How to Level Up FAST (feat. Fear the Fro)

[00:00:00] Hey everyone, welcome to Pickleball Cheat Code, the show for competitive pickleball players who are looking to level up their game. We focus on advanced strategies for experienced players, stuff only the pros know. I'm Brodie Smith, I'm a 5'5 plus level player and a coach, and I'm here with a very special guest. We don't have Tanner today, but we have a CRBN-sponsored athlete and content creator, Kevin Sati, aka Fear the Fro. What is up guys, how are y'all doing?

[00:00:27] Today, we're going to be breaking down Kevin's incredible pickleball journey and how to level up your game lightning fast. If you've done anything to improve your game, share the show with your pickleball community. Alright, let's get into it. Kevin, how are we doing, man? Good, good, good.

[00:00:57] For the people that don't know you, you're getting a lot bigger in the pickleball community, which is great. Tell the people about yourself, your sports background, your YouTube channel, Fear the Fro. I'd love to hear more about you, dude. Sure. Well, my name is Kevin. That's what I go by, generally. But most people around just call me Fro. It's just kind of become a thing. I'm getting used to it. Well, I played 20 years of tennis. That's kind of my, I guess, my background.

[00:01:26] I've never played really any other sports besides that, religiously played tennis my whole life. Switching to pickleball was a, well, I guess, okay. I played college tennis and got into- Where did you play at? What school? I played A&M Texarkana. It's an NAIA school. Pretty high-level tennis. I mean, got burnt out after college and picked up gaming. So I started gaming for a living. Were you streaming and stuff?

[00:01:55] Yeah, I would stream. What's up with all the streamers coming into pickleball? I know, right? Isn't Tanner played Fortnite? Oh, yeah. That's what I played. Yeah, it was Fortnite. That's right. I was an unk, though. I played zero build. I was a zero build legend, dude. That's awesome. But got into that, gained a bunch of weight. A couple years later, decided I was going to get back into tennis.

[00:02:19] And first day playing tennis, I basically, let's just say, injured three different things at once. And so I was like, shoot, I need to lose weight. I don't want to go to the gym. I wasn't in good shape to run. And I was like, I need to pick up something fun. And the closest thing to tennis was pickleball. And I hated the idea. I can't lie. I hated the idea of playing pickleball just as a tennis fanatic. But obviously, I started playing some open play. And it just kind of became contagious.

[00:02:48] And I fell in love with the sport. And that's how I started, why I started. And I guess as a tennis player, I was trying to become a professional player. But I guess I failed in that for many different, you know, I mean, it's a tough sport. Yeah. But I think. There's a lot of people out there playing. Oh, yeah. No, it's absurd. It's been trying. So pickleball was like, okay, maybe I can do it in pickleball. And that's kind of how the journey started. The fear to throw kind of channel was more of a tennis channel at first.

[00:03:19] And I used to post a bunch of tennis stuff because I was essentially doing a similar thing where it was like a road to 10 UTR, which is essentially, you know, an above average tennis player, I would say. Would that be like a 5-5 pickleball, 6-0 pickleball? I'd say 5-0 pickleball, honestly. Because I used to be like a 12, which is closer to, you know, 5-5 and you're getting to like the pro levels of, you know, tennis. Like the bottom pro levels.

[00:03:46] Like tennis is such a, you know, there's levels to it. It's a beast, dude. Yeah. You think there's levels to pickleball. I feel like there's just, that's a different world. Oh, yeah. No, it is. It is. And I mean, you know, granted, pickleball surprised me too. Yeah. So, yeah. I mean, fear to throw just kind of started as a, you know, a trying to get to a 5-0. And as I was doing it, I played like a, I think I played like one pro event last year or two. I played the worlds because I'm out in Dallas.

[00:04:15] And I was kind of like, you know, maybe I can, maybe I can try and go pro and see where that goes. And I mean, so far it's been, it's been quite, it's been, it's been surprising what, you know, I guess I've been able to do. Yeah. It's amazing. I mean, in, in just about a year, you went from, what'd you start at? Roughly a 4-0 and now you're a 5-4. That's insane. I mean, I started close to a 4-0 and like I said, around 5-5-ish now. That took me about four years.

[00:04:42] I mean, your, your route to getting there is insane. So, I mean, I, I want to learn from you because it's so easy to hit plateaus and pickleball. It's so easy to feel like you're stuck and there's, you know, you're not making improvements in your game. So that's what I want this episode to really be about is, is how to level up your game quickly, what you need to do on the mental side, the physical side and ways to be able to move forward. So I'm, I'm sure you've learned an insane amount. So, and if anybody hasn't seen the Fear the Fro channel, please go check it out.

[00:05:12] The content is incredible. I feel like it's like a, a video diary of you kind of opening up all of your wins and losses, your failures, your successes, and mainly your failures. And that's what's helped you, you know, fail forward to where you are now, which is so incredible. And I think so many people, including myself, can be so, so, you know, they, they just want to hide their failures and they want to only want to care about their successes. But I feel like that's been a huge part to your growth moving forward. Is that fair to say?

[00:05:42] I think it's the biggest, I think. I think you've been so open with that and that's, what's really helped catapult you to, to moving forward. So with that, like, what advice would you have for people trying to level up their game, taking on, you know, that, that openness that you have and translating that to themselves? Biggest, I think, I mean, this comes from like, you know, also I'm going to try and be as let the, the least, the least, bias that I can be and take tennis out of the equation.

[00:06:09] Because I still, I think a lot of these things apply to pickleball players without a tennis background or just any, honestly, sports backgrounds at all. Like, I think you can be technically sound. You can be athletic.

[00:06:29] You can have all sorts of sports backgrounds, whatever it is, but you, you will not get better if you don't fail in tournaments. I think when you, you get exposed as a player, when you play tournaments. And so I've never, I guess, I've never been afraid of being judged. And I've had this conversation with a lot of, like, my clients and even some of the people that drill with me.

[00:06:57] They're like, Kevin, aren't you afraid that, you know, sponsors are not going to pick you up? And I'm like, I don't really, like, that's not why I do it. And I think the, I think the fastest way to improve is to simply fail as long as you're pointing out. So, like, as an example, when I first started, I couldn't figure out for the life of me whether to hold a continental, an eastern, a west. Like, I could not figure that out. Oh, yeah, you've got to spell.

[00:07:25] You got, yeah, listen, you figured it out. It's working over here. And so what I did for a long time is I said, okay, I'm coming from tennis. This is pickleball. This is not, I got to just, okay, go continental. So I played continental for about two, three months and learned a lot about, you know, like, dinking. And the net game was just starting to get pretty good. But I would, I'm also, I mean, we'll probably dive more into it a little bit.

[00:07:53] But I'm obviously more of a singles guy. Yeah, for sure. But I would still argue that the way that playing doubles tournaments at the beginning of kind of my journey was the way I was able to improve so fast because I had to learn how to play pickleball itself. It is a different game, even if you try to translate it into singles.

[00:08:16] So, yeah, I guess to answer your question on that advice is you're not going to get better by playing to win. You're going to get better by playing to improve. So, like, you know, every time you play, you test what you want to work on in those tournament environments, essentially, is I guess what I'm trying to say. So not being afraid to try new things in tournaments because it's so commonplace for people to resort back.

[00:08:45] I mean, for me, for example, as of late, like, I've been training a lot of super aggressive backhand roll dinks. But then I was playing a tournament money ball the other night and I was resorting back to some of the safer, like, push dinks. So you're saying don't be afraid just to F up and just go just keep just testing things because that's how you're going to learn and develop and how things stick, essentially. Yeah, I'd say that's for me, even now, it's the most difficult thing that I've had to, like, force myself to do.

[00:09:13] Like, as a brief example, probably speaking of, like, feeling stuck and like where you plateau and you feel like, you know, you're – because when you start, you're going to improve the most at the beginning. Oh, for sure. First three months, you're going to be like, oh, it's easy. I'm getting better. I'm going to be the greatest of all time. You're like, dude, I'm going to be – This growth path is taking me straight to 6-0. And you're like, wait a second. It's the same as lifting weights for people too for, you know – No, it's true. Yeah, it's true.

[00:09:39] It's like, I mean, you can tell I'm jacked, so I know what I'm talking about. You get my point. It's a similar translation. Yeah. No, so when I get to – so when I got to – I got to a point where my game style was winning a lot of matches on a local level, right? But when I tried to play the pro level players or even like 5-0 when I was trying to kind of break that 5-0 barrier, there was just like a plateau. And I just could not – I mean, I couldn't figure it out.

[00:10:09] And I would tell myself – so this would be the biggest thing. And you could watch it throughout my videos. I say it at like the beginning of every single video or at the end of every single video when I'm reflecting. You know, I need to get better at pushing the net. I need to get better at coming up to the net. And this is singles, even getting more comfortable playing the net in doubles. Like you can see I'm like backing off the kitchen line. I'm trying to play like a banger style as opposed to like learning the proper way to actually play.

[00:10:36] And it wasn't until I'd say maybe two, three months ago I played in the Newport Beach Challenger. And this was probably – it was actually meant to be – they were going to test the new skinny lines on the singles courts that you probably could imagine I'm not a fan of. That's okay. But that's just me. But because of that, I knew like, okay, I can't – I have to come up to the net no matter what. But on that court, I just – my game is not going to work.

[00:11:06] And funnily enough, that whole week I drilled nothing but returns coming up to the net. And even like doubles drilling was one of the things that I actually started to enjoy at that time because I think that helped a lot. And next thing you know, they changed the lines back to a regular court, right? That's right. Then they pull it. Yeah, two days before. Two days before the tournament, they pull it out. But I told myself, okay, you've been drilling this.

[00:11:28] This is a great time to go out there because I have been struggling in my first round of qualifiers and challengers to just get past that round. It doesn't matter who's in front of me. It could be a 4-5. It could be a 4-3. I'm losing to these guys because I'm just – nerves or people have the experience of playing on that level. Dude, coming out first round of a tournament at any level is so hard. It's like this mental gap and then maybe after one game you get in the flow, maybe after three points or maybe it's after two matches.

[00:11:56] It's different for everybody but finding a way to get past that. I mean not to cut you off but I think that's a really good point. How did you get past that mark then? I mean you're kind of leading into that right now but I would love to drill into that a little bit more too, the mental gap of that first round jitters and being able to bypass that. You know, I think it's because honestly I've played – you play so many tournaments. At first it was a bunch of local tournaments. It happened on the local level at first.

[00:12:24] It was the same pattern. I couldn't get past a certain barrier. Granted, it was in the later rounds and it was mostly for doubles on that level. But it was like I'd get to the quarterfinals. I'd get to the semifinals and you face an opponent that is your level, right? Not way – he's your level and you just can't – you feel like you just – you don't know what to do against them. And so enough of that, of just going over and over where I – me personally, I got frustrated.

[00:12:53] And I – funnily enough, so I started this channel because I actually – I started recording my games not for the channel. I actually started recording them to get better. Like that's actually how I – I didn't really care to post videos at first. That's something I wanted to ask you too. How much do you think recording and just watching yourself improves your game? Is it – I feel like it's – for me, when I've done it, it's super helpful and I still don't do it enough. But it's crazy what you can see because you can sit there and watch a PPA pro match and you're like, oh, you should have hit a dink middle. You should have done that.

[00:13:22] It's like you can still critique people, people that are way better than you, but nobody does it to themselves, which is so interesting. I think it's huge. I think – and honestly, going to lead into this, I think, point as well. Watching myself like lose consistently in the first rounds of these tournaments, specifically the pro events.

[00:13:46] Just made – it just – I'm watching these videos and I think I was trying to be so specific on, okay, you missed your forehand here or you're missing this many returns. And you start to almost, I think, dive too much in detail of what you're doing wrong with the shots that you already have. As opposed to thinking, okay, what if we try something completely different? And like put – so for me, it was pushing the net.

[00:14:11] So that tournament where I played in Newport, I told my – that's what – it took me – I think it was six tournaments before I decided, okay, this is the one where I don't care if I lose. I told my wife because she was watching the tournament. I was streaming it. I said, if I don't come up to the net at least 90% of the time, I'm quitting pickleball after this tournament. I told her that. I was like, you have to hold me accountable. And I mean, so recording yourself helps to hold yourself accountable to that, right? You set a goal.

[00:14:40] You tell yourself, I'm going to do this tournament. And I made it an absolute point of when I drilled it that week that no matter what, I am pushing the net. So drilling it for a week straight, like just having that one focus of whatever it is that you're wanting to improve on. So whether it's like a shot you want to work on, like every third, I'm only going to hit drops. I'm not driving a single ball even if that's what you love doing and that's what works for you just so you can get better at that. And so going into that tournament, that's what I did. I came up to the net. I came up to the net when I shouldn't have.

[00:15:10] And this is another thing that I work on with a lot of the clients that I teach for doubles is when you're trying to work on something. So let's say you're working on, let's say, flicks or like out-of-the-air speed-ups. I tell them, okay, when the ball is high and you're able to catch it out to your high, how sure are you that you need to speed this ball up? They're like, oh, 100% sure. Okay, so you go for it. Okay. How about when it's low? It's bounce. It's below the net.

[00:15:40] How sure are you that you should speed up this ball? And you're like, well, I shouldn't speed it up at all. Okay, perfect. You don't. And then when there's those kind of weird shots where you don't know, it's like, I think I can, but I'm not sure. If you're not sure whether to speed it up or not, just speed it up every single time. So that's the way that I've kind of improved my game is when I'm not sure whether I should do it or shouldn't do it, I just do it. Because I learn in that moment of doing it over and over again.

[00:16:09] You find your line, essentially. You find your line, exactly. So you find when you're actually comfortable doing it. Because if you don't know and you're never trying, you just try to pick that perfect time, you'll pick it perfectly that one time. Or sorry, you might pick it imperfectly that one time. And that's going to ruin everything because you're mentally going to think, oh, okay, I should just never attack those balls. When in reality, you maybe just were out of balance, out of position. You just got to give yourself a larger sample size, I guess. 100%. Yeah, that's cool.

[00:16:37] I mean, usually when people hit one shot that's way below the net and they'll make it one in 10 times. So like I'm doing it every time anyway. Right. That's true. That happens a lot too. That flick felt so good that I just got to keep ripping it. Yeah, 100%. That's cool though that the whole video aspect helps that much. And I've noticed that for myself too, like I was saying. So I think that's a key takeaway for a lot of people. Next tournament you go into, pick something you want to improve on, like Kevin was saying.

[00:17:05] Film it and then go back to the drawing board. And if you didn't hold yourself accountable, try it again. But make some goals and actually commit to something. Because I don't think people are being mindful enough, and again, myself included, for an area and a focus that they need to improve on. Like you said, it's so easy to get into the weeds of areas of your game, like of little technical things, of shots that you already have, stuff that you already know. And if anything, it just comes down to a mental confidence.

[00:17:33] I mean, that separates a good player from a great player all day long. I miss so many more drops sometimes in a tournament than I do in rec. And it's all just like some confidence that comes through. And then sometimes I can make those adjustments mentally, and sometimes I can't. I'm just stuck. I'm like, how am I missing drops? I hit drops all day long. It's my favorite shot. Right. When the pressure's on, you can miss them all day long. It's crazy. It's a different game. Different game. Because people like to think, well, because they like to think.

[00:18:04] So for example, like my forehand. This was the funniest thing when I first started playing. Forehand was like when I'm drilling, when I'm playing rec. It's like my biggest weapon. Yeah. I love my forehand, right? Baseline, dinking, anywhere. I just love my forehands. But when I play tournaments, and that's all I post, right? I don't post my drilling as much. I like choke up. And I'm reading the comment sections, and it's like, work on your forehand. And I'm like getting in my head like, shoot.

[00:18:32] Is my forehand the worst shot? What are you talking about? You work on your forehand. That's my best shot. And I'm just like, what? I'm like, what? That's my best shot. But I'm watching these videos. I'm like, yeah, I don't miss these shots when I'm practicing. And I do think it has a lot more to do with confidence in the mental game than it does with your technique or any of that. Because you know how to hit the shot. It's just, it's so super mental. Do you know what's funny? There's this, I saw this in this most recent March Madness.

[00:19:01] This is such a random segue. But this guy, he's the highest three-point shooting percentage player in all of college basketball. And his mental trick is every time he shot the ball, he said the word jelly bean in his head. And it's this mental trick. And I've seen this in sports psychology before and other athletes doing this. I started trying this when I was hitting thirds when I was in a lull the last time I was playing. I just started picking a random word and saying it right when I hit it.

[00:19:31] It worked every time. I don't know. This could be a whole other episode. But I remember him talking about that. I don't know where I'm going with this, but there's something to that. And I think it's really interesting. I can't remember if I've talked about this on another episode before. I forgot the name of the player. Someone else. We'll put it on the screen. But yeah, interesting stuff there. You just made me write that down because I'm going to look for this. Think about that. Yeah. Well, text me after. And yeah, I'm actually curious. The jelly, like this is definitely a mental thing.

[00:19:59] I mean, jelly bean, March Madness. Let's see his name. Okay, now this is like a jelly bean, March Madness taste test. Yeah, that's not what I'm talking about. I'm going to look it up later. That's ridiculous. Okay. So for you to level up so fast, we obviously talked about the openness to failure, which is probably going to be the biggest thing out of all this, along with the filming aspect.

[00:20:25] But let's go to like a week-to-week basis, a month-to-month basis. Like what were some of the steps you were taking? How often were you drilling versus how often you were playing rec? You know, what did you really do day-to-day to get there? Drilling versus playing. I think that honestly, that was like a big balance that I was trying to figure out when I first started.

[00:20:50] For me, it was, I honestly, I'd say it was, I was mostly playing when I first started. Mostly playing. I mean, I didn't know better to drill. Yeah. I mean, as you should, when you're first getting going, you got to play for fun and see if you even like the sport too, right? That's true. And I think a lot of it, like if you, like even as a beginner, I still think that, yeah, that's true.

[00:21:18] I mean, it's an important part of like, you got to enjoy the sport first before you decide that you're going to be drilling. Let's drill every day. Let's drill every day. But, but like, I guess if we, if you just plot me down into like the middle of my journey where I'm really just trying to work on getting better, it would be two hours a day of drilling and about, I mean, honestly, like the maybe 20, 30 minutes of the end of those drills would be in my case, a lot of singles games, but the drilling would be, you know, singles,

[00:21:48] doubles, just all my, all my shots. And I generally, every day I pick one focus that I want to work on. And that's what I'm drilling usually for the, honestly, like the entire time. So let's say if I'm working on drops, I'll start with the fundamental way of doing it. My partner will just hand feed me balls or, you know, feed it with a paddle. And then we'll add, you know, a, a, you know, a transition drills that starts with a drop. And then you kind of work your way in and you just kind of, for two hours, you're just

[00:22:16] coming up with different ways to, to work on your drop. And you're, that's all you're focused on. I think that's been the biggest help for me is picking one thing as opposed to trying to focus on four or five. Maybe, maybe I'd say one thing per hour. I'd say you're, you're not, I wouldn't limit yourself to just one thing the whole time. But, and then as far as, and then rec play, I'd usually throw in, I mean, I mean, when

[00:22:46] I first started it was every day, but honestly I don't play as much rec play now I'd say once a week. But it's usually like 90% of my week is just drills. Damn. That's just me. That's, I think that's how I've been able to get better. And then tournaments, it's like drilling and a lot of tournaments I played. I think it was in the last year I've played 143 singles matches. Oh, I thought you were going to say tournaments. I was like, wait. Oh no.

[00:23:15] Oh my gosh. It was a lot of tournaments. That's not even possible. But it's a lot of singles matches. And it's still a ton, a ton. I would honestly argue that I played more singles matches since I've started playing tournaments than I have practice like rec games. Like me, because I just filled all my rec time with drilling. Me personally. I think that's worked for me because I think I like to really practice a shot that I'm

[00:23:44] working on while I'm drilling and then tell myself, all right, this tournament you're going to be like, this is your main focus is to get this shot down. And that's to the mental part also that I guess we kind of discussed. When you put your goal of the tournament on a specific shot you want to hit, like let's say you say, okay, I want to every third shot, I'm going to hit a drop. If you succeed in that and you've hit, let's just say 95% of the whole tournament, you've

[00:24:14] hit drops. No matter how you do, and especially like when I personally, and I'll look back at the video when I've set those goals, you will be more satisfied with the fact that you came through with what you told yourself you were going to do than you are with winning or losing. When that becomes like your focus, I think that's been a huge. And in the moment you care a little bit less about the outcome and you start caring a little bit more about like the actual shot that you're working on. I think that's for me, I like that huge.

[00:24:45] Cause people get so obviously, I mean, you're there to win, right? But when you make that your only focus, that's going to stray you away from winning oddly enough. So I think that's really important. I feel like what I'm taking from a lot of this is just, you do such a great job of having intentional focus from drilling and going to a match, whether it's, you know, doing it on YouTube, but not everyone's going to be making YouTube videos. So I think for most people, maybe it's just writing it down, telling their drilling partner,

[00:25:11] having some source of accountability going into that next event and then really seeing what you can draw from that is, is really big. So that's great advice. And I wouldn't ignore, I mean, again, I know people watching this are probably coming from, they're not all going to be trying to go pro. Yeah. I mean, most people that are listening to this, they're, I mean, not trying to go pro necessarily, but everyone's trying to get, everyone's trying to improve on this podcast. Everybody that's listening is really trying to improve. I mean, yeah, that would make sense. Not everyone's trying to go pro, definitely.

[00:25:39] But, but, but what I, I think it still matters to my point. I mean, most people that are watching this are going to be playing tournaments. I mean, a hundred percent, but I think most people, uh, there's two ways to look at it, right? You either, some people just really care about winning. I think the fun in the sport comes from improving and the winning, I always say this to everyone I work with, uh, improving is the fun part.

[00:26:06] And, and then like your duper and your, the wins is just a side effect. Like if you can treat it as a side effect, um, I think that's when you'll find a lot more joy in the sport. Uh, and when, cause I've, I've, there, there was a bit of, uh, there was a time last couple of months, honestly, winning was more of a relief. And that's when I knew it was a problem. Uh, because you, you just, you're thinking so much about winning as opposed to like, okay, you know, what do I need to work on? Why? You know?

[00:26:37] So, but to my point, um, drilling is a lot more important than most people, I think, think it is. I feel like we always hit that point on every other episode. Yes. I've watched, I've watched pretty much all of them. You know what? Just drill more. That's what we can do. Every, every episode of this pod will be five seconds long in the future. It's like, yeah, just drill. That's true. It's true. But, and it's hard because you got to think, you know, people have nine to fives and people have other, you know, other things going on.

[00:27:06] Like, it's easy for me to say, yeah, drill three hours a day. This is all I do. I just, I'm either coaching pickleball, playing pickleball or watching pickleball. So it's like, for me, that's a lot easier to say, but I would always say having a, like a healthy ratio of, like, honestly, if you can get it to like 50, 50, if you can drill 50% of the time and play rec play 50% of the time. Or if you can show up to rec play 30 minutes early and get some sort of drilling in right

[00:27:34] before you're about to play and say, I'm working on drops, drill drops for 30 minutes and then go into rec play and essentially use rec play as like a drilling, um, drilling, um, space. Yeah. And being able to create like a mental focus from there too, because you could use that where you're just doing 30 minutes of straight drops. And then you're saying, you know what, during these rec games, the next two hours, I'm only going to hit drops. I'm not going to drive one time for your points. Exactly.

[00:28:00] And rec games are competitive enough to where there's enough pressure to, to get decent practice. Especially when you're forcing yourself to improve on something specific, you're going to feel a lot of pressure trying to hit those shots. That's true. Oh, that's a good point. That you don't like under, in rec play. Because in rec play, you play to win. Like if you're a banger and that wins your rec games, like what have you told, what if now you can only drop? Like, Hey, I can only do tell the people you're playing. Like, Hey guys, I'm not allowed to drive. If I, you know, if you want to be, let me drive today.

[00:28:30] Exactly. So, so you get, you get tight, you get nervous. Um, and I think another, I think maybe this is a bit of a off topic. I mean, I don't think so. All right. Uh, one special thing about pickleball is duper because we can, I've, I've, I've, I've

[00:28:54] had a few people locally to do this, but you, if you host duper games, those, you mean people care about their dupers. I can say I don't, but I can't lie. I definitely care. I think we all do to a degree. We all do to a degree of some way more, some way less, but you there's, you'd be lying if you said you didn't give a shit about it. Everyone. Oh, exactly. And so I think pick, pick a ball is one of those sports where we have that tool where most

[00:29:23] other sports, I mean, you don't have like a, a rating system, uh, besides maybe like tennis, um, that you can use as a way to replicate pressure because just like a lot of people don't play tournaments for money. They play it to improve their duper and to level up in their duper. So if you think about it, having duper games, you're essentially playing in a tournament environment because most people play tournaments or not most, but I think a lot of people play

[00:29:53] tournaments to increase their duper. Yeah. So, so you're saying with like your friends locally, you're setting up duper matches. Oh yeah. It's just like you and three others and you guys are just like, Hey, we're duper matching today. Like, yeah, no, literally. Like, I mean, I, I don't run these. I have this guy in town that runs them and he, uh, kind of sets up these, these duper groups and has us play with random partners, which makes it even more interesting, but it puts a lot more pressure on you. And I can't lie.

[00:30:22] Like these games feel very intense. I mean, um, it's, you know, it's about as close as it gets to, to a tournament environment. I mean, especially for most people playing local tournaments. I mean, it's, you know, it's enough pressure. And especially for me, like when I'm, if I'm playing a four, three in, in, in a, uh, duper game or sorry, you know, in just a regular game, I'm going to smoke them. I mean, it's, there's no pressure. I don't, I don't care.

[00:30:52] I mean, I'm just going to be playing free and loose. You put duper on the line. All of a sudden I'm caring about how many points I'm giving up. I'm caring about all the, like I'm playing to win. So I've had, I mean, this one kid, somebody I'm working with, he's like a four, three, four, five. Um, you know, we, I've, I've gotten to a point where I was pickling him like seven, eight games in a row. Dude, we played a duper game for the first time. He took a game off of me.

[00:31:19] And how it was like the amount of, because, and you play those. So even when you play the lower level players, I think it's important to practice that because in a tournament, you're going to face people that are lower level and you're going to get in your own head and it's going to, you know, you'd be surprised. Dude, I, this is common for a lot of people. I play worse when I play against people that are lower rated than me and then play way better when people are better than me. Cause I feel like it's, it's all mental again. And there's, there's a way I need to overcome that obviously, but playing people that I

[00:31:48] know that are better than me or like, you know, sign PPA pros when I'm going against them, win or lose. I go in there with, uh, I don't have anything to lose mindset. Let's go play free, play your game, have fun. And let's go after it. If I lose, who gives a shit? But if I'm playing somebody worse than me, I'm like, I can't lose this match. I'm better than this person. Exactly. My brain goes. And it's like, then I'm hitting more safe shots. I'm not playing free. I'm not playing like with a flow to my game. So it's so funny how that works though. So, but it's annoying.

[00:32:18] Um, so for all the work that you're putting in on the court, you're grinding out there. How do you manage your physical fitness? Is it just, are you just sticking to pick a ball only? Or, I mean, if you are great, that's, that could be your answer. Um, or are you doing other things on the side, plyometrics, heavy stretching, foam rolling? Like what's your routine to make sure that you're fully locked in for all the hours that you're putting in?

[00:32:41] Um, so yeah, I mean, recently a lot of just, uh, it's called what is it called? High, uh, high interval training. Um, mainly cause I play singles, but I honestly think this two doubles can tire you out. I think people underestimate like playing all day at a tournament. It's exhausting. It doesn't matter. You know, sure. Singles does a lot more to your body, but it's still, it is so exhaust, but I'd say,

[00:33:10] so a lot of high interval training, which is essentially, um, what you're doing. So let's just say I do it with running a lot. So let's say I run a mile and I usually try to do this two to three times a week. Um, running a mile and you say 20 seconds, you're sprinting. You're going like full throttle as fast as you possibly can. And then 10 seconds you're jogging. So it's 20 and 10 and you do that until you've reached a mile. Um, and then honest one mile is honestly enough.

[00:33:40] And, and that's been printing is 20 seconds. It's a long time. It's a really long time. And usually there's a bunch of playlists on my Spotify. That's what I do. I just put in my headphones and I just do that. That's been a main focus for a while. And that's helped my stamina. I don't ever cramp up at tournaments anymore. I don't ever like when I played, uh, in Atlanta and I qualified for my first main draw, like I was worried. I thought, dude, the next day I'm going to feel like crap, but I came, I mean, the next day I felt like it was, I was super fresh.

[00:34:10] Um, and then, so that's the, the second thing would be your diet. I mean, I don't think people need to be like Novak Djokovic or, and, and eat like extremely healthy and be super clean. But I think being hydrated and, um, eating enough carbs days prior to playing tournament or just, I mean, every day if you're drilling. Right. Um, and there's a lot of electrolytes.

[00:34:39] That's been like my number one and watermelon. I love watermelon. I drink, I eat too much watermelon. Uh, and then, uh, the gym, honestly, I do a lot of traditional weightlifting and I just do a lot of, I'd probably do more leg days than I do anything else. Okay. How do you manage leg days and then playing singles the next day for two hours? Are you just not cooked? Are you able to like, are you sore? Oh, I'm usually pretty cooked, but you get used to it.

[00:35:05] I I've noticed when I went to Atlanta, I saw a lot of pros at the lifetime fitness the day it was raining the day before the tournament started. And a lot of these, like I saw Collins Johns and, uh, who else was there? No, no way cliff they're at the gym. Just, I mean, hitting max bench presses and I'm watching them. Like, are you not going to be cooked? You have, you're playing in three different disciplines and, and I've learned that if you

[00:35:34] can learn to treat your tournaments in a very similar day way that you treat your average day of drilling, it becomes more normal to kind of deal with those things. Um, so like I'm not going to hit leg day two days before or a day before a tournament, but, but I'm not gonna, I used to, to me, it used to be where if it's a week of a tournament,

[00:36:00] like let's say I play Friday and it's Monday, I'll tell myself no gym this week at all. And I'll just play pickleball. I keep it light and I just try to, and the next thing I know I'm, I'm, I mean, you know, all my cardio feels like it's not there anymore. Me, for me personally. Um, and so just cause you're not in your normal routine essentially. Yeah. I think cause it just feels off. You're, you're, you're kind of out of your normal routine and you've, it's almost like

[00:36:25] you feel like you're in a tournament mindset when like, I don't know. There's just in for, okay. Maybe for me, because I'm playing a tournament like every other week at this point, because I do that. I, so now it's, I had a month where I was, I think I played six or seven tournaments and it's like, you're fine. You're fine. For all the listeners, I had that coming. I mean, I, when I said it, I already knew. I'm seven years old. Go ahead.

[00:36:53] Um, it gets to the point where I'm just not going to the gym and I'm not doing anything. So I'm like, I just have to deal with it. And so I'll, I'll go to the, you know, I'll hit like days really early in the week, Monday. Uh, and then I'll usually drill the next, uh, the next, I always do like that at the end of the day after I've already drilled. Um, I mean, are you going to shower rest and then do it? You know, is it, is, are you separating those out completely?

[00:37:22] Oh, you mean like the drilling versus? Yeah. Usually. So like my schedule is six to eight or six to nine in the morning. I am drilling pickleball. That's like the first thing I do for three hours. Then, I mean, it's like a work break. Basically I'm either working, uh, you know, take watching my diet or not. So, so there is a break. Yeah. So it's like three hours of pickleball in the morning, five, six hours of like work.

[00:37:48] Um, and then maybe some cardio an hour or two break and then I'll hit the gym usually every single day. You're active, man. You're active. I know. So, so you, but your legs get used to like, you'd be surprised, like leg days hurt, but you get so used to with, with just playing with, with, with, with soreness, uh, not just for legs, but in general that I think it, it also just makes you, I think a little bit more mentally tough too. Um, I don't know.

[00:38:17] It's just, it becomes a routine. You're not, you don't ever, I don't know. Just keeps you in warrior mode, you know? No, no, you're not wrong. And I, and I do think it's a diet is a big aspect of it too, because days where I feel the least recovered are usually, you know, the weeks where I've really been slacking on my diet or like, I'm not eating enough, uh, potassium, sodium, whatever it may be like that, that, that kind of anything protein, sorry.

[00:38:47] Protein is the biggest one I think for recovery, but I don't know. It's huge to be able to, to, um, uh, and maybe I'm a little tougher on myself because I also dropped a lot of weight since I started playing pickleball. And so for me, like hit, you know, hitting a leg day is not nearly as bad as trying to play with an extra 50 pounds on my body that I think. So I don't know. I think it's, I think it's a mental toughness thing for sure. Dude, I love it. You're, you're battling. I love it. Let's go.

[00:39:16] You're an inspiration for everyone listening. You know, there's so much more work that all of us can be putting in myself included. I'm just keeping all my fitness to pickleball. I need to do way more. So it's, that's, it's inspiring, honestly. And it's good. I mean, dude, playing just, dude, if you're playing three, four, your cardio is going to be better. Yeah, dude. I mean like your cardio is going to be really good, but I, I, I don't think I can speak

[00:39:38] enough to how doing stuff outside of pickleball is for me more of a mental, um, it, it helps me so much more mentally. Like I build more confidence when I'm, uh, drilling through, you know, like days or, um, it, so just builds a sort of a different mentality for me, I think. Um, so I wouldn't say you don't have to hit the gym every day, but exactly. But as long as you're incorporating it at least once or twice a week, right?

[00:40:06] Once or twice a week of a gym, maybe pick like a day where it's car, like you're doing focused cardio or it's not just because pickleball is probably, I mean, it's one of the best cardio as you can get, but focus cardio and unlike, you know, running and all that kind of stuff. Cause if you like run long distance, fun fact, I'm actually wanting to, my goal this year is to run a marathon by the end of the year. So you're going to, you're going to skip the half and go straight to the full. I'm going to go straight to the full, man. Maybe I'm crazy, but I think I'm just going to go straight into it. Have you signed up at all yet?

[00:40:34] Cause I know I'm going to fill up pretty early. No, I'm not. Honestly, I need to look into it. And I want to say I'll probably be closer to next year, like beginning or maybe mid next year, but I want to start, I want to be ready to run a marathon. Let's go. Getting you updated on that journey. I got you, dude. I'm excited. I'm probably, you're going to be one of those guys that you only talk about marathons when you meet them. And yes, I do. Dude, this is what the, like running is one of my passions that a lot of people think I don't.

[00:41:02] It's one of my, dude, I hated it when I first started it, but oh my gosh, like I, it's so good. I can't, you have to, you have to get, you have to run for maybe two weeks consistently before you can really feel like, oh shoot, this, this is actually like, I mean, like the runner high thing. I didn't ever believe in it, but it's real. But, but like, it's one of those things where I don't talk or post about and people always ask me to, okay, I've talked to my friends about it all the time.

[00:41:33] Like, hey, yeah, I run a lot. I love running. That's how I lost a lot of my weight, but I don't care to share it. It's more of like a hobby for me. Uh, and I, I think pickleball has kind of become a job when, when, when you're doing, um, social media and coaching and, and I, and I think I keep running as like, this is just my thing. But what I know myself, once I hit run a marathon, it's going to be all over my social media. I love it. That's awesome. Um, okay.

[00:41:59] Well, we've, we've talked a lot of, about a lot of great things here, physical fitness, uh, the mental game, everything in between. So I'm loving this episode, but one thing I wanted to ask you, I didn't ask you last time I saw you was how often do you beat people in a tournament where you film it and they say something where they don't want you to upload it. I'm not, we're not without naming names. Does that happen often at all? Or does that never happen? Cause you're filming all these matches and you're uploading them. So I'm curious if people are like, don't post that at all. Cause that's happened to me once. It happened to me once.

[00:42:29] Once? Once. So it's surprising, but yeah, that's shocking that it hasn't happened way more than that. Yeah. And, and quite honestly, I think I'm one of the, like, I'm one of the nicer guys about it because if people don't want to be recorded, I don't argue. I don't try to, you know, and I usually, I usually ask. Sometimes I don't like you're playing a PPA. Like you're going to be recorded. Yeah. That's, that's different. But right. But like a lot of local turn, this is happening at a local tournament, but usually I'll ask

[00:42:58] like, Hey, do you mind if I record? It's going on YouTube, blah, blah, blah. Most nobody's ever had a problem with it. But this one time, uh, this guy knows who I am. I know he does. And we're actually good. We're actually all good. Like we're good friends too now. Uh, but I'm not going to call him out, but he's, he's a, he was at the time a five, five. And I was probably a four or six. Oh, he couldn't handle the, the, the loss. So here, here's the, so here's the, the crazy part.

[00:43:25] I didn't beat him, but it, it was, it was on my birthday. I actually talk about it in my video. So honestly, it probably wouldn't be too hard to figure out who it is, but, um, it was on my birthday and I show up to this tournament, like on a, on a high thinking like, I'm going to play the best pickleball of my life. It was my third tournament that weekend. And I'm recording myself all these matches and I get to the quarterfinals. I'm like, yeah, well, this, this is probably the end of the road for me.

[00:43:55] And I'm like, but it'll be a good video. Like I, you know, people will want to see that the love that played on the level. So he said, he told me, he came up to me. I didn't even ask. He came up to me and was like, Hey, I do not want to be recorded. I was like, Oh, okay. That's odd. You're like a five, five and you're probably going to whoop my ass. Um, and I, I even told him, I was like, do you care if I record and, and I just won't post it? Like just for me, because he's, cause I really generally wanted to, you know, watch the, he

[00:44:22] said, no, I just, you know, I don't, I don't like being on social media and I, you know, and he, this guy competes actively on the PPA by the way. So I don't, yeah, I don't know why. Anyway, I was like, all right, whatever. It was the best match that I've played. Oh, you did. I didn't see this video. I remember talking about this. Yeah. Yes. It was up to that point. And honestly, it's still probably my top five matches played. I was so upset when I played that match and I was like, that was not recorded.

[00:44:51] And that's like, was, I feel like that would have been like one of those videos where like a milestone for a lot of like the viewers to see. It's like, damn it. But it's okay. We, we got some better ones. And the one that got away, maybe somebody, maybe somebody recorded it in the shadows. You didn't even know. Maybe I can get access to the security cameras. There's security cameras, but it's blurry black and white. The guy that, the guy, right. The guy that ran the tournament was actually a friend of mine. So, you know, I have thought about it. Oh, that's funny. All right, Kevin, it's been real, man. This is a great app.

[00:45:20] So we'll meet again soon and we'll, we'll be chatting about singles on our next episode, but I appreciate the time here. It's been good chatting and thanks for everything. And thanks for all your advice here, dude. Yes, sir. Thank you. Let's go. All right. See everyone.