ISB's Fabian Sandrup Selvik slams the ball across the net in his 6-1, 6-3 win over George Shaffer of Naples in the boys singles final at the DODDS-Europe tennis championships in Wiesbaden, Germany, Saturday, Oct. 25, 2014. (Michael Abrams/Stars and Stripes)
ISB's Fabian Sandrup Selvik slams the ball across the net in his 6-1, 6-3 win over George Shaffer of Naples in the boys singles final at the DODDS-Europe tennis championships in Wiesbaden, Germany, Saturday, Oct. 25, 2014. (Michael Abrams/Stars and Stripes)
ISB's Fabian Sandrup Selvik celebrates his 6-1, 6-3 win over George Shaffer of Naples in the boys singles final at the DODDS-Europe tennis championships in Wiesbaden, Germany, Saturday, Oct. 25, 2014. (Michael Abrams/Stars and Stripes)
The departure of last year’s DODDS-Europe boys tennis champion, Lakenheath’s Peter Kovats, made runner-up Fabian Sandrup Selvik of International School of Brussels the obvious favorite to replace him as champion.
That wasn’t good enough for Selvik.
“I knew I had to take the next step in my tennis,” Selvik said.
And so last fall, soon after falling to Kovats in the European championship match, Selvik began his renaissance. Despite how good he already was, Selvik identified a lot of areas for improvement.
First up was his physical fitness.
Selvik said he was “quite exhausted” entering last year’s final match. To prevent that from happening again, he stepped up his workout routine, packing additional sessions of cardiovascular work and strength training into his regimen and logging even more court time at his local Belgian tennis club.
“To go the next step, you’ve got to get stronger physically,” Selvik said. “That was something I took to mind.”
Selvik also found that his game required some psychological adjustments. Too often, he said, he’d found himself distracted on the court or disturbed by an opponent’s tendencies and mannerisms. That needed to stop.
“I knew I had to improve my mental game,” Selvik said. “I sometimes have a tendency to lose concentration and get nervous and start thinking about other things.”
Finally, he examined his mechanics. Over countless hours of practice, Selvik corrected a glitch in his backhand, smoothed out his stroke and generally “cleaned up” the unnecessary quirks affecting his technical game.
The Selvik that lost to Kovats last fall might have been good enough to win this year’s title in his absence. But the Selvik that finally won that European title last month – the Selvik that is the 2014 Stars and Stripes boys tennis Athlete of the Year – is a vastly improved player.
And his program is the better for it.
The upgrades Selvik made to his game have benefitted other ISB players, particularly Bram den Dekker and Maxime Dumortier, and the three Raider standouts have all pushed each other to championship heights. On the same day Selvik claimed the singles crown, den Dekker and Dumortier were teaming up for the European doubles title.
“Playing against (Selvik), you learn a lot about how to play mental tennis, about how to improve your technique,” den Dekker said.
“We’ve learned a lot from him about how to cope with competition,” Dumortier said. “Where you want to relax and calm down because you’re stressed, but you actually have to be much more concentrated.”
It seems the lessons Selvik has applied to his own game have taken root at ISB. Coach Kevin Horst isn’t surprised that Selvik has had such an influence.
“He’s the first one to help any other player, the first one to come to practices,” Horst said. “He really does everything for the team. That’s incredibly amazing, in my opinion, to have our best player that committed to the team.”
After winning the title as a junior, Selvik already has some further upgrades in mind before his senior season.
“Of course I would want to improve my game,” Selvik said. “It would be nice to add another DODDS victory to show my improvement.”
Twitter: @broomestripes
