Ramblings

Hi, you can send your team, friends, or tennis buddies to www.tenniswarrior.com to sign up for their free email tennis lessons.

If anyone has missed the last six months of the email tennis lessons they are now posted at my website www.tenniswarrior.com under ‘Archives' along with all the other lessons since 1998.

TEAM SPECIAL!

In the near future I will be offering a Special Team Package discount for my new book, "The Truth about Winning!" for purchases of 10 books or more. Since team unity is one of the most important aspects of winning as a team my book offers the opportunity for everyone on the team to utilize similar mental principles.

For example, one of the key points in the book is learning to handle your mistakes correctly and moving on.  This is what I call the ‘Refocus Technique.'  An area we all constantly need to improve.  When everyone on the team understand the principles around the Refocus Technique you improve team camaraderie.  Partners begin helping each other with their mistakes. Included in the team special will be summary post cards of the Refocus Technique and stickers.  The stickers can be placed on a racket to remind you to forget your mistakes and move on.  The sticker simply says, "The next shot is more important than the last mistake."  Many of my students use these stickers in their matches.  When they make mistakes in the heat of battle they glance at the sticker and snap back to a better frame of mind. I will let you know when the Special Team Package is ready.

If anyone has not yet read the first chapter of my book you can do so by clicking on www.tenniswarrior.com/truthaboutwinning.htm

The lesson below is a tough one to completely understand.  But if you eventually would like to learn tennis at a faster rate and play in a more instinctive and automatic mode it is a lesson you must learn.  Tie this lesson together with the other tennis instruction you have learned from me and maybe it will begin clicking a little more.

Enjoy the lesson and I will see you next time!

Welcome to Tom's Online Tennis Lesson, sponsored by TennisWarrior.com, "Where you can learn  to  think like a pro!"

If you would like to learn to play tennis or reach a higher level at a quicker rate you must understand that stroke production is based on a ‘feel' of a particular stroke, not ‘mechanics.'  Are you thinking, "not mechanics, I thought strokes were all mechanics!"  Well, that is what conventional methods would lead you to believe, but it simply is not true.

The truth is all pros have developed a feel of a given stroke by many hours of repetition.  Either by having someone feed them balls or just having fun as a child playing day in and day out.  As they develop a feel for a given shot then the mechanics work correctly.  Did you catch that?  The feel of a stroke allows the mechanics to function properly.  The mechanics themselves do not make the stroke function correctly.  An example of this would be a player who has the perfect mechanics and looks good, but cannot keep the ball in the court with any consistency.  He has painstakingly forced himself to do the mechanics correctly, but has developed no ‘feel' of the stroke through repetition.

What do I mean by ‘feel'?  A feel is an identification with a stroke as a whole unit, not its individual parts.  By the way this is true for all sports.  If you think Michael Jordan was one of the all time greatest basketball players because he had the best mechanics you would be dead wrong.  His ‘feel' of the game, shots, and situations were beyond most players in the history of the game.  He developed that ‘feel' from long hours of repetition when most would become bored!  The same is true in tennis.  Develop a feel of a shot and that feel will make the mechanics work correctly.  Try it and see for yourself!

Go out and practice any one of your shots for one month, just one half hour a week or more and watch what begins to happen.  Use a ball machine or a partner that will simply feed you balls.  Hit for ten minutes, then rest by practicing another stroke for three minutes, then come back to the same stroke for ten more minutes.   Do this for as long as you like each week for a month and watch the different ‘feel' that develops for that particular shot.  Even if you are not doing everything perfectly you will still improve!!!  Why?  THE MAGIC OF THE LOST ART OF REPETITION!

That's right I said the lost art of repetition.  Most players now-a-days want a pro to tell them what they technically did wrong so they can correct it and then they think everything is fine.  Only one problem, if that is all there were to it everyone would be a pro!  Everyone seems to forget repetition.  Repetition is so powerful that many times you do not even have to be technically correct and you will still improve.  Besides with a little guidance and a lot of repetition many of the mistakes you are making will disappear on there own.  Why?  Because most of the mistakes players make are based on incorrect balance, timing, judgment, and undeveloped muscle.  All four can only be developed by repetition, not by forcing yourself to do a host of technical things.

This is the same problem a child is having when he learns to walk.  He lacks the balance, the timing, the judgment, and has undeveloped muscle.  How does the child solve this problem?  With the same principle you should use to develop your game - REPETITION!

REPETITION develops balance, timing, judgment, and undeveloped muscle which in turn leads to a feel for any given stroke and that feel makes the mechanics work properly.  This is exactly how repetition taught you a feel for walking as a child and eventually a feel for the advanced skill of running.  Learning tennis is based on developing a ‘feel' for the whole stroke through repetition, not on learning each and every intricate mechanical movement.

Your email tennis pro,

Tom

Copyright © 2001 Tom Veneziano. All rights reserved

"Tom deals with the thinking end of tennis like no one else. It's almost too difficult to explain, you have to experience it. He has an uncanny knack for getting right to the heart of the matter. You come away thinking, that's right: it makes sense!"

Colleen Cremer, Houston, TX.

"It's interesting to note that everyone can use these tapes from beginner to championship level. You can apply the information to whatever level you play on."

Dan Hanusa, Houston, TX.

" Tom's audio cassettes have changed my thinking, aligning it with the correct information needed to improve my game. He's right there with you, inside your head, challenging you to make those changes. It's like having your own personal coach! I highly recommend his tapes for everyone."

Linda Zimmerman, Houston, TX.

"On the way to my HLTA match I listened to Tom's tape, "Some Before Match Pointers." Call it a coincidence, but I won my first HLTA match ever! I just seemed to be in a better frame of mind. Thanks, Tom."

Mary Ogden, Houston, TX.

"Tom and I have been friends for over twenty years. It's not surprising to me players talk so positively about his tapes. He's always possessed exceptional athletic ability along with an unusual analytical mind. Tom simply likes to think! At times he would drive me crazy, but he was the driving force behind my journey into tennis. I'm 6'1" and Tom is 5'6" but I could never beat the little imp! All joking aside, if Tom's thinking is on audio cassettes, you should listen! You'll never view tennis the same way again!"

Sam Lacava, Tennis Professional, Stewartsville, N.J.

Thank you all for the testimonials! I appreciate it!

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