We (Brad & Steve) wrote the book in 1991 and it was kind of a fun thing and we did it a short period of time and you don’t really know what you’re doing. Obviously, you can always look back and make changes. Oh, I could’ve done this, I would have done that. But that’s to me doesn’t really make sense. You beat yourself up thinking you could have done things differently. Part of life sometimes is making mistakes. I’m not a magician. I can’t just touch people and make them better.

The way idea of the book was formed when I sat on the balcony with Steve, who had never written before, he was a morning producer. So, we were at the same tennis club and we were watching from the balcony. The two guys that he plays against and he’s watching them play. I started asking him some questions and telling him my observations. It was like that guy; he hits a frying pan serve so he can only go middle and can’t hit out wide. He can never hit a backhand down the line. Steve is looking at me like, how do you know that? I was like, well, I’m just scouting these guys and I’m telling you what he can do and what he can’t do and what he definitely will not be able to do under pressure. Steve said that he had never thought about it in that way before. So, I think the thing that I did understand from the process of writing Winning Ugly more than anything is that players wants to perform better, but a lot of them they didn’t maybe really understand their own games and their opponents’ games very well. So that was a fascinating part for me.

(Inspired by the podcast episode #77: “The Best Coaching is Done over Dinner” w. Brad Gilbert on The Adam Blicher Show — Dissecting High Performance in Tennis)

Want to listen to the full episode: buff.ly/3anuHYS

 

 

Recommended Posts