Taking his tennis to new heights

Harry Pugh has broken into the top 250 U18 tennis players in the world, having also strengthened his spot as the best junior player in the country.

The 17-year-old Garin College student has been busy in recent weeks, having just returned from Australia after winning the doubles title in Sydney at the ITF (International Tennis Federation) New South Wales Junior International.

That win saw him springboard on the ITF U18 rankings from in the 300s to being #224 in the world, his best ever ranking.

Having finished 2021 ranked #1667 and 2000 ranked #2957, it’s been a meteoric rise for the young tennis star.

And with another year in the junior circuit, before he ages out, there’s big ambitions as he eyes up cracking the top 100 so he earns his place into the junior Grand Slams in 2024.

But it wasn’t all smooth sailing, as he changed playing partners with less than three hours before the tournament started.

While he did have to find another teammate for his previous partner, it was the right call as his new partner, Charlie Camus, sits inside the top 50 U18 players in the world.

The pair came into the tournament as the top seed and lived up to the expectations with a 6-1, 6-2 win in the semi-final before a 6-3, 6-2 win in the final to dominate the competition.

In the singles, it was more of a bumpy track as Harry found himself up against the eventual winner in the quarter-finals and finding himself on the wrong end of a straight sets loss.

Having won seven ITF titles, including five this year, Harry says his recent success has seen him quickly climb the rankings.

With an additional two second place finishes, one in doubles and one in singles, he says it’s been a good reward for the hard work he’s put in.

Harry spends at least 10 hours a week on court, while also doing gym work four hours a week on top of his school work and travel.

That dedication sees him break at least two strings a week, jokingly saying he hits the ball too hard.

While his recent success has come more in doubles, he says singles is his primary focus and he’s been working hard to get on top.

Although Harry doesn’t get much of a chance to play on clay, with only two courts in the country, he says it’s his favourite surface and he dreams to one day win the French Open.

Having started playing tennis when he was just three-years-old, he quickly progressed and by the time he was 10 people were telling him he had a promising future in the sport.

Since then he has started spending weekends in Wellington, training and playing up there because of the better facilities and level of competition.

Alongside those trips, he’s travelling overseas often including an upcoming trip to Korea and Japan for a trio of tournaments with good points on offer.

“I need to defend some points. It’s a high grade, so there’s bigger points on offer.”

And it’s not cheap, with Harry saying it’s hard to find sponsorship for individual sports and having to rely on his job and PaknSave and his parents to help cover the costs.

While his success has seen him enter talks for a scholarship to America to train and play for university, he still has over a year on the junior circuit and is always on the hunt for new sponsors, having already teamed up with Technifibre as a racket sponsor.

At international level competitions, Harry boasts an impressive 73 per cent win rate and still says he has room to improve.

“My competitiveness is my strength. Just competing, I’m always up for it.

“If I could improve anything, it’s my serve. It’s what I’m always working on.”