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Tennis in the Zone
10 Ways to Enter the Zone from TENNISMINDGAME.com

If you haven’t heard of the expression “the zone” when it comes to tennis, here’s a brief introduction: the term “the zone” was first used by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in his book Flow in Sports.

The zone is that special mental state where everything flows effortlessly and the player is playing at peak performance. James Loehr has called this state the IPS - Ideal Performance State.

If we combine the findings of Csikszentmihalyi, Loehr, and other authors that have been researching the illusive Zone (Scott Ford), then we can identify the main characteristics of this mental state that allow us to perform at our best.

10 Ways to Enter the Zone
If we know the main characteristics of the zone, then we can reach this ideal mental state by putting these pieces of the puzzle together. We can work on each of these elements in practice and become increasingly better at entering the zone and playing our best tennis.

1. Challenge and skills
The player in the zone does not perceive his opponent as a threat. Instead, the player perceives the opponent as a challenge and uses his skills to overcome this challenge. A tennis match becomes a problem solving task and the player is focused only on finding the solutions.

2. Focus on the process and not on the outcome
The outcome-hitting the ball in, winning a point, winning a match, reaching the finals- is not within your control. If you focus on the outcome, you will become anxious since deep inside you know that you cannot guarantee the result.

Being anxious only worsens your ability to play good tennis. That’s why you need to focus on the process that is within your control; direct all of your attention toward the ball and what you want to do with it.

The process is your idea of how you want to send the ball away, which means that you IMAGINE the trajectory of the ball and where you want it to land. Keep your focus on the execution of the shot until it’s finished.

3. Having a clear goal and being decisive
The opposite of being decisive is being indecisive, which means that you don’t have a clear goal. A player in the zone does not change his mind and does not doubt his decisions. Whatever decision comes to mind, he sticks with it, trusts it, and goes with it.

4. Seeing every shot as feedback
A player in the zone does not judge his shots as good or bad. He sees them only as feedback to indicate whether he needs to keep doing what’s working or make slight adjustments. Judgment immediately triggers emotions, which break the flow and the zone state.

5. Being here and now
Another characteristic of being in the zone is having no sense of the past or future. The player is immersed in “the now”. This allows him to use all of his brain capacity for solving the problem in the moment without distracting thoughts about the past and future.

If you devote your full attention to the ball, you’ll be in the here and now. You’ll also be one step closer to playing in the zone.

6. Belief in your abilities
When a player enters the zone, he doesn’t doubt his shots. As soon as he decides what kind of shot to play (which in the zone happens automatically and very fast), he focuses on the execution and does not stop to think about whether or not this shot is too difficult to make.

There is total commitment to it and the player “sees” his shots as already being successful as he makes contact with the ball. The key for the existence of this belief is to accept mistakes as a part of tennis.

7. Playing point by point
A player in the zone is focused on the “here and now,” and thus, is playing each point separately from the total score. He doesn’t care whether it is 5:1 ahead or 0:4 behind, he gives 100% effort for every point he plays.

This makes him very hard to beat and very unlikely to lose the lead once he gets ahead.

8. No ego
Ego-based motivation can be described as external motivation-where external rewards or threats motivate the player to compete. Ego-oriented motivation would be, for example, showing superior ability, beating others, earning money with winning, and becoming famous.

Egoless motivation is when there are internal rewards for the player: mastering the sport, seeing a tennis match as a series of tasks (and challenges) that need to be overcome with one’s own skills, personal improvement, and giving 100% effort.

When a player plays in the zone, he typically experiences every situation as a challenging problem and focuses on solving this problem. It’s not about beating your opponent; it’s about solving the problem that your opponent presents to you. If you solve the problem, then the consequence will be the result you are looking for-the key is not to focus on this result when you play.

9. Effortless play and breathing
The player in the zone feels as if every movement is effortless and his breathing reflects that. The player is not out of breath, and when he moves and hits the ball, his body feels elastic, full of energy, and free of tension.

Your goal to is to recreate this feeling of no tension and effortless breathing in practice as much as possible so that your body and mind get used to it.

10. Enjoyment of play
One of the most important aspects of the zone is the feeling of enjoyment. The zone cannot be achieved if the player is experiencing stress and anxiety. The joy of playing the sport for no external rewards is the key.

In other words, a person who loves to play tennis even if there are no rewards has the greatest chance of entering the zone.

Remember how it is just to play, like children do. Your goal is to remember the feeling of joy when playing tennis and what you need to focus on to experience enjoyment when playing tennis. Once you know that, you’ll be able to refocus during a match and start enjoying it. This is the express way to the zone.

Summary
In order to enter the zone, which allows peak performance, we can work on certain characteristics of this mental state.

Instead of just letting the zone happen here and there, perhaps 2 or 3 times a year, use these 10 tennis drills to open up the door to the zone. Once you know the feeling of the zone, you’ll be able to recall it almost every time.

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