15th Year, Issue 43, December 2007 1

Dave MileyExecutive Director,Tennis Development

Miguel Crespo Research Officer, Tennis Development/Coaching

Patrick MclnerneyAssistant Research Officer,Tennis Development/Coaching

The Official Coaching and Sport Science Publication of the International Tennis Federation

SCIENCE REVIEWCCOOAACCHHIINNGG && SSPPOORRTT

ontentsEditorial CCWelcome to issue 43 of the ITF Coaching and Sport Science Review, which is the final edition for 2007.

October saw the staging of the 15th ITF Worldwide Coaches Conference, entitled 'An integrated approach tocoaching advanced players', in Asunción, Paraguay. In attendance were, a record turn-out, three hundredand eighty coaches from 76 nations. The conference featured over 60 presentations, including keynotelectures, workshop sessions, free communications and poster presentations from a series of renownedinternational speakers.

Former French Open finalist Victor Pecci of Paraguay participated in a round-table panel discussion withSouth American experts that included Ivan Molina (ITF Travelling coach), Larissa Schaerer (former top playerand Fed Cup Captain for Paraguay), Eduardo Zuleta (National Technical Director of the Chilean TennisFederation), and Mariana Díaz Oliva (former Fed Cup player for Argentina) among others.

Fifty per cent of the presentations took place on court, which provided participants with valuable practicalinformation. Bruce Elliott and Machar Reid (AUS) gave two excellent sessions on analysing players. BenniLinder, Head Conditioning coach for the Swiss Tennis Association; Gustavo Luza former Davis Cup Captainof Argentina; Horacio Anselmi, conditioning coach of top Argentine tennis players; Rodney Harmon, Directorof Men's Tennis for the USTA High Performance; and Louis Cayer, Performance Manager for the British LawnTennis Association, also presented on court.

Lecture room presenters included Randy Snow, World and Olympic Wheelchair tennis champion; BernardPestre, National Technical Director for the French Tennis Federation; Steven Martens, Head of TechnicalSupport for the British Lawn Tennis Association; and Doug MacCurdy, former ITF General Manager andDirector of Development, among others. For those readers who were unable to attend some of thepresentations can now be seen at www.tennisicoach.com the new coaching website launched by the ITF thatfeatures many hours of exclusive video footage and articles from leading tennis coaches and experts.

The workshop was sponsored by Head and each day presentations took place during the lunch breaksrelated to the ITF Play and Stay campaign which featured the Head red, orange and green modifiedequipment. At the official closing dinner of the Conference, the ITF presented its special Award for Servicesto the Game to Ivo van Aken, former Fed Cup Captain from Belgium.

Several ITF meetings took place during the Conference including the ITF Coaches Commission, chaired by ITFBoard Member Ismail El-Shafei and the ITF Sports Science and Medicine Commission, chaired by Dr. BrianHainline. The ITF would again like to thank the Paraguay Tennis Federation and the Hotel Resort Casino Yacht& Golf Club staff for their hard work in assisting the ITF, as well as all the participants, speakers and ITF staffinvolved.

January 24-26 will see Australia host their 2008 Australian Grand Slam Coaches Conference and coachesfrom overseas are welcome to enrol through Tennis Australia. More courses are planned for 2008 as are the5 ITF regional conferences at which we look forward to seeing many of our readers in attendance.

We hope you continue to take advantage of the resources provided on the weblet(http://www.itftennis.com/coaching/) and that you enjoy the 43rd issue of the ITF Coaching Sport ScienceReview.

USING VARIETY FROM 2THE BASELINE IN WOMEN'STENNISRob Antoun (GBR)

PRE-TTENNIS STRETCHING 3Mark Kovacs and T. J.Chandler (USA)

DIFFERENTIAL 6COORDINATION AND SPEED TRAINING FOR TENNIS FOOTWORK -PART 2Ulrike Benko and Stefan Lindinger (AUT)

ITF LESSON PLANS FOR 8BEGINNER PLAYERS:LESSON 3

TENNIS FOR THE BLIND 10AND PARTIALLY SIGHTEDMark Bullock (ITF)

WATCH THE BALL? 11Damien Lafont (FRA)

COGNITIVE TECHNIQUES 12TO MANAGE PERFORMANCEANXIETY IN TENNISAndrew Peden (GBR)

OBSERVATION OF 13TRAININGSESSIONS ANDPRE MATCH PREPARATIONAT THE WORLD TEAM CUP2007P. Born, M. Heck, M. Krüger,V. Langholz, P. Zimmer(GER)

TRAINING AND 14COMPETITION LOG FORTENNIS PLAYERSMiguel Miranda (ITF)

RECOMMENDED 17BOOKS AND DVDS

Brabenec and Stojan (2006) underlined thatcoaches and players have been payingattention in training or during the learningprocess exclusively to the visible elements ofthe stroke; backswing, forward swing andfollow through and that examination of themoment of impact has however receivedcomparatively less research attention.

In this context, the purpose of this study wasto examine head and gaze behaviour duringthe hitting phase, i.e. to explore the oldadage "keep your eye on the ball!" probablythe most used instruction ever given intennis.

METHODIn order to explore the head and gazebehaviour of elite players, photos at - andjust after - the moment of impact wasanalysed and compared to less-skilled topplayers on the professional tour.

Past research of Stein and Slatt (1981) wholooked at photos of all the majorprofessionals demonstrated that top players'eyes invariably do not follow the ball andhighlighted that tracking the ball as close aspossible to the impact zone is not feasible ordesirable for most people. It is oftenassumed that, at the very best, everyone cankeep their eyes on the ball until the momentthat the ball actually strikes the racquet.

However, recent observations of RogerFederer and Rafael Nadal call into questiontheir conclusion. More specifically, the ideamotivating this study is that great players,i.e. those at the top of the professionalrankings (as defined by Brabenec and Stojan,1997), seem to achieve a control of their gazeand head movement during the hittingphase.

RESULTSA considerable amount of sequenced photosof the hitting phase (several hundred for eachplayer) reveal that elite players not only seemto follow the ball longer than other playersbut also possess a characteristic posture ofthe upper body: At impact, their head andeyes are turned in the direction of the hittingzone.

Additionally, what contrasts with previousstudies is that Federer and Nadal not onlykeep their eye on the ball up to the momentof impact, but after impact their headremains still and in the direction of thecontact zone. This 'fixation' on the contactzone is the trademark of elite players.

The most noteworthy finding was that eliteplayers were able to maintain a fairlyconsistent control; a consistency alsoillustrated on the women's tour by Steffi Grafwho kept her eyes on the ball for every shotand had a significant fixation on the impactzone after impact.

COMPARISON OF TOP PLAYERSThe comparison of hitting sequences showsthat top players differ greatly in their gazebehaviour. Indeed, there is a profounddisparity in their head and gaze behaviour ascompared to previous elite players (seeArnaud Clément for example). The vastmajority of photos show players hitting withtheir eyes focused ahead of the ball in the fogzone - term introduced by Stein and Slatt(1981).

Moreover, players were often seen to lift theireyes and pull their head up before the balleven reaches the racket. They turn their headas if they want to immediately follow thebeginning of the ball trajectory or themovement of their opponent (Brechbuhl etal., 2005). It is evident for the forehand sidewhere top-ranked players differ greatly fromthose of lower ranking.

Furthermore, this comparison reveals that amajority of professional players appear to notkeep their eye on the ball or onlyintermittently, players have been noted tohave better head control on their best stroke(often their backhand), i.e. associated tobetter centring and accuracy (see LleytonHewitt).

A common idea is that there is very littledifference in the stroke capabilities of the topplayers (Taylor, 2000) and therefore the onlydifference lies in their mental strength.However, the above observations show thatat the professional level, all the players arenot equally talented in terms of technical skillespecially with regard to gaze control.

Past studies in racket sports have alreadyreported that experts watch the balldifferently. They differ from novices in eyefixation patterns and perceptual strategies(Murray, 1999), analyse relatively littleinformation but focus only on the mostpertinent information (La Rue and Ripoll,2004), and show faster informationprocessing and decision making (Day, 1980).But, what is particularly interesting anddistinct from previous studies is that greatplayers watch the ball and position theirhead differently, especially after impact.

Thus, great players don't just hit the ballbetter, they do it differently.

CONCLUSIONIn tennis, top players are expected tomaintain visual contact with the ball as theycomplete the hitting action but that was notconsistent with the observations. Inparticular, what emerges in this study is thatthe top players are not as individual in theway they deal with the gaze control in tennisas they are in the way they stroke the ball.More precisely, among top players, only fewhigh-level performers follow a typical fixationof the contact zone. It is significantlyillustrated in the modern game by theamazing consistency of Roger Federer andRafael Nadal.So, is gaze control a decisive characteristic ofgreat players? At this time, observations ofelite players only suggest that gaze control,especially fixation contribute to achievinggreater accuracy especially through bettercentring. More broadly, Federer and Nadaldemonstrate that it is possible and evenbeneficial to play tennis with the eyes notalways focused on the ball. Therefore,watching the ball throughout its entire flightis not the visual strategy used by eliteplayers. In a sense, it confirms thehypothesis of Ford et al. (2002) about thepossibility and benefits of focusing on thecontact zone during the stroke execution.

REFERENCESBrabenec, J. and Stojan, S. (2006). The invisible technique:

Two seconds decide the result. ITF Coaching andSportScience Review, 38.

Brechbuhl, J., Anker, P. and Frey, D. (2005). Quelquesmythesà combattre dansl'enseignementdu tennis.Roehampton: ITF Coaching.

Day, J.L. (1980). Anticipation in junior players. InProceeding of the International Symposium in theEffective Teaching of Racquet Sports, (edited by J.L.Groppel and R. Sears), pp. 107-116, Champaign, IL:University of Illinois.

Ford, S. A., Hines, W. L., and Kluka, D. (2002). A. Parallelprocessing and peak performance in tennis,Gambling, La, Gambling State University Press.

La Rue, J. and Ripoll, H. (2004). Manuel de psychologie dusport. 1. Les déterminants de la performancesportive, Editions Revue.

Lafont, D. (2007). High-speed photo analysis of topplayer's gaze behaviour, Tennis Science andTechnology 3, ITF, London.

Moran, A. (1994). The psychology of concentration intennis, ITF Coaching and Sport Science Review, 5, 7-8.

Murray, J. F. (1999). SmartTennis: How to Play and Win theMental Game. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, CA.

Stein, H. and Slatt, B. (1981). Hitting Blind: The New VisualApproach to Winning Tennis, Beaufort, NY.

Taylor, J. (2000). Prime Tennis: Triumph of the MentalGame. Writers Club Press, Lincoln.

Weinberg, R. (2002). Tennis: Winning the mental game.Oxford, Ohio: H.O. Zimman, Inc.

15th Year, Issue 43, December 2007 11

Watch The Ball?By Damien Lafont (PhD and Certified Tennis Coach, France)