Tennis Spotlight: Sivan Garteiz

Sivan Garteiz is a senior at Valencia High School, and has been a member of the Girls Varsity Tennis Team since her sophomore year. Some things she likes to do in her free time are photography, listening to music, cooking healthy and delicious food, laughing with friends, and of course, playing tennis with her teammates. Sivan is very excited to share some of her experiences regarding tennis as well as some other details about her as a person.

1.How long have you played tennis, and what inspired you to start?

“I started playing tennis for fun in fourth grade, but I started getting serious about it in fifth grade. It’s actually a funny story! I started playing tennis because we had a unit in my gym class, and I was really competitive. I wanted to beat all the kids in my class, so after our gym teacher told us we were doing tennis as our unit, I went home, ran up to my dad and told him we have to go out and buy tennis rackets so I can practice and beat all the kids in my class!”

2. What lessons has playing this sport taught you?

“It’s taught me patience and endurance because sometimes you’re not feeling that well while playing, and you just have to keep on going and keep on pushing through. It also taught me to be analytical about the things that happen around me because you always have to analyze the ball on the court, and the different plays and moves, and how you’ve done, and how you can improve.”

3. Are you planning to continue this sport in the future?

“I think I will continue playing for fun, but I’m not sure if I want to play in a Division I or II college.”

4. What has your favorite moment/achievement been in your athletic career?

“I don’t know. It’s hard with tennis because I feel like every point is an achievement that you win, and I guess one of my favorite moments would be just winning with my friends in really hard and tough matches that we’ve played in different tournaments.”

5. What will you miss most about this sport when you graduate?

“I’ll miss the people, definitely my teammates. They’re all so nice and wonderful, and I’ll miss going to tournaments with them like we did this year in San Francisco.”

6. What is one book/movie everyone should read/watch?

“One book I think everyone should read is actually a children’s book that I read a long, long time ago, but I keep on looking at the quotes from that book and it’s just beautiful. It’s called The Phantom Tollbooth. It is a British work, I totally forgot who the author was, but it’s really good. My favorite quote from that book is ‘So many things are possible just as long as you don’t know they’re impossible.’ Two other quotes I really love are ‘The only thing you can do easily is be wrong, and that’s hardly worth the effort’ and ‘Being lost is not a matter of knowing where you are, it’s a matter of knowing where you aren’t.’”

7. What subject interests you the most and why?

“I really like physical science and math. I feel like the connection between the two, especially with physics and calculus, is just really really interesting. I’ve always found that math problems are kind of like little puzzles you can solve in different ways, and there’s a bunch of shortcuts.”

8. What is your favorite place you have ever traveled to?

“My favorite place I’ve traveled to is definitely Rome, Italy. It was so beautiful, and the food was so good! Oh my gosh, I love Italian food! And the pizza there is just the best. It was so much fun. We roamed around the city a lot, and we would just roam around the corner and there would be another really cool ancient building from the Roman times. It was crazy; it was like an adventure to find these hidden spots that no one really knew about other than seeing the famous Colosseum which is really cool too.”

9. If you could add a word to the dictionary, what word would you add, and why?

“If I could add any word to the dictionary, it would be “confuzzled.” Hear me out! Do I ever use this word? No, but I think it would be really hilarious because I remember in sixth grade it was a thing at my school where we’d say “We’re so confuzzled right now” as in confused and puzzled. I think it’s a great combination of words, and I think it would be hilarious if it actually was one.”

10. If you had 25 hours in a day, what would you do with the extra hour?

“I would definitely, let’s be honest here, be on my phone for another hour. I would probably procrastinate for another hour, if I’m being completely honest. I guess it would also turn into the new normal, so it would balance out.”