Yuri Bettoni was part of the Swiss Tennis Federation set up of Peter Lundgren, Sven Groeneveld, Peter Carter which developed and produced Roger Federer. Bettoni recalls a couple of his favorite Peter Lundgren memories…
Yuri Bettoni: Too many personal memories with Peter Lundgren to share, too many but definitely one of the top ones would be when we all flew in for Sven Groeneveld’s wedding in Holland, my flight was almost four hours after his arrival in Schiphol Airport Amsterdam. There would be too many cool, unique CLASSIC stories to narrate about Peter. We definitely shared some incredible moments happy and sad yet I feel blessed to have been part of his life for quite some time. Definitely he was an outlier, not only for his tennis skills and later coach but as a human being, a great life mentor that taught me a lot.
I can remember as it was yesterday when we all flew in for Sven Groeneveld’s wedding in Holland, my flight arrival in Schiphol was almost four hours after his arrival but still he made sure to wait for me to land and meet at one of the airport’s restaurants, that’s how he greeted me and how we started those four incredible days of celebration. That’s what Peter was all about, a simple, humble person with a huge heart, always ready to support his close friends. That was such a cool gesture especially coming from a tennis guy. “A CLASSIC!” That’s how he would have liked to say it. Another time during one of the very first Roger Federer’s US Opens, center court, early afternoon, quite a hot day at center court, Roger is up and seemed to be cruising through the match until all of a sudden after a break he melts down, his usual tanking kicks in which at that time was happening often. “A CLASSIC”… I had never seen Peter that upset which made the entire situation also quite, at one point I doubt he was Swedish, with that northern cool but more of a hot Italian with all those agitated gestures, me trying to hold him from leaving the player’s box, Roger looking over and not understanding what was going on, it was like a little comic theater. I want to remember Peter like the last day we met with that calm aura that made him such a special person, that person that would enter any room, situation and light up with his energy every one. Ciao Peter.
Peter Lundgren · US Open · Yuri Bettoni
Steve · September 4, 2024 at 10:29 am
I can’t remember which year but I saw him walking around the US Open grounds alone and he carried himself in an unassuming manner. I have seen many famous people there from all diff. entertainment industries but I was more star struck with Lundgren than the others. He must’ve been pretty chill and even keeled to coach both Safin and Rios. I wouldn’t want those jobs. 🙂
Scoop Malinowski · September 4, 2024 at 11:29 am
Steve, a totally regular normal cool guy. Swedes are different. only talked with him a few times but his normalcy stood out in the hectic high stakes image is everything tennis jungle.