It’s so exciting to have a fairly complete national tournament schedule and a growing local tournament again! With the resurgence of these events it’s possible to resume individual tournament goals.
Goals are typically win or lose; either you win the tournament, reach top 5 in rankings, accomplish your goal or you don’t. That mindset can be defeating if you do not reach your goal(s). At the base root, improving will get you closer to where you want to be. By focusing on your process and systems the scoreboard will take care of itself. If you can improve .1% every day at the end of the year you will be 37% better. Year end goals might not reflect this growth, over time it will look like an overnight success to everybody that hasn’t paid attention to your sustained systems for success.
There are big and small areas that are possible to make .1% changes in. There are the obvious ways that coaches talk about; technique, shot selection, and tactics. There are also the tiny ways; how often you change your strings, grips, shoes, socks, the material of your clothing, where you store your tennis bag, what is in your tennis bag that you might need, nutrition, water consumption, when/how you stretch or workout. The list can go on and on.
Most of these decisions are made subconsciously based on habit. I challenge you to evaluate these habits, write down all of your tennis tendencies in a list. Next to each listed item put a + for positive habits, = for neutral habits, and a – for negative habits. This is not a list to punish mistakes, it is a list to help you be aware of unconscious decisions that are now habits. Embrace your positive habits and acknowledge your negative habits. Second, create a list of habits that you imagine a tournament tennis player probably has.
With awareness of these subconscious habits we can make conscious decisions. Our habits are our identity, it’s who we have proven we are. If you identify yourself as a competitive tennis player you can make conscious decisions that a competitive tennis player would. Ordering a water with dinner instead of a soda/milkshake/alcohol won’t make you healthier tomorrow. It will be at the very least .1% better for you, over the course of a year it will start to be noticeable, over 5 – 10 years it will be very noticeable.
The average person struggles with these .1% increases because the results don’t come overnight, which is how every success story looks from the outside. Knowing that these small changes are a process and focusing on your systems of growth will create a more fulfilling and enjoyable journey.
We have several adult high performance groups returning to our schedule! These sessions are designed to help you identify as a competitive player, encourage your journey, and support your tournament competition. If there is an adult high performance level/day/time that you would like to see added to our schedule please let us know!