Mexican on menu for Tauranga tennis

Coaching at Tauranga Lawn tennis club has taken on an international flavour - with the expertise coming not from expected quarters such as the US or Europe, but Mexico.
Spicing up proceedings at the club is former Mexico national junior team coach Luis Luna, who took over as head coach last month.
Having guided Mexico's junior side for a decade before emigrating in December, Luna has lived and breathed tennis since first taking up a scholarship to the US at age 12.
Based in Florida, Luna's early teenage experiences included duelling with Andre Agassi at the US hardcourt nationals, and a memorable defeat of eventual world No1 Jim Courier.
After a three-year stint in Munich trying his hand at a pro career, Luna qualified as a coach and eventually became tennis director at the 1000-strong Britania Tennis Club in his Mexico hometown of Jalapa. He also had the responsibility of training and certifying coaches across the country's southeast, before marriage to his Kiwi fiancee Deborah saw Luna emigrate to New Zealand.
That step into the unknown has become Tauranga Lawn's gain, as the club sought someone to replace Brandon Rowe, who had taken up an offer to coach at Murwillumbah Tennis Club in Tweed Heads, New South Wales.
Luna's reception at his new base has made him feel instantly at home, the 42-year-old says.
"Club president John Palmer and everybody here has welcomed me with open arms and open heart. My wife and I are very happy to be here.
"When I arrived the club had a Mexican themed get-together - sombreros, nachos. The kids had a Mexican fancy-dress competition too, the boys wearing moustaches, it was a lot of fun."
To help boost junior ranks, Luna aims to extend tennis to a year-round sport, as it is in his home country. Friday interclub competition got underway last week, featuring youngsters aged 9-17 from the Otumoetai, Gate Pa and Mount Maunganui clubs plus hosts Tauranga Lawn.
Taking up his new role on July 1, Luna certainly hit the ground running. Filling in as Western Bay juniors co-coach alongside Peter Blow while Andy Donald recovers from injury, he is at Blow's Gate Pa club on Mondays.
In addition to 2-3 full-time coaching days each week at Tauranga Lawn, with daytime adult tuition and after-school kids' sessions Tuesdays and Thursdays, he slots in sessions at Rotorua Tennis Club on Wednesdays.
Based in his wife's hometown of Fielding before the position at Tauranga Lawn eventuated, he coached national under-14 champ Paige Hourigan, who is from Marton, and was to have gone with her to the world junior finals held last week in the Czech Republic. "Tennis can be a hard, lonely sport but if you make coaching fun it helps you and others reach goals," he says.
Luna brings a strong technical focus to his new role. "Modern tennis is about footwork, but not many coaches teach it. Look at Federer, he learned how to run. That court penetration takes time away from your opponent."
Chosen by Tauranga Lawn officials from a strong bunch of applicants, Luna had got to know Rowe through promising junior Jacob Carey, a member of Lawn's Baywide championship-winning men's premier team for 2010-11.
Residing in Palmerston North for this school year, Carey has travelled regularly to Feilding - where Luna and his wife were previously based - to tap into the Mexican's coaching experience.
Carey says Luna has a keenly analytical approach.
"He breaks the court down to zones, from that we've worked on [play] patterns. He's taught me a lot about footwork, which helps get more power into shots.
"He also has a lot of energy and I've noticed he's really good with kids."