Relaxed start to tennis camp to get used to clay courts

Day 1 at the tennis camp with the European Tennis Academy in Naturns, South Tyrol. The sun was indeed shining at the start of training, but the temperatures weren't exactly spring-like. However, this didn't dampen the good spirits of the three motivated young tennis players at the start of the camp.

Alex greeted the kids and they started with a relaxed warm-up on the small court. Even during the warm-up from the baseline, two key points established: exhaling while hitting and smoothly following through the hit to the final position . The children were to concentrate on these two points from now on.

This focused work on the focal points was varied in the following exercises: after each stroke, the children had to rate themselves on a scale of 1-5 how far they had smoothly swung their stroke. 5 represented reaching the final position. 

Then long rallies were played - now the children said "Now" at the start of the backswing - thus the focus was placed on an early backswing and ultimately a good hitting position. 

In the last part of the training session, the children practiced serving – always a tricky business outdoors at first. So, coach Alex introduced a new focus: no ball should go into the net , meaning always serve with a kick. This worked quite well quite quickly, so that by the end of the session, the children were able to play their first points against each other. And it all looked pretty good!

Focus points for increased concentration

Working with these focus points was a new experience for the children. However, these focus points are a fundamental component of the European Tennis Academy's Mental Match Play training method . Paying closer attention to one's own strokes is a particularly interesting concept for children.

I am curious to see how the children will be able to implement and internalize this self-coaching method in the coming days.

Some impressions from the first day of training