Nancy Lee dreams of wowing a full house at Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York, whipping her powerful right-handed baseline forehand again and again en route to a U.S. Open tennis title.
While the thought of a 16-year-old from Belmont someday playing late into the New York City night and hoisting the sterling silver trophy might seem far-fetched, Lee’s tennis trajectory makes it seem possible.
“I want to be a Grand Slam champion,” Lee said during an interview at Grove Street Park. “I want to be the best player in the world.”
How will she get there?
“Hard work, determination, and pushing through even when times get tough,” she said.
A dozen years ago, Lee picked up a racket for the first time at the Grove Street Park tennis courts. Now, she’s among the world’s rising tennis stars, ranked No. 121 in the International Tennis Federation’s ITF World Tennis Tour Junior Rankings of players worldwide ages 13-18 and the No. 14 American high school prospect by Babolat per Tennis Recruiting.
THE MAKING OF A STAR
Michael and Sarah Lee knew of each other growing up in China, but their relationship blossomed while students at Boston University. They settled in Belmont shortly after Nancy, their only child, was born.
Michael enjoyed playing tennis recreationally and brought Nancy along when he’d hit with friends. She started hitting around age four and entered her first tournament at age six, winning a 10-and-under bracket down the road at Harvard. She quickly found her groove and started beating her self-taught father at age nine. Lee kept entering and winning more local tournaments. By 11, she debuted at the national level, bowing out in the first round. The competition and intensity surprised Lee.
The next year, she played in her first tournament against international players, reaching the semifinals of the Orange Bowl in Florida, later winning the singles bracket for her age group at the Easter Bowl national tournament in California. To date, she’s played in Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Bolivia, the Czech Republic, Spain, France, Italy, Mexico, Canada, and China. She’s won four USTA National Junior Level 1 tournaments in all.
The trip to the Czech Republic for the World Junior Tennis Finals was Lee’s first time traveling outside the country without her parents. She loved playing as part of a team and calls the experience the highlight of her tennis career to date.
“It was such an honor to represent your country,” Lee said.
ALL-IN ON TENNIS
As tennis travel ramped up, the traditional school schedule presented a roadblock. After attending Burbank Elementary School and Chenery Middle School, Lee switched to online schooling, TEC Connections Academy Commonwealth, after seventh grade. On the road for a week or two at a time for tournaments most of the year, the public school schedule just didn’t make sense.
“It was difficult at first to basically teach yourself everything and manage your time,” Lee said. “Over time, it got better.”
A normal day in her life goes like this: two to three hours of practice, lunch and schoolwork, another two to three hours of practice, an hour of fitness, then more schooling. Not only does Lee travel often for tournament play, she spends one week a month in Florida, staying at the USTA player development facility, training with peers.
Lee remains close with a handful of childhood Belmont friends and enjoys meeting new friends from tennis, but sometimes she feels “a bit lonely.”
What makes it all worth it, Lee said, is winning.
“Results definitely make the process worth it,” Lee said. “I don’t know how to describe it really, but when you win, the feeling is just so nice. It makes you feel like you’ve come so far, and all the work you’ve put in behind the scenes shows through.”
She approaches tennis like a math problem, one she solves while running around.
“You don’t know what’s coming next,” Lee said, “and you have to do it for hours.”
MAKING IT WORK
Almost all costs come out of the Lee family’s pocket. Sarah travels with her daughter full-time, while Michael is a biochemistry researcher at a small biotech company. He will travel when he can. The couple swapped the working and traveling roles when Nancy was 12. They try to fly budget airlines and use tools like Priceline to stretch their dollars.
In the past, they’ve run a GoFundMe to help cover costs. Michael, who drives a green minivan donated by a community member, credits both Belmont and the area’s Chinese community with supporting Nancy’s journey.
One prohibitive cost is that of a consistent, professional coach. Unlike most of her peers, Lee has risen through the ranks without one.
“As you get better and better, you need formal coaches, but our situation financially is a bit tough,” Lee said. “So my parents are still my main coaches… Everyone else has professional coaches, and I have my parents.”
At first, her father just fed her the ball for hitting practice. He pored over tennis instruction books and coaching videos on cassette and received his Professional Tennis Registry certification.
“I saw that she has talent,” Michael Lee said. “I’m not that good at tennis, and we don’t have official training for her… If she has a stable coach, she has a very good chance to become a pro.”
Michael said some of Lee’s competitors travel with both a tennis and a fitness coach. Michael said the cost of a full-time coach who travels is between $80,000 and $100,000 per year. The family spends more than six figures on travel per year for Nancy and Sarah combined.
“We have zero,” he said. “We definitely need to find a stable coach so she can move to the professional level, but we have limited resources.”
Colette Lewis, who covers the junior and college tennis circuits for ZooTennis, said most players of Lee’s caliber have personal coaches by now. The majority share coaches.
“It’s hard to generalize on that,” Lewis said. “I would say that it’s an unusual part of her story if at this age she’s still being coached primarily [by her parents].”
CHARTING THE FUTURE
Lee is also New England’s top-ranked recruit for her age group and a blue chip designee, the highest prospect status at Tennis Recruiting. There is no perfect ranking system, given that American junior players split time between international ITF tournaments and the USTA circuit. Lee plays mostly ITF.
Some players choose to forgo college in favor of turning pro, but Rhiannon Potkey, Tennis Recruiting’s content strategist, said more and more top recruits now go to college before successful professional careers. It’s too early to tell how Lee’s career might play out.
“Having a sustainable pro career and just playing pro tournaments are two different things,” Potkey said. “It’s not that hard to play pro tournaments if you are a top recruit or top college player, but having success on tour to have a long career is harder to predict. She has displayed the potential early to put her on the right path for future success.”
Lee plans to attend college. The idea is to participate in a handful of professional-level tournaments during the school year, play for a college team, and turn professional after graduating.
The recruitment process began in earnest on June 15, and she’s heard from about 30 schools, including some of the top national programs.
“It’s honestly really cool,” Lee said, albeit a bit “overwhelming.”
HEAD supplies Lee with free gear, and she hopes to ramp up Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) as an income source. With more than 100,000 followers on an Instagram managed by Michael, she has reach.
The big tournament this summer is the USTA Billie Jean King Girls’ 18s National Championship in San Diego, starting Aug. 2, one of four Level 1 tournaments. The winner qualifies for the main draw of the U.S. Open.
As the glowing sun set on the warmest June day in recent history, the 5-foot-9 Lee greeted two young boys about half her size and joined them on the Grove Street Park tennis courts, the courts where she learned to play, for a friendly game of pickleball. It’s a wholesome summer scene ending the hottest June day in the region’s history, a reminder that those lofty—but—believable — dreams belong to a Belmont teen.
