63: Tournament Prep PART 2!

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Welcome to 4.0 to Pro.

The Pickleball podcast that focuses on a single shot, tip or strategy to improve your Pickleball game with every single pocket-sized episode.

Our goal is to make you better on the court every time you hear our voices.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of 4.0 to Pro.

Your pocket-sized Pickleball podcast where we teach you a single shot or strategy.

I'm Michael O'Neill here in Mesa, Arizona.

At the Dink and Dine, joined by one, Mircha Marariou, also in Mesa, Arizona.

One of our rare occasions where you're sitting right next to me as we do this show. Hello, sir. How are you?

I am doing a wonderful Michael.

I'm just really happy to be here for an incredible event.

We're here for the Pickleball.

Yeah.

Which is a charity sort of pro-AM slash celebrity event at the amazing Dink and Dine Pickle Park here in Mesa.

And trying to raise awareness and some money for fentanyl addiction and treatments were the same.

So we've had an amazing crew here, quite a cast of characters.

We've got to get the honor to be on the court with Rick Berry.

Yeah, that was cool.

Really cool, super nice guy.

And really good player.

At 82 years old.

I mean, still rocking it.

Incredible how agile he is and he's got really good hands, just solid player.

And a very, very competitive, which I love about him.

Yeah, unbelievable.

You could tell too.

If you miss a ball, he was very unhappy about that.

You could tell that there was a world class athlete.

And that was 82 year old bones who just was mad at himself if he missed even a single easy shot.

And that's how he got to be a world class athlete by being a perfectionist.

He was the guy, by the way, as far as my memory goes, he would shoot free throws underhanded.

That's what he sort of became famous for in the NBA.

Yeah, he was, and he would make him.

He was very consistent.

But he would shoot, you know, kind of between your legs.

Like you teach a little kid to do and nailed it.

He was fantastic at it.

Very cool.

I did not know that.

You of course were on the final court.

One thing that was really for me the highlight of the weekend.

And it's been, again, the most amazing people watching I've seen in quite some time.

But I've never been on court, not once with juniors.

Young, good, pickleball players.

And there were so many great young, you know, 12, 13, 14, 15, up to maybe 17 players that I got to play.

And that was super fun.

Yeah, no, it was fun.

It was remarkable to see their level of skill, how high it is.

It's just incredible.

And they were all really nice kids, very earnest, wanted to learn.

And let's just say that the future of pickleball is very bright.

Looking at A, the players, and then B, the venues.

Yeah.

The facility they were at is just one of probably 50 to 100 in the country.

Yeah.

And this is very similar to something like chicken and pickle.

But more pickleball forward than top golf would be the golf.

This is a little more like a real golfer would go.

In this case, a real pickleball player could play here.

Always some challenges with lighting and court positioning and things like that.

But definitely you could see that they could have like a, you know, NPL or whatever they're calling it now.

Challenge series event or something like that here.

And it would probably be pretty good.

But I will say if you want to have some fun, play some pickleball at a great venue.

And you're in the Phoenix Scottsdale Mesa area.

This is a great place to be.

And shout out to Smiley Riley, who's the pickleball director here.

And all the staff who treated us incredibly.

We were honored to be here, honored to be here for the charity.

One of the things that I do want to bring up also is all the veterans we met.

There are a ton of veterans that are afflicted with addiction and mental health issues.

After their time in the service and we are so grateful for them.

And if you're out there listening, just want to express our gratitude for your service,

all the service members and their family, also sacrifice their time with their loved ones.

We are most, most grateful.

This is part two of our tournament prep.

If you caught last episode, we will be here for the first time.

We talked about, well, what is it like to do a tournament for the first time?

It can be very intimidating.

We saw that over and over today because we were with a lot of people that,

even though they were famous in other sports, playing professional baseball or professional basketball,

still very new to the pickleball world.

And when it's your first time playing, we had real actual refs on court.

Some refs that you've had at the US open, like they were the real deal kind of refs.

Calling it like a professional game.

And some of the people that were still very brand new at pickleball were vastly unprepared for what that looks like.

Which means you have to, you know, why don't you talk a little bit through what it's like to play with a ref

because a lot of people listening have never done that.

Yeah, it's definitely an experience.

And I have to say that the referees are overall just amazing.

Yeah.

They're out there giving their time.

You know, it's not like they're making tons of money.

I mean, they're probably losing money at all.

Like, you know, they're maybe getting a lunch, but they are out there standing there in the heat.

You know, putting up with, you know, quite a bit of grief often, especially if there's some sort of conflict.

But they're amazing people and please treat them with respect and appreciate them.

They do a great job, you know, invariably.

They really are out there doing their best, just like we all are.

But it is something that you need to get used to and you need to be familiar with.

The biggest thing I would say is one getting used to the squarbing called and two is the foot faults.

Yeah.

And it is incredible how often in Rec play people foot fault, especially people that don't play tournaments.

They're in the kitchen.

An amazing amount of time if you're actually paying attention.

Yeah.

And just the way my brain works, I tend to really focus on observing the other side of the net in terms of how people are positioned with their hips.

Their feet, their body position, and I often catch foot faults.

And a lot of times I don't call them, but when we're playing high level rec games and people are stepping in the kitchen,

it's the equivalent of calling a ball in or out.

Yeah.

If someone steps in the kitchen, just so you know the rule, if you are in an unreft match, if you see your opponent step in the kitchen when they're volling or after they hit a volley and their momentum carries them in.

If you call them on it and they disagree, which they often will, you just play the point over.

So that's the rule.

But when you have a ref, obviously they're going to call foot faults.

That's one of their primary responsibilities.

So it's your responsibility to call the lines.

It's their responsibility often to call short serves and to call foot faults and similar types of faults.

Another example of a fault, which is called today, when someone hit a volley, and they didn't step in the kitchen yet, their paddle hit the ground.

Yeah, that's another rule.

In the kitchen.

In the kitchen.

But one of the biggest mistakes I see people make when they first start playing tournaments is they'll serve as the ref is calling the score or just before.

Now that used to be a fault a lot of times and sometimes it still is in the appropriate context, but that's something you really need to get used to.

So you could probably comment on this, but if you guys ever watch any matches on YouTube or pickable TV or PPA or whatever.

And you can comment, Mircha, on pro matches, the odds of them getting a foot fault call wrong are infinitesimal.

I agree.

None of us think we ever foot fault, but inevitably if they show the video replay, there's a foot fault.

It's one of those things like nobody in jail is guilty.

Nobody that foot felt actually foot faulted, but everybody foot faulted.

One of the things that I would recommend as tournament prep is set up a camera by the side of the court focused on the kitchen line and record yourself and then watch it back.

Yeah.

And see how it works.

We have a friend, like if you were in a group, have somebody stand there and be the ref and say, hey guys, let's call foot faults this time.

Just watch because it's like you said, they don't call lines, which that's another whole show in and of itself.

But they're pretty much only job is to call the score and call foot faults.

It's the only thing they're really looking for during gameplay.

They generally tend to get it as right as they can.

They do.

And one of the things you really want to know about is the scoring.

So when you go to tournament, you want to know what the venue is going to be.

Is it indoors? Is it outdoors? Is it going to be cold weather?

You got to check the weather.

But you want to know the ball you're playing with the scoring format.

Is it a game to 11 win by one?

There are sometimes some around robin formats where that's the case.

Is it a game?

Did you have an NPL?

Didn't they?

Was it win by one or something?

Yes, NPL you win by one.

Exactly.

Which is a huge deal.

And it is.

If you're not aware of it, it's right.

So you need to know the scoring format if you're winning by one or two.

Don't forget the timeouts.

A lot of times people forget that timeout rules.

For example, NPL is only one timeout.

Traditional tournaments.

It's two timeouts.

The other thing you want to know is about switching sides.

You want to think about whether you're picking serve or receive if you win the toss or whether you're picking end.

I can tell you what I do.

What do you do, Michael?

You've mentioned this before that you like to pick the good end.

So you always start on the opposite side.

So when it's game three and you have to switch sides, you're on the good side for game three.

So that's generally how you do it.

I do the same thing.

It really matters.

Like we're in a great situation right now to illustrate this.

They've got courts here, even though this is mostly an indoor facility.

And most of the courts are facing the right direction.

Their championship court is facing the wrong direction.

So you've got big open light on each side and it's very difficult to see.

And even when we are on the opposite, the 90 degree facing courts,

if you happen to be on the left hand side on the far side of where we are right now,

and someone went across court with a speed up, it just got lost.

I mean, I completely lost the ball.

So those are the kinds of things that I would try to notice so that if I end up getting in this 10-8-8 game three,

I want to make sure I'm on the right side and I can actually see as well as I could.

Yeah, and even indoors, the sightlines are often an issue in quite a few venues.

There are ones that are getting better.

A perfect example is Pickler Universe. That place is amazing.

It doesn't matter which side you're on.

Yeah, that's good.

For the most of the courts there at least.

But there are other venues where they have very light background in the walls.

And when you're facing that, it's really tough.

And you really want to be in the best position you can in the last portion of the game to close.

You could be down 6-0 in the third, turn around, and get on the good side, and end up winning the third.

And that's what you want to be. You want to be in the best position to finish the match.

We have these great local tournaments in California called Kappa, which is California Pickleball Association.

And one of the greatest things they do is you just know if you're A.M. or PM.

So they'll have an 8-12 and then like a 12-4.

And you just need to know that.

But they are so great that they're all round robins.

And you get all of your pickleball into that four-hour span.

Versus what you might see in the APP or PPA, which is a traditional bracket.

And you might get up at, you know, get there at 8 and you're still playing at 4 depending on how your bracket went.

It's really helpful to know that because most of us when we're playing Rec Play are there 9-12 or 8-11 or whatever it is.

And your body might not be prepared to be on a court for 9.

I mean, I've been here today for 8 hours.

You take a break and get up and go, whoo, must have a little bit sore after playing a few games and stopping and playing a few games.

So it's really helpful to know not only if it's a round robin or a traditional bracket,

but is there a come-around in your local tournament where if you happen to have lost the first round,

can you do what you did in your first singles tournament and make your way all the way back in the back draw to the gold medal match?

That still exists in a lot of tournaments in the country.

Yeah, another thing about that type of format that you're talking about is there are a bunch of terms that are now doing round robins to start the tournament

and then doing the draw or brackets afterward.

So for example, if you have 16 teams, perhaps you have four groups of four and then you're playing three, 15 games.

And there are some tournaments that are also doing rally style scoring.

So that's a totally different kind of scoring.

Remember that every point counts with rally scoring.

So that's the one where it's even more important to make consistent shots.

You're not going to go for serves quite as much.

You're going to make every return because when you're missing the serve in rally scoring, your matters a lot.

I was just going to suggest that if you have a regular group that you play with, it's worth it.

You know, when you show up on that particular Tuesday to say, hey guys, what do you say about doing rally scoring today?

Just so you have some reps with it and or what if we just do one game to 15 and do your normal round robin like that you might do,

but the dynamic of a one game to 15 feels very different than two games to 11.

I mean, it's a totally different feel to it.

And the ball, you really have to know which ball they're using because that's a huge difference.

Yeah, you know, between the Franklin and the lifetime ball, some tournaments use other types of balls.

They just certain events have ball sponsors.

So you really want to use the ball that will be used during the tournament.

Another thing is you want to know which type of paddles will be allowed.

If it's a USAP.

This just happened to you.

This just happened to me exactly.

I talked to the tournament director before and he asked me to help him with the format and do a bunch of things, you know, help him out the tournament which I did.

And one of the things that was thought was nice is the NPL, which is now the champion series pickleball.

So when they did a tournament style with brackets, they put a tournament style event, what they did was they allowed both UPA and USAP approved paddles to be used.

And I suggested that in this event.

And he said, yeah, there's no problems.

Let's do that.

So he announced that in the morning each day.

And then when the refs went out there, there were USAP reps.

And they said, by the way, we can't have you use a UPA only approved paddle because

we're USAP reps.

Wow.

So which was appropriate.

They, you know, they had and discussed it specifically with the tournament director.

So I had to switch the paddle was that I was using.

Yeah.

Which wasn't a big deal.

But again, it's something that you want to know these days because there's a little more confusion in terms of which governing body is approving which paddle.

He's spent the weekend with your brand new out of the box.

Carbon barrage four, which is what I've been hitting.

I've not hit the one yet.

But I'm really loving mine so far.

I have to say I was really impressed with it.

It has the best sweet spot of any carbon paddle.

So far, it has quite a bit of pop and power.

Yet it has very good control.

Yeah, it's going to take some time for me to, you know, get used to it just like it does with any paddle.

Yeah.

That's what it is for all of us.

But I really enjoyed it and it really has an amazing amount of spin that you can generate on drives.

Yeah.

That is something that was really noticeable.

So I'm excited to test it out a little bit longer and wait it up.

Thank you to carbon for that.

And by the way, if you guys want to get your barrage when it comes out very shortly, carbonpickable.com.

See our bnpickable.com. Use the promo code 402p.

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And I highly recommend you pick up some of their soft goods.

They've got great bags. They've got great clothes.

They've got great hats.

They work with Florence Marine on a lot of their stuff.

And to me, it's the best wicking, lightest pickleball gear I've ever worn.

And you forgot the new goodies that you gave me this weekend.

Which for those of you that have ever been seen me play.

Yeah.

I wear a sleeve on one side.

And it's funny people always ask me what they think I have an injury.

But it's not the injuries because I start playing in Florida.

Yeah.

And where it's very humid and I started in September.

And so I was sweating so much that it was going through my wristband.

Right.

And someone suggested sleeves.

I've been wearing the sleeves on my right arm.

And thank you very much.

It's your look for the sleeve.

Yeah, they have new sleeves.

I don't even know when they're for sale.

So they'll have some cool sleeves.

One thing I will say about tournaments, especially, you know, if you guys play singles or doubles.

Singles definitely, but there's a lot of mental game required for tournaments.

When you're playing another team, all they're looking for is a chink in the armor.

They are looking for an opportunity to get you in your head and start making some mistakes.

And today I hit a slightly higher speed up.

These are good kids.

They're very good juniors.

Slightly higher than I wanted to.

Kid was not real happy about the location of it.

His parents were there.

They were like, it's fine.

But he was in his head for the next three points and made three quick mistakes.

Because he was just trying to basically retaliate.

And I was like, I'm so sorry, man.

But he was an axel.

It was just a little higher than I meant.

But man is the mental game important in pickleball.

I can't thank anybody that's more stable than like Ben Johns on a court.

He's just a rock.

And that combined with the nerves, which are almost impossible to train for.

I'm curious about this.

Once the last time you felt nervy on a game or a match.

Actually, I'll have to say that I get a little bit of butterflies every morning when I start the draw.

It improves after the first match.

But it actually makes me a little nervous when I don't get the butterflies.

And that's when I know that I'm a little bit off.

It's funny.

Like the butterflies are comforting to me now because I know it's meaningful to me.

And there's always, I like that little element of the unknown at the beginning of the day where you don't know you're playing.

I typically don't look at the draw.

That's just my thing because I can't really change it.

And I don't really worry about it.

And players are so good now at almost any tournament level that no match in my opinion is just a gimmie.

And if you look at matches like a gimmie, just a walk over, you think, oh, we're going to crush these people.

I don't think that's a good way to approach it.

I think you always need to respect your opponents from the very first round on.

What's nice about Ron Robbins is that you get a little bit of leeway because it's not a double elimination or even a single elimination.

So you get to play into the term a little bit.

That's why it's nice to have that little mental prep before.

So you know the format.

But I always get some butterflies before the draw starts.

And as I start playing, they go away.

And towards the end of the day, I really don't have any.

How about you?

I got the very first tournament I ever played, which is about a month after I started playing pickleball.

I got the Yips.

It just never happened to me again.

The Yips being in hand to God, I could not put a ball into the service box on my serve.

I just, I was like looking at my paddle going, what is going on here?

I couldn't have been trying to hit a more basic serve.

I still, by the way, was competitive, but I missed 27 serves in my first two games.

And I hung in there.

I lost 11, 9, 11, 7 or something like that.

But holy moly, I just got the Yips.

And I played a lot more competitive racquetball to this point than I had pickleball.

So I was very new to that whole thing.

One of the things that I could do in racquetball, I copied from one of the top players, which was the second the point.

I think Parastod does this.

The second the point was over, racquetball is a box.

You usually have a door.

I would walk back, tap my paddle on the door, like right at the handle, and then I would wipe it physically.

I would tap, wipe.

And that physical manifestation was me wiping the last point away and starting this point.

And it was a really nice mental prep.

So if you guys ever see me on court, I will often walk back and I'll tap my paddle on the fence or something.

And that is my mental reset for the next point.

Yeah, there's quite a few ways to do that, whether it's before you're serving and some people tap their paddles on the ball or drop the ball in their paddles.

Or like, for example, Georgia Johnson, she'll touch the back wall or the screen in order.

Yeah, right.

She might be Leah Janssen is probably famous for her routine.

She has multiple paddle taps all over her body.

And it's just a good way to mentally reset.

One more thing I want to add to that really quick.

Super ADD on the court.

And one thing that actually helps me a lot, and people think, like, are you okay, whatever.

I'll just be staring down at the ground very often between points.

Or I'll be leaning on my knees and just looking right down.

And that's because if I look up and have all the input and all the noise from all the other courts, I get really distracted and I lose my focus very easily.

So if you see that, don't be alarmed. I'm not hurt.

I'm just trying to keep my head in the game as we play.

Yeah, I mean, I think we should talk about how to prepare for that.

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Let's talk about how we prepare that mental aspect of the game.

And for me, at least the night before and the morning of, what I really like to do is prepare all the things that I could potentially need

over the course of the day. We talked about that a little bit, but that's a way that it helps me mentally.

Like gear wise and all that. Exactly.

Like I have all my clothes that I need. I have all the food, all the hydration.

I have the paddles. My paddles are wrapped. You know, they're appropriately weighted.

So if something goes awry or if we have it long delay or whatever, I'm prepared.

Yeah. So that's one thing that won't distract you if you're prepared with all the stuff that you might need.

Knowing the format and the scoring the balls, we just talked about that.

That actually helps me mentally prepare.

If you can do this, really try to play a bunch of wreck games with your partner with a very intentional

tournament style play. Right.

You can't completely reproduce it. But what you can do is talk to each other in terms of how you're going to communicate.

Practice that style of communication, whatever works for you.

And if you're going to try certain things during a wreck game, let's say you're working on speed ups

and you're both aggressive players and you're working off speed ups off the bounce,

tell each other where you're speed up, practice that.

But if it gets to a really tight game like eight all, nine all in the wreck play,

make sure you're hitting the best shots. So that's make the balls.

Make the balls, but come up with the strategy over the course of the game.

And then try to stick to the highest percentage strategy.

Yeah. Over the course of the game, especially during big points where you're practicing,

making your thirds. If you're going to make a drive, you make a drive over the net,

the dips that's not 100 miles an hour, you hit the 50 to 60 percent drive that's dipping a little bit,

nice margin over the net, one or two feet.

You're not trying to hit it one inch over the net, a perfect ball to hit a winner.

It's not a place for superhero sports center top 10 shots.

It's more of a place for consistency in making the shots as much as you can.

I mean, I can't tell you how many times I've seen players in practice.

Tell me, oh, yeah, I'm not going to hit that shot in the tournament.

I'm not going to hit that shot, especially the NPL world now that's CSP.

But in the team format, I've seen people prepare and they tell each other,

oh, I'm not going to hit that during the match.

And they get in the match and guess what? They hit that awful speed up

or the inside out attempting a winner on the line and they hit it out.

You cannot reproduce good decision making in the heat of battle during a tournament

if you have not practiced it repeatedly during wreck games

during intentional tournament practice type wreck games.

I still feel like, like, if I have a two-e-roll cross-court dink, backhand to backhand,

I still am very tentative to deploy that in higher pressure situations.

When I know that I can just hit a slice dink that will make it

versus trying to be offensive and aggressive with this two-e, if it's not quite there yet.

And if I catch myself in the part of a game, I'll just tell myself, dude, that's not there yet.

This is not tournament ready yet.

And I might try it and just go, oh, dude, that's what are you doing?

That's not there. And then that'll be my, I made the mistake.

I'm going to go back to at least being safe and making the ball the rest of the day.

I mean, I will tell you the consistency and good decision making

is going to win you so many more tournament matches than the spectacular speed up

or amazing down the line or inside out winner on the line.

Yeah. Those kind of shots are not going to win you.

They might win your game. They might make you win you one match.

They're not going to win you multiple matches over the course of the day.

They're not going to win you tournaments. It's really consistency.

And that's another way you can settle into the tournament by you and your partner

talking before the match, especially if you don't know who you're playing.

Let's just start off with the basics. Let's return down the middle.

Yeah.

And if we figure out the weaker player, we'll return toward the weaker player.

But on the middle side of that weaker player, and what I mean by that is that

you're not aiming for the sidelines. Yeah.

Okay. What you want to do also at the beginning, you know,

hit your thirds towards the person that's moving. Yeah.

Basic strategy that wins consistently. That's where you start.

And then as you get more comfortable, then you can start more aggressive type of play.

And also don't lose the game before you've hit the first serve of the game.

Meaning you might be facing somebody that's got a great reputation in your town

or their fantastic players. Don't just concede the match just because they've got this great reputation

and play your game. Do your thing. And if you have to make a strategy within it,

make a strategy within it. But if you're able to make those balls and start getting a couple of points,

you never know any given Sunday here on pickleball courts.

Exactly. We just saw just this past weekend in the PPA,

Hayden Patrick and then a bright lost, I think in the quarters,

and they had just beaten Ben Johns and Anley Waters in the tournament before.

Yep. And pretty soundly as well, not soundly, but I would say decisively.

And they lost in the quarters next, you know, J. W. and Georgia also lost

before the finals. They usually get to the finals. So yeah.

There are just better and better players out there.

One more thing I want to add is that everyone gets nervous.

Yeah, I really think that everyone gets some type of nerves.

Yeah. Except for the people that they're in the finals every time.

Yeah, I really don't care.

They just don't care. Yeah.

But the majority of high level athletes, I'm pretty certain,

get that little bit of anxiety or butterflies or whatever you want to call it.

And I actually look forward to that. I mean, that's part of why we play

is to get that little adrenaline rush. Yeah.

A great, a great, a great, that's why we play.

The first few times I would play with you, I was always a little jumpy.

I'm a little more used to it now, but it's always fun when you're

know you're facing somebody who's a really great player,

because it's a great test of your own skill and your intestinal fortitude.

Shout out to young Rhett, I played with today, who was a great young,

up and coming player, who's got a diabolically angled, two-eat,

role-dink, what I just talked about. Got me at least three times during our match,

with just an incredibly well-placed, aggressive role.

But we pulled the trigger a little early, need a little more patience

with the rest of his point. We talked after and I said,

man, you're going to be a real weapon. Just a little more,

because yeah, sometimes I try to get a little, I actually let it come to you.

Your shots are amazing. They're already there.

So I think that happens in tournaments a lot, where maybe we aren't as patient

as we should be or as consistent as we'd like to be in games.

And that's why we end up losing.

Yeah, and one additional thing that I feel really improves your mental game

is focus on your footwork.

Which is tough for me when I hurt my knees so bad yesterday.

Exactly. So when it gets tight, I always really focus on my footwork.

I think, okay, let's stand on the balls of my feet. Let's be on my toes for a return,

or when my partners are turning, make sure I split step,

make sure I focus on my footwork. And that helps me loosen.

People notice that during really big points, when you get caught tight,

you don't move as well. Your feet are kind of stuck because you feel tight.

And so I feel that getting your feet involved sort of loosens you up from the ground up.

And I really think it does improve your mental skill set and helps you relax

and do what you need to do.

And I think a perfect example, someone that is incredibly mentally tough,

is Analy Waters.

Sure.

And I really think that part of that skill set that she has starts with her footwork.

Her footwork is so sound, it allows her to be in the right spot,

to really predict balls, to help set the mental tone by physically being there

and being present, and focusing on the footwork that allows her to plan those

mentally tough games and get through those mentally tough times.

I mean, how many times have we seen Ben and Analy down eight to one

and they end up winning 11 to eight? And that reminds me of what I was about to say,

which is I was listening to Dave Fleming and Adam Stone do the commentary

for the new port tournaments going on right now as we record this.

And I can't remember what team it was, but they were down eight nothing.

And Adam said they just need two. They just need two on this.

They need to get on the board. Don't be afraid when you're way behind

just to not a couple of points.

You don't have to get it all in one shot, but there's something mentally that really helps

when you just get a couple of points on the board. Now you feel like you're in the game.

Even in the first game or say you won the first game and you're losing the second game,

I really feel that it's really important for the third game,

or if you're still in the first, it's important for the second game as well.

If you're down eight zero to get two or three points, if you lose 11, three, 11, five,

I feel that helps you settle in and get into the next game a little bit better

as opposed to losing 11-1 or 11-0.

Just have that mentality that even if you're way down, just don't tank the rest of the game.

Just don't give it up. Try to get a little bit of traction.

Maybe you try a new pattern. If you're losing eight nothing, something's not going well.

You're either missing balls or you're hitting to the best player or whatever.

So just try something a little bit different to see if you can establish some patterns.

Yeah, stack, mix something up.

Exactly.

I also like the idea of going home with the date you're brung.

What I mean by that is, let's say you won the first game 11-2.

For whatever reason, you've changed your strategy or something.

Maybe they adjusted a little bit or something, but you got away from the thing that got you there in the first place.

Sometimes you got to take a time out and go, hey, this whole first game we did XYZ,

the shaking bake was working really well for us.

For whatever reason we got away from it, game two, let's go back to that and see if we can make some hay.

Absolutely.

And if you videotape your matches, that's another way that you can help yourself mentally,

because you can look back on it.

And when you have the intentional rec play where you're practicing for tournaments,

so you're doing intentional style, tournament, rec play, you can take a look at how you adjusted,

how you and your partner adjusted, what were the patterns that were working, what weren't.

That's why coaching is getting to be more and more important at the pro level.

You have an extra set of eyes to help you out.

And if you have that available to you, I strongly suggest you do that.

Maybe ask a friend to come and just watch maybe an knowledgeable friend come watch you play

and you're in your partner play and give you some advice during timeouts.

Hey, I see that you were targeting Joe in the mid court in the first six points,

and you guys won every point.

But now you're targeting Steve and you've lost the last six points.

Right. Why did you do that?

Let's talk about a few common pitfalls, common mistakes that Mike getting our way.

I guess we could probably volley these back and forth.

The first one and this just came up again today.

I've pretty much only been hitting with the lifetime ball for the last month or so.

And it was like the first game we played with a sell clerk and it was like a night and day difference

and how that ball reacts and performs.

And I'm not good enough to just go cold and not need a couple of hits to go.

All right, I got to modify my swing a little bit this way, this way, this way.

So you got to play with the tournament ball before you get that.

That's that's 100%.

Next one is I'd say is really a poor warm up or poor planning.

You get to the tournament.

Let's say tournament starts at eight o'clock and perhaps you get the venue at seven forty five.

So you haven't warmed up.

You're in a rush to get there.

So mentally you're not quite there.

You're not quite prepared.

You don't have the proper mentality.

You got to have in pickleball.

You're often played with a partner unless you're playing singles.

You got to make sure that you're there for your partner.

And you know what your partner needs for a warm up.

Maybe your partner needs a longer warm up than you.

Yeah.

So if you usually get there at seven thirty and start today,

but your partner needs to get there at seven fifteen or seven o'clock,

you have to accommodate your partner.

So make sure you're there.

You warm up properly.

You're hydrated.

And you've eaten properly and you're ready to go.

Alongside with that, I've been known in my life to over prepare or overthink for tournaments.

And sometimes I have to go, do just let it rip.

You've been on the court enough.

You've practiced enough.

You're there.

Like get out of your own head a little bit for these things.

Number three, do not change equipment.

Last minute.

Not a great idea.

Mirch has got this brand new paddle right now.

I would not expect him to be playing with it this week.

Another, you adapt to paddles really fast.

I've seen you.

But it's really nice to put on your comfortable jeans and your comfortable boots

before you go out and go on your hot date.

Obviously this was not a, you know, intense tournament style thing.

So yeah, that's 100% correct.

And make sure you bring a back up paddle.

Yeah.

A lot of people forget that.

You really need to do that.

Another mistake is just playing really aggressive too early.

And trying to hit really aggressive, maybe third shots where you're missing or really aggressive returns or really aggressive serves.

And you miss a serve, you miss a return.

Those are the kinds of things that are not going to help you settle in at all.

Or you're just speeding up off the bounce too quickly.

You know, if you get an easy ball, you have a controllable dink.

And you want to hit something aggressive, whether it's a lob or speed up or aggressive dink.

Of course, definitely do that.

Don't let opportunities slip by.

But don't try speeding up when you're off balance or off the court or whatever.

That's the kind of stuff that you really want to work on as the consistent patterns that win.

Next, do not let your nerves dictate your shots.

What I mean by that is if you are afraid to let it rip, let's say you're a really great third shot driver, fifth shot dropper.

But for whatever reason, you're a little jumpy, your nerves aren't there.

Maybe your drive isn't working the way you wanted to.

Well, you got a choice.

You can start working on a drop or you can drip or you can rip through a few of those drives until you settle it down.

And now you're in the sweet spot of your game.

Don't let your nerves dictate how you might change your shots or change your strategy.

If you're not using what's in your wheelhouse.

Oh, yeah, absolutely.

So that's one of the keys is really focusing on again, the patterns that win.

The consistent patterns of win.

All right, next is being hydrated and having proper nutrition, being prepared for that.

And if you're not physically or mentally able to perform because you're not hydrated or you're not properly fed,

you haven't fed yourself properly, that's just a recipe for disaster.

Yeah.

And it physically can hurt you.

Like when you're dehydrated, that's when you're more likely to have an injury.

Strain something.

When you're not feeling well because or you're not mentally there because you're starving or you haven't eaten properly

or you've eaten too big of a meal right before the match and you don't feel good.

Yeah.

You know, those are killers.

And they are very, very easy to repair and prepare for.

The last time I played a PPA was a San Clemente lifetime fitness.

And we weren't told when the senior pro of playing singles when we were supposed to go.

So I didn't get a text until the morning of the actual event.

And they said, yeah, you guys started 7 a.m.

And I went, what?

Okay.

So it what I think I woke up.

I just happened to have woken up at 615 or something that day.

And I went, oh my god.

So I got my stuff together and ran over.

And then I went to the thing, where am I?

You know, I checked in.

Oh, you're on blah, blah, blah.

I was some weird number.

And I said, well, I don't know.

I'm, look, I did a, you know, if you've been to there, it's multi levels.

It's, it's all, it's all over the place.

I don't know where I have to be.

Well, turns out I was on the grandstand court.

I was on GC, GC one or whatever.

So you got center court.

And you got grandstand court.

I didn't even know where that was.

I showed up at 657 with, wow.

For singles.

And the ref was already standing on the court.

And it said three minutes.

And I went, great.

So major tournament, zero warm up with a ref.

So I pretty much didn't do most of these things on this list.

And you can imagine how that went.

Uh, yes, I can.

And imagine that we're relatively poorly.

And one of the other things is not understanding the scoring or format

and not being used to be playing with a ref.

Yeah.

So that's another thing that's going to affect you negatively

in terms of your mindset.

And it's not going to help you play your best.

So again, prepare.

Finally, stay solid.

Steadiest she goes, do not have emotional reactions to things.

There's going to be some things.

There's going to be a call that doesn't go your way.

You knew it was in.

They hooked you on it.

Whatever it was.

They spit up.

They got you.

Really easy to get mad.

I watched Conrad Arnet get hit by an errant ball in the face at the PPA.

And he just laughed and went on to the next point.

I was thinking, man, I don't know how many people I know that wouldn't have reacted incredibly

negatively to that.

But he was super chill and went on and played the next point.

And that was that.

And that was like, yeah, that's what a pro does.

Yeah, and if you are going to get body bag, which is a very good possibility and pickleball,

remember, there's one of two people that are at fault.

Either yourself or your partner.

Yeah.

So it's not the other side's fault.

I really don't think there's anyone out there intentionally headhunting.

Now, sure, there are people that are doing full send.

Yeah.

And some balls that are trying to tag people, sure.

But that's part of pickleball tournament play.

If you're upset that someone's targeting your partner in an tournament, all right, that's how it's supposed to go.

Okay.

And if your partner's struggling and you're not getting any balls, that's one hard thing to get used to.

It's not easy when you don't get that many balls.

Right.

So you're not prepared or you're trying to do too much.

And that's another thing you got to keep in mind is that that's part of a tournament style format.

Under pressure that you may not get many balls if you're the better player.

Yeah, we didn't really touch on that much during this whole thing.

But when your partner is isolated and they're picking on him or her, and you've got to stay active and in the point.

I remember playing Mixed Once, Mircha, and I looked down on my heart rates at like 140 BPM.

I don't think I touched the ball because I was just doing calisthenics the whole time.

Having to cover back and forth and back and forth and back and forth.

I'm like, how am I this out of breath?

And I did not even lay a single paddle on a ball in this point.

But that was Mixed.

That's what happens when they go right at your partner.

Yeah, absolutely.

We both enjoy play tournaments.

Yeah.

There's a lot of benefits to it.

It helps you improve.

It helps your mental game.

It helps your strategy.

It helps your decision making.

It's just a good way to test yourself and improve.

You get to play all different styles that you normally wouldn't.

So we highly recommend you play tournaments.

We want you to prepare because preparation is going to build your confidence.

We really want to remember that when it gets tight, focus on your feet and focus on the simple, most effective strategy.

Don't try to go crazy doing super aggressive things or things you're not used to doing.

So kind of stay in your wheelhouse.

Simplicity, if you aren't making the balls you want, then keep it simple.

I always think of Colin Johns because he's just a guy who doesn't do a lot of flash with a lot of his shots.

But he makes balls.

He makes this third.

He doesn't make a ton of mistakes, unforced errors, which is what makes him a steady as he goes player.

And consistency is going to win out.

Yeah.

The most part.

Yeah.

And there's nothing like it.

You get on a court for a tournament.

You'll be after the fact.

You're going to be sitting at a bar having a drink, having a beer with the people you just played with.

You guys all had a blast.

You're all exhausted.

And you can't wait to do it again.

It's the best teacher.

Yeah.

And you get to meet new people, which is one of the things we all love about pickleball.

Yeah.

Is the community, the people we met.

We met some amazing people here.

We met a lot of people.

We met a lot of people.

Yeah.

Hall of Fame basketball player.

And baseball players in the Hall of Fame.

I mean, just some amazing, amazing people.

And that's why we love this great sport.

So it's another way to get out there and improve your connections and community and experience.

Well, guys, get out there, play some tournaments.

It's a blast.

If you've never done it.

And you're like, well, I'm not that competitive.

You might be surprised at what it lights in your soul as it comes to pickleball.

And how quickly you go, oh, we used to say this in car racing, Mircha.

I'd bring someone who was brand new to one of our auto crosses.

And they would get a case of the needs.

And what I mean by that is they'd have their stock, you know, BMW M3 and they'd run it all day.

And they're, they love their car.

And they couldn't say enough about their car.

And at the end of the day, who knew?

But they now they need new tires and they need wheels and they need shocks.

Kind of happens in pickleball.

Like if you want a reason to start drilling, go ahead and play a tournament and see how it feels.

And you go, wow, a lot of my weaknesses got exposed.

And now I'm going to work on that stuff and come back to the tournament and do it all over again because it was a blast.

Absolutely.

Just couldn't recommend enough.

It's really gratifying to kind of go through the gauntlet.

And, you know, whether or not you succeed, just think of it all as data points.

It's a learning experience.

And that's what we're all here to do is grow both with our game and with our experiences.

So just get out there and improve your experience.

Well, from thinking, Dine here in Mace Arizona, I'm Michael.

That is Mircha.

We hope you enjoyed this two-part series on what to expect for your first tournaments.

Get out there, get some practice in and get registered.

I would love if you guys would write to myself for Mircha.

You can go to picklehelp.com or wherever.

But we would love to find out if you have registered for a tournament.

And we'd love to keep you ready for it.

Okay?

Alright, get out there, have some fun.

We'll talk to you soon.

Thank you for listening to 4.0 to Pro.

For more tips, find us on Instagram at 4.0 to Pro.

If you have a pickleball question, submit it at picklehelp.com.

Now, get out there and dominate.

But don't forget to have fun.

You can go to picklehelp.com or whatever.

You can go to picklehelp.com or whatever.

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