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Tennis player Duckhee Lee of South Korea poses after her tennis match on Monday, August 19, 2019 at the Open Winston-Salem in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Lee became the first deaf professional to play in an ATP tennis tournament. (AP Photo / Joedy McCreary)
Duckhee Lee threw the ball into the air for his first serve in an ATP tournament match, and blew him up in front of his opponent with a loud noise.
The 21-year-old South Korean has never heard it. He was born deaf.
The first professional deaf player on the circuit states that he does not want to be defined by the handicap that he has overcome enough to play at the highest level of the sport.
His first appearance in a high level tournament will last at least until the second round. Lee on Monday beat Switzerland's Henri Laaksonen 7-6 (4), 6-1 in the opening round of the Winston-Salem Open, winning a duel with Poland, seeded number 3, Hubert Hurkacz.
Even if the first-round victory meant for Lee and his career, it could have meant even more for hearing-impaired athletes in all sports.
"Do not be discouraged and if you do your best, you can do anything you want," Lee said through an interpreter, adding that he "did not want people to get discouraged and denigrate their disability . "
The ability to hear is of particular importance in tennis. Players often insist on silence during the points so they can hear the ball out of their opponent's strings and identify the rotation in a fraction of a second.
Lee catches up with his eyes, focusing more on his opponent's swing, how that player makes contact, the speed and effects of the ball heading towards him.
To complicate things further, he does not speak English either, reads the lips instead of using sign language and relies on the hand gestures of the referees who call.
Because he can not hear score ads, he keeps track of his points and his matches – which can be more difficult at smaller events without dashboards. This caused a hiccup early in his debut in the main draw, after being aligned to serve after the decision of a match.
"I think (the referee) forgot to give the signal" from time to time during the match, he said, adding that he "hoped that he would give signals from "Entrance and exit".
The Winston-Salem debut marked a new stage in the tennis event for Lee, who started playing tennis at the age of 7 – a year after realizing that he was deaf , although doctors diagnosed him as a toddler.
"People made fun of (me) because of their disability and said (I) should not play," said Lee, adding that his motivation was "to enjoy my life by overcoming my disability."
Lee made his debut on the ITF Futures Tour at age 14 and won eight titles before turning 18. He then reached three finals on the ATP Challenger circuit, including one in June, at the expense of Dudi Sela at the Baptist Health Little Rock Open in Arkansas. He set a world ranking No. 212 for hardcourt players in central North Carolina.
He will always remember his first victory at ATP – not just because of the result. Lee was two points behind when storms forced a delay of nearly five hours. He and Laakonsen returned to court around 10:15 pm – and finished the game in 87 seconds.
When asked how he had spent that time, Lee made his point about a pantomime, imitating someone playing table tennis and basketball, because there was both a table pingpong and a slot machine in the players lounge. He smiled when his translator said how "he likes the installation here."
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