Gavin MacMillan: He Fixed Sabalenka's Serve. Now He's Working With Coco Gauff

Tennis is a single hardest sport in the world to succeed in professionally. You have to be a great athlete, so you have to have great speed, you have to have great endurance, you have to have the mind of a world-class chess player. There's just nothing it doesn't ask. There aren't world-class players that aren't smart out there. There doesn't exist. If you look at the first final arena played, I think she don't fall to six times against Robacca, but if she flash forward the next year, she don't fall to six times the whole turn. It's with the arena if she was serving a 70% for a surge she was on mute. This idea of bigger, faster, stronger is just the biggest lie I've ever told. Loin titers, it's Karol Garcia. Before we start, one quick thing. If you enjoy this conversation, hit the subscribe button. It's the best way to help us grow and keep bringing you to players and coaches you love. Thank you so much! I grew up playing hockey. When my mom passed away at 15, I was playing seven sports at the time. It was normal. Everybody played. Hockey was a travel team, baseball was a travel team, and then you played basketball, volleyball at high school, ran track, played soccer. The tennis wasn't even my life. He's nice with team sports. Parents grow up as a kid. Obviously, if there are very bad people, they can have enough effect on their kids, but if not, it's more complicated. Yeah, because they can't. There's so many other people around, so it's tough to do it in public and get away with it. I grew up in the restaurant. If that comes in your aunt's, you look, I thought this was the best way to get her to pro. I would put already a lot of questions. Why do we have to push so much someone to become a pro athlete? But then once she has pro, she has resources to hire a team, while you don't step down, and you get a proper coach. It's not going to get you to fly. You get a busier, that has been working with and drag us, you know, like, whatever, experience people. Yeah, but I think that's the usually narcissism on someone's part, right? And they're living somewhat through someone else's life. And this idea, first of all, like if you're putting that concept in a child's head, like, you're going to sit there and tell me that Alcara is at 13 when you watch him. Yeah, he's a good player. He's a good kid. He bouts and around. He's a good shot maker. You have a crystal ball to show he's going to be number one in the world. When I was helping Brandon Akashima, we played him on clay like years ago, right? And look, I thought he was good. Of course, like, good athlete. Like, you could see the markings of, you know, big forehand, but he wasn't serving very well. And to say he was going to be number one, no, no chance. I thought that. And I would say the same with the attic, right? But look at the difference that's happened now in terms of the way they play. And, and, and, and in the men. Like, the men's game now, it's just, to me, it's just absurd. The level that they're hitting the ball with. And the margins, you know, victory are just so small. I mean, Carlos was a pointer to from being out in in Australia. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And, and obviously, Yanuk was. So it's the, the differences are so small and the chances that somebody can get into this. And I think they really lose the perception of this. So if you thought about any other career, and you said you were top 100 in the world in it. So you're the best one of the best hundred lawyers in the world. You're one of the best hundred doctors in the world. And in tennis, because, you know, and I've tried to explain this to people before, it's a single hardest sport in the world to succeed in professionally. And, and when you look at the skills required, there's so many different skills you have to have, right? So you essentially have to be ambidextrous. You have to have, you be able to swing with power off both sides. And you have to be able to volley, you have to be able to hit overheads, you have to be able to serve hit returns. You're changing the courts every week. You're changing the balls every week. Your opponent changes every day. There is no sport that requires this none. And people, when they try to say like golf is as technically difficult, golf isn't even close to this. It doesn't move. It doesn't move. I mean, you're, you're going to say that getting paracard serve back is as hard as playing golf. The guy serves 150 miles an hour, like, give me a break. And you're doing it into a very large space that you have to cover. So it's not something to say. If you was, tennis was just served. Yes. So then, you know, you still have to be a great athlete. So you have to have great speed. You have to have great endurance. You have to have the mind of a world-class chess player. Like, there's just nothing it doesn't ask. That doesn't exist. You can't just bash balls and pray. Does not work. No, because during one match, already many things happen. And sometimes you have change of tactics. And then between in one tournament, it's like all another story. Exactly. You have to deal with like different kind of players, different conditions. With a different level of yourself as well. Yeah, you are as inspired as the preview. What was Australia as this year was when there was 40s and there was 20 with like full wind. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, in pro sports in the US, like, the smallest teams are like the NBA. So you got 12 guys per team, but there's 30 teams, right? So you're still dealing with 300-400 guys that are making a really good living. That doesn't include Europe and all the other leagues where you can still make good money. Baseball, it's 30-something, and there's 30 plus teams. So now you're dealing with almost a thousand players that are making great money. The NFL is 53 guys per team. Wow. That's about okay. Yeah, but 30 players on that team will make under the, you know, a million dollars. So the league minimum, 750, something like that. And then the elite players, obviously, they can make real money now. But those contracts didn't even used to be guaranteed. And you're taking your life in your hands. I mean, you're dealing with 250 pound people that run 440s trying to kill you. So, yeah. I'd say the only other sport, like mentally, that's the same is the fight business. Or it's just one-on-one, and I've had a lot of my career in that. And the mindset that it takes, the dedication it takes for, you know, camps or eight weeks, they're really long, they're tough. And you have to show up on Saturday night, which is typically when the big fights go off. And you need to be ready. And if you don't prepare properly, you can forget it. You're not going to figure it out out there. Like the. I mean, you have a visa to reach it already. But like, I think a few weeks ago, there was one video of fighting guys, of a guy who had to lose like so much weight before the weight day. And on the weight day, like, he waited himself and then just like collapsed. Yeah, and usually the fights called off if a guy passes out now on the stage. So the weight cuts a big part of it, right? In 2000, when I was at 15. But sometimes you were saying, yeah, they have to lose like 10 kilos. Or more. No weight. Yeah. And then they do the weight day. And then they take back eight kilo or 10 in one day. So the way that works is the. And it depends on the rehydration clause. If you're smart enough to make sure you have it. And if you have the power in your camp to be able to enforce it. Because there's always an A side and a B side in the fight business. And the A side controls the rules. So like, may weather, for instance, he's been A side as a tire career. So these, they write the rules. When we fought, I used to work for Miguel Codos, one of the best. How do you describe him? Well, he's a Hall of Fame fighter that won, you know, World titles in four divisions. But he's one of the best people I've worked with in my life. And the way he treats his team, once you show him, you know, the willingness to work hard and make sure that things are taken care of. That's how he treats you. And that's just not normal, right, in the sports world. But we had to fight Kenawa Alvarez, who at that time was very up and coming Mexican fighter. And we've. The fight was out, I think, 154. And when he stepped into the ring, he stepped into the scale coming into the tunnel that, you know, an HBO put a scale there, you know, and he said, "He was 178 pounds." So he had gained back 24 pounds in 24 hours. And we were 157. Miguel, Miguel, that's his weight. So it was like, "Come on." I'm not sure if I. Yeah. And so the politics of it, you know, if you enforce the rehydration clause, you know, then you can say, "Okay, you can't be more than 160, something like that." Okay. And a lot of times they do that now. You have C. They didn't even use to, you know, drug test people up until 2014, '15. And George Shapiro really started spearing heading that because he was getting frustrated because he knew people were. And everybody's accusing him of that. And he's like, "I'll pay for it." Yeah. I'm not doing this. And people still refuse, right? Okay. And now it's mandatory. But. I mean, in the sports leagues, you say it's quite important. Of course it is. Because you literally end someone's life. And in boxing, a lot more people get killed. Like, you have seen that you get hurt, obviously, but because the knockout rules are so different and you don't get a standing count. Like, if you hurt somebody quick, you know, they're down, the chances are getting up, but doesn't happen that much. Okay. Boxing, you get a 10 count, you get your senses back a little. Now you get back up and you get hit 20 more times. So it's a, but the mindset, right, to be able to stand in front of 20,000 people with two million watching and, and this guy's trying to, trying to kill you. It's not simple. I'm not doing that. You didn't either. You did boxing and then you went to tennis? No, so like I, my, most of my career has been in the strength and conditioning side. So I've always had tennis players, but we have, like company has a different way of approaching sports performance in terms of the strength side, especially. And we don't use conventional weights at all because frankly, it just doesn't work. And it never did. And in the United States, like if you look at the community, the strength and conditioning community, 99% of them are completely uneducated. Their ex want to be football players that don't study a thing and they're pushing a bench brush, a squat, and a power playing. Like how the hell is that helping her? There's nothing to do with it. How is that addressing her flexibility or reaction time or lateral movement? All the things that dominate tennis, tennis is dominated by lateral movement. Straight ahead speed helps here and there, but it's the least important part of your speed, right? And so what we were doing is really, because you know, as an athlete myself that was quite fast and when I was in high school and like that nobody was really pushing weightlifting. I spent six weeks squatting, I couldn't dunk a basketball anymore and I was like, I'm not doing this anymore. I'm too small, I'll get killed out there. You didn't know why, but you just knew it felt like crap and I'm not going to do this. And then you flash forward and started looking at how the Russians were training people, specifically a guy named Berkashansky. He wrote a book called Super Training. And they basically try to analyze everything from A to Z on how to train athletes during a communist era. And we took a lot of the principles that came out of that and just started applying it and then started building equipment around it or finding equipment that already existed that you could train people, plyometrically with load. So the world is training people for force. So it's just pure mass times acceleration when they need to be training people for power, power is displacement. So it's force times velocity. And that is the ability to move yourself and your own body weight. That's predominantly the elasticity in your tendons. So if you look at somebody like Federer and the efficiency that he moves with, which he's never, it really calls him so graceful. Well, why? It was so light, it looked so light moving. We'd spring it like a cat. That's the elasticity in the tendons, whereas an adult was always forcing it, right? And phenomenal athlete, but doesn't have the same efficiency of movement and it obviously cost him from an injury standpoint, but he also lifted a lot. So when you look at lifting weights, people believe you can grow muscle. That's just factually incorrect. When you start loading people vertically on their body, right? First of all, you're risking the spine, which is an S curve and it's at specific risk. It's C7 and then L4L5 where it's curved. So how you're going to take that risk to justify, you know, just increasing what's called concentric strength. If you have other ways to get power, right? Because when you have weights, the muscle grows laterally and radially, right? So if you think about a peck muscle, and I start benching a lot, it grows this way. But the problem with that is is when I go to serve and I go to throw something, it actually has to stretch longitudinally and then release itself, right, so that it can actually roll the arm forward. So you're doing the very thing, the opposite thing you need to do to improve the elasticity of it. You look at Federer's upper body, it looks like a toothpick, right? But super powerful because he knows how to get the torque of his spine to accelerate his arm, whether it's off his forehand or off his serve. So you have to get super lucky, I think, with who you run into as a coach or as a player, with the right coaches when you're young, that actually have knowledge. And they aren't just following what everybody else is doing. Yeah, and also like, as a kid, it's even more important because like, as a kid, if you start to lift weight very early when your body is still growing and you're not prepared, it's even worse. Well, so your body's 60% water. So it's an enormous risk. And remember the epidemic of soft tissue injuries we have now did not exist when I was playing high school sports. We didn't have people tell their ACLs, they're, they're Achilles tendon. This stuff just did not happen. But if you start thinking about it a little differently in that your body is, you know, predominantly water. And I vertically load it and I vertically load the joints. You know, the joints, your knee, for instance, has four primary ligaments that hold it together. You know, you keep it moving. The tibia from going forward, from back and from side to side. There's four of them. And if you increase the weight load on someone. So let's say we increase the, your body weight. Yep. So you go from, you know, 140 pound women to now 180 pound women and you're all muscular and everything else. You're carrying 40 extra pounds of weight on the same exact limit ligaments. Yeah. Yes. It's a stress. It's no different than your door. And that's another example. I've used 100 times. If you take the mass of your door and say it's 25 pounds and it has three joints holding it to the wall, right? Well, if you triple the mass of the door and start swinging it quickly, you think maybe those joints are going to pull out of the wall. I think they are. They're not built for that. And so this idea of bigger, faster, stronger is just the biggest lie I ever told. And fetter being, you know, you look at his posture and his balance and all these things that are so important to athleticism, the strength. There's nine types of strength. Which one are you training? That's what you have to start asking. So when you change direction, that is plyometric movements, right? Your feet are not in constant contact with the ground. When you're squatting, your feet never leave the ground. Right? So it's all concentric force. Well, how a human produces strength, once they start moving and change direction is completely different than we're trying to move an external load. And then they'll say, well, you can convert it from that strength to this one. It's physically impossible. So now is like certain measurement tools are coming out, right? You can prove that if you lift as much as 20 pounds too much, your power gets cut by about 80%. Because the ability to move it quickly changes so drastically. This will eventually, you have to have the right ability to measure it to prove it. And that's the problem in the strength business, right? Everybody's got an opinion. Yeah. Not a lot of data. Not data. Yeah, yeah. There is a lot of different opinion in like. How can that be? How can that be possible? Your shoulder and my shoulder are built the same. So it's his, right? So if you're trying to look at human anatomy and how it works, it's not a debatable fact about once a person starts moving, how they produce power out of each step. That can't be different for you and me. We can be different in terms of how well we do it, but it can't be different. So if we do the same thing, we will be able to do to improve the same. No. So that would imply that everybody could be saying bold. Now obviously talent, coordination, but athleticism is a learned behavior. It's, you're born with it? Yeah, okay. By the time I was 16, I was the fastest player in the country in hockey. But at five, I was put in volleyball class. At six, I was put in figure skating. I was not allowed to play hockey. At seven, I was finally my first organized team event. And I won the scoring title that season by double because I could skate and no one else could. So is it talent or is it the environment and the training that I was put into? Why do you think there's such a lack of professionalism or a data backed exercises in such a high performance and sport with so much more than his tennis? Well, I mean, now you're opening another can of worms, right? So I think that if you look at a lot of the coaching things that happen out here, that there's people that develop personal relationships with their player. And they become emotionally dependent on them. They're not providing elite information to be able to help them. So they have, because this tour is such a crazy example of you're traveling somewhere every week, these people can become your friends or whatever it is. And how are you going to find a people that want to do it? Right? It's not easy. I think there's a major gap in terms of where do you look at people's credentials, their experience, or is it you just like them and keep them around? I mean, you are on tour. Why do you think there's such a gap? Because if you're looking at it from my standpoint, right, it's you. Like, you know, I've always been a fan of yours from the day I met you. I've always tried to encourage her and everything because you're such a phenomenal athlete. And as a coach, you're looking on and I'll give you my 22nd analysis, right? You were playing too tight, like muscully with your serve. If you could have been a little bit looser with your arms, it probably buys you another five, even 10 miles an hour off that. Technically it's super solid, you know, very simple with the way you bring it up. So it doesn't break down. Off the ground would get too aggressive and not be patient enough of when to attack. Great hands at the net, like how many more thing, you know, phenomenal mover, you know, you have all the gifts. So then as a player, you know, if you're in a situation of doubt, and I think that maybe is the biggest thing is that it's so much easier to believe that you can't be great. And to be great at anything means you have to fail so many times and not worry about it. So did you grow up in an environment that allows that? Like in your case doesn't seem like it. So then if that's happening, like you're constantly feeling like you're under a microscope and you just can't play. You take or you do the opposite, right? You take too much risk and don't allow your opponent to break down. Like there's antennas is such a difficult sport that way in terms of when to pull the trigger and when to when to sit back and let your opponent. Anyway, I'm the one talking now asking you, but no, no, go fight. No, I mean, that's that would be my, you know, analysis, but and then of course you're always just such a nice person. So then you just want to see nice people do well, right? So do you think if I was more lose on my serve, I would have less shoulder problems? Yeah, so like the and you have to actually just look, you know, slowly at the at the video frame, I find it to look at it. I don't know what the what was your shoulder injury? More than those. Yeah, he was not. I had pain at contact on the ball. Say a contact? Yeah. They did not like on scans and everything. Nobody was seeing much. No, didn't see this is something that I'm not remembering. I remember about two. But I mean, I've been through this a thousand times. But I feel like there is more and more like, like we were talking like big injury in tennis, shoulder injuries, like a classic one, everyone has shoulder problems. When you stop tennis, no one can do a serve. No, I can't. No, I've been throwing all my life at the carlage and then but things changed like for me, like I've been told I was 44, like I could still dunk a basketball. I was still super explosive, got hurt and then it starts going the other direction and you're just eventually the wear and tear, right? Of what you're doing. But tennis when you make impact is force, right? So it's like the end of a punch is force when you hit here it bang. And so where would you get the pain? Yeah. Yeah, that's your biceat tendon. Yeah, inside. Inside. So then I would be asking like what was the routine that they were doing? Because if the scan, like remember magnetic resonance imaging is a guess, not definitive. The only definitive is putting the camera in there. And unless somebody did that, then they can't necessarily pick up some of the small things. But it's a ball socket joint. So it has to be able to roll and move around. And it sits inside of a labor room, right? That acts more like a suction cup. And then the support muscles of the shoulder complex are quite complex for the shoulder. So then you have to look at how is the shoulder being treated in terms of where you're doing movements that are similar to your serve at high speed and different ranges of motion, different planes of movement. And unless you get lucky with someone that's great, then you know, you're just you're guessing. But you know, did you do the right water therapy for it? Like we had a whole protocol for that. Yeah, that because we deal with baseball. Got him to that. Yeah, like many other things player. Yeah, I feel like at least I don't feel only my problem. But it's just like it feels like lean tennis like there is way more injury and there is way more people who need like a break or cannot like play the old season. The seasons insane. Yes. And like how does it make sense? Like think think we are seasoned started the last, you know, Thanksgiving in the US. So that's the last week in November. That's when our new season started. Yeah, yeah, because we're in our preseason. And that was the entire month of December. Got on the plane a day after Christmas went to Australia, played the United Cup. Right from there we go to Australia. We have five days to get ready for the tournament to play that. You come back and now we're here. We had three days in Florida. And now this is the way it's going to go until Thanksgiving next year. There's no other sport that doesn't that has this type of physical demands. It doesn't have a three month off season. So like our football players that we would try in NFL, right? Their season starts in what is that August. And ends, you know, if you get to the Super Bowl last weekend. But they then to have like two months off and these guys they would come back like, no, I got to get ready for the next season. I'm like, Jesus, I've been in like 200 car wrecks in the last four months. Go rest. Yeah. Like you want to last because the average football player lasts two and a half years in the NFL. You can't stand it. Oh, you can't. No, it's a revolving door. And when you're looking at the, you know, the genetics of these guys and the speeds that they're hitting people with, it's insane. And the fact that somebody doesn't get killed doing every year is shocking. So for tennis, like again, four different surfaces, right? Different balls all the time. There's so many components that don't allow you to make, you know, try to stay healthy. So if you look at your body and what you're having to do, right, you're having to swing overhead a lot, which isn't the most natural movement for a person. And obviously the multiple impacts off both sides, you have multiple impacts for your legs, your body. So it isn't just one thing that you have to look at it. You have to look at it in its totality. A, do they have the necessary power to be able to move themselves properly for three hours in women's tennis if they need it? Are they flexible enough to be able to withstand extreme positions if they're put into it, which will happen eventually. And do they have muscular balance throughout their body because if they don't have that, A, it's going to affect speed, but B, it dramatically impacts injury rates. And then did somebody properly evaluate you? So for flexibility, joint mobility, muscle strength. And then do they even have the understanding of what that is? No. So I would say the European trained physios now are some of the best because of the education. But like you take my wife, for example, who's a physical therapist, has her masters in physical therapy, has her PhD in physical therapy, has 15 years of practical experience from children to the highest professional levels in the world. She's a lecturer, she's, you know, overlooks PhD students. She runs a research lab where we test athletes on a weekly basis. How many people have that kind of resume? And so like, and then our, that is when you scratch their background is very random, like somehow they made the player don't even get me started. We had Francesca Jones, the British player. She was saying that there's like so many like bullshit on tour and like, uh, fissures or fitness coaches, like, see like, cool, like, just on Instagram. And think, well, this is going to be also one of my Instagram. So then he's just like, he's actually the good idea to do it in most seconds behind it. None. And you know, that was why we called our company what it was called, what it's called is, is because the I wanted scientific proven principles, not somebody's trend, somebody's opinion. And so few people on the physical side of this has attempted this, where the comprehensive nature of the research was put around what best advanced that. And that's just the physical part. You have to address, you know, in tennis, there was the physical part, the technical part, and the tactical part. And the without the technical part and that piece, these two become to not matter because you can be fast, but it and to a certain point, you're going to get enough balls back to get you a certain level. You're not winning slams like that. It's not possible. The men, it's impossible. The women, it's become impossible, right? Because, you know, you look at the way Ash Barty played, he was so intelligent on a tennis court in terms of changing spin pace, always disrupting rhythm. And that's not a, there's not a lot of players out there that can can do that now. So the, if you're not, and I had a really good conversation with Jim Courier at Australia. And, you know, he said, he points something out that like this, this air now is so much different than when he played because like, even though he knew like that his backhand had flaws, he knew he could make it, he knew he could get it deep, but with the way the pace is today, that you can't get a way with technical flaws anymore. And I hadn't thought of it like that, but like the way he phrased it was correct, right? So you're in a sport that the second something's not working, everybody finds out and they're coming after it's blood in the water. in the charges. So the modern game, the way it's going, even though they've slowed the courts down so much on most of this tournament, the impact and the pace that people are hitting with has changed so much that there's that component that offsets a lot of it. So if you went to these faster courts, you can see that's where in Cincinnati people can get exposed, because on the faster courts, you know, Al Krauss is struggled there sometimes and you're going to tell me that Pete Samper is serving at his best at 25 years old on the original, you know, the grass courts that one of them used to be, isn't driving every single player here nuts. Come on, you have one look a set, right, because of how good his serve is and where's his serve power abilities today with the technology we have now. I mean, it's significantly better than what he was doing. That's sure of. I mean, speed wise, power wise. Oh my god. I'm not sure if he was how totally wise, but he's about 61, but he could dunk a basketball. He had long arms. Yeah, he was a phenomenal athlete. He probably had, if not the best on the run for hand ever, who's was better, but like that would be another component. I mean, how many how many times when you were taught tennis, were you told to go this way? No, you have to finish here. Yeah. Go watch and try to find a forehand that Pete was hitting on the on the run to his right where he did not finish this way. And now you look at the game today and look how much Al Krauss does that look how much Federer did that? Everybody calls it Rafa. Rafa, like JC who I, you know, work with, he point out the other day, like Rafa didn't used to always do that. And he was bringing up videos and showing me. And he's like, then when he started really, you know, accentuating this, he became so much harder to beat. And it's a very effective and necessary shot for the for the modern game because if you're late at all, right? And try it. You have to keep extension is here now if you're coming across. But if you're coming this way, you can take it a little bit later and come up through it this way. And now you're taking the back side of the ball almost every time. So that creates the RPMs that then you can try to accelerate under pressure because it's what you can do under pressure, right? That that wins or loses. That's just, I mean, don't you think? But again, like you weren't taught to do that and yet you were sure. You had to figure it out on the court. Like it comes out as you're in quite naturally. I will say probably in matches or that's how you learn it. Obviously, sometimes one of the mistakes when there are like kids were younger or like teenager and everything seeing rougher all over one, but like just like going from here to going up, but without going like four, if George go up, you're going to play very short. Like the way you hit the ball is more or less the same, but then you finish a bit higher. So you have like more. You just expanded much better. But sometimes like especially at one moment, when Waffa was so good and was doing every time, you were saying so many kids doing like, yeah. And like the ball was like, yeah, barely passing the ball. But like obviously, like when you do it like this and then you finish, you understand like why you are winning and obviously when you're running on your phone, it's like mandatory. You have no other option now. Yeah, and 100%. But again, if it's not being practiced every day, how are you improving it? You're going to improve it and then the stress of the match. You look with that. Yeah, rings out. We had Brad Jean Verde in that in an episode when he was talking about these, not like how much like they put the focus on drills and stuff, but then like players don't know how to adapt how to compete and he was like just compete and now he figured out what was the best way for you to play. Yeah. That's yeah. I mean to try to, you know, to prepare somebody for this, for the level, right, to try to win. Yeah. You know, you've got to, you've got to be covering all of the bases and because the, it's, you're going to get exposed otherwise. There's too, too many people doing this that want it. And are working hard and trying to achieve this. And I think you have to be pretty smart these days to be able to take a look at your own game and say, okay, here's what I'm doing well. I'm not doing this so well and have the guts to sit down and say, hey, I've got to work on this. And if I can just bring this up to a good level, it doesn't necessarily have to be great. Now, I, you know, I'm winning five to eight more points that I was losing before and that's a, that's two games. That's a lot. It's true that sometimes he can be surprising and maybe I'd say every moment that women's do it, you know, I'm not an expert on what about how some players still don't know how to do some stuff. And I'm like, some players doesn't know how to do like a proper drop shot. Like they gave me so tough now you should be able to do everything like properly. I mean, not some better shots than others, no, but like you should be able to do everything. If not, it's going to be hard sometimes. Well, it'll get impossible. So you can't, because when I was with Arena, like we had, oh, guys, I don't, I might memory of exactly when we start doing that as in the best, but it was before I think the Clay season 24 and Anton really started. And we started working a lot on her drop shots. Those one that was open at that and the ability to go this way because she, she didn't really use that shot then that much. And it was actually an Abu Dhabi that we started trying to get her to do it more. And especially with her power, like it was just like, was she a person? It was just come on. Like, you know, if you do that, the effectiveness of it is really good. But, but again, you have to explain it right. Right. It's not here. You have to still go through it and then come up. And that's, you know, and again, so if you don't have the right person around teaching it, then things don't work. And that's back to the same thing that you said before. It's like, how do you get lucky enough to get the right, you know, conditioning person that's not lied about as resume or didn't have one at all? Which happens a lot. And then is now in charge of somebody's physical program who's trying to win grand slams like that just requires a lot of you physically. So then you have to get somebody that also understands the technical side, right? And how to improve that. And then somebody has to be able to fill in the tactical side. So if you don't have those three pieces in the modern game, I would like to understand how you think you're winning a grand slam. Good luck. In a team like either when you join Sabalanka over a team, maybe your role is slightly different. But what is your role? What do you do? Well, specifically to improve, you know, her shot making, right? But like, JC is very knowledgeable in this. Like that he's been in tennis all his life. And so, you know, putting people into like the role, yes, that's specifically everyone knows. Like I was hired to help her with her serve and her forehand that she's been struggling with. But he's had great experience working with a lot of players, both on the male and the female side. He knows her way better than I do. He's been around her since, you know, she was 15. Yeah. And specifically these last two years, and we talk about everything. So, you know, if anything, this is more of a collaboration in terms of what we're doing with her. And, and he's been super supportive and great about it. So, you know, we don't put anything in front of her that we don't discuss. Like this is a team and we, you know, I make sure that this is how we are going to approach things. Like and I think that not using his knowledge and his, you know, his experience on tour would be a mistake. How difficult is it to change a technical thing on a professional tennis player who is already an adult? Well, I don't know. So the first one where I really started changing it was Brandon Akashima and we, the first time I was helping him with his tennis was when he was 17 and he qualified for the ITF Junior Masters. No different than the Masters in Pro's. You know, there was only eight people invited. And, you know, I was doing his movement stuff in his conditioning then and he had come up and was a top junior in the world, but he was limited with his serve and his forehand. And so I just, they asked me if I would help him before his tournaments and one of his other coaches couldn't wasn't available. I don't even remember. And I said to him, like, well, you know, you're the 8th seed, like the way you're hitting the ball off the ground, you know, that side and you're serving. Do you really think you have a shot at winning a tournament? And he's like, I don't know. I'm like, well, no. So we have nothing to lose. So why don't we just take this month that we have and let's try to improve it and and see what you kid because the kids are so hot. Like if you give him good information, like he's probably somebody that I've seen do it as fast as anyone I've ever coached. And so I'm like, look, you'll get to the tournament. We won't have a ton of competition under our belt, but confidence is everything in tennis, not match play. So you can have a lot of matches under your belt, doesn't mean you're confident. And he was hitting his serve a lot better. He was hitting his kick serve a lot better. and I'm like, I think you'll probably struggle, you know, the first few matches in terms of, you know, finding it rhythm and trusting it, but if you can battle and get through that, who knows what happens? And, you know, I think it was first round one is, you know, it's a group thing. You want to first match in three and then ends up winning the tournament. So you have to have, it's not a simple answer, I guess, is what I'm saying. - No, it depends. - You have to have the person A by into it. B, not focus on the immediate result, because that's a death sentence in tennis anyway, like if that's what you're focused on mentally, you're not focusing on how to get the result, which now it will never work. And there has to be a certain level of physical ability, right, to be able to execute it. So when we work in the combine business, or I have for a long time, you have to have a certain physical ability that allows you to run a four or four, just because I teach you the right running mechanics, doesn't mean you're gonna run a four or four. But if you're running a five, two, pretty sure I can get that down to four, eight, four, nine. So like the answer to your question then is Nicholas Bosch, he was feeling we, I was asked to help him before Indian Wells during COVID. And his was like a first serve percentage was so low. And so all we focused on was like a hard, heavy first, you know, serve was spin on it, that you could get in 65% of the time. He had never won around Indian Wells in six years and got to the finals. So I mean, he beat Sissipas, Fritz, catchin' off, the Los Ramos, like, so you can change it. And you can change it fairly quickly if you keep it simple enough. And I would also say like you have to look at how much was wrong, you know? I mean, Arina's case, like we had three days before since an adi. And like, her previous match was I think 23 and now it's five. - Yeah, since an adi already was quite a good difference. - Yeah, so she, you know, right away is buying into doing it. And has long arms and as she can, and good physical size. So like if she can just start making it effective, like then you can tramp and plus it's not just do it. You still have to get results. - Yeah, it's tennis. - Yeah, and if you start to get results, you're like even believing more than before. - Yeah, and then are the expectations realistic, right? And so in her case, you know, you can, I don't think it was unrealistic to think like if you learn how to have an effective serve and trust your second serve and start hitting your forehand better and with more spin, I don't think that was a stretch to say, okay, this girl can win a grand slam. - Yeah. - She has talent and will fight and is a hard worker. So, you know, all these different pieces have to happen. So I think it really, each situation is totally different. You know, like if you look at expectations, obviously a couple of those had a ton of them put on her and stuff like that. But, you know, if you're like, and from my standpoint, we have the best athlete on tour. And so, and with, you know, phenomenal backhand and, you know, somebody gonna outrun her, no? So it's just, you know, if we can improve these areas for her, let's see what she can do. And I think it, you know, it's obviously something I believe in or wouldn't be doing it. And so I guess the other answer your question is you always find out with each person, right? But if you look at right away, like after New York, you know, she goes to China, wins the tournament, had the first match of her life that she didn't go fault. And now it's starting, you know, but it takes time. Because you have to get the pattern down, right? Where, and then your brain has to get that imprint down to where it becomes automatic. - Yep. - You know, it's a neural pathway. You don't just snap your fingers and, you know, bang, it works. You know, if you look at the first final arena play, she, I think she don't fault it six times against Robacchia. And, but if you flash forward the next year, she don't fault it six times the whole tournament. Because now she had a whole another year of trusting it. And now your, you know, your brain can, you know, process under stress. If I just keep doing this, I can make it. And so it depends to what your immediate expectations are, right? If it's like all of a sudden I'm serving like Samper, so come on. - It's true in Danny sometimes it's hard to have this patient. Well, because if you keep, if every week you get, you're being, you're being remembered that you suck. It's hard to believe on that long journey. It's gonna pay off. - Yeah, and that's where, you know, I just, everybody you work with, you try to make sure that you explain what you're doing. - Yes. - And what you're trying to do is educate the players, so they actually don't need you. That's another problem in the coaching, right? Is that if you're setting this up, so that they're dependent on you all the time, that you're in the wrong profession, not from. And there's a lot of that. - Darwin K. Hilton, there's a good coach after three years. He should be like obsolete. - Yeah. - After three years, you should have taught everything, you know? And after, you know, it's time for someone else, because you really don't, like in everything that he did, he learned, he learned after three years from you. - Well, and then how would anyone, because they'll have people that obviously try to criticize what he's saying, but what's the counter argument to that? There isn't one, because he's right. Like, I mean, totally. - I mean, I think when someone tries to stay there, it's starting to be for the wrong reasons. It's about you and I. - No, of course it is. And people like that in this profession, I'm trying to project their job and all these other things. And so, you know, I think that when you set these things out, it's to make sure you educate them on what you're doing, make sure that they understand it, so they can own it, right? Because I can't play out there. I'm not the one that's standing in a stadium full of people trying to pull this off. So, what you're trying to do is make sure they understand what the information is and then we just have to keep doing it and doing it every day. And you can only do so many reps of it. Serve isn't like, like forehand. I mean, we're not gonna hit more than 70 or 80 a day just because of the stress on the arm and everything. It's, you can't really take that risk. So multiply that number, right? So in a month, if it's 70 or 80 a day, what are we getting here? Five, 600 a week, 2000. So maybe in the year, it's 20 something thousand total. So, you know, then you can look at at the end of the year and go, is this pattern improving, right? But I just love listening to this BS that you see with people. Oh, this is a five minute fix. You have to be a functional or more on to believe that. So. - And to make it automatic, it's repetition. - Of course. So, you know, I learned so much from, in the coaching side of things, was Freddie Roach. Now, Freddie will go down as one of the greatest boxing coaches ever. He comes from the streets in Boston, his whole family fought. His dad was a street fighter. And Freddie actually was the best fighter in his family, man. He'll tell you not even the most talented, but he was the smartest. And what was great about him is, is once he got done these, he got diagnosed with Parkinson's in his late 20s, right? And then, not unlike what everyone else does. Okay, I was a boxer, now I'm a boxing trainer. He went and worked for Eddie Futch, which was a great boxing trainer at the time for like five years, learning how to actually train players or boxers. And so it tells you a different mindset, right? It's not, I already know how to coach 'cause I did. - To me you'd see. - Well, it's the humility to understand that playing doesn't mean you know how to coach and transfer information to somebody in a simple way. And the fact that you just think you do because you played it, I think that that's an enormous arrogance. And when you look at most great coaches in sports in general, never. And because they had to think differently as the not only why did they fail. - Some people learn more like, with a feeling or like, explaining kind of like shadowing what the coach is telling you. and some player needs to be super precise and accurate, or they need to do ZZZZ. And then if you learn, when will teach it to another person, it's important. - You are talking about the different learning abilities of people, so it's auditory, it's visual, or sensory, those are primary ones, so feel, vision and hearing, and how you interpret it. And one of the things that's a death sentence for any athlete is that if you're thinking through how to do it, because if you're doing that, it can't possibly be in conditioned reflex, or automatically, like you were saying, and that's the struggle in terms of trying to change technique. Because in the initial stages of it, we have to address it that from a technical standpoint, and specifics, like your arm toss needs to be here. You're right, oh well, obviously it has to be a certain place, like you just can't serve without these things. and they have to be. spoken about and address, but you have to get them to a point where they're externally focused on just the task. In other words, I'm down break point in the third. I'm hitting a hard, heavy spin first serve out wide that's going to jump. I'm focused on the task, not the how, because then my brains locked into a solution to beat my opponent. But now I'm not self-absorbed trying to figure myself out and also trying to figure you out. It's impossible. That's the trick of this is when do you say something when not to and you have these brief moments where you can try to help somebody in a high-stress match and things like that that hopefully can give them something simple to focus on. That was my point about Freddie. So when our first fight we were in together was in the Home Depot Center in LA and it was with a guy named Ruslan Pravada-Nakoff who they ended up calling the Siberian Rocky. He was fighting Timothy Bradley who was World Champion. So we have a World Title fight. It's my first experience with him. Ruslan is one of the toughest fighters you've ever seen in your life and not necessarily the most skilled but is just going to keep coming. With him like the conditioning really made a difference in terms of making him last 12 rounds. Well he dropped Bradley twice in the first round, literally beat the crop out of him. Leavens 12 round drops him again. We got screwed on the decision. But Freddie, like in the corner you have one minute and so you just sit there and you know watch. He only ever told them one thing. Never anything more. First 30 seconds he's just pulling on their shorts trying to get them to breathe, relax, relax, relax. And he's never bombarding them with information. And he's, you know when you ask him about it, it's obvious, right? I mean I've got somebody in front of me trying to kill me. I mean I cannot process a lot of inflammation. And the point is is that we prepared for that fight for eight weeks. And you know you know your fighters tendencies and what Freddie was so good at was evaluating his, our opponent. And then how can our fighter skills expose that? And then you sit down the first week and this is what we're doing. And that's what we did for eight weeks. So there's no figuring it out in the rain. You either did the preparation or you didn't. And that's why you have such a high, you know, winning percentage in his career with so many great fighters is because of the simplicity. And in coaching has to get to a simple point. You can't, you can't be thinking through ten things while you're trying to dissect your opponent. It's in a way. It makes me think of sometimes, you know, Billy Jenkins cup when you have a captain on the bench with you. And like you're used to like tennis, chain, shides or where you're by yourself just in your mind. Sometimes a bit too much lost in your mind. But like when you have a captain, if the captain doesn't adjust of what you want, he's start to talk to you during like one minute and one or one and a half minute. And you're like too much in full and you just leave and you're like, I have no idea what you just told me. Right. Because you're used to like quiet or in your mind moment. Correct. And then a captain maybe will talk to you like during the all like 60 seconds. Right. And then sometimes you have to do me a ride to the line. I was like, what did he say? Yeah. I'm not talking the most in the most like stressful. I'm your question. So after as a player, you have to like or surpass the message of what you like. But sometimes you just like too many information compared to what we are all we are doing. Like it was all year. Yeah. And that's where I would see it in the opposing corners, right? Where these guys are giving all the same from age to do this to that like, what? Like, are you kidding me man? I almost got knocked out last round. I'm gonna run. That's what I'm looking for. Yeah. Yeah. I'm just gonna keep moving. And the problem is that it gets you weight, you know, from your instincts and you're processing everything at a million miles an hour and it's like, no, this isn't going to work. So simplicity has to be the way to go. And you know, and then you go back to the drawing board and practice and try to figure it out, right? You can't possibly be doing that under the duress of these matches because the the tour exposes you. Whatever your weaknesses, right? Sooner or later, somebody's gonna find it. And if your movement is a problem, well guess what? We're gonna keep extending the points and changing direction on you until we have no other answers. But until you can beat us doing that, like that's all you're getting. And or, you know, if whatever your flaw is, you know, if you can't pass very well, guess what? We need to come in. Like, and now you're exposed like the to your point earlier, like you have to have all the skills now. So if you don't have the ability because everybody plays so far back, right? And then women, then if they're playing shorter, you know, closer to the baseline and the big hitters, we're blocking a arena on Isomalva and they're trying to take time away from you and you have to adjust it out. And you have to do it in an instant. So if you haven't been practicing these things, you're not going to figure it out out there. Not my opinion. And what about the serve? Because the serve adds in, it's kind of holding your hands. Yeah. You control what you're doing. Yeah. Obviously, the other one can be pressure either by its quality of return or position, nothing like that. But the serve is only like, it's your thing. Yes. So, yeah, I think you have to, if you look at again, what your player is, right? And how do they win? What like, with the arena, if she was serving a 70% for a serve, she was unbeatable. And it wasn't because of the serve. It was because then she is attacking the next shot so much easier. And then her side-to-side movement is as much of an issue. So it's definitely, it has to be a shot that has to be effective is the best way to say it. Yeah. Right? Do you have to serve 20 aces? No. But if you're going out there serving hard, flat, and putting it in everybody's strike zone, well, they're going to be able to attack that. The speed isn't going to matter if it's here. Yeah. Right? But if you're getting, you know, serves 105, 110 miles an hour that have a lot of RPMs and the ball is rising, or in this case, a slice is pulling you away. It's again out of your strike zone. And so now they can't attack it. So I think it's more understanding what the philosophy of it should be. Right? Is that I'm trying to use it to set up the next shot? And if you look at Faire and the way he did that, not the most powerful serve ever, but one of the greatest servers for sure. Yeah. And the accuracy and the dependability of his second serve and that pull and his ability to put it in places where it's not comfortable for you. Yeah. Now if you're hercax, now it's a different story. I mean, you know, I cut this year, you know, our singles match that Taylor was playing, he served 78%. And he did it. He's averaging like 135 miles an hour or something. So you're getting no looks. Right? So again, how many people can serve that hard, that big with that much spin for that long? Yeah. It's not a lot of people. I mean, his percentage is insane for the speed of the serve. I think I guess he's a great example because he had good movement on his serve. He was accurate. It never broke down. His second serve was super dependable. And for his game, like that was as good as it was going to be. And but he had a great hold rate because it set up the next shot for him. And if he got you moving, now you're dead. Like because he was so accurate the last, you know, 78 years of his career. And he could accelerate off both sides and he was putting so much pressure on him. So it has to be used too much now. And the women, I think it's just hit it as hard as you can. And now I hit a second serve. And if I don't ace you, well, now I'm under pressure. It flips the narrative, right? Yeah. And this is a game of applied pressure and who can do it longer? You don't win it. There's no home runs in tennis. It doesn't work like that. So just going for these hard flat aces right out of the box. Like, you know, I think we're back in it because of her, you know, her height, the effectiveness of her second serve, the mechanics are good. Like she needs to keep going for it. Like, you know, because when she's on, it changes everything, right? You just, you can't break her. So now you're under so much pressure, hold all the time. So again, it comes back to the player that you are and what are your other skill sets because you can't, you know, you're not going to turn, you know, rebok and into palini and palini not into rebok. And they have different gifts. And it doesn't mean one can't beat the other. It's tennis. That's the beauty of it, right? Is that it's a game. You do this. I do that. But if it just is in your mindset is just who bashes it harder. Well, then in that case, palini should never win. Okay. But then that doesn't actually account for her athletic ability. She has a great forehand competes really well. And actually I love her serve motion. I mean, one of the best for her size. She improved the dog. She improved so much. Yep. So yeah, you take away. You look at it as a coach and you know, in its totality. And what are the other things we're trying to do here? That's how I would answer it. I like it. It was a good answer. Yeah. Thanks. What advice would you give to your players? Thank you. you don't have to worry? Number one, stop worrying about that. Yeah. And really work on your development. So this sport is a hundred percent skill first, physicality and tactics. And they're, you know, not probably that order. Without the skills, you're not rising very high because the skills will get exposed. You know, you can't just to your point, just keep getting balls back short. No. The women finish them like now. This is a different era. The ball striking is elite. So for instance, with an Isomoe, if you sit a backhand to her, she rips it like. And don't see the ball anymore. No, yeah. So like the skill levels, you know, same with Coco, like, you know, she's great backhand and great retriever. And so you're, you know, hurting her off the backhand side is not going to happen if you just put balls back. It won't. For me, the philosophy you're trying to establish in a player is really that 85% rule, right? It's your 85% of power with, you know, two feet over the net that has a lot of RPMs fully, you know, accelerated that I'm hitting to large spate targets. And my ability to repeat that, right? And I can do it cross, cross. And now I can go line with it when I need to and keep them moving. It's not our 100% shots that win slant. That's not how it works. And the first slam that arena one, if you watch like the real stress points and how well or forehand held up, hitting it with shape, that's where you knew the change had happened. So that, that to me for young players, that's what I would be saying. Like, really focus, don't focus on the result. It's easy to say that. Focus on what's going to improve the things to get a result. And don't show up every day doing the same thing. It's a recipe for disaster. And don't be afraid to address the things that aren't working. Because if you don't, they're going to catch up to you anyway. And you may have some temporary, you know, success, but it's not going to, not going to withstand itself, right? And in any sport, you have to have nowadays, you have to have weapons, right? Your forehand has to be able to withstand a barrage of power, flat, you know, high balls getting up on you. And you have to be able to adjust all these things. If you can't, then that's what you're going to get dealt every day, same thing on your back end. So for me, it's 100% focusing on the skill. And the problem is you're almost always in an environment that doesn't do that unless it's abnormal. Because you're either your parents are pushing the success because tennis is such an expensive sport to do. So there may be a lot of pressure coming up them that way. I mean, I think for me, it's 100%. You know, when you look at Tom Brady and what he accomplished, right? One of the worst physical talents. If you looked at it that way coming out of the draft and you're not looking at all the other intangibles he had, because he then took the very things that he was supposedly not good at and made them exceptional. So was he ever going to win a sprint contest? No, but it got better. And his ability in the pocket to move upside to side and evade was exceptional. But when you look at how much he practiced it and the perseverance it took to overcome it. How many people have that? And then it's like, you know, you look at his decision making and all these other things because, you know, I work in all these sports and you know, like you have to have a certain confidence like in football, you're putting the ball into windows like this that are moving, right? Baseball, at least it sits still. And you have to have, you know, a decision, they'll have almost four reads of who to throw to and it's bang, bang, bang, go. And it's like that. And if you hesitate, you get. And then if you miss, it's even worse, right? So the complexity of what they're doing. So if you don't have the throwing accuracy, you can forget it. It does not matter that you want to do this. You can't. You're not hitting your spots. Yeah. And my point to saying that is that tennis is the same. You either have an effective big server. You don't, right? And if you don't, you have to focus on improving it. You either have an effective big forehand or you don't. You're going to tell me that you're going to beat center and you don't have a forehand that can hurt him. Yeah. How are you doing it? You can't, he's going to outrally you. He's going to hurt you off his. So what's your answer? Like, you see your house to lose that much. Yeah. And how often does that happen? One February year. Yeah. I mean, it took the best player in history to knock him out. And it was in five sets over how long. And then everybody goes, Oh my god, what a shock. I mean, come on. Like no vox abilities. And his mindset is not normal. His work ethic is not normal. You know, as approached, like, I'd say, learn from these people. Like, what are you missing yourself? And it's just such a hard conversation, right? Because we're so afraid of not making it or keeping our success going or all the things that kind of got us to this level because maybe we never really thought we could get there right now. So I don't got how do I stay here? Because smart ones are trying to get better. Yeah, we have Jessica Peguro in the podcast and she said that she tries to be driven by getting better every day instead of just obsessing on results. Yeah. And I mean, obviously, I know Darren pushes that narrative with Yanic because I speak to him about it. And it's one of the things you always try to do is like, we're not going to talk about the results or what we're offering. We're just every day trying to improve and hopefully that that gets us, you know, results. And that's part of the problem too, because it's a results business. And like, that's where it starts going. Like, at some point, how do you change this out here? Where it, you know, essentially in the women, what is it? 30, 40, maybe 50 of them make money or whatever. And that's not sustainable. How do you market this better, especially when it's a sport that's so popular in the world and yet doesn't have the same financial resources put at it like golf does. And, you know, Tiger single handedly change that. Can that happen in tennis? I don't know. But I think somebody's got to come up with maybe a different approach than just, okay, well, you know, Caroline, it's great that you got to the tour finals last year. But guess what, your shoulders hurt. Now, you know, your rankings protected for about nine months. So now you guess what? We don't have any more wild cards for you. You got to go back to challengers and stuff like this. But here's the problem. People actually like to watch her play. This is an entertainment. An entertainment has to sell itself. And if you don't sell itself, if it doesn't sell itself, there's no money. So there's no equal in sports. Everybody forgets this. So, no, but like this idea that men and women shouldn't be paid the same, like this argument, they're missing it completely. First of all, I never know when saying they shouldn't. In fact, if you go back to arenas and Coco's match at the US Open or Coco beat us, the television ratings for that were enormous and way bigger than the men's was. Yeah. Shouldn't they in fact have therefore made more? Yeah. Because if we're generating the revenue from it, that is where this argument has to be be put because it's no different than women's soccer versus the men. You can't compare what the men's world cup brings in versus the women. Okay. Well, how do we, because I work with a ton of women's soccer players, the product is is enormous, is enormously good. I don't know how else to put it. We had the superstar team with the LA soul in 2009. So how do you market better and sell it better? Because people will watch it. That's not the problem. So, and obviously that match in terms of Coco and Arena proves that. So you have to find a way to like I was so disappointed when it went to Mexico for the tour finals, right? Because four different women had won the Grand Slam. And they just do this brief little video tribute. Nobody's telling a story. Yes. Of how each one pulled this off. Like how are you getting people attached and wanting to root for people? And if you don't understand them and what they've gone through. And I just think that there's got to be a better way that we can market this so that when something like that happens, you know, to you, like it's not like, oh my god, I got to go back to Challengers to try to get a shot back at this. I mean, that's insane. There's only so many people that people really want to come out and watch playing the first place. That's just reality. When you were talking about like marketing and like women's soccer, for example, the problem, something of that time, even in tennis, like people compare, it's like it's different sports. It's like you cannot expect a woman to be covering the chords the same way as a man. And obviously they're presenting a very great sports and a very great show, but you cannot expect the same thing. You know, it's like they are not going to defend the same. So obviously like there is probably more goals because just to defend it's impossible for a woman on a big field like this. And in tennis is the same, you know, like so so much is or maybe more boring or there is more winner or there is no valley. Love love love. But it's just you cannot expect even the the best runner like Coco, she cannot defend like Carlos. - No, and she's the best athlete out here. - Yes. - Yeah, but again, it's back to that, and it's such a bad comparison, right? So it doesn't mean that the product doesn't have drama. People watch sports for one simple reason they never know what the ending's gonna be. It changes every time, right? - Too many times. - Yeah, especially when you're losing, right? But so that's what we show up for is we show up to see somebody do something extraordinary under extraordinary duress, right? And then, you know, we hail these people. And it's a special job, for sure. It doesn't mean you're a special person. And so the whole argument in terms of keeping people in the forefront of all this mental health stuff today, like if you're attaching your identity to yourself as a success in athletics and not as a human, there's a big problem. Because you're gonna live and die with every single point, every single match, and it's just never sustainable in terms of feeling okay after it's a tennis match. The world did not come to an end today. And yeah, of course we want to win. You think in 23 when we lose the US Open Final, everybody's not devastated? Yeah, of course they are. But it's a tennis match. And, you know, get back to work and be grateful for the opportunities you have. And hopefully, like, if they don't start, you know, doing that, what is the alternative solution, right? You've got to have enough people playing it to make people want to watch it and see like the different challenges that they're put on her, right, throughout it. So, for me, it's just how you market it. Like, if you go back to the US Women's Soccer team that won the World Cup in Santa Clara way back, that was awesome. Like, if you can't figure out a way to sell that, you've got to be a target. Yeah. So, and it's the worst way you can compare it is, you know, trying to compare, you know, men to women. Men and women are different. That never does not mean not equal. And you treat it differently. So what? Like, let's find a way to, you know, to do a better job of highlighting the people that are doing this. Because I think if the public even had a clue, the struggles these people go through, they would have such a greater level of respect for, because tennis tests you in so many, you know, difficult ways. That's my answer to that. We had a good chat with both Moran, the tournament director of Cincinnati about this. Like, we have to make a better job at telling the story of, like, 35 in the world because he's an amazing, and he's almost as good as the top five. But for our fans, it's hard to enjoy, you know, if you're not like emotionally connected to his player, but at the same time, the tour, it's obsessed with two or three players. Right. So at the end, you know, like, we have to do a better job helping these guys and explain their story, understand like how much work, and how good they are. You know, you said, the end, like, there's no blood from what these guys do. No. And golf did a really a lot better job at that. So, right, like, the lower tour levels can, can survive financially. And I think until we find a way that, because if only 40 people can, 50 people can make a living at this, we're in trouble. And there has to be a pool, you know, of a couple hundred, whatever that number is, you know, and how do you sell it? And, you know, like for us, like, you know, I had a cup was a blast. Like, I think it's a great concept because, you know, what, we play our singles match and we go in there in a week. We go in there in a week, we know we're playing three, four times. And, like, preparation wise, what would be better than that? Going into a slam. Why aren't we doing more of this? And the team side of it, which I really enjoy, you know, Christian, our doubles player played awesome, and he just won the Australian Open Doubles two weeks later. And does anybody even know who he is? Like, it's, and how good he is, you know, to your point, I don't think, like, the difference in the men between 102, it's not a lot now. And he given week, you're going to have people challenging that. And so there's a total lack of understanding of what the skill is and the talent. And again, like, and then pushing that, you know, format of what's the best way? It's entertainment. Yes. So how can you attract more people to watch that? I think that's the number one question that has to get answered, right? Because even now, the slams, like, how many people are watching the doubles events? Do you think it's a lot? I don't think it's a lot. No. So is that-- I mean, I think that was outside of, in US. It's a non-walking business. Right. But again, like, when you have like a United Cup thing, you know, you have a famous player playing those doubles already. And he's not watching. And he's even just open. Like, everyone was like, so it's like, you know, like, let's make those guys like stars. Let's share their stories. People will-- if you have a human connection like with that guy, you would want to watch him. Me when I see it in his mouth, I don't know who he's playing, you know, like, I need to pick sides. Because there's no fun, you know? Yeah, maybe every night. It's just like, wow, that was nice. Oh, the way is it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like in football or things like that. Yeah, so-- but it helps to know the person, the player, you know, like, their story. I think that it's a bit of an organization, like, too much homework on sharing this person's site. But then you-- I think to your point, then you got to get somebody in that thinks completely outside the box that actually isn't from tennis. Yeah. And looks at it from a completely different lens. And that's what we also have, like, 200,000 downloads per month, you know? Yeah, because people love to be for one hour listening to favorite videos, sharing about their life, their journey, their relationship with their dad. People like that, you know, like, and for the tour, you have to help them. And we'll have next to them in the evening. How many, yeah? 200,000 downloads per month. Yeah. And it's growing. But again, because at the end, people want to see who's behind the tennis player. So how does this whole podcast-- you don't have to even turn-- I'm curious. No. And it works. You have to get sponsors, right? So I mean, you can do it by yourself. And then obviously, like, we started, like, organically and just, like, doing on every platform to Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and since beginning of last year on YouTube, which is the one growing the fastest and the more, like, crazy. And, yeah, like, after you have some company you want to work with, you can sponsor and do, like, add into podcast. And yeah, that's it. Well, that's awesome. You're out, guys. Yeah. It's good to see nice people. But at the end, it's that people want to-- of course, they want to see a good match, but they also want to hear and learn from the players. So the tour is not doing anything. They're just putting them right after they lost on our press conference. They show the worst version of the players who then gets, like, hates it. So they close even more. And they don't want to share their story. You're just don't-- Do you want to even get me started on that? Yeah, you're seeing-- Well, I have an area at some point I did, and I don't do very many of these. And it was after the US Open, we had lost, and then Arena got back. You know, the warm up, small warm up area for match prep in the-- Oh, yeah. Where are you trying to-- Yeah. And I directly asked them. I'm like, so you have to have a camera in here? Yeah. What's more, like, who chose to leak this? And I said, and then they did something else. Ega had lost. And then she was sitting in the hallway right before you walk into the warm up area at the end. And she's sitting up against the wall. Got her racket bag next to her just really upset. And somehow somebody with a camera goes in and zooming in on it. Really? This is how we have to sell this. Like, everybody's-- we've all played her. You're going to tell me, you guys not out here trying to be the best she can be. She's trying to be the best she can be. She can't be left alone for five minutes after she has a devastating loss. Like, this is your entertainment. OK. No, and like-- I mean, send that up and to go go in or start an open at the end. It's like, you know, no more privacy to be yourself or to be like women. It's a two-year-old, a big brother of practice. Yes, you're right. You may. No, I-- it gets me really upset. And because it's the stress of, you know, especially at the top levels that, you know, you ought to win the tournament or it's a failure. OK. Come on, man. Well, like, you just finished like, in our case, in the top eight in the world, this is a great result. Obviously, we want to win the tournaments. Like, nobody's more competitive than I am with this stuff. And-- but you have to have perspective on it. And like, the things that we're working on, she did better. OK, like, you can't just snap her fingers and expect this, you know, unbelievable change in anyone. And the fact that she has the guts to address these things at 21 years old, say, I've got to improve them. And like, I've told her a hundred times. Like, you know, if we follow what I'm doing and it doesn't work, you blame me. Not yourself. And you find somebody else that can help you. That's what a coach is supposed to try to do out here. And hopefully, like, you know, you keep doing the right things each day and obviously then the quality of it comes up. That's what we're trying to incrementally do every day, each week, each month. And hopefully you see that. But if you're getting ripped across social media platforms because that's the other this generation that's all the way they communicate. It's hard to explain yourself from all the bushies that they've been talking about here. Yeah, I mean, of course, you know, I hear all this crap too, but like, I flat don't care. Yeah, I mean. The thing is also with the player, like, obviously, there is a social media, but also you have the press conference, where even if you don't go on social media and read the crap there, when after a loss, after a tough match, oh, you did like 17 double foot today. How do you explain it? You didn't serve well. You did like that many enforcers, like, how do you explain it? But you know, I get it. But you know, I'm trying very hard not to do an enforcer, you know, is not like. Yeah, it's like, you know, I set out today and, you know, I was hoping for a minimum of 16, 17, so I. You know, I'm just. I just keep my goal, yeah. So, I mean, it's just, you know. Godot has a good, a couple of good answers. Yeah, she asked about that, but I was like, "Well, I still managed to win this match, I'm pretty proud of how good I am." It's true, it's true, it's true, it's the responsibility I deserve. I get this is where it's also very important to have an identity, like, develop outside of being at any player, not so like, you can also like, be able to stay within the. After two matches and. have a laser-valued role to record to the ring a year, yeah. Oh, yeah, this is too hard, like, without it. If you're gonna, you know, and it's hard, right? If you're competitive, you do live and die with each match, but I always was in awe of how fast, you know, Federer somehow would just get back to work. Like, you know, as a fan watching him lose the Wemmelon file, the Novak too much points up, like, I was wrecked. I was like, "Oh, man, like, I want him to win that." You know, really badly just because of, you know, that point in his career where he had turned everything around and improved so much and to get that close. And, you know, how did he do that? I mean, it's, you know, I just met his parents at Australia for the first time and it really told you a lot about the person he is, right? Because they're both so humble, so genuinely nice. And they're like, "Yeah, we just really stayed out of his tennis. We were really lucky with great coaches and we just focused on him being a good person." And, well, it worked, right? We did good things, but it was just to be a good father. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, yeah, the tennis side of it because the, you know, you now become the breadwinner and you're not in a team situation where the one's paying you, right? It's this whole different, weird dynamic in the teams that we have. And, and I think like the back to the United Cup thing, like the way World Team tennis used to be. And there's, I think if we get more of these types of events, I think it's great. And because the focus for us, like if you look at us, the 100% focus is our results in slams, right? That's why we're here. Yeah. And, but the rest of the year, is that our, all those tournaments are 100% focus? No, they're not. And the United Cup type, you know, thing where you get in and you get a lot of great experience and you get support from other players. And it's not like this, you know, everything's this, you know. Life and death situation. And, you know, you're my opponent, I'm supposed to hate you. And all of it, yeah, whatever. Like it's, it was great because like her match with, Coco's match with, you know, there was great. Like her quality was really solid, really happy with the way she was trying to do things. We need more of those things where you can just build. Yes. Right? Where you're not under this stress to be now. She's 21. And every of the, she's been out here six years, like, almost seven years or whatever. It's like an show. She's a very, very interesting character. Obviously player because obviously she's only 21. And she won so many things with so much pressure. Oh my god. So much. That's like, I cannot even imagine what she lived. Yeah. And this year, like after winning Royal and Gowls, which is like insane. Right. One week before you had soap and she choose to change plans to walk on her serve because she believes she can do so much better. But you already want to slam this year. Right. And maybe some people from outside don't really understand. But like when you're inside the tennis, you know like what it means to try to change like something as important as your service, especially in your game. And it's like, wow, like I've already so much respect for you. But I'm, I'm, I signed for like 20 years. Yeah. It's like, it's like so, so good to see that she has like long term goals, you know, like obviously she wanted to play well in US Open this year and everything. But it's just like, oh, we did play well. Yeah. And that's the thing like, you know, go back and watch her match with Ida first around him in the quality of tennis between the two of them was unbelievable off the ground. And, you know, then we have to, you know, play a player now in Veket who was the silver medal, medalist in the Olympics. Like, these are very, very good tennis players, you know. It's not like you just, you know, one some matches at a park. And because you know, all of a sudden we don't win the tournament and can't pull off, you know, around a 16 match who by the way, that person happened to win the US Open twice. Not exactly a terrible player in Osaka. So it's, is it perfect? It was a really good match. It's good to be very good at it from now on. Well, yeah. And so again, you have to have perspective, right? Yeah, yeah. And did you, did we set out to try and, and start improving this? Yes, I think we did. And, but to put somebody under the microscope that the only success from that then is that you want it. Okay. You clearly have zero understanding of how difficult it is to win it if you're doing everything well. He doesn't only depend on yourself, so we're not grounded. No. Like, you know, I'm going to have someone in front of you. He's just better. No, Jose and Garrice taught me that. He's one of my favorite coaches that I've been fortunate enough to learn from. And we had some great weeks with Brandon and I Shima. And he went literally back to backfiled in Mexico and at LANN. And he is one of the best at running a practice, you know, in terms of just organizing the drills that you're doing, making them competitive, keeping you on top of simple things that are going to help you. And he said, listen, Gavin, don't forget this. You can do everything right and you can still lose. Yeah, yeah. It's professional tennis. And if you'd lose sight of that, then you lose sight of the process to give yourself a chance, you know. So, yeah, I totally agree with you. And yeah, so you can be hitting your forehand great. You can be serving bonds and then you run into Pete Sanprice, who's serving bigger and hitting his forehand bigger. And he's a great athlete. And by the way, the court's fast. So yeah, good luck. Yeah, yeah. So, some days the other one is just better than you. They're just better. It's possible. But it doesn't mean too much later you're not going to meet them. No. And so the focus, you know, then on like what your result was that that's not acceptable. Yeah. Okay. That's an impossible lens to live under. Like as an athlete from a day to day, you know, standpoint, unless you have really healthy people around you. And most don't. Most don't. You rarely see it now. You know, if you look at the like the technical development of this Jova kid is really good, right? You can everybody can see that. Right. It's not a secret. So it gives you a really good opportunity going forward. And then you have, you know, from a game style, what's there's style going to be? She has to be aggressive off the ground. She's only so tall. So research has to be a certain way to hurt people. And, you know, but from what you've seen, like somehow somebody's managed to develop somebody pretty well, in my opinion. Yeah. Yeah, it looks like she can do a lot of things and and compete. Yeah, and compete and montage is stable. Yeah. On the court, but yeah, it's very nice to see her play. It's very clean. So I got a question for you then. So yeah, what would be what would be the number one thing like you would change about your career if what are your 31 now? 32. So you're still a kid. And if you were 18 again, and how would you, like, because that's actually more important than anything I'm saying. I will say I have a better team around me. It was competent people who come from the tour and walk on a plan B in my game style. And what you were saying about Sabalinka, for example, where she was able to eat bigger target as fast, but like with more spin and like trying to move a bit more the player around, I think I would have been able to do it in my game style and it would have helped me a lot to win a few matches most of the time in slams, where I was struggling by doing a bit too many and forced error and kind of losing the game by myself. And yeah, I think that's kind of what stuck me is like I had one way to play and and why do you think you had one way to play? Because I was thought I was not able to do anything else. By who? For my father at the time. Because I was good at like hitting the ball and everything and yeah, I knew I would to do it, but as we were not really practicing it in matches, it was not coming out. Not possible. Impossible. Every athlete in the world falls to their level of preparation. There is a single one that rises to anything. It's not possible because you had to have done it to be able to believe you can. You need to learn to do everything and you need to be a super complete player. I was able to do things. But yeah, sometimes I was not confident enough in some piece of my game. For example, I believe that I was not a very good defender. I didn't move very well. So, you know, like. Cruising. So, sometimes when I had to defend, I was kind of afraid or sometimes when I had to defend, I was like going for it because I thought I was not going to be able to come back. So, obviously, on the moment it looks like a stupid shot. But just because I didn't. I know. So, again, you are what you're trying to be. You can't. If you don't, you know, that doesn't change because like yours was glaringly obvious what had to happen. And like, you just. And it's. You didn't need a plan B. You needed the right plan A. Plan A had to be. I need to be hitting this yes hard. But it's got to be that 85, 90% shot with spin that has margin of error that I can trust in the stress situations. And if I get a ball, I can go 100 on, then I do it. But no one can win going 100. It's not possible. Like in the men, you're not even in top 500 anymore if you're doing that. And. Wait, was it about five weeks in your life? No, we're. No, I don't think it is. Like I just. Because you're just running into too many other people now that can. That can hit big spots and keep it deep enough to where you can't. And the courts are slow enough that you can't hit enough winners, right? So, yeah. And that's a thing as an athlete, because you. My career was hockey, you know, it was taken. And so, tennis wasn't something I even attempted until I was 17. And you're being told you have to win. Like it's. What? I'm playing people that have been playing this for 10 years more than me. And yeah, I'm faster than them, but that gets you here, not here. It's not possible. And so, like, you look back at it as an athlete. And I know I did this a lot. And you're just beating a crap out of yourself. Well, I shouldn't on this. I shouldn't on that. I'm like, "No, wait a second. You need somebody had to know how to get there." A really simple story is one of my linemates was Scott Malamy. And we had a lot of success and a lot of sports, but both of us were very good hockey players. His dad was the producer for Hockey Night in Canada. So, the television program put around that. So, when we were like provincial champions or something that we had won at that point, he had set a record for goal scored that year and really, really good player. But Scott had a lot of talents. He was a good goal scorer, but he was tougher than hell. He could fight. He was a guy in the corners that could win games, you know. Out of nowhere, his dad pulls us off our travel team and puts them on our high school team. We were just terrible. And everybody's like, "This guy's lost his mind." Because we were all trying to play junior A, which is essentially a pro-schedule at 16, right? You're playing 80-something games or whatever it is. Well, high school played like 30. Well, he knew he already had a scholarship to University of Wisconsin in the States. He goes, "I'm not trying to win a junior A title. I'm trying to get him drafted." And college in the US, he only played 35 games. So, now I'm not getting him beat up and he's a physical player. Scott was a first round draft back at 19 years old, one to the Philadelphia Flyers. He played 21 years in the NHL. I never played one minute. My father had no idea what he was doing and then took me out of it. The very thing that I'd spent my entire life learning how to do. So, my point is, is like, you have to have, you have to get likes for it. You have to get lucky. Like, if you ever watch the Joe Rogan podcast with George St. Pierre, it's really good. And George was just, because what was unique about George is how humble he is. And he can be terrible at something and he will just keep working at it until he's good at it. And he doesn't care what it looks like. He doesn't care who's watching. Like, he does not care. He's going to master this. In the case of his wrestling, like, he went to the Canadian Olympic team. I'm, you know, teach me. And they'll tell you, and the interview was like, he was terrible and then nobody can, now nobody can do anything to him. John Dana, one of the best jujitsu coaches in the world. He would take the bus to New York to learn from this guy when he was a garbage truck driver. Like, the perseverance of that mentality, right? I'm just going to constantly improve, like, no matter what. And he has, like, because he was the one that always reminded me, like, you know, in the fight business, everything's great. So you get hit in the face and then you go back to what you know. Right. And what you're trained to do, it comes out like under enormous stress. So like, all these aspects of learning, getting better, the things that really, like, matter. And then Joe's interviewing him. And he's like, yeah, George, I know, like, you know, you're awesome at all these things. And, but the stars aligned to create you, my friend. And I was like, wow, what a great way to put that. Everything had to go right. And it went right for him. And yes, because he made so many great choices. But the universe got around this one. Like, yeah, you know, and you got to get a little lucky and get the, and that's all it is with you. Like, how anybody can believe that you can't defend, like, that's insane. Right? Well, the first thing I said about you is your athleticism. Yes. Right. So if you're athletic, you can defend. And tennis has three aspects to it. We need offense. We need defense. And we need to be able to neutralize their three different things. And without doing all three, then you're simply one dimensional. And once somebody solves that, and there's no other dimension to win. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it's interesting. Yeah. But yeah, sports is the only place where you don't necessarily surround yourself with experts. Yeah. Well, these parrots and all these, like, maybe fake feces or whatever, who think they know better. Oh my god. Well, we do it all the time. I mean, I deal with it with my company where we have people now that, you know, claim to have the same methods we use. And they actually know it better than I do. And then in that case, like they go around somebody that then claims to have, you know, done this or done that or been associated with my former partner. And therefore, they know what this is. Oh, okay. Right. No, you don't have a clue. And, you know, have you spent a decade, you know, preparing people for the NFL combine? Do you know what that stress is like if you can't get these people faster and you don't get them drafted? No. So, you know, methods and all these types of things are one thing. Being able to apply them, be able to communicate them to your athlete and your player is a whole nother thing. But because the conditioning side, especially is so unlicensed, there's no standard of education that it's that's for us. Dr. Either you're a doctor or you're not a doctor. That's a doctor. Right. So, therefore, you end up with all these different philosophies. Right. When that's actually anatomically impossible in terms of how humans work, it's impossible. You think there's like, I think it's that question that we're getting today. There's like, sorry. No, no, no, no, no, no, it's super interesting. Athletes who are more like to set people to injuries or they just strain worse than others. I think you have to just think of it a little bit different. I think that there's definitely a genetic predisposition in certain cases where people that don't necessarily have the physical capacity were pushed too far and then you word out. If you're looking at injuries the way I look at it, injuries really only happen for two reasons. Impact, trauma, so in contact sports, you have contact in tennis. It would be the contact of landing or something else like that. And then biomechanical dysfunction that overuse then causes an injury. So that's what happened with my hip. It was like a change reaction of my toe getting hurt. I changed how I walked. I changed how my femur was rotating in the capsule. That caused arthritis within it. I was working 12 hours a day and not taking care of myself. And now eight years later, the overuse of it caused a problem, but I was 50 years old by that point. And in tennis, so you would look at, like if you take her physical constitution, you would say, you basically have an amazing build for tennis, right? Your tall, your long athletic. So now, if we're going to talk about injury prevention, we start with muscular balance, we start with flexibility, joint mobility, make sure all those things are taken into context. Then we start worrying about how explosive she is and how explosive can she be and can she maintain that for three hours? Are these questions being addressed? Are they being asked so the athlete and she willing to do the work necessary to fix them, right? If you just hire somebody and assume that they know what they're doing, well, now you got a problem. Especially at this level because there's not a ton of room for error. So if the injury's come and it's serious enough, now you have to stop playing because nobody can figure out your shoulder. And at the end of the day, like the stress, the frustration, everybody's got their limits. And again, back to the fight business really exposes that because you just get up one down you just. can't do it. And it's just too hard and you're like enough, enough. Yeah, it's not worth it. So I think that the injury side of it, you really have to start with the right evaluation, you know, in terms of your own body and what it is. If you don't think there's a genetic predisposition to that, that's just naive. I mean, you know, we used to use that analogy and for the NFL, like if you were going to take from the jungle and make animals play football, all the linemen are elephants. They're massive, they move really well, laterally, front to back, everything. Your linebackers on defense, if you understand what they are, those are all lions, they're big, they're fast, they're meaner and shit. Sorry. And then, you know, out wide, you're going to have cheetahs and, you know, because they're the fastest and only have to do that, you can't make a cheetah into an elephant and you cannot make an elephant into a cheetah. And so this strength business stuff is what they're doing. Oh, they got a bulk up, they got to do this, they got to do that. That's just insane. You know, with her, for sure, it would be how elastic can we get her and how efficient from balance can we move her? So where she's spending the least amount of energy possible, changing directions, but you can maintain your posture, which is required in a tennis football. And then, our her joints mobile are the is the shoulder, what is your shoulder preparation routine? If you're not doing that consistently, there's just if there's any flaw in the motion, right, you're going to have a problem because the way that joint works, right, it's a ball socket. So it rolls back when the peck, you know, it's internal rotation. So when it rolls back, the peck pulls it forward. So now it rolls forward. Well, that's where this has to drop, right? Well, now that's where the body then accelerates this up. So if your motion is more like, let's say, after where he really held it, there's so much muscular tension that over time, sooner or later, it's going to cause a problem, even if it doesn't happen the first five, six years, you were holding it, right? So now muscles are doing a job they're really not supposed to be doing. Instead of if it was dropped a little lower and you can bring it up, relax, and as soon as it gets here, you go, then there's no muscular tension built into the motion. The key in for a thrower. So whether it's baseball, football, tennis, to accelerate something, you're trying to get your spine, your torso to create enough torque to accelerate your arm. If the arm has to create the power and the control, you've got a problem and yours, if you're holding it, and now there's another impact. Now multiply that what we say, 22,000 times a year, sooner or later, the damn breaks. Does that make sense? It does. Because if you look at fetters, it's just here up and go. So this rolls back, rolls forward, release, rolls back, roll forward, release. It's so hard to perfect. It's not like you just go, "Oh yeah, okay." I saw the video, I could, but it says semi-files that you're hoping no problem. No problem, is it fixed? Most of it. Thank you so much for your time. You're so interested. Did you have an extra work? Yeah, you too. Thank you.