of the juniors hit with the adults. We charged $35 a weekend for the junior sessions, and I gave all of it to my pros for putting in the extra time. Both junior and adult lessons proved popular, and I am proud to say that The Colony became the No. 1 tennis resort in the world for the five years I stayed there.
Many of the people I met at Dorado Beach followed me to The Colony, visiting over Christmas and other holidays. Louis Marx and his family were among them. His son Louis became the captain of the Princeton tennis team.
A few years later, he bought a home on Casey Key, installed a private court and would fly down almost every weekend with his kids to play tennis with my staff and me. Casey Key became home to well-to-do and famous people who value their privacy, like the author Stephen King and Rosie O'Donnell.
Bassett and Horvath
One day a young girl and her father, Carling and John Bassett, showed up at the courts of The Colony. I had no idea who they were, but on John's request, I hit a few balls with her.
Afterward he asked me what I thought and I told him that Carling had a lot of talent. John informed me that first afternoon that he wanted her to stay with me, and she became my first live-in student, staying at my home on Shinbone Alley on the north end of Longboat Key.
It turned out that Carling's mother's family had founded Carling Breweries in Canada. John later became one of the Academy's great benefactors. He bought a bus for us when we wanted to take our players to state-wide tournaments, and he built a Har-Tru court for me at my house and included me in the development of a residential community next to the Academy.
He loved sports and was instrumental in starting the World Football League. It was a shame that he died so young in his early 50s. His widow, Susan, a wonderful woman, ended up marrying Doc Klauber.
Carling was always a fierce competitor. Her favorite saying was, "Watch out for me, I'm coming." She won a number of junior tournaments and reached the semifinals of the U.S. Open in 1984 as a 16-year-old. That was just a year after she had turned pro. Carling achieved a ranking of No. 8 in the world by the time she was 17.
At the same time, she pursued a career as a fashion model and dabbled in acting. In 1987, she married fellow tennis player Robert Seguso, and they have five beautiful children.
Another student who came to Florida to stay at my home was Kathleen Horvath. She was a talented youngster and my first protégé to be ranked among the top 10 female players in the world.
One day I came upon her at my pool hanging upside down from a tree. When I asked her why, she said her father had told her that it would stretch her and make her taller. It's doubtful that that regimen had anything to do with her success.
She won a number of junior championships, turned pro at 15 and two years later upset Martina Navratilova in the 1983 French Open--the only player to defeat Martina that year. But her career stalled and she left tennis behind in her early 20s and made her career with Merrill Lynch in New York.
Meanwhile, so many youngsters were visiting our Beaver Dam camp that in the summer of 1977, I told a number of the families at the camp that I was opening a boarding school for junior tennis players in Sarasota.
I can still remember the surprise on Julio Moros' face when I told him that we'd have 15 to 20 kids arriving in September. He asked, "Where are we going to put them?" At that point we had no boarding facilities, so we ended up having the students live at my house and with the other pros.
One of our earliest boarders was Anne White, a delightful young woman from West Virginia, who ranked among the top 20 women players in the world before she turned 20. She stayed with Mike DePalmer's family and later caused quite a stir at the 1985 Wimbledon tournament when she wore a full-length, formfitting, white lycra body suit in her first round match.
The Birth of Group Lessons
As programs at The Colony expanded, I began large group instruction for the junior players. I had no choice because Julio and I were dealing with an increasing number of guests, and we had to find a way to teach all of our young players in the limited time and space available.
So I put anywhere from 20 to 40 students on one court at a time. While one was hitting, everybody else was skipping rope, running in place and improving their conditioning. If someone missed a ball, it was push-up time.
This was a revolutionary idea, and it worked quite well, although Kathleen Horvath didn't like it and insisted on getting personal attention. The successful experiment started the trend of mass teaching that is commonplace in tennis clubs and training facilities everywhere now.
The Club and the Motel
When things finally got so busy at The Colony that the guests couldn't get court time, I bought a club in 1978 in West Bradenton that had 21 courts, (nine clay and 12 hard, 16 of them lighted). We called our junior academy the DePalmer Bollettieri Tennis Club and kept growing to the point that we needed to add our separate own student housing.
We found a rundown, 20-room motel on Manatee Avenue in Bradenton that was for sale. I asked Louis Marx if he could help with payment, and he generously gave me the $50,000 needed.
The motel had small rooms designed for two people, but we arranged the bedding to accommodate four to six kids. Eric Korita, at 6' 6", was so tall that his feet would stick out over the end of his bunk bed.
The rooms were so small that all the students' racquets, bags and personal items had to be stored by the shed in the pool area. The tennis itself was still in a separate location at the club Mike and I owned.
The kitchen was set up for one family, so we turned two bedrooms into our academy commissary. We'd give our students breakfast and send them off in two rental vans, one to Bradenton Academy and the other to Saint Stephen's Episcopal School. Then we made sandwiches for lunch, which the students ate in the parking lot of the club before their tennis lessons. Later a cook prepared dinner at the motel--spaghetti, Salisbury steak.
Afterwards, it was time for cleanup, homework and room checks. There was no chef on Sundays, so we cooked bacon and scrambled eggs in a big frying pan for everyone. For dinner, we bought KFC or pizza--this was before I became more interested in nutrition and its effects on athletic performance.
Some of the players who ended up staying at the motel in the early days included Susan Smith, a nationally ranked junior and Frank Falkenburg, later an Ultimate Frisbee champion, who became an attorney and my personal manager for some time at the Academy.
Annacone
Paul Annacone also stayed there. Paul was an All-American at the University of Tennessee and spent a decade as a pro, winning the doubles championship at the Australian Open in 1985.
Later on, he became a coach and took over as Pete Sampras' coach when Tim Gullikson got sick in 1994. Paul went on to coach Tim Henman and Roger Federer. His calm personality fit in well with these relatively laid back players.
We were anything but laid back at the new Academy. We went at breakneck pace and improvised whenever necessary. Picnic tables were set up in the driveway and the kids would eat in shifts. We didn't have a place for them to study, so we filled in the swimming pool and built a 1,200-square-foot structure on top of it to serve as a makeshift study hall.
Academy coaches served as cooks, bus drivers, maids and yes, tennis coaches. We worked 365 days a year with no time off, but I shared the profits we made with them (if we made any profits).
I can't say enough about the dedication of my amazing staff from those early days, including Julio Moros, Chip Brooks, Ted Meekma, Greg Breunich, Steve Owens, Sammy Aviles, and Piri and Edwin Oyola.
Many stayed with me for decades and worked tirelessly to help make my vision for a tennis academy become a reality. Some remain with me today!
Another Divorce
While my dedicated staff joined me willingly for the busy ride, my marriage did not survive the whirlwind of activity and my relentless drive to succeed. After more than a decade together, Jeri and I weren't getting along anymore, and she decided to file for divorce. She moved to Cincinnati where her sister Janet lived, taking my two daughters with her.
After a while my older daughter Danielle decided to come back to Florida to stay with me. She didn't receive any privileges when at the house or on the courts. She became an excellent tennis player and won the state doubles championship.
Danielle later married academy coach Greg Breunich and they have given me two wonderful granddaughters, Willa Bay and Addie Sky, both excellent tennis players.
During the two years after my divorce, I lived as a bachelor, spending time in hot spots on St. Armand's Circle, at the time the "in" place in Sarasota for tourists, resort guests and wealthy, famous people. Some nights we got pretty wild.
My drink in those days was Crown Royal whiskey, ginger ale and a wedge of lemon. One night, when I had had too much "ginger ale," I went to the bathroom and got into an argument with someone. It got so loud that some of my friends came rushing in to intercede. Turns out, it was me I was shouting at. I was cursing out my own reflection in the mirror.
But regardless of how late we stayed out and how much drinking we had done, we never let that interfere with the job. At six a.m. everyone was ready to work, even if they hadn't been to bed.
Tennis always came first, and my ambition kept me plenty busy. Although we had the motel, some of the students also still stayed with me in my home on Longboat Key.
Arias and the Modern Forehand
One of them was a young boy named Jimmy Arias. I first met him when he came to The Colony from his home in Buffalo, New York. Although only 12, he was already the U.S. 14 and under champion. He was 5' 2" on his toes and had a slender frame, but he shocked us all by jumping off the ground, throwing his full body into his forehand and wrapping the racquet around his shoulder on his follow-through.
Add to this his--at the time--weird grip, a strong semi-western, and you get a preview of today's game. He was smashing the ball around the court when others were just pushing it. His dad, an engineer who was also small, had taught it to him.
My other juniors started to imitate Jimmy's forehand, and it became the signaturestroke of the Academy. I believe that it revolutionized tennis and that Jimmy Arias deserves credit for initiating the "power game."
The Big Racquet
Meanwhile, during the late 70s, another revolution occurred when Prince brought out an oversized racquet. It had a larger striking surface than the traditional wood and steel racquets, which required precise hand-eye coordination. With the sweet spot increasing from two to about seven tennis balls, it made the game easier for everyone.
Jack Murray, the president of Prince, and Howard Head, the inventor of the racquet, approached me and asked if I would use it in my programs. I said, "Are you kidding?" When they added, "We will pay you for it," my ears perked up and I said, "Okay, I'll do it."
I became part of a Prince team, and we toured the country to introduce and promote the new racquet. A lot of people poked fun at us when we showed up with it. It helped, though, that I got paid $3,500 for my services. In the end, the racquet revolutionized tennis, ushering in the way the game is played today by elite players.
Another Marriage
By 1979, my marriage life took another turn. Many evenings after work, my staff and I would start with drinks at The Colony's Lounge before heading out to St. Armand's Circle to party.
On one particular night a waitress caught my eye. Her name was Diane. I asked her what time she got off and she said not until 10:30 p.m.
I knew the maitre d' at The Colony and asked him if Diane could leave early. He said, "Sure, Nick," so the entire group, including Diane, headed out. We went to the Patio, a local hot spot on the Circle and danced to "Saturday Night Fever" by Barry Gibb and the Bee Gees. Later on, I met Barry when Barry’s sons attended the IMG Academy.
A few weeks after that night at the Patio, Diane and I got married. She and her two beautiful children came to live in my house on Longboat Key, sharing it with Carling Bassett, Jimmy Arias, Pam Casale, Aaron Krickstein, Kathleen Horvath, the Marx children and a host of other kids.
It was quite a circus--with Kathleen hanging from a tree outside, Dr. Krickstein calling me every night at 11 p.m., Jimmy Arias trying to explain to his dad on the phone why he lost one game in beating his opponent 6-0, 6-1, Louis Marx's secretary Barbara Chin calling 20 times a day checking on his kids to make sure they were on the court, not to mention having to feed this tribe of hungry kids.
So it was no surprise when I returned late one evening from a tournament with the players and found a note on the door: "Nick, I love you, but I have my two children. This is too much for me. Good luck to you!"
The marriage had lasted less than a year, but I didn't stay single for long. As if I weren't busy enough already, I decided to branch out and get into the restaurant business. I bought an Italian restaurant.
Nobody knew that I was the owner. I'd go there in the evening and enjoy dinner without paying. Although the place was busy, we weren't making any money.
But when opportunity knocks, I always open the door. One evening a beautiful young woman came over to deliver the check for my meal and Tomas, the maitre d', intercepted her and told her that there was no check for me, because I was the owner.
And Another One
You guessed it; I started dating her and married her soon after in the backyard of her grandmother's house in Sarasota. Kellie and I lasted a lot longer than my previous marriage, and we had two beautiful daughters, Nicole and Alexandra.
Shortly after our dormitory motel opened for the new season, a television producer from ABC's "20/20" program was visiting The Colony with his daughter. They walked past me giving lessons to some youngsters, yelling at the top of my voice, as usual. Nonetheless, he asked if she could join the group, and I said, "Sure." Later he asked if I would like him to do a television piece on me and the tennis program.
The "20/20" segment did a good job of presenting the program and my high expectations of the students and ability to motivate, although it wasn't entirely complimentary. It made no bones about my temper, my ego, and "my way or the highway" approach.
And it missed my fun side--me calling off practice anytime the waves were up, and leading the charge of a horde of kids to the beach to go bodysurfing. More often than not, we jumped into the waves still wearing our tennis clothes.
The television program did not go over well with my mother. My dad later told me that she started to swear at the television screen in Italian.
But the "20/20" piece put us on the map and generated further interest in the tennis program. We had so many inquiries from parents and requests to take their children that we were working harder and longer than ever-if that was even possible.
We began to have so many kids in attendance that at the motel housing they had to eat in shifts under the direction of Bill Baxter, a former Marine drill sergeant I had hired to keep things organized. He was powerfully built, had the standard Marine "butch" haircut, and treated the students as though they had enlisted in the Corps.
Beds had to be made with the blanket so tight you could bounce coins on it. Shoes and sneakers had to be neatly placed under the beds. During morning inspections, the students stood at attention.
If they passed muster, they could then go to the outdoor mess hall and eat breakfast, one shift at a time. The boys and girls then marched out to the busses taking them to school. If they were going to the DePalmer Bollettieri Tennis Club, a short distance away, they jogged there in double time.
Bill Baxter's boot camp training methods may have seemed harsh, but without them we never would have succeeded. My coaches simply didn't have enough time to do everything. To this day I still wonder how we made it through the early days at all.
World’s First Live In Academy
We were outgrowing our capacity and the time was ripe for my idea to combine the housing and the tennis and create the first live-in tennis academy in the world. Over Thanksgiving in 1980, when Mr. Marx visited, I told him how well the junior program was doing. I talked about the expansion and needing a bigger, unified facility with courts, dormitories and food service in one place to make our growth possible.
He told me to work up a proposal. I found 12 acres of land on 34th Street West. The parcel was surrounded by hundreds of acres of tomato fields.
When I showed the proposal to Mr. Marx, he didn't bat an eye. He not only wrote a check for $1.2 million, but also guaranteed the bank loan for the rest of the money to build the complex.
All of his friends assured him that he would never see that money again, but he told me not to worry about it. If we didn't succeed, he would use it as a tax write off. I was reassured but determined to prove his friends wrong. The doors to NBTA, the first junior tennis academy in the world, opened in November of 1981, and we were on our way.
