Jul 04, 2024

Hey!

89 days left until ThatPickleballSchool launches on October 1st. I'm still fine-tuning how to describe the school in one sentence. Right now, I’m saying:

It’s the place where obsessed players go to master their game. 

Someone asked, "Do you only want 'obsessed' players?" It's a good question. My short answer is yes. From my experience, people often use "addicted" and "obsessed" to describe their love for the game. And if you just kinda like pickleball, this school might not be for you. But if you really love it, whether you're new to the game or trying to become a pro or senior pro — and want to get better faster, this is exactly the thing you'll want to be a part of. Use this link to get on the priority list where I'll give early benefits too as we get closer to October 1.

**Disclaimer: Everything below happened yesterday. I woke up early to write this and am at the courts now finishing up :) If there are any typos or less-than-perfect sentences, please forgive me! I’m working on extremely slow internet speed (which is why the videos below had to be compressed) and I really wanted to get you all this while it’s fresh. And many reading this are actually playing in the APP Newport this weekend. So I’m hoping some of this will be helpful before you go out there for your matches :)

Now, strap in because I’m taking you through my entire day yesterday with some deep analysis. 

 Before we keep going, welcome back to another edition of the blog. If you’re new to the blog and want to go back and check out past editions, go here!

What Happened

Yesterday:

CONTEXT: I’m in California at the APP Newport tournament. In fact, I’m writing to you write now from the Venue while I wait for the mixed doubles qualifier to start in a couple hours.

Yesterday, I played the pro singles qualifier and the men's doubles qualifier. And before I get into what happened in those matches, let’s talk about how I handle...

Pre Match Prep & Nerves 

Pre match preparation: a. When I wake up in the morning for a tournament, I do two things. Some type of meditation / breathwork (I’ve really gotten into Wim Hof) breathing recently. So that’s what I did yesterday. And the truth is, the more meditation i’ve done over the last couple months, the calmer I’ve felt on court under pressure. The 2nd thing I do is write down a few reminders for myself for the day (examples below).

The first thing you’ll see in these images is 3 overarching reminders: 

• Breath (while on court) - This is the number 1 action you can take on court to calm yourself down. We get tight on court because our muscles get tight because we’re squeezing everything harder and breathing less.

• Energize my teammate - When we’re on court, we want to play well, (for ourselves and our partners). There’s a lot of emotions out there. “Does my partner think I suck?” “I don’t want to let them down.” Etc. So one way to remove focus from yourself is to turn your attention to your partner and bring them energy!

• Enjoy it - 8 months ago, I hated tournaments. Seriously, I got so nervous, I just would think, “How am I going to screw this up today?” And I wasn’t even mad when I lost. Feels weird to say, but I was actually glad when it was over. So every time I play a tournament, I remind myself to enjoy it and be grateful, because c'mon — how cool is it I get to play pickleball today? 

The following two images are just some reminders I wanted to give myself for singles. And then some reminders for doubles. This was a first time partnership and he’s a lefty. So I knew I’d be playing the left and there were some specific patterns I wanted to keep in mind as I went out there. Feel free to respond and ask my any follow up questions on what you see. 

WHAT HAPPENED YESTERDAY.

Because of the quick turn around time, I haven’t had a chance to go back and watch each of these matches. I wanted to get this to you in real time before I go back on court later today. So I’m going to speak from memory, but then include the matches if you’d like to go through and see some of the things I’m talking about :) 

Mens Singles Qualifier

First round - 21-9 - click here to watch.

At app tournaments, singles qualifier is first to 21, rally scoring. This was a relatively easy win. I’d never played this guy, so I spent the first few points looking for patterns. Which is still something I really struggle to recognize quickly in singles. 

Early on, I noticed he sliced every backhand and hit topspin on every forehand. Initially, I aimed my serves to his backhand and looked for passing shots on my third shot. However, he started cutting those backhand returns deep and approaching the net, which wasn’t working for me. So, I tested his forehand more and earned some easy points that way. In addition, I realized he was just missing a lot. So I didn’t need to go for big shots. I just needed to be solid, apply pressure at the net with my length, and I’d win. And that’s exactly what happened! 

Second round - 21-19 - click here to watch.

If you’re going to watch one (of the singles) matches, make it this one. I played Elliot Schupp, a young lefty. He was playing on the court next to me during the first round, and I noticed he was good.

Before the match, I spent a couple of minutes processing that he’s left-handed, which changes things like where his backhand is. It’s easy to forget and play like he’s a righty, only to find yourself hitting to his forehand more than you should.

I held a lead for most of this match, but never felt like I was in control. He’s quick, has good strokes on both sides, and was just a great competitor. I really enjoyed this match. 

I remember near 18-15, I was up. And he played 3 really good points. I played the same strategy I had the whole match. Which was: return up the line and approach the net. But he just crushed me. My returns were a little bit short which didn’t help. I was proud of myself, because I didn’t panic (internally) after he played a few good points in a row. At 18-18, I decided to change my return strategy for one point. I returned it cross court, instead of up the line. I assumed he’d be expecting another line return (and he was). He ended up missing his 3rd shot wide. Now I’m up 19-18. Then he hit a good return, and I missed. 19-19.

On 19-19, I hit a deep return back up the line and I think it hit the line, and I won the point. THEN, at 20-19, match point. I took a good deep breath before serving. And then I cranked a big serve. On his return. He didn’t approach the net. Then on my 3rd shot, I hit a drive and approached the net and he missed the passing shot wide.

21-19 game. That one felt good. 

Third round - Lost 13-21 - click here to watch.

I played this guy Quan Do. Truth is, he’s just a better singles player than me (right now). I’d never seen or watched him play, but I knew he was good just from knowing his results from the past. I started slow and honestly couldn’t figure out what to do.

After getting down early, I decided to change my offensive strategy. Originally I was trying to pass him with power. That wasn’t working. So I changed to hitting more 3rd shot drops and approaching the kitchen behind the ball. I think I won 4 points in a row with this strategy. Then later in the match, I figured out he was hitting most of his 3rd shot drives to my backhand, and it was working. But it was too little too late when I realized this.

I’m usually pretty even keeled on court, but I was getting mad during this match, mainly because I felt like I could’ve won this match if I figured out a better strategy early. I hope I play him again sometime, because while he’s without a doubt a better singles player than me, I think I could get him with strategy. 

And the truth is, for me, I’m not better than most of these really good singles player. BUT, I know I can outthink a lot of players who have better strokes than me. And as I continue to play singles, that’s where I’ll hang my hat…

On using my mind to win matches I “shouldn’t” win.

MENS DOUBLES with Tanner Tomassi

Tanner is another guy who does a lot of content. Here’s his IG & his youtube channel.

After seeing each other at tournaments the last few months, we decided to partner up for this tourney.

We played three matches yesterday in the men’s doubles qualifier. And it went really well. Our three game scores were... 

15-2 - click here to watch.

15-3 - click here to watch.

15-1 - click here to watch.

And instead of going match by match, I’ll break all three down together. Because the truth is, we used the same strategy in each match, and as you can see from the scores, giving up 6 points in 3 games ain't too shabby. 

To start, Tanner's a lefty and I’m a righty. We got one day of practice before yesterday to iron out a few things that can trip up a righty lefty combo. Namely, middle balls.

And the conversation we had in practice, in my opinion, was crucial to use having a smooth run yesterday. Early I realized that Tanner’s forehand 3rd shot drop in the middle of the court was money. So I just said to him, “You’re middle drop is better than mine. You take all those balls.”

No ego needed here, just who’s better at that shot. That person takes it more. Done. Let’s move on. And we had no issues with it the whole day.

The other one that can sometimes be tough is the middle ball at the kitchen. And in my opinion, both of us play pretty well on the middle ball at the kitchen. In practice, I noticed tanner did some tricky stuff with the middle ball that I actually felt was more difficult to handle than me trying to get in there. SO, we didn’t even talk about this much, I just decided I like him taking a few more of those, and I’d get out of the way. And when I do take them, we’d just communicate about it.

Which to be honest, is probably the most important thing. Early communication, often.

Overall, just a really enjoyable day with him. We had really good chemistry on court.

NOW, to the actual matches. 

Here’s an interesting insight. In three matches, I think we only sped up 3 balls from the kitchen, off the bounce. Off the bounce speed ups aren’t bad by any stretch, BUT, we felt extremely confident on our kitchen work against our three opponents, so we didn’t feel the need to force anything. We got to the kitchen consistently, moved the ball around, and didn’t wait for pop ups, but rather, earned opponent errors by the quality of our dinks and dink placement choices. In addition, we played more grind it out points. Where the rally would go 6-8 shots rather than 3-5. And by that point, we'd typically earn a miss or an opportunity to speed up out of the air.

One person mentioned after watching, “I watched for a few minutes from afar and couldn’t tell who was winning.” Which is very common in the style we were playing. We didn’t overpower any of the three teams with big drives and shake n bake. It was more methodical. Get to the kitchen. Move our dinks around, get them off balance, and attack out of the air. It was as simple as that. 

Now, there’s no doubt the three teams we played yesterday were weaker than who we’ll play on Saturday in the main draw. But we feel confident in our strategy and are stoked for Saturday! 

(I’ll do a part 2 next week on how it goes).

Whew!

That was a lot. Hope you enjoyed. As a reminder, I linked all three doubles matches above. I know the video quality is a tad grainy. But it was either that or I couldn't upload with my internet speed :) Thanks in advance for understanding!

Hit me with any follow up questions you have and I’ll get back to you next week when I’m back from the tournament.

Until next week,

Kyle

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