When asked the question “what skills are needed to be a good tennis player” the first things that come to mind for most of us are athletic abilities such as good eye hand coordination, quickness, agility, or strength and flexibility. Other players may cite more cognitive traits such as being a good strategist, picking out an opponents weakness, or having rock solid mental toughness. Today I’d like to talk briefly about a different type of skill.
I would like to submit to you today that putting in maximum effort is a skill. It’s an athletic trait that can be practiced and learned, not something that you’re either born with or not. This is great news for all of you reading this, it means that you’re capable of great things if you just focus and actually try as hard as you can. I know this may seem kind of corny, and probably overly obvious as well, but please just bear with me for a few more paragraphs.
Separate Yourself
When I graduated from college and started teaching full time I was blind sided by the type of people that I started to work with. I had grown up with a huge appreciation for the tennis lessons I received because I actually paid for most of them myself. I didn’t take a single one for granted, and worked incredibly hard on the court. Imagine my frustration when trying to teach somebody who had shown up at the tennis club that day simply to have something to do with their time, the two of us had completely different ideas about what it meant to “play tennis”.
Many, many recreational tennis players have a very leisurely and laid back attitude about their tennis. Is there anything wrong with this? No, absolutely not. These players have different priorities in life, and tennis isn’t extremely high on their list overall, it’s just a fun activity to participate in. This is where you can gain a huge advantage on the court, by separating yourself from the casual player in attitude and effort level.
Make a Commitment
Next time you step out onto the tennis court, whether it’s for practice or competition, make these commitments to yourself:
- I will run for every ball until I either get to it or it bounces twice.
- When I run for a difficult ball I will actually run full speed, and not slow down at the end.
- I will make at least three steps towards every shot my opponent/partner hits, even if I think it’s going out or into the net.
- I will remain mentally focused on the drill I’m completing or the strategy I’m trying to implement.
If you can make it through an hour of tennis and can honestly say that you’ve completed the above four things I can promise you that your game will advance more quickly. Few people take the game seriously enough to put in this kind of effort both physically and mentally, if you make the commitment to do it every part of your game will be better for it.
Train Your Body
As you continue to follow the four guidelines listed above you will start to notice a difference in your athleticism. Your anticipation and reaction time will start to increase as you build up your habit of immediately making a move for every single ball. Your physical quickness and agility will become greater as you actually try with full effort to run down every single ball, rather than making a subjective decision whether or not you could get there and just watching it bounce twice instead.
These are the types of things that we see in high level players and say to ourselves: “Wow, what an amazing athlete! I wish I could run down shots like that.” The only difference between them and yourself is that they’ve actually practiced running down every ball, over and over, year after year. They’ve built up their reaction time, quickness, and agility over time. You can do the same thing!
At first you may start getting to more shots, but missing due to the difficulty level of them. Don’t get frustrated and stop trying, it will take time to practice the actual stroke needed to make these shots on the run, often times in awkward positions with your body and on the court. Make the commitment, keep working hard, and build your skill at putting in 100% effort!
