Bigger Better Tennis - Paul Dale

  You could be mistaken for thinking tennis is all about aggression. At the top level, players are pounding the ball at every opportunity. You'd be surprised then if you learned that my goal when coaching advanced players is to first have them develop a defensive mental foundation.   I'm not suggesting that I teach players to send up continuous lobs during the rally or for them to stand at the back fence to retrieve balls. My goal with advanced players is to change the internal mental dialogue all players experince before every stroke.  A PLAYERS INTERNAL DIALOG BEFORE SHOTS Every player has a continuous mental dialogue inside their head when they play a point.  "How aggressive should I be on this ball?", "Is this the ball to change direction down the line?" etc. The internal dialogue inside our heads drives our decision making There's nothing wrong with this type of internal dialogue, but there are better questions to ask yourself before each shot. So,...

What would you do next? You've rallied strongly and managed to put your opponent under pressure. They've dropped the ball short in the court; it's time to finish the point with an aggressive winner. Can you finish points like this confidently? Do you finish with a winner, or do you get the jitters and embarrass yourself in front of everyone? If it's the latter, you're in the majority.  The inability to finish points is a problem for tennis players worldwide. How well do you react when finishing the point? I've coached players of all levels, every level of player suffers from nerves; it's just that the best players somehow have ways to overcome them.  THE MIND SCALE: 0 - 100 I need you to use your imagination for me.  Try to remember what goes on inside your head when you want to attack that half-court ball and hit a winner. Imagine that your thoughts are like a straight line.  Picture a mental scale in your mind from 0-100. 0 is when you decide to attack th...

I attended a tennis event during the weekend with a team of college players. On the first day of matches, we had some disastrous starts. In several matches, we went down by 5 games before we began playing at our normal level, but often it was too late to save the game. Here are 4 ways you can avoid slow starts in your matches: THE WARM-UP IS 90% MENTAL The most significant difference I see between the top professionals and college players is players at the top only have one mental "gear". They're always focused. Whereas college-level players think it's ok to warm up in a different mental "gear" than the one they use in the match. Your body and your mind like doing things habitually, meaning anything you repeat enough times will become the norm. If you ask more from yourself in practice and matches, your body and mind will adapt to that new normal.  This matters most during the morning warm-up before matches. If you're not focused or you’re clowning aroun...