Mental toughness is one of the hardest challenges any junior tennis player will ever face

Entire books have been written in regards to the mental aspects of tennis. Far more detail is already out there than what I can offer in a single blog post. Some of this advice can feel very theoretical and often not applicable to the junior tennis player who oftentimes lacks the maturity and self-awareness to put basic self-regulating techniques into practice. My goal, therefore, is just to share what has worked for my son in practical terms to see if there are any tips you might want to apply yourself. 

Before I get started, I thought I should offer my own personal definition of mental toughness as it relates to tennis.

Summarized at the highest level, I define it as staying calm and positive under perceived pressure. Why calm? Because keeping your cool and not panicking on the court is how the player stays focused on the challenge before them. Why positive? Because negativity rarely is effective in winning matches and positivity keeps the player motivated over the long-term. And if there is one single guaranteed way to fail at achieving your tennis goals, it will be from quitting because the game just isn’t fun anymore and the player is down on themselves about it. And “perceived” pressure? Because with very few exceptions, most junior tennis matches do not significantly change the life of the player who’s playing in it. There are obviously pros who won’t get paid unless they win, and there are high stakes college bound recruits who need to win to earn scholarships, but these are exceptional circumstances. The vast majority of the time these are kids playing one of many tournament matches and so whether they win or lose one of these matches, at any given point in time, the chances are extremely low that the player’s life will be all that different either way. 

With that said, I will now assert that mental toughness in tennis is more important than maybe any other sport. And the higher the player advances to more competitive levels of play, the more the mental game plays a role. There are many reasons for this. The ones that stand out are…

First, the way each point starts is unique. In no other sport does the first movement (I.e., the serve) play as big a factor as the game of tennis. And even though the motion is the same every time, there can be a high degree of variance with the ball toss, the wind conditions, the sun, where the opponent is standing, etc. A ton of factors can impact the effectiveness of that very first movement, which then amps up the pressure to get it right because to get it wrong will likely cost you the point.

Second is the scoring format. In almost every sport, the winner is decided by which person scored the higher number of points, but not tennis! The “winner take all” nature of tennis can lead to a winner actually scoring fewer points, as long as they score the right ones at the right time. This dynamic can create confusion for the player, because they can sometimes be the better competitor, score more points, and still lose! Reconciling this can be mentally taxing.

Third is the fact that it is an individual sport played directly against another person. There are, of course, many other individual sports where you win and lose on your own. Sports like golf, track, or swimming are all good examples of sports that are not team based. The difference, however, is that in these sports you are competing against yourself to improve your personal best results vs. competing directly against another human and trying to guess how that person will respond to your shots. This makes the game extremely dynamic and dependent on constant problem solving.

When viewed through this lens, it is not surprising that you see so much petulance and aggravation on display even at the highest levels of the game (McEnroe anyone?). It can be even worst for kids. 

When my son was younger, these factors (and many others) compounded onto one another to overwhelm him in matches. He would grow frustrated when he made bad shots which would then rob him of focus. He would encounter matches where his opponent would make changes to how they were playing against him, and he would not be able to adjust accordingly. And worst of all, he would become extremely frustrated whenever he would lose to someone he perceived as lower rated than him, to the point where he would yell and scream on court and want to quit afterward. 

I realized quickly that we needed help in this department, and so here is what we did.

First, we told him in no uncertain terms that he cannot scream and cry and yell during his matches. Other players might behave this way, but our child would not. For me, it was disrepecting the game and his opponents, so it was critical that as a first step he needed to find a way to control his emotions. 

Second, before every match we discussed what the objectives were. Was he going to test different shot types and therefore expect to lose to obtain the learnings (what we called: Lose to learn), or was he going to try and win at all costs? Did he remember that the main objective of tennis was to test himself and have fun vs getting a UTR boost? Did he remember that no matter what happens in the match, that life afterward was going to be the same? Meaning: He would still have a family that loved him, food on the table, and a roof over his head. We highlighted these things so he could remember tennis was not life or death, and the objective is always to have fun. 

Third, we developed an on-court routine to manage the pressure. What is critical in tennis (and most high level sports as far as I can tell) is the ability to forget immediately about the point that was just played. Whether it was a point won or lost, it doesn’t matter. What is critical is to focus on the upcoming point with a clear mind. This can be helped with a routine between points and at changeover. Simple things like adjusting his racquet strings or deep breathing were techniques we employed. We also tested journaling at changeover, so my son could take notes about what he was seeing and reflect on whether any patterns were emerging. These changes distracted him from the emotions that surface after a good or bad point is just played, and helped maintain focus.

Fourth, we thought ahead and created strategies on how to play big points. As I mentioned earlier, tennis is more mentally exhausting than most sports because of the scoring system. It disproportionately rewards big points, which amplifies the stress in a match. One technique we employed was to recognize a big point (set point, ad points, etc.) and to have a strategy on what to do before the match started. We would discuss whether big points meant you played with more or less risk, or whether it was a time to hit to bigger spots vs smaller spots. Having these pressure moments thought about in advance was a way to calm the nerves knowing that when the occasion arrived, there would be an approach to deal with the challenge. 

Fifth, we actually reduced the amount of tennis he was playing. I think a lot of tennis parents can go overboard (including me!) with training. There is a belief that the more the player practices, the more matches they will win. To some degree that is true, and there is probably some bare minimum amount of time that a player needs to practice in order to be competitive. But there is also a point of diminishing return where the intense training just leads to injury risk and burnout. For my son, it was clear that too much practice was actually causing harm because he was tired and unfocused, which reduced the effectiveness of the practice! We then experimented with far less practice … going from 25 hours per week at his peak to less than 10. And we saw a dramatic improvement. But more important than his increase in wins was the fact that his love for the game returned. Instead of dreading practice and feeling like it was a chore, the reduction in hours created a feeling like he was missing something and so he started to look forward to practice again and asked for ways to add to his schedule (even though we continue to discourage it).

And finally, we hired a professional to reinforce all of these things and that has made a massive difference. Some of what I wrote above was received easily from my son, but some just didn’t make sense. Or in other cases, because I was never a competitive tennis player myself, my son would second guess whether what I was advising was actually going to be effective. I can’t say I blame him since it’s easy to sit on the sidelines and tell someone to calm down when you have no idea of the mental toll that he is experiencing. What helped was for him to hear some of these same concepts from a professional. It was the same advice (deep breathing, focus on process not outcomes, practice with a reasonable schedule, etc.), but hearing it from someone who is not his parent made a huge difference. When I describe this experience to other parents, the response I sometimes hear is that it is expensive to hire someone like this. But my response to that has always been the same which is that time with a sports psychologist is actually about the same hourly rate as a good tennis coach, but the lessons learned are ones that are just as critical as how to hit topspin or slice!

The mental part of tennis is hard and only gets harder as the player progresses and plays in higher stakes matches.

The more you can address these issues and create coping mechanisms and routines when the player is young, the more they will be ready to compete at a higher level and most important — have fun with the game!