Mind over matter
As mentioned throughout the blog, mentality of players is an important aspect of tennis. You are alone on court with none to help you if things go wrong. Lots of players give up due to this and cannot handle the frustration. It is very easy to tell a player to calm down and relax, however when you are in that point playing and putting everything you have into and still loosing anger or pressure can get the better of you. I have myself experienced that but as I got older I came to understand how to control this and use it to my advantage. As the tournament approaches this is what we are trying to teach the players. How to handle themselves in tough time. Auggie, owner of Lakeland, gave some of the players a speech on what to do. Here I sat in on this to get an understanding of what he was trying to convey. Firstly, believe in yourself before you go on court and never fear the other person. This is vital if the player has a losing mentality before they have stepped on court they have already lost. This is one reason why leading up to the tournament you focus on positive aspects of their game and help them improve on little things. Secondly, not giving up. I have seen over the last weekend players give off the body language during their matches of giving up this gives the opponent an advantage and also is disrespectful to the other player. No shouting, bad body language, throwing racket or giving up is allowed in training or in matches. Consequences will happen if so. This speech was to try and teach the players how to compose themselves. Take their time in-between points, run for every ball and use their brain. This was addressing a problem which many players have and was the first step in solving this problem by addressing it in practice first.
Once academy started I worked with some of the younger children today who are also a little weaker. I basket fed, hand fed and also helped them practicing serving. Whenever I teach the younger children I have learn to remember not to overload them with information. But to give them small tips and give lots of positive feedback afterwards. You have to keep on eye on them all the time to ensure moving feet, not swinging rackets near peoples head and to stop the chatting all the time. I really enjoy teaching this class as I get great satisfaction from seeing them improve. As you can see from the pictures, its a happy environment at Lakeland and this also give the academy a great community feel and personality. This i hope to carry through to my business later in life.
