The secret of Novak Djokovic’s record-breaking tennis success is his mental resilience – expert explains

By Sahen Gupta, University of Portsmouth

It comes as no surprise to anyone who follows tennis that Novak Djokovic won his 23rd Grand Slam at the French Open this month, making him the most successful men’s tennis player in history. The Serbian player is consistently hard to beat, even when he is playing poorly. But what is it that sets him apart?

There are a few answers. Djokovic has superb technical skills and has been called the best “returner” in the sport’s history. He has worked on his diet and fitness to ensure he is consistently in optimal health. And his tactical understanding and execution of tennis are second to none.

What remains? The controller of all these three elements: the mental side. In the past 20 years, Djokovic is perhaps the tennis player who has most openly spoken about and advocated for mental training – and resilience has been a key focus.

Djokovic has dedicated a significant amount of time and planning to his mental training and has worked with experts to incorporate mindfulness. Talking of this in his 2013 cookbook, Serve to Win, Djokovic said: “I do it for about 15 minutes and it is as important to me as my physical training.”

Mindfulness is a mental skill that allows people to experience their conscious thoughts and emotions with the goal of changing their focus of awareness. For example, if the player misses a serve, the brain will probably catastrophise: You missed a serve. You will double fault, and then they will break your serve. In tennis, where every point is a win or a loss, this triggers self-doubt.

Mindfulness allows players to be conscious of this and avoid a negative response. Djokovic goes on to say:

I’ve done so much mindfulness that my brain functions better now automatically … I used to freeze up whenever I made a mistake. Now when I blow a serve or shank a backhand, I still get those flashes of self-doubt, but I know how to handle them.

Read Full Story https://theconversation.com/the-secret-of-novak-djokovics-record-breaking-tennis-success-is-his-mental-resilience-expert-explains-207872