Today I speak to Craig Boynton, the coach of Hubert Hurkacz. I was lucky to meet Craig last year at the IMG Future Stars event in Greece as Hubie was playing in the exhibition match and also stayed on to train for a few days.

Going into chat I didn’t know too much about Craig and I was intrigued to find out more about his early tennis and coaching career. He gets straight into it talking about stories of Pete Sampras and Jim Courier. He also talks about the type of coach he is and how he adapts to players he has worked with. He tells us about his relationship with Hubert, we touch on his match against Novak in the Wimbledon 1/4s and he ends by giving advice for our listeners who are tennis parents.

Fabio

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

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Welcome to the Functional Tennis Podcast.

I'm your host, Fabio Molle, 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 Craig Boynton, the coach of Hubert Hercat.

I was lucky to meet Craig last year at the IMG Future Stars events in Greece as Eubie was playing in the exhibition match and also stayed on to train for numerous days.

So since then I've wanted to get Craig on the show.

Going into the chat, I didn't know too much about Craig and I was intrigued to find out more about his early tennis and coaching career.

He gets straight into it, talking about stories of Pete Sampras, Jim Currier.

He also talks about the type of coach he is and how he adapts the players he's worked with.

He tells us about his relationship with Eubie.

We touch on his match against Novak in the Wimbledon quarters this year and he ends giving advice for our listeners who are tennis parents.

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

Asics, in my opinion, make the world's best tennis shoes.

And whether you need shoes to cover every inch of the court or spend the full day coaching, they have you covered.

My personal favorites are the solution speeds FF2 and for coaches, I recommend the resolution 9s.

Head over to asics.com to see their full range.

Okay, here's Craig.

Hi, Craig, welcome to the Functional Tennis Podcast.

How are you?

Great, thanks for having me.

Excited to have you on.

I've been wanting to get you on.

I'd say it's well over a year.

It's at IMG from last year, the Future Stars event where I first met you.

So you weren't on social media back then?

Not much.

Not much.

So I'm not a huge social media guy.

My daughter creates and runs my Instagram and I just do it kind of for fun and I'll send her all the information, she posts it.

But now I'm more of a behind the scenes type of guy.

I'm not.

My personality fits better just being the one that's behind than the one that's out in front banging a drum.

You're right though.

Look, if you can stay off social media, I encourage it and stay in the present and yet just concentrate on what you're doing.

But.

Right.

I think with that, with what you said there, it was something we just had briefly chat about before had John, where I don't know much about you, obviously I've done a bit of research.

I Hear the commentators speak a bit, but I don't know.

So I'm really interested to find out.

Like, where did tennis begin for you?

My parents played, and when I was introduced to tennis, we lived in Maine, a state here in the US that's not really known for tennis.

And my parents would go out and play, and at the time, the indoor courts was expensive, and so I would get on the court and bang the ball around for the last five minutes or whatnot.

And then from there, it just kind of grew.

And from Maine, we moved to Florida.

And then it was.

Tennis was wide open.

You can play, you know, all the time.

A lot of public courts was cheap, wasn't taxing financially.

And then I just kind of became a court rat.

I just showed up at the court and it was myself and like, 15 other kids my age, and.

And we would.

We would.

I can remember it as it was yesterday, we would show up at the courts with no agenda, and someone would take the lead, and we would go, I play you for an hour, then I'll play you for an hour, then we'll play doubles.

And then our tennis courts were right across from Tampa General Hospital.

And we would go over to the hospital and basically eat lunch for $2.

And then we would come back and it was just all sets.

It was all playing.

There was no.

There was no drilling.

There was no less.

It was just play, play, play.

And that's how we grew up.

How I grew up.

Introduced to tennis and getting into tennis.

And as evolved, I wasn't very good up until probably my second year 16s, first year 18s.

And then I had.

I mean, I was a 60 in the.

In the state in the second year 16s.

Then out of nowhere, I got to like, top five of the 18s.

And it just kind of progressed from there.

Went to college, played at 2, and it just progressed from there.

And I can remember when I was in.

I went to TCU for two years and then Clemson for two years.

And I can remember helping my teammates out at Clemson more so than I could help myself out.

And so I think that's where the kind of the coaching DNA started to evolve through that process.

And it was really there at Clemson where I've started to.

I think I can help somebody a lot better than I can help myself.

So Clemson was a Chris.

It was Chuck Creasy.

Yes.

One of my old coaches owned Casey.

And I remember, like, back when I was playing, he used to come.

He was on the tour, he was giving the tour guide.

He used to Tell us stories from coach and he was saying like they'd have to run like mile and under 5:30 to make the team.

And there's just training was.

The condition was incredible.

Now I'm not sure what it's like to compare today, but it must have been some experience.

There's nothing that compare.

I mean you, you can't do the things that Chuck did.

Now you would, I mean I wouldn't say they'll throw you in jail, but you just wouldn't be able to do.

I mean I could, you could have a whole podcast of just my two year experience at Clemson and all the things I, I'm not kidding when I tell you we ran more than the track team.

I mean we had to run.

You had to run a sub 5 minute mile in the fall to get your clothes.

To get your clothes.

We had a thing called Morning Madness.

So from Monday through Friday, two weeks in a row, you show up at the track at I think it was some ungodly like 4:15 or something.

And he prided himself on never cutting anybody.

So he would just run you into the ground.

And I remember my time to do because I transferred in and I had to do Morning Madness with the incoming freshman and I think I was the only transfer.

We had a guy on the team that was a runner in high school.

He was an intermediate tennis player, but he was a runner in high school and he could just run laps around us.

And Chuck wanted to push the group so he would quit.

And you know, finally the assistant coach stepped in and said if you push these guys anymore, you're going to lose the tennis players.

Guy's name was Keith Loop and he's a great guy.

I mean, legs up to his chest and just was a gazelle.

I mean nobody could keep up with him.

But it was just kind of that.

It was, it was called Morning Madness and it was absolute madness.

Coach used to tell us all the stories and they used to run us so hard as well.

It was, you must have got all the running from there.

But I used to hate some of those.

I wasn't a natural runner.

If you don't like running, you got to work really hard at it.

Oh, it was, yeah, it was bad.

It was, it was, it was something that, what it did is it galvanized the team.

It brought us, it brought us really close because we had something in common.

You know, we had just absolute pain.

And we also used to have to go run the stadium steps.

Death Valley.

And that was after practice and that, I mean, you'd get down on the lower level, field level, and you look up and the stairs just seemed like they would go to heaven.

And we would have to run sprints.

And it was just brutal.

It was absolutely brutal training.

Sorry.

One of my other friends, Robert Dudley, he was more recently there in Clemson.

There's definitely an Irish affiliation with Clemson.

And Chris.

Chris Chucky.

A cut cross.

What's his.

What's the coach's name?

Chuck Creasy.

Chuck Creasy.

Okay.

Yeah.

And so tell me, after.

After college tennis, you know, you felt.

During your time, you felt you were helping people.

Did you.

How did you move into coaching?

Well, I played for.

Off and on for a bit, and I just never really.

I mean, I was.

I was pretty good.

I felt like I was a pretty good player, but I could just never mentally get kind of over that Humphrey.

And so it just.

It was a scenario where I just.

I couldn't.

I couldn't seem to get over that hump and was getting frustrated.

And I remember stopping and just kind of the.

Was.

One door closes, another door opens.

I was invited to become a hitting partner down in Australia.

And then just kind of one step happened after another.

Then I met.

I met a guy, started coaching him.

I'm from Tampa, and when I was still toward the tail end of me playing, I would go up to Saddlebrook and train at Saddlebrook.

And I got to know.

I used to train with Jennifer Capriotti when she was 13.

You know, I was, I don't.

Whatever, 20 years old going on to play Futures.

And she's.

And they would put me on the court with her because, you know, I was there for free and I didn't care.

I just.

She had a great ball for me.

It was great.

It was fun.

I didn't mind.

And I got my work in and became friends with Jennifer and Stefanos, her dad, and then worked at Saddlebrook.

And that evolved into what hit with the Turing pros that came through there and also work with the juniors at Academy.

So it was just kind of an evolution, and it was no big master plan.

I was fortunate enough to be on the court with some really, really good coaches.

And I just listened and I just.

There was an issue that would pop up on court and I would, in my head, handle it a certain way.

And when the coach handled it a completely different way, it just opened up my eyes and my ears to, okay, well, there's obviously multiple different ways of doing things.

And I was fortunate enough to be around some really, really strong, smart voices and was Able to learn from that.

Who was the first player you actually worked with in official capacity?

Probably my brother in law.

Kelly Jones would be the first one.

And then Kelly married Tammy Whitlinger, I married Terry Whitlinger.

So it was kind of a family affair there.

And from Saddlebrook, I was, I mean, I went on the road for a couple weeks with Jennifer, I went on the road for a couple weeks with Sampras.

Jim Courier came in town and I was always kind of his guy when he came back.

So I was able to get to know and be touch base with some really prominent people at the time, players.

And then things just kind of mushroomed from there.

What was it like working with Sampras?

What was he like on court?

We don't often hear of people who've worked with him.

Well, I mean, so I was, I was based in Tampa, he was based in Tampa and we developed a pretty good friendship.

You know, occasionally go play golf.

And he was a lot of fun to work with.

I mean, he would just come on the court and I was just there.

Pete, what do you need?

You know, I just don't want to mess anything up for you.

And he was pretty laid back.

He worked really, really hard off the court at the time.

He and Jim were working with Pat Etcher Berry and Pete was like insanely strong, you wouldn't think, but the exercises he would do off court.

And I can remember one, one time Pete and I, he's, he's going to play a tournament in Philadelphia.

He's flying up later that afternoon and we show up for.

He just wants a little light hit for.

He gets on the plane and we warm up and we sit down and then we just start talking.

And I, and I don't recall what it was, but the conversation just flowed and it went from one point to the other to the other to the other.

And literally I just got lost in the conversation with him and I looked down and it's like 45 minutes later and I just.

Pete, I am so sorry.

Come on, let's hit some serves.

And he's like, cb, don't worry about it, we're good.

I'm like, no, no, no, no, no.

Like I, I felt like I failed him.

And he's like, I promise we're good.

And then he gets on a plane and he wins Philly and doesn't lose a set.

I mean he was just, he was a lot of, it was a lot of fun, really laid back.

And we just, we just, we just got along.

We just got along and it was.

It was.

I always tried to be kind of an easy hang for these guys, you know, just someone that I'm sure they.

I felt like they were.

They had people, you know, hanging on them all the time.

And I just wanted them to realize that when they got on the court, I was there 100 for them.

Whatever they needed, you know, I was there to help them.

I had no agenda.

I didn't care.

Whatever you need me to do, because I generally felt like I wanted.

That was kind of my coaching DNA.

I wanted to be able to help them because I like them and they're good people.

And you're.

You say you live in Tampa.

Does Pete still.

Does he live in Tampa?

No, he.

After his career, he moved back to California.

He was a California boy, but he was smart enough to know to move to Tampa because that was.

That was best for his career.

And then when his career was winding down, then he went back to where he grew up, and he loved in California.

And does he still play a bit of tennis now?

Do you see him at all?

I don't see him much, and he's not real connected with.

With the tour or tennis.

I.

I don't see him much now, unfortunately.

It's crazy the way some of the players stay connected, like, let's say a Tommy Haas, for example, who just lives and breeds tennis.

And you look at Tommy and I think you feel he still wants to be out there competing.

And then maybe if Pete at the other end, who's like, probably get me away from tennis.

Yeah, it's.

It's.

It's interesting.

But just as, you know, their tennis games, their personalities are so individualized.

And so that's part of understanding who you're working with and what makes them tick and what.

What they ultimately want to do or achieve.

And what was.

What was Jim like?

Jim was all business.

Jim was all business.

He walked on the court.

He had an agenda.

It was.

There was no fluff.

We're doing this, and we worked insanely hard.

And so it was a different tone when I was working with Jim.

I had to come ready.

I had to come prepared, because that was just his personality.

That's what drove him to be number one in the world.

And so walking on the court, that's what you had to do in order to help Jim.

So they're two really completely different personalities and different styles.

I mean, they're different in every way, except they both worked exceedingly hard off court.

Exceedingly hard off court.

Now, by working hard off court, what do you mean?

Exactly.

But if I like the reps in the gym, the track work.

Yeah.

All the things that.

That Pat Etchaberry had him running in the sand, the medicine ball, the lifting, the running, everything off court, all the off court training.

Surely in today's game that's a necessity.

If you don't do that, you can't even be considered to get anywhere.

Well, today's game you need.

There's a necessity of a lot of things, and that's definitely one of them.

You've got to be in shape, you've got to be strong, you've got to be flexible.

You have to have endurance, stamina.

There's a lot of different things.

So.

And that's exactly kind of what Jim brought to the game when he was one.

He brought a physical element.

He used to say, you know, everyone on the tour can play five sets.

I'm the only one that can do it tomorrow.

So he brought that level and now it's like if.

Well, if you don't have that, then just stay at home because you have.

It's just you have to have that level of fitness in order to be able to compete.

Yeah.

Then there was the likes of Thomas Moster, you know, putting in.

He was another man, for example, of just being a workhorse.

Workhorse.

Yeah, yeah.

On the clay, you know, for him.

Yeah.

No, and it's just everyone that, that every kind of freak that has been number one brings something different to the level of.

Of the sport.

And you see the tennis like when Jim was won, you watch that and you watch the tennis now.

I mean, the difference.

But that's because someone has brought something to the game that everyone has had to adapt and evolve.

And it's interesting to watch the evolution of tennis from kind of like the 90s to now.

You just could say that in any sport, really, you look at any sport and the evolution.

Well, it's because of the athletes that have caused it to evolve.

They make everybody better.

You have to be, you know, adapt or die.

No doubt Alcaz is going to improve, Djokovic, improve UBI as well.

Everybody have to step up their game even more.

Like so.

Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.

And so to.

You've mentioned working with Sampras one style, Jim another style.

I know you also worked with.

Who.

Who did you work with?

I'm trying to think Sam Query.

And who did you work with?

Sam with Steve Johnson.

So you worked with them together.

So that's another different coaching style.

So you're quite flexible and you must be quite understanding and knowing exactly how to work with players.

Well, that was kind of what was a little bit different for me is I knew what.

I knew what I needed for someone to kind of.

I know what I needed back then.

If I had someone that would be able to understand me and help me, then I felt like I would have been a better tennis player.

And so I kind of.

That.

That is what evolved for me.

And so that's why I'm more behind the scenes guy.

I don't care about really what people think, per se, or like you said, people really don't know who I am.

And I've been coaching on the tour for 25 years and had some decent players too, some really good players.

But so for me, it's more like I want to do my work inside the tent and getting to know who I'm working with as a person.

The tennis, it's a little bit easier for me because I've been around for a long time and I can identify pretty quickly what the issues are, tennis wise.

But what's driving the tennis is really interesting.

And that's the person, that's what, you know, what they do well, what they don't do well, what their personality is, how they generally will look at a certain situation or issue as a person.

And sports is like real life times 20.

So those, those assets or liabilities get cranked up quite a bit.

And the higher the level, the higher those issues come to bloom or.

Or assets come to bloom.

Yeah.

The cracks can appear quickly, can't they?

Well, they can.

And also the solutions can appear quickly if you're.

If that's what you're wired for, you know, so are you playing checkers?

Are you playing chess?

So a lot of that has to come down to emotional management because all these guys are pretty smart and they know what's going on.

So, you know, I'm seeing a lot more and more of that on the tour.

It's more of how you manage your emotions.

Yeah.

Because they can all.

They're all pretty good at hitting the ball.

They're all really good hitting the ball.

Maybe you can.

We're skipping ahead here to where I want to chat about, but obviously we're fresh out of Wimbledon here, which ub suffer, you know, a tight match.

He could.

That could have went three sets in his favor.

He could have been.

He could have wrapped that up quickly.

You know, it comes down to these, I think, emotional moments does it in mental and emotional.

Being able to handle situation.

But how, how tough is out there facing Novak when it gets to These six all moments or known how locked in he is.

Like, what do you tell UBI in those moments?

Well, you can tell someone all you want to be able to tell them, but the question is, are you going to, like I said, you can play checkers.

Are you going to play chess?

Are you going to be able to take a deep breath and remember and have retention about that moment and be able to execute in that moment, or are you going to react in that moment?

And this is where it's really interesting.

This is what it comes down to, the person.

And I'm not saying this for hubby, I'm just saying this for anybody that's listening.

Like you, you're playing someone.

And I often do this with Hubie, sometimes in practice.

And I said, all right, it's five.

All is six, five in the fifth set at Wimbledon against, boom.

Let's see, let's see your best serve.

And if he fails, it's like, ah, if he succeeds, I'm like, congratulations, you're Wimbledon champion.

Because your emotions don't know the difference.

Your emotions for that, the emotions are like, oh, my gosh, this is the real thing.

And so you, you can, you can train for that.

I like to train for it very selectively because if you do it over and over, you know, then it becomes maybe does.

It loses its effect a little bit.

But, you know, that's a.

For those of you listening and if you're, if you're a club player, you're a junior player, or you're a pro, visualize yourself in the, in the position of beating someone that is a good win or a great win.

And then visualize yourself just calmly executing your plan.

And if it works out, terrific.

If it doesn't work out because they stepped up to the plate, well, understand that who you're playing has a high set of skills and they're good for a reason.

And then how are you going to react to that?

You know, what's, what's your reaction to that?

Is it.

Are you going to crumble or are you going to still play chess?

And you know that that's a, that's not easy to do.

And that's, that's a very, very difficult.

Sometimes they call it experience.

But, you know, that's a, that's a tough thing to learn.

And if everybody, if it was so easy, everyone would be able to do it.

And that's kind of what separates, you know, the, the amazing from the great and the great from the good and the good from the average.

Yeah.

No, when you say it, it sounds so easy, doesn't it?

Like, yeah, visualize it.

Do it a few times.

Do it a few times a year or whenever.

And then when it happens, we just happen.

But we all know we have real life moment pressure and your previous mental history and your future mental thoughts and all catches up with you on the moment.

I will say in that match with Hubie, he did an amazing job to get in.

I mean, some of this stuff that we talked about beforehand because Hubie had played him, played Novak five times and I think, I don't know if it was all five when I was with him, but two of the times, I mean, it was tight.

It was.

I mean, he won a set off him at Wimbledon.

It was one set, all in 19.

And then in the semis of bear C in 21, he was up a break in the third set, tiebreaker against them serving at five all.

So, I mean, it was right there for him.

It was nip and tuck.

Each match has a different scope around it.

But I mean, you're there.

I mean you can, you can belief is, draw upon that.

Yeah, you're there.

So, you know, what we, what we talked about was something completely different than what we had talked about prior.

And it was, I'm like, listen, this is going to be a little bit uncomfortable, but we have got to do something different.

You've got to do something different.

And he did.

And you got to the point.

Well, then the next time is.

Okay, you get to that point.

Let's take a step one step further.

So it's all about, you know, incremental learning.

Yeah.

And it must be.

That was a bit different to where it was the overnight, wasn't it, where you came back out the next day and.

Right.

Because they have a curfew at 11.

Tough getting to sleep those nights.

Is it?

Where is the mind racing or you're actually so exhausted you're like happy to get to bed?

Well, I mean, it's not unusual for that.

I mean, it's something where it doesn't happen all the time, but it happens enough where it's like, I mean, Hubie came back the next day because what we talked about was all the positives, like, this is what you're doing.

Well, okay.

Yet of course, he was down two sets to love.

Should have really been one set all.

I mean, because he served his way out of just complete jail on the second set.

So should have, but.

But it wasn't okay.

So I said, look, we can sit here and cry about what should be or we can take a practical look about what's going well.

And then when it comes time to this, we just disappoint this.

And so, you know, we had.

We were upstairs, he had a quick bite to eat.

I mean, there's nobody there.

It was just us.

So I wanted to.

I wanted to send him home with kind of a clear, positive what's going well?

And then he showed up the next day.

He was in a great mood, he played well, but it's just.

It's a tough ask to beat Novak three straight sets.

He just had zero wiggle room.

Yeah.

And you know, unfortunately, it just wasn't meant to be that day.

At least he gave it.

He gave it a good effort.

You can't ask for.

You can't ask for much there.

Much more.

Definitely something to build on.

And you describe Ub before to me as a big kid, big soft kid.

Why is he a big soft kid?

He's just.

He's as genuine as the day is long.

He.

He loves to play.

He wants to be out and about.

He's, you know, a good way.

He's 26, going on 8 years old.

And he's just like that type of energy, you know, what do.

Doing next?

What's next?

What's next?

He's good at everything.

And when we were.

So when Covid hit we're in Indian Wells, and I said, look, you can go back to Europe, but I don't know if I'll see you for a while.

Or you can come back to Saddle, come back to Tampa and put you up at Saddlebrook.

And there are like four or five things that we could get to that we weren't able to get to at.

We didn't have enough time off season.

So we came back.

And then as Covid kept on going and going and going, I was like, well, we just can't keep doing the same drilling with no day in sight.

So we.

He took up golf and you know him, he's just like, he's going to be great at golf.

And he thinks he can beat me at everything, which he can, except for golf.

I mean, I'm not great at golf, but I've been playing golf.

I mean, I know what I need to do and it's nice to work out, but so he couldn't.

It just beside himself that he can't beat me in golf.

He just beside himself.

And we're actually.

He just called me up last night, midnight, his time.

He's flying in today.

He hadn't packed yet, but it's typical.

And he's talking about how he's going to beat me in golf.

I love it.

And I'm like, qb, do you realize every time you put that type of pressure on yourself, all I have to do is wait and by the sixth hole you're throwing your putter or something because, you know.

But he, his expectations are that he's going to beat me in golf.

This is how good he is.

He's only been playing him a couple years and he's pretty good.

He's pretty good.

I mean his handicap I think is like 11.

Okay.

Which in two years.

Yeah.

You know, in two years and he can't putt and which is great.

I'm like.

Just because he plays lefty and putts righty.

So it's a little bit disjointed.

And I might keep three putting baby, keep three.

But because, I mean, it's not going to be long before he flies right by me.

I know it's coming.

He's just, he's a great athlete and he just wants to play.

He just wants to play.

And as soon as I beat him in golf.

Okay, when are we playing tomorrow?

When are we playing tomorrow?

So he's in that way.

He's just kind of a big kid.

That's brilliant.

I remember like I met him last year as well in Greece and you know, I think I saw him a month later then in Roland Garrison.

He was on court, he's in practice court and he waved up and like you'd rarely.

I've never really seen a player, you know, something I didn't really know remember you first of all and then acknowledge it and a few people in the crowd and I was like, that's really nice.

Like.

So it's very unusual for any that the top pros to.

To be that nice.

And I've met him a few times since.

Just quick hellos.

But he's always like respectful and nice and sort of remembers you.

Which is, which is good for me as well.

The racket you gave us to try, it's like, you know, how would you describe that?

It's a tennis ball hitting a tennis ball.

Yeah.

So for people at home, it's your gracious training too.

That's what it's a training.

Yeah, it's a training tool.

I mean it's really good.

But like Hubie wanted to hit with that warming up before matches.

I mean he would do the whole warm up with that and I'm like, hubie, come on.

Like, I know.

So that's why I had to, like, I had to take it out of the bag because he's like, CB Give me the saber, give me the saber.

And I'm like, kubi.

And then he's showing everybody and then, you know, 45 minutes into an hour long practice, I'm like trying to give him his right.

So that's where he's a kid, but I mean, it was a great tool.

But this is what, what he'll do.

And it's, it's very genuine.

He's very, very genuine.

He's got a great heart.

I mean, this is where people, he's drawn to people and they connect with him for his kindness.

And they, people, people show up and cheer for people for different reasons.

And the reasons that people generally cheer for hubby is that they like him and they see what a good person is and what a great heart he is and they want to see good people succeed.

Is 19, yep.

What, so what is.

I know you mentioned kindness there, but is that the one big lesson you've learned for him or is there something else that you can bring with you that say, okay, I learned this from Ubian, it's changed my life?

Well, I think the number one and most obvious is culturally American, working with the European and also Polish, getting to know, really know their culture and having an understanding about how and why Hubie is where he is.

And a lot of obviously is cultural based and having an understanding that working together and having, you know, having coming from a U S background and then him coming from a Polish background, how we've got to work together because some of it is really on opposite sides of the aisle and being able to sit down and have conversations and me saying, okay, I accept you for who you are and you accept me for who I am.

Can we somewhere meet in the middle on some things and can we understand, have an understanding?

So a lot of it is, is been understanding and compromise because he's.

I'm not saying that, you know my background 100% right, and I'm not saying his background is 100% right, but you can take the best of what he has and the best of what I have and we can put those things together, which is not always the easiest thing because then there's compromise involved and then there's.

Because it's just, it's a history of what your heritage and culture has either shown you or taught you for all these times.

And so.

But having those conversations where we can get together and just put everything on the table and with the.

The interest of his success in mind, that's been what I've really.

Because I've already worked with, with, With Americans.

Yeah.

And most of the Americans that I've known, that I've worked with, I knew prior.

I mean, with.

With Pete, I knew.

I didn't.

I didn't really travel with people.

With Jim, I knew going in with Isner, I knew for a year and a half before I started working with him.

And with Sampras, I mean, with the Aquari, probably a good 10 years, because John and Sam played doubles together for all the time.

Stevie, I didn't know TV Johnson, I didn't know that well.

But, you know, I had the luxury of knowing most of everyone and knowing who they were.

And the culture, you know, it just was a fit like that.

So it just took.

It takes some time when you.

When you have different cultures working together.

And does he have.

I know you're fond of a whiskey.

Does he enjoy a whiskey?

Bourbon.

The bourbon.

Oh, that's the bourbon.

Sorry.

Bourbon.

Okay.

Yeah, no, no, it's fine.

I mean, so there's just.

There's just some differences between the bourbon and whiskey.

So.

No, he doesn't.

Hubie doesn't drink.

He's.

He is pretty much full vegan.

He doesn't eat sugar.

He won't even have vegan dessert.

He's very, very disciplined.

Very disciplined in that way.

So he just kind of laughs at me when I.

When I start talking bourbon.

You need Carter.

He's your wingman.

Right.

And do you find all these top athletes you've worked with and others you've seen are really disciplined?

They just have this level of discipline that's incredible.

When they're success, you have to be, because, you know, the Tour is improving by an average of 2% a year.

So if you're only 2% a year improving, then you're staying the same.

So there.

There you got to look at every.

Every area and how can you shave off and how can you catch and how can you know, how can you be better at your.

At your job in order to catch where you.

And a lot of it depends upon where you want to go.

And so, you know, with John, John is incredibly disciplined.

I mean, he's 38 now, and he's on the twilight of his career.

But back when, when we were together, he was so diligent about gym work, his diet, his stretching.

He was amazing with that off the court.

And Stevie Johnson, he, after, like, he going from college into the pros.

He in one off season, lost like, like seven or eight kilos.

I showed up and I didn't recognize them for off season.

So, yeah, you.

If you're not doing it, who you're chasing is or who you're fending off, they're doing it.

So if you want to get to where you want to go, you got to get to work.

You got to be disciplined.

You got to be disciplined.

So a lot of people see, you know, see you travel around the world, they see the players, what an amazing life, you know, especially aspiring players, they think like, this is the most amazing thing in the world.

But tell us the hard side.

Like, you have a family, you've three kids.

Is there tough moments on tour?

We just.

I just want to be home.

Or you miss home, or have you.

You've been doing it so long now.

You just.

You know what it is, and you'll get home eventually.

It just comes with, yeah, of course I miss home.

Of course I miss, you know, my home, living my routine at home.

But, you know, my job is to get on a plane and go and help.

Help Hooby.

It's just.

It's just part of it.

And it doesn't help me if I'm complaining about it.

It's just.

I've just come to the realization.

And the thing is, travel never really bothered me.

It never really.

Never really getting on a plane.

It was never really kind of a negative for me.

I made it a game.

So it's all the Marriott points I can acquire, all the United points I can acquire.

I know how many times I can use my points to get upgraded.

So it was more of a game for me.

When I get on a plane or start traveling, I'm fortunate now where my family members, little by little, can come and stay with me.

My wife came to the French Open.

My daughter came to.

To Wimbledon.

I'm going to try to have my son come to Canada and Cincinnati.

So, you know, that's important because I'm traveling a lot more now with Hubie than I ever traveled with the American guys.

You know, I was fortunate enough when I was working with John, that he was.

He was based out of Saddlebrook, so we would just fly home.

And it was.

It was beneficial because I could get to work in a couple of days on just exactly what I saw break down, you know, three days ago.

And we're from the same area code, so it was a.

It was a little bit Easier, but it's just, it's just the job, it's just what it is.

And accepting that and working with it is gonna.

It was.

Has been a lot easier for me than trying to fight it.

Yeah.

No.

And what advice do you have for.

We have a lot of parent listeners here who've young kids who play From, I know 12 to 18 who are aspiring players.

And some of the parents know a lot, some they think they know a lot, and some know nothing.

So what advice do you have for parents out there who have young prodigy tennis players?

Well, I'll just give the advice that I've tried to follow with my children.

So my, my girls played softball.

My son plays baseball in college.

He's a pitcher.

So I don't know much.

I know some.

I don't pretend to know a lot.

So what I tried to do was get them in the environment with someone that is good to be able to teach them.

And from what I do kind of on the other end is help them try to craft their mind to be as disciplined and understand what it takes to succeed.

And from a, from a coaching standpoint of success at a, at a professional level, I don't know the mechanics.

I don't, I don't know the fundamentals of it.

So I would just try to help them and groom them from that side so then they can go and do their work.

I've always said, I said this to my son, when you become a great pitcher or you become a successful pitcher, it's not going to be because of me pushing you.

It's going to be because you are the one that's putting in the work.

I will help find the environment for you and I will help that way get you in front of the people that you do need to be in front of and work from.

But this is on you.

This is going to be your success.

This is going to be you.

And if you don't want to work for two weeks, well, then you know that's, that's going to be a tough lesson for you somewhere down the road.

And having them fail was the best motivation from a parent because then it's got to be on them.

It's got to be on them.

If I'm pushing my son to get to the gym, then that, that's not the relationship that I wanted to have.

I wanted to have.

Let's go talk about what you're doing.

Let me see your plan.

Let me see what your key aspects are for success and your plan for each one of those so that that, that's the advice that I took from me.

I don't know if that works for everybody, but I always thought, okay, how many successful baseball pitchers are there in the world?

How many successful tennis players are there in the world?

Successful, like, you know, making a really good living.

And the percentages of that are really, really, really slim.

So I want to, I want to educate them to get there, but I also want to have a really good relationship with them, you know, afterwards.

Yeah.

And for them to be able to, there's, there's no animosity, there's no, you know, you made me do things that I didn't want to do or, or things of that nature.

So my advice is find people that are good.

Find people that you trust.

Find people that you feel that, that can, they can get your, your child there and let them, let them do their work.

But also have conversations.

There's no, no reasons why you can't have conversations.

And go over things quarterly as to what, what the goals are, what are you trying to do or you're trying to create more spin on the second serve.

Well, then there are markers for that and see how, see how things go quarterly.

Yeah, I think there's, there's plenty to take from that.

And finally running this.

What's your plan for the rest of the year now?

So you've the hard court season coming up and how.

Maybe my question is how are you going to get, how's Ubi going to get back into the top 10?

He's about 19 now.

What's the, what's the plan moving forward?

Well, you know, don't really ever look at, I've never really looked at rankings until, you know, maybe it's towards the fall and you're close to Turin or whatnot.

It's more when Hubie takes care of what he needs to take care.

When he needs what he needs to take care of.

The ranking will take care of itself.

And so with every player there are certain goals, yearly goals.

And these goals are not ranking based or point based.

These are goals are what do you need, what needs to be done for you to be able to playing this type of tennis.

And this type of tennis is what we identify as gives him the best chance to get in a position of success.

And so there are, there are say five assets and five liabilities or whatnot that will get us there or holding us from getting there.

So then it's just working on that list.

And so the list per se doesn't change how we go about it might change Based on a surface.

Because there are certain things that are.

You can't fight the surface.

You see a lot of that on the grass.

People trying to fight the grass of what it should be doing in their mind.

And, you know, Hubie plays great on grass.

It comes naturally to him.

So there's no fight at all.

And so Hubie's going to be.

We'll get on the court tomorrow and we'll start getting ready for the hard court.

So we'll get ready for hard court tennis and we'll start working on this asset and liability list.

And then we'll take that list and see what we get in D.C.

and then from D.C.

it's Canada, then Cincinnati and then the week off before the US Open, and then the Open.

So that's the next.

That next little block.

I'm excited for it.

Just one thing I only thought about there, the first thing I remember from you actually, is always Solenco.

I'm surprised, KT definitely.

I don't know if I had a Solinko gear here, but I'm surprised because.

I've told this to KT before, who looks after the Solenco.

I was like, you're his biggest ambassador out there.

And you're the first I remember actually, who was always.

I was like, who's your man wearing the cake?

You know, the Solenco.

So that's how I first.

That's how I saw you first, let's say maybe on TV or at a tournament.

It's always a Solenco to silence.

So, yeah, that, that happened.

I think we started talk.

I mean, he's a lovely, lovely guy.

And then he gave me a lot of samples to try.

It's really, really good string.

I think it's.

It without question the best poly on the market.

And so we just established a relationship.

And every single one of my players, with the exception of John, has played with a Solinko string.

And I do blind test.

I'm like, I don't care what you play with.

I really don't, as long as it's good and it's going to help you with your performance.

And every one of them in the blind test has, has.

Has chosen Slinko.

This is one of the.

One of the projects that I mentioned earlier with Hubi during COVID we had.

We went through about five days of completely different strings, different gut in the main gut in the cross, different polys and, you know, Solinko has always been the choice of, of all the players.

It's a really good string.

It's a great string.

So you're probably kt, sir, Salenko's first ever ambassador.

Influencer.

You're an influencer.

Influencer.

Yeah.

I guess I should probably get on social media a little bit more.

Sure.

They'd like that.

Yeah.

So, Craig, thank you very much.

Appreciate your time.

Edit your stories, and I hope to see you in the future at some stage.

Thank you very much.

Thanks for having me.

Thank you.

Hope you enjoyed that episode with Craig.

I thought he was super nice.

Super interesting.

I love some things he said, like, listen, adapt.

Adapt or die.

There's so much to take from it.

Until next week.

Goodbye.

How.