"Tennis is the passion of my life"

Born in October 1939, he graduated from TBS Education in 1964. Today, Pierre Lavau is several times French champion and world champion in veteran tennis.

Pierre Lavau, a born tennis player

Pierre Lavau grew up in Tunisia and lived 150 metres from the Tunis Tennis Club. He started playing tennis at the age of 8 and took up this passion again at the age of 30 in France. His childhood friends being well ranked in French tennis, he could have started his career young but it is finally in the senior ranks that he obtained an impressive record of achievements.

He won his first world championship with the French team in 2000 in Tarragona. He was French champion at 60, 65 and 70 years old, then French vice-champion at 80 years old and he has great hopes for the next championship to repeat this title. For him all these titles represent the accomplishment of his pleasure to be on the field, his desire and especially his good physical condition.

A career that he continues to write

After graduating from TBS Education, Pierre Lavau became a regional product manager for Purina for 9 years. He then ran a tennis shop, "Wimbledon", in downtown Toulouse. You may have recognised it, the name of the tennis shop comes from the famous London tennis tournament. After 20 years of running his shop, Pierre Lavau finally finished his professional career in real estate as a self-employed sales agent for several estate agencies in Toulouse. He finally retired at the age of 63.

Retired for 20 years now, Pierre Lavau is not inactive. A true sportsman, he dedicated his first 10 years of retirement to golf and finally focused on tennis in order to rise in level. He has been a member of the French veterans' team for more than twenty years and has won many titles. He is a three-time French veteran tennis champion and will try his luck again at Rolland Garros in June 2022. This status has allowed him to travel all over the world, to the United States, Australia, South Africa or even Palm Beach where he was a month ago for his participation in the senior team world championship. He will soon go back to Majorca for a new tournament in October. Over the years, Pierre Lavau has become a tennis globetrotter!

Preparing for success

At the moment, Pierre Lavau is preparing for the French individual championships which will take place at the end of the month in Rolland Garros. To do this, he plays tennis every morning and plays in regional and ITF (International Tennis Federation) tournaments all over the world, which allows him to have a world ranking and, above all, to stay motivated in order to stay at the level he wants.

A secret ?

Pierre told us the secret of his longevity in tennis. For him, there is no mystery, you have to train physically and regularly. Maintaining a healthy weight and a healthy lifestyle are the two key elements, but you must not forget your passion. As he says so well, tennis is his life's passion.

Advice to students

If he had one piece of advice to share with our students, it would be to keep physically fit all your life in order to prepare for aging as early as possible. According to him, we must avoid old age being a shipwreck and to do this, we must do sport all our lives and adopt a healthy lifestyle.

So who is ready to adopt this lifestyle? 😉

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