In this episode you are going to listen to Mikael Tilström, Mikael was a professional player himself reaching a career high of #39 in singles & #15 in doubles.

Mikael has been the Coach of Thomas Enqvist, Magnus Norman & Andreas Vinciguerra & in 2011 he co founded the Good To Great Tennis Academy with fellow Swedes Magnus Norman & Nicklas Kulti. Since then he has been the lead Coach of Grigor Dimitrov & is currently coaching Gael Monfils.

In this episode you’ll get to know:

– How Good To Great determine whether to accept a new player into their program or not

– The difference on coaching an established professional player like Monfils & the up & coming junior players from Good To Great

– The blessing & the curse of having Roger Federer at the top of tennis for so many years

Enjoy the show!

Timestamps

01:30 Story of Good To Great
04:10 What Nicklas learned outside of tennis
05:40 How Mikael came to work with Monfils
08:30 How Mikael keeps a good relation with his family while on tour
10:53 The acceptance process at Good To Great
14:05 Getting to know your players
15:46 Why you should not play tennis for money & fame
30-40 to put away money
19:39 Why tennis players need to be stubborn
20:36 The person before the player
21:53 Allistair Mccaw
22:38 Shared philosophy with Allistair
25:10 Why all Tour Tennis Coaches are a bit crazy
26:30 The blessing & course of Roger Federer
28:30 Why Monfils shook his head at Mikael
31:01 The best part about being a Tennis Coach
31:30 How Mikael gets better
33:20 What Mikael has changed his mind about
34:16 Mikael’s advice

In this episode you are going to listen to Alberto Castellani, Alberto has been on the Professional Circuit for more than 30 years coaching a bunch of top 100 players & to name a few he has coached: Janko Tipsarevic, Rainer Schuettler, Ivo Karlovic, Marc Rosset & Hicham Arazi.

Alberto is recoqnized by the ATP as one of the only 50 coaches World Wide as an international Tennis Coach where the conditions to be accepted is to continously bring or work with players in the top 100 on the ATP-Tour. Further more Alberto is the president of the GPTCA (The Global Professional Tennis Coaches Association) which has the only ATP Certified Coaches Education in the world.

In this episode you’ll get to know:

– What the Tennis Paradox is

– How Coaches & players often do not know what concentration is

– Why training the Mental aspect of tennis is like training the Technical one.

Enjoy the show!

Timestamps

01:30 The tennis Paradox
04:14 Why a lot of players are mentally weak
05:56 What does concentration mean
07:58 How to train concentration
13:34 Bioenergetica
16:10 Level of activation
19:36 Mental aspect when coming back from injury
26:38 No guarantee for success
28:22 Human > tennis player
34:18 Autoritarian coaching
37:18 Empathy & intelligence
39:04 Learning
40:48 The story of a former top 30 ATP Player
43:39 Why Alberto doesn’t like the “Australian”
45:16 Lack of time spent on mental training
45:44 To rest well is as important as to practice well
47:14 Alberto’s advise

Today you are going to listen to Jaro Levinksy, Jaro was a professional player himself reaching a career high of #239 in singles & #24 in doubles. Immediately after retiring as a pro he went into coaching & has been at the Schuettler-Waske Tennis University & the private coach for Schuettler himself. He has had coaching stints with Sergiy Stakhovsky, Yen-Hsun Lu & the junior player Olga Fridman. Jaro has been a consultant for the Turkish Tennis Federation & is currently the coach of Anna Karolina Schmiedlova

In this conversation you’ll get to know:

– How Jaro goes about traveling full time on the tour while having a wife & a small child

– The difference on coaching an established professional player & an up and coming junior

– Why it’s essential to set limits as a coach & how to do it

Enjoy the show!

Timestamps

02:00 Own playing career – why coaching
03:11 The steps that took Jaro into professional Coaching
06:20 The most important lesson learned at Schuetler-Waske
08:05 Coaching Rainer Schuetler
11:45 Similarities & differences on coaching a young & an older guy on tour
13:03 Traveling as a tennis coach while having a kid
15:05 How to balance traveling that much away from your family
16:37 Difference in working with an established player & a junior player
19:08 Differences in working on ATP & WTA Tour
20:37 The Turkish Federation
24:31 How Hrbarty would describe Jaro’s look on tennis
26:38 How the players on tour have changed
28:17 Setting limits as a tennis coach
30:59 Why you need to push players outside of their comfort zone
32:15 How to get players outside of their comfort zone in practices
33:20 Nothing tastes better than winning
33:46 Most important characteristics in a tennis player
34:24 Decision making skills
36:17 Efficient practices
39:40 Playing Pokemon is biggest waste of time on tour

In this episode you are going to listen to Robert Davis, Robert has been on the ATP Tour for 24 years. He has served as either a Technical Director & National Coach for Peru, Panama, Thailand, Indonesia & the list goes on an on. Robert is further more a writer who regularly contributes to ATP’s DEUCE magazine, ITF publications, and TENNIS Magazine Australia.

Currently he is the Technical Advisor of Strategic Operations of tennis for Sport Singapore & the coach of Matsui from Japan.

In this episode you’ll get to know:

– What Robert calls the “non-negotiables” in a coaching relation

– How Larry Stefanki had different approaches with Gonzalez & Roddick

– The difference between tennis coaches & tennis teachers

Enjoy the show!

Timestamps

01:30 Creating a long term coach-player relationship
02:52 The non negotiables
05:03 The difference on Technical Director & National Coach
08:20 Milos Ranonic example
09:56 Players from developing countries
11:03 Sock, Johnson, Fernando Gonzalez, Andy Roddick
13:53 What common trait the best coaches in the world share
17:45 Super Coaches
18:59 Who gets to call themselves Tour Coaches
21:18 Do apprenticeships if you are a young coach
23:15 The difference between tennis teachers & tennis coaches
26:10 What coaches deserves the credit?
28:10 The French Coaches System
29:42 How tennis coaches are left behind coaches from other sports
32:19 The chart system David Robert uses
33:30 Best part about being a touring coach
34:56 Why Robert finds the competitive nature of a player the most important
36:51 The care factor
38:17 Reading, talking, observing
40:46 Process over product
41:31 Why Robert could never coach Kyrgios
42:05 The old school fitness
43:55 Too much analytics
47:01 Specialty shots
50:02 Quality time
51:39 Robert’s advice

In this episode you are going to listen to Christian Groh, Christian was an ATP ranked player himself & then went directly into coaching after pulling the plug as a player. Christian has worked with the likes of Michael Berrer & Bradley Klahn & was the Coach who guided Taylor Fritz to the US Open Junior title & the number 1 spot in the junior rankings. Christian is currently the coach of German Veteran Tommy Haas & has been so since 2012.

In this episode you’ll get to know:

– The steps Christian & Taylor Fritz worked on in order to successfully transition from a great junior into a professional senior player

– How the coaching relation with Tommy Hass came about despite the fact that Haas is actually older than Christian.

– The fine line between being self-confident & having to big of an ego

Christian is based in San Diego, Rancho Santa Fe where it is possible to play outdoors all year. Make sure to say hi to Christian on Social & tell him what parts of the interview you liked!

Enjoy the show!

Timestamps

01:30 How Christian started working with Tommy Haas
03:05 How it works for a coach while a player is injuried
04:43 Christians considerations before starting to work with Tommy
06:06 Being younger than your player
07:15 What Haas would say about Christian
08:15 How to balance the on & off court life on tour
09:29 How Christian nurtures his mind when on the tour
10:09 The difference in working with Haas & Fritz
12:03 What made Fritz decide to fully focus on tennis
13:44 The steps that lead Fritz into the top 100
15:03 The off-court transiton steps for Fritz into the top 100
16:25 Taylor Fritz’s biggest room for improvement
17:18 How Fritz being married will affect his career
18:26 It’s really not that glamorous
20:37 The biggest challenges when traveling on tour
22:36 How to go about communicating with your boss who also happens to be the player you are working with
24:15 No regrets
25:37 Being surrounded by the best athletes in the world
26:27 Persistence
28:06 Stress tolerance
30:26 Integrity
33:27 How Christian gets better as a coach
36:02 The value of time
37:08 The way Haas practices
38:30 How to deal with fiery guys
38:23 How Christian would go about training Haas if he had been 14 years old
41:23 How the level has changed
42:11 Ego vs self confidence
44:58 Christian’s advice

In this episode you are going to listen to Karan Rastogi, Karan was a very promising Indian Junior player that was scouted & signed by IMG as a 14 year old, he was 4 in the ITF ranking & had a career high of 284 in singles & 221 in doubles. Karan has worked with top 100 ATP Doubles specialist Purav Raja & is currently the National Coach of Hong Coach which also includes being a coach for both the Davis Cup & the Fed Cup Team

In this episode you’ll get to know:

– How Karan helps the players he is working with avoiding the same mistakes as he did

– The most valuable lesson he learned being at the IMG Tennis Academy for 11 years

– How to gain trust from the parents of the players you are coaching

Get to know more about Karan by going to his profile at either GPTCA or OrangeCoach.

Enjoy the show!

Timestamps

01:30 The steps that lead Karan to go from a professional player to a coach
03:17 What Karan learned at the GPTCA Courses
04:30 What Karan is doing in Hong Kong
06:03 Karan’s mistakes
11:36 What makes Nishikori so special
14:26 Karan’s first meeting with Maria Sharapova
16:25 Biggest lesson from the IMG Tennis Academy
19:10 How to educate tennis parents
20:21 How to handle unwanted parent behaviour as a coach
21:32 The steps of gaining trust of the parents
23:35 How to navigate in the jungle of technology
24:20 The very best about being a tennis coach
25:06 How to spot desire
26:19 Why you need adaptability & flexibility as a tennis coach
27:30 Karan’s book recommendation
29:45 Why you will learn how to persevere
31:46 The positives of getting seriously injured
37:48 How to do smart practices
40:43 Why you need to take care of yourself

In this episode you are going to listen to Federico Ricci, Federico was the director at the Evert Tennis Academy where he worked with the likes of Lauren Davis, Jesse Levine, Madison Keys & Ajla Tomljanovic. Since 2011 he has been the director of the Jarkko Nieminen Tennis Academy which is one of the few non-profit Tennis Academies in the world

In this episode you’ll get to know:

– The similarities & differences on the Jarko Nieminen & Evert Tennis Academy

– How it’s possible to develop a players stress tolerance

– The most important lesson he learned under the guidance of Andy Brandi

Get to know more about Federico by going to the official Jarkko Nieminen Tennis Academy homepage.

Enjoy the show!

Timestamps

01:30 Non profit academy
4:20 The specific actions of commitment
06:12 The benefits of having a small environment
09:50 The collaboration with the finish tennis association
11:42 The story of the Estonian Tennis Federation
12:34 Similarities & differences on Jarko Nieminen & Evert Tennis Academy
16:45 How the quality of the facility influences the players
19:45 How some parents from Scandinavia perceive sport
22:58 The best thing about being an academy director
24:34 Something he has not talked about before
24:50 The stress level a player can sustain
26:42 Daily actions to develop stress tolerance
30:26 Resilience
32:49 Empathy
38:20 Most important lesson learned from Andy Brandi
40:14 Biggest myth
43:14 How tennis has become more complicated
45:30 The complexity of traveling
The physical aspect while traveling has become more important
49:30 Federico’s advice

In this episode you are going to listen to Dusan Vemic, Dusan was on the tour as a player for nearly 20 years & represented Serbia in Davis Cup. He assisted Petar Popovic in guiding Andrea Petkovic to the top 10, He was a part of Novak Djokovic’s team for 1 & a half years & accompanied him by himself in 2012 when Novak won the World Tour Finals. Since 2013 he has been a part of the Serbian Davis Cup Coaching Staff & is currently the coach of Filip Krajinovic.

In this episode you’ll get to know:

– How it’s possible to create an environment that is too difficult for the opponent to handle

– Why Dusan thinks that you are pretty much able to handle every job after a tennis playing career

– Why Dusan puts more importance on the technical aspect of tennis than he did earlier, and YES I did say MORE IMPORTANCE

Get to know more about Dusan by going to the official GPTCA homepage & check out his bio.

Enjoy the show!

Timestamps

01:30: How Dusan became part of the Serbian Davis cup team
03:32 The reason Dusan wanted to become a coach
04:22: What Petar Popovic would say about Dusan
05:40 Working with the mental aspect in tennis
08:10 How to be present in high pressure situations on the tennis court
09:40 The strategic part of tennis
11:46 The difference between males & female tennis players
13:49 Why presence is important
15:25 Every tennis player has the same challenges
18:42 The most important characteristic in a tennis player
20:30 What person or books has inspired you the most
23:41 Most valuable lesson learned from tennis
23:32 Different than others
29:18 Biggest waste of time
32:45 How tennis coaches can educate tennis parents
35:53 What made Dusan change his mind about the importance of technique
38:32 More important / less important
40:44 Dusan’s advice

In this episode you are going to listen to Roberto Brogin. Roberto was on the tour for more than 20 years as a coach & has coached several top 100 ATP & WTA players. He has been the coach of the Uzbekistan Davis Cup Team leading them into the World Group, In 2006 he worked for the Chinese Tennis Federation with players as Li Na & Zheng Jie & in 2009 he was specially assigned to work with Eugine Bouchard at the National Tennis Centre in Canada,

In this episode you’ll get to know:

– Why Brogan thinks that you should never judge the future of a tennis player at the age of 18

– Why he especially likes Australian & Spanish coaches

– Why you should watch Rafael Nadal’s volley practices

Get to know more about Roberto by going to the official GPTCA homepage & check out his bio.

Enjoy the show!

In this episode you are going to listen to Claudio Pistolesi. Claudio (@cpistolesi) is a former Junior World Champion & top 100 singles player. He has brought 10 players from the outside of top 100 to the inside & worked with players like Söderling, Hantuchova & Bolleli

In this episode you’ll get to know:

The mentality of a professional tennis player

When it’s time to move on from a coaching relation

How Claudio keeps updated every year

Get to know more about Claudio by visiting www.claudiopistolesienterprise.com, give a shout out on Twitter @cpistolesi or be one of more than a thousand people to follow Claudio Pistolesi Enterprise on Facebook.

Enjoy the show!