The Super Mental Training Book (6 page)

I played the match over in my head last night and I didn't get to sleep until 1 a.m. I felt Chris was nervous at the beginning and I didn't feel threatened. I didn't think she could hurt me. [4]

The ladies' champion practices her imagery the night before an important match, which is when Bunker and Rotella recommend you listen to a self-made visualization audio tape (though they urge you to listen to it every night). Late at night, particularly when falling asleep, is an excellent time for one to perform a mental training strategy, as we discuss at length elsewhere in this book. One thing Navratilova does not say is how she learned imagery, but clearly the discipline has helped her maximize her enormous athletic potential.

Other women tennis pros, fully appreciating the difficulty of excelling in their sport, have turned to mental training for assistance. Hana Mandlikova, who defeated Navratilova in the finals

of the 1985 U.S. Open, also engaged in imagery exercises to improve her on-court concentration. Focusing in on the matter at hand, whether it was playing tennis or participating in some other activity, had presented problems to Mandlikova over the years. She explained in the May, 1986 issue of Tennis, "If I was talking to somebody, I'd be listening to maybe five other people around me at the same time."[5] Her coach, Betty Stove, recognized the problem, and culled sports psychology books to find the logical remedy. Related Mandlikova:

Betty has really helped me mentally by giving me special exercises all the time. I would get bored if I had to read all the books, but she picks things out and writes them down for me to look at. She believes that tennis and working on the court is O.K., but that you also have to work your brain off the court. I remember one of the exercises taught how to concentrate on one specific thing. I've always had trouble with that. . . In this exercise, you look at a watch and concentrate on the hands for one minute. Then you rest a couple of minutes and imagine the watch hands moving in your head for one minute. I came pretty close to hitting the time consistently with practice. Things like that help on court when there are so many distractions around.

The watch-hand exercise is, of course, an imagery drill; some people might simply call it a "concentration exercise." But, it matters little what it is called. The drill, once mastered, leads you on to the next step, which is to imagine yourself hitting perfect shots, and so on. By regularly practicing this stage of imagery (the practical applications stage), extraneous factors present during competition, such as the crowd or what is going on in the next court, lose much of their potential to disturb you. Hana Mandlikova's experience certainly demonstrates this. She recalled the crowd reaction during her '85 U.S. Open victory over Navratilova:

I could sense the crowd was groaning after Martina won the second set so easily. It was like they were saying, "Oh, no, here she goes again. She's going to lose." But I never felt that inside.

So, the mental training exercises helped Mandlikova to disregard the crowd, and instead listen to her own internal voice. And she prevailed, defeating Navratilova in a third set tiebreaker. This victory was significant given the fact that Mandlikova had not won a Grand Slam title in four years (since the 1981 French Open).

Chris Evert, who along with Martina Navratilova ruled over women's tennis during the '70s and '80s, also employed visualization and other mental training strategies. She notes in a 1986 Tennis magazine article that "I have always been known for my mental toughness and determination. Those qualities have probably won me a lot of matches through the years, matches I easily could have lost." [6] How did Evert maintain her mental toughness and determination? Part of the secret lies in the tennis champion's following a mental preparation plan similar to the one Navratilova uses. She states:

I start thinking about an important match the night before. I visualize what the match will be like and that keeps me from falling asleep. I have a court in my mind and I visualize points. I play the points out inside my head as I think ahead to the next day.

Other things Evert did, she informs us, was listen to rock music while waiting in the locker room before the match to get "in a happy mood" and "positive frame of mind." If the match proved difficult, and went to a third set, "I [would] take some deep breaths and try to stay calm and relaxed," she explained; this was done at the changeovers.

From the late '70s through 1986, few women's Grand Slam titles were won by players other than Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert. It is instructive to note that both champions, comprising the greatest rivalry in the history of women's tennis, used visualization to prepare for the "big one."

Prominent tennis coach Nick Bollettieri sees a great need for mental conditioning; as reported in the November, 1985 issue of World Tennis, he advocates mastery and employment of relaxaion skills to cope with stress and tension. Working with top tennis pros Jimmy Arias and Aaron Krickstein, Bollettieri had the two undergo biofeedback training, in which "they were connected to a muscle tension feedback instrument and taught to relax and manage their tension."[7] Each player manifested anxiety in a different way, which seems to be the case with everyone. For instance, says Bollettieri, Arias "gets so worked up before a late afternoon match that he is physically exhausted before he even steps on the court;" by contrast, Krickstein "experiences a tightness in his jaw that sometimes extends down his neck, into his shoulder, and even into his arm." Since such symptoms of anxiety and tension can detrimentally affect performance, two things are needed: 1) awareness that one is tense, and 2) preventive or corrective treatment. Biofeedback testing, as conducted on Arias and Krickstein, is one way to determine one's unique anxiety patterns. Once these are known, Bollettieri recommends "single techniques, such as deep breathing exercises," to relax and clear one's mind as the occasion warrants. He states that such techniques have helped both Arias and Krickstein; this claim, however, requires further verification because no testimonials from the players are presented.

Bill Talbert, four-time U.S. men's doubles champion during the mid-1940s, once scored an extremely shocking victory thanks to his inadvertent exposure to hypnosis. Talbert entered a tournament in North Carolina, and had to face Bobby Riggs, then at the peak of his competitive game. He had never beaten Riggs in 32 matches, and figured there was no way to prevent loss number 33. However, a crazy sequence of events was to change Talbert's luck. In his book, Bill Talbert's Weekend Tennis (1970), he relates what happened:

The night before the match I was invited to a party that I intended to leave by ten or ten thirty in order to get plenty of sleep. But I was having so much fun there and my chances seemed so poor ("You in training for your thirty-third loss?" someone asked me), that I allowed myself to be persuaded to stay on—first until midnight, then one o'clock, then two... well, you get the picture. I arrived at the clubhouse for the match in my dinner clothes, never having been to sleep at all. In the car driving over, my friends from the party had practically hypnotized me by telling me over and over again, "You can beat him, you can beat him, you know you can beat him," and as I walked onto the court, light-headed and loose, that was the only thought my mind had room for. Bobby's usual psyching tricks were completely ineffective. I took him in straight sets, got a standing ovation, and his magic spell over me was broken.

Hypnosis is hypnosis, whether it occurs by accident or not. In Talbert's case, his all-night partying left him highly susceptible to any suggestions coming his way. He was on auto-pilot, and could not mentally resist his friends' repetitive commands to beat Riggs. Incidentally, this illustrates why salespeople often call you at night: they know you are tired from working all day, and therefore will be less able to fight their high pressure tactics.

Talbert's victory over Riggs certainly demonstrates the importance of the mental side of athletics. One tennis champion who realizes this is Billie Jean King, winner of 20 Wimbledon singles and doubles titles. She regularly practiced during her playing career what appears to be self-hypnosis. Tennis legend Pancho Segura states in his book, Pancho Segura's Championship Strategy (1976), "Billie Jean King will literally look at the ball for five minutes at night; she wipes everything else out of her mind and sees only the ball." Meanwhile, Eugene Cantin, in his Topspin to Better Tennis (1977), reports about King that "throughout the year before she won her first Wimbledon she spent five minutes every night repeating T can win Wimbledon!'" For the hypnotic state to occur a central focus of attention is required. The tennis ball King stared at served this purpose. Repeating "I can win Wimbledon!" was the hypnotic suggestion Billie Jean gave herself. It worked just as did the "you can beat him" suggestion given to Talbert by his

friends. (In fact, I strongly recommend such suggestions to any tennis player using self-hypnosis. Telling yourself "to win" provides a drive, a killer instinct —something so many tennis players lack. And there is nothing wrong with giving yourself this suggestion. After all, your opponent will gladly close out the match on you given the opportunity; so, return the favor.)

King's interest in mental training strategies is apparently not limited to self-hypnosis. According to teaching pro Bill Sheen, King also used a "stress tape" he has put out. Virginia Wade, 1977 Wimbledon champion, is supposed to have regularly listened to the tape, too, which makes sense because Sheen says she gave him the idea. The 22-minute cassette contains classical music, its purpose being to reduce tension.

L. A. Times staff writer John Weyler decided to look into the matter. He interviewed Sheen, who revealed how the tape's music seems to benefit one along both physical and mental lines:

"We did biofeedback tests with scans on the heart, body temperature and the brain," he said. "The results showed the music reduced the heart rate and body temperature and had a profound effect on the hypothalamus section of the brain, which controls the secretions of hormones from the pituitary. . ." "Most players tell me about a change in attitude," Sheen said. "The music tends to make one introspective and people become more aware of themselves. What often results is a more positive attitude." [8]

Sheen's classical music "stress tape," which really should be called an anti-stress tape, is hardly a breakthrough idea. Champion weight lifter Russ Knipp, for example, said in 1977 that the Bulgarian Olympic lifters "use music as one form of concentration" (see Weightlifting chapter). In fact, music therapy has for some time been widely practiced throughout Europe. [9] Even 800 years ago, the great Jewish physician Moses Maimonides, in his treatise On the Causes of Symptoms, written for his patron, Sultan Saladin of Egypt, advised the Sultan to lie down after eating breakfast, while "the chanter should intone with the strings and raise his voice and continue his melodies for an hour. Then, the chanter should lower his voice gradually, loosen his strings and soften his melody until he (the Sultan) sleeps deeply, whereupon he should stop." Added Maimonides, "Physicians and philosophers have already mentioned that sleep in this manner, when the melody of the strings induces sleep, endows the psyche with good nature and dilates it greatly, improving its management of the body."

You might wish to experiment on your own with soft classical music. It is not difficult to concoct your own anti-stress tape; but, if you want to avoid the effort, there is always Sheen's tape and others like it; still a good investment. No matter what you decide, it certainly would not hurt to incorporate calming music into the time you set aside for mental preparation for your upcoming competition or workout. Besides this, you may be wise to listen to such music during other periods of the day, for more and more evidence suggests that the employment of anti-stress measures is indispensable for survival in Western society. According to Dr. James Skinner, a Baylor University neurophysiologist, stress is what usually causes heart attacks, not clogged arteries. We note this pertinent section in the November 10, 1978 L. A. Times article, "Stress Alone Can Kill, Expert Says":

Skinner said his Houston laboratory blocked the coronary arteries of a group of pigs, the animal whose cardiovascular system most resembles man's. Some of them had been subjected to physical and psychological stress, such as being placed in unfamiliar surroundings or receiving mild electric shocks to the skin. The stressed animals died within a matter of minutes. The animals not under stress did not die, even when the major blood supply to their hearts was blocked.

Explained Dr. Skinner, "We found that the psychological factor was necessary for the occlusion (blockage) of the coronary artery to produce ventricular fibrillation, the death-causing component of heart attacks." As Dr. Skinner further observed, "it may be that brain states alone"

are what triggers heart attacks. If so, this would help explain the puzzling circumstance of heart attacks striking people regarded to be in excellent physical condition. The pressures of modern society being what they are, Dr. Skinner suggests that science develop an "anti-stress pill" to help people deal with the situation. But, this development has already occurred. We can easily get through the day by utilizing meditation, calming music, and other proven stress combatters such as proper nutrition and daily exercise; such strategies as these make up the "anti-stress pill."

All this is necessary to bring up because even some top athletes, presumably in peak physical condition, have suffered heart attacks. In tennis the most famous example is that of Arthur Ashe, who incurred a heart attack in early August, 1979, and underwent a quadruple heart by-pass operation the following December. One wonders if by 1979 Ashe had abandoned the meditationlike procedure he had used at Wimbledon in 1975. Whatever the case, meditation offers one approach toward reducing stress. Studies by Dr. Ronald Jenning and Dr. Archie Wilson, professors of medicine at the University of California, Irvine, verify this. Scott Moore, L.A. Times staff writer, reported that one study by Dr. Jenning and Dr. Wilson "indicated that those who practice meditation experience a decrease in the hormone Cortisol—an indicator of stress—in their blood flow during meditation. Another study showed a decrease in blood lactate concentrations— another stress indicator—during meditation."[ll] Such studies are cause for optimism. They demonstrate that once we become aware of the stress factors present in our lives, we can do something to reduce or eliminate their negative impact.