Flip through the latest issue of Gulf Weekly.
Hi everyone, I am the new tennis pro at the Dilmun Club in Saar. If you are a tennis player on the island you probably know me already or you will have heard of me as I have been teaching here for many years.
I am very happy to have the opportunity to express my views, give some tips and generally educate people on this fantastic game.
I wasn't sure where to start, so I thought I'll take it from the beginning. This column is dedicated to anyone starting out or maybe thinking about it. How do I learn to play tennis?
Probably one of the most important things to know is that learning tennis is very different from learning other things, for example, how to use a computer or how to play the latest electronic gadget.
Over the last few years coaches and national associations have finally recognised that tennis coaching has been far too intellectual and has now started teaching tennis through the 'game-based' approach.
The traditional model was to learn the skill first, study the strategies and tactics next, followed by playing the game. For years tennis instructors spent endless hours perfecting students' strokes. Many players never got to play the game as they lost interest trying to master them and the students that continued had nice strokes yet they couldn't play the game!
By modifying the lesson and game you can allow beginners to learn and play at the same time. Don't get me wrong, some instruction is still necessary and mostly depends on the player's co-ordination, athleticism and tracking skills but, mostly, tennis is learned through feel.
If a tennis coach on court instructs you to hit a ball with a certain technique, it's almost certain that you will not be able to do it. Even if you try 10 or 20 times, it's still highly unlikely that you will be able to perform that technique or stroke the way a coach has instructed you. This is because the body has to adapt and coordinate various parts to move in a certain way. Your body cannot learn as fast as your mind.
It can literally take hundreds of repetitions before some strokes or movements become automatic and fluid (this is why tennis coaches have anywhere from 50-200 tennis balls in their basket). So be patient, you can't force results. Your body will adapt, when it adapts.
This is why the game-based approach is so important to tennis. It allows the student to do these repetitions while playing or rallying, gets players playing sooner and makes learning fun.
