As you saw in the clip above, I waited for quite a while before telling Colin to correct his head position.

I noticed that from the first minute we started playing, but I stuck to my #1 rule while teaching tennis: Do Not Overwhelm The Player.

Focus on priorities, get the rallies going, assess how much the player is thinking at the moment, and then decide if it’s the right time to give another piece of advice or wait longer until the time is right.

I still overwhelm the players sometimes, and I know it’s always my fault – unless, of course, they think something on their own which I didn’t ask them to do.

That’s what I was referring to when I told Colin that it was his fault if he thinks additional things besides what I asked him to do.

It is his fault now if he becomes overwhelmed.

So, my advice to all tennis players who take lessons with me or any other tennis coach is: Do not think about anything besides what your coach is asking you to do.

We are coaching day in, day out for years and have (hopefully!) by now mastered the art of teaching and the art of delivering the right information at the right time based on the priorities of each particular student.

There is a grave danger of overthinking in the process of learning tennis, which quickly escalates to an overwhelmed mind and inability to keep the ball in play, let alone hit any good shots.

If you’ve had any experiences with getting overwhelmed or ending up in paralysis-by-analysis, please share your thoughts below so that your fellow tennis players realize that this doesn’t happen only to them. 

P.S. Here’s a before & after video clip of Colin’s backhand after 5 2-hour lessons:

If you want to know the methods I use to improve stroke technique in a short time, please take a look at the One-Handed Backhand video course.

No one is poaching at the net like in doubles, which tends to distract you a lot. Additionally, there are no emotions involved (hopefully) just because you missed one shot and so on.

In other words, your mind is calm and clear.

ONLY NOW can you actually become more aware of the constant feedback you’re receiving from your mind and body.

And secondly, when you are calm you are also relaxed.

And only a relaxed body can start to make corrections of your existing technique.

Most of the tennis instruction online and on court revolves around correcting your strokes – which is the visible part of your skills.

Even so, there are also many invisible skills that you need to master in order to play tennis well and that I shared throughout this website.

Some of these invisible (or less obvious) skills are:

• timing of the strokes, which means that you consistently hit the ball in the ideal contact point;
• having a good stroke rhythm, which means that you prepare early and your swing is in sync with the ball flight;
• having good balance;
• seeing the ball clearly, which allows good rhythm and timing;
• hitting strokes with good weight transfer, which allows you to hit more effortlessly;
• hitting lots of balls with the sweet spot of your racket, which gives you more power;
• having a clear intention of how you want the ball the fly;
• breathing properly (exhaling at contact and breathing normally in a rally);
• and so on.

When you’re not under pressure, you have enough time to be aware of the feedback you’re receiving from your last shot.

This can occur when you don’t feel rushed immediately after your shot because you don’t have to recover and look at your opponent to see what they are up to.

Only then will you become aware of all the things I listed above.

You will feel whether you hit the ball too late, whether you were balanced, whether you saw the ball clearly just before contact, whether you hit the sweet spot, and so on.

And this feedback will allow you to constantly adjust for the next shot and gradually improve your skills over time.

Why Playing For Points Doesn’t Improve Your Technique (And Other Skills)

When your technique is not yet at a high enough level that it’s stable, effortless and allows you to hit consistently, then playing for points is the worst thing you can do.

That’s because you will constantly have to improvise.

In the process, you’ll make a lot of short, jerky movements and not really execute the stroke like you’re supposed to.

You cannot do that because your technique is not grooved in yet – it’s not ingrained yet.

You also won’t execute many other skills in those rushed situations that higher-level players still do – like staying on balance, seeing the ball well, hitting the ball cleanly with a smooth swing, and so on.

And that means that you are just reinforcing bad habits and making it much more difficult for you to acquire these skills and techniques when you do eventually take lessons or work on your strokes.

When I played as a teenager, I would hit with my friends and fellow tennis players for hours just down the middle, sometimes four to six hours per day.

We would rarely play points, and I would say that my ratio of free hitting vs points play was around 10:1.

So, for every ten free-hitting sessions, I would play one time for points.

That allowed me to really RELAX during my practices and become aware of all the weakness and flaws of my technique and skills mentioned above.

This approach also allowed me to work on each of these skills for prolonged periods of time which, of course, improved them a lot.

I remember hitting the ball late and focusing on hitting it more in front for months in all those free-hitting sessions until my timing and rhythm adjusted to the point that I was almost never late.

I remember not seeing the ball clearly after the bounce and not keeping my head still and then working on that skill for many free-hitting sessions during one summer.

I practiced hundreds, if not thousands, of hours under no pressure, simply hitting down the middle with my fellow tennis players.

During these sessions, I worked on my skills and techniques until they reached a point where they were so stable that they didn’t break down under pressure in match situations.

If you’re serious about improving your tennis game and reaching another level, then you have to practice much more in no-pressure situations and work on techniques and other skills so that you can reach a higher level.

Once your skills are better, your competitive results can improve, too.

Sidebar: Of course, if one never plays matches and then starts to play them, they will experience a lot of anxiety since their ego will suffer if they lose.

It takes quite a few matches before one become more desensitized to pressure situations and learns to play more freely.

But, as in every sport (or learning to play a musical instrument), the ratio between practicing and competition is way more in favor of practice sessions.

How To Improve Technique And Other Skills In Free-Hitting Sessions

There are two ways you can work on your game in free-hitting sessions:

• focusing on one thing at a time, or
• getting feedback from every single shot and adjusting.

1. Focusing on one thing at a time

I highly recommend that you start with the first method where you focus on one thing at a time for 5-10 minutes.

If, for example, I have three main flaws of my forehand like:

• not moving and doing a split step,
• not lifting the racket head in the preparation, and
• hitting the ball late.

Then I need to work first on movement and split step for 5-10 minutes and not think about anything else.

The thing that worries tennis players when they focus on only one thing at a time is that other flaws and mistakes in their strokes are still there.

DON’T WORRY ABOUT IT!

That is a normal process of improvement as we can completely focus on only one thing at a time – that’s how our brain works.

So, if I focus on split step only and still do an incorrect backswing and hit the ball late, that’s ok!

Each skill is being improved by a certain amount as we work on it.

If my movement is at level 2 out of 10 (2/10) and of course my goal is to reach 10/10 at some point, then as I focus and work on this skill for a couple of sessions, I will raise that skill to 3/10.

And even though I will not focus on the movement and split step in the next few minutes as I work on my backswing, the improvement process has already started!

As time goes by and you repeat working on each skill separately, you will realize that each skill becomes better and better even though you work on them separately.

Only when you have that laser focus of correcting that one single flaw will you really make a change and bring it to a higher level.

It takes laser focus to overcome bad habits as it is a hard battle between old and new movements or old and new timing of your strokes.

If you let go of your focus just a bit, there’s a good chance the old habit will win again.

Only when you have improved your skills to a fairly high level, let’s say to 7/10 or higher, can you try to work on two or even three of them at the same time.

But, as you saw in the video above, that also requires a very high level of concentration to constantly remind yourself of all three things you work on on every single shot you receive and in the short amount of time between your opponent’s stroke and yours.

2. Feedback and adjusting

The second method of working on your strokes is to get feedback from each stroke, be aware of what was not right and try to adjust for your next shot.

I suggest you try this approach when you reach at least 3.5 NTRP level or when you are able to play a lot of tennis during the week in non-competitive situations.

That means at least two to three sessions per week when you just rally with a partner or hit against the wall or against a ball machine.

When you practice in this way, you simply hit one shot and quickly realize what was not right.

Perhaps you felt that you hit the ball too late, and on the next shot you focus on hitting the ball more in front.

Then, as you do that and you hit more in front, you realize that you didn’t hit the sweet spot because you weren’t really watching the ball well.

So, on the next shot, you remind yourself to watch the ball. Perhaps you stay focused on that for a few shots, and then you again empty your mind and see what feedback you’ll get from the next shot.

As you can see, your focus is jumping from one skill to another in a very short amount of time.

You can do that only when your skills are at a quite high level and when you are able to process information that fast.

This is, of course, possible only in non-competitive situations where you receive steady, nice balls from your opponent.

If your opponent cannot provide you with most of the balls coming towards you at a similar speed, height, depth and amount of spin, then you’ll struggle too much to adjust to each different shot.

You can get in a groove and stabilize your technique only if you receive very similar incoming balls in a row.

Why else do you think coaches feed balls from a basket in all tennis clubs and academies?

Because it takes a certain time before the stroke technique and other skills stabilize in easy conditions.

Once we see that the stroke is stable in easy conditions – which means on a very similar incoming ball – only then do we start to vary our feeds and have players play more with each other where the incoming balls will have more variety.

When you practice on your own, you must follow the same principle of learning as that’s how you will achieve the best results.

One more very important point: whenever you engage in this kind of practice with your tennis buddy, keep in mind that you cannot focus only on yourself and your flaws without knowing at least in general what kind of ball you want to hit.

You must have an intention present most of the time that you want to send a nice ball to your partner. After all, that’s the final goal of your training – to be able to send the ball where you want.

So the “want” part must be present most of the time.

You can get lost in the technicalities of the stroke and forget what exactly you want to do with the ball. That’s like driving a car without looking out on the road.

By having a clear intention of how you want the ball to fly so that it comes nicely in the strike zone of your partner, you also allow them to get into a groove and therefore have a higher chance of receiving a nice ball from them again.

You must see and be aware of what happened on the other side and what kind of ball your partner received: Was it too short? Too high? Too fast?

By being aware, you can adjust for the next shot.

Not only do we work on technical flaws and other tennis skills in training like this, but we also work on feel.

Working on feel simply means that we try to figure out the right direction, amount of speed, height and amount of spin we will impart SO THAT the ball will fly roughly how we want.

Why A Free-Hitting Session Is Not Boring

Some players say that a free-hitting session is boring and that they prefer to play points as it’s more exciting (and rewarding).

Yes, it’s more rewarding for your ego as you beat someone and you feel superior for a while.

But, if you want to master tennis technique and other key skills needed to play at a higher level, then you have to work on them as does every serious athlete in every sport.

And if you watched the video above where I said what I experienced after each shot, you can see that, in about three-quarters of the shots, something was not right.

Even though my strokes looked fine and I didn’t miss the court much, I was still aware that:

• my shot was shorter than I intended,
• my shot was higher than I intended,
• I was late on the shot,
• I didn’t hit in the sweet spot, and
• so on.

That means that I am constantly unsuccessful in what I am attempting to do.

If I am motivated to improve my game and I realize that, on more than half of the shots, something was not right, that surely isn’t boring to me!

That knowledge is highly motivating, and it only increases my focus!

And with a high level of concentration, time flies very fast. You can hit like this for an hour, and it will feel like only 20 minutes.

That’s why I could do this for two hours at a time with short breaks for resting and drinking.

By playing with many different tennis players, you will also receive different types of incoming balls to which you will have to adjust again and therefore challenge your current skills to reach a new level.

Hopefully this explains the one part of tennis practice that is the foundation of general tennis training that should be done a lot but is in fact done the least.

I know that I improved my technique and other tennis skills mentioned in this article mostly through free-hitting sessions which I have done far more than playing for points or practicing certain drills.

I also know that most of you don’t spend enough time hitting freely and don’t have the time to calm your mind.

Only when your mind is calm will you realize what your mind and body are signaling to you all the time (which you can’t “hear” when playing a match). Then you can start working on all the skills necessary for higher level tennis.

So, hopefully this shows you how to make the best of this seemingly “boring” practice and lets you see the beauty and challenge of it.

Harmonious Body And How It Affects The Mind

The last and possibly the biggest benefit of practicing in free-hitting sessions is that, when you practice without pressure, your body relaxes more.

As your body relaxes, it can start adjusting. Tight and locked joints don’t allow any movement, and therefore your technique cannot change!

Only a relaxed body allows change, and it also starts to move more harmoniously and more smoothly.

My best buddy Urban and I have experienced many times that this harmonious and smooth movement of body affects our mind.

As the body moves more harmoniously, it starts to influence the mind to function more harmoniously.

In other words, you start to experience a very quiet mind, which is totally absorbed with the ball and is therefore present.

When we are in the now, we are in a different state. It is what meditation and other mental techniques try to help us experience.

I believe that harmonious movement of the body causes harmonious function of the mind – you enter a different state in which you experience no stress, no worries and no real emotions, just peace and some kind of bliss.

And the more times you experience that on a tennis court, the more it transforms you as a person because you carry that state more and more outside of the tennis court.

Isn’t that worth striving for more than spending all that time trying to figure out how to beat someone?

The ball is in your court. 

My first suggestion is to play way less tennis for points if you want to improve in the long term.

And my second suggestion is to play way behind the baseline for 5 to 10 minutes every session (perhaps even more).

By playing 2 or 3 meters behind the baseline, you’ll have much more time to prepare and swing. You’ll also have a much longer court to play into.

So, you’ll benefit in two ways: more time to swing and more freedom to swing, as the other baseline will be quite far away and you’ll see that it’s quite difficult to hit the ball too long.

The goal is to find the rhythm with the ball—try to hit the ball when it’s falling down and swing freely without tension through it.

With practice, you’ll find it very enjoyable to play like that. As you’ll feel no time pressure, you’ll finally be free to swing and let go.

This type of timing is the FOUNDATION for other timing where there is less time, like hitting the ball at the top of the bounce and hitting the ball on the rise.

Once you have this timing in place, it will be much easier to adjust it and still retain the feeling of no time pressure and the relaxed swing through the ball. In turn, your technique of groundstrokes will also be much smoother.

Drill #2: “Do I Have Time?”

Because coaches and players notice very early that the beginner or intermediate tennis player is late hitting the ball, the most common correction is to “put your racquet back” early, as that will give the player more time.

In theory that’s correct, but in practice that doesn’t work well. That’s because the player actually breaks down their timing by the sudden movement of bringing the racquet back.

The racquet then also starts the forward swing from a still point, which requires a jerky movement to get it started. In order to accelerate the racquet suddenly from a still point (to jerk it), we need to use a lot of force suddenly.

We can achieve that only through tension and strong muscle contraction, both of which cause inconsistency of the shot and a lot of wasted energy.

In reality, the swing of the groundstroke has 3 phases:

– Quick preparation

– Slower movement of the racquet in the phase between the backswing and the forward swing

– Acceleration toward the ball

In order to make all three work in harmony, the key part is the second one—it’s where we transition from backswing to forward swing.

This part MUST be smooth, as that allows gradual acceleration toward the ball. If the acceleration is not gradual but jerky, then muscles will tighten, contract suddenly, and cause small changes in the racquet head orientation, which in turn will cause a lot of errors.

That’s why it is crucial that the second phase of the swing is smooth, and it can be smooth only if we don’t feel any time pressure.

The best way to achieve that, in my experience, is to keep asking yourself whether you have time in that part of the swing.

The more you are aware of that phase and how you go through it, the more you’ll be able to adjust your swing.

In fact, most of the adjustments will happen unconsciously as your brain will adjust the speed of each phase and the transitions between them.

But again, in order to pay attention to these details, you need to rally in easy conditions without playing points.

Your whole awareness must be in your stroke—that’s why you must receive easy balls.

It’s best if you combine this drill with Drill #1, where you rally 2 to 3 meters behind the baseline.

Your final goal in this drill is to find time in phase 2 of the swing. You’ll find it through awareness and repetition. Once you feel no time pressure, you’ll be able to relax.

Once you relax, the swing will be much smoother and will generate much more force with less effort.

Feeling no time pressure and hitting effortlessly will tell you that you’re on the right track.

One more thing: allow your unconscious mind to make all the adjustments in the long term. Don’t force it consciously—just look for time in phase 2, hit 1000 balls, and wait.

Give your cerebellum enough information and feedback so that it can adjust this highly complex operation of sending thousands of signals to hundreds of your muscles that need to operate in almost perfect harmony.

Drill #3: Align With The Ball Flight

This is a drill I first discovered through The Inner Game of Tennis from Timothy Gallwey, and it’s one of the best drills to work on both timing and rhythm at once.

Gallwey called it “riding the ball”, and the idea is that you move in the same way as the ball does.

When the ball is going down, you’re going down, and when the ball is going up, you’re going up.

This drill works best if you don’t stand too far behind the baseline because then the ball will be falling down again at the time you need to go up toward it.

So, it’s not a drill that works in every situation, as the rhythms of your movement need to adjust to the ball’s flight.

Sometimes you hit the ball when it’s falling down, sometimes on top of the bounce, and sometimes when it’s rising—so there isn’t one drill that teaches you all three rhythms at the same time (except simply playing).

So, try to go down and load the energy in your legs and then go up once the ball bounces off the ground and release that energy into your stroke.

This will be the correct rhythm in most baseline exchanges when you rally nicely with your partner but also in most exchanges later when you play points.

One of the best hidden benefits of this drill besides helping you improve your timing in tennis is also helping you focus more on the loading of your legs and becoming more aware of the power you can generate off the ground.

By “pressing” into the ground with your legs, the “ground will press back”, and you’ll feel as if you’re receiving energy from the ground.

Of course, the ground doesn’t send energy, but that’s how it feels.

By finding more power in your legs you’ll be able to let go of some of the tension in your arms, and you’ll find another level of more effortless swing and eventually more consistency and power.

In summary, timing and rhythm in tennis are not easy to master, and most technical errors that we see are actually caused by poor timing.

In fact, when you’re thinking about the “correct movement of the racquet”, then in your mind’s eye you’re observing your racquet path and you’re not really tracking the ball.

How can you time the ball well when in fact you’re not even paying attention to it?

Only when you have your full attention on the ball will you be able to gauge the right time to go against it in the most comfortable and efficient way.

It is crucial that you complement your technical lessons with timing and rhythm exercises in order to achieve that effortless stroke in the long term.

Test these drills repeatedly, and let me know how they work for you!

This is playing now based on Self2 – your Self1 chose the end result, meaning how the ball should fly – and left Self2 to figure out what commands to send to the body in order to achieve that.

What I am explaining is no magic – it’s exactly the same process you’re using when throwing the ball with the hand – you’re obviously not thinking about a backswing or a follow-through.

Once you do that, you’ll have a much clearer mind, and you’ll see the ball well. After all, the ball is the only thing that matters, since now you want only to make the ball fly the way you decided.

What About Speed and Depth?

In order to control the ball, we need:

• Direction
• Height
• Depth
• Speed
• Spin

In real game, we control speed by rhythm. We don’t look to adjust speed by a mile per hour for each incoming ball – leave that to the pros.

Instead, we rely on a rhythm – a certain speed of shots that practice and play have shown us we control well.

So, we simply hold that tempo, and we focus on other ball controls/variables.

(The article on speed of shots is coming soon…)

Depth is determined by height (or the angle at which we play the ball), speed and spin. While you might have certain depth in mind, you need to be aware of the height and spin – since your speed is more or less constant (unless you’re attacking).

So, you’re not really aiming at a certain depth – rather, you’re focusing on speed and height and spin that create that depth of shots.

In reality, your rate of spin is also more or less constant, so you roughly have constant speed and spin, and you adjust the height of your shots in order to control depth.

Since most of your shots need to go deep (except for short cross court shots), you’re basically trying to find the right speed, spin and height, which will remain constant, and you simply change the direction of the ball for most of the baseline rallies.

How to Practice

The start is important so that you don’t flood your mind immediately with tons of mechanical commands and so that you learn to engage Self2 into the playing process.

After all, that’s how we play tennis eventually!

The finish of the lesson is again important since you want to return from technical thinking (if you had such a lesson) to a more natural way of playing tennis – which is to simply play the ball.

Follow this progression:

1. On mini tennis and at the start of rallying on the full court, focus only on direction and height and start rallying with a good height above the net.
2. After a minute or two, lower the trajectory of the ball and add rotation to the ball. Don’t just »spin« the ball, but hit the ball by pressing and rolling it. Of course, use feel to do that, and don’t be rough or forceful.
3. Keep those three parameters in mind – direction, height and spin – and work on changing them and adjusting them to each incoming ball.
   
   Direct the ball slightly away from your partner while knowing exactly at what height you want to play it. Choose the amount to spin you want to put on the ball, and try to find the right amount in order to have good control of most incoming balls.
4. Look to get into a good rhythm, and after about 5-10 minutes, proceed to other tasks and things you want to work on.
5. Finish the lesson with 5 minutes of rallying (cool down) by focusing again on the 3 parameters of natural tennis: direction, height and spin.

When you read this statement, you probably nod your head and agree with it. But when you play, you most likely react to every mistake you make.

Suddenly, you’re not so convinced that making mistakes is normal.

In fact, you probably react to every mistake you make with something negative – a sigh, negative self-talk, a frown or some other action that shows you’re dissatisfied with yourself, with your shot or with your shot selection.

If I asked you after the match (or simple free hitting lesson) which of your mistakes were normal, you would most likely find an explanation for each and every one you made, and none of these explanations would be “that it’s normal”.

You might say you “should have”:

• Bent your knees more
• Watched the ball longer
• Had better focus
• Put more spin on the ball
• Etc.

Every mistake would have an explanation, and you would believe that if you hadn’t made that error, you would have hit the ball in, right?

If you keep correcting yourself and eliminate those errors, you won’t make as many mistakes, right?

If you agree to the above statement, then you also agree that there are still some mistakes left. You probably didn’t say that if you eliminated all the causes of your mistakes, you would have never missed.

So, some mistakes are left there. “We all miss; even the pros do.”

Following this logic, if you’re a 3.0 player and you want to play like a 5.0 player, you believe that as a 5.0 player, you will miss less.

In fact, the better the player, the less they miss, right?

Well, not exactly!

In reality, something else happens…

The following video shows 3 very different tennis players:

1. A total beginner (my nephew  ) who was on a tennis court for his second lesson with me. He had never played with a foam ball before, but he had played a lot of table tennis and badminton, so his hand-eye coordination is good, and he is able to rally well with a foam ball.

2. An older club player who was self-taught and started taking lessons a few years ago.

3. My friend and I – both have been playing tennis for over 25 years, and both are tennis coaches.

As you saw, the average rally in all three cases lasted about 20 seconds!

People think that when they fix their strokes, movement and timing, they will miss less.

That’s NOT really the case!

Why?

Because once you know how to hit a better ball, you attempt it – and that’s riskier!

Sure, I don’t have to miss if I rally like that club player. (you can see me in the background – I just gently played the balls back.)

But I don’t want to.

I want to hit higher quality shots.

So, now I miss. And I miss at about the same rate as a less skilled player – but when I hit in the court, my shot is better. (And I am able to play better shots from more challenging situations.)

You’re traveling exactly the same road – the more skilled you are, the higher quality shots you’ll want to play – which means that you’ll play with the SAME risk of missing as someone not as skilled.

The same risk of missing means that you’ll miss roughly the same amount of balls.

So, there is no end to this journey.

You will never end by playing tennis so well that you won’t miss (except at a very low level of tennis which you won’t want to play – it’s not fun, not exciting and not rewarding!).

The idea that more practice helps you make fewer mistakes is WRONG.

It is true only for your current playing level.

As soon as you can make fewer mistakes at that level, you’ll want to play better. So you’ll play better, but you’ll still make a mistake every 20 seconds or so.

The final point is this – each time tennis players make mistakes, there is a reaction, meaning that the players would prefer not to have made those mistake. They believe they did something wrong, and if they fix “that” thing, they won’t miss the next time.

That’s an illusion. You will keep missing.

A certain percentage of mistakes are unfixable. The mind makes a mistake at calculating the ball trajectory, the body is not well-coordinated, the timing is slightly off – you name it.

These causes of errors are not fixable (since human mind and body abilities are not perfect!), meaning you cannot eliminate them. This in turn means you cannot eliminate mistakes completely.

Why Are Tennis Players Different? Tennis Is No Different…

Yet, this logic doesn’t seem to get to tennis players.

Everyone I know reacts to a mistake. They think they did something wrong. No one accepts mistakes as normal.

Still, when I watch recreational basketball players play near our tennis courts, no one reacts negatively to missing the basket.

It’s normal to them.

OBVIOUSLY you cannot hit the basket every time.

However, this simple logical idea is totally strange to tennis players as EVERYONE reacts to almost EVERY mistake they make.

They say something, they frown, or they do something else to show their dissatisfaction – meaning they don’t think it’s normal and obvious that it’s just a matter of time before they miss.

Why are these expectations so different between basketball and tennis players when REALITY keeps telling us for years and years that we keep missing?

(I’d really love to hear your thoughts on this in the comments below.)

The simple reality is this: the longer you play tennis and the more you practice, the higher quality shots you’ll be able to make.

But mistakes will stay forever. In fact, the rate of balls in vs. mistakes will stay roughly the same throughout your life.

Therefore, reacting to mistakes and scolding yourself is totally illogical and useless.

You need to accept mistakes as a part of tennis in the same way that missing a basket in basketball or striking in baseball is something completely normal and simply a matter of statistics.

In fact, as soon as you start a rally, the clock starts ticking.

It is simply a matter of time before you make a mistake.

Can you rally for one hour without mistakes? Do you believe that if you do everything technically correctly you won’t miss?

If that’s true, then why do the top pros miss?

What’s your explanation for that? Should they work on their technique? 

So, if you agree that it is impossible to rally for one hour without mistakes and that is impossible to play a match without mistakes, then which of your mistakes do you accept as normal?

If you’re brutally honest with yourself, you’ll see that you don’t accept any. (We’re talking just about unforced errors in this article, not forced ones.)

What you demand of yourself is impossible.

The reality is that you’ll keep missing shots for the rest of your life, and it’s better to accept them as a normal obstacle in your path toward the end goal.

To me, a mistake is the same as a red traffic light when I am driving a car toward where I want to go.

Red traffic lights are normal, and they stop my journey temporarily.

They are unwanted events, but I don’t get upset at every red traffic light. I simply accept them as a reality of driving a car in a city.

That’s exactly how I see mistakes in tennis.

They are unwanted, but I accept them as a reality of tennis and simply move on to the next rally.

I do get feedback from the mistake, but I know that my mind and body are not perfect and that believing that I “wouldn’t have made that mistake if I did something correctly” is completely false.

At that moment with my current sports abilities and current mental abilities, I was not able to do that – and I never will have perfect body/mind abilities.

Therefore, I will keep missing.

The Reality Of Sport

Here are some stats that reflect the reality of any sport – and this is from elite athletes in each sport:

1. Kobe Bryant (basketball), season 2011-2012:

• Free throws: 84.5%
• Field goals: 43%
• 3 points: 30.3%

2. Tiger Woods (golf), season 2012:

• Putting from 3-5 feet: 92.11% (missed 8% of putts from this distance – which is roughly 1 out of 12)
• Putting from 5-10 feet: 61.06%

3. Second serve statistics of tennis players in Grand Slam finals in 2012:

• Australian Open: Novak Djokovic – 66 / 68 (97%), Rafael Nadal – 62 / 66 (94%)
• Roland Garros: Novak Djokovic – 46 / 50 (92%), Rafael Nadal – 41 / 45 (91%)
• Wimbledon: Roger Federer – 38 / 41 (93%), Andy Murray – 68 / 69 (98.5%)

Sure, it may happen in a match here and there, but the point is that the mistakes are unavoidable.

Of course, none of the players had 0 unforced errors in those matches either.

The reason that you need to look at the above stats is to SEE that, no matter which numbers you look at in the long term, none will show 100%.

Even the best, most talented athletes in the world are unable to make 100% of shots in situations where they are not disturbed and simply need to hit a target that they have been practicing on for more than 20 years.

Kobe Bryant cannot make 100% of free throws, Tiger Woods cannot make 100% of putts from only a meter away and Roger Federer cannot make 100% of the second serves in the long term even though his service technique borders on perfection.

What are your expectations then?

Why do you demand of yourself not to make mistakes when it is in fact impossible to do so?

When it comes to tennis, it’s not really that you’re not disturbed. In most cases, you’re trying to hit a small moving ball with your moving racquet while your body is moving – and direct it into a target.

Sure, you may say, the court is so big – but in most cases, you weren’t just trying to hit the court. You were aiming close to the net, close to the sideline, close to the baseline or maybe even all of those.

Additionally, your target was extremely small, and you were trying to hit it in a very difficult situation.

To complete this thought of how difficult tennis is and how imperfect the human mind and body are, here’s a short collection of missed shots by top pros:

Why Do We Miss Then?

If you accept that mistakes are unavoidable, then what are the reasons we make them?

1. You didn’t know what to do exactly.

This is, in my opinion, the #1 reason for missing in tennis.

Most of the information about tennis is technical instruction, yet I believe that tennis technique is the last and the least common cause of mistakes in tennis.

The most common cause is mental.

Before contact, you must have a clear image of the trajectory of the ball you’re about to play.

In addition, this imagined ball flight has to be there early enough that your mind can calculate all the needed data and your body and limbs have enough time to adjust and adapt to send the incoming ball into this desired trajectory.

Simply put – in order to hit the ball in, you need to KNOW exactly how you want the ball to fly, and you need to KNOW that in the first half-second the ball leaves the racquet of your opponent.

For most recreational and junior tennis players, the game goes too fast to be able to decide correctly in each situation what to do and do it early enough in the incoming ball flight so that the body and limbs can adjust to the ball.

Combine that with the lack of high-level coordination needed to hit a tennis ball, the lack of timing and the lack of the ability to track and see a fast-moving ball clearly just before the contact, and you wonder how on earth club and junior tennis players are actually able to hit the ball in court at all.

In my experience, most club players and juniors simply think of the direction of the ball and have very little idea of the depth they want to play and even less idea of the height they want to play at.

Then they wonder why they hit into the net.

When I ask a player who hit into the net whether he knew the height of the ball before he hit it, 95% of the time he will say no. He knew only the direction.

Therefore, before you start fixing your technique when you miss, ask yourself first if you had a clear imagined trajectory of the ball in your mind before hitting it and whether you knew at what height you wanted to play it.

If you didn’t know that, forget about technique and make sure you’re programming the flight path correctly first!

That will significantly decrease the number of errors you make.

But you’ll still make some because…

2. The sport is too difficult.

Simply put, every sport is designed in a way that is too difficult for a human being to control it or to master it with 100% certainty.

If, for example, in basketball, the hoop were 10 feet around and the free throw line 2 feet from it, then it would be possible to make 100% of free throws.

It is within human ability to do so.

But the game of basketball was designed in a way that it is impossible for a human to hit 100% of attempts; therefore, a chance of missing exists.

Because of this chance for missing, the sport is exciting and unpredictable.

In tennis, if the server could stand 3 feet from the net and aim his serve into the service box, he would be able to make 100% of the second serves. But, the rules of tennis are designed differently, and therefore we cannot control the outcome.

We are all very limited in our skills. Although tennis looks fairly simple if you look at it from the outside, it is one of the most difficult sports overall.

If you take two normal adults with no special sports training and ask them to play table tennis or badminton, they can rally and occasionally make mistakes.

If you put them on a tennis court, they can’t make 4 balls over the net from the baseline for the whole hour – and probably not for the next 5 hours either.

In order to control a tennis ball, you need extremely good ball judgment skills, timing, movement skills, feel and coordination. As soon as the speed of the ball increases, you must play within a certain probability of missing, and it is simply a matter of time before you miss.

It is the same as driving through the city with a car – it is simply a matter of time before you will be stopped by a red light. Wanting to get through the city with only green traffic lights is a ridiculous desire – yet in tennis, almost everyone has a desire that they won’t miss.

I personally know that I’ll very likely miss in the next 20 seconds of the rally unless my opponent does it first.

The way I see my mistakes is that “I” didn’t miss – because it is not “I, Tomaz” who is:

– calculating the timing,

– sending commands to my 650+ muscles in the body,

– coordinating them in the exact right sequence in a very limited time and

– attempting to make contact with the small moving ball that needs to hit almost the center of my small sweet spot on the racquet (which is also moving)

– and attempt to direct the ball with the margin of error of just a few degree and a few kilometers per hour towards the other side

– while at the same time maintaining the dynamic balance of my body.

No, that’s not “me, Tomaz” doing it. I am completely uncapable of performing such a complex operation.

It is my brain doing that. (click here to read more on how complex this process is)

Timothy Gallwey called it Self 2.

But we can now call it in a more scientific way – it’ is the cerebellum.

It is responsible for movement, coordination of muscles and balance. It learns by trial and error – not by conscious thinking.

It learns by feel and by receiving feedback. When a baby learns to walk, it keeps sending signals to the cerebellum. The baby wants to walk and the cerebellum wants to help.

But it doesn’t know yet which signals to send when to which muscles. So it keeps trying and it learns by trial and error.

Every error gives the cerebellum the suggestion on what to try differently. And in time, the baby learns to walk and eventually to run.

The baby didn’t learn to walk – his cerebellum did.

In the same way, “me – Tomaz – my conscious ego”, didn’t learn to hit a tennis ball well.

My cerebellum did – or let’s call it simply “brain”.

My brain actually performs all those complex functions just to keep me upright, let alone coordinate all muscles and time them to almost perfection so that I can hit a tennis ball over the net.

Therefore, when I miss, “I” didn’t miss, my brain did.

And that’s why I don’t take mistakes personally.

I know that:

1. My brain had perform extremely difficult calculations in a very short time and that the more complex the system is, the greater the chance of a mistake is.
2. I didn’t start playing tennis at 4 years old so I don’t have the best skills installed in my brain. No one stimulated my cerebellum with complex exercises at the age when the brain is the most plastic and can learn the most.
3. I don’t play tennis every day in difficult situations and therefore my cerebellum is not stimulated to remain at the peak of its performance. Its calculations are not as good as they were when I was younger and when I played 3-5 hours per day against good opponents.
4. I am not 100% motivated to give it everything I can for every single ball I play therefore I am not alert enough to keep my brain working at the 100% of its current capacity and I am not willing to exert so much effort in movement and positioning just to hit the ball over.

To give you an extreme example, if someone held a gun to your head, would you be able to give it more to that current shot you’re making? Probably yes.

Therefore, you’re always holding back slightly and you’re not willing to do what it takes to hit the ball well – so you increase the chances of missing again.

Knowing all that, I see no reason to get upset when I miss.

In fact, it is quite a miracle that I am able to hit that many balls over and hit them so well while my cerebellum is working overtime just so that I can have fun on a tennis court. 

Missing in tennis is one of the common things that happens and will continue to happen all the time.

Did you know that if your racquet face changes by only one degree and you hit from the baseline, the ball will land 41 centimeters (1.35 feet) away from where the first ball landed on the opposite baseline?

Chech the “One Degree Error” article for a more thorough explanation…

How Being Negative About Mistakes Hurts Your Game

The worst thing that happens to your tennis if you blame yourself for mistakes is that you lose confidence in your strokes.

What you may have never thought about is that you’re not responsible for mistakes since you cannot control the outcome – meaning playing the ball in.

If the outcome could be controlled, then someone would have learned to always play the ball in. No one has and no one will…

Sure, we CAN put the ball in if we loop it over the net. But as soon as you hit a shot lower over the net with some speed, there’s immediately an element of risk and a chance of missing.

It’s just a matter of time and statistics before you miss.

Thefore you do not control the outcome – hitting the court is only a probability.

And so you cannot be responsible for missing the shot if you cannot control the outcome.

And yet so many players blame themselves for missing. It’s very painful to watch and totally illogical.

By blaming yourself for mistakes you’re losing confidence in your strokes and in yourself. You bring down your self-esteem and cause doubt and hesitation when you’re about to hit the ball.

And this now is the cause of the next mistake!

While the first mistake was most likely just a matter of statistics, the consequent ones will be actually caused by your negative mental state.

Do not allow yourself to fall into this vicious spiral of negativity!

Conclusion

Making mistakes is unavoidable and happens all the time to everyone who plays tennis – from total beginners to the finalists of a Grand Slam.

It is as unavoidable as missing the hoop in basketball, missing the ball in baseball or missing a putt in golf.

And it as unavoidable as red traffic lights on your drive through a big city.

Yet, for some reason, this FACT of tennis is something tennis players do not want to accept as a reality of tennis.

They believe that you miss because you did something wrong – and that this thing can be fixed. Additionally, they feel that, if one trains long enough, he will have eliminated all causes of mistakes and will therefore make no more unforced errors and no more double faults.

If this is what you believe, you will suffer through playing tennis for the rest of your time spent on court.

The reality is this – we make mistakes because the game of tennis and its rules are designed in a way that human beings (in other words, our cerebellum) cannot control them.

In the same way that in basketball one cannot always hit the hoop, so a human being cannot always play the ball into a tennis court – even though it seems he could.

The reality stands firm in its fact – everyone misses, and everyone will keep missing. Therefore, why do you get upset when you miss?

Your expectations are obviously not aligned with reality, and reality always wins.

Fighting this battle with reality is futile, and it only causes you emotional pain.

See mistakes as part of tennis, and don’t take them so personally.

It is only a matter of time before you miss again. It is just the statistics of tennis.

Focus on how well you’re hitting the ball when it goes in and give much less attention to mistakes.

I personally am very sad to see almost everyone so negative on a tennis court, while so many people have fun playing basketball or beach volleyball or any other recreational sport.

Why can’t tennis players be the same?

Please take a few minutes to ponder on the logic I tried to present in this post and videos. Then look at your beliefs and expectations and determine whether you can adjust them to better fit the reality of tennis.

If you do, you’ll find the game of tennis to be pure joy. I do.