The following post is an excerpt from the Second Edition of The Tennis Parent’s Bible NOW available through most online retailers! Click Here to Order
NAVIGATING THE ATHLETE’S PATHWAYS
Regardless of the stage of development, parents should seek coaches and trainers with high tennis IQ’s and optimistic attitudes- which will stimulate growth and happiness. Hire great educators to join your elite team and they will take your child beyond your wildest dreams.
Identifying and Motivating Talent
So, you’ve got a promising young talent, that’s a great start. Now how do you manage that talent, their entourage of coaches, academies, and teams?
Let’s look deeper into the facts and myths of talent. There are a lot of myths surrounding the word “Talent.” If sheer natural talent was gifted to an individual, then the naturally talented would drift to the top without effort. Unfortunately, by the time a junior reaches the competitive stages of the game; their sheer physical talent isn’t enough. Why? Because at the high-performance level, most of their competitors are also solid athletes, but with great work ethic, deep desire and a deliberate, customized developmental plan.
I know… many of you reading this may be thinking:
“Yeah but…My kid was endowed by my superior gene pool; they inherited my awesomeness …so they are obviously destined for greatness.”
While that may be true, success at the higher level demands a bit more than genes. It takes years and years of applying a customized deliberate developmental plan.
Talent is considered by most to be a genetic predisposition, a sense of natural ability handed down through the family gene pool. Expert educators in various fields agree that every decade one truly gifted individual walks through their doors. Does this mean that most truly successful people aren’t genuinely talented or does it mean that talent is more than merely good genes?
“Junior talent is only a foreshadowing of future greatness.”
