Rajeev Ram

Rajeev Ram competes in a tennis match. Ram is CHS’ first Olympian.

Part of watching the Olympic games is imagining what it would be like to compete in them, and for many students, that’s all the Olympics will ever be – an imagination. Yet, for Rajeev Ram ‘00, a member of the 2016 Olympic tennis team, dreams became a reality just a few days before the opening ceremony.

“Mike and Bob Brian (defending men’s doubles champions) pulled out a couple of days before the team was supposed to go to Rio, and I had to make a decision. I had already scheduled other things, and I wasn’t planning on going. But once I figured out I could do it, and logistically it could work, it was a no-brainer. It’s a once-in-a life experience,”  Ram said. “I was at another tournament in Toronto, preparing to go to the next one in Atlanta. Instead of going, I  just went down to Houston, where the rest of the team was.”

While this was the official start to his Olympic story, Ram said he began to learn some of the skills necessary to be an Olympian at CHS.

Ram said that during his years at CHS, “A lot of kids that played sports at a high level had to either move away or do things to concentrate on them. I always felt that it was a big priority to not do that, to make sure I had my ‘high school’ experience, because I really thought that was important.”

In order to achieve that full experience, Ram said he had to learn time management, and with the help of staff and friends, he was able to do just that.

He said, “I think more than anything, CHS taught me how to balance my life out. I mean tennis was important then, and I put a lot into it, but I also wanted to make sure I gave priority to other things.”

These things, he said, included having time to hang out with friends and enjoy activities outside of school.

Since graduating from CHS, Ram has won a National Championship with the University of Illinois, and he has competed in several major tournaments like The Championships, Wimbledon, and The U.S. Open. He said competing in these tournaments helped him a great deal with the mental and physical preparation necessary for the Olympics.

In terms of competing with and against other players in the world, Ram said, “It’s not that different (at the Olympics). It’s kind of my job, and I do it on a regular basis. I played a few weeks before the Olympics at Wimbledon, and now I’m at the U.S .Open, which are two of the biggest tournaments in our sport.”

More than a solely competitive environment, the Olympic games provide a change in atmosphere. “We usually play individually, for ourselves, and that’s it,” Ram said.

“So, just the idea, in tennis, that we got to play on a team, for our country, that was the part that was different. One of my best memories from tennis is playing in college for the same reason,” said Ram. “We played for a team, for our school, and (the Olympics) is like that times 10.  It’s a situation that I feel I am really lucky to have had. To wear USA on your back and represent your country, that is something I regard very highly.”

Ram said representing one’s country at the Olympics evokes more emotion and instills more pressure than most tournaments. In order to cope, Ram said he had to get into the right mental state and just play.

He said, “It’s hard (getting focused), I guess, but it’s part of the job. I’ve been on the professional circuit since 2004, so one of the things you have to get pretty good at is blocking out your surroundings and just playing the sport. Like I said, you’re playing for something bigger than yourself; but at the end of the day, I’m not playing a sport that I’ve never done before.”

“It’s a little more tricky when the emotions and surroundings are different because it’s the Olympics, but I’d rather have it be tennis than anything else,” he added.

No athlete has ever made it to the Olympics without training, and Ram is no exception. While he admitted it takes hours of hard work and dedication to have success on the world’s biggest stage, he said people often overlook one of the most important parts of training.

He said, “I think the thing that people overlook is that (training) has to be fun, too. One thing that I have tried to make my tennis career about is having it be fun; and if it’s ever not fun, I think there is a problem.”

According to Ram, it’s easy to focus on something you like, and it’s easy to have drive for something you enjoy doing.

He said, “So, yeah, you practice a lot, you train a lot, and you make ‘sacrifices,’ but it’s always been something I’ve liked and enjoyed. It’s not a burden. I think a big key in getting good at something is finding a way to really enjoy it.”

Once you learn to have fun, he said, you can improve and make it to the next level. Ram said he knows hand first what it takes to get to the next level, and, in his interview, he offered some advice to all student athletes with the hope of one day being called an olympian.

Ram said, “I would say first and foremost, you have to make it fun. You have to find ways to make the challenge be enjoyable. If you wake up and you’re going to your sport, to practice every day thinking, ‘My gosh this is terrible,’ or, ‘I don’t want to do this,’ then there is obviously an issue. It doesn’t mean you can’t do that sport. It means maybe the way you go about it has to be tinkered. You don’t want to get stale.”

Ram reflected on what it was like to win his silver medal. Explaining the mixed emotions stemming from his gold medal match loss, Ram said the sense of accomplishment that comes from winning an Olympic medal hit him later while he was walking through Rio.

He said, “I walked somewhere, and I saw a screen with the medal count on it. I knew the USA had won a ton of medals. But to think I added to that total, that I wasn’t just there as one of the olympians, which by itself is unbelieveable, but I added to the actual medal count – that was pretty surreal.”