On the courts or on the course, Zavier Gervais is garnering some attention - of course - which is saying something considering the grade four student at Ecole élémentaire Hélène Gravel is currently all of nine years old.

On skis since the age of two, Gervais will list alpine ski as his first sport of choice - for very good reason.

He has won pretty much every event he has entered, often pitted against kids two or three years his elder. Racing the Mansfield 101 this weekend, the youngest of two boys in the family finished third - despite falling on his second run.

"I always want to go skiing; I don't really know why," noted Gervais a few weeks ago as we chatted at the Sudbury Indoor Tennis Centre, his other primary pastime when he is not out on the hills.

"It's a fast sport and I really like it."

Yet for as much as his need for speed can be met with a dash downhill in the straightest of lines, it is in the slalom events where Gervais most shines.

"I like more doing slalom down the hill because you can get nice and low," he stated. "Before I was racing, I could go straight and then turn, all the way down. When I started racing, they me teaching me carving."

"You just need to push down on your skis and your skis will stay there," added Gervais. "You can trust them - and you can get very low."

Though he started his skiing at the Adanac Hill, Gervais now finds himself travelling to Mont Dufour in Elliot Lake, a slightly different offering than the busy public venue in the heart of the City of Sudbury.

Equally as comfortable skiing for the mere enjoyment of the sport, doing the jumps and everything else that comes with it, Gervais is a highly focused youth when race day comes.

"The girls often go first and I can watch and see what they're doing and see what the better line (down the hill) is," he said.

While tennis might be his secondary pursuit, it's a long way from merely a recreational interest for the pre-teen who somehow finds time to mix in the occasional team sport at school, or some mountain bike riding in Walden or out near his house in Skead.

"I feel like when I am playing people that are older and better than me (in tennis), it makes me better," said Gervais. Understandably, there is still plenty to learn. For now, he will start with what amounts to the starting point in tennis - service and serve receive.

"My best serve is a flat serve," he noted. "It goes down and fast. On my second serve, then I would slice. It's slower, but it stays in the court."

Of course, on the court is also where Zavier Gervais would prefer to stay - unless he is out on a course, speeding down a hill. Either way, he's hard not to notice.