Hi, I'm James Smith

I'm 16 and currently a student at Wakatipu High in Queenstown. But in January I'm gping up to St Andrew's School in Christchurch on a sports scholarship. I first started tennis when I was nine and my friend Harry James, who's also in the Academy, moved down to Queenstown from Timaru. Over the years I've had coaching with Mark and with Lan.

The Academy has been a huge help to me because we've had training every day and I've been able to learn from Lan's experience of playing a the highest level. Both Mark and Lan have really helped me with the technical side of the game but also in learning how to deal with the mental side of competitive tennis too. I'm a right-hander but my favourite shot is the backhand down the line.

I've already played in quite a lot of tournaments, including the Nationals in NZ, and some ITF tournaments in Australia and NZ. I even went over to France for 6 weeks in the winter of 2010 and played some clay court tournaments there. That was hard work because all the French kids learn on clay but we don't have many clay courts here and it's a very different type of tennis. But I really enjoyed the experience and learned a lot from it.

My long-tern goal is to go pro and play on the men's circuit like Lan. Another option might be to go for a college scholarship in the US like Riki and Ben but I'll have to work really hard over the next 2 years and see what happens.