When Teddy Bouquemont was head pro at Westmoreland, he injured his hip playing platform tennis over Christmas break. The pain radiated all the way down to his knee — he couldn't feed balls, and he could barely stand. At the time, Teddy handled over 60% of the club's total lesson volume. Canceling would have meant disappointing members and losing a significant slice of his income.
Volley gave him a way to stay on court. Instead of standing across the net feeding balls, Teddy ran his lessons from a stool next to the player while the trainer handled the repetition. It put him closer to players — watching the swing instead of focusing on the next feed. He didn't have to drop a single lesson, and the director never had to scramble to rework the programming.
A better way to run junior programs.
The injury also tested Teddy's junior platform tennis program. Running a clinic for 16 kids on two enclosed courts is hard enough with a full coaching staff. Teddy was doing it alone, and couldn't feed a single ball. So he put one Volley trainer on each court and ran drills across both. The kids stayed engaged, got more repetitions, and progressed faster than they had with basket feeding.
By the end of the first session, several players returned a screen shot for the first time.
The experience changed the way Teddy thought about coaching — and the lesson held up. The following fall, a rotator cuff injury sidelined him again. For a second time, Volley helped him stay on the court.
Building a program around Volley.
Last year, Teddy was promoted to Director at The Lake Forest Club, a hybrid racquets-and-social club where Volley had already been installed but gone largely underused after a vacancy in the director role. One of his first priorities was rebuilding the program around it.
Today he regularly works Volley into lessons so members get comfortable using the trainer. Between lessons, players keep practicing on their own — building repetitions and reinforcing what they worked on with their pro. As a result, players arrive at their next lesson ready to advance instead of spending valuable coaching time repeating the same fundamentals.
Teddy understands the skepticism some pros have toward trainers like Volley. He just doesn't share it.
What started as a way to keep teaching through an injury has become a core part of how Teddy coaches, develops players, and scales programming today.
