It all looks so easy when it's on the television, right? The missed shots, the easy putts, the open-goal misses. Everyone has been guilty of watching a professional sports star mess something up while thinking 'well I could've easily done that better'.

But until you're actually in that situation, faced with the pressure, nerves and expectation, it's a feeling few will ever be truly aware of. For one mega-rich man, it proved a humbling experience when he tried it out for the first time.

Introducing Bill Ackman, who is used to having to perform under pressure, but not in the sporting sense. The investor, who boasts a reported net worth of £7billion, competed in his maiden professional tennis event at the Hall of Fame Open, having had an unlikely wildcard accepted by the ATP Tour.

Reacting to the experience, Ackman, 59, said on social media: "I can speak in front of an audience of a thousand people or in a TV studio on a broad range of topics without any preparation and without a twinge of fear, but yesterday I had my first real experience with stage fright.

"I found myself on a tennis court in a live streamed professional tournament with a few hundred in the crowd. Throughout the match, my wrist, arm and body literally froze with the expected negative outcomes. I had difficulty breathing, and it was not a fitness issue. It got a bit better as the match progressed, but I was not able to overcome it."

Ackman was partnered with Jack Sock, an American doubles ace who has three Grand Slam titles to his name in the two-person format. The pair were dumped out in the first round, with Ackman adding: "I regularly play with mid-20-year-old D1 college players and recently retired pros on a familiar court with no audience with none of the same symptoms.

"It was a very humbling experience that gives one even more respect for the pros who play for a living in front of the cameras and the crowds. We forget that they also need to manage the challenges of their carefully examined personal lives, their break ups, their emotions, financial stresses, and their mental health, family, and other challenges.

"Tennis is one of the few sports where the athlete is out there alone in front of the klieg lights for hours operating with incredible intensity with barely a bathroom break. And they might have been awakened in the middle of the previous night for a drug test while staying far from home."