CHELSEA WARRENStudent Life sat down with tennis player Dave Weingeist to discuss shucking corn, the Boilermakers, and having sex with Jack Nicholson.
Student Life: Anna Kournikova’s boyfriend Enrique Iglesias recently had his trademark mole removed. Who will be missed more: Iglesias’ mole or Anna’s tennis career?
Dave Weingeist: Well obviously Anna Kournikova, but then again with Mandy Moore tagging along after Roddick, it’s not so bad.
SL: In tennis, when you have zero points in a game, you have l’oeuf, or love, coming from the French word for egg. Do you find it interesting then that all these years in tennis we have been Frenching the egg rather than the traditional American practice of egging the French?
DW: Actually, I’ve had a pretty positive experience with the French. This guy Julian, who’s from Paris, hits with us and I play doubles with him at practice. He’s a great guy and a good coach and he’s funny when he messes up verb tenses. The other day he said, “I want to broke my racquet.”
SL: Tennis player Paradorn Srichipan has a following that calls itself the Srichi-fans. Do you curse your parents that you don’t have a surname that can be easily translated into a pun for your fan base?
DW: My roommates’ nickname for me is “Wiener,” and they’re pretty big fans and they call themselves the “Wiener Watchers.”
SL: You’re from Iowa, a land of farms; how does corn shucking help your tennis?
DW: I used to go to a tennis camp in North Shore, Chicago and all the rich suburban kids would give me a hard time about being from Iowa. So instead of being defensive I just went along with it telling them I was from a town of 10 people. They said, “Well how can you be so good at tennis then?” And I said, “Forehand – same motion as corn shucking.”
SL: I understand you practice Kung Fu, a traditionally Eastern discipline. You, of course, are from the West here in the U.S. Is that why you use a semi-western grip on your forehand?
DW: I feel Kung Fu has helped all aspects of my game. I’ve actually got about half the tennis team to join my new Washington University Kung Fu Club, which meets Sunday evenings.
SL: Do you ever wish Coach Follmer would call you grasshopper?
DW: Coach Follmer is always trying to come up with nicknames for me, especially when we had David Genovese – another David on the team. For a while he played around with “D-Dubs” ’cause the athletic secretary, that’s her nickname, but it didn’t stick.
SL: If everybody is really Kung Fu fighting, as one Carl Douglass attests, are there tennis applications to your Kung Fu study?
DW: Yes, it’s helped me to be fast as lightening, with groundstrokes a little bit frightening. I’m playing with expert timing.
SL: What does your coach tell you to do when you break an opponent’s serve?
DW: Last year we played NYU, which is a competitive team in our conference, and coach told us we needed to have more spirit on the court, be louder. He told us that when he played at Purdue and they would break an opponent’s serve, they’d yell, “Let’s go Boilermakers.” So we got out there and Brian Alvo was quick to win his first game, breaking his opponents serve and he screamed, “Let’s go Boilermakers.” So for the rest of the match, everyone did that and the NYU team had no clue what was going on.
SL: Jaap De Hoop Scheffer of the Netherlands had been announced as the next Secretary General of NATO. Do you find it interesting that now when the U.S. wants the rest of the world to chip in to rebuild Iraq that NATO goes Dutch?
DW: There’s only two things that I hate – people who are intolerant of other people’s cultures…and the Dutch!
SL: What do you guys do before a match for team building?
DW: Before our big matches we get together in a huddle and coach gets us pumped up, but we don’t want to be too loud and obnoxious so coach tells us to do a silent “Bears!” so we do a “1,2,3, Bearssssss.” And then our assistant coach, who’s into yoga, tells us to get into the downward facing dog position so I mean, take it how you want.
SL: If you could have Agassi’s return, Connor’s backhands, Rafter’s volleys, or Sampras’ wife, which would you pick?
DW: That Veronica Vaughn is one piece of ace and I know from experience.
SL: No you don’t.
DW: Not me personally, but a guy I know, Eric Borden, him and her got it on.
SL: No they didn’t
DW: No, no they didn’t but you could imagine what it would be like.
SL: Sampras’ wife, Bridgette Wilson, is of course best known for her role as Ms. Veronica Vaughn in “Billy Madison” leading me to a dilemma posed in the film- who would you rather bone, Meg Ryan or Jack Nicholson?
DW: Jack Nicholson now, or Jack Nicholson 1974?
SL: 1974.
DW: Meg Ryan.