Donna Vekic

(August 21, 2024) NEW YORK, New York – The WTA Tour and the Harlem Junior Tennis & Education Program co-hosted a “Come to Play” clinic with former pro and mother of Andy and Jamie Murray, – Judy Murray, sponsored by Morgan Stanley. This event  which took place in Howard Bennett Park in East Harlem, also included current players – No. 25 Donna Vekic, the singles silver medalist in Paris earlier this month as well as Wimbledon semifinalist and former Top 10 player, No. 29 Caroline Garcia. Former pros Katrina Adams, Executive Director, Harlem Junior Tennis & Education Program and former USTA President and Vania King were on hand for the clinic along with new WTA CEO Portia Archer.

“It’s a great honor to even be a participant in the “Come Play Series” the WTA Charities with Morgan Stanley,” Noted Adams. “This is our second year doing it and to have someone like Judy Murray out here – the kids may not know who Judy Murray is but they know who Andy Murray is and Jamie Murray for that matter. Their eyes got big when who she is and what’s she’s done but for Judy to be able to come and teach the coaches clinic and have the older kids engage and learn how to do different things.”

“A lot of our kids as they get older, they go and work with our grassroots kids, our beginners. There is a great opportunity on the coaching side as well. Now to be able to have those major players come out, now to be able to have players come here, Donna Vekic, Caroline Garcia, Vania King and my friends like Boris Kodjoe to stop by and lend their time, it’s a great asset for us.”

Talking to Vekic about how important it is to do events like this, she told Tennis Panorama: Honestly for me, it’s just important for kids to be active to play any kind of sport and if it’s tennis, then that’s even better. They’ll fall in love with the game like I did. They’ll play it for the rest of their life. Most importantly just to be active.

The woman from Croatia talked about her resurgence this summer and how she came close to quitting tennis:

“The last couple of years haven’t been easy at all, I felt with a lot of injuries, the knee surgery and at times it was very tough because I was playing with a lot of pain. I was rushing to come back. I didn’t take the proper time to heal and in tennis it’s always tough to take a break and you always feel like to are missing out on tournaments and dropping in the rankings. Yes, there were tough moments that I had really good people around me, my team my family were supporting me and believing in me when there were times when I didn’t believe in myself. This year when I was giving everything to tennis and I wasn’t getting the results that I was kind of expecting and it just got to be really frustrating. Tennis is such a tough sport mentally and when you are travelling the whole year it can be really tiring, especially when you are giving everything and not have the results, it can be very frustrating.”

“It’s been a crazy month,” said Vekic. “Wimbledon, making the semifinals of my favorite slam, so it was definitely a special moment, a very heart-breaking loss in the semifinals but you know even after Wimbledon, I was dealing with a few injuries. I got sick so I wasn’t sure if I was going to go to Paris, but then 10 days later I had a medal so… it was a surreal experience. It still doesn’t feel real,so when I look at the medal. I did it, it will stay with me for the rest of my life.”

How does she feel coming into the US Open:

“Mindset….New York is very hectic, it’s not my favorite city so I just try to save my energy for the week before and just focus on training and not have too many distractions, but events like this are something that brings you energy.”