Blog
How Not To Lose
May 18, 2022“Before you learn how to win, you have to learn how not to lose.” On the path to becoming a great competitor, you will learn many lessons, and one of the most difficult lessons in sport is learning how not to lose, how not to give it (the point, the game, the match) away. The […]
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Keep Your Expectations Low and Your Standards High
April 22, 2022In the fall of 2020, Iga Świątek emerged from relative obscurity to capture the women’s singles title at Roland Garros. During the tournament and afterwards, Świątek talked about the importance of keeping her expectations low in matches, and simply focusing on playing one shot at a time. She wasn’t going onto the court “expecting” to […]
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Winner’s Creed by Bill Tym
March 6, 2022Bill Tym’s Winner’s Creed is a philosophy of performance excellence that should be studied by all athletes (not just tennis players) who aspire to become champions. The creed describes the controllable aspects of performance that are vital to competing your best on a given day. Even on those days when you are not playing well, […]
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Cheating in Tennis
February 28, 2022Cheating and unethical behavior in tennis is not a new phenomenon, but it has received more attention in recent years, especially in college tennis. Perhaps this is because many college matches are streamed live, and the bad calls are plain to see. Jon Wertheim of Tennis Channel and Sports Illustrated wrote about cheating in college […]
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Play With Courage
February 9, 2022“Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the assessment that something else is more important than fear.” -Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States Courage. In Stoic philosophy, it is one of the four cardinal virtues (wisdom, temperance, and justice are the others). It’s that important. Striving for your potential depends […]
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Everything Is Practice
April 1, 2021“I play better in practice than in competition.” -Nearly Everyone If you’re like most people, you have probably noticed that you play better in practice than you do in competition. You may have even said something like the above quote to a coach, a family member, or to yourself. And it makes sense that most […]
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Using Visualization to Improve Learning and Performance
September 30, 2020Visualization (also known as imagery) is an area of study in sport psychology that has received a great deal of attention over the last few decades. It is often discussed from the perspective of players and how they can use it for mental rehearsal and preparation. Novak Djokovic is a good example of a player […]
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Being Competitive
September 17, 2020Over the years, I have heard many people describe themselves as being “so competitive.” But if the definition of competitive is solely concerned with beating others and/or winning, then it’s off the mark. To me, being competitive is a process oriented pursuit of mastery in which results are data points to help you improve. I […]
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What To Do When You’re Losing
September 16, 2020At some point in your athletic career, you are going to find yourself in a losing situation in a game or match. That moment is a test of your mental toughness. How will you handle it? What can you do to turn the situation around? For some players, losing results in a loss of motivation […]
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Why We Need Sports
July 17, 2020Most people today can agree that sports are a great and significant part of human culture. They’re fun, they’re exciting, they’re good for you, both for the players and the spectators alike. But, while these ideas seem self-evident, have you ever asked yourself if we need sports? Or, more specifically, why we need them? This isn’t […]
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