Playing and teaching on the tennis courts of Butler Park in a white hat, white shorts, black sunglasses and a white beard, Jeff Cooper is not hard to find.
Tuesday, Aug. 16, will find the Verde Valley tennis pro back on those courts with over 25 players in training, from 5 to 15 years old, teaching them Fit Kids Tennis.
“A whole bunch of kids, about 10, I had right in the very first session in the spring of 2012, I still have now,” he said. “In Camp Verde, I have nine kids, but there is really no ceiling for kids who want to jump into the fall.”
So Cooper expects at least 15 players back for the first weekly session, with two nights a week possible if there is a larger turnout.
“There are some really good high school players in town,” he added. “I’ve had the average student for probably two years.”
One has even been with Cooper six years, including three years of private lessons in Cottonwood, which Cooper, heading into his 25th year as a certified tennis pro, still gives to several adults as well as younger players.
Fundamentals like forehand and backhand ground strokes, serves and return of service, volleys and overhead approach shots are covered in the first part of each lesson.
“Then we do something more specialized,” Cooper said. “More advanced strokes, half volleys, drop shots, top spin lobs [and] slice ground strokes. Some of the kids are starting to learn slice and kick serves.”
Finally, in the last third or quarter of each lesson, Cooper introduces games like the lob game, tennis academy, volley cat, four square or one of 16 others in his repertoire — all of which his students will be introduced to in their age groups over each 24-lesson season.
“The lob game is a singles game that starts off with a lob [and] volley cat is like HORSE in basketball,” he said. “In four square, there’s a king or queen who serves the ball to the prince or princess in the diagonally opposite box of the court.
“The bottom box is the peasant. They’re hitting ground strokes, so the ball bounces before [they] hit it.
“The kids never seem to get tired of being in the prince or princess box and calling the king or queen dad and mom.”
Cooper’s kids are divided into age groups, with most at the beginner or intermediate skill level playing with other students no more than two years older or younger than them.
“Some younger kids are as good as the older kids,” he said. “I have just a very athletic 5-year-old in Camp Verde who plays with the 8-year-olds.”
They have come from American Heritage Academy, Camp Verde Elementary School and Mountain View Preparatory Academy in Cottonwood.
Cooper even has one student from United Christian School in Camp Verde and up to nine students who are home-schooled.
“There’s a whole family of 10 kids, believe it or not, who are home-schooled and sign up for different classes during the season,” he said. “I sometimes have five of them at once.”
Three different skills and a game are typically covered per hour, as Cooper has found that students improve faster when they have an enjoyable challenge to engage their skills.
“We always mix things up a good amount,” he said. “In terms of backhands, the strokes we’re working on and their level of difficulty, we always keep those things heavily practiced, then introduce more difficult things.”
In one such challenge, “Return of Serve Levels,” the student has to return two serves in a row to move up to the next level, starting with returning very soft serves until he or she is returning heavy sidespins, kicks and tough placements with lots of pace at the seventh and final level.
“We’re always doing some new things, but the essence of the program is extremely varied. By the time we get through a session, we’ve done so many different things, it’s not like there’s a lot of things we’re not covering.”
For more information about Jeff Cooper and Fit Kids Tennis lessons in Camp Verde, please see the Wednesday, Aug. 10, issues of the Camp Verde Journal and Cottonwood Journal Extra.
