They are among the closest spectators at a tennis match, sometimes within an arm’s distance of the game’s best players. Stamina and flexibility are necessary as their working hours can be long. But for many young tennis lovers it’s a dream job — to be a ball boy or ball girl and serve the world’s top male tennis players.

Gu Chuanqian can hardly wait for the 2015 Shanghai Rolex Masters to start. She will get to meet her favorite players like Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic. It will be her third year as a ball girl at the Shanghai event.

“It feels like a dream to stand so close beside the players,” the 16-year-old tells Shanghai Daily. When Federer said ‘thank you’ after I helped him unpack a racket, I simply felt thrilled!”

Gu is a Shanghai Health School student. She will be among the 70 ball kids to serve during the Shanghai Rolex Masters this year. Gu started playing the sport about seven years ago. It was about two years ago that she met a coach who trains the ball kids.

Together with 30 other youngsters, Gu took a half-day training class at Xuhui No. 1 Youth Amateur Athletic School in the summer of 2013. They were taught the rules of tennis and technical terms, as well as where to position themselves on court. Experienced ball kids were also invited to demonstrate the correct ways of tossing and collecting balls. A test was given at the end of training with the youngsters divided into groups to simulate a real tennis match. Some were cut during the procedure.

“It’s not very difficult given that a lot of us are tennis followers and are familiar with the basic rules,” Gu says. “We just need to memorize the English terms like tie-break, nets, etc.”

The kids who qualify practiced their skills during the Shanghai ATP Challenge, an international tournament held weeks before the Shanghai Rolex Masters. The players who do well in the tournament are given wildcard spots in the Masters event.

Gu can still remember parts of her first Shanghai Rolex Masters experience back in 2013.

“It was a preliminary round match and I can’t even remember the names of the foreign players,” Gu says, adding she was very nervous and not familiar with the rules for a tie-break at that time.

“I was collecting balls at the net,” she says. “When the players switched sides during the tie-break, I threw the balls to the wrong end. One player was staring at me and I felt very embarrassed.”

She learned though and it’s never happened again. Gu is proud that she was a group leader during last year’s tournament, leading a team of five others.

Six ball kids serve one match — two at the net and the other four in each corner of the court. As a group leader, Gu decides on the positions for her team members and handles emergencies.

“I usually keep the net position for myself as there is usually more hard work there. One has to squat down and do a lot of running. Most of my group members were younger than me and I had to take care of them. I also tried to let the girls stand in the shade to avoid long exposure to the sun.

“There was one time I felt exhausted and dizzy after squatting under the sun for so long. Luckily I managed to hold on until our shift ended,” Gu says.

During the Shanghai Rolex Masters, the ball kids gather at Shanghai Stadium at 8:15am everyday and take a shuttle bus to the court. Matches start as early as 10:30am, and they switch shifts every 45 to 60 minutes. They work five or six matches a day. Night matches can sometimes extend as late as 1am the next day. Lunch and dinner are provided and each kid gets a daily 80-yuan (US$12.54) subsidy. When off duty, they can change back into their own clothes and watch matches in the arena.

“Ball kids are not allowed to start a conversation or interrupt the players,” Gu says. “But it’s a great pleasure being able to see the players up close. My schoolmates, who are also tennis fans, always ask me questions like, ‘What does Djokovic say to himself during a match? What does he eat? What kind of person is Federer when he is off court?’ That makes me feel so proud.”

Since Gu became a ball girl, she started paying special attention to the ball boys and girls when watching television broadcasts of other tennis tournaments, especially the Grand Slams.

“I’ll watch how they handle some situations during a match, including their gestures and other details so as to improve myself,” she says.

Gu has also prepared some tips for new ball kids.

“You have to get the towel ready after every single point no matter whether the player asks for it or not. When small pieces of garbage are detected on the court, you have to pick it up immediately. And don’t let insects rest on player’s towels,” she says.

Gu is one of the 20 experienced ball kids this year who have previously worked at the Shanghai Rolex Masters and are not required to undergo training again. The other 50 will be newcomers who completed their training at Xuhui No. 1 Youth Amateur Athletic School during the summer.

“We had 80 new applicants this year and the number was narrowed down to 50 after the training and test,” says Yang Yi, a ball kid coach at the school.

According to Yang, students from Grade 5 up to college can apply to become ball kids.

The school has been training ball kids for Shanghai’s various tennis tournaments over the years including the Heineken Open, Masters Cup and now the Shanghai Rolex Masters.

Earlier this year, four ball kids who worked the Wuhan Open, a WTA tournament held in Hubei Province, were selected to serve at this year’s French Open.

They had been able to make the journey to Paris due to an exchange program between the two tournaments. Four ball kids from France had traveled to China during the WTA tournament in Wuhan last September.

Roland Garros is where China’s best known female player, Li Na, won her first Grand Slam in 2011. The Wuhan native was the first Asian ever to win a singles major.

The ball kids stayed in Paris from May 14 until June 18. After training with local counterparts, they shared the court with the likes of Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Andy Murray, Petra Kvitova and Serena Williams.

“I envy them,” Gu says. “That’s a Grand Slam and it provides a totally different experience. I really hope someday I can work at a Grand Slam tournament.”