Aryia Pringle Quinn
A 12-year-old from east Belfast is heading to Turkey to represent Ireland as the country’s number one female U12 tennis player.
Aryia Pringle Quinn, who started playing tennis as a toddler, will face the best junior players in Europe at the European Summer Cup after her selection.
She hopes it will kickstart a successful international career.
“I am looking forward to meeting and playing with other junior players from across Europe and hopefully this is the first in lots of international competitions,” she said.
“My goal is to step onto centre court at Wimbledon some day – and to secure a scholarship to study and play tennis in the USA.”
Aryia was encouraged at a young age by her parents and inspired by her mother Khara Pringle, who is a photographer. Her grandfather and uncle are also keen tennis players.
In the last few months, Aryia has racked up an impressive number of wins, including Leinster Junior Open U14, National Junior Open at Templelogue U12, Carrickmines Open U12 and the U12 National Indoor Championships. Aryia also reached the semi-finals of Sutton Under 14.
“Tennis is such a huge part of my life and heading to the Summer Cup in Turkey is going to be an amazing experience,” said Aryia.
“Tennis takes a lot of discipline, hard work and training but I absolutely love it. I have made so many good friends and learned a lot of lessons that are useful on and off the court – about how to win, how to lose, how to be respectful to other people.
Aryia is coached by Gordy Watt and plays at Hilden Tennis Academy at Hilden Tennis Club. She is supported by the Mary Peters Trust and Tecnifibre UK.
“Each year I feel more and more focused on my tennis and I think if you put the hard work in, you can go really far with the sport. I definitely plan to keep going and am determined to achieve everything I want to,” Aryia said.
