INTERVIEW: The Secret to Maximizing Potential in Tennis
The Parent-Child Relationship: The Secret to Maximizing Potential in Tennis
WTCA – Women’s Tennis Coaching Association
CLICK HERE to view Frank Giampaolo’s interview: Secret to Maximizing Potential in Tennis both on-court and off-court.
Web Link https://wtcatennis.org/the-parent-child-relationship-the-secret-to-maximizing-potential-in-tennis-frank-giampaolo/
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The Secret Ingredients Found in Champions
A hidden factor in the process of developing a tennis champion is the importance of Life Skills-Based Education. Well-equipped athletes are able to make good decisions under pressure on and off the court. The below skill sets play a critical role in a well-rounded and comprehensive tennis education.
A wonderful daily skill is gratitude. You can’t be angry and grateful simultaneously…so choose gratitude.
The Secret Ingredients Found in Champions
By Frank Giampaolo
So, you have a natural athlete. That’s the “GIFT”. But why do so many athletes fail to reach their full potential? Being an athlete is one ingredient out of the dozens required, what are some of the other Secrets?
Time Management
The time management life skill is the ability to use one’s time efficiently or productively. A successful athlete with strong time management skills would organize daily, weekly, and monthly planners to assist in scheduling the development of each of the four major components (technical, athletic, mental, and emotional) essential to compete at the higher levels.
Adaptability
The adaptability life skill is being able to adjust to different situations and conditions comfortably. To get the most from your physical talent, one must be open to change. Adapting is emotional intelligence at work.
“No athlete has ever reached their full potential without learning to overcome stress, fear, and discomfort. Life skills are essential.”
Handling Adversity
Handling adversity is a critical athletic and life skill. Competition brings hardship, drama, and suffering along with positive attributes. Overcoming daily problems is a driving force of champions. Seeing adversity as a challenge versus a life or death crisis is vital.
Handling Stress
Stress causes physiological and mental tension. It occurs when one believes that their physical skills aren’t strong enough to meet the challenge. While some personalities stress more than others, proper preparation and a positive attitude dramatically reduce stress levels.
Perseverance
Perseverance is one’s ability to stay on course through setbacks, discouragement, injuries, and losses. It is the ability to fight stubbornly to achieve greatness.
“The most meaningful lessons come from the toughest losses…If the student is willing to listen.”
Courage
Courage is the ability to apply belief in your skills in spite of the threat at hand. A courageous athlete knows that competition in sports is to be embraced and not feared. Courage is not allowing oneself to listen to the typical noise of “What if I lose?”
Work Ethic
Work ethic is a diligent, consistent standard of conduct. Strengthening physical, mental and emotional components and the attainment of goals is dependent on a deliberate customized plan and hard work.
Resiliency
Resiliency is the capacity to recover and adjust to difficulties. Champions fall, hurt and fail just like us, but they have preset protocols to adapt and press on. Winners aren’t always the most intelligent or even the strongest athletes in the event. They are often the individuals who respond with the best adjustments after misfortunes.
“Great performances stem from a peaceful heart. So after mistakes, forgive yourself quickly.”
Goal Setting
Goal setting is the process of identifying something that you want to accomplish with measurable goals. Dreams are a great start, but the work begins when both specific performance improvement goals and outcome goals have action plans and target dates. Setting daily, monthly and long-term goals build the emotional strength you seek.
Sticking to Commitments
Commitments are obligations that restrict freedom of action. Staying loyal to a written action plan separates the champion from the part-time hobbyist. Hobbyists train when it’s convenient. Committed athletes put their sport above their social calendar.
Determination
Determination is the power to persist with a singular fixed purpose. Champions are stubbornly tenacious to reach their goals. Champions often begin as average athletes with abnormal determination.
Problem-Solving Skills
Identifying the problem is only the first step. Step two is to isolate the causes of the problem. Step three is then to customize the solution to the problem. Creative problem solving requires digging deeper rather than merely identifying the flaw.
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“When dealing with gamesmanship, mature athletes do not give the drama more importance then intelligently remaining on script.”
Spotting Patterns and Tendencies
Patterns and tendencies are an individual’s predisposition to act repeatedly. Spotting reoccurring behavior is essential to understanding your strengths and weaknesses as well as defeating a worthy opponent.
Discipline
Discipline is behavior that is judged by how well it follows a set of rules. It is one of the most important emotional elements that turn dreams and goals into accomplishments. It often requires you to choose to train when you’d rather be socializing. Discipline is painful but not nearly as painful as losing to people you should be beating.
Sportsmanship
Sportsmanship is the underlying respect for the game, the rules governing the sport, the opponents and the officials. It’s giving it your all and playing with confidence and pride regardless of the outcome.
Focus
Focus is the ability to centralize your attention. Examples include adhering to short-term goals, such as a single play, point or game, all the way towards attaining long-term goals, such as playing a junior Grand Slam or being offered a college athletic scholarship.
“Improving involves cleaning out the clutter. Adding more isn’t always the answer. Often, solutions stem from doing less.”
Preparation Skills
The life skill of being prepared is especially important in athletics. Preparing properly for battle is one of the most neglected aspects of intermediate athletes. Success begins with total preparation. It is indeed the key to preventing a poor performance.
Persistence
Persistence is the continued passion for action in spite of opposition. You need constant energy devoted to your sport, anything less means that you’re a hobbyist. Persistence gets you to the top. Consistency with that persistent frame of mind keeps you there.
“Don’t confuse busy work with productive growth. Practice in the manner you are expected to perform.”
Dedication
Dedication is the quality of being committed to a purpose. Dedication to a sport requires passion and commitment to strive for daily improvement. Lazy, non-athletic people use the word “obsessed” to describe the dedicated athletes.
Positive Self-Image
Strong emotional aptitude starts with positive self-esteem. Trusting yourself is a key to competing freely. Changing the negative self-talk into positive internal dialog is a great start.
“Strong competitive character at crunch time stems from life lessons developed.”
This is an excerpt from Frank Giampaolo’s #1Amazon Best Seller: The Soft Science Of Tennis. Www.maximizingtennispotential.com
MASTER CLASS TENNIS PARENT SEMINAR – GEORGIA
MASTER CLASS TENNIS PARENT SEMINAR
2 DAY SEMINAR:
ADVANCED CONCEPTS FOR FUTURE CHAMPIONS
DAY ONE: Saturday, December 8, 2018
10 a.m.-12:00 p.m. / 1-3:00 p.m.
Customizing the Developmental Plan
- Navigating Your Entourage
- Identifying Brain Types & Body Types
- Organizing Game Plans
- Customized Match Day Preparation
- Opponent Profiling
- Developing Secondary Strokes
- Between Point/Change-Over Rituals
- Handling Gamesmanship
- Organizing their Weekly Planner
- Developing & Rehearsing their
- Top 7 Patterns
- Tactics Vs. Styles of Play
Each attendee receives a
FREE Customized
Organizational Book
DAY TWO: Sunday, December 9, 2018
10 a.m.-12:00 p.m. / 1-3:00 p.m.
Neuro Priming for Peak Performance
- What is Neuro Priming
Mental Rehearsals that activate a network of neural coded motor programs in the brain that when primed activate the athlete’s correct physiological responses. - How Does Neuro Priming Work
Neuro Priming assists athletes by helping to strengthen their physical, mental and emotional neural pathways required for competition.
- Why Neuro Priming Works
Mental rehearsal is a form of preventative medicine. It identifies the causes of an athlete’s anxiety by pinpoints the possible problems and pre-setting their solutions.
Each Attendee receives a
FREE Neuro Priming for
Peak Performance
WHERE:
Life Time Athletic and Tennis Peachtree Corners
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Peachtree Corners, GA 30092
DATES: Saturday, Dec 8 & Sunday, Dec 9, 2018
COSTS: Family Fee- $149.00 (1-Day) & $249.00 (2-Day)
RSVP: Linda email lindateresag@hotmail.com or
Call at (949)933-1272
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SELECT: USTA Tennis Parent Seminar ONE DAY or
USTA Tennis Parent Seminar TWO DAY
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Simple Match Charts
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The following post is an excerpt from Frank’s newest book, The Match Chart Collection. Click Here to Order through Amazon INTRODUCTION TO THE MATCH CHART COLLECTION The Match Chart Collection is a series of ten different charts that have been designed for easy implementation and maximum information gathering potential. The charts quantify match performance by identifying the strengths and weaknesses of a player’s performance under stress- match conditions. Although all parents/coaches want their players to “win”, the match should be considered an information gathering opportunity. The charts “ user-friendly” format makes them attractive to the novice tennis parent as well as the advanced tennis coach. The goal is to encourage coaches, parents, family and/or friends to assist in the growth of the junior player. After charting a match, the charting notes should be shared with the player and the developmental team to organize future training sessions.
Additional Charting Advantages: Past Match Chart Review: Players often play the same opponents over and over again at the higher levels. Reviewing past charts against the same opponent may reveal the opponent’s strengths and weaknesses. Charting Opponents: You may also want to consider charting opponents and /or top seeds for a comparison study. Self-Charting: Recognizing and applying the match statics (charting notes) during actual match play is a wonderful learned behavior that the top players have mastered. For example, it would prove meaningful if you knew the opponent’s forehand to backhand unforced error count heading into a tie-breaker.
FIRST STRIKE WINNING PERCENTAGE: In-ground stroke warfare, it’s estimated that approximately 80% of the opponent’s winners come from their forehand and approximately 20% from their backhand. The First Strike is the very first shot your athlete hits- serve or return of serve. This chart will help identify the winning percentage of the location of your player’s serve and return of serve (First Strike) and aid in shot selection awareness.
In-ground stroke warfare, it’s estimated that approximately 80% of the opponent’s winners come from their forehand and approximately 20% from their backhand. The First Strike is the very first shot your athlete hits- serve or return of serve. Identifying the winning percentage of the location of your player’s serve and return of serve (First Strike) is shot selection awareness. (Examples: Your player serves to the opponent’s backhand and wins the point-tally one point into the backhand win column. Your player returns serve to the opponent’s forehand and loses the point-tally one point into the forehand loss column.)
CHART NOTES: After each set, tally the percentage of points won with first strikes to the opponent’s forehand versus backhand. Simply by starting each point to the opponents weaker side rewards athletes with a dominating court position and a substantial winning percentage.
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Loss
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| THIRD | Win | Loss | Win |
Loss
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BLAME-SHIFTING IN TENNIS
BLAME-SHIFTING IN TENNIS
Blame shifting is a common tactic found in the emotional realm of competitive tennis. It’s one of the most common performance anxieties. Athletes fearful of being judged pre-set failure by blaming something or someone to avoid taking leadership in their own behavior.
Blame-Shifters have difficulty taking responsibility and accepting ownership for their inadequate training and poor effort. Coaches have used the term “pretenders or contenders” for decades. Ask coaches and they agree that blame shifters fall into the pretender category.
“The educators’ challenge lies in choosing to salvage these players versus choosing to avoid the dirty work and ignore their issues.”
Blame shifters are found at every level, in every club around the world. These athletes routinely point the finger at others in their sphere of influence. “I would have trained but they didn’t…”, or “They made me ….so I couldn’t” are typical mantras as these athletes assign the lack of responsibility to others within their entourage. Another form of self-deception is blaming the probable upcoming loss on a phony injury. “I can’t play today, my wrist hurts or I feel sick.” These are what I call ego outs. It’s their coping mechanism for dealing with their fear of failure combined with their lack of proper preparation. When used habitually, these athletes believe that they’re the victim when in reality, the problem is all their own.
A solution for dealing with these fake injury, excuse experts is to ask them to simply play a few games. If the injury truly persists, they’re encouraged to default. Convincing them to at least show-up and try to compete is a critical first step in overcoming their performance anxieties.
“Flipping blame shifters is a tough fix because athletes with this habit typically get aggressive when called out on their poor choices.”
An experienced coach can flip this behavior by encouraging the athlete and their entourage to accept responsibility. Here’s how:
- Educate how to truly prepare their whole person for competition. This includes a full tool belt of strokes, athleticism such as speed, agility, and stamina, the wide range of customized strategies and tactics found in mental toughness and the emotional components such as solutions to performance anxieties as they prepare properly for pressure.
- Organize daily and weekly planners and expect the athlete to be accountable for completing their customized developmental plan. Weekly components to improve include off-court training, primary and secondary strokes development, pattern repetition, match play, and match video analysis.
- Ask members of their entourage to lead by example by making their words match their actions. I’ve often witnessed loving parents who prescribe to the philosophy that rules don’t apply to them. They routinely arrive 15 minutes late to their child’s lesson. They make their child skip practice when it suits their needs. These parents’ words say to their children “You need to work hard” their actions say “unless there’s something more enjoyable to do.” Leading by example is key.
- Design an entourage agreement. This moves the process from deliberation to action. In this contract, each party commits to excellence for a 3 month period. By doing so, you’ll change your pretenders into contenders.
Blaming their lack of results on others is an undesirable and possible lifelong habit. Striving to apply the above solutions will not only maximize your athlete’s tennis potential, but it will also develop strong, confident, and resilient people.
The Real Talent Is Emotional Toughness- Part 3
The following post is an excerpt from Emotional Aptitude In Sports NOW available through most online retailers! Click Here to Order
After reading this book, it is my hope that you, the athlete, understand a simple concept- to strengthen emotional aptitude, you must take deliberate customized action and set aside time to focus on improving yourself each and every day. Not just improving your game …Not just improving your swing… But improving yourself, which is the essence of emotional stability.
Simply improve yourself… And your game will improve.
Most athletes live in their “Comfort Zone” – doing what everyone else appears to be doing, playing it safe, not taking risks or sticking to the road of least resistance. I urge you to leave that false belief system and venture into the “Learning Zone” – doing what’s uncomfortable, choosing the unknown and often more difficult path, trying methods that are new to you or exploring new ideas. If you read this book and then return only to your old, comfortable training methods, it is unlikely your will get the results you are capable of achieving.
Each section of this book, from the solutions to the story telling, is essentially assisting you in doing something extremely difficult … and that something is change. I’m not talking about changing your equipment, your environment or your coaches, I’m talking about changing your routines and rituals. Many athletes may say they want to improve but their words do not match their actions.
To improve you must be WILLING to acquire new routines and rituals and to be DISCIPLINED with their implementation.
Any great coach knows that an athlete’s rituals predicts their success or failure.
In storytelling, it is my intention to invoke an emotional response which leads to resourcefulness.
That’s why the experiences of the twins; Evan and Jarrod, resonate. Their opinions connect because their stories are all too familiar. Even though their comments represent both positive and negative points of view, their voices are a call to action.
I’d like to offer a warning for those not quite ready to commit to self-improvement. Please don’t expect your results to dramatically change without transforming your emotional aptitude.
Self-discipline is doing what needs to be done, even if you don’t want to do it.
For those of you who are ready to make emotional aptitude improvements a priority, congratulations, you are on the road to making your dreams a reality. Commit to the process and begin organizing your customized action plan. Each day specify the time needed to begin your metamorphosis.
Dabbling here and there in the developmental process is procrastination and is not a proactive life skill. Maximizing potential begins with maximum commitment.
Recognize that change can be uncomfortable and painful in the beginning. It may even be chaotic and stressful in the thick of it. But change is incredibly rewarding and oh so sweet in the end.
The Real Talent Is Emotional Toughness- Part 2
The following post is an excerpt from Emotional Aptitude In Sports NOW available through most online retailers! Click Here to Order
Fifteen Solutions to Foster Emotional Strength
Nurture the Love of Competition
Studies show that experiences bring more joy than possessions. The energy of the event is contagious. Athletes should enjoy competing against their past, fatigue, opponents and against time.
Commit to Improving
Being the best of the best (even in your town) doesn’t come without extreme effort. Improve your performance by understanding emotional aptitude.
Recognize That You Can’t Be Normal …and a Champion
Champions lead very different lives than normal people. Being an athletic champion is a daily life style.
Customize Your Training
Realize that diligent customized training trumps social, group learning. Research shows, on average, group training takes up to six times longer than quality private training.
Adopt a Growth Mind-Set
Great skills are cultivated through continuous effort more so than initial talent or IQ. Without effort…you fail by default. Understand that success starts with the effort of optimism and a growth mindset.
Embrace Failure
Initial failures are the beginning of the long road to success. They are your teachers. It’s often through setbacks that your customized secrets to success are found.
Step Up and Take Responsibility
A challenge for many athletes is to not allow parents or coaches to routinely solve their problems for them. Solve your problems yourself versus tapping out when difficulties arise.
Take Competitive Risks
Being scared to leave your comfort zone stalls the growth you seek. Take the risk…or grow old wondering if you were ever good enough.
Ask Experts About Their Story
You’ll quickly realize that failing is what winners do often. Winners often don’t have the most physical talent. They most often possess the positive emotional qualities you seek.
Organize a New Developmental Plan
Success stems from spectacular preparation. A brand new deliberate, customized developmental plan along with intelligent game day preparation could make all the difference in the world.
Apply Positive Visualization
Winners use positive visualization by imagining themselves executing their best patterns and plays without hesitation. Less successful athletes are overcome with negative visualization, which of course overwhelms their thought processes with visions of failure.
Train Under Game Day Stress
Athletes need to train much more than just their physical techniques and athleticism in practice. They have to get comfortable… being uncomfortable.
Rehearse Tolerance
Overcome hardships and pain in practice. Simulating stress in practice provides you with the opportunity to conquer your emotional demons. By doing so, reoccurring game day negative thoughts are replaced by positive thoughts such as: “I’ve done this before, I’ve conquered this several times and I know I can overcome this again because I have done it often.”
Learn to Compartmentalize Emotions
Great athletes stay in their optimal performance frame of mind during discomfort by staying on script (pre-set protocol). This entails choosing to mentally focus on the job at hand by overriding the emotional contaminants, thus not letting emotions control the show.
Stop Feeding Negative. Emotions
Flip constantly feeding the problems, worries and fears with customize protocols which feeds optimism, courage, resiliency and fortitude. Athletes should have pre-set triggers (words and actions) that help them focus on positive plays and patterns.
The Real Talent Is Emotional Toughness
The following post is an excerpt from Emotional Aptitude In Sports NOW available through most online retailers! Click Here to Order
Emotional Aptitude Is a Skill
At the start of a Southern California junior tennis tournament, the referee calls Kristen Michaels and Jenny Scott to court number four for their match. Kristen seemed to be a super fit, committed athlete with poise and solid fundamentals. She was dressed from head to toe in the newest Nike gear with her hair braided to perfection. She walked onto the court, unpacked her Wimbledon tournament towel, Gatorade and water bottle as she meticulously lined them up next to her chair. She then selected two rackets from her Nike tour bag as she “pings” them together to listen for the perfect string tension. Deciding on one, she immediately started shadow swinging and shuffling her feet as she waited for the umpire to perform the mandatory coin toss.
Jenny on the other hand, did not appear to be as polished. In fact, she looked downright amateur in her California board shorts and surfer T-shirt. At the coin toss, Jenny was still wrestling through her tennis bag looking for a hair tie as the umpire yells “heads or tails?” Jenny grabs the only racket she brought and calmly saunters towards the net. She lets Kristin choose to serve or return. Jenny couldn’t care less.
The 5 minute pre-match warm-up started and Kristen looked like a professional. Her movement and strokes were flawless. Jenny, on the other side of the net looked unorthodox, as she scrambled to return the ball back Kristin’s way.
The referee called time and the match started. Most watching were sure Kristen was going to blow Jenny off the court. But to the spectator’s surprise, Kristin was struggling, down 0-2 within the first 5 minutes of play. The beautiful strokes we had witnessed in the warm-up were gone. By game 3, Kristin reached her maximum frustration tolerance level. She couldn’t keep a backhand in the court as Jenny profiled her opponent and systematically hit every ball to Kristin’s ailing backhand side. Kristen was angry, stomping around, yelling at herself, screaming at her racket, her coach and her mom. Jenny, on the other hand, was a composed warrior relentlessly picking on Kristin’s weakness. Within 45 minutes, Jenny went on to win 6-2, 6-0. After the match, Jenny’s mom was overheard only uttered three words “Who wants Taco’s?”
As illustrated above, emotional aptitude isn’t typically identifiable until after competition begins. What separates the elite competitors from the emotionally fragile athletes is their ability to thrive under perceived stress. Emotional aptitude is the ability to overcome hardships and to distress situations rather than magnify stressful situations. Athletes struggling with poor emotional aptitude lack confidence, composure, suffer bouts of self-doubt and possess an overwhelming fear of being judged by others. These performance meltdowns often go unseen in practice but shine in all their glory on game day.
Elite competitors are confident that their superior emotional strength will override any hardships and physical limitations. The emotionally weak athletes are convinced that the unfair hardships and their perceived limitations will override their peak performance and catastrophe will once again occur.
An old-school word used to describe emotional aptitude is Grit. In regards to high achievers, researchers have come to the conclusion that successful individuals possess traits deeper than the mastery of athletic ability. Grit is persistent courage, resolve and strength of character. Grit is the learned ability to have “nerves of steel,” fortitude and determination. Interestingly, some athletes are pre-wired to have these essential components and some are not. For those athletes who are not natural combatants, developing emotional aptitude is critical.
Sadly, emotionally weak competitors often ignore the development of such skills. Cultivating these character traits is what propels the few into the winner’s circle. If you believe that your emotions are holding you hostage on game day and keeping you from the success you deserve, I suggest focusing your attention on the below list of solutions
