Resilience is a fundamental characteristic of tennis players
Without it players will not reach their potential

Coach Lerman is a mental performance coach and strength and conditioning coach

Dr. Larry Lauer leads the mental performance team for USTA Player and Coach Development and the central part of his philosophy is that to perform in tennis you must be resilient

Define Resilience
Explain the 3 Pillars to the foundation of a Resilient Competitor
Examine how to apply mental skills in daily routines
Explore the parents role in developing a resilient competitor and person

Resilience has been defined simply as bouncing back
It also has been defined as adapting, returning to form and growing because of adversity
Resilience is a trait but it is also a skill that can be learned
Resilient competitors bounce back, adapt, and find a way when they are struggling. They become better because of their struggles.
Fragile competitors just want everything to go as it should. Anything that goes off course or against them they do not adapt or bounce back. Like a cracked egg they crack when they struggle and cannot return to form.
The resilient competitor is more like the super ball that bounces back higher than the height it was dropped from - adversity makes you stronger.

Coach Lerman watched the women’s final of the US Open in 2020 live and noted how Osaka struggled in the first set. But, as the picture shows she went to some form of mindfulness, meditation, relaxation or visualization and bounced back. She was resilient to come back and win the match in 3 sets, but it started with a choice to respond effectively to her struggles.

You too need a strong foundation to compete, to keep fighting when things aren’t going well
Research on resilience has revealed the existence of three things you need to exhibit resilience.
Thus, everyone can be resilient if these pillars exist.

Players typically don’t understand what the word adversity means. Adversity is a negative stimulus, it is uncomfortable. Things like fatigue, pain, cold, heat, making mistakes, bad calls and so forth can be a negative stimulus.
Adversity is normal in life and in tennis, you cannot avoid it. It’s best to accept its’ existence and accept that you will struggle and be uncomfortable at times. Everyone goes through it. When you accept adversity you start to respond differently. Instead of avoiding it and hoping it won’t occur you choose how you want to respond. Youth athletes struggle with adversity because they have a strong desire to win and void losing. In addition, they don’t necessarily have the coping skills or life experiences to manage adverse situations. This is why we need to teach it.Adversity is positive because adapting to it and overcoming it creates confidence and growth.

Renewed appreciation for tennis, for training, for your coach, for the opportunity. Being resilient changes your perspective.
Enhance personal fortitude
Stronger, more meaningful relationships
Builds self-efficacy
Teaches how to re-frame perceptions

If something in tennis is uncomfortable (and appropriate) you probably should move in that direction. It is a chance to become better.
How does someone become resilient?
By experiencing adversity and stress; this gives us the opportunity to grow and learn from our experiences.
There is so much inherent adversity in tennis so what does this mean for you?

Those that get through adversity and bounce back, or are resilient, apply certain perspectives and skills.
These are best learned in low stress environments at first, and then are applied in training under stress and in real adverse match situations.
In the case of feeling anxiety or nerves before and during a performance there are several things you must accept to perform “free”.

Routines create: Comfort = calm = confident == resilient
We challenge you to make this a part of your daily routine so you can reap the benefit of being present, at ease, and focused on your goals.

Our team is observing that when players share their fears and feelings of pressure to a coach or performance team member that fear has less hold over them.It allows the player to relax a bit and possibly gain perspective, so they can then refocus on the task in the moment.

There is no specific formula for parenting, and certainly one doesn’t exist for parenting a young tennis player. There are, however, best practices that have helped many parents over the years.
It is our belief that children need to experience struggles, adversity, failure… and learn how to adapt to it. If you guard and protect your child from it then they become fragile in the face of later, more intense or profound adversity.
Please check out the 10 Tips for Raising Resilient Kids as Coaches Lerman and Lauer have adapted the discussion on the parent’s role in resilience from this article.
10 Tips For Raising Resilient Kids

Expect, Plan for and Accept Adversity
Do DMP (breathing/visu​alization/Journ​aling)
Use Breathe and Believe in practice to accept adverse situations
Journal and reflect upon your experiences.
- Allow your reflection to groove learning into your brain
Communicat​e openly and honestly with your parents & coaches