Celebrating 151 Year of Tennis with Fernando Segal

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In today's episode,

Bobby and I talk with Fernando Segal.

Fernando is the GPTCA National President

for Argentina and Chile.

And the Sigal Institute, along with coachtube.com,

run the World Tennis Conference,

which has its fifth edition coming up next month.

Also, today is the 151st anniversary of tennis.

Have a listen and let us know what you think.

(upbeat music)

Fernando, thank you so much for taking the time to be here

and talking with us today,

but I would like to hear from you.

I want to hear from you specifically as to who you are.

You have the World Tennis Conference.

It's the fifth one coming up, but please,

introduce yourself and tell us about the World Tennis Conference.

- Thank you, Shaun.

Thank you, Bobby, for the invitation.

It's a privilege for me to share some ideas

and a concept about our love at sport.

I'm coming from Argentina, originally I'm a city

which is Mar de Plata, where the revolution of tennis

started many, many years ago in terms of the Argentina tennis.

My coach, Felipe Lucicero, was the first guy in Argentina

started to pitch with Tospin.

And he first, let's say, famous player was Giger Movila.

Giger Movila's one, four Grand Slam was number two in the world.

Today will be number one in the world

because he won 77, he won two Grand Slam's,

used Open and Raranga Rose and 14 ATP tournaments.

You can even imagine, you know,

from those times the system of percentage was different

if you compare with actually how the ranking works.

But going to me, from the early age,

I want to be not only a player,

more than that I want to be a coach,

using the concept which I was learning from my master coach.

And I was studying in Raranga Rose

in the French Federation, high performance.

Then I was studying in different countries,

always looking to create system to develop an approach

to have more people, a better quality of tennis,

but like a system, not like a natural way

if you provide a player, what happened in my country

when Giger Movila came,

everybody wants to play tennis.

This is one way, you know, it's happened,

let's say in Mexico with Robert Ramirez,

with Google and Brazil, many times when one player appears,

everyone wants to play tennis.

But we have to go in the opposite direction

to do a development program to create a systematic approach

to develop players, not only in terms of high performance players,

which is my main focus of work,

also to develop coaches, to develop better competitions,

to develop promotion, more people playing in a recreation

and promotional basis.

Many, many different aspects.

I was working with five different countries,

like a national tennis director.

I was working with Mexico, Brazil, and Argentina.

My first country, which I was a national tennis director,

was my own country, which was my first purpose and goal,

like a young guy at the beginning.

And then like a main consultant,

I was working with Australia and New Zealand.

And of course, in many different organizations

and used United States and Europe and also in Asia.

I wrote many books.

I always spend the last 45 years involved

it in how to develop a systematic approach

to create growth in our sport.

This is my main objective.

In that sense, five, six years ago, we build up a new concept,

which is the World Tennis Conference,

which for my point of view, and my experience,

we have a lot of conference in tennis,

but nothing in terms to talk specifically about high performance.

I, we created a project following another project,

we created the ITF World Wide Coaches Conference in Cancun,

who were together with the ITF doing the best conference

for the ITF.

And we did the record.

We had 924 coaches one week in Cancun,

which is still the record.

Normally, ITF conferences around 600, 700 coaches in one week.

And I wasn't that time, this coaches committee,

and I was working with ITF, with my good friend, Dave Miley.

I was talking and saying, we have half million people

working like a tennis coach in the world.

Yes, 500,000 people working like us, like coaches.

You know, we did the record, 924.

How are we going to move the needle?

It's impossible to have all the guys in one place.

And from my point of view, because I always was my object,

it was centered into a level of coaches,

and through coaches, develop players,

I was not the type of coach who wants to develop a player only.

I was once to a level of coaches, but that coaches develop players.

Even when I was a national director, I was working a lot,

because from my point of view, coaches are always in the middle.

That's why I used to say, the person in the middle is the coach.

In any program you can do, you have to put the coach in the middle.

Why? Because the coach is the most influential person

that can bring knowledge or awareness,

is to build up a pathway following different experiences.

Not only the good ones, because this is another thing to speak a little bit,

and you know, after this.

I say to the guys, so the idea of, "How are we going to move the needle?"

924 coaches, and we have all of the new people working.

That's why I started to say to them, "Let's do something online.

Spend time to political situations always."

And I say, "Okay, I'm going to do it."

And I started a project with my team

to create the Worldwide coaches' conference,

which is mainly focusing on the high performance.

Why is it important for me to have a high performance mentality?

Even you can bring the high performance,

because you can be a minute in it.

You can be working in adults.

You can be working with events.

The most important, if you develop a high standard,

how you are doing your work, your job.

And the main example in tennis is the guy,

which normally are producing players who are playing at the top

of the best circuit on the planet.

And that's why we created that bridge between the top guys,

the top coaches in the world,

and we had the support of the ATP, the WTA.

We are working together with the GPTCA,

which is the Global Professional Antennaz Coaches Association,

where you can have the degree of certification of the ATP.

And this is our fifth year to say something shown,

and Bobby, all in this conference,

we have coaches who won 38 grants.

You can see the level of the coaches.

Sometimes you have a conference,

probably you can have three or four top guys.

You know, good coaches, well-experienced,

but no, probably with the level of success in terms of results.

We have top scientists, top experts,

top coaches in the circuit,

and the conference is divided in four days.

First day are 70 coaches who are working, actually, on the circuit.

Second day is about technical stuff.

It's more about biomechanics, methodology,

and technical recommendations.

We have a lot of coaches.

We are that day, we are starting with Tony Nadal,

Tony Nadal won 17 grants.

But he is presenting about a technical concept.

Even though he is not right now traveling in the circuit,

he won 17 grants.

Then with second presentation of the day is Rick Macy,

and the last presentation of the day,

we have 18 speakers that day.

It's Lika Yeh, Lika Yeh for the history of tennis.

He developed eight number one in doubles.

You know, probably is the best coaching doubles on the tennis history.

You know, he's working since almost 20 years ago for England,

for the LTA.

You know, he is Canadian.

Third day is about four science.

We have a top guys like Dr. Jim Lauer, Jack Gropel,

or Elizabeth Ramay, Anquin, many, many top guys.

We have a Ligia Lem, which is a physical coach,

who was two time in the final of Rorangaroz.

We've been traveling in Sutherling.

We have a lot of experts and scientists with great results with players.

And the fourth day is about human development.

It's up to because behind or before to be a tennis player,

you have a human being.

You have to understand the human being to be a very effective coach.

And we are talking also, which is related with the last question

that you're going to make about the future of tennis.

You know, because we have the presentation about the future of high performance

for the ATP, WTA, TDI, RSPA, many different organizations

are involved with us to try to create a pathway for the next 10 years'

work and is going.

That's the, like an overall picture about the conference.

That's fantastic.

And that's moving the needle.

And what you and I spoke about previously is you've got 70 speakers.

And if each of them can move the needle 1%,

you can actually see some significant change there.

And I love that.

And we will talk about the future.

But I want to jump back a little bit and talk about the past.

One of the reasons we're speaking to you today is because today is a fairly recognizable anniversary of tennis.

Can you talk to us about that?

Well, thank you, Jean.

It's a very important day.

Probably most of the people, even in tennis, they don't know about it.

You know, the tennis was created exactly 150 years, 151 years ago,

you know, in terms of how we know now.

clubton, Wimfield.

Walter, clubton, Wimfield created and was amazing the history because he was an innovator.

And the innovation was to put everything together in one box.

He didn't invent the racket.

He didn't invent the balls.

He didn't invent the next or the polls.

The invasion was to put everything together to create rules and try that people can be playing on parks, on public spaces.

You know, that's what's the main objective.

That's why another aspect which is interesting of his story,

And he put the name to the game.

The name was Sparatiske.

Sparatiske in Greek means the ball game.

But he realized that nobody understand the name, which is even today.

You can know it's not a very good brand name, let's say.

The Queen Victory approved the pattern along tennis, which was the second brand today, 151 years ago.

And that's why it's very important to understand that our game is a game for everyone.

And I always try to mention to everyone, because sometimes we are in the situation to talk about if tennis is a pretty old,

if it's loosening the bottle against Newspaper like a pickable bottle.

And I say to everyone, guys,

we have to bring back the spirit of Winfield.

Winfield was an innovator, put in everything in one box.

The second mentality or concept of his mentality was he was a development guy.

He wants everyone playing tennis.

And third one, he was thinking like a businessman.

That's why he changed it.

The name is Sparatiske for the second name, because he was thinking like a businessman.

I always say to everyone, and I did many conferences, and I say that speaking about that,

we need to recover our passion.

You know about them.

It's about us.

What we need to learn from other sport, which are growing.

And I celebrate that they are growing.

It's to recover our own passion for our game and be creative.

Be recovering the spirit of Winfield.

You know, because we have 151 years, you know, more than 300 million people playing tennis in the world.

Sometimes Sean and his Bobby too.

We don't speak too much about the benefits, all the kind of sport that we have.

We talk too much about foreign has a back and a what happened in the secret.

But what happened in the secret is less than 1% of tennis.

How many players do you think that is leading quite good in some kind of level of a professional tennis?

3,000?

2,000?

Let's say 3,000.

You know, because some players are going to inter clubs in Europe.

That other players are playing in France or small amount of money, but they can leave all that.

You know, we are talking about 300 million people playing our sport.

We have the fifth sport in terms of quantity of people playing our sport.

We can be explaining the benefits of our sport.

That's from my point of view.

It's not only about to celebrate the birthday of tennis.

It's to remark all the benefit that we have and promote that benefit to bring people.

Of course, we need to learn probably society today needs more social environment.

That's why some sports I'll grow in more.

Sometimes tennis is so complicated to learn because you need a lot of skills to do that.

But now we have Sean Bobby.

Do you know which is the biggest amateur circle in the world?

Japan.

With 3 million people playing amateur tennis with Greenball.

From the beginning, 10 years ago, 12 years ago, they started to create an amateur circuit.

With Greenball, which is having a bounce, 25% less of the bounce on the normal ball.

And they put the amateur people to play with the Greenball.

Why?

Because you have to play more.

You have to hit more balls for a normal player, for an adult, to pass the ball over the net.

It's success.

It doesn't care if we have a good technique.

If I hit it like that or like that.

Oh, come on.

You can say that people, everyone has this very good technique.

No.

It's about to pass the ball over the net and to create an example that we can play many times.

Probably, we missed the point when 25 years ago, or 20 years ago, most of the tennis players following the ITF,

they applied the different balls, the different size of the racket.

And we didn't use it for the adults.

The Japanese took the advantage to do that.

But sometimes we need to think what the society wants.

And we have the normal game, which is the traditional game.

And then we can add up some kind of games or situations that to bring more people to our sport.

Even we are doing the celebration to Mayor Wimffel.

And you know which is funny.

Wimffel was like a two, three years because the first rules of the key created,

he was following more the cracket.

Cracket is like a cricket, you know, and it was a very close rules.

Then he changed it and a couple of persons helped him to change a little more of the rules.

And Wimblom was the first big tournament in the world.

That's why all this Grand Slam is Wimblom.

Of course in the war, the two wars, they don't need the tournament.

That's why because they missed 10 years.

But anyway, my point is the first big tournament was Wimblom.

And since then, can you imagine one idea, one concept that he put everything in the box.

Now 300 million people are playing all over the world.

We'll call that a success.

Bobby, it sends me thinking of the history and thinking of the future.

And his comment, Fernando's comment about creating a system and having that pathway for players

to make up for when you don't have the tennis is cool right now, guy at the top.

So Fernando, Bobby is a fan of having that guy at the top.

So Bobby, what's the thing there?

Is it kind of a give and take that one create one gets the other?

Yeah, I like the idea that you got to work both simultaneously.

That's what I would say. That's the big advantage. I feel golf has over tennis.

Golf continues to promote the game when a tiger woods comes along and explodes.

We wait too long with tennis for the next thing.

And frankly, we've been very spoiled the last 20-some odd years.

There's a lot of pressure on the guys right now to keep up with the level of play that we've become accustomed to.

So it is. It's a great time to promote the system.

Love what the Japanese are doing.

And it's okay to be patient. It takes some time.

I know. So, you know, there are a lot of strategy that we can apply.

Like what we say, you know, tennis, you have to dream.

You know, when when a player, a couple of years ago, I was with one American organization, you know,

don't put myself in politics.

No, I will mention that I have a meeting with some guys.

And I say to them, when I did the project in Argentina, we won.

We won the World Championship in Japan under 14.

What we did was the first time worldwide that the one team was using the soccer t-shirt with the national colors.

And we put the logo because for Argentinians, football, we call it soccer in the United States.

It's a culture. You know, it's like a Brazilian.

It's a, it's like a first sport. It's for you.

American football or baseball, you know, it's like a.

Everyone is talking about that. You know, and we use a symbol to create sense of belonging, you know, and create the sense that you belong to a country and fight and have question, you know, and we won the tournament.

You can see pictures of Korean, and I've had a little.

And then they were number three in the world.

They be there was the developer for our for my program, you know, but we use a communication concept to create a very imagination and also to create a sense of belonging, which is giving you an extra sense of purpose.

And I wasn't a meeting with some guys in United States, which was the last big team of United States in the morning, the, the, the, the, the, many, many guys say to me, United States, the beating Russia, you know, I got to some past career.

I think it would talk to go Roman was the captain and Joe Magaro, okay.

And I say to them, okay, which one was the T shirt that they use it? Okay, which was, okay.

Let's do that you are looking for for the next Agassi Sampras courier and you make a deal with all the sport companies in United States to sell that T shirt that everything is cool in United States.

The kids can use it following the concept of the dream.

You drop water in the plan, you know, but this sometimes to develop players is a communication concept, you know, it's not only a technical approach.

It's a combination of leadership, communication, the right message, you know, annals branding, let's say, I'm also creating the concept that you belong to your country for you, the flag, the colors of the flag are very important, you know, why don't use it?

Why don't why you don't have kids everywhere using Davis cap underage for that kind of economy, Davis cap and you are creating the sense because to develop, I probably say one thing, which is very important.

Then this is a long term sport to double of a player you need at least 15 years today. If you are given to me or to us, you know, someone is giving to us a kid of eight years.

From 18 to 25, the standard when a player is stable in the under under the top 100, it's around 25 years.

Okay, it means even you have the best player under 18 in the world, you're going to spend seven years more to learn how to play in the circuit.

What big is the result? Of course, if you have an Alcaras of you have a gas here that that one is a exceptions, you know, I'm talking about no my guys.

Okay, you know, no my guys, which are very good, but I know my guys know are the seniors of the Alcaras or the feders or Nadal's or whatever, all the Serena Williams.

Okay, the thing is you need to create a systematic approach why because if you have a lot of players top to 100, the players is using that platform to jump to 100, then the next stage is top 50, the next stage is top 20 and the next stage is top 10 and then and you every player is using that stage to jump to the next level.

You know, and why is it important in the sense of belonging because you show Bobby and Fernando are training the same way and Bobby has a great result because we trained together.

I can say to me, I can do that because we are training to do it. If he did it, I can do it again. Are you going to think the same? That's the concept.

That's why if you sometimes there's no question of telling the question how you approach and you put a message, a vision, how you're going to make it and those first you need technical tactical stuff like sports science today, if you don't have very good team sports science, you are over, you know, it's not about is above today is above football.

Bobby, you know that but the shown 70% of the mistake technical mistake of the player in any level is of all footwork.

Today, if your players are not able to move in the right way in high speed, you are over. You can have all the talent in the hand.

You can have all the talent in your head, you know, but is if you don't have the talent to be always behind the ball and be able to manage different situations and different strokes and to resolve it with the legs and the body.

You know what I mean? That's why I say there are a lot of things but from my point of view, to the level of players has to be.

That's why I insist and say, no, I insist and say many years ago, he said the most powerful force in the universe is imagination.

You have to feed the imagination of the players in all the United States that they can feel that they will be the next Sampras Agassi's career, whatever, Blake, Serena Williams, Shara Povah, any player that you want to mention.

No, corners, you know, anyone Joe Marcaro, of course, okay, I think sometimes we are very isolated talking about one player. That's why the baller theory was good.

From my point of view, baller theory was created in the mutual vision to every player.

If you ask me, he was developing Agassi, Courier, he was working in Sampras, Shara Povah, a lot of players, you know, all of them are playing the same? No.

You are talking that he has a technical style? No. He has a tactical style? No.

He was a leadership, he has a leadership style where he was able to wake up the inner warrior, you know, and connect with everyone in the same level. That was, that from my point of view, baller theory was good.

Bobby's big on the team atmosphere and the culture of a group being able to help a player.

Look at this Spanish, I mean, look at this, you know, Spain, they developed the Spanish method, they had a team environment, Rafa won the French Open, but Rafa was still carrying Carlos Boyer's bags.

I think that's great. And I think, you know, from what this journey we've been on, that we've taken speaking to people, everybody comes back with the players love that team environment.

Like you said, give them purpose, give them purpose beyond themselves. A lot of people are just not selfish enough, but if you put something else on it, then they can rise to the occasion.

I mean, I love what you're saying. I love the idea. Obviously just for the technical standpoint, I'd love to hear your thoughts on Americans being behind because we grow up on hard courts as opposed to play saying what you're saying, you know, that it's such a more athletic sport today than it ever was that this game is ground up.

And unfortunately in the States, you still have a bunch of coaches still focusing on the stroke and not the balance, not the, you know, from the ground up. So there's so many things.

So a system across the board, great place start, of course. And tennis is always like that. And unfortunately, as we discuss often in this country, there's the governing bodies probably don't have the leadership that is necessary.

To your point, I always left we live in Atlanta. There's something called the Atlanta Law and tennis association. It's Alta. It's the largest recreational tennis league in the world. And if you ask people if they play tennis, they'll say no, we play Alta.

You gave them purpose. You gave them something bigger than them and Alta became the vehicle. And you know, everything you're saying, there's plenty of proof that you're absolutely right.

And also following what Bobby say, I am publishing a book. My last book, my 12th book, scummy now will be in English probably a day, no April, because we are correct in some of things.

It called it the four tennis. The four tennis for me is the tennis of the head, which is the how the brain and the mind learn. The second one is the tennis of the feet.

The third one is the tennis of the body and the hand. And the fourth one is the tennis of the hurt. It means if you see tennis, you have to divide in different tennis because sometimes you have a player which is have a wonderful hand.

He's able to hit every ball, but he is not able to think to take right decisions.

Or sometimes you have a good thinker, good hand, but he is not able to move, you know, because many times even coaches are not working to level up the right kind of pattern or play in terms of movement.

So if you see in the last 25 years, now is changing, you know, worldwide is changing that the enemies is working more and footwork, but for my point of view, I put in a book.

Footwork is the third stroke of the or the back.

And then back ends and footwork. If you understand that, you have to work footwork in the cell level, you are working for a hand of back ends, you know, because it's the same level, you know, even.

Very important. My point of view is we need to keep learning, keep discovering, keeping innovating, you know, keep challenging us about our mindset, talking what Bobby said, no, we cannot train in the future of coaches like mechanics.

Then this is not about foreign hands of back ends, even foreign hands, you know how many foreign hands we have, 54, no one more.

Because there is a concept which is situational training is depending the situation. Sometimes you are the ball here, here, here in attack, in defense, in control.

Our totally different foreign hands is not only foreign hands, it is a general concept. The most important thing in the high performance is the integrated approach, which is a situational approach about which can absorb you need in that particular tactical situation.

And if you are not training in that tactical situation, how the player will be able to compete, because tennis is about to compete.

And that's why from the beginning you need to compete always. Sometimes in the coaches asking me, Fernando, when you consider that players, even amateur, can start to compete.

And I say from the first lesson, you know, why? Because how to manage the pressure, you have to train people to manage that situation.

How do you do it from the beginning? Roll out a ball going to the net, which is who will be more closer to the net with the ball?

Do competition because tennis is about to compete. That's why there are a lot of players in the United States, the Argentina, Spain, Brazil, France, any country that nationally are playing quite good.

But when they are going to play internationally, they are not able to compete. Why? Because they don't practice enough how to manage the competition, how to deal with the pressure in different situations.

You know, you cannot ask for the player or train something that you never teach before.

You know what I mean? It's like Bobby say, we have some coaches, which is good because probably four years ago, our teaching philosophy was more technical.

And then, you used to happen in Argentina too. You know, your coaches say to you, okay, Fernando, go to play, try to watch in the rally, which is the style, which is the stroke.

It's not today. You have to study first, you have to train different situations. You have to integrate your footwork, your pattern, what happened when you are in the offensive game, controlling the game, the offensive game.

You have to create situations and follow in the situation, which kind of results are you going to use?

You know, that's why the integrated approach is more important now that the game based approach, game based approach has 20, 20 years.

Now is integrated approach that you are bringing the human being.

I cannot teach Bobby is my player. I cannot teach, you know, to attack the short ball is if Bobby is not, which we call it the mirror low.

The mirror low is when you face yourself and you work with your human being side saying, okay, when the ball is short, I have doubts.

I have fear. I have anxiety. Okay, what are you going to do?

You put it over and inside or you're going to work with yourself to try to resolve the situation. That's why I call it mirror and to transform you in new human being, which is able to manage that situation.

That's why we need to try work with human beings.

You know, this is not about forming as a package. It's about how we transform for people. You know, even for others, no, I'm talking even I'm the, the niche of high performance is to everyone to everyone is the same.

You know, if someone wants to jump forward in the next level, play tennis.

Bobby, I think we can talk for hours and in this case, actually just listen for hours. This is what I really like to share with you some idea.

Yeah, we have we have a lot, a lot to learn in general, even the industry, those of us coach types that need to learn more and that there is more out there, which is why we appreciate the world tennis conference that you're doing because there is more out there.

And it isn't just for the high performance coaches, although that's probably your target parents are going to learn from this any coach can benefit from it.

I've seen the list of 70 plus coaches you have there. There is a lot of great information and we are going to promote that as well that's coming up the end of March.

And we have all the links in the show notes and we'll do all that of course, but two more things one I wanted to ask Fran, it was anything specific.

You wanted to talk about our share if we have covered most everything that we were going to talk about this time.

I think I think even don't take the conference only like information.

And now for your audience and for the coaches and people who is playing if you can change 1% learning from every coach, you're going to change 70% which is a huge.

Only 1% to every speaker, you know, because sometimes we are looking for the half moment and that the half moment will be a principle concept, a phrase and real many many things.

And also in terms of what we are speaking about coaches.

Our profession is basis into give. The kind of profession that we have is to give others. That's why we are teacher coaches facilitators consultant any any name or brand that you can say.

And now we are in the to give industry. That's why always create attention and also traction attraction to the game.

It means from my point of view, the last big innovator in tennis, non-sports science in tennis was Dennis van der Beer from my point of view.

And Dennis van der Beer from the point of view was the last guy which is thinking out of the box, think for many many coaches, you know, which could be the better stage for coaches.

And I think this is very important, but Dennis van der Beer started the project 50 years ago. That's why we need to use what we learn and create no one person many knew that is the bridge Dennis van der Beer.

Guys who are ready to push forward bringing innovation and which was the key from my point of view. He was creating attention, which is when the brain is capturing attention immediately is like a kid is paying attention what you are saying.

You know second create attraction do your tennis program attractive to participate to learn third create traction movement why some 10 is this for him.

If I'm doing all with the same drill he gonna be more for the people is easy. You know, because the attention of one kid of eight 10 years is 10 minutes.

If you are doing for a hand to four or 15 minutes. My full my full and you know my gasoline and my my tank my brain time is over why because you don't know cut you don't catch your mind attention that you don't be very creative to create attraction.

You know what I mean that's why new generation are totally different that you we used to be when we were kids you know and that's why this is a message for all the coaches out there you know create attention capture know the names but Dennis van der Beer was so good knowing the names of everyone saying hey Bobby you are coming to the to the conference no he so Bobby and he say hey Bobby how are you.

Immediately and you say oh hey Fernando how are you.

Immediately the sense of recognition is very important to create connection.

You know that's why if you have a your tennis coach and you are working with kids being the same level with your eyes same level.

No no the name of the kids opening your arms when you are opening your arms the brain is registering that is a safe place to be smile which is connection and then say hey what if we you.

Sometimes it's about technique and understand how human beings connect with different tools which help us to deliver the message people are not connecting because I'm the best coach teaching the foreign and the United States come on guys no Bobby what do you think.

No I'm with you I mean I'm sitting here just laughing and of course you know all my favorites I love Dennis van der Beer I had to pleasure I worked with associate of his I watched him give a clinic and like you said that was part of their method is you learned everybody's name and he you know I watch him get good I still do this day I heard him say take a picture with his South African accent.

10,000 times because they were working on bodies and everybody who came to that he was a picture and you know I you know I love what you're saying to me I love and if we could sell it this is a great thing how do we teach the idea because we always go to the outliers like you mentioned the Alcaraz the center's all the guys that don't take the normal path.

How do we convince the folks that it's going to be 25 years and here's the great part about it you can still be getting better at 40 you might not win when win will win anymore but you should still be getting better and you know that so many people get into it you know the learning curve they get excited then they plateau and there's they lose some of the passion for the game.

That's a great part about this game is that it is constantly evolving so it is changing dramatically I think again I was judge a great podcast by how many more doors it opens how many more conversations it opens like you said the modern player why are they winning the grand slams like the old guys did you know and I think that's a lot to do with purpose and just the differences in personality and if they stick with it I think they're going to have a obviously they have a longer shelf life.

You don't see that you see guys playing a lot longer today so it's there's so many fascinating things and again goes back to that's what makes this sport great it's the reason why we play it it keeps us alive 10 years longer life expectancy there's so much good out of it let's keep working on the good.

And exactly Bobby and is it very important to every coach which is listening to this and to everyone who is listening why 10 is a very good sport to extend your life 10 years more cognitive reason because to you know when you are in the first stage of your life you start to suffer simple different kind of illness you know which is because you are coming off you know and one of the key.

Discover of the two universities the universe is Stockholm and the universe in a Copenhagen they put it that tennis is the best sport to extend your cognitive life 10 years more because you are taking decision all the time that it was short the position of the others you are thinking when you are thinking and also doing physical activity which is a main aspect to stay.

And of course adapt to the new generations and new times you know using more social environment create use the different balls to manage the level of the player like the Japanese is doing you know the thing is again bring back with being innovator but in your own program no innovator to do an invention which is you know discovering something very very important.

Very very odd no no no no simple things you know the other day I was doing a conference in Palm Svane the night last year and I say to the coaches coaches why we are always going from the forehand to the backhand why.

For the brain right side left side is the same but as like a tennis coaches we are saying we we say the weakest part of the player normally is the bagga okay from the beginning in any training session all over the world we are going from the forehand for the right side to the left side okay

rather to start sometimes to the left side going to the right side it means if we are assume that the the the weakest part of the game is the backhand let's work the backhand opening opportunity to the forehand one within the last 50 years all over the place

sometimes it's common sense.

Well it only sounds like common sense after you've told us because now we know it sounds obvious only after you tell us and I want you to tell us infinitely more but we've got to make sure we we don't stay here forever

so Fernando I appreciate your time number one and I want to end with my favorite question which we like which we love to ask and it is the king of tennis question so I'd love to ask you if you were king of tennis whether it's for the world or just high performance any scale you can imagine if you were king of tennis is there anything you would do or change

well there are many things probably my my my conversation can show you but three things I can mention very briefly firstly more recognition for coaches that is the the only sport that to be a ATP WTA coach with a badge you don't need to be a coach

it's a gravel you know some players is giving the badge of the coach to his girlfriend you know it means more recognition for our profession of course as like a coach we need to work at that you know but tennis coaches are the last part of the chain

for my point of view is the person in the middle one thing I'm going to do every every tournament in the world ATP WTA ITF used to be a coach be able to do coaching you have to be certified like a tennis coach

you know going to Kalamazoo the nationals I do want to coach is no problem you have a corner you have a box you know a sign in the box you can coach your player but you have to show your creation that you are a PTR is PTA ITF RSPA whatever you know Paramong use what you want

okay but I don't care about that for for my point of view is the discussion of public university or private university I don't care PTR use PTA RSPA whatever ITF you know from my point of view you have to be a coach

to be a paramedic in the United States you need to pass for certifications to be a paramedic in the United States to be a coach for eight hours

no my chance okay we need to improve that better recognition improve the quality of the process update because like happening doctors architects lawyers every two three years you have to update the knowledge

you know let's do a show with something which is not very very you know on the books you know is my point is be innovators break down some auto docs concept that we have in tennis and sometimes there are a lot of things that we can learn even from pickable and father we can learn from them you know why

I'm sure they are communicating better than us you know okay that's my requirement to keep that's great I love it I put some thought into it and I appreciate that because as I expected you put some thought into the future of tennis with the time you spend just doing what you do and being you and we appreciate that and I'm sure we can talk forever and you are welcome to come back anytime if there is more that you want to talk about but I will say thank you

Bobby of course so he's over there Bobby of course thank you so much friend oh so go I really appreciate your time we appreciate your time and we will be in touch and looking forward to the world tennis conference coming up next month thank you thank you

shams thank you okay take care and we keep pushing forward

well there you have it we want to thank rejGeovinate.com for use of the studio and signature tennis for their support and be sure to hit that follow button for more racket sports content you can go to let's go tennis dot com and while you're there check out our calendar of events great deals on

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