Seminole HP is stepping it up!

We’re pretty awesome here at Seminole High Performance. Over the years of the SHP tradition, we have developed ambitious young tennis players into the current Tallahassee tennis superstars, and we continue to work hard and motivate our students to excel in the sport through multiple different avenues. We’ve recently reconvened with our coaching staff to assess our successes and what we need to continue to build on to make our program the continuing stand-out tennis training program in not just Tallahassee alone, but in North Florida in general. 

Our major focus, is, of course, the kiddos. We want to motivate our players to be the best they can be, and to do that, we need to focus on inspiration, practices that instill integrity and discipline, and the incorporation of team elements. Creating a team out of SHP is essential to our success—in order to do this, we will begin incorporating team-building both during clinics as well as incorporating outside events such as Seminole High Performance socials, where you can get to know the players that go to SHP as well as the coaching team. Not part of SHP yet but want to be? This is a great event to attend in order to meet and greet current players and coaches at SHP. 

In addition to socials, we will also be sending a tournament coaching team to specific tournaments at least once a month starting in March 2014. This will instill Seminole pride in our players and will allow the advantage of having a passionate and knowledgeable coach at the tournament sites. This is a great way of introducing your SHP players to tournament competition—all of our coaches have been prior players and know how to professionally deal with factors that affect all players at tournaments, including match prep, nervousness, third set feedback, and match reflection. All coaches that travel to tournaments will set up dinners with all SHP parents and players, incorporating a friendly and team-building environment at the tournament level. To find out more about tournament travel, please don’t hesitate to call or ask to be place on the SHP mailing list via seminolehptennis@gmail.com or http://www.seminoletenniscamps.com/.

If you have any feedback for us or any kind of evaluation of how we can serve you better, whether you are a parent, student, or potential client, please do not hesitate to email seminolehptennis@gmail.com or leave a comment below!

In Seminole spirit, go noles!!

The Fantastical Brain (And what it has to do with tennis)

The brain. It’s a weird thing, really. It’s what’s allowing me to write this article. It’s what’s allowing me to think about this article while I’m writing it, and think what the article would be about in the first place before I even opened my word document on the computer. It’s what’s allowing me to breathe and regulate my body’s activities without me consciously thinking about it, like my blood circulating and my fingers sensing the keypads underneath my fingertips.

Funny thing, it is, the brain. I learn about it often in my own studies, and it has always been an object of fascination for me. How is it that we learn? How is it that I can hit a tennis ball without thinking, instead focusing on how the other person is hitting the ball so that I can coach them? How is it that while I’m thinking about instructing kids on moving their feet, my lungs and my heart and my body temperature is regulated by this gray, electric blob in my skull, as if to say “I got you, no worries.” I can write a whole book on what fascinates me, and I can write a whole book for you to read and understand how the brain functions. What interests me that may interest you, however, is what happens when you are learning as a tennis player.

Let’s start with a bit of background—some basic biology and other b words to continue my rant with fine-tuned alliteration. Your gooey, gray brain is made up of matter—it’s this stuff that is covered in goo that allows for electronic signals to fire. That’s right, your brain is so fantastical that it even is electric! Nerve cells are your brains chess pieces, while the brain is the board. They, for lack of a better metaphor, bounce around together and send each other electronic pulses through something called the axon and the myelin sheath, a little tail and it’s covering goo that is attached to the actual nerve cell. Unlike other cells that die off and quickly replenish in your body, like blood cells, nerve cells typically do not regenerate. Hence, after losing nerve cells during a stroke (lack of oxygen to the brain that starves off cells), the issues with certain functions, like language and balance. You have the most amount of nerve cells when you are 3 years old. As you grow older, these nerve cells die off, but become smarter due to practice. For example, if you learn multiple languages as an infant, because you have a lot of new, green, and ready to go nerve cells, you learn that language quickly and develop strong “firing” in your language center. Essentially, the ol’ “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks” has a neurological explanation—while your older brain has “smarter” nerve cells that can fire language signals in different ways, like with added vocabulary, it needs more and more practice to develop new language skills that have, in essence, died off when you are young because you never utilized them (in other words, if you don’t learn the language, those nerve cells die off).

But, the cool thing about older brains is that our nerve cells are a little more chill. They don’t fire when they’ve encountered a stimulus (a fancy way of saying something that provokes us) that they’ve experienced before. They don’t send the “Oh crap” fight or flight reflex and instinct when provoked as much—hence why an angry teenager yelling at a line judge is said to be immature. If it were an adult, that instinct to “fight” and that electronic fire between nerve cells that say “Hey let’s get angry” simmer down, and don’t fire as much.

In fact, there are some instincts and thoughts that aren’t fully developed in teens yet. For example, the “I probably shouldn’t do that” instinct isn’t fully developed yet—teenagers learn more from experience actually getting hurt than from the wariness to certain situations. Essentially, this means that teens on the court will remember to stretch after practice if they have ever pulled a muscle—they are less likely to stretch if they are simply told to do so to avoid stretching said muscle.

In addition to the developing nerve cells, teens are also still developing in their cerebellum, a part of the brain that controls balance and movement—hence the clumsiness of a developing adolescent. The cerebellum is in the back of you head in your brain, and it’s a pretty awesome place because it explains why tennis is good for you in the first place (or any sport or exercise, for that matter). Remember how I said nerve cells die off without practice? The cerebellum doesn’t die off without practice, but with practice it develops quicker. If a 12 year old engages in sports, they are training their cerebellum, and hence more likely to develop balance and more coordinated movement as they grow up. The awesome thing about tennis is that it is a mental and physical sport, a part of the cerebellum that is often left untrained—not only do you have to visually assess the ball, which triggers different parts of your brain, but these nerve cells that fire the visual recognition of the ball have to fire back to the cerebellum to signal “Hey let’s get moving to that ball.” Nerve cells that are chilling in your cerebellum then shoot a signal down your spinal cord through nearby nerve cells down to your muscles, making them move. Did I mention this is all happening within 2 seconds? A firing nerve cells takes about half a second to transmit different signals. If you didn’t know to move to the ball when your brain transmits the visual signal that you see the ball, this process slows down—hence younger kids and how they sometimes move clumsily to the ball, or do not see to register that they need to move to the ball at all until there is a verbal cue (i.e. a sharp yell “Move!” from the coach). The more you practice, the quicker this signal becomes. Moving to the ball then becomes a reflex rather than a registered and conscious decision.      

Okay, so now lets talk about learning. It’s pretty cool, actually (maybe my fellow nerds will agree). See, there is a part of the brain called the frontal lobe. It is one fourth of the major lobes in your brain. As it’s name suggests, it is located in the front of the brain, and is also your major learning center. This is where short term memory is processed, and makes its way to long-term memory. This is also where emotions are processed, as well as decision-making, thought processing, and all the cool conscious things we do with our brains. As I’ve mentioned before, there are nerve cells here too. They fire signals to this part of the brain that then signal processing, from thoughts like “Hit the ball with spin” to emotions like “I’m terrible at this game.” Without practice, this part of the brain doesn’t fire signals in an easy connection with the cerebellum—this isn’t because they aren’t as close to each other as other parts of the brain, but rather because the nerve cells still need GPS directions to the movement part of the brain (cerebellum) from the frontal lobe. Just like you travel the same road to and from the courts, after a while knowing these roads well, the same way your nerve cells travel to each other, just, well, much faster. They still need practice though to develop the comfort of traveling without those “directions,” if you will. With practice, this part of the brain develops tennis awareness, where as you hit the shot thoughts are run through your frontal lobe, typically adjusting the shot. What is unique about the tennis swing though is that the visual part of your brain typically can’t do much—it’s can’t see your swing. Because you cannot see yourself swing outside of yourself, video can help with this, as well as a coach that you trust.

There is lots more that I can write about—I’m already at three pages in length and have just begun talking about the brain and learning in tennis. Hopefully you take away from this blog the fascination that I have with the brain, as well as the essential moral of the story here—to be decent in tennis, you have to practice and train those nerve cells of yours.   

Practice Makes Perfect (Or does it?)

We just recently talked (or, more honestly, I talked) about goals, and equilibrium, and our New Year’s resolution. Like I mentioned, talking to your coach is always a good starting point, and getting lessons in is another good starting point, but there shouldn’t be an ending point to these practices—just like I will continue to challenge myself in learning about new things once I am done with my PhD, I expect all our players at SHP to continue to grow in their tennis by continuing to pursue their goals.

Now, everyone has different goals, and that’s perfectly alright. Some of us have dreams of becoming professional tennis players. Others dream of competing on college team. Still others want to learn the game and have a sport that they can play throughout their lives. Picking and choosing your goals is important, and making sure you are doing what you need to do in order to achieve those goals is important too.

Now a lot of parents ask me when their kids should begin tennis. Should they play only tennis? Should they play once a week? Twice a week? Take lessons? This really depends on their goals. It’s not enough to take a few privates before the high school season starts to develop a player’s game to the point where they are making a huge leap of achievement, but will it be enough to get some more tennis in and get a bit of a rhythm? Sure! It’s probably not enough to play once a week as a seven or eight year old if you and your kid have dreams of being a competitive athlete, but if they want to get out there and exercise some? No problem! Like I’ve mentioned in some previous blogs, typically a younger player needs more individual time with a coach at SHP. This is to make sure technique doesn’t slip and the correct technique is in place. The older a kid gets, the less “brush up” they need, but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be a.) playing more and b.) taking lessons at all. 

It’s easy to think that a coach has the “magic pill,” the answer to everything. At the end of the day, just like in life, if YOU want to accomplish something, YOU will be the one going out there and doing it, not anybody else. Will a SHP coach guide you to that goal? Sure! I’ve given fitness plans to plenty of kids throughout my time as a coach, and I can see even without asking which kids have been following it on the court, because it makes them stronger, faster, and more confident. So motivation is important for practice, and no matter how seldom or how often you do it, make sure you come in with the right mindset and expect of yourself what you would expect from someone who wants to accomplish your goals.  

As a side-note: SHP had an outstanding showing at the State Closed this past weekend! A total of 20 matches won all together, including one tournament trophy back! There is no doubt that we have brought home the best results in town! :)

Fitness for 2014

2014 is a good time to start a fitness regimen. We talked about it all week at SHP clinics this week—at the end of the day, the fitter person is stronger, healthier, faster, and more confident than their opponent on the tennis court, no matter what level you are playing at.

We’ve begun to incorporate different types of fitness into our clinics, and it is important that you stay on top of fitness on your own time as well. I had a lesson of my own in this just this holiday break. As an avid runner (amongst other things, like Pilates and yoga), I jogged around my neighborhood Publix, a perfect circle that is about 3.5 miles. 

Let’s preface this with I haven’t jogged in a while—I almost died. Okay, maybe not literally, but after the jog I had the worst headache, my legs were wobbly, my face tomato-red, and, of course, I was hyperventilating, for a lack of a better metaphor, like a moose (Do moose even hyperventilate? And what is the plural of moose? Mooses? Moosi? Ah, the entertainment of some good ol’ English language humor) I grudgingly ran again the next day, knowing, or at least hoping, that it would be better. It wasn’t better. Same tomato face, same hyperventilation, same headache (it’s normal, by the way, to have an exercise induced headache if you haven’t worked out in a while), and a feeling of regret. Some say I am a glutton for punishment—the next day, I ran another 3.5 miles. All of a sudden, my face still tomato red, I came home feeling a tad bit better. I could draw the story out a bit longer, but all in all, it took me about six days of running to get back into running shape. I was able to run on the seventh day without so much hyperventilation, red face, ect.

Guess how long it took to get back out of shape? Two days. Two days off and I was back running the third day huffing and puffing. Moral of the story—it’s not so easy to stay in shape as you think. The good thing about you kiddos is that you are young and usually much more active—playing tennis is, after all, good exercise. Now, fitness on the other hand, makes tennis a lot easier to handle, and through a long day of a tournament or a weekend of high school matches, you definitely need it. It also helps you stay powerful through your strokes. Some bigger and taller kids wonder why they can’t hit a serve as hard as some other (shorter) kids do, but when I ask them to do twenty crunches; they barely make it without being in pain. Core muscles are huge in all strokes to gain power. Leg muscles help explosiveness—aka, being able to get to the ball. Arm muscles help build technique. Yup, that’s right. The stronger, say, your wrist is, the less likely you’ll drop your wrist on a volley. Stronger triceps? Yes, you got it, stronger overhead technique. Overall body training is important, so take what you learn at clinics and utilize it once a day for ten to twenty minutes to build strength in your body. There are so many exercises that are simple and necessitate only body weight or light dumbbells that can help build your game up. Here are some examples of quick, ten minute power builders! Get to it!

Monday- 20 lunges each leg, 40 squats, 15 frog jumps (try to do this twice through)

Tuesday- 1 minute plank, 30 second side plank on each side, 40 supermans (back), 40 fast bicycles, 20 slow-mo bicycles

Wednesday- 25 bench (or sofa) dips, 25 wrist weights in each direction (up and down with your palms down, up and down with your palms sideways, side to side, usually with a 2 to 5 pound weight), 25 bicep curls (8-25 pound weight)

         

Thursday- 40 suitcases (or 80 crunches), 40 alternating supermans (lift left arm, right leg, and vice versa), 40 Russian twists (legs up, can add optional weight), twice through

Friday- 25 lunge jumps each leg, 500 jump rope, 25-100 double jumps (not in a row)

New Year's Resolution

Yeah, I know, I’m about 8 days short of New Years Day. A lot of us have already long forgotten our dreams and goals for 2014, and, grudgingly back to the “real-world” after the holiday, have already managed to get ourselves into a slump. Thus, the reason for the New Year’s resolution blog about a week late. Everyone can tell me their new year’s resolution the day of, but when it comes back to the court, it all of a sudden becomes too difficult to pursue. Hence the crowded first week at the gym then the empty second week because everyone is sore from overworking their muscles too quickly. 

So, I think the best way to actually do something about your new year’s resolution is to make a timeline of sorts—what you will accomplish, and more importantly how you will accomplish it, and by when. I’ll tell you a story; when I was about seventeen or so (which seems like a million years ago—and no, I’m not going to tell you this story in rhyme), I decided that I was eating so badly that I needed to change my diet completely. I went from eating junk to not eating junk at all, and went full-out crazy health guru. I’m talking drinking aloe vera juice for breakfast and eating percentages of what I knew I had to eat carb, protein, and fruit/veggie wise. I have to admit, the first two weeks were terrible. I had a crazy headache all the time because I was craving the sweets I adore so much, and my skin got really bad. After two weeks though, my body communicated with my brain—okay, crazy girl, I think I know what you’re plan is now, so I got you. I started feeling better—I was amazed. I had more energy, my tennis got better because I could put in so much effort on the court and my muscles seemed to not cramp up as much and recover quicker. I loved my new diet—I started telling everyone how awesome it was and how much I enjoyed feeling like a brand new person. My mom was in the background, saying “everything in moderation,” but what do moms know, right? 

She was right. Six months in, I didn’t just get sick—I got so sick that I couldn’t play for three months, and my professional tennis career, just as I was beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel, suddenly turned pitch black. I would say it was fate (I ended up taking a scholarship to FSU, and, well, the rest is history), but I’ll save that for another blog when I’m feeling more philosophical. The point is, I went so extremely into one direction that I ended up getting burnt. So I learned that year about equilibrium. Yes, yes, it’s a scientific term, but it really does, when it boils down to it, make a lot of difference in someone’s tennis in more than one way. 

Equilibrium is essential to life. It essentially means balance, and it is what keeps us alive. If it were not for the equilibrium of water in our body (now, it doesn’t necessarily mean 50%, but the correct proportion—in actuality, our body is made up of 70% water, and if it is not 70%, we quickly deteriorate), we wouldn’t be alive. The correct equilibrium of carbon dioxide and oxygen makes sure our lungs and heart keep doing their job. The correct equilibrium of calcium and phosphorus makes sure our bones don’t crumble keeping us up. You get the point. Equilibrium is also a state of mind. Without balance in your thoughts, you’ll go crazy. If the majority of your day tennis is in your thoughts and you don’t leave any thoughts or strength for school and other activities, whether it be chatting with your friends or watching TV or reading a book or strumming a guitar, your equilibrium is off. If you play, play, play, play you don’t have that equilibrium of rest. If you play, then rest, then rest some more, then half-heartedly play, then play seriously for a day or two, then rest, then your equilibrium is off. 

It’s easy to go into the new year with a goal in mind, but it is just as easy to burn out on that thought—playing hard for a week won’t change your game. Make a commitment to whatever your goal is—if it is to eat better, plan out a diet that isn’t extreme. Eat a cupcake once in a while, but don’t eat a dozen doughnuts binging after eating lettuce for a week straight. If it is to become a better tennis player, first sit down with your coach at SHP and examine exactly what will make that better, and come up with strategies as to how to do that. Want to get fitter? Don’t go run fifteen stadiums tomorrow and then have a hard time sitting down or standing up for a week. Run four stadiums tomorrow, then add a few each week. Gradually make whatever it is a routine, and make it part of the equilibrium in your life.