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Winning domestic tournaments like leagues, cups, and super cups adds to your standing in your country, but once you take a step forward in Europe and lift that European Cup, I think that prestige extends to the global stage.
Ronnie is the greatest player to have ever picked up a snooker cue. People have said that about me. But although I won 50 or so tournaments I never picked up the world championship. That was a little bit of a disappointment.
I like to listen to Congolese music because when I was a kid with my father, he took me to play some tournaments in the car and always put on this music. I always fell asleep with this music so it's good things that I remember.
There doesn't need to be hatred after a fight, because it's all said and done. I'm cool with a lot of my opponents in the UFC. There's people I've fought who were my friends in kickboxing tournaments and after we were still cool.
I can picture it now, where I grew and me playing in the cage where I used to play. To see what I've achieved and where I've been, the countries I've seen, tournaments I've played in, players I've played against, it's incredible.
If money titles meant anything, I'd play more tournaments. The only thing that means a lot to me is winning. If I have more wins than anybody else and win more majors than anybody else in the same year, then it's been a good year.
Movement is one of the most important things. My consistency, everything - there's a lot to improve. Coaches are never happy. But I'd like to keep improving, go deeper in the tournaments, and get as high in the rankings as possible.
In the end, it's about the teaching, and what I always loved about coaching was the practices. Not the games, not the tournaments, not the alumni stuff. But teaching the players during practice was what coaching was all about to me.
I wanted to just come out and continue to improve my game, continue to improve my mental capacity to play well in tournaments. I've had a slow year compared to last year, but I've been pleased because I felt like I was getting better.
In Georgia it's a little different because of the East Cobb program. It's such a strong program that we see a lot of kids that come through here on a lot of different teams from across the country that come here to play in tournaments.
We want to change the way people think about England teams. At the men's tournaments, we haven't exceeded expectations, and it's the same with the women's. If we can change that, it could have a knock-on effect, even for the men's team.
I know it's not the most important thing for me to win the most Grand Slams and be remembered in this world. I certainly don't have to win little tournaments here, there and everywhere, I don't have to win at all. Although I do want to.
Well, you know, I've bonded with a lot of people over the years, you know. We played the same tournaments year after year and we go back to the same place and many times the seats have been full and that has meant the world to me for sure.
I never think I want to go to another World Cup just to be in the record books again and play in six tournaments or four World Cups. If I am lucky enough to go, I want to go there to fight for my place and win something in an England shirt.
I had a lot of success in big tournaments as well - won Masters Series in Rome - so a lot of things are coming together. I've done a lot of hard work in the off-season. A lot of physical work, a lot of work on my serve and on my return game.
I just travel all the time. And I was just looking at the schedules now and starting the first week of October I will be every weekend with somebody at tournaments through Christmas. So it gets very difficult to just go away and not do that.
One of the thrills of playing at the top tennis centres of the world is to see the Indian flag go up whenever I'm participating in these events. That's enough motivation for any Indian who has the opportunity to perform at these tournaments.
People play games seriously. People host tournaments. People watch other people play and listen to broadcasters talking about it. The kind of entire ecosystem we see around other sports and forms of entertainment has formed around games as well.
It was a tough year for me, '89, losing two Slam finals and losing another five finals. It wasn't until I won the Masters, or what's now called the ATP Finals, that things changed again. Suddenly I won seven tournaments in 1990 and became No. 1.
I don't think I could ever say that I will never play again, because even if I felt I could never play in top-class tournaments again because I don't have time for the preparation, after a while you might one day think: 'maybe, maybe, maybe... why not?'
Sparks is a sporting charity that puts on golf tournaments for sick children, and my animal charities include Oldham Cats and Feline Care, a big cat charity close to me in Norfolk. I'm also a Freemason and the money they raise for charity is phenomenal.
I got into pool tournaments when I was five, playing every weekend in competitions. Then one day I started playing snooker. I learnt by practising on my own, repeating the same shots again and again, and watching other players and copying what they did.
I see myself more as an ambassador of the game. And I hope to bring chess to a higher level in the United States. Making bigger tournaments, more interesting events. Making it a respectable profession for young people to be able to pursue in the future.
I remember that if you went down to the Crucible or other snooker tournaments it was all the snooker writers, and then all of a sudden when the game became popular on television it wasn't only snooker writers: it was what we called special correspondents.
We know how hard it is to travel around and if the schedules are really tight for you, it means you're doing really well because you're not going home early from many events. When you go deep in tournaments, that's the consequence you have to pay I suppose.
It was natural for me to go to local tournaments with my mother and watch my brothers compete and sometimes be left with my mom at home while my dad would take my brothers away to different tournaments and competitions. So I started doing everything they did.
At the very beginning of my career, when I opened my business in Italy, I was also a ranked tennis player. I had won many tournaments. To be an athlete was my first choice. Second choice: designer. However! There was more money in being a designer at that time.
My generation started in big tournaments. '88 Olympics, we got silver. '89 European Championship, we got gold. 1990 World Cup in Argentina, we got gold. '91 European Championship, we got gold, and then there was a civil war, and for three years, we didn't play.
I was not picked immediately at any level, be it Under-14, Under-16 or Under-19. So apart from my batting, I bowled legspin. In one of the selection tournaments for Mumbai Under-19, I happened to pick 34 wickets. So I was finally picked, but as a bowling allrounder.
I didn't learn how to swing a golf club until late in my career. And even though I won all those tournaments, I still struggled with consistency, and I relied on my strengths, which were hitting the ball long and high, and I could chip and putt with the best of 'em.
There was a minor burst of macho nuttiness after 'Jaws' came out, in which people would go off in shark tournaments and come back holding the bloody heads of these animals and say, 'Look what I did.' But they've been doing that for hundreds of thousands of years anyway.
If I'm being honest, I think I'd be good at television; I just don't know if I am interested, because you are kind of geographically responsible to a location, and frankly I don't know if I retired from tennis so that I could sit around tennis tournaments 12 hours a day.
My first assistant-coaching job in football was at William & Mary in 1961. The pay wasn't much, so to get $300 more per year, I agreed to coach the golf team. I didn't even know how to keep score, and really, my main job was not to wreck the van on the way to tournaments.
A big part of managing a golf course is managing your swing on the course. A lot of guys can go out and hit a golf ball, but they have no idea how to manage what they do with the ball. I've won as many golf tournaments hitting the ball badly as I have hitting the ball well.
I've always been a bit shy, especially in new situations. But I have that other side in me too. Cricket demands that you grow up fast. Playing in domestic tournaments as an overseas player, you're expected to score runs and bring a lot to the group. And I expect that of myself.
Being a professional chess player is not very family-friendly and I am away quite often playing tournaments, sometimes for 12 days at a time. I catch up with Gusztav every day on Skype and email but even though I miss them, I don't make a point of ringing the children every night.
You see it from my area, from any area, really, so many who want to be great and have the drive, but don't have the resources. I'm very blessed that I have a family that was financially stable enough to get me to tournaments and camps and to practices so I could wrestle year-round.
I am most challenged by playing cash games against the world's top players. These games force me to think several moves in advance, like in a game of chess. And though I also find tournaments fun to play, they just don't provide the constant brain buzz that cash game players crave.
I grew up with WWE and New Japan, but when I started traveling to Germany, I had the chance to train with people like Christian Eckstein and Tony St. Clair. They were two of the cornerstones of the German 'beer tent' wrestling era, when they'd have 30-day tournaments in the same town.
You could have all the tools in the world, but if you really don't want to be there, or if there's something that's off course that's playing on your mind... the game of golf is so mental, and if you don't have everything in the right order, it's very difficult to win golf tournaments.
I used to play chess when I was a kid and participate in national-level tournaments with the geekiest guys. This one time, I was losing terribly, so I batted my eyelashes and flirted as I asked for a draw. My dad just couldn't believe it. He thought, 'What have I created, a floozy?' But it worked!
It's good for Brazilian football to have idols, stars, big stars coming back to Brazilian clubs. The tournaments become much better, more interesting. Ze Roberto, Juninho Pernambucano, Ronaldinho Gaucho, and other players who have returned to Brazil strengthen the league and improve the tournaments.
Before a game, I avoid having a heavy meal so that I don't feel sleepy at the board. You eat to be healthy, and that generally takes care of everything. Also, you can't be too finicky, since at tournaments you tend to eat at restaurants here and there. But, as long as you're eating sensibly, it's all good.
I don't think there has been enough communication between the players and the tournaments. In one sense it's just as much the players' fault. Players talk between each other and in the locker room about things that can be improved and then when the time comes to talk and really do something about it they stop.
Sitting on the airplane seat today, I was thinking - I have been in different cities every week. Most of the time, it's because of golf tournaments. But occasionally, I also attend various events. All of a sudden, I feel like I am a business woman. Although sometimes I feel tired, I do enjoy this kind of life.
Because we're playing tournaments week in and week out I'd think to myself, 'What's the point in practising?' You have no down time to yourself and you're looking for some to spend with your family and friends. But I've now realised that with the game so cut-throat and standards going up every week, it doesn't work.
You're going to play a lot of tournaments during the year, a lot of traveling. If you have a good set of mind, you're committed to the work, you want to do that work, and you definitely got to do it. Doesn't matter if you have four, five, six losses in a row, that doesn't have to discourage you to stop all of a sudden.
I started playing in '98, but I got hooked by playing celebrity golf tournaments. Tiger had a lot to do with it - his passion, the way that he plays. He's unique and different, and he inspired a lot of my passion. It's a sport you can't master. If you're an athlete, you can do almost anything, but golf is not like that.
I think all tennis players have to struggle through the early stages of their career. We start off playing tournaments and really just get by. I always had a dream to play in the big tournaments and never have doubted if it was worth it. Having to battle a little early on in my career makes it all the more worthwhile now.
Since I was part of the St. Francis College basketball team, I used to get the opportunity to go to various parts of the city for tournaments. It's during one such outing that I figured this is the Chowmahalla Palace! I still remember buying a ticket and getting into the palace with my team, all of us in our sports uniform.