How do you deal with the game that's tied
at 10-10? Does it excite you or does it make you run for cover?
Today, I'm going to share with you one of my favorite ways to learn to play under
pressure and stop losing those close games.
Hey, everybody, it's C.J. Johnson.
Welcome to Better Pickleball, where we
help pickleball players over 50 learn to live their best lives on and off the
pickleball courts. I'm publishing this, the week of the U.S. Open.
Tony, my partner and his wife, Jill, are both playing and typical of any
tournaments and unfortunately intensified by the weather this week has been full of
mental twists and turns for the people who have been playing in it.
On Tuesday, a weather delay forced a change of format.
It went from two out of three to 11 to one game to 11 win by two. Ouch!
On Wednesday,
another weather delay caused some matches to be halted because of darkness.
So players had to come back the next morning to finish up their event.
It doesn't matter if you are playing in a
big tournament, competitively with your friends, or at your local club.
Learning to play under pressure is just that.
It's a learned skill, and one of the
reasons that most people fail to do it well is because they don't practice it.
This is a fun way to learn how to be a great closer.
It gives you the opportunity to be the
serving team and feel the pressure of needing to get two points to get a win.
It also gives you the opportunity to be the receiving team who needs a side-out.
This game includes four mini-games.
Each of those mini-games is worth one potential point to the serving team.
Here's the scenario.
Imagine the score is 10-10-1 in an 11 point game.
The serving team must win both points to win the game.
The first mini-game begins with Player One serving from the even side.
If that team doesn't win the rally, the
first mini-game is over and the serving team does not earn a point.
If they win the first rally player one
serves from the odd side and then they get to try to close out this game.
If they win the second rally, which means they won two rallies in a row, they win
mini- game number one, and they get one point.
If they don't win the second rally, they get zero points.
Teams follow the same format for the next three games to begin mini-game number two.
Player number two from the previous
serving team starts on the even side of the court.
Again, if that team doesn't win the first
rally, mini-game number two is over and the serving team does not get any points.
If they do win that first rally player two moves over to the odd side of the court
and they get to try to win two rallies in a row.
Remember, the serving team needs to win
two rallies in a row to earn one point. T hen play moves over to the other side of
the net, where we repeat that with player number three, starting from the right
side, and then player number four, starting from the even side.
It's their chance to see if they can score
two points in a row while they are serving. At the end of this count h
ow many times you won a mini game while you were on the serving side.
That's the winner.
I love this game because it simulates some
of the pressure that we feel when we're in a 10-10 game.
That's little scoring alteration helps to
expose some of the areas where we might have weakness in our game, either on the
serve side or on the return side so that we learn to play better under pressure.
Remember, it's hard to replicate things under pressure if you don't practice them.
So we've got you covered with this
playlist because together we can train smart, live bold and age well.