Tag Archives: Emotional Control and Confidence

More Industry Testimonials

The following post is an excerpt from
Frank’s newest book,

THE SOFT SCIENCE OF TENNIS 

Click Here to ORDER!  

Soft Science of Tennis_3D_Cover_version5

“Frank’s positive attitude and his ability to see tennis from different angles make his insights fresh and unique. In The Soft Science of Tennis, Frank once again shows us different, powerful pathways to success.”

Eliot Teltscher, Irvine, California Top #6 ATP player, Former managing director of the USTA Player Development Program

 

 

The Soft Side of Tennis is filled with insight and inspiration to help you reach your potential. In this extraordinary book, Frank Giampaolo shows you how to successfully utilize your skill set by developing a positive mindset.”

Roger Crawford, Sacramento California, Host of Tennis Channel’s Motivational Monday’s, Best-Selling Author-Hall of Fame Speaker
The Soft Science of Tennis is not just another tool in your toolbox but another complete toolbox that every coach and parent should read. As in any sport, technical and physical abilities will not flourish until mental capabilities grow and strengthen. Frank takes you through the effective steps of how to assist your athletes in developing a strong and positive mindset. Any coach or parent trying to help a player who is striving for excellence must read this book. This is definitely a book that I will purchase for the entire High-Performance coaching staff at CDL.”

Dean Hollingworth, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, WTA Trainer, CSCS, MTPS Director of High-Performance Club CDL

 

“Great book! I believe this is going to help a lot of coaches and players. It should be part of the mandatory curriculum as a teaching professional. The four parts of a performance paradigm are physical, equipment, technical, and mental. This book is a must for the mental side of the athlete. If you’re into building champions of life and on-court this book is a must.”

Dr. Sean Drake, Oceanside California, Performance Director at TPI

How the Brain Affects Performance- Part 2

The following post is an excerpt from
Frank’s newest book,

THE SOFT SCIENCE OF TENNISSoft Science of Tennis_3D_Cover_version5 

Click Here to pre-order eBook for only 2.99!  

SALE price through July 10

This chapter will uncover how brain design affects tennis performances. The following brain design categories can be used as an informal observation as you first profile yourself. However, I suggest going online to the dozens of more in-depth questionnaires. Choose the accuracy and depth of the personality profiling questionnaire that is right for you. After a bit of research, you will recognize learning preferences that best describe your brain design.

Let’s review the basics from earlier in this book. There are 16 configurations of personality profiles found around the world. By completing your chosen questionnaire, you will discover your association – a 4-letter acronym nicknaming your personality profile. Once comfortable with the terminology, you will be able to categorize your athletes into their unique design. Following is a list of commonalities I’ve uncovered on-court with my high-performance students.

Sensate (S) versus Intuitive (N)

  • Sensate Students
  • Choose to make decisions after analyzing.
  • Often hesitate on-court due to over thinking.
  • Thrive on the coaches facts versus opinions.
  • Enjoy practical details versus the “Do it cuz I said so!” method.
  • Need to know when and why not just how.
  • Success on-court is based on personal experience not theory.
  • Pragmatic need for sports science rational.
  • Comfortable backcourt players where they have more decision-making time.
  • Prefer organized, structured lessons versus time-wasting ad-lib sessions.

 

Intuitive Students

  • Trust their gut instinct and hunches over detailed facts.
  • In matches, often do first then analyze second.
  • Apply and trust their imagination with creative shot selection.
  • Thrive on new, exciting opportunities on the practice court.
  • In discussions are less interested in minute details and facts.
  • Learn quicker by being shown versus lengthy verbal explanations of the drill.
  • Seek the creative approach to the game.
  • Natural born offensive net rushers and poachers in doubles.
  • Enjoy coaches’ metaphors and analogies.
  • Often have to be reminded of the reality of the situation.

 

“PET scan and sensing perception studies from the University of Iowa show that different brain designs use various parts of their brain. Athletes are pre-wired with their genetics. Teaching them to compete on-court within their natural guidelines versus opposing those guidelines will maximize their potential and enjoyment of our great sport.

An analogy to illustrate this point is swimming downstream and working within one’s genetic predisposition versus swimming upstream and working against one’s genetic predisposition. While it is possible to find success outside one’s dominant brain design, it is much more difficult.”

 

How the Brain Affects Performance -Part 1

The following post is an excerpt from
Frank’s newest book,

THE SOFT SCIENCE OF TENNIS 

Click Here to pre-order eBook for only 2.99!  

SALE price through July 10

Soft Science of Tennis_3D_Cover_version5

HOW THE BRAIN AFFECTS PERFORMANCE

“Athletes who share similar cerebral inner workings also share mental and emotional strengths and weaknesses in the competitive arena.”

 

This chapter will uncover how brain design affects tennis performances. The following brain design categories can be used as an informal observation as you first profile yourself. However, I suggest going online to the dozens of more in-depth questionnaires. Choose the accuracy and depth of the personality profiling questionnaire that is right for you. After a bit of research, you will recognize learning preferences that best describe your brain design.

Let’s review the basics from earlier in this book. There are 16 configurations of personality profiles found around the world. By completing your chosen questionnaire, you will discover your association – a 4-letter acronym nicknaming your personality profile. Once comfortable with the terminology, you will be able to categorize your athletes into their unique design. Following is a list of commonalities I’ve uncovered on-court with my high-performance students.

 

Uncovering Your Students Typography

Introverts (I) versus Extroverts (E)

  • Introvert Students
  • Reserved, reflective thinkers.
  • Prefer concrete advice versus abstract thinking.
  • Need quiet, alone time to recharge their batteries.
  • Prefer to blend into groups versus stand out.
  • Energy conserving, private and quiet individuals.
  • Enjoy the one-on-one settings of private lessons over group lessons.
  • Prefer to retaliate in match play versus instigate action.

 

Extrovert Students

  • Enjoy the energy in group lessons with lots of people.
  • Enjoy the limelight, center court, and center stage.
  • Vocally and physically expressive on court.
  • Easily bored with mundane repetition.
  • Prefer to make things happen in matches versus retrieving.
  • View tournaments as social environments.
  • Work best in short attention span type drills.
  • Strangers are friends they haven’t met yet.
  • Benefit from stretches of silent tennis drilling.

 

“Coaching confusion takes place when an athlete’s body type (size, speed, agility, strength) opposes their hidden inner workings.

For example, the athlete body type appears to be designed to instigate action by capturing the net, but they religiously choose to stay back and retaliate instead. Typically brain design over-rides body design.”

Emotional Development

The following post is an excerpt from Emotional Aptitude In Sports NOW available through most online retailers!  Click Here to Order

 

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Pumping Up the Adrenaline

Adrenaline (also called epinephrine) is a hormone secreted by the adrenal glands in conditions of stress. It increases the rate of blood circulation, breathing and carbohydrate metabolism. Adrenaline can be called up to prepare muscles for exertion. Pumping up the adrenaline is essentially releasing it into the bloodstream and heart. As the heart rate increases so too does the athlete’s blood pressure. Increased respiratory performance means more oxygen flows into the athlete’s muscles. The more oxygen that’s flowing throughout the athlete’s body, the better the performance.

In every close competition, becoming victorious often stems from one solution. It’s not technical, it’s not physical and it’s not even strategic; it’s an athlete’s ability to manage their adrenaline. Calling up and/or taming adrenaline at crunch time is a crucial emotional component. No matter the sport.

 

Managing one’s adrenaline and energy output is a serious emotional skill.

 

Winners have a secret. A secret they aren’t going to share. They have learned to systematically raise their adrenaline to ensure that they perform at their peak performance level when they need it the most. So how does an athlete raise adrenaline? By applying verbal and/or physical “triggers” to activate the flow of adrenaline. Verbal triggers may include shouting “Come On!”, “Let’s go right now!” or “Right here!”  Teams may apply a quick, motivational cheer to stimulate adrenaline in their teammates. Physical triggers may include quick footwork movements, vigorous shadow swinging or a slap in the thigh to wake up the energy within.

Strong emotional aptitude allows an athlete to monitor adrenaline throughout the competition to maximize performance- increasing and decreasing adrenaline as needed.  Elite athletes are better able to coordinate technical skills, athleticism, strategies, and emotions by controlling their arousal state.

 

You can’t wait for adrenaline to find you … You must call it up.

 

Let’s Get Fired Up!

While attending a girl’s 10 and under soccer game, I witnessed these little warriors belting out organized cheers with two minutes left on the clock. “LET’S GET FIRED UP!!…LET’S GET FIRED UP!!” Even at the ripe old age of 9, these competitors understood the value of pumping up the adrenaline at precisely the right time.

Foster Emotional Strength- Part 3

The following post is an excerpt from Emotional Aptitude In Sports NOW available through most online retailers!  Click Here to Order

ea-in-sports4a_final

Following are Five More Solutions to Foster Emotional Strength:

  1. Apply Positive Visualization
    Winners use positive visualization by imagining themselves executing their best patterns and plays without hesitation. Less successful athletes are overcome with negative visualization, which of course overwhelms their thought processes with visions of failure.
  2. Train Under Game Day Stress
    Athletes need to train much more than just their physical techniques and athleticism in practice. They have to get comfortable… being uncomfortable.
  3. Rehearse Tolerance
    Overcome hardships and pain in practice. Simulating stress in practice provides you with the opportunity to conquer your emotional demons. By doing so, reoccurring game day negative thoughts are replaced by positive thoughts such as: “I’ve done this before, I’ve conquered this several times and I know I can overcome this again because I have done it often.”
  4. Learn to Compartmentalize Emotions
    Great athletes stay in their optimal performance frame of mind during discomfort by staying on script (pre-set protocol). This entails choosing to mentally focus on the job at hand by overriding the emotional contaminants, thus not letting emotions control the show.
  5. Stop Feeding Negative Emotions
    Flip constantly feeding the problems, worries, and fears with customized protocols which feeds optimism, courage, resiliency, and fortitude. Athletes should have pre-set triggers (words and actions) that help them focus on positive plays and patterns.

Solutions to Foster Emotional Strength

The following post is an excerpt from Emotional Aptitude In Sports NOW available through most online retailers!  Click Here to Order

 

ea-in-sports4a_final

 

EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Elite competitors are confident that their superior emotional strength will override any hardships and physical limitations. The emotionally weak athletes are convinced that the unfair hardships and their perceived limitations will override their peak performance
and catastrophe will once again occur.

 

An old-school word used to describe emotional aptitude is Grit. In regards to high achievers, researchers have come to the conclusion that successful individuals possess traits deeper than the mastery of athletic ability.  Grit is persistent courage, resolve, and strength of character. Grit is the learned ability to have “nerves of steel,” fortitude and determination. Interestingly, some athletes are pre-wired to have these essential components and some are not. For those athletes who are not natural combatants, developing emotional aptitude is critical.

Sadly, emotionally weak competitors often ignore the development of such skills.  Cultivating these character traits is what propels the few into the winners’ circle. If you believe that your emotions are holding you hostage on game day and keeping you from the success you deserve, I suggest focusing your attention on the below list of solutions

Posted Below are Five of Fifteen Solutions to Foster Emotional Strength.

  1. Nurture the Love of Competition
    Studies show that experiences bring more joy than possessions. The energy of the event is contagious. Athletes should enjoy competing against their past, fatigue, opponents and against time.
  2. Commit to Improving
    Being the best of the best (even in your town) doesn’t come without extreme effort. Improve your performance by understanding emotional aptitude.
  3. Recognize That You Can’t Be Normal …and a Champion
    Champions lead very different lives than normal people. Being an athletic champion is a daily lifestyle.
  4. Customize Your Training
    Realize that diligent customized training trumps social, group learning. Research shows, on average, group training takes up to six times longer than quality private training.
  5. Adopt a Growth Mind-Set
    Great skills are cultivated through continuous effort more so than initial talent or IQ. Without effort…you fail by default. Understand that success starts with the effort of optimism and a growth mindset.

Improving Confidence and Low Self Esteem

I’m excited to announce that my new book: Emotional Aptitude in Sports is scheduled for a fall 2016 release. The below post discusses the role of emotional intelligence in rekindling confidence.

Enjoy the ride!

Frank

IMPROVING CONFIDENCE AND LOW SELF ESTEEMFrank Giampaolo

Regardless of the reason, athletes who begin to doubt their true capabilities need to flip their negative outlook before their negative beliefs ruin their practices and performances.

 

“A positive outlook is a prerequisite to positive performances.”

A lack of confidence can stem from a singular reasons or a combination of reasons. As always, solutions are dictated by their cause.

 

Typical Causes of Low Confidence:

1) Athlete has slacked off in their weekly training regiments…

2) Athlete has not trained efficiently (quality over quantity)…

3) Athlete is injured, sick or are returning to the game after an injury or sickness…

4) Athlete’s pessimistic attitude is getting the best of them…

5) Athlete has under-performed in recent competition and lost a few close matches to players they believe they should beat…

 

Rekindling confidence starts with a rebuilding of the belief systems.

 

“Confidence is a progressive spiral of numerous positive inputs which leads to a positive attitude…which in turn leads to new positive actions that leads to positive results.”

 

Let’s first look deeper into common stepping stones that will help rekindle an athlete’s confidence:

  • Re-Commit to Getting Fit Start with being the best athlete they can be. Hit the gym and hit the track – gain strength and improve stamina, speed and agility.
  • Clear the Mind: Re-Focus on Tennis Teens can get derailed by numerous factors including: school, parties, peer pressure, other sports, hobbies, shopping, etc. Re-organize your weekly planner.
  • Customize the Instruction Practice in the manner in which you are expected to perform. Build a game plan around exposing strengths while hiding weaknesses. Customize the athlete’s style to their brain and body type. Develop and rehearse the critical Top 7 Patterns of play.
  • Promote and Educate Independence Independent problem solving promotes confidence on and off the court. Even though some parents think they are helping, it may be wise to slowly stop doing everything for your little Phenom.
  • Surround Them with Supportive People Positive coaches, trainers and friends with good character are key. Is his new girlfriend pulling his focus in a new direction? Do her new friends at school want to party and shop all the time? Is her coach pessimistic?
  • Help Others Ask your athlete to teach the under privileged kids for free at the park and rec or assist the local food bank once a month and feed the homeless. Seeing the positive attitude of someone less fortunate reminds them how fortunate they truly are…
  • Avoid Negative Comments Derogatory comments, a negative tone of voice, offensive, threatening body language or even facial expressions can tear down a sensitive player’s confidence. Cut out the negative influences in their life. Pessimism is contagious and very toxic.
  • Perfectionists Set the Bar Too High Unrealistic expectations kill confidence. Parents, just because your son won last week’s tournament, don’t expect him to win every one from now on. Players, a sure fire way to disable your confidence is to expect perfection. Even if you’re in the zone for a while, it’s a borrowed experience. No one owns the zone. No one stays in the zone and lives there year around.

 

“Parents and coaches, it’s important to communicate to your athlete that they can’t go back and rewrite a better past…but they can start today and write a better future.”

 

FOCUS ON POSITIVE INFLUENCES

 

“Guidance from a coach or parent with a negative mindset is extremely toxic to a child.”

 

Exposing and destroying pessimistic beliefs and attitudes is an integral part of my daily mission, both personally and professionally. It’s your job as the tennis parent to eliminate these poisons from your athlete’s world. Sadly, it’s often a parent, sibling, friend or coach that’s feeding the negative beliefs and pessimistic attitudes. It is in your best interest to remedy this issue or remove the negative source(s) from the child’s tennis entourage. Parents, just as it is your duty to remove negative psychology, it is your responsibility to teach positive psychology. Teach belief and confidence, find their motivational buttons, develop their desire and hunger for mastering the game and teach them to embrace the challenge. These positive life lessons are part of raising athletic royalty.  If you teach the love of the game and the benefits of commitment, your athlete will progress seamlessly through the losses, technical difficulties, injuries and bad luck that come with athletics.

Allow the tennis teachers to teach, the coaches to coach and the trainers to train because as you know now, the tennis parent’s job description is far too comprehensive to micro manage each entourage’s role.

 

Mind Sets: Fixed versus Growth

Similar to the two sides of psychology, there are also two mind sets. Coaches often see student’s with either a fixed mind set or a growth mind set. While the athlete’s genetic predisposition is undoubtedly present, it’s most often the nurtured opinions of their parents, siblings and coaches that set their outlook.

1) A person with a debilitating fixed mind set truly believes that they cannot change. They are extremely rigid, view the world as black or white and are un-interested in change. Their unwillingness to accept new challenges often results in remaining average at best.

2) A person with a growth mind set believes that their opinions, outlooks, attitudes and abilities can and will change throughout their lives. Growth mind set individuals are more willing and open to accept change in the name of progress/improvement.

 

“Raising athletic royalty is a direction, not a destination. What you choose to teach your children now will live on for generations to come.”

 

I find that parents who encourage both positive psychology and a growth mind set are developing much more than a future athlete, they are developing future leaders.

 

CONTACT: Frank Giampaolo
FGSA@earthlink.net