Hyperbole, yes. But you do know their background, right? In an age in which most top tennis players have to weather the mean streets of IMG Academy under the tutelage of Nick Bolleteri, Venus and Serena were learning to play on public courts in Compton, CA, taught by their father, who learned how to play from books and videos. Yes, it will make a hell of a Disney movie.
"Serena's father—a former sharecropper from Louisiana determined to see his two youngest girls succeed—used what he'd gleaned from tennis books and videos to instruct Serena and Venus on how to play the game. At the age of 3, practicing on a court not far from the family's new Compton, California, home, Serena withstood the rigors of daily two-hour practices from her father.
The fact that the family had relocated to Compton was no accident. With its high rate of gang activity, Richard Williams wanted to expose his daughters to the ugly possibilities of life "if they did not work hard and get an education." In this setting, on courts that were riddled with potholes and sometimes missing nets, Serena and Venus cut their teeth on the game of tennis and the requirements for persevering in a tough climate."
