Winning Ugly: Mental Warfare in Tennis--Lessons from a Master

Brad Gilbert is truly a master when it comes to winning ugly! This book is helpful for beginners and advanced players, alike. Anyone looking to make the most of their skills by taking their mental game and tennis strategy to the next level should give this book a read. Just look what Brad's approach did for Andre Agassi! Enough said.

I could never break past the round of 16's or quarters at any big tournament. I'll summarize how to win those matches now: get in great physical shape, apply the principles of Winning Ugly, visualization, and embracing/enjoying close matches with your best effort rather than choking.

Another title of this book might be "Helping your opponent make mistakes and lose". For the majority of us, especially at the club level, we dont have the skillset to win by hitting winners. We just need to play percentage tennis, and help our opponents lose. Its only at the very highest levels of the game that winners are sometimes greater than unforced errors. Only at the top fo the game where two guys can trade winner after winner, hit stuff around the net and between their legs. Unless one is a naturally gifted tennis player (Federer) Winning Ugly is for the rest of us. And its a lot more than just hitting to a guys bad backhand.

To Champions, a lot of this comes naturally. But it CAN be learned. Once in my life, I got in the zone. I could not miss. My dad still talks about that set! I'm so happy he was there to see it. I took a set off a guy who was ranked #3 in the US, and as I was marvelling at the crowd forming to watch me, and calculating the rise in my ranking, he mopped the floor with me 0 and 1. If I'd had Winning Ugly, I might have kept my head in the game and won that match.

I remember this guy in my Sectionals, who was the dorkiest guy on the junior tour, but always in the top 5 seeds. He wasnt in great shape. He actually had a tether! built into his grip for his unorthodox two handed forehand, and thick coke bottle glasses. In the semi's, he met this new kid recently from California, a snobby Bjorn Italian FILA wearing Brad Pitt looking guy with the most beautiful strokes, and boundless confidence, who was just deystroying excellent players and getting all the girls attention. Imagine that blonde dude Johnny from Karate Kid I. Yeah, ok, I was jealous.

Well, expecting Brad Pitt to claim his next victim, I marvelled as this dorky nerdy chump wouldnt get intimidated, and wouldnt allow this guy to play his game. Instead of trading strokes in jousting fashion, he applied his strengths to Cobra Kai's weakness. I was witness to the total dismantling of a superior opponent's game. By the end of the match, Brad Pitt was smashing his rackets and scratching his head, trying to figure out how a guy with coke bottle glasses and a home-made TETHER on his raquet's butt beat him! The dork went to the finals and I was smiling inside at "Brads" misfortune. Twenty-five odd years later, there's a name for this: Winning Ugly. For most people, the match is lost before you go out. Well, that's the negative thinking that costs one matches. That's why the same people advance through the draw at almost every tournament.

Winning ugly isnt about trading fire at Gettysburg, until somebody drops, thats how I used to play. I didnt just have to win, it had to be with panache. How stupid. It was somehow unsportsmanly to hit "junk" or "push" the ball to take off pace, or hit "moonballs". I wish I had this book when I was a junior player, I bet I would have won half the matches I lost from bad strategy.

Winning Ugly is about applying the best of your game, to the worst of your opponent's. Its about using anything to win. One application of this strategy I use is the super lob when I'm out of position. I hit it as hard as I can so it goes 100 feet and can back up a guy to the baseline. It drives some guys crazy. They're like "play tennis" you ---hole. But I WIN! Yeah, its not pretty, but it feels better driving home. When I read that you should analyze your opponents strokes in the warmup to see what he's missing or practicing more, it hit my like a lightning bolt. I had never ever done this, and it was SO obvious. I was too focused on getting warmed up and MY strokes. The hundreds of matches I had played, and never considered this. This book is a must for competetive players.

As a final note:I wouldnt say Winning Ugly is about the mental game. I think its more a book about tactics. The mental game is best explained by Inner Tennis.

This book, like Gilbert's game, will not knock your socks off at first glance. The writing style is plain, and there is not much in the way of technicality or fancy shot making advice. It really is about winning ugly. Gilbert does two major things in this book. First he breaks down the game itself. Second he breaks down the mind of the player. Gilbert really shows his understanding of the critical nature of certain points in the match and what to do in certain situations. He also shows from vast experience just how psychological the game is. Gilbert doesn't focus on 'great players' so much as he focuses on players with a mentally tough approach to the game, the thing that makes them really hard to beat. There are plenty of examples he uses from Mac to Connors to Lendl, all to great effect. And gives an insider's look into some of the game's greatest minds, and what they do to win. You don't necessarily need to read this as a tennis guide either. There are a lot of things which you can apply in life. It makes for an overall entertaining read.

Well, if this book is so good and everyone read it and managed to improve their games thanks to it, all the matches would be decided in tie-breakers in each set...

Come one! Don't talk about mind games. Guys like Federer, Nadal and Djokovic would destroy guys like GIlbert, and guys like Sampras and Agassi, Courier, etc, would win at least 7 in 10 matches against him!

The first aspect is to have the best all around shots - then you develop your mental skills, of course developing conditioning at the same time.

This book may be a pleasant reading, but it will not help you at ALL against a guy who simply is better than you. If both players are aproximately at the same technical level, of course there are a lot of aspects that can give you the edge: proper sleeping, adequate stretching, adequate warming-up, positive thinking, etc, etc... You don't need this book to know about all that stuff, if you're a reasonable tennis enthusiast.

This book deals with mental tennistactics. Brad lets you think about your own game, and analyzes where things often tend to go wrong (on all levels: pros, but also clubplayers). It is helpful in making you a smarter player. A must read, and a true classic already, for everyone who wants to get its own game improved.