How I Found Out Tennis Is a Mental Sport

People always claim that tennis is a mental sport. This statement is true, and it’s a fact I learned early in my career, but was never more evident than during one memorable match in 1989 in Sao Paolo, Brazil.

That match, a first-round qualifier of an ATP Tour event, taught me a great lesson about the wonders of the human brain and the game of tennis, and it turned out to be a unique experiment.

The Sao Paolo event was one of the last events of the season. I was totally burned out coming into the event, having played more than 35 tournaments in the first 11 months of the year.

Being young and eager to improve my ranking, I entered many events, won many matches, and wound up playing way more than I expected. By the time I reached the Sao Paolo tournament, I was out of gas, both physically and mentally. I just couldn’t stand the sight of a tennis court, I was a mental wreck and completely burned out. I was ready to hang it up for the year, and take some much needed time off.

I had been playing for six consecutive weeks in three different continents. I had a good year and was ready to go into the offseason, but I had an obligation to play in the Sao Paolo event in order to earn a bonus from the ATP. All I had to do was show up for the match and was eligible for the bonus, which was a nice chunk for those days.

My coach said to me before the match, “As far as I am concerned … the year is over. You had a great year. Let’s go out and celebrate … no need to prepare for the match tomorrow, you’re just going to sign up so you can get your bonus. Go out there and go for winners on every point, make it quick, and then we are going to Rio for a week to enjoy life on the beach.”

That night, we went out and had fun, stayed out pretty late and showed up five minutes before the start of the match without a warm up and without thinking about the match or stressing out about it for even a second.

Going into the match, my mind was really loose and calm, I had told myself that the year was already over and that this match doesn’t count, my mind was already thinking about the beautiful beaches of Rio.

I remember the strange feeling of warming up and playing a professional match on center court, but inside, I was already on vacation, I was literally smiling as I was hitting, joking with the refs and the ball kids. My opponent was a young player named Nicky Barone, who was a top American collegiate player and a rookie on the pro tour.

In that match, unlike any match I had ever played, I simply went for a winner on the first shot of each point, on every point for an entire match. I played with the reckless abandon of a person who didn’t care if they lost points. I went for aces, even on my second serve. I stepped into every shot, and hit it as hard as I could. The result was the best match I ever played in my life … a quick 6-2, 6-1 victory with lots of winners. While I was hitting winner after winner, I felt a freedom I never felt before on the court. I was almost apologizing to my opponent after each winner, smiling and shaking my head in amazement, asking myself jokingly: “Did I just hit that shot?” At the end of the match, I shook Nicky’s hand and told him apologetically that I never play like this. He told me that he didn’t think that tennis like this existed, I told him, “It doesn’t!”

Coming out of the match, my coach was laughing hard and thought it was comical, but I was excited. I had so much fun playing this freestyle type of tennis without much thought. I just went for each shot, played high risk points and attacked relentlessly.

“This is the way I’m going to play from now on,” I declared. “No more playing safe and grinding it out. I’m going to just go for it, play loose and enjoy the game.”

But reality set in pretty fast. The second round of qualifying was later that day, and I had another chance to test out my new approach to the game. I was determined to continue with the game plan and play an ultra-aggressive, high-risk game. At the start of that day, I was a burned out player who wanted to go on vacation. Walking into that second round match, I was thinking that if I won the match, I was one win away from making it to the main draw of a tour event. The beaches of Rio could wait. My competitive spirit returned, and with it, stress and anxiety.

The second round match started great. I kept the same aggressive style, kept loose and won the first set 6-3. But in the second set, the low percentage shots that were going in started to miss the lines. The errors were piling up, and my attempts to play perfect tennis started to result in wildly missed shots, mishits and unforced errors. Before I knew it, I lost the second set and in the third set, I was already back to being a burned out player who was in dire need of a vacation. My bluff was called, and I went back to being a stressed out, tired and depleted player who played way too much tennis that year. I was on the edge of a mental meltdown, and in fact, I barely managed to finish the match without defaulting.

I lost that match and that was the last match of 1989 for me, but I learned a lot from that experience. I learned that playing a perfect match is possible. I learned that when you trust your shots, you can achieve unbelievable heights. But I also learned that even if you play without fear, you still need to play smart and play the percentage game. I learned that if you don’t take some risks, you will never know how good you can be. I mostly learned that tennis is the art of fooling yourself, and in not caring whether I won or lost, I tricked myself into playing my best tennis ever.