Ty Ana Williams: Note the name - she's 10 and she's a tennis star in the making

At just 10 years of age, Ty Ana Williams is something of a tennis phenomenon in the United States.

She has been playing, and winning, since she took up tennis drills as a two-year-old with her father and brother. She has become a tiny powergouse in the two States where she trains and is expected to make her debut in the Midwest Women’s Championships (formerly a Midwest Grand Prix Tour event) this year.

She plays regularly in every Junior division event for 10, 12, 14, 16 and 18-year-olds and three years ago won the Championship in the 8s Division at the Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs Co-Ed championships for boys and girls. And she is ranked in 12s, 14s, 16s and 18s in most junior ranking systems.
 
It was when Ty Ana was seven, and the youngest and smallest of four semi-finalists in an 8-and-under tournament in Texas, that her parents realised they had a really special talent on their hands.

A year earlier she had burst on the national stage at the prestigious Maureen “Little Mo” Connolly Brinker Foundation championships circuit in Austin, Texas, a three-stage progressional junior tour with Sectionals in five states, Regionals in 15 states and nationals in 50 states. She finished second, third and fourth in the three.

“At this point my wife and I knew that she really wanted to play, because just a year before she finished last at sectionals and didn't advance in the tour,” explained her father.

From that national tournament Ty Ana became the little girl who would not be denied. Training alongside her brother, seven years her senior, gave her an advantage over most of her peers and opponents.

Home-schooled Ty Ana and her brother grew up with reading, writing, arithmetic and tennis as their every day curriculum, but Ty Ana has also cross-trained with golf and track and field, where she has shown excellent junior abilities as well.

To end a great 2007, Ty Ana was given the opportunity to represent the Maureen Connolly Brinker Tennis Foundation by Midwest Tour directors Sylvia Gothard and Nancy Watland at the Fed Ex Shootout in Chicago in December, which featured the great Pete Sampras and Todd Martin in an exhibition match.
 
Ty Ana and three other Midwest Li'l Mo players put on an exhibition match before 4,000 fans at the UIC pavilion in Chicago. She later had the opportunity to meet and chat with Sampras and Martin.

"I watch them on television, I cheer for them when they're in the Grand Slams, but I know that I can get there too,” said Ty Ana. "I have been playing my father and brother all my life. They don't pull their punches, and neither do I.”
 
Ty Ana Williams has crammed a lot into her young life so far – and her family are sure there is a lot more to come. She truly is a star in the making.