Heart racing, palms sweating, cries from spectators. You’re in the middle of a caged arena fighting your way out. This is what a state championship atmosphere feels like. In the moment it felt like forever, but when I think back, I can barely remember it. However, that's what it takes. Being so present that you can block out everything around you and focus on that very moment and nothing else. This is just one aspect that contributed to becoming a two-time state champion.
The physical and mental strain of tennis is something that steers people away from the competitive side of the sport. You see players, even the best, like Novak Djokovic having meltdowns on the court. Screaming, shouting, and breaking rackets for what seems like no reason from the spectator's perspective. Unless you have played tennis at a competitive level before, it's impossible to understand or feel that intensity and pressure.
To achieve one's winning aspirations in tennis, or any individual sport for that matter, it takes more than just being the most talented player on the court. It takes an unmatched level of desire, diligence, and commitment to every aspect of the sport. As previously mentioned, these aspects include the physical and mental side of tennis. That's what I will dive deeper into today.
2023 Oregon Doubles State Championship Match
The physical side of tennis isn't just giving it your all during matches, it includes taking the same energy you put into a match into every training session. You have to practice the way you want to perform. In tennis, it is easy to be lazy and get away with mediocrity during practice, but it will show during matches. That's where the commitment comes in. You have to commit yourself to leaving everything out there whenever you are training. You have to push yourself and focus on the little things to improve. This means focusing on your footwork and working to optimize your movement on the court. Yes, you are going to get tired. Yes, it is going to be tedious. But that's what it takes to win. You want to go into a match knowing you prepared as much as you possibly could and the only reason you would lose a match is because your opponent outplayed you, not because you came in unprepared. If you leave a match feeling you didn’t do enough, you didn’t work hard enough in training.
Training doesn’t come in the form of just using a ball machine or hitting with a friend. Training at a high level includes doing footwork drills, conditioning drills, strength work, and hit drilling. It takes consistency and a desire to get better and train with purpose. There were certainly days I didn’t want to get up on a rainy Saturday morning and strength train in the undercover area of a middle school in the frigid Portland weather. But I did because I knew that's what it took to get to where I wanted to be. It wasn’t negotiable.
Moving on to the mental aspect of tennis, this is where desire and commitment become very important. You must come to an agreement with yourself about where you want to go in the sport, understand how you have to get there, and then decide if you're willing to commit to the process under any circumstance. I made a deal with myself that I would do everything in my power to give myself the best chance of becoming a state champion. There were some sacrifices I had to make throughout the process and even sometimes asked myself, “Is this worth it?” I missed out on social events to train instead. I had to stay in on Friday nights to be prepared to train at 8:00 a.m. the next morning. I had to tell my friends I couldn’t hang out because I had a tournament coming up on the weekend. It was tough, but I had a goal and had a deal with myself.
On the court, tennis requires an immense amount of mental focus. You must stay calm, but be all guns blazing during points. You have to accept that frustration is imminent, but it's what you do with the frustration that sets the greats apart from the good players. You sometimes don’t have control over the outcome of a point but you have control over how you react. This matters in tennis where momentum is a factor and you never want to give your opponent leverage or make them feel in control of the match due to your frustration. Emotions run high in tennis but you have to use your emotions to your advantage and not let them play against you. Being a doubles player, I made sure to use my emotions to lift myself and my partner.
There is nothing compared to having swarms of people surrounding your court, pressed up against the fence cheering and hollering. The amount of focus as well as physical and mental preparation leading up to the state final match allowed me to feel confident. There were nerves, but not regarding how I was going to play, only about what was at stake. I knew I did everything I could to prepare and it was just about executing at that point. And that's what I did. My doubles partner and I went on to win the 2022 and 2023 Oregon 6A OSAA Doubles State Championships.
2023 OSAA State Championship Ceremony
Winning a state title was more than just winning a medal, it was a display of dedication and persistence. The feeling of winning, that sigh of relief, and the overcoming of emotions made it all worth it. If I had to do it all over, I wouldn’t change a thing.
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