There is so much I know about the sport that it makes it hard to decide where to start and what might be most fun and helpful. So, I'll go with my gut feeling.
Anyone who knows me - or has been following me for a while - is likely tired of hearing me say that I have learned everything I know about life from my sport. This is likely true for anyone with any passion - especially those that come to us early in our lives - as we are still forming into who we become, and our neuroplasticity is at its best. We cling to something because it stimulates all of the cells in our body - including our mind. And from my podcast interviews, I also find that passion is often hard to explain. People struggle to find the right words for why they chose the sport they did - but we all know the feeling when it appears. Most often, my podcast guests describe it as simply as "it just felt right."
I resonate with the many. I cannot fully explain how I started tennis, but I'm undoubtedly better off trying to live the life of a professional tennis player. I am grateful for all that my sport taught me, including the things it took away from me (which took some time and soul-searching to make peace with to get to this stage).
The game of tennis can be divided into four high-level categories:
1. Fitness: More precisely, footwork - it takes significant effort to successfully cover the tennis court, so you have to know how to effectively move from one side to another with swiftness, elegance, and efficiency while not losing sight of the ball and your opponent.
2. Stroke Technique: To hit the ball without wasting energy, you must know how to hit it right. This will allow you to be effective and accurate with your shots and hopefully also prevent injuries, especially as you progress to hitting more and more balls over the years - as incorrect movements and doing more of what you don't have to do add up quickly over too many repetitions. This is no secret - good repetition creates good muscle memory, and wrong repetition creates higher chances of developing an injury.
3. Game Strategy: Tennis is about statistics, physics, and mathematics. Understanding angels and probabilities is vital. You may have some awesome winners and aces up your sleeve, but tennis history teaches us - the person with more unforced errors and worse consistency loses. With that - there is NO magic to winning in tennis. A simplified winning strategy could be summarized as = Win more points than your opponent does/ Be more consistent.
4. Your Mind: Your mind is typically the strongest opponent you will ever face. If you can get to a point where you are competing against your opponent - and not your mind - that is a success. You probably heard about the mental game of tennis - another thing that could easily be described as a mystery - that people write books and create movies about. In my opinion, this is the hardest one to master as a coach can easily see what you are doing wrong regarding your tennis technique or how inefficiently you move, but it is impossible to see into one's head and even harder to know how one feels. Speaking about this requires a lot of trust and courage, and from personal experience, it can often be challenging to find the right words to describe our feelings (and feelings can be tricky and messy to understand and know how to deal with). The real champions know how to tap into this elevated level of their minds and use it to their utmost advantage. As Billie Jean King would say: "Pressure is a privilege." While this for sure makes the difference between being the GOAT and being excellent, it is equally important at all levels of the sport - but perhaps not as visible when you are starting as the gaps in the former three (especially the first two are much more significant). So, this becomes more and more important as you advance your skills in the other three categories.
I will dive deeper into each category in the upcoming weeks and months.
🎾 game 🎾 set 🎾 match
With tennis love ❤️
Klára
Master your tennis game, Tennis training, Mental toughness in sport
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