If you or your child is 13-18 years old and is even remotely interested in possibly playing college tennis you need to read this column and then attend this camp.

It's called the Roadmap to College Tennis Camp to be held in late January at the Abilene Country Club. A parent or personal coach will be required to attend some of the sessions because there will be so much information that they want to be sure everyone retains the knowledge.

This is not a camp to change your grip on your volley or teach you a kick serve. It will provide you with a roadmap to play college tennis. There are a variety of reasons to attend.

In the classroom segments there will be people there to teach you the process of college recruitment, NCAA contact rules of how and when you can contact college coaches and when they can contatct you, how to navigate through the NCAA clearinghouse and the academic requirements concerning your SAT and ACT scores and your GPA. It's never too early to learn those things.

Some of you are already saying to yourself "What's the NCAA clearinghouse and is that something that I'm required to do to play college tennis?" That's exactly why you need to be at this camp.

The second part of the camp is a current evaluation of not only your ground strokes, volleys and serve but also an evaluation of your muscular strength and flexibility, your body fat, footspeed, nutrition and conditioning. They will give you a program to work on, according to your age, to improve the quickest so that you can play college tennis.

There will be a weight trainer there to test for deficiencies in your strength. You may find out that are weak in your left shoulder muscles and that could be why your back sometimes hurts. You will also leave with a tennis specific weight training program tailored to your age for you to adopt to reach your maximum potential as an athlete and to hopefully avoid future injuries.

There will also be a lot of drilling and matchplay so that the coaches can evaluate your current physical game. They may say to a 14 year old "You have a great backhand but you need to start working on a slice backhand" or "It's time for you to transition to a one-handed backhand volley" or "How do you build your points?" Huh? Build my points? Come to the camp.

You will learn what college coaches look for in a player whether they like all-court players or baseliners. Is it important to play doubles in the juniors?

There will also be some mental toughness seminars and they will explain John Wooden's Pyramid of Success and how you can use it better yourself as a player and as a person. There will be a lot of talk about how to communicate with the college coaches, how involved your parents should be and what they should and should not say.

You will also find out how many college scholarships are out there. There are so many opportunities across the nation that most people don't know about. It's difficult to know how to know about them which is another reason to attend the camp so that you can be knowledgable.

The camp will be conducted by Coach Jerry Simmons and his staff. Jerry was the L.S.U. coach from 1982-1997 and since then he has achieved many other successes. I could write an entire other column about him and his coaching successes but there is not enough room here today. It would be easier for you to visit his website at www.coachsimmons.com and read where and how he has acquired his knowledge that he wants to pass on to you.

The cost of the Roadmap to College Tennis Camp is $495 for the weekend. If you think that's a little expensive think of how much you spent for your last out of town Supers or Champs weekend tournament. Probably close to the same but this will be a totally different type of knowledge learned for the future of your tennis. I highly recommend everyone attend this camp.

We will start on a Friday at 5:00 p.m. and go to 7:30. Then Saturday from 9:00 - 6:00 and Sunday from 9:00 - 5:30.

Everyone knows how much I recommend everyone playing every tournament that they can but if money is an issue I suggest you skip one tournament and attend this camp.

Again, if you have any inclination to play college tennis there is a lot to know of how to navigate through the process of contacting the coaches and the recruitment but it's also good to get some expert advice on where your game stands right now and what you need to be doing for the future.

Contrary to what most people believe, there are definitely college scholarship opportunities out there but you need to develop your game so that you can receive one of those opportunities.

Coming to the camp will improve your game because of all of the testing and evaluations. You will have a better plan for the future and a much better understanding of what it takes to get yourself to the right college tennis program and how to get there. You can contact me to sign up.

Please don't miss this opportunity to learn more about your future in tennis and please go to Coach Simmons' website, www.coachsimmons.com or feel free to e-mail him at coachsimmons1@satx.rr.com for even more information.