Mark Schauer is not only my dad, but a great couch and mentor. I’ve been playing tennis for five years and he has been at my side through it all. It was hard in the beginning getting trained by one of my parents. He would always tell me what I was doing wrong and then I would get mad, because I thought I was doing fine. He would wake me up early in the morning, I wouldn’t even realize what was going on and he would tell me to get up because were going to the courts. I would get up and be so excited we would be out on the courts for four hours practicing everything.

My dad taught me even if I miss a ball or mess up, I can learn from it and fix it the next time. He taught me if I have the right mind set, I can accomplish anything. Sometimes if I missed a couple of balls or really easy shots, I would get frustrated and mad and I wouldn’t want to play anymore. But he is always patient enough to tell me to get a drink of water and say, “We can just start over, and look at what you’re doing wrong”.
When I started playing for my high school team, my dad would come and watch my games. He would sit on the side and if I messed up, he tell me what I did wrong, sometimes yelling it to me from the side.

Everyone loves my dad. He has such an out there personality. He is always the life of the party. He makes me laugh constantly, and he never stops embarrassing me any chance he gets, even when we go to the grocery store, I will go get something and look over at him and he will be dancing with the grocery cart and not very well, I must add.
Even at some of my volleyball games in grade school, he would yell, If you don’t get this serve over, you don’t get dessert tonight,” he was never serious about it, but I could swear you could hear a pin drop in the gymnasium, and everyone started laughing, and four years later people still remember that.

I could always go to him for whatever I needed, I know people say their parents are their best friends, but that is really what my dad is to me. Just from a game of tennis, he has taught me to never give up, and I can accomplish anything, even if I’m loosing in a game. Mark Schauer, my dad, coach and best friend. Who could ask for anything else?