Tennis : Austin to Return When She’s Good and Ready

Tracy Austin welcomed a reporter into her Rolling Hills apartment, although this was one meeting she would have rather not had to schedule.

Austin is into lying low these days. She’s been away from the women’s professional tennis circuit for a year now, rehabilitating a variety of injuries, and isn’t exactly keen on publicizing her progress. Interviews with Tracy Austin are currently as common as tennis matches involving Tracy Austin.

But then, Austin wasn’t really looking at this as an interview. For her, it was more a chance for rebuttal. Point, counterpoint.

Point was made in this space two weeks ago by Billie Jean King, who, while espousing views on the present state of tennis, chided Austin for being “afraid” of returning to the women’s pro tour.

To wit: “I think she owes it to the game and to herself, but she’s darn afraid to get back on the court. She’s afraid to lose . . . or, maybe she’s afraid to win.

” . . . It’s OK for her to go out there and lose for a year while she gets it together. I had to take my knocks after I came back from knee surgery and it’s scary, a horrible feeling. But, it’s very important for one’s self to give it another try. Tracy’s afraid she’s not ready, but when is she ever gonna be ready?”

When Austin picked up the paper and read those comments . . . well, let’s just say it didn’t make her day.

“Here I am,” Austin said, “doing the things I have to do to get back into tennis, minding my own business, and something like this comes out.

“It kind of disturbed me. I respect Billie Jean and I expect more from her than just making educated guesses. To question my determination or my desire, that’s just not something that applies with me.

“If I was 100% ready, I would be playing. Billie Jean doesn’t know the injuries I’ve had. I haven’t talked to her in a year-and-a-half.

“I’ll be the first to admit that a comeback is not easy. I’ve tried it before. This time, it’s a longer road back. I’m not afraid of the challenge, and to say I am comes from a lack of information.”

Austin knows about comebacks. Since 1981, her list of injuries has rivaled in length her tennis achievements. Every time she steps onto the court, it’s another Austin Comeback.

It’s taken her a while, Austin says, to get it right.

“When I had the stress fracture in my back in 1983, I tried to come back too fast,” she said. “My first day back, I went out and hit for three hours. And that resulted in me getting shoulder tendinitis.”

Austin’s most recent comeback effort, which ended last April during a six-women exhibition event at the Forum, was also sabotaged by her efforts to do too much too soon.

“That was the ultimate in trying to play with injuries,” Austin said. “I pulled a hamstring the week before and hadn’t hit one ball until the first exhibition match. I went out there and--bam!--I pulled my hip-flexer muscle.

“I said to myself, ‘What are you doing?’ I wasn’t prepared, I hadn’t run before. . . . My body was injured and I was battering it. That’s not lacking determination. It’s being overzealous, if anything, the exact opposite.”

Austin responded by retreating, pulling herself off the circuit and out of the limelight. Her new strategy: Go easy, go slowly, and go about it quietly.

Right now, she’s confronted by three obstacles--shoulder tendinitis, tennis elbow and a torn tendon in the arch of her left foot. Austin’s route to recovery has reached the point where she’s now practicing five to six times a week--one-hour hitting sessions, no match play yet--and working out with weights three times a week at Centinela Hospital Medical Center under the direction of Dr. Robert Kerlan.

“I have three things that are not right with me yet--shoulder tendinitis, tennis elbow and plantar-fascitis (the foot injury). Those aren’t exactly hangnails,” Austin said, managing a grin. “It’s a slow process. Before, I would’ve run out there--’OK, Let’s play three out of five.’ Now, I’m just hitting and going through a few drills. In a few months, I’ll start playing some practice matches.”

The year away from the circuit has done more than allow the injuries some time to heal, Austin said.

“I’ve learned patience, when to go more and when to let up,” she said. “I know how to listen to my body. And, it’s helped me personally off the court.

“It used to be that when I’d wake up in the morning, the first and only thing I thought about was tennis. In the past year, I’ve learned about Tracy the person, too. And I feel good about Tracy. She’s someone who enjoys going out dancing, taking pottery classes, decorating her apartment, going to concerts.

“I’ve liked finding out about that side of me. It’s nice to have a balance in your life. . . . Sometimes, I think this was all a blessing in disguise.”

Austin’s thoughts returned to her eventual return to the pro tour--and to King’s comments.

She says she has no timetable but plans to resume competitive play sometime this year (“It’s only April,” she said). And Austin said she believes King’s remarks were well-intentioned.

“I think she wanted to put a spur under my skin,” Austin said. She’s aware of the view held by King, and many others, that women’s tennis sorely needs a young face or two to break up the staid Navratilova-Lloyd reign.

Even if that face is not exactly new.

“I’m young, 22,” Austin said with a laugh. “I wouldn’t mind coming up and taking it away from them. Being No. 1 is not my goal, but I would love it. Oh, God, yeah.”

Austin laughed again and pounded her right fist into the palm of her left hand.

“I’m just going to keep quiet,” she said, “and then, I’ll sting ‘em.”

Tennis Notes

Another comeback resumes this week when Andrea Jaeger returns to singles competition for the first time in nine months during this week’s $75,000 Virginia Slims on San Diego tournament at the San Diego Hilton Beach and Tennis Resort. Jaeger hasn’t played competitively since withdrawing from last summer’s Olympic tennis demonstration with a shoulder injury. The San Diego tournament, which features a 32-player field headed by top-seeded Wendy Turnbull, began play Saturday and will conclude next Sunday. . . . The Southern California Senior Sectional tennis championships are also under way this week, with competition at the Racquet Center in Universal City running through Sunday. Men’s divisions run from 35-and-over to 80-and-over, women’s from 35 to 65. Each round of the tournament is open to the public.