#ICYMI - The Tennis Brain: Strategy, Analytics, Mental Game

Hosts Chuck Nice and Gary O’Reilly investigate tennis brain and the strategy, analytics, and neuroscience that make it work alongside tennis strategy analyst Craig O’Shannessy, sport psychologist Leslie Sherlin, and professional tennis coach Sarah Stone. Don’t miss an episode of Playing with Science. Please subscribe to our channels on: Apple Podcasts: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/playing-with-science/id1198280360 TuneIn: https://tunein.com/podcasts/Science-Podcasts/Playing-with-Science-p952100/ GooglePlay Music: https://play.google.com/music/listen?u=0#/ps/Iimke5bwpoh2nb25swchmw6kzjq SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/startalk_playing-with-science Stitcher: http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/startalk/playing-with-science NOTE: StarTalk All-Access subscribers can watch or listen to this entire episode commercial-free here: https://www.startalkradio.net/all-access/the-tennis-brain-strategy-analytics-mental-game/ Photo Credit: Ben Ratner.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:09Gary O'Reilly?

  I'm Gary O'Reilly.

• 0:10Chuck Nice?

  And I'm Chuck Nice.

• 0:11Gary O'Reilly?

  This is Playing with Science. Long gone are the days of wooden rackets, ah, Roscoe Tanner, Borg versus McEnroe. Things were, well, rather analog.

• 0:22Chuck Nice?

  Oh, man, I miss those days. Uh, but you know what? It's a new age, a digital age, if you will. And if you don't train your brain, you ain't got no game. Did you like that?

• 0:33Gary O'Reilly?

  I did.

• 0:33Chuck Nice?

  Yeah. And if you ain't got no stats, guess what? Where are you?

• 0:37Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah, while you're here, it's exactly it. It's about pattern recognition and finding your zone. How quickly can you dial it up? How quickly can you dial it back down again?

• 0:47Chuck Nice?

  Absolutely right. And joining us today will be tennis strategist and analyst Craig O'Shanacy, as well as sports psychologist and mental performance consultant Leslie Sherlin.

• 0:58Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah, and we'll also hear from coach Sarah Stone, who currently works with Serbia's number one ranked female player, Aleksandra Kunich. So put down your rackets and pay attention, please.

• 1:10Chuck Nice?

  But joining us first is tennis strategist and expert Craig O'Shanacy. He's the number one tennis strategist analyst in the world. He's coached on tour for 20 years. He created, uh, BrainGameTennis.com. And, um, actually, uh, he's the lead tennis analyst for the New York Times. Craig, welcome to the show. Yeah, welcome.

• 1:35Speaker 02

  I've just arrived in New York. It's great to be here, looking forward to an amazing US Open.

• 1:41Chuck Nice?

  Oh, that's right. That's why you're here. Of course. By the way, love the Open. Can you please get me some tickets? Get me in.

• 1:53Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:53Chuck Nice?

  I'm joking, I'm I.

• 1:55Gary O'Reilly?

  He's not joking, don't encourage him.

• 1:56Chuck Nice?

  All right, Craig, I'm really not joking, but I am joking, you know what I'm saying, you know. It's kind of like when you ask a girl if you want her to sleep with you and you're like, I mean, I'm joking. I mean, unless you're into that. So anyway.

• 2:08Gary O'Reilly?

  So much of your personal life comes out in this show.

• 2:10Chuck Nice?

  I know. Hey, man, let me just say this. It is such a pleasure to watch you. When you're doing the analyst for the Open or for Wimbledon or for the French, or it doesn't make a difference. You're so enthusiastic. Can you give us a backstory about how you came to be Craig O'Shanacy, the greatest tennis analyst in the world?

• 2:34Gary O'Reilly?

  You're working on those tickets, aren't you?

• 2:35Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, I'm working on those tickets.

• 2:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, you're doing a good job of that, by the way.

• 2:43Speaker 02

  I I think I think it goes back to when I was a kid. I grew up in Aubrey, Australia, a rural country place, but it's a hotbed of tennis. There's 200 grass courts within 100 kilometers or 60 miles.

• 2:57Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 2:58Speaker 02

  Tennis everywhere. So the club I grew up had 25 grass courts. The club over the road, you know, just a couple of miles down, 30 grass courts. And all I could do as a kid was was play, you know, I'd I'd get on my bike after school and go home and go to the courts and play until it got dark. And I should have, I really wish I should have taken some tennis lessons to refine my technique. But it just wasn't something the kids did back then. We just went and played. So I play, I was very heavy on playing sets, therefore the strategy of the game. What matters to winning and losing. I think, you know, these days, while most kids may play, you know, 50 or 60 matches a year, 80 matches a year, whatever.

• 3:43Speaker 02

  You know, we're playing three or 400 plus all the practice sets. So I was just so heavy onto the strategy side of it and I greatly enjoyed that, you know. I never really wanted to practice. We'd rock up to the courts and, you know, it's like, well, why warm up? Let's just go and and start our points. So from a young age, I I loved to compete and I and I love the strategy of the sport.

• 4:06Gary O'Reilly?

  So with the strategy, now you've got that big ally called Big Data. When when did Big Data start to really get a hold on the sport of tennis for you?

• 4:18Speaker 02

  For, okay, so between, from nineteen ninety one backwards.

• 4:23Gary O'Reilly?

  Right.

• 4:23Speaker 02

  There is no data was ever collected in tennis. So the first year was nineteen ninety one. So. You wanna look back at, you know, the nineteen eighty one Borg McEnroe final, there is no analytics whatsoever that exists. You've got to go and find the match and do it yourself. So from nineteen ninety one to two thousand and two. There was primitive data in our sport. It, you know, it was very, it was ten line items, that's about it. From two thousand and two onwards, it was what we call rich data. And then I got involved in the. Research of it in two thousand and fifteen.

• 5:00Gary O'Reilly?

  Right.

• 5:01Speaker 02

  And it was at the Australian Open two thousand and fifteen where I really moved from saying, you know, I've, I'm, I've gone through this. Period of my life where I've coached on the court, I've coached on a tour, I, I really enjoyed writing, I have a journalism degree. I hate math, but I understand that math, you know, that why I'm into it so much is that it, it. Distinguishes between the, the patterns of play, you know, is it better to fall in or back in, is it better to serve wide or go down the T? Is it better to step in or return or step back? Is it better to go to the net or, or stay at the baseline? So, you know, in our. Coaching industry, we've only had to guess. And um, once I saw all this data, I'm like, we don't need to guess anymore.

• 5:44Speaker 02

  We've got some really good data and I looked at it differently and I started taking my own stuff and then. And um, have evolved from then, but really moneyball in tennis, analytical, you know, this really good data in tennis. It's only two thousand and fifteen onwards, it's very recent in our sport. And um, I, I greatly enjoy all the work that I do to help improve the practice court primarily, you know. Let's put the match court first, you know, traditionally in our sport, we go on practice. We think we're doing the right thing. We think hitting a million balls, back and forth, forehands and backhands is a good deal. But then you go and look at a match and you look at the analytics and it it it matters very little.

• 6:26Speaker 02

  So my main role is all over the world globally is to help improve the practice court, help coaches, empower them with this data so that the kids can be practicing on the things that matter in their competition.

• 6:38Chuck Nice?

  So when you're developing strategy, do you do you start with the player or do you start with a platform upon which uh all players rest for a strategy?

• 6:50Speaker 02

  Oh, always start with a platform, you know, that's and it's a great question because the beauty of our sport is there's a lot of different ways to be successful. You can be six foot nine like Kevin Anderson or you can be five foot nine like Diego Schwartzman, you know, both in the top fifteen in the world. You can be left-handed, right-handed, you can come forward a lot, you can stay back and never come in. You need tons of spin or no spin. So that's a real advantage of our sport is the is the lot of the different playing styles. But in saying that, there are underlying analytics that apply to everyone that you can't escape. And so you start with those analytics, you understand what they

• 7:32Speaker 02

  are, you understand that the number one player in the world each year is going to take a fifty fifty battle, tip it up to fifty five percent, you're number one in the world. The top ten average, winning only fifty three percent of their points. The twenty number twenty guy in the world averages fifty percent. So it doesn't matter your style, that's just how our sport is organized. And in some ways, it doesn't matter whether it's two men playing at the US Open, or two women, or two juniors, or two kangaroos playing on the dark side of the moon. It's still going to produce the same amount of analytics.

• 8:07Chuck Nice?

  Uh, by the way, can you get me tickets to that kangaroo match too?

• 8:10Speaker 02

  We are on StarTalk, I mean, I wanted to go, I wanted to go.

• 8:14Gary O'Reilly?

  Don't don't encourage him because you'll only sell them on. So I'm I'm just thinking now, so when you get strategy and you've got, basically, take taking the doubles out of this conversation temporarily, you've got a one-on-one situation. This is kind of like chess, but it's not as simple as me setting you up. There must be a a whole raft of. Standard strategies that you go through. Or have I got that wrong? Is there, is there like, are there ten definable key strategies? Or does it just free form itself?

• 8:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's a good question. So, you know, there's four elements that'll happen in a point. You've got serving, returning, rallying and approaching the net.

• 8:55Gary O'Reilly?

  Mm hmm.

• 8:56Speaker 02

  So you've got patterns of play that I divide up very simply into primary patterns and secondary patterns. So tennis is absolutely straight out of Pavlovian theory.

• 9:08Gary O'Reilly?

  Mm hmm.

• 9:09Speaker 02

  So you serve out wide, you win the point. You serve out wide again the next game. You serve out wide in the junior court. You do it three or four or five times. You then condition your opponent's mind to expect that. And if you're smart enough, you'll figure out, okay, I've got them where I want them. I've got them thinking that this is coming and that's when you employ the secondary tactic. So, you know, there's a lot of times you'll see on a court that some, you know, a drop shot will happen for the first time. Well, it's been set up. It's four games and twenty five minutes in the making that have enabled that drop shot to be successful. Players that run secondary patterns first, they're trying the shotgun approach, they're trying everything.

• 9:54Speaker 02

  They don't even know where the ball's going. So there is absolutely a structure to where you serve, how you return, how you um put together points from the back of the court. And a- and again, you know, one of the things as a coach early on is like, do these patterns from the professional tour wash down to junior tennis? And I'm like, well, let me experiment with this. Let me try and figure it out. Let me find some patterns from Roger and Rafa and Novak and see and and take them to twelve year old boys and girls and see if they work. And the answer is yes. It's done, you know, the speed of the, the speed of the foot is different.

• 10:30Gary O'Reilly?

  Mm hmm.

• 10:31Speaker 02

  And the speed of the ball was different. And that's it.

• 10:33Gary O'Reilly?

  Hmm.

• 10:33Speaker 02

  If you just slow Novak and these guys down, you know, wa- watch them at eighty percent of their pace, you're watching a junior tennis match and where the ball goes is what you want to teach these young kids.

• 10:45Gary O'Reilly?

  Hmm. That's, that's kind of like saying though, if you made me eighty percent less good looking, then you would have Idris Elba. So I understand what you're saying.

• 10:53Speaker 02

  No, you wouldn't.

• 10:55Chuck Nice?

  You've never been in the same sentence as Idris Elba. This is so true.

• 11:00Speaker 02

  Perfect analogy.

• 11:01Chuck Nice?

  Exactly. So here's the deal. I just want to talk about this confusion, this strategy, this mental game. You know, I think tennis is like probably one of the most mental sports there is, period. I mean, like so much of the game happens in your head. And with that, I want to talk about Dustin Brown and this, what they call the most unorthodox match ever. And that is Dustin Brown, at the time, I think he was ranked 102. And of course, he went up against Rafael Nadal, and Nadal was, of course, number one. And I gotta tell you, if you go on YouTube and watch this as point play, it is just the most unbelievable match to watch. And here's what I want to ask you.

• 11:46Chuck Nice?

  Dustin Brown looks highly improvised. It looks like he's just pulling crap out of nowhere. And I know you were his strategist at the time, and I know you were working with the coach as well. How much of that is improvisation? And how much of that is just like, yep, we meant to do that?

• 12:06Speaker 02

  Yeah. So Scott Wittenberg was his coach. The relationship with Dustin and I, I went to school at Saddleback Junior College in Southern California with Chris Wittenberg. I then went with Chris. He goes, my brother runs a tennis camp in Germany, come on over. So I went over to Germany during my summer in college. And his older brother, Kim Wittenberg, was there. And there's the middle brother, Scott. So Scott ends up working with Dustin. Now, I'm a coach at this camp back in like 89 and 90. And around 93, Dustin comes there, I think, as a 12-year-old boy. And he spends a lot of time at this camp in Germany. He knows all the brothers. The brothers introduce them to me.

• 12:50Speaker 02

  I know him when he gets on tour. And then, you know, we turn up at Wimbledon when. What was that, twenty fifteen, I think? Mm-hmm. Um, and, you know, I said, Dustin, you know, if you need some help this tournament, just, just ask, I'd love to help you. And so then he's like, Craig, I, I've, I've seen the draw. If I win this match, then I've got, um, I've got Rafa, and I'm like, listen, I know exactly how to play this guy. You know, as the analyst of the ATP, I study Rafa so much. He's one of the greatest players of all time, he's one of the greatest thinkers of all time. Um, I have such huge respect for him. Um, but, you know, it, it's one of the reasons that Rafa is so insanely good. Is he does the same monotonous thing again and again.

• 13:33Speaker 02

  Because it, it wins, it, it just sticks to the high percentage patterns. So I know where every serve's going, I know if the score is this, he's probably doing this. And Dustin just has, it was the perfect storm because what Dustin does well. Really plugs into what Rafa doesn't like, so it's the shorter points, it's the initial attacking. Um, you know, I called that match, uh, you know, Dustin's strategy, it was organized chaos. Hmm. And that's what it must have felt, you know, before the match, if you're to say, Craig, you know, you've got to put a hundred bucks either way. It's, you've got to put on Dustin or Rafa, I'm like, I'm all in on Dustin and I'll double down on Dustin. I really thought Dustin was the favorite of that match.

• 14:16Speaker 02

  Um, because Dustin knew exactly how to play Rafa. He, the, one quick example, in the juice court. When Rafa serves his second serve in the juice court, it is always, back in twenty fifteen, it's always gonna slice down the tee. Dustin stands over automatically more towards the middle of the court. So he's two steps over, Dustin gives up the out wide serve, he shuts down the middle serve. All the other players step sideways to that, at return, Dustin's already behind it, so he's stepping in. And I say, Dustin, every other guy on tour wants to initially attack Rafa's backhand. Don't go there, it's the, it's straight down the line to the forehand. What Rafa does so well is he serves and then falls to his backhand side.

• 15:01Speaker 02

  To say, uh uh, I'm not gonna hit a backhand, I'm gonna hit a forehand. So he's already leaning that way, his, his body weight is that way, which makes him very vulnerable out wide to the forehand. So time and time again, as you watch that match, you'll see Dustin returning on the juice court, straight down the line. Dustin's sitting on it, waiting on it. I know the serve's gonna go there. Dustin knows it's gonna be, Rafa doesn't know that the return's gonna go there, and he never adjusted, and it's a big reason why Dustin won that match.

• 15:28Gary O'Reilly?

  Wow. Greg, here's one for you. Are you, were you, rather, because it's past tense, were you surprised, Rafa, as good as he is, doesn't then change his strategy, doesn't go from plan A to plan B through to D, C, E, F? Because I'm guessing, if you're gonna be one of the best in the, in the world and of all time, you've got more than one ace up your sleeve.

• 15:50Speaker 02

  Okay, so yes and no. I was working for the Wimbledon Channel then, and after the match, I went up and spoke to Annabelle Croft and, and Maxwellander in a, in an interview. And in that interview, I said, I think it was, I, I don't know whether it was the third or the fourth set, I forget, I forget which set, but Rafa served and volleyed, out of nowhere, served and volleyed, and won the point. And then never did it again. And I'm like, this is what Rafa needed to do, because Dustin took the net away and owned the net, they weren't playing baseline points. And what Rafa should have done is say, you know what, you are troubling me and making me very uncomfortable by, by being at the net.

• 16:30Speaker 02

  Why don't I just take it away from you and, and mitigate all of the, you know, the problems I'm having there? So he never problem solved. Back in twenty ten, Rafa owned Novak Djokovic, owned him.

• 16:43Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah.

• 16:44Speaker 02

  At the end of twenty ten, Novak goes home to Serbia, has Christmas dinner, goes, you know what, let me think about this for a second. Rafa has the world's best forehand, I have the world's best backhand, but, you know, it's like a battering ram, he just beats me down with it. And what he does to, what he used to do back in twenty ten, twenty seven through twenty ten, he pushed Novak back, he'd get the ball up with the spin, and Novak would go that cross-court on defence, and he got nowhere. So at the start of twenty eleven, Novak adjusts, he steps in, he takes the ball on the rise, he takes it down the line, he makes Rafa hit backhands. For seven straight matches, Rafa never adjusts. For seven straight finals through to the Australian Open in two thousand and twelve,

• 17:28Speaker 02

  he never won a match. And Rafa halfway through that, he's going, at his press interviews, he's going, nothing I do hurts this guy anymore. The problem was Rafa was playing the two thousand and ten version of Novak. That two thousand and ten version fails to exist anymore because Novak adjusted and Rafa, it took him over a year to figure it out.

• 17:51Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 17:52Gary O'Reilly?

  Evolution.

• 17:52Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, that's what it's about. It's about making the adjustments. By the way, the Joker is my favorite tennis player, so.

• 17:59Speaker 02

  Very good in here.

• 18:00Gary O'Reilly?

  Who's the best? By the way, Craig, I've got to know now you've said that, who, who is the best and who has been the guest, the best at in-game management, the, the, the intuitive identification of this is dialing up my kryptonite, I can't allow that to beat me, I need to change this way, this way. Who is and who was all the very best?

• 18:19Speaker 02

  Okay, so back, back probably in before two thousand and ten, when I'm, I'm putting all this together and I'm learning and I'm studying. I, I remember a lot of people would come up to me, you know, let's say it's two thousand and eight. In two thousand and eight, you come up to me and say, Craig, who's the best thinkers of all time? Who's got the greatest tennis IQ? Who can make the changes in the court? And I came up with three guys. One of them was playing at the time, Rafael Nadal. His ability to problem solve, especially to dominate Roger Federer through his mind, was incredible. So I put Rafa in there. The second guy who I learned a ton from, that was a tennis mastermind, Andre Agassi.

• 19:05Speaker 02

  Just incredible at how he would break down opponents. And we saw him break them down physically, but the match was already over, two hours before that, he'd already figured it out. Now, the third guy will surprise you. The third guy's a left-hander, um, from South America, did ascend to number one for a brief period of time. I studied about fifteen of his matches when he was at his, at his peak. His ability to just pick apart an opponent mentally and then do it physically, he beat.

• 19:42Speaker 02

  Agassi in the nineteen ninety eight Miami final to become number one, he took, um, he took over from P. Sampras when he did that. The guy's name is Marcelo Rios.

• 19:54Gary O'Reilly?

  Oh, I remember the name. I can't remember his game, but I do remember the name.

• 20:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, he, he, he had a bad temper. He was an honorary kind of honorary kind of fella on the court. He got a bad rap. A lot of people didn't like him because he didn't really care much out there. He didn't appear to care, but, um, boy, I'll tell you what, the guys that I, I, I, when I watched him play his big matches, um, winning Indian Wells, winning Miami both in ninety eight to become number one in the world. One of the smartest players I've ever seen.

• 20:27Chuck Nice?

  Wow. Well, we got to wrap this up, man. This is fascinating talking to you. I could just talk tennis with you all day long. It's just so great to listen to you.

• 20:34Gary O'Reilly?

  Hey, enjoy the US Open, sir. It's been a pleasure talking to you.

• 20:37Chuck Nice?

  And I say enjoy the US Open with Chuck Nice.

• 20:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, very good, gentlemen. Thank you. It's an absolute pleasure to be on the show.

• 20:43Gary O'Reilly?

  Oh, pleasure's ours, sir. Thank you. Uh, Greg O'Shanacy, and if you didn't know already, the reason why he's the world's number one tennis analyst. We are going to take a break. Uh, when we come back, psychologist and mental performance consultant, Leslie Sherlin. Oh, you're not going to want to go away, are you? See you shortly.

• 21:06Gary O'Reilly?

  Welcome back to Playing with Science. Today, as you know, we're exploring the tennis brain. And joining us now is sports psychologist and mental performance consultant, Leslie Sherlin. Lesley, welcome to the show, sir. How are you?

• 21:20Chuck Nice?

  I'm very good. Thanks for having me. Ah, man, thank you for being here. So you're one of the world's leading experts in neuroscience and high performance assistant, professor of psychology at Ottawa University in, surprise, Arizona. Got, uh, that's got, surprise, Arizona. You have to say it like that. You know that, right? That's right. Everybody does. It's okay. Hey, you know, you're also the co-founder and science officer of Neurotherapeutics, a leader in research on uh, the use of neuroscience for improving human performance, huh?

• 21:50Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah, I mean, you don't do anything without the brain. Even I have that much knowledge, but I think that's the limit. Um, so how do you go about improving performance? And taking out all of the musculature and just focusing on how the brain operates?

• 22:07Speaker 03

  Well, it's really straightforward when we think about it. If you ask any athlete, or even you guys, any person who is performing at any level, whether they're a parent, or an athlete, or a business executive, you can say, "To what degree does the mental side of things contribute to performance?" They're likely to give you a very high percentage. Even in all the athletes that I've worked with in the most physical types of professions, rugby, and football, and things that you can't imagine the mental side of it so much, they all say the thing that makes them different from their competitor is not their physicality, but in fact their mental discipline, their capacity to be smart about the game, engage

• 22:51Speaker 03

  at the right time, disengage at the right time, and control their own reactions.

• 22:56Gary O'Reilly?

  You're asking an athlete, and if you look at it in the context of tennis, to perform at a high end, an elite performance, but without engaging certain processes in the brain, nothing happens. So how do I dial up my body to be in peak performance mode, but bring my brain to a point where I am so comfortable in the way that I assess every single thing that's taking place in front of me?

• 23:25Speaker 03

  Yeah, that was really well stated. In fact, if this whole interviewing thing doesn't work out, you could shift into sports psych consulting, because that's in fact the essence of what we're trying to get people to conjure up within. And it varies, there's some certain strategies, some mental skills, techniques that we teach, but in general, the athlete, each individual, and even a team, has to figure that piece out. And that's one of the reasons why sports psych is kind of, by and large, to some people, squishy, because there's not like a set recipe to follow to create that. But there are certain techniques and and really what you're doing is creating a flexibility

• 24:07Speaker 03

  or creating that stamina, creating the strength from a mental standpoint in much the same way we work with our body and our muscles. So by going through specific exercises, by going through specific skills and also practicing and implementing those things, that's ultimately how we get there. So it's a bit of work, but there are some some strategies.

• 24:27Gary O'Reilly?

  What I'm hearing is we've we've got this athletic body and we've trained it, we've worked it, it's full of, it's packed full of muscle memories and that allows us to compete at a very high level. What I'm feeling is you're doing the same with the brain, although I can't call it muscle memory. What what terminology do you use? Because you are exercising this brain to work in a better way every time. So it's it's that's the way it's engaging. So how how do you describe that to someone like myself, please?

• 25:01Speaker 03

  I I call it mental discipline and it's for a couple of reasons. One, because not only are you teaching the brain how to be strong, how to do something like the the physical analogy works out really well here. So if we think about the brain is not a muscle, it's not comprised of the same tissue, it's it's very strict, but the analogy works very similar, that just like your strength and conditioning your body, you can do the same thing with the brain. You're giving it good nutrition, you're you're challenging it, you're asking it to be in a very high intensity state of focus or concentration, you're giving it the opportunity to recover. So there is that physical component, but then just like in a sport, you're coaching skills, you're teaching the person how to do the particular

• 25:45Speaker 03

  activity, whatever it is, how to be successful. Well, that's where then the mental skills, we will call them, lay on top of the brain physiology. So it's very much the same. We have two systems. We have the physical piece of the brain and then we have what we've been taught, what we're implementing from a thought process.

• 26:02Chuck Nice?

  Wow, this is so fascinating talking to you. I gotta flip that script right now. I mean, you know, this is great. Gary just made me think of a really great scenario. This is where I am, just the opposite, okay? Where my brain thinks I can do things and my body cannot.

• 26:20Gary O'Reilly?

  That's called being a fan.

• 26:23Chuck Nice?

  So how do you deal with that? Because I swear that is where I am, man. It's just like, no, of course I can do that. And then I go to do it and I fail miserably.

• 26:33Speaker 03

  For many people, that's the easier problem to solve because we can put you in the gym. We can put you with the right coaching. We can put you with the right team and ultimately find that success. So that's actually an easier position because it's tangible. We can, we can watch you on film and know where your weaknesses are and teach you how to succeed in that sport. Where the mental side of things gets squirrely for a lot of people because they can't see it. They don't know, am I doing this right or not? So in fact, I think you're probably in a good spot.

• 27:00Chuck Nice?

  Ah, man, that's so cool. What a great answer.

• 27:02Gary O'Reilly?

  Cheered him up. No end there.

• 27:04Chuck Nice?

  There's hope for me.

• 27:05Gary O'Reilly?

  Yes. Now I'm just thinking about this. With the brain acting in certain way, it's acting slightly different to the way it was acting. Because we've worked on it and developed it. It must then be transmitting, I'll call them brainwaves for the, for the lack of a better term. But can you then differentiate and see and prove to an athlete? Look, this is your brain working in this way. And then you can, you're nodding, I can see you and you're nodding. So please explain that to me.

• 27:36Speaker 03

  Yeah. So actually you were right on, right on target with the idea of brainwaves. Because the electrical activity of the brain is reflective of the state that we're in. So just imagine, you know, when you're focused, you have a different electrical signature than when you're relaxed. And that looks different than when you're drowsy. And that translates not only to trait characteristics, but also the state that you're in. So if I'm feeling particularly nervous about an event that's coming up, or I'm feeling really confident. There are different electrical signatures that fit that. And so we can literally put a person into a scenario and monitor the EEG. And that's where this quantitative electroencephalography comes in.

• 28:17Speaker 03

  So that's the, the process of measuring that electrical activity and identifying that signature. Say, now let's, let's push you, let's train your brain to perform in a, to match a signature. That's more likely to be successful in that particular scenario. And then we can monitor it after and we can see.

• 28:36Chuck Nice?

  And how, how exactly are you monitoring that activity of the brain? How are you recording and capturing that data?

• 28:43Speaker 03

  Yeah, so we'll put little electrodes on the scalp and then it goes into an amplifier, an EEG amplifier, and then that data is captured via computer. And it's not dissimilar from the type of procedures that you historically might have been aware of in a medical community from like a polysomnography or sleep studies.

• 29:02Gary O'Reilly?

  Right.

• 29:02Speaker 03

  It's that same electrical activity that they're monitoring. We're just condensing it into a smaller, more portable technology that can be transported into the field.

• 29:13Gary O'Reilly?

  And is that in the form of a headset?

• 29:16Speaker 03

  Yes, exactly. So you can do it in a number of ways. There's the traditional type where there's electrodes and wires that are attached to the scalp, but then the way the technology's going now is it's condensed into mobile devices that are worn that look like headphones, only they have sensors attached to them. And it's, you know, just simply put on the head and walk around with it and it's Bluetooth. And, you know, the technology's really allowing us to get in the moment of sport as opposed to looking at things in a laboratory.

• 29:45Gary O'Reilly?

  Some of the work you've done has been with Mike Bryan, one of the Bryan brothers.

• 29:50Speaker 03

  Right.

• 29:51Gary O'Reilly?

  Probably the most successful, you'll know better than I about this, the most successful men's double act at the moment.

• 29:55Chuck Nice?

  Uh, well, right now they are, without a doubt, uh, yeah, without a doubt. He and his brother.

• 30:00Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah, so one of the Mike comes to you and he wants to dial up or dial down because he, the sort of game head, I'll call it the game head that he's using to compete with, he brings with him off court and it's still game head that's on. And he's very intense and very competitive, most likely. How do you work with athletes like that? Because normally it's a case like, I need to rev this guy up or this, I need to get this woman in a competitive state. But there are other instances where you are asking them to be able to select as and when to use it. How, how do you work with that?

• 30:36Chuck Nice?

  Does he have game rage? Ooh.

• 30:40Speaker 03

  Can translate over for many people where they take that same state that is successful in a competitive environment and they take it into daily life and it's not as successful there and that's in fact, I would say for by and large, most of the athletes with whom I've worked, they are in fact in that competitive state, they're very successful in that area, but it's about being able to recover, kind of turn it off when they're not in that moment, which lends to, you know, dysregulated sleep and recovery cycles and that's one of the areas where, you know, it can be most beneficial. For me, the, the tool and the modality that I use is again based on these brainwaves, which is teaching the brain to do something different.

• 31:21Speaker 03

  My exposure to these elite performing athletes has been that by and large, they have a good mindset, they understand what's going to be successful, they understand the competitive environment and what they need to do, but they sometimes get stuck in a particular place. So if we think back to those electrical signatures, they have that game, that competitive signature and now to down modulate that or turn it off or dial it back in between sets or rounds or games or even in between plays if we're in a fast-moving sport, figuring that piece out can be really challenging because the body is less tangible for us to, to measure and so by placing those electrodes on the scalp, we can see what that electrical signature

• 32:06Speaker 03

  is and as they learn to transition or shift it into a more desirable direction, we give them feedback, saying, yes, that's the direction of more calm or a, a more, I hate to use this term, but we'll call it relaxed state. And as their brain moves in that direction, they get the feedback and they go, oh, that's what that's like. And so we're creating the opportunity for them to figure out, what did I do to make that happen? And now let me take it into the field and then I can be able to regulate and have to create this flexibility of being very intense when I'm in and I'm about to take that serve, that laser beam of, of concentration, but then when I'm stepping back, waiting for the

• 32:49Speaker 03

  ball to be returned to me, how can I take that moment and relax for just the right amount of coming down to save and conserve energy rather than burning it all up in the beginning?

• 33:00Gary O'Reilly?

  See, from an athlete's point of view, having been one many years ago. I could lose my mojo. If you dial me down, I could lose my mojo. That's what's got me this far. And do you find, to begin with, athletes will cling to this competitive state that they've had all this time?

• 33:19Speaker 03

  Yeah, very much so. And the thing that I really try to emphasize, and we'll make a point here, is that it's not that we're taking the other, that real high competitive state away, it's that you're creating an increased repertoire of state. So I can do that at will, rather than my environment pushing me there. And so you probably experienced the time where the mojo wasn't there, and you feel kind of helpless towards it. And you're like, well, what do I do? How can I conjure it up? And we, you know, bump chests, or whatever we do to kind of pep ourselves up to get there, where creating that flexibility internally allows you to go there when it's ideal, but in the moments where that isn't the best

• 33:59Speaker 03

  state for optimal success, you can dial it down. But it's within their control not being pressured by the environment.

• 34:06Chuck Nice?

  Wow. Man, we could have done a whole show just on this.

• 34:08Gary O'Reilly?

  I've got one question before we have to let you go. Sadly, we do. You have a situation where you've got a computer-generated car, I believe, and you get your athletes to power that car by just setting themselves up in a certain brain state. Have I manufactured that in a dream, or is that actually true?

• 34:29Speaker 03

  That's exactly correct. And it's this process where we're saying, all right, we know what the electrical signature looks like to be highly engaged. We know what intense focus looks like. And we also know what it means to kind of be alert and ready, but not actively burning up all that energy. So we set those parameters in the computer program, and then as the athlete or the individual shifts their brain state into that desired direction, the car moves forward. And so that's that feedback. And for them, they're figuring out, what did I do to make that car move forward? And that process, it's called operant conditioning, they begin to learn how to create that. And then they can do it at their own will, and

• 35:12Speaker 03

  it's neat to be able to move a race car forward, that's fun. But more important than that is that when they're in the field, when they're on the court, then they can say, okay, I need to step it up. And they know internally what it is that they need to do to create that.

• 35:27Chuck Nice?

  So you're literally giving them gas and brake pedals for their brain?

• 35:33Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah, in fact.

• 35:34Chuck Nice?

  How very cool.

• 35:35Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah.

• 35:36Chuck Nice?

  That's just fantastic.

• 35:37Gary O'Reilly?

  Did you personally come up with the idea of being able to move the car forward? Because I think that's whoever came up with that genius. Because it's so, it's so, that's how I do it. Look at my, this is the result. This is me actually. My brain power is now, I can see it doing actually something. It's amazing.

• 35:55Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, and I know if I were to take that simulation, my brain would call AAA.

• 36:02Gary O'Reilly?

  But mind you, if your brain just dialed AAA, I'd be quite impressed. I really would be impressed by that.

• 36:08Chuck Nice?

  It's just like, hey, that wasn't written in the program. Where'd that tow truck come from?

• 36:12Gary O'Reilly?

  Are we, are we, while we discuss this, I'm thinking, I mean, this, this wasn't, I mean, I worked with sports psychologists in the eighties. And at no point did I have a conversation like the one we've just had. And I'm wondering, how far at the forefront are you in this particular field? Because I think this is really where sport's going to be redefined. We've done all the bodybuilding, we've done all the stretching, working, endurance and all of the physical sides. I think now.

• 36:43Chuck Nice?

  The last frontier.

• 36:44Gary O'Reilly?

  There you go. Is, are we, is this it? Is this, is this the next frontier for sport?

• 36:50Speaker 03

  I think it's definitely the next frontier. Um, I wish I could take credit for having been more instrumental or being more, um, more important than I am in reality. This has been around for a long time, this idea of conditioning, the physiology. Um, you know, so the technology is what's making this concept that's been around for a long time now applicable to sport. Um, athletes are a different type of population than just either pathological states or healthy individuals. There's a unique characteristic about them and we're just starting to learn, what does high performance look like physiologically? How does the brain operate and how is that different?

• 37:29Speaker 03

  So technology has been the catalyst and then implementing these techniques is just an overlay where I just happened to be at the right time, at the right place and said, oh, these two things should go together. So I think it's definitely the next step, um, allowing someone, an athlete to see how their brain is performing in the same way that we've been looking at their body composition for decades. Will allow them to just have one more way, one more window of being able to optimize performance.

• 37:57Chuck Nice?

  Well, I gotta tell you, this has just been a fascinating conversation and.

• 38:00Gary O'Reilly?

  Thank you to Leslie Sherlin, it's been a pleasure, sir. You have, I will say it, opened our minds, and that was intended. Right, we're gonna take a break. Up next is coach Sarah Stone, and take a look at how you develop world-class tennis players. Don't go away, we'll be right back. Welcome back to Playing with Science, we've been exploring the strategy and mental game in tennis. And joining us now to give the coaches' point of view is Sarah Stone, currently coaching Serbia's number one ranked female player, Aleksandra Krych, as well as many others.

• 38:39Chuck Nice?

  Yes, Alexa Glatch, who is American, she works with her, and actually, why don't we just welcome Sarah in, she could tell us all about who she's working with. Hey Sarah, how are you?

• 38:48Speaker 04

  Hi. Hi guys, thanks for having me on the show, it's really nice to be here with you.

• 38:52Chuck Nice?

  Welcome, thank you. Super happy to have you. And who else do you work with? I know, we mentioned too, there's a third player.

• 38:59Speaker 04

  I spend a little bit of time working with a couple of different juniors, so the main thing that I'm doing right now is working with the pros. I'm back home at the moment, actually, working with Alexa Glatch, she's been out, American player for the last year and a half. She played the qualies there last year, and she got injured, actually, so part of what we're talking about today is really interesting, the mental health side of tennis, particularly when you're out injured. So I'm doing a fair bit of everything and coaching a few different players.

• 39:30Gary O'Reilly?

  And you're a good friend of Craig O'Shanish's as well, we just found out.

• 39:33Speaker 04

  Yeah, I've known Craig for a really long time. I said to you guys, I think it was since I was 14 or 15, when he was working in Australia, and he's coached quite a few of my friends, and he's a phenomenal guy, and he's super knowledgeable, he's really changed the industry, so I always love learning from him and spending time with him.

• 39:53Gary O'Reilly?

  You're not alone, we've just realized just how knowledgeable he is, so yeah, we're in agreeance. Going back to Aleksandra Krych, and reading her profile, she started to play tennis at age three.

• 40:04Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 40:05Gary O'Reilly?

  At what point do you get, and I wanna say serious, but I guess from a very early age, she's been quite serious with the way that she's gone about her game.

• 40:13Chuck Nice?

  How do you make a racket for a three-year-old?

• 40:15Gary O'Reilly?

  Small hand.

• 40:16Speaker 04

  They're pretty small. My dad's tennis coach, actually, and I started playing when I was three as well. And back then, there weren't really small rackets, I guess. So he cut it a full-size down for me with a hacksaw. So that's how it was done. And manufacturers have got on to making small rackets. But a lot of players start pretty young. I think specializing in tennis too soon is not the best thing for players. It certainly doesn't help you with skill acquisition. There's a lot of other sports that I suggest that players should be playing or kids developing. Alex is very young, at three. I'm not sure if she knew she was gonna be a professional then, but it's not uncommon for players to play from a pretty young age.

• 40:57Chuck Nice?

  You know, speaking of that, so to talk about young, and you talk about the developing brain, and you talk about how mental tennis is. I mean, it's just so mental. How do you develop a kid to deal with that kind of pressure and then develop them so that they can go pro?

• 41:19Speaker 04

  Yeah, well, I think that, you know, you wanna make sure that it's fun. That's the biggest thing that tennis is all about. It's a game and you wanna ensure that they enjoy the sport, otherwise they end up dropping out anyway. I mean, the number of girls actually rapidly declines from around 12 years of age. So participation drops. So particularly in the girls' side, I think instilling enjoyment and communicating that with the parents, that's the big thing. You don't really prepare someone to be a pro. I think that you encourage the kid to enjoy the sport and get as good as they can and. If they're a professional, they're a professional. And if they're not, they go to college and they have a very successful life regardless.

• 42:00Chuck Nice?

  Okay, so let's, let's do a little role play here, Sarah, okay? I'm a player. I'm a player.

• 42:05Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 42:06Chuck Nice?

  I'm, I'm pretty damn good.

• 42:08Gary O'Reilly?

  You say so yourself.

• 42:09Chuck Nice?

  Thanks, thanks Gary. Thanks, I appreciate that. Uh, but I've, I've just lost a string of matches, okay?

• 42:16Gary O'Reilly?

  Okay.

• 42:16Chuck Nice?

  I'm down on myself. I don't really believe in my abilities anymore because, you know, I was on top. And now it just seems like nothing's working for me. How do you help me? I mean, do you, it, do you work on technique? Do you work on? What, what do you do for somebody like that?

• 42:32Speaker 04

  Are you a professional? Are we talking about a professional right now? You're on tour and you lost the matches?

• 42:37Chuck Nice?

  I'm on tour and man, you know, I was hot. I was hot. And now for some reason, I'm just dropping matches, ones that I shouldn't be losing, you know? Uh, what, what do you do for me?

• 42:52Speaker 04

  I think you have, as a coach, you really have to listen to the player and see what's going on for them. It's not always about how they're hitting the ball.

• 42:59Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 42:59Speaker 04

  For girls, for example, it could be that they have really low iron and, and they just don't have enough energy out there and they don't realize or, you know, they could have a thyroid condition that causes them to feel pretty tired. I mean, these are, these are things that are outside of hitting the ball. So,

• 43:14Chuck Nice?

  Hmm.

• 43:15Speaker 04

  I would, I would tend to sort of start there and just ask some questions, how they're feeling, what's been going on? Do they feel a lot of pressure? And then you sort of can navigate it from there. The WTA has awesome resources with people that they, you know, they can deal with, uh, outside pressures that they're coping with. It might be parents, it might be sponsors, it might be all sorts of things. But there's a lot of programs in place where, that's where I would steer my player towards, is to talking with the, the people that the WTA has in place. And, and I think that's a, a great place to start.

• 43:47Gary O'Reilly?

  With, when you say the WTA, if, if you've got a young player that has an awful lot of potential, but they have, you know, they're looking at clouds, they're looking, watching squirrels, and they're not quite focusing the way that you would like them to, to bring the best of their game with them.

• 44:02Chuck Nice?

  I'm right here. You don't have to talk about me like that.

• 44:05Speaker 04

  Were you looking at clouds when you went on that bad streak, or what?

• 44:08Chuck Nice?

  Absolutely.

• 44:08Gary O'Reilly?

  Probably, yeah.

• 44:10Chuck Nice?

  I was, and, and honestly, I was like, that cloud looks like a squirrel. Okay, go ahead.

• 44:14Gary O'Reilly?

  See what I work with?

• 44:16Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 44:16Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah. Are there the resources to sit down with people who can help? With programs to develop the concentration, to develop an athlete's focus.

• 44:28Speaker 04

  Yeah, I think for sure. The first thing you wanna look at is with young kids is how much they're really into the sport. You tend to coach kids with parents who really push them in. And the parents want it more than the kids. So when you're looking at whether or not someone has the potential to be a professional player, a young player, is you have to see if they're motivated. If it's just the parents pushing all the time and they're kind of dragging their bag as they're coming into practice and they don't seem that eager. I mean, the signs are there. You can see it. And I typically try to talk with the younger players and say, you know, what are your goals or what do you wanna do? And just see what what they share with me and ask a lot of questions because

• 45:10Speaker 04

  a lot of the time you'll you'll get the answer of, oh, you know, I'd like to play college or whatever. They probably won't say that in front of their parents. It's there's a particular type of character or person, these traits that you see with young players that you know that they're gonna be successful. I don't know if it's like a champion breed, but you get the feeling from that kid that they're really committed. And I haven't seen it too much. I've coached some top kids in the States, but it's rare. I've I've worked with a couple that have gone on to play college and and going on from there. But it's not, it's pretty rare. For the number of kids that you end up coaching when you're in a club, it's not that many. So I think you're looking for

• 45:50Speaker 04

  they're dedicated, they're really students of the game. A simple question would be, do you watch tennis at home on TV? And the number of kids that tell me, or their parents want their kid to be a professional and they don't even watch tennis on TV. I mean, they're just, they're not that invested in the game. You can see it right there.

• 46:07Chuck Nice?

  That makes sense. So let me ask you this. Speaking of that, you look at women's tennis and everyone for the past, God knows how many years has been waiting for the next Williams sisters. That seems to be the big deal. Like, who's going to be the next Serena? You know?

• 46:26Chuck Nice?

  Is there anybody on the horizon as you see the sunset for some of these big names in women's tennis, which I believe has made tennis super popular. It's really the women, not the men that make tennis as a sport super popular.

• 46:42Chuck Nice?

  Is there, as these women reach the twilight of their careers, is there somebody on the horizon that's going to take that mantle?

• 46:50Speaker 04

  Well, I think tennis has certainly changed and I hope Serena and Venus play for another 10 years. I don't know if that's on their horizon, but we probably never thought that 37 was on their horizon in the past either. So we have to see how long that plays out and I think we all want them to play as long as possible. Absolutely. It's kind of changed because there's a lot of, the players are a lot older now. I believe just a little while back, the average age of the top 100 was 27 for females. So if we're looking at who is the next one on the horizon, I think sometimes people look too young and maybe we should be looking at that, you know, 25, 26, 27. It's just not the same as it was in the past. So will they ever win as many slams as Serena? I

• 47:33Speaker 04

  mean, who knows? We never know. Wouldn't have thought that maybe she could have won that many herself. But I think the way that the style of the game is going, tennis is on the women's side is definitely becoming more and more athletic, stronger players, you know, very physical game now. And we'll look for more all-court players to dominate tennis in the future. I mean, player like Kasekeen, I mean, she's a huge talent. She can do everything around the court. Mm-hmm. Ash Barty, Ash Barty is, she's brilliant. When you speak to a lot of players, they talk about Ash Barty, that she's just unbelievable all around the court. So that's someone that I could see that could potentially dominate the game in the future. And, you know, players

• 48:18Speaker 04

  like Alex and Alex, I mean, they're going to keep developing. Players are between 25 to 28. I think you can't overlook that group because a 25-year-old now, at 27, if they hit their peak and they play like Serena, they're going to be in the game for 10 years. So I think we, yeah, it's always hard to predict, but I think it's going to be an all-court player. Okay.

• 48:39Gary O'Reilly?

  Interesting. So that's the player side of it. How about coaches? What for you is going to be the next big thing to, maybe not revolutionize, but really take your ability to coach to a new level?

• 48:52Speaker 04

  I think all of the things that the WTA Coach Programme are doing are really helping us as coaches get better and expand our knowledge, certainly with all of the stuff from SAP when we can study the game from an angle that wasn't out there before and it wasn't so readily available, then it really enhances our knowledge and we can say more fact-based, the way that we're talking about tennis. Previously, I think they'd say, "Well, you know, this girl kind of hits the ball about so high and this heavy." Now it's really specific. So, and they've got lots of great things in place. Also, the programme they have with the university, that also applies for coaches in their programme. We can go on and study, maybe where you want to study exercise science or different sorts of things

• 49:35Speaker 04

  that can enhance us as coaches. So, I think more well-rounded coaches, because everything's so readily available. There's a lot of online content that you can study and the more you're invested, just like a player. We want them to continue learning, and so the same goes for us as coaches. We need to continue to invest in our future, have great mentors, and then I think you'll see the level of coaching continue to rise.

• 49:57Chuck Nice?

  Fantastic.

• 49:58Gary O'Reilly?

  Isn't it?

• 49:59Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 50:00Gary O'Reilly?

  Wow, this has been great.

• 50:01Chuck Nice?

  Thank you so much.

• 50:02Gary O'Reilly?

  And we wish you the best of luck with all of your players.

• 50:04Speaker 04

  No problem, guys. Thanks so much for having me on the show, and it's always great to talk about women's tennis, so I appreciate it.

• 50:09Chuck Nice?

  Absolutely.

• 50:10Gary O'Reilly?

  The pleasure is ours. Thank you so much for your time.

• 50:12Chuck Nice?

  Women's tennis is the only tennis. That's what I say.

• 50:15Gary O'Reilly?

  Okay.

• 50:16Speaker 04

  I love it.

• 50:17Chuck Nice?

  Take care.

• 50:18Gary O'Reilly?

  Thank you so much. I mean, you see, Chuck, we're looking at the different compartments, the big data, the analytics with Craig, Sharon there, Sarah there, rather, with the point of view of how you work with young athletes, how you develop it, and then with Lesley, who is looking at how you get players to work themselves. Because as a player in a competition, you've got to be this high level of performance, but your brain's got to be all the way calm and thoughtful to utilise the sort of things that Sarah's been talking about, that Craig was being talking about. And you're saying to yourself, "I've still got to hit this ball back, and I'm going to run, I'm going to twist." And then

• 51:00Gary O'Reilly?

  it's got to become a muscle memory, got to be able to do this without having to think twice about it.

• 51:05Chuck Nice?

  Absolutely, yeah. Which is why I don't play any sports at all.

• 51:10Gary O'Reilly?

  Don't be so down on yourself. Don't be so down on yourself. Right.

• 51:13Chuck Nice?

  It just made me sad. I was just like, God, no wonder I suck.

• 51:16Gary O'Reilly?

  No, what I'm thinking as I'm saying those words is how incredible.

• 51:22Chuck Nice?

  It's really, it's such a feat to rise to this level. I mean, on all the sports that we talk about on the show, but for tennis especially.

• 51:30Gary O'Reilly?

  If you're not a tennis fan and you're listening to this, and thank you for, if you've stayed with us all the way through the show is if you get a chance now to watch

• 51:37Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 51:38Gary O'Reilly?

  the elite tennis players.

• 51:39Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 51:40Gary O'Reilly?

  Hopefully now you will see their game in a slightly different way because there is so much more going on.

• 51:47Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 51:48Gary O'Reilly?

  On court.

• 51:49Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 51:49Gary O'Reilly?

  In the most dangerous space in an athlete's game is the space between their ears.

• 51:55Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 51:56Gary O'Reilly?

  And so much more. So.

• 51:58Chuck Nice?

  You know, and that's the great, I hope people did take away from this, like to watch the game differently because it really is what makes tennis exciting. So.

• 52:04Gary O'Reilly?

  It is. Tennis is exciting and it will continue to be so. And I will continue to be Gary O'Reilly.

• 52:10Chuck Nice?

  And I shall continue to be Chris Rock.

• 52:12Gary O'Reilly?

  Fabulous news for all of us. This has been Playing with Science. Hope you enjoyed the show and we'll be back soon enough with a new one.