Patten gets engaged in Turin! 'I was much more nervous about getting engaged than my first match'

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Patten gets engaged in Turin! 'I was much more nervous about getting engaged than my first match'

Briton speaks exclusively to ATPTour.com about his special moment

Henry Patten

Ellie Stone and Henry Patten got engaged this week in Turin. By Andrew Eichenholz

Henry Patten still has a chance to win the Nitto ATP Finals with partner Harri Heliovaara, but the Briton has already earned a win for life this week.

Sunday, the day before Patten played his first match of the season finale, he got engaged to longtime partner Ellie Stone.

“I've been with Ellie now for best part of 10 years, pretty much,” Patten told ATPTour.com. “It was coming at some point and as a tennis player, I don't get to see her that much throughout the year. And this is one of the trips that she chose to come on.”

Patten secured the ring during Wimbledon and has been waiting for the special moment since, always having an eye on Turin. The 29-year-old arrived a day before Stone and scouted the city for the perfect spot. He ended up discovering Basilica di Superga, which has a view of the city.

“Somehow it was really quiet. Went up there in the morning, really beautiful day, and then I told her to look over at the chimneys, made up some kind of excuse, and then proposed,” Patten said. “She was very, very happy, I'm pleased to report. And [she was] surprised, which I think gets me bonus points.”

The doubles standout played college tennis at the University of North Carolina Asheville, where he met Stone, who was on the soccer team. They have been together since.

It is difficult for them to spend time together throughout the year because Stone is in her second year of medical residency in North Carolina.

“She's a doctor, officially, but she is in the process of becoming fully trained as a doctor over there,” Patten said. “She doesn't get much time off and she can't travel much. It's not like she can do her job remotely. She's in the hospital all the time.”

As excited as he was, Patten needed to refocus quickly to take the court inside Inalpi Arena Monday for his opening match of the year-end championships with Heliovaara against Christian Harrison and Evan King.

“I was much more nervous about getting engaged than I was about playing my first match,” Patten said, cracking a laugh. “I can tell you that for free.”

Heliovaara and Patten are 1-1 in the John McEnroe Group and still have a chance to qualify for the semi-finals. The Briton hopes to make it as far as possible in Turin, but will leave the city with his head held high no matter what happens.

“It’s such a big deal to me, so much more important. We’ve been together for 10 years and I’ll spend the rest of my life with her, which I'm incredibly excited about,” Patten said of his engagement. “It's crazy, because obviously it is one of the biggest [tournaments], but it's taken quite a big back seat. That being said, we’re still taking the tennis pretty seriously.”

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