Junior Player Spotlight: Valentina Singh Carvajal, Centercourt Tennis Academy

At the end of 2024, Valentina Singh Carvajal put together an impressive run of results across multiple USTA tournaments. She brought home the title at the L4 Turkey Bowl at Centercourt Chatham, a girls doubles and mixed doubles title at the L3 event in Mountainside, New Jersey prior to that, and before that, the singles titles at both the L4 Closed tournament in Matawan, New Jersey and the L4 Open event in Chestertown, Maryland.

In the latter two tournaments, Singh Carvajal came back from a set down in the finals, demonstrating a remarkable mental toughness that you don’t often see in young players. Much of that is a product of her training and development as a full-time athlete of the Centercourt Tennis Academy.

“I’m trying to be mentally stronger when I am on court, and we do mental training sessions here at Centercourt twice per week,” said Singh Carvajal. “There was times in the past where maybe I would break down on court if things weren’t going right, but doing these Mental Toughness sessions really help me a lot and keeps me in a good state of mind during a match. One thing we learned is that when you are on court sitting down on a changeover, look at something on court that can’t move, like the court number on the fence. If you look at that, it doesn’t move, and it helps you refocus and stay on task.”

It’s one of the many things she has improved on over the last few years, and at just 11-years-old, the future is bright for Singh Carvajal because of that desire to get better, and to do so in an environment like Centercourt.

She is the daughter of Centercourt Tennis CEO Conrad Singh, who brought his international tennis experience from places like Australia, Japan, China, Western Europe and England and more to the New Jersey-based academy. And despite his position as a coach and director, Valentina found her footing in tennis the natural way, never getting pushed into it by her father, but instead falling in love with it on her own. Her true start was with the Centercourt Red Ball Programs where the focus is firmly based on sound technical foundations with World Class Leaders in the field like Cinto Casanova and Todd Anderson, who lead the entry-level programs at Centercourt.

“I tried other sports growing up like Ninja Warrior, softball and soccer, but the only sport that stuck out to me was tennis,” she says. “I loved the competition, the feeling of beating my opponents, the feeling that comes with playing aggressively, fist bumping after winning a point, that sort of stuff. I just loved the whole feeling of those things. I remember playing Red Ball matches every Friday and getting pizza afterwards when I was five-years-old. That’s when I learnt to love to compete”

Her father can recall a time during COVID, where people were stuck inside for the most part and Valentina was just starting out in Red Ball. She would go outside every day and hit one thousands balls against their house to hone her technique, and play as much as she can. This was the foundation of her passion to rally and to control the ball.

“There was no paint left on the side of the house because I could not get her to stop when it was done,” Conrad says. “We had to repaint the wall.”

Valentina turned 11 just before the end of 2024, but has been competing in the Girls 12s singles events, which has enabled her to test herself against girls who are older than her and most of the time bigger than her.

“It teaches me how aggressive they can be, and shows me how aggressive I need to be in order to play with and beat them,” she said. “I know a lot of them are taller and stronger, so it makes me want to improve my game and play aggressively.”

She hasn’t only learned more about herself in this experience, but she is also winning. She ranks number one in New Jersey for her age group, and fourth nationally on TennisRecruiting.net, and she just recently signed a full sponsorship deal with tennis brand HEAD. She also recently teamed up with SJ Bibbee to win back to back National Titles in platform tennis.

That success is the result of her dedication to the sport. As a member of the Full-Time Academy at Centercourt, she plays tennis six days a week, and this past year began doing online schooling, which allows her to spend more time at Centercourt working on her tennis while not sacrificing her academics.

“The coaches here are really caring and smart, and I’ve been able to learn a lot from them,” Valentina explains. “With all my coaches I work on different things, and every time I get on court they give me really good advice, and really push me to be the best I can be.”

For Conrad, striking the balance between being a father and a coach can sometimes be difficult, but for the most part, the two are able to compartmentalize that.

“I try not to be on court with her during those times she is training, and let the other coaches do their job,” he says. “I do work with the coaches on delivering the right message, but they do the talking to her. I let them take control and Valentina does connect with them extremely well. And my wife is essentially her manager in terms of tournament booking, arranging the travel, and even does a lot of the mental work with Valentina. It’s a good system we’ve been able to work out.”

He says sometimes he has to remind her what hat he is wearing at a particular time, sometimes it’s the coaching hat, other times it’s the father hat. But even at a young age, Valentina is able to distinguish between that, which is extremely important. In the end she is a great student which is a priority for everyone.

“She made a cool comment to me the other night when we were just hanging at the house playing with our dog Izzy and watching tv. She mentioned how cool it is to be able to see all the different sides of dad,” Conrad recalls. “She gets to see the dad side when we are at home, and at Centercourt she sees the professional side. Because she’s full-time at Centercourt she is in my office during lunchtime, and can see me talk to other coaches and things like that. So she recognizes that, and I give all the credit to Valentina for understanding the difference.”

Valentina won’t turn 12 until later this year but has already established herself as one of the top players in that division. She is looking forward to playing more Level 1 tournaments to try to build up her experience in those top events, and her main goal for the time being is to simply train harder, and do what she can to be the best version of herself. She can’t speak highly enough about Centercourt and the great experiences she has daily with world class coaching, facilities and also many chances to compete in her own Academy.