HOW TO BE A DOMINANT
TENNIS PLAYER
Without Having To Think About It The information in this article could very well be the difference between frustration and success, plateau or improvement. What you’re about to learn is so powerful because very often how quickly or slowly we advance at anything is determined by our attitude and outlook. We also must have a good understanding of the process that mastery requires, otherwise it can be tempting to either stay in our comfort zone year after year, or even give up the journey all together. What I’m about to lay out for you below is in response to an excellent question that I recently received from one of my online students. Aaron in Australia asked the following: “How do I get better at reading the game and staying externally focused? When I started tennis a couple years
ago all of my focus went into getting my mechanics right: footwork, stroke technique, movement patterns, etc. While that was no doubt necessary at first I’m now finding it to be a problem instead. No matter how hard I try to focus on what my opponent is doing during a match I keep reverting back to
myself!” Aaron then gave a specific example of hitting a great shot into the corner during a singles point. He knew that he put his opponent in trouble, but he didn’t react. He understood that the right play would be to close in behind that great shot he just hit and take the ball out of the air for an easy, winning volley. Instead, he realized this seconds too late and got “stuck” on the baseline with his coach yelling behind him, “You should have moved in!” He knew that, but his mind was preoccupied with his own performance during that last swing. How was his technique? His footwork? etc. Good news. I’m not only going to share with you how to break away from the bad habit of constantly self-evaluating during a match, but I’ll also show you how it’s possible to win completely on auto pilot, playing your absolute best tennis without even having to think about it. Plus, I’ll give you the secret to long term, continual improvement of your tennis game. These are processes and mindsets that high performers in all disciplines follow and I want you to as well.
THE FOUR PHASES OF WINNING ON AUTO PILOT Having the ability to get out of your understanding about X skill but you own head and start performing at your aren’t good at executing it yet. Your best starts with understanding the four level of performance is low. main phases of being good at anything in life, not just sports: Phase 3 - Consciously Competent: You have knowledge and understanding Phase 1 - Unconsciously Incompetent: about X skill and you’ve become good at You don’t really have any knowledge or executing it correctly, but you still have understanding about X skill and you to be consciously aware of it to do so. aren’t good at executing it either. Phase 4 - Unconsciously Competent: Phase 2 - Consciously Incompetent: You not only have a high level of You have some knowledge and knowledge and understanding about
X skill but you’ve executed it correctly so many times that it is now performed without any conscious awareness of the process. For example, having an unconsciously competent serve would allow you to no longer think at all about your toss, racquet drop, contact point or follow through. It would all happen correctly without being aware of it at all leaving you completely free to instead study your opponent’s strengths and
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HOW TO SEE THE FUTURE [FOUR PHASES, FROM 1] weaknesses and also pick the most winning type of serve and service placement every time. The final phase is obviously where you want to be as often as possible. It frees up your mind to do what is most important during a tennis match: analyze the opposition and construct a deadly plan of attack without having to worry about whether or not you can execute on it correctly. Believe it or not, getting to that point with your tennis is not genetic! The fact is, nobody is born a high level tennis player. Not a single person has the neurological pathways pre-encoded to hit a high level forehand, backhand and serve giving them the ability to just walk out onto the court and immediately play with a high level of execution and confidence. That should be encouraging to you because it means playing “in the zone” is something that is developed and learned, not something set aside for only the elite who have some kind of magical powers on the court. You can do it, too!
DURING YOUR POINTS Something incredibly important to understand about this process is that absolutely everybody begins at Phase 1. Unconsciously Incompetent. The only way to arrive at Phase 4 is to work your way through the three preceding phases, training your mind and your body how to react and when. I’ll explain exactly what I mean using Aaron as an example. When it comes to reacting to an offensive opportunity on the court, Aaron is currently at Phase 2: Consciously Incompetent. The knowledge is there. He absolutely knows that when his opponent has been put in a difficult position on the court he should advance his own and look for the easy put-away. The information is in his head, but he isn’t executing it yet. Only after the fact does he remember, “Oh ya, I should have moved in!” Phase 3 will come once he has reminded himself (or his coach reminds him) about the tactical error enough times that he sees it coming before it even happens, almost like seeing into the future. After hitting that powerful forehand to the corner he immediately thinks to himself “Awesome shot, now start moving in for the kill!” That awareness prompts action and he closes forward to put away an easy sitter groundstroke or volley.
Success? Yes, however, one more step remains. Ideally, Aaron wants to get to the point where he no longer has to consciously remind himself of the tactical advantage he has gained on the court. Over time he will start to develop a “sixth sense” about when his opponent is in trouble and start moving forward without any conscious prompting what so ever. This is ideal because instead of using his mental capacity to selfcoach in his head he will be able to start noticing and using to his advantage some of the finer details about the point situation: how his opponent takes their racquet back to hit the next shot, what their balance is like, where on the court they’re positioned, what shot selections they’ve used in similar situations up until this point in the match, etc. The combination of the automatic response on Aaron’s part, along with the ability to be aware of and make decisions based on deeply layered information about his opponent, and the match will lead him to anticipate like never before. Plus, as he starts to become better and better at this process, things will become more and more automatic. This is where players start to enter “the zone.” High level execution with minimal conscious awareness as the points are actually taking place.
WHY TENNIS PLAYERS PLATEAU So at this point you’re probably saying to yourself, “This all sounds absolutely amazing, Ian, but how can I get to Phase 4 as quickly as possible?” After all, it’s
now? Shouldn’t all of that information just “sink in” over time and leave you playing awesome tennis on auto-pilot? It would be great if it worked that way, but unfortunately it doesn’t. Getting likely that you’ve already been playing any skill to Phase 4 not only takes a tennis for years or even decades while lot of repetition, it takes the right kind picking up knowledge all along the way. [PLAYERS PLATEAU, CONTINUED ON 3] Why in the world isn’t it all automatic by
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[PLAYERS PLATEAU, FROM 2] points and then immediately discarding of repetition. This is where the vast majority of tennis players fall short, leaving them in a rut year after year after year. You see, ingesting new information about what you need to do to take things to the next level, and then going out onto the court and doing what you’ve always done isn’t going to get you better results. Neither is trying something new for a few shots or a few
it because it felt “weird” or “different,” or you weren’t immediately successful. A lot of players fool themselves into thinking they’re improving. They talk the talk and have incredibly detailed understandings of technique and strategy, but they’ve been playing at the same level forever. That happens because they aren’t willing to periodically sacrifice short term comfort or ability for long term improvements.
Guess what? For most people, picking up new skills takes a lot of time and often during that time they don’t see any “next level” results yet. Once in a while, something is explained just the right way, or you’re asked to execute just the right drill, and things immediately “click”. However, the fact of the matter is it usually it doesn’t work that way unless we’re lucky enough to have a lot of prior experience in a different sport or athletic pursuit.
THE SECRET TO LONG TERM IMPROVEMENT The bottom line is this: if you want to consistently advance from level to level to level you must consistently put yourself out of your comfort zone and challenge yourself to raise your “execution IQ”. This only happens by making your way through the four phases of improvement each and every time you identify a new skill or ability that needs to be added to your game in order to advance. At times that process can be slower than what we want, which often leads to frustration. In my opinion, the secret to the success of players that ascend your local club’s challenge ladders year after year is a love of the improvement process itself. They primarily derive their satisfaction from doing what they know needs to be done, usually out there on the practice court. Sure, they love to win as well, but they understand that once in a while it’s necessary to lose more than you win in order to make an improvement big enough to bring long term results. Going into a match with that kind of attitude goes a long way towards alleviating the stress of competition, too. Please understand that there is never any singular match the will define your place in tennis history. Its all part of a bigger story, a longer journey, and
I want that journey to be as fulfilling for you as possible. If you’re willing to put in the right kind of repetition needed to carry new skills through the four phases of improvement, and also be mature enough of a competitor to not let a lack of immediate improvement (or even an initial dip in performance) bother you, then you are set up for a lifetime of tennis joy and fulfillment.. Tennis players frequently get “stuck” at a certain level because they’re most concerned with their win/loss record year after year. They aren’t willing to change their serve grip or learn how to hit with more topspin because it would mean an initial loss of comfort and consistency. Why in the world would somebody do that when their only gauge of success is beating every opponent? And yet, all too often, the players with that attitude are battling the very same opponents year after year, or even decade after decade, because they’ve never ventured out of their comfort zone to make truly impactful improvements to their game. Learn to love the improvement process, learn to understand the value of getting out of your comfort zone, put in the right kind repetition on the practice court and I can promise you a lifetime of improvement and satisfaction.
THANK YOU FOR READING I hope this article has shed some light on the improvement process and inspired you to take bold action towards improving your game! Please feel free to share it with anyone else that you think would benefit from its message. Thanks for reading and good luck with your tennis! Ian Westermann Head Pro at Essential Tennis http://www.essentialtennis.com
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