Today I speak with Gary Cahill, former Irish Davis Cup & Billie Jean King Cup (formerly Fed Cup) captain as well as a previous High-Performance Director for Tennis Ireland. Gary is now the Performance Director and founder of Prodigy Tennis which provides high-performance training programs to junior tennis players. Their mission is quite simple - to produce champions. 

In today's discussion, we delve into Garry's recent research collaboration with a prominent Irish University, focusing on the experiences of tennis parents throughout their journey. 

In our chat, we cover ⬇️

• The pivotal role of each parent
• Navigating challenging decisions at critical junctures
• Factors that influence decision-making
• Challenges working with multiple coaches
• Selecting the right academy
• Key takeaways and lessons learned from his ongoing research

Hope you enjoy it!

Fabio

Have you seen the Functional Tennis Saber? Check it out here and don't miss the video of Stan Wawrinka crushing the ball.

This podcast is sponsored by ASICS. ASICS is a Japanese company founded in 1949 with the purpose of giving more people the opportunity to experience how sports and movement can have a positive impact on mental well-being.

To learn more about ASICS visit their website here: https://www.asics.com/nl/en-nl/sports/tennis/

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YouTube: Functional Tennis Podcast

Welcome to the Functional Tennis Podcast.

I'm your host, Fabio Molly and every week I bring you insights from players, coaches, parents and experts who are ingrained in the world of high level tennis.

Today I speak to coach Gary Cattle.

Gary has been on the podcast previously where he discussed how he got into tennis coaching.

His previous role as the high performance director for Tennis Ireland for over 10 years.

Setting up his own academy, Prodigy Tennis, where he provides high performance training programs to junior tennis players.

We also talked about working with ATP and WTA pros.

You can check out episode 10 and 103 for them.

But today we're discussing a very interesting topic.

We've many tennis parents as listeners on the Functional Tennis podcast and this episode should help you better understand your kid's journey.

The episode is also a great reminder if you're a tennis coach and it's really worth listening to.

Gary has been working on a research project in Dublin City University where he's looking into the journey of tennis parents who have kids competing at various age groups.

We discussed the role of tennis parents, pivotal decisions parents have to make at various stages of their child's development, working with one or more coaches, how to choose academies, the importance of long term planning, and ultimately what is the most important information that has surfaced so far in this research.

It's not complete yet, but the findings are firm.

Before we get started, a shout out to our podcast partners, asics.

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And whether you need shoes to cover every inch of the court or spend a full day coaching in them, ASICS, have you covered?

My personal favorites are the Solutionspeed FF2.

And if you're a coach, I recommend the Resolution 9.

Head over to ASICS.com to see the full range.

Okay, here's Gary.

Gary, welcome back to the Functional Tennis Podcast.

It's your third time on here, did you know that?

Yeah, third time lucky, I think Fabio.

Yeah, look, we've talked about in previous episodes about your career, how you got into coaching, your 10 years plus working as the main guy at the National Irish National Academy or Detroit.

What was that actually called?

It was, it was the National Training center at the time.

Okay.

You were leading the show there.

You had a great group of lads.

There's like, I was thinking the Simon, I think about this or somebody the other day where there's like eight, nine lads and girls.

There was a really good crew and something that hasn't been the Same since.

So we talked about that.

We talked about you working on the ATP tour, WT tour with players, your consultants, setting up an academy, the Prodigy Academy, and We Breathe.

And your mentoring as well.

We briefly touched on.

What we're going to talk about today is where you've gone back to university and don't overly know what you're working on, but I think it's something that will help a lot of our listeners because we've many parent listeners and younger players and I think what you've been working on is ideal for them.

I'm sure there's a lot for coaches to learn as well here.

So tell us, what have you been up to?

Yeah, so basically now it's just finished, gone into fourth year where I went back to Dublin City University with this lady called Anya McNamara who is a, you know, a specialist in talent development.

And we set up a project which I'm in the middle of now, which is researching parents, the journey of parents.

But know, because my interest is in tennis.

It's specifically on the journey of parents in tennis.

So what we're doing is tracking parents of tennis players at different age groups, so starting at under 12, then at under 14, then at under 18, and then players who are just going into the pros and looking at, you know, the job that the parents have along this journey because it's a, it's a crazy job.

And the kinds of decisions that they're hit with along the journey and the kind of decisions they're hit with that actually are so important.

And a lot of the time these parents end up having to make these decisions, you know, without having a huge amount of experience themselves.

And you know, from coaching for so long, I suppose what influenced me to do this is I, you know, I've, I've, I've seen this.

I've realized how important the parents are.

We educate the coaches, we spend, you know, federations a lot of money and resources on educating the coach.

But actually the parents need support and possibly in some cases they're, they're just as important or us coaches wouldn't like to think of what, maybe they're even more important.

Okay.

Okay.

And is it a PhD you're doing or is it.

Yeah, it's a, it's a doctorate and I'm doing it as a professional because.

So I'm doing it like through the sport and through my work.

Okay, great.

And what sort of, what players are you tracking?

Well, I can't tell you who they are, but they're all national level players.

Some of them are based in foreign academies.

Almost half of them are in foreign academies, which is interesting.

And then, you know, some of them have just started the tour, but they're all high level, they're all top in, in the country.

So we're talking about performance tennis players.

We're not talking about, you know, kids who have just started tennis in the parks, because I think it's a completely different job.

Yeah, so you're talking about players who are on the road to become professional or some are professional.

So that's the path they're on.

Okay, so what is the role of a tennis player?

What have you learned?

All right.

I mean, it's, it's a, it's a really kind of, I would say, complicated job because, you know, one of the parents said to me, look, you know, I had this child, didn't know what sport they were going to go into.

I went into tennis.

But when you have a child, they don't come with a manual, they don't come with a handbook.

So you really end up in something that you, you don't know an awful lot about and the role becomes really complex.

So, like, what we're noticing is that there's mainly like, let's say, two different roles that the parents play.

One is they're kind of this, you know, let's say real emotional support for their kid in, in the sport of tennis.

So what I mean by that is like, you know, the kids are in tournaments, they lose matches, they have lows, you know, they don't make the ranking that they thought they were going to make.

They don't go as far in the tournaments.

So they have to support their kid in this way, firstly the emotional way.

And secondly, then, you know, the role is also like a developmental role that, you know, they're supporting their kid as regards, like the, the logistics, you know, driving the kids to come, you know, to competitions, traveling with their kids, managing the kid outside of tennis.

Because not only are the parents trying to develop tennis kids, but they're also trying to develop people.

So it's a fascinating role.

And you got some are coaches also.

And we only spoke to Tamea Babas last week and she talked about how her dad, you know, her dad played a vital role in her early career.

She did do a stint in the UK as well.

They're trying to claim her, but she went back home to Hungary.

But I actually asked her.

Now, maybe I'm touching a bit early on this where I said to her, like, Hungary lately has produced some great players.

There's some great females in the top hundred.

They've males in the top hundred, there's some upcoming players.

And she basically said, I was like, well, you must have a good system.

And she goes, well, a lot of it's privately driven.

Yeah, so I touched on that.

I just wanted to bring that up.

I touched on that earlier where we can talk about structures of coaching and various academies, and maybe it's a conversation for a different day, but you speak the different roles of parents.

Gary, do you see, like, that the male parent does more, the female parent does more.

What have you found with the split there?

That is a great question, Fabio, because actually, what's very interesting so far is that you do see that it's almost like in houses, that the role is split.

You know, you know, one of the parents may take more of a role in the logistics, you know, driving the kid or, you know, going to the competitions.

The other one may take more of the emotional support.

You know, you may have one parent who is a little bit tougher on the kid and the other one maybe is a little bit more supportive.

And actually, this can cause problems with parents.

I mean, you know, they're married, they have one who may be a bit tougher on the kid and one maybe a little bit softer.

So what you do see is that in some cases, this kind of relationship between the parents can be tough as well, because, you know, they're both often coming from two different.

Two different sides.

And.

And you have to remember as well that, you know, you.

They have May have three or four kids.

So in some cases, you see that one of the parents might work closer with another kid in another sport.

So, for example, one of the.

One of the athletes that were tracking, there's a tennis player and a footballer, and the dad is at the football, so he's following the football kid.

And the mother wasn't into tennis, but really has no other option but to follow the tennis player.

So, yeah, you're right.

I mean, they can be very different.

And I don't think that's a bad thing, because sometimes you have to balance it.

You need a good cop and bad cop.

Yeah, but what about when the parent isn't.

I spoke to an Irish tennis player during the week.

Don't know how this came up, but I asked, oh, did your dad watch you play much?

And he goes, never, never.

And if he did, he'd always say.

He'd always say, is that all you got?

Like, is that how good you are?

And he said only recently he saw Alcaraz Play.

And he like, he sort of nearly took everything back goes, oh, I know how good these guys are.

I'm kind of sorry for being so hard on you, you know, but so do you see parents who just have.

I know you say they've other kids play football, just have zero interest.

Is there any correlation to that, where the parents just want to have anything got to do with it?

Well, in the parents that we're tracking at the moment, I don't think it's the case.

I mean, all of the ones that, that were involved with, they all are really interested in it and, you know, quite intense about it.

They're committing a huge amount to it to commit a huge amount of money, resources, etc.

They're all really, really into it.

But I'd say that if there's two parents, one of them may not be into it, but at least one of these parents is really, really into it.

Yeah, that guy you're talking about, that they weren't into it.

I don't know if it's possible to really make it without one of these parents being really, really into it.

I think you need somebody, somebody that's driving it.

But you nearly hit on something that's interesting.

That has really been obvious from.

This is where parents have talked a lot about what to do when their kid is not successful.

You know, like, what do you do when your kid comes off the court after losing a match, gets in the car and you start the journey home?

This is something that parents really struggle with and something that they've spoken a lot about to me.

You know, the fact that without having experience, they often just jump straight into what they think with the kid.

You know, are they.

They start by, you know, criticizing, ends up becoming a.

Becoming a row in the car on the way home.

And I think, you know, simple things like that to help parents to understand what should you do when your kid loses a match?

Is something that us coaches really need to get out to parents so we can help them to develop the athletes.

Can I answer that?

Yeah.

Well, from what I've learned, I'm not a.

Obviously I'm a young parent, as in my kids are really young.

They don't play tennis, they're like under four.

But from listen, talking to coaches, parents on here, what I think the simple thing is you kind of.

Because I think, I know you kind of think everybody knows it then, but it's just basically you don't say anything.

You let them speak, you let them process and when they're ready, they speak.

And that's is.

Is it that simple?

I think it's part of it.

I do think, you know, you have to let them process everything first.

I think what's really useful here is to have good questions, you know, to try and ask the right questions to help the kid to reflect on what's after happening in the match, you know, because let's assume that they're still young and, you know, a lot of them are that they may not have the skills to really reflect at that age.

So to be able to, you know, ask them simple questions like, you know, what did you do well today?

You set a plan before the match.

How did that work out in the match?

You know, just to have some really basic questions like, what would you do the next time?

But I think what's really important in this, Fabio, is that as a parent, you have to be very careful not to judge the kid because of winning and losing.

And that's where a lot of parents can make the mistake.

Because in your head you are actually thinking, oh, shit, I really wanted them to win and I want them to win so much for themselves.

Not just about the family, not just about me.

But it's very hard to keep your mouth shut.

And kids pick up on this stuff, so they can feel when you're really happy and they can feel when you're sad.

So when they get into the car and you're like, the lighted stereo's up full blast after winning a match, and when it's like you're mourning after they've lost, even if you say nothing, they notice it.

So you have to try to, you know, keep the same.

I remember one time at a tournament where the father was presenting the prize for the to the kid that were after winning the under 18 championships.

And during the speech, the father goes, oh, look, I'm.

I just happen to be the president of the club that's running the tournament, and I'm really delighted that I'm presenting this prize to my own son.

But tomorrow he's still going to mow the grass.

Yeah, you know, I think the message has to be, look, you're the same.

Yeah, look, we've all seen at junior tournaments where, well, sorry, I'm generalizing that.

I've seen it during tournaments where a young kid wins, like, I don't know, let's say a grade, a lower grade ITF tournament or an under Tennis Europe event, and they're going around with the parents, buy them a gift, like set of earbuds, a set of whatever it is.

And I think things like that are bad because then they lose next few weeks, they lose first round, both weeks and you know, you can, you're very right.

You have to do your best.

No matter win or lose, keep these kids grounded, but encourage them.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You get a new racket if you win and you walk home if you lose.

Yeah.

So it's keeping the, it's the parents.

I think it's the parents who keep their players grounded.

The best are probably the ones that get the most long term success.

Yeah, yeah.

But.

Oh.

So Gary, what are these big decisions that parents have to make?

So I'm sure you found this pivotal points in a junior's career and what are some big decisions that parents have to make that could dictate their career?

Yeah, well, look, it's an interesting one and I suppose the, the famous story about this is when you look at Andy Murray's career and you look at what happened there where, you know, I suppose, look, we just know about this one because it was in the media so much where the decision was made by, by Judy to send Andy to Spain for certain parts of his, his training not only sent him there, but actually made sure to still be in and out to touch base and ensure that the training was, you know, going well and the coaching was being, you know, done well, etc.

And you know, this kind of decision, when you look at what happened in his career was so important that you could argue and could say, well, look, would he have been the same player if this never happened?

But is that not Jamie Murray then?

Is not Jamie Murray that he didn't go?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's like these two guys, one went, one didn't.

I know they're slightly different age, but it could.

Is, does that show anything that or is it, does it come down too much to personality then?

Well, we never will never know.

But you know, if, if somebody makes the wrong decision, you know, let's say chooses the wrong coach, let's say goes to the wrong program, starts with a coach that doesn't give them fundamentals.

I think that they have less chance of developing than somebody who makes good decisions.

And when parents start with a kid, there's kind of three main phases of decisions that they have to make.

And you can almost predict these by talking to parents.

Firstly, they start off in the really young ages.

It's about what sport am I going to play?

Okay, I'm going to play tennis.

Where's the best place for me to learn to play tennis?

Who's the best coach for me to Work with.

They're the first kind of stages.

And also making that decision, well, look, you're probably better off to keep the other sports going as well, which a lot of parents don't make.

The second phase then is where they're getting a little bit more into the sport.

They start to kind of specialize in tennis.

I'm talking about, you know, more 13, 14, 15, you know, kind of kind of stage.

And at that stage, they may be looking for academies.

As I say, a lot of these, especially in countries like Ireland, they travel, they go to foreign academies.

They might choose which academy we have to go to.

Again, they might be choosing a different coach.

Now they really have to start picking competitions.

What's the best competition route for me to go in?

And then as they progress, you get to, you know, finally the third phase where it's more about, okay, what's my track here?

Am I going to go college?

Am I going to try and play pro?

And Jordan, this phase as well, you're making huge competition and financial decisions about, you know, do I spend all my money playing juniors?

Do I go on the pro tour?

So these are all, like, massive, massive decisions that parents have to make.

And because every decision is different and the people are different, you can't have, like just one, one textbook to say you should do exactly this with your kid, but you can predict that these kind of things are going to happen.

And I think as coaches, you know, we can influence this and we can help.

Yeah, I definitely think there's a lot of education there.

The coaches should be able to offer the parents with.

With what you're talking about.

But kind of your three stages.

First stage, kind of funny where, you know, you get your kids into tennis.

Normally it's a local club.

You know, you're not traveling far because you're trying to keep logistics short so you can get lucky with.

There's a great coach at a local club and that can help get.

That's really what helps get the ball rolling, isn't it?

So that can help get the ball.

And sometimes you can know too much where you feel you don't want to send your kid to a club because you know too much.

If that's another way, which is a bad thing as well.

So sometimes the less you know, the better.

What you say about academy, you're talking about choosing a coach.

But from what I get, when a lot of the kids, not all of them, but a lot of them go to these academies around Europe, around the world, you're not picking the coach.

You're picking the academy, so you ultimately don't know what coach you're going to be working on.

Unless you're.

I think unless you're a really good player and you're at the top, you get more of a choice.

You might get the best coach there, but in these academies with loads of coaches, they're not all the best coaches.

Yeah.

And that's something that did come up, because actually, as well, what you find is that some of them change pretty quickly.

So they go one place and they realize, oh, well, look, I decided to go here, but now my kids been there for this amount of time and I should switch.

It's.

You're right.

I mean, the coach is really important.

Firstly, I think that, you know, at the end of the day, for me, I think the coach is the most important thing.

When you go anywhere, I think it's the most important thing.

And when parents choose an academy, a lot of the time they don't do the research.

How do they do research?

How can they?

Well, I'll tell you one story, and I thought this was fascinating because most of the people you know, when I asked them this question, how did you decide where to go?

Well, look, I looked on the Internet, I saw that Fabio trains there looks like a nice place, facilities are good.

So, yeah, let's go there.

And that could be the first place they've ever went.

But one of the parents I spoke, that was very interesting, because what they did was they decided themselves to go and have a look and went around loads of different places, but never even said in the academy what they were doing.

So rocked up, basically went there during the day, had a look, went back at different times in the day to see how everything was structured.

They were not tennis people got a feel for what they thought they needed for their kid, and then they decided to trial different places for a week, and they made their decision based on this.

And I thought it was smart because, you know, it's such a critical decision, especially if you're going long term.

If you're going for a week, maybe it's not, but if you're going long term, I think you have to try and gather every single piece of information you can get.

Because when parents make decisions, mostly they're making the decisions based on information from other parents.

And I'm not sure if that's always the right way to get your information.

I think you have to really be prepared to gather information, go out, check, talk to the coaches.

But what also is really important here, Fabio, is I think you know, because they're spending a lot of money.

You should be reviewing if things are working or not.

What would be some things to review apart from.

Obviously ranking is an easy one to review, but it may not apply too well at young kids.

So is it just having goals in place?

How would you review if you, one of your kids in, let's say an academy in Europe, three months, you want to review, what are you looking at?

Well, I would go firstly.

Well, it's different because I'm a coach, but I'd go different.

I'd go firstly, I'd watch the player to see, I would go talk to the coaches, see what they feel, how they feel the player is doing.

I talk to the physical trainers and most importantly, I'd regularly talk to, to the athlete themselves and ask them to log their, their improvement and, and make sure that they're, they're working towards their goals.

Now, I know, look, a lot of experienced coaches will, will do this anyway, but I think it's important for parents not just to go, well, look, you're there now for next year.

There you go.

I think you have to regularly.

Yeah, review the investment.

Is it working or not?

It's an investment.

You're right overall, isn't it?

Yeah, it is an investment.

And, and somebody said to me as well during this, look, you know, it's, it's not really about how much money, it's about how you spend the money you have, because you can spend any amount of money you want.

You can spend whatever you want, you can remortgage your house, you can do whatever you want, but it's about being really smart about how you spend it.

And have you seen anybody, Gary?

Let's say to go to the academy in Europe could cost between 50 and 80k a year, roughly.

I'd say they're rough figures.

Are they?

I'd say, I'd say you're pretty, you're pretty much, yeah.

And that's probably without.

As you get older, a lot of travel weeks as well, where you're paying more.

So let's say you're in 80 grand for the year.

Whether it's dollars, sterile and euros, doesn't matter.

Have you seen anybody say, okay, well, we're not going, we're not going to spend that money overseas.

We are going to work with a coach and a trainer in our base country.

We are, we've like this coach.

We're going to trust that coach.

Have you.

I know this, this of course happens around the world, but have you seen any really Planned decisions like that, you.

Know, the people I'm talk, talking to, Fabio know, and there was a reason for it.

The, the, the biggest challenge that people have is logistical challenges of.

Look, you need so many different things.

You need a tennis coach, you need a physical trainer, you need a physio, you need the right surfaces, you need the indoor courts in most, you know, a lot of countries.

So a lot of the time, parents end up driving to get a physio somewhere.

They're looking for a coach somewhere, they're looking for an indoor course somewhere.

Look, so the easiest way for parents is to centralize everything and put it all under the same roof.

And if you don't have this service available to you, then, you know, you probably don't have a lot of options.

But, you know, I can see the merit in what you're saying to be able to put your system in a place if you can, you know, if you can organize it.

But the organization part of that for a lot of people is not easy.

And don't forget as well, even when you organize it, one of the key things that people talk about a lot is role models.

You know, to be somewhere where you're surrounded by, you know, people who have made it give you belief, give you belief.

So, like, if you're walking in for your breakfast in one of the academies and you're sitting beside whoever Novak or whoever having your breakfast, there's a certain amount of, you know, maybe belief, I don't know, or feeling of what's possible, which you don't often, you know, find.

And I think that's an important piece.

Whereas if you're stuck in a club with your coach, you know, you're not going to have to 10 other players your age to spar with to compete with.

That can be very difficult.

You're probably in many places, you're missing the competition.

Ultimately, that's what you need as well to help you raise your level.

You need to be playing and practicing with as good as you can get.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Absolutely.

It's definitely tough.

How do parents deal with kids getting, let's say, coaching overload, where there's a few coaches giving inputs and they're sort of staring the player left, right, right, left.

And I think that's.

When I speak to a lot of players and coaches, you often hear, well, working with this coach and this coaching, and the parents are saying, and then you're speaking to some kids who are a bit older and go, when I got to 16, 17, all these coaches start giving me inputs.

And it got a bit, it got a bit cloudy.

How can a parent control that?

Fabio?

It's one of the biggest problems in our sport is this idea of overload and coherency of messages for kids in our country.

It's a massive issue because we have a system here where there's kids who go to a provincial squad, they might go to a private academy, they'll be in their club and they'll have a private coach so they can be effectively listening to four different people in a week.

And it is a massive, massive issue, in my opinion.

I think somebody has to be in charge.

Somebody has to decide, well, with this player, we're going to do X, Y and Z and the other people have to work with this person in charge, otherwise it doesn't work, you know.

So, like, if you have a player over a six month period and you can improve one or two things, I think you're a great coach.

Like, it's hard to improve one or two things in a player.

It might be easy to go out and look at something and say, okay, you know, elbow's a little bit low on the serve.

I can put that up a bit higher.

That might be easy.

But that's only something that's changed for that five minutes of that practice.

Has that changed that?

It's different in a match that takes months.

So we have to understand that changing anything takes a lot of time.

Changing 10 things at the same time will never happen.

In actual fact, it'll just bring the kid back, in my opinion.

And it's difficult one to resolve.

And there's a lot of egos involved here because every, you know, all of us think we know more.

And when, when you put so many coaches around the kid, somebody's going to say something to confuse the kid.

So if I was the parent, I'd be saying, number one, have as little a number of coaches as possible.

One, maybe somebody doing a group as well.

Two, no more have these people communicating regularly, working together.

And as the parent, I would be going, let's try and all meet up regularly and decide what we're trying to do here.

But you're right, I mean, this is crazy.

And it really happens on the ground.

Two things here.

One is, I spoke to coach while I was away working with under 12 players and he goes, check out this kid's forehand.

We've changed.

It was, I think it was an elbow.

It was a, it was maybe contact point.

I can't remember exactly what it was.

He goes, we spent three weeks working on that Thing solely he tracked the number of balls.

It came in close.

I know the magic 10,000 number, but it came in close to 10,000 balls.

This kid hit to change this and he was delighted because he was seeing his kid do it in the match and it was three weeks.

One thing they only worked on and he said he saw, he saw it in the match.

So he was like, it wasn't like, the job's done because we're seeing it in matches now.

It's happened automatically.

And so it gets back to what you're saying.

It wasn't just a five minute thing.

Sort your elbow out there.

It was that.

We're going to track this, we're going to keep working on it, Keep working until I don't need to talk to you about it.

So that was one and two is players.

I've heard this being discussed as well with talking to especially in academies or with some coaches.

Where does it.

They look at the kid, maybe it's 12, 13, and then they build a long term plan to say, okay, we think when you're 18, 20, 21, you're going to be this height, you're going to be this game.

We need to build your game around this.

We need that big forehand.

And the plan starts then and they stick to that all the way through.

Do you see much of that long term game plan and with juniors?

Yeah, I think no, not, not really.

And I'm going to go back to parents again here and I am going to say that I blame parents for.

Some of this and sorry, sorry.

This comes back to your whole getting the coach involved, getting the communication involved.

Sorry, it's coming back to that point.

And I would blame parents for some of this, Fabio, because I think parents don't understand enough about the big picture and they're looking for the quicker results young, because these quicker results young help them to get resources and help them to get selected for certain things.

So for example, if you're the best under 12, you're going to be selected for the European Championships.

If you're the best under 13, you're going to get selected for tarps or whatever.

Okay, which is fine.

But as a coach, we're under pressure to make these kids the best under 12 or under 13 or we're going to lose their job, they're going to bring them to someone else that will do that.

But as a result of that, this idea of, okay, we want to develop the player into a, a more aggressive game style, more rounded player for the future, etc.

Etc.

That doesn't really mean that winning young is going to be as easy because you don't have the strength yet to really maybe a little bit less consistent, et cetera.

But I think the parents really need education, but also the federations, because, you know, if.

If the federations are, you know, given resources, et cetera, just based on results, then of course parents who, you know, can't afford it are going to choose to get.

Look to get the results.

So it's.

It's a combination of things.

It is, again, going back to look, parents don't understand this, and I would say that federations also need to understand this.

Too many times the results driven overdrives the process driven.

So, Gary, where ultimately parents have to be educated here, coaches have to be educated.

Where does this start?

How do we get education to the parents?

How can we educate the parents?

How are you going to educate the parents?

What's the root here?

Well, I think we are educating coaches, and there's a lot of very good coach education programs.

I think it's really improved, actually.

I think, you know, even like podcasts like this are, you know, excellent for educating coaches.

We didn't have this 20 years ago.

They're great for parents, too.

Most of our listeners, I think, are.

It's hard to get the exact numbers, but we've a lot of parents.

And that's why even the trip to when I took to Greece with the future IMG future stars did the beats.

We had the parents on.

When we have parents on, the reaction's great.

I did the tips on what I learned over there.

It just surfaces up a lot of the audience to say, oh, that's really important.

I learned a lot from that.

So that's why I think this is what you're talking about here is really important.

And I think it's important that this, as much of this knowledge gets out to tennis parents around the world.

Yeah.

So, you know, I think a good start would be to include parent education in our coach education programs.

So, you know, as coaches, what kind of things could we do to really help parents and to make a, you know, a conscious effort to include parent education programs as part of your tennis training programs.

I think that would be a good start.

The second thing, I think for parents themselves, I feel that parents need support.

So when they get to points where they're making critical decisions, I think they need to be able to speak to people that might be able to help them to make these decisions.

Like, ultimately, when you make a decision, you don't know if it's going to be the right one or the wrong one.

No one can tell.

But you try and you try and make the bed.

You try and educate yourself to make the better decision.

Yes, exactly.

And the way I would kind of come at this, Fabio, is, okay, make parents aware of the different phases that they're going to be hit with throughout the kid's career.

Okay.

You are potentially going to be hit with this, this, and this at the different stages, because we can predict these by following what's happened with players.

Not all of them, of course, but you can predict a lot of them.

And then to support parents making the decisions.

So in actual fact, you'll be go, you know, kind of touching on, you know, things that relate to.

Even outside of tennis, how do people make decisions?

Like, when we make decisions, we make decisions.

Decisions that are either really quick.

So we call them like these kind of system one decisions that are intuitive, very quick decisions we have to make.

We don't even notice we're making them.

And then we have the second one, which are these we call system two, which are very slow decisions.

And I think that in tennis, we need to help parents to make these slow decisions and in actual fact, where possible, have as much time to make decisions and then making sure that they have the right information, that they use some of the research to get this information as well.

So it's based on solid information, not just other parents, and support them in these ways.

I think that would be a good start.

It just one thing Tamir Babas last week spoke about.

She's a sister who's older than her, and her dad, her mom had gone through everything with her, so they sort of learned with the sister.

Just like they told Tamir, you're not playing tennis.

There's too much going on.

It costs too much, too much time.

Chance are low.

You're not playing tennis.

And she ultimately had the drive to play tennis.

So I think that fire alone is what somebody needs.

But have you noticed anything like that where, like, you know.

Yeah, they've had a couple of kids, too, so now they know the system a bit better.

And, you know, the second and third kid can do as much better opportunity then 100%.

Right, Fabio?

That is 100% right.

I've come across this so much in this that, yeah, yeah, they've.

They've made all the mistakes, you know, along the way.

And the young one is capitalizing on all this.

Yeah, this.

This for sure is happening.

And, you know, the interesting thing is that they end up a lot of the Time where the older one who, you know, they realize that maybe they're not going to be the pro that we taught initially.

They're the sparring partner now for the younger one.

Yeah.

You know, it ends up where yet the lessons that maybe we could, we could help them with, they've learned.

And the, The.

The younger one is the one that is, you know, really capitalizing.

You know, the other thing that's worth mentioning here that I have found interesting is that we kind of assume that when parents are sending kids to academies and spending this much money that they want their kids to be professional tennis players, but a lot of them don't.

Okay, that's a good.

That's a good.

That's a good one.

A lot of them actually don't want them to be professional tennis players.

A lot of parents do this because they want to just give them a chance.

They want to give them something, and in many cases, this is because they didn't have the chance themselves.

They might have done well for themselves.

They might have been good at something themselves when they were kids, and they never had the chance.

So, you know, so many times I've heard from parents, look, I don't believe my kid is going to be the next Novak Djokovic or, you know, whoever, but I just want to give them a chance.

I just want them to feel what it's like.

I want them to learn other skills for life through this.

Is there a fine line between that and the pushy parent dad, you know, the one we've all heard about, where, you know, they never made it and they're living their life to their kid and they're pushing their kid too hard.

That must be a fine line between giving their kid a chance but also pushing their kid too much.

Yeah.

Yeah, I think it is a fine line.

I, I think there certainly is a case that you, you know, you do have a lot parents who maybe don't realize it as well that they're pushing their kid too much and not, not, you know, on purpose or consciously, but they are, you know, but it is very interesting that the, the decisions they make around this stuff are not all.

And a lot of the time they're not, because they're expecting them to make their living out of tennis.

It's an experience in life that will build a character, build them as people, and they can afford to do it, so why not?

But it also, I think one, one thing you're missing out, it does give opportunity, even if they don't go on and play tennis finally, because One, you, you get into life skill, as you mentioned, as you mentioned.

Will it help you later on by being really good at something, people always want to play with you.

You can do connections.

But two, by being the best in your country, let's say a doctor, all of a sudden you have a choice to go to any university in the States.

You can get this unbelievable education, which then you can get any job you want in the world.

Like, if you come out of Stanford with a degree in religion, you can get a job working in finance, they'll take you on.

It's crazy.

Like, but you get, you know, you get these opportunities, go to these best schools that kids could only dream of.

And that's an education as well, where parents don't know enough about that as think tennis can be a key to not only professional tennis career, but also it can open up so many doors for you.

Yeah, and, and, and it was interesting that, you know, parents in their, in their mind have a, you know, certain way that they want to bring up their kid.

Right.

So, you know, I'd like my kid to have these kind of values.

I'd like them to be hardworking, you know, what, Whatever it is.

And a lot of the time I think they search for ways to develop the dolls in their kid, you know, and true sport, true tennis, whatever, you know, is one of the ways that you're going to be able to develop these things within your kid.

And that's a reason.

And also, you know, people also have said to me that when they're choosing their coach, they have this in their mind.

Does this coach fit in with the kind of values that I want to see in my kid?

Is this coach going to be, you know, someone who's going to push my kid to work hard?

Is this coach going to be someone who, you know, is going to listen to my kid?

Is this, you know, and, and that I found interesting.

That is something I hadn't really thought about it, though.

The values of the coach kind of match up with the values of the parent.

Yeah.

And you'll see that in relationships as things play out, it's always great when you see a player win a big tournament, especially, obviously, the, the bigger the player, the bigger the event where the first player, the first person they always run to is the coach, never the parent.

Like, it's always straight to the code.

Sort of feel bad for the parents because they spend so much time, this relationship is so strong.

And yeah, they've both guided themselves there.

It's kind of crazy that, though, as far As I know, I've always.

It's always the coach is the first person they go to, but ultimately.

Gary, actually have two more questions for you, but before I ask the last one, how do you, how do parents deal with a player who ultimately isn't good enough?

You say they're, they love the game, they want to be like they, I want to be a top hundred player.

But you just know sometimes it's just not there.

It's never going to be there.

No matter how much work and the player consists on keep going.

It turns into a wasted, not youth, but early, like teenage years upwards where they spend time and they just say, look, how, how, how do you handle that?

Well, I suppose, you know, the, the question the parents have to ask themselves is what are they trying to get out of this?

You know, are they, are they trying to get the player to the, to, to be at the top of the game?

And if they are, then, you know, I think that they have to sit down with the kid at some stage and say, look, you know, we're investing a lot in this.

Probably the chances are, you know, not what you expect or we expect or bring the coach into this conversation and have a realistic chat about the options that they have.

Maybe in this case the option might be, look, go to college, get a great education, you're going to have a future.

You could be a coach, you could be whatever.

But I think they could have that conversation with, with the kid, but I think including someone in it like the coach, so you have, you know, a bit of backup in it and, but probably the player underneath maybe has a good idea themselves anyway.

So, like, you know, well, you'd like to, you'd like to think you would.

I think that's something that you could do.

But I also take that, you know, maybe go back to what I said earlier, that the parents in many cases might just want to let them enjoy it and let them continue doing it.

And if they're able to financially afford it and they think it's doing their kid good, maybe they just keep them doing it.

Yeah, well, one thing tennis has done, I think for me, for most people, you know, keeps kids off the streets.

It puts them, you know, you hope they're with a good coach, with another good set of kids as well, training with them.

And it, yeah, keeps you out of trouble, which is something.

If it can just do that alone, I think that can help.

But we're going to end this.

Gary, what is your one, what's your one takeaway?

You've learned I know it's.

The journey isn't over for you in this, in this doctorate here.

What's the one thing that surfaced the most that parents can take away today?

I know you've said a lot of good things already, but is there anything that really stands out that you think is really important parents need to know?

Yeah, I think plan.

I think the biggest thing here is plan.

I would say that, you know, from what I've seen and the parents who I think may have done a better job, they plan well.

You know, they're thinking down the road, they're thinking a few years ahead.

They're not just doing it on foot.

They're really well, well planned.

And they do go wherever they need to put that plan together.

They talk to whoever they can, they listen to whoever they can.

They get the best possible information that they can when they're planning.

Not just plan.

Keep looking and reviewing the plan all the time.

Keep going back to it and asking yourself and your kid and involved your kid in the plan because at the end of the day, they're the ones that are going to have to do it.

So involve them in the plan, but keep going back regularly to see if you're achieving what you've set out to do within that plan.

And don't base that plan just on whether your kid is the best 10, 11 year old or 12 year old.

Wherever you are, make it a plan based on what exactly you're trying to achieve for your kid, what they want.

And yeah, get the best information and people around you.

Thank you, Gary.

Thank you very much.

That's great.

And if people do want to connect with you or learn more or have a question or, you know, parents, where can they actually find you?

Well, My email is infoprodigytennis.com and there is a.

We have an Instagram page for Prodigy Tennis.

That's Prodigy Introdigy int.

Yeah, so look, I'm happy to, you know, I find this a fascinating area.

So I'm sure this, it's a great area.

I think a lot of parents around the world need to know this sort of information.

So I'm sure I'll hear you on other podcasts soon enough spreading your message.

So, yeah, best of luck with this and I look forward to hearing about the final results you get when you finish it up.

Yeah, thanks, Fabio.

I hope you find that info from Gary interesting and importantly, valuable.

If you want to know more about Gary, check out our previous episodes with him, episode 10 and 103.

And other than that, I'll be back here next week.

Hope you enjoyed the episode.

Bye.

It.