Jamie Kirkman back in Qld coaching Zarina Diyas at Billie Jean King Cup

A Qlder who has spent years travelling the world coaching tennis players will return to his home state to fulfill his childhood dream of participating in the World Cup of Tennis.

Whitsundays tennis coach Jamie Kirkman with player Zarina Diyas. Photo: Contributed

Whitsundays tennis coach Jamie Kirkman has spent years travelling the world coaching up-and-coming tennis stars, now he is heading back to Queensland for a competition that will fulfil a childhood dream.

Mr Kirkman’s world revolved around tennis from a young age.

He watched both of his parents play throughout his childhood, with early memories of sleeping in the car while they took to the court in the evenings.

He went on to play himself while in school, dreaming of a career in tennis, but after a shoulder reconstruction at 14 and another at 16 the reality began to sink in that making money playing tennis was not on the cards.

“I don’t know if I really liked tennis at the time, it was kind of a sore point,” he said.

“But I loved that I could still be involved.”

He decided that coaching was the next best thing to playing and didn’t look back.

Jamie Kirkman and his mother Jenny.

Mr Kirkman and his mum Jenny Kirkman relocated to the Whitsundays and opened JJK Tennis in Cannonvale giving them both the opportunity to pursue their love of tennis professionally.

“It’s a wonderful experience,” he said.

“I’m very fortunate that it’s a job and a career that I’ve got to spend certain moments with my mum that others wouldn’t normally get to spend.

“I’ve got to be on court with her and coaching other people.

“I’m very privileged and very grateful that I get to do something with my mum.”

While Mr Kirkman has spent much of the last two decades travelling for work he still considers Airlie Beach home and his mum still plays a huge part in the local tennis community, running Tennis Whitsunday.

Jamie Kirkman is getting ready for the World Cup of Tennis with player Zarina Diyas. Photo: Contributed

Mr Kirkman is now heading back to Queensland for the Billie Jean King Cup qualifiers which will see Australia, Colombia and Kazakhstan face-off in a round-robin tournament across three days this April, with the winning nation from each group progressing to the finals in Shenzhen in China.

Mr Kirkman’s is coaching Kazakh professional tennis player Zarina Diyas who is taking on six hour training days in preparation for the cup.

He said it was a childhood dream to be involved with a Davis or Federation Cup team but he knew it was unlikely to be the Australian team, so to be part of Kazakhstan’s national team was very special.

“To have their national anthem play, and I have no idea what the words are, but to have the national anthem play and stand up for a national anthem and be in a country’s colours was an incredibly amazing experience,” he said.

“I was moved by it.”

He said looking back on his career, it was really all about the relationship between him and his players.

“I literally see my player more than I see anybody else,” he said.

Training days are long for Jamie Kirkman and Zarina Diyas as they prepare for the cup. Photo: Contributed

An experience he said would stick with him was one where he coached a junior player and took her from a ranking in the thousands to qualifying at Wimbledon.

“The day she qualified, I was living in Florida at the time and she called and was so excited to tell me that she qualified, that was an amazing phone call,” he said.

“Then 24 hours later, I get the phone call while she’s still sitting on court telling me that she’d lost the match and that she was so upset.”

He said he would never forget that second phone call.

“Because it meant that she knew I cared and that I was the first person she called,” he said.

“Her parents were there, she didn’t want to talk to them, I was the first phone call.”