Daniel Tibbetts
Daniel was always a sporty kid, having played both tennis and football since he was a toddler, however it was not until he was 7 years old that he tried out table tennis at the brand-new club in Stonehaven. This was thanks to his stepdad Steve who was a founding member of the club and always supported Daniel in his range of sporting endeavours. It did not take long for the club to build up enough junior members for ASV Academy coach Max Singer to come along to assess their level and later invite the best few to train at the ASV academy, one of them being Daniel.
The ASV academy sessions were initially a little daunting as Daniel found himself amongst players that were both older and more experienced than him. Fortunately, he was attending with a small group of friends from Stonehaven who were all feeling the same nerves. Within a few weeks, however, the other 3 kids all quit leaving Daniel as the only one still making the trip. Luckily, this didn’t deter Daniel as he quickly made new friends within the academy (one of them being future double partner Harry Blackhall) and some years later was joined in the academy by a different friend from Stonehaven, Allan He, which helped for sharing journeys into Aberdeen for training.
On his 8th birthday Daniel received a full-size table tennis table as a gift from his mum Lucy and stepdad Steve. Practising on this with Steve in their garage whilst also receiving the quality coaching of Max Singer and Charlie Matthews at ASV meant Daniel improved quickly and started competing for Stonehaven in the ADTTA leagues the following year. This was the first of many competitive events for Daniel that have ranged from local club championships to representing Scotland internationally at the European Youth Championships.
Currently, Daniel studies medicine at Dundee University and plays in the DDTTA league whilst continuing to compete nationally and aid the ADTTA British League effort lead by Ross Martin. During the summers away from his studies, he returns to the ASV academy sessions to train with the current talents in the club.
Top three achievements to date:
- 2x Junior National Doubles Champion (Scottish National Championships 2024 & 2025)
- Junior Doubles gold and Junior Team silver (Home Countries International 2025, Dublin)
- U12, U14 and U18 Scottish Schools Champion (2019, 2022 and 2025 respectively)