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IEOR alum Patrick Briaud puts his faith in tennis
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One of his engineering professors advised Patrick Briaud (B.S.’05 IEOR) to change majors if he wanted to continue playing tennis at such a high level. But Briaud kept competing, ending his Cal tennis career ranked 15 in doubles, all while completing his bachelor’s degree in IEOR with a 3.58 GPA.
BERKELEY INTERCOLLEGIATE ATHLETICS PHOTO
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With a fresh engineering degree under his belt and a successful collegiate tennis career behind him, Patrick Briaud (B.S.’05 IEOR) still hasn’t quite decided what he wants to do when he grows up.
“I have no idea what’s next,” he says with relaxed confidence, adding that he is now considering a medical career. “Right now I’m enjoying the break from tennis, since I’ve been going at it pretty hard from the time I was eight or nine.”
That break didn’t last long. The 23-year-old from College Station, Texas, was all set to do an engineering internship in London this fall, but decided instead to train full time and dedicate 2007 to playing tennis professionally. He had already earned his first three ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) points—the points used to put professional players on the world map—playing tournaments in Venezuela and China in 2005.
“As an engineering student, Patrick was unique,” says Cal Men’s Tennis Head Coach Peter Wright, who hired Briaud as full-time assistant coach just after he graduated. “Both the academics and the athletics demand your 100 percent attention, but Patrick was able to do both at an incredibly high level.”
Briaud ascribes his success to not only doing the sports and the studies and keeping mindful of priorities, but also to finding people to support him in both pursuits. “My relationships are the most important thing. That’s what got me through the tough times.”
Coached by his father, Texas A&M civil engineering professor Jean-Louis Briaud, Patrick started hitting tennis balls at age five. In high school, he won the state 5A singles championship, took the Junior Davis Cup for Team Texas and was named two-time team MVP. At Cal, he made All-American in 2004 and was ranked as high as sixth nationwide in doubles.
Last summer Briaud spent three weeks in Kazakhstan with Athletes in Action, a Christian ministry organization for college athletes. Active in ministry groups since high school, he continues to look for ways to integrate his faith into his life, no matter what activity he pursues. So, if he does go after that medical career, it won’t be in sports medicine or surgery.
“I would do something broad, like general practice or family or emergency medicine, maybe on the international scale,” he says. “I’d like to be able to help people anywhere, and help the most people I can.”
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