I am often asked what should be the division of time between practice and match play. This is a subtle question with many pit falls. As one parent put it, playing a match is like taking a test after a period of study. True it is, but how much study is appropriate before taking a test? As an former faculty member at both the university and high school level, I know that a test is appropriate after a complete set of concepts have been presented and the related homework assignments completed. The same is true for anything you are studying. Our challenge is to decide what set of concepts are appropriate to cover in tennis before play is initiated.

There are two classes of issues that relate to the decision as to what the time division should be between play and practice. One class is physical, the other is mental. We discuss the physical first.

Physical Requirements for Match Play

We attack this issue by examining an example. To start at a clear point, suppose a player has no backhand. Should they play a match, and if so, what do they have to gain? Clearly, at the tournament level, even the USTA L6 level, having no backhand will result in quick defeat since an opponent at this level will attack the backhand constantly. So what has been learned? You need a backhand, which was already known. However, one could argue that some level of experience has been acquired, ever how meager, and one has learned what it is like to play a tournament match. On the other hand, the severe loss can result in damage to the player's confidence that can be hard to heal. So there is a trade-off. In most cases, the damage to the player's confidence is too hard to repair,and the little learned (and a lot more) can be learned just as well when the player has a backhand. Parents who have been professionally trained in combat and related activities know that if a player cannot defend themselves, they are not ready to compete. The analogy is that a player without a backhand has no ability to defend themselves against the backhand attack.

In our view, the minimum skill needed to play matches is a forehand, backhand and second serve. These skills need to be sufficiently developed that the student will not regress to reflexes during the match and thus undo all of their training. This issue (regression) will be treated in the mental requirements for match play discussed below. But this is not enough for serious players. There must also be conditioning. If a player with the basic skills loses due to fatigue, they have learned nothing new. Hence, there is a minimum level of physical conditioning needed. Further if the player has poor footwork and loses as a result, nothing new is learned. Hence there are three areas of development needed as a minimum for the serious player: Basic stroke skills, anaerobic conditioning and footwork. Footwork requires a minimum level of strength in the legs and core, so those elements must be included.

If a player has all of these physical elements they can still lose due to mental issues. There are four that can be treated with training.

Mental Requirements for Match Play

Physical requirements for the serious player to begin match play are easy to enumerate. The mental requirements are a more complex set of issues. The five mental areas that we now discuss that have a bearing on match play are: (1) Regression, (2) Playing in the Past, (3) Playing in the future (4) Incongruence of knowledge and skill, and (5) Cultural Biases. Of these, Cultural Biases are the hardest to fix.

Regression Type I (Limbic Regression)

There are two parts to understanding regression and the potential toward regression. First we explain the term. The human brain is constructed to have primitive reflexes already in place at an early age. These are defensive in nature. Second, the human brain has, in addition to the primitive part, a neocortex part. In the neocortex reside a large component of our learned motor skills. In the event of nervousness or fear, the primitive brain can take control of all our thoughts and actions restricting access to the neocortex skills (the skills learned during tennis training). The motor skills available to the primitive brain are mostly primitive reflexes. Hence, when a player becomes nervous, there is a high potential for them to regress to the use of primitive reflexes rather than to the use of trained motor skills. The exact switch that governs this process can vary between individuals. We know that cultural conditioning can play a large role in this switch and, in the case of females, the father's perspectives can play a large role as well.

One significant issue that is created by the regression mechanism is the impact to the training cycle. In particular, the regression dynamic has a significant impact on when, in their training cycle, a student should begin to play matches. If they are asked to play too soon, then the regression dynamic will cause them to revert to primitive actions, or a mixture of primitive and learned actions, during the match, thus breaking down the skills acquired during training. This, in turn, leads to a loss of confidence in themselves and their training program. If this is done often enough, then the player becomes conditioned to regression as a strategy for competition. If this occurs, it can become very hard for them to retain trained skills and hence they have great difficulty in advancing their skill. This results in a stagnation of their development.

As a result of the presence of the regression dynamic, it is necessary to design a training program for each student that takes into consideration their tendency to regress during match play. While there are wide differences between personalities, there are a few generic steps that can be taken to combat regression and minimize the time it takes to get a student to match plan. We note that pop psychology techniques have some short-term effect, but they do not work, and cannot work, in the long run. There has to be a real understanding of the neuropsychological dynamics involved and their attendant issues before a long-term solution to regression can be found.

At this point we must discuss the concept of confidence. Confidence is a word for a state of mind in which an individual feels that they can do what they have been trained to do. It is not a precise term. In tennis, confidence can be thought of as a state of being certain that a chosen course of action is the best, given the circumstances of a match. While confidence is the greatest antidote to regression, building confidence is not a trivial matter and the lack of precision of the term makes it hard to be sure that a player is confident. What we do know is that confidence can emerge from a program that addresses the deep seated cultural and related issues that inhibit a player's performance. Among the generic elements that can address the problem of confidence are conditioning, physical strength, choreography and precision movement. Including these elements in a training program is essential to building the confidence level necessary to combat regression. We have discussed all of these in past articles and here we will take the discussion a step further.

There is a physiological element, nervousness, that must be addressed that bears a close relationship to regression and is thus included in this section. Nervousness causes the motor control systems to become imprecise, or shaky. One finds, when they are nervous, that the precision of their shots is reduced. Shots that are winners in practice become unforced errors under the pressures of match play. This leads to frustration and a loss of confidence. It also leads one to hurry their shots and to swing faster. Speeding up the swing is a natural response to nervousness since it reduces the time available for the nerves to cause the muscles to shake. Try drawing a straight line slowly and try drawing it quickly. A quick stroke has less variation only because there was less time for the hand to shake during the motion. But speeding up your shots is not a good solution to the problem.

When you are in a state of fear, the mind can wander randomly as a defensive mechanism. As a result, the individual in fear does not exercise control over any part of their body since they cannot consciously focus to direct their bodies effectively. Instead the limbic brain takes over and issues random directions related to flight. This is an effective mechanism when fleeing a predator since the body moves in a chaotic path making it impossible for the predator to predict the path of the prey. When playing a tennis match, this process is corrupted because the player is not likely to run away, and so the fear response appears as random jerks and burst movements that lead to unforced errors.

Regression Type II (Skill Regression)

Limbic regression is often replaced by skill regression as the student develops. Skill regression refers to the student regressing to a previously known or perfected skill level that has worked in the past under the pressures of the match. For example, a student may have perfected an endurance game and wants to evolve to a power game. If the student is placed in match conditions too soon in the redevelopment cycle, they will regress to the endurance game. Hence, progress in the power game is retarded. This can result in a very complicated development problem. If the player returns to match play while their power game is working in the training environment as opposed to the match environment, they may be unable to execute either game. This makes sense, because they are transitioning to a new game type and the old game skill type is being forgotten. Of course, it is desirable that the old game skill be forgotten because it is one of the objectives of training the new skill. but this can be frustrating to the player since they seem to have neither skill in the match. The solution is patience and perseverance. The new game skill will take hold given enough time.

Playing in the Past

Playing in the past refers to trying to hit a shot based on recent memories of how the shot was made. To do this requires a laps of concentration long enough to produce an unforced error. How this works is that the player begins a stroke sequence and tries to remember how it is done. The effort to recall a past memory consumes a fraction of a second, and because a stroke is very short in duration, this fraction of a second diversion results in the player not being able to complete the stroke within the requires time. As a result, a partial stroke is produces and an error results. This is only a problem because tennis strokes are executed at a speed well above normal reaction times.

Playing in the Future

Looking ahead in a point is as bad as playing in the past, since the player must divert their attention from the moment at hand to do this. This idea is unrelated to anticipation. In a chess match this works.

Incongruence

Incongruence refers to a mismatch between how a player hits a stroke and how they think they hit the stroke. This is common among all pros who never think about how they hit, they just do it. However, if a player imagines that they know how they hit a stroke and that memory is not the same as how they hit a stroke, then an error will result whenever they try to execute the stroke.

Mental Exercises to Address Mental Issues

Now that we have identified a problem source that can be treated with tennis exercises, we proceed to construct a program of development directed at improving the mental game. We will use the serve as a venue to construct our initial exercises. We choose the serve because it involves movement of the head position and thus poses greater challenges.

Since the fundamental problem is drifting consciousness stimulated by the limbic brain, we ask the student to execute their serve in slow motion. Slow motion provides a larger opportunity for drift to engage and thus override conscious motor control. This will allow the instructor to intervene and correct the motion. The instructor should be on the look out for the possibility that the slow motion serve does not agree with the student's natural serve motion (incongruence). If there is not agreement between the slow motion serve and the natural serve, then under pressure, the serve can break down easily. This is because in addition to the limbic interference, a secondary action is for the conscious mind to try and remember how the serve is executed. If there is not agreement between the slow motion serve and the natural serve, it will be impossible to execute the serve successfully under pressure by the recall method.

Correcting the slow motion serve consists in keeping the student in the slow motion mode by slowing them down if they have a tendency to speed up. In order to assure that the ball has some chance of landing in the service box with a slow motion action, the student should be asked to make the contact component to be fast It is the only normal component allowed. Now take three balls and give the student one. Have the student serve the first ball. Make note of where the ball landed. If it did not land in the proper service box, continue giving the student balls to serve until they get a first good serve in the service box. That ball will be your starting point for the three ball exercise. Now ask the student to repeat the same service motion and obtain the same result. If they are successful, then give them the third ball and request a repeat of the first two balls. In general, the third ball will be way off the mark from the first two balls. This is a universal phenomenon among students and results from the student accumulating a memory of their two successful serves. What happens under pressure is one of two things: (1) the brain tries to serve the third ball by recall rather than by the same method used for the first two balls; (2) the pressure of the moment causes the neuronal system to produce a spike ( myoclonus ) inserting a jerky action in the stroke and producing a wild shot. When incongruence is present, the serve will resemble the perceived rather than the actual serve. Both events usually produce a fault. If incongruence is absent, then spiking will account for the third serve error. When the perceived serve is congruent with the actual serve, this exercise can reduce spiking and improve the serve overall if there are no cultural barriers present.

At the third ball in the series, the student is now face-to-face with a loss of focus. Typically, rather than operating in the present, they are trying to operate in the past or are spiking, and thus have lost conscious control of their body. It is at this point that progress in developing focus can be made. The instructor must demand (without being mean or overbearing) that the student repeat the slow motion serve three times. When the student begins being successful at this exercise, they will have improved their focus significantly. At this point, the exercise goes to another level. The student is asked to serve to the ad court and hit the center service line three times. The exercise should go on for about 100 balls on the average. Any player on a professional track should repeat this exercise for 400 balls.

Students doing this exercise often report that they feel like their heads are about to bust. This is a result of the extreme demands placed on the student's concentration. What is happening is that new neural pathways are being formed that will result in an improved ability to focus on the present as opposed to drawing on the past. A secondary effect is that the variation in the normal muscle control system will be reduced.

There are a wide range of possible exercises that can be used to reduce the regression dynamic. The recall dynamic can be improved by assuring that the actual serve agrees with the recalled memory of the serve. For the regression dynamic, one may use any exercise that requires the student to repeat an action under pressure. We elected to construct an exercise that uses actual tennis actions.

If, while using this exercise, the instructor does not see an improvement in body control and focus, then they must look to culturally based factors as a possible source of regression. Culturally bases factors are much harder to treat and no amount of hypnotizing and pop psychology tricks will ever solve a culturally based tendency to regression. A far more aggressive program must be used that consists in high intensity training combined with focus training under physically grueling drills. In addition it is essential to remove the student from the cultural influences that are the source of regression. If this cannot be done, the prospects for the student becoming a winner are very grim.

Cultural Biases

If, while using this exercise, the instructor does not see an improvement in body control and focus, then they must look to culturally based factors as a possible problem source. Culturally based factors are much harder to treat and no amount of hypnotizing and pop psychology tricks will ever solve a culturally based tendency to limbic regression. The most common example of a cultural bias is that females are inferior to males. Another bias is that females must be submissive. These types of biases will cause a superior player to lose to an inferior player. A far more aggressive program must be used that consists in high intensity training combined with focus training under physically demanding drills. In addition, it is essential that the student be remove from the cultural influences that are the source of regression. If this cannot be done, the prospects for the student becoming a winner are very grim.

Play versus Practice

So what is the right balance between play and practice. A common mistake is to use match play to compensate for mental or physical problems that should be treated off the court. If used to compensate for technical issues, then regression will likely cause the player to make very slow progress. If used to treat cultural issues, the player may become a perennial loser. The fact is that the need for match play is far less than previously conceived. If a player has thorough physical, technique and mental training they will require about twenty percent of the match play experience of other players. We have verified this many times and there are good historical examples that also verify this fact. The reason is that coaches have become conditioned to assume that play cures all ills. But it cannot. The chief mental problem that players is the problem of habituation which we have treated in other articles. It takes about three tournaments for a player to habituate to the tournament environment if they are properly trained.

Until a player has good basic skills, match play provides little value. Once basic skills are in place, match play can provide a window into the mental issues of the player. Once identified, these issues must be address outside the tournament venue if progress is to be made. Typically, we spend six months preparing a player before exposing them to competition. This may seem short to some, but our high technology training methods can put basic technique skills and mental skills into place very rapidly. After they play their first tournament, we do not allow them to play again until we have addressed the issues that were exposed by the stresses of competition.

Summary