Nadal Love the Battle

[dipperhitter]

The Jim Loehr article on Nadal loving the battle is one of the best things ever about why he made it to the top of the mountain. It's It's that mental invincibility--I've noticed too that when you look at Nadal you never believe that he thinks he going to lose.

Thanks for pointing out this path--iI think now that it's really worth trying to have that much emotional control.

[JullietteRogers]

I've read every mental game article and it made me happy to read what Jim Loehr had to say about nadal. Seems to make sense of what you saw but maybe didn't realize watching the final this year in England. Does anyone wonder if Roger believes he can beat Rafael?

[nabrug]

Nice article. But it says only something about how Nadal is staying in his own routine. (Every topplayer has his/her routines. Otherwise you will not become a topplayer.) And because he is winning lately for him it is the easiest to do.

Any reference that any top 200 player is intimidated by this behaviour, let stand that Roger Federer is, is not true. They are remarks of what spectators think they see or want to see. To become a top 200 player is about creating your own routines, to be in your own zone, with your own gameplan. It is very healthy, during gameplay, to sometimes get rid of negative emtions. Because people can not accept that Nadal is winning they try to find these kind of answers. And it looks related and Nadal is having some unusual routines so that is the answer. Well it is not.

Nadal is winning because he has the most (technical) answers in the given game-situations! And that is all.

Nico Mol
Amsterdam
Holland

[johnyandell]

It's an interesting question, the relation of technical/tactical abilities to mental strength.

But I don't agree that these alone are what determines match outcomes. The belief factor is critical. Having worked with quite a few tour players who have told me their own stories of how players such as McEnroe, Connors, Lendl and others dominated mentally as well as physically, I think what Jim talks about is a critical component, maybe the critical component past a certain point.

Certainly you can see this in Jim's success stories with Sabatini--her only Open title, as well as Dan Jansen's gold medals and athletes in the NBA and other sports. They have clearly acknowledged that the work they did with Jim on these factors was the difference.

If you don't have the belief in yourself it is going to be very difficult to perform your best, and that belief is something directly related to the types of disciplined behaviors we see in Nadal. Interestingly in the few instances where Nadal loses this is reflected in his negative on court demeanor and affect as with every other player.