Glorious career on the courts comes to an end
She has inspired many to take up the game over the years.
GLORIA Larkan, a woman of great distinction, and long time member of the Uvongo Tennis Club has decided on medical advice to hang up her ‘tekkies’.
She was selected to play for South Africa in successive veterans’ age groups no less than five times.
Gloria actually represented this county on three occasions, in Austria twice and in Turkey.
She also took part in 13 interprovincial veterans’ tournaments and won the Free State mixed doubles tournament with fellow Uvongo club octogenarian Ralph Burls.
In earlier days Gloria played against people like former Springbok Maryna Godwin (wife of famous cricketer Mike Procter) and lost 6-4, 6-4 to famed international player Greer Stevens in the Natal Open Championships.
Gloria went on to play tennis in Hawaii and in Bunderberg in Australia, well known for its rum distillery, where she lived briefly.
Gloria grew up in the Northern Cape in a village outside Kimberley where both her mother and father were keen tennis players, and took their children with them wherever they played.
The children practised their tennis in the back yard on limestone after their father erected a net for them.
Gloria moved to Harding as a bride at the age of 21.
In those days the entire province was divided up into counties with Uvongo being Alfred County and Harding South County.
The counties played against each other. Gloria played for Harding A for 25 years and 15 years for South County. There were 750 players registered from Umzinto to Himeville. Port Edward alone boasted 25 clubs.
On an organisational level Gloria took over the presidency of Southern Counties and held the balance of power between Durban and Pietermaritzburg where she attended meetings in the capital and Durban.
Although Gloria is no longer active on the courts she remains a glamorous and instantly recognisable figure, and is the centre of attraction when she makes the occasional appearance at the club.
Gloria is a confirmation of the finding of a study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine which found that racquet sports are the best way to reduce the chance of premature death.
Playing either tennis, squash or badminton cuts the risk of an early death by no less than 47 percent.
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