Meyers: Good practice habits vital to competition success

For as much as tennis has changed over the years, one thing that has not changed is practice techniques. What has changed, however, is how our young athletes approach their practices and their practice frequencies.

I could easily write volumes on this subject, but I will try to limit it to a few paragraphs.

Athletes compete best when they consistently practice with the same energy, intensity and focus required for successful tournament matches. There's an old saying that goes, "Practice the way you play or you will play the way you practice."

If coaches and parents could somehow impress upon our kids the importance of those great philosophical words, everyone would have better success. It used to be easy to convince young athletes to practice correctly, but it's becoming more and more difficult.

Athletes need to adopt the belief that continuous improvement will take care of results. Everyone has the tendency to look at the outcome goals of rankings and match wins, and they lose sight of their improvement.

Developing their games rather than measuring their outcome goals needs to be foremost in their minds. When athletes commit themselves to improvement, outcome goals tend to take care of themselves.

Another mainstay of tennis is that consistency trumps power most of the time. Consistency doesn't just mean getting 22 shots in a row in the court by hitting softly and into the middle of the court. Variety in placement, depth, spin and power as opposed to booming serves and forehands (that only sometimes go in) remains the correct recipe for winning points.

Depth of serve is definitely an overlooked aspect of success. An effective serve draws a weak service return or possibly an error. To be effective the ball needs to get to the receiver quickly giving the receiver less reaction time. One way to accomplish this is to hit it hard but the harder a player tries to hit the ball the greater the chance of a missed serve. A serve needs to be hit deep and with penetration.

Here's an interesting example. A served ball travels only half as fast after the bounce as before the bounce. So a ball served at 60 mph landing within a few inches of the service line gets to the receiver quicker than a ball served at 80 mph landing 9 feet inside the service line.

Serves and service returns are still the two most important shots in tennis. Accordingly, they should be practiced more than the other shots. This is definitely another area in which our juniors and adults fail. Proper practice of these two shots needs to be improved.

Remember that saying of "Practice the way you play or you will play the way you practice," and hopefully you will be better prepared for your competitions.


Watch your thoughts for they become your words. Watch your words for they become your actions. Watch your actions for they become your habits. Watch your habits for they become your character. Watch your character for it becomes your destiny. Therefore, your destiny starts with your thoughts. Think about it.




Midland Dec. 8-9

Frisco Jan. 5-6


Abilene Dec. 1-2

Mansfield Jan. 5-6

SUPERS 12/14

Bryan Dec. 8-10

Austin Jan. 5-7

SUPERS 16/18

Dallas Dec. 8-10

San Antonio Jan. 5-7