I recently had a conversation with Joel Chasnoff, my co-author on our book Essential Tennis, that I believe every serious tennis player needs to hear.

Joel had just finished a package of five lessons at a club while traveling, and ten minutes into the first lesson, he called me absolutely furious. He used words like “criminal” and felt like he’d been lied to. His frustration wasn’t just about wasting money. It was about something much deeper that I think plagues our entire sport.

Here’s what happened: Joel told his coach exactly what he wanted to work on. He wanted to focus on loading his weight and transferring it into the ball. Simple, specific, clear. But within minutes, the coach was throwing multiple instructions at him. Stay low. Keep your left hand out. Get more distance from the ball.

Joel literally told her, “My brain can only handle one thing,” but the corrections kept coming.

And here’s the thing that makes this so tricky: everything the coach said was probably correct. Those adjustments might all have been helpful. But piling them on top of each other guaranteed that Joel wouldn’t actually change anything. He’d just spend an hour feeling frustrated and confused.

This is where most tennis players get stuck, and honestly, it’s not entirely your fault.

There’s a massive misunderstanding in tennis culture about what lessons are actually FOR. Most players assume that when you pay a coach, you’re paying them to make you better at tennis. That seems obvious, right? It’s like going to a car wash and expecting them to clean your car.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth: not all tennis coaches provide the service of actually making you better.

I know that sounds crazy. It sounds almost insulting. But stay with me.

When I worked at a private country club early in my career, I was shocked to discover that the majority of my students didn’t actually want what I was trying to give them. I’d spend hour after hour trying to help people make real breakthroughs, and they’d resist. They wanted something else entirely.

I was naive back then. I assumed that if people were paying me money, they’d value my best technical insight. That just wasn’t the case for most of them.

The reality is that tennis lessons serve MANY different purposes, and changing your habits is just one of them. Some people take lessons for the workout. Some people want the social connection. Some just want to hit with someone better than them. Some people genuinely believe that simply being on a court with a pro means they’re getting better by osmosis.

And you know what? All of those reasons are completely valid if that’s what you’re looking for.

The problem happens when YOU want one thing and your COACH is delivering something else. That’s where the frustration, the wasted money, and the years of plateau come from.

Think about it this way: some coaches build entire careers on personality and energy alone. They might not know much about pronation or the kinetic chain, but they’re magnetic and fun, and at the right club, they can make a great living. Other coaches are pure technicians who can break down every microscopic detail of your swing but might not have much personality at all.

These are wildly different skill sets serving completely different needs.

So here’s what I need you to understand: before you invest in another lesson package, you have to get crystal clear on what YOU actually want. Not what you think you’re supposed to want. Not what sounds good to say. What do you REALLY want?

Do you want to fundamentally change a habit in your game? That’s going to require a very specific type of coaching. It means being uncomfortable. It means missing more shots at first. It means potentially losing to people you normally beat while you work through the change. It’s not fun, and it takes serious commitment.

Or do you want a good workout with some helpful reminders and encouragement? That’s also fine, but it’s a completely different experience that requires a different type of coach.

The hard part is that you can’t just assume your coach knows what you want or that they’re equipped to deliver it. You have to do your homework. Watch coaches teaching other students before you sign up. Ask yourself what their core strength actually is. And then, in your very first conversation, you need to be absolutely explicit about your goals.

I wish I could tell you that a simple conversation would solve everything, but the truth is even more uncomfortable than that. You have to take ownership of your own improvement journey because the responsibility is actually on YOU as the student, not on the coach to figure it out.

That’s not the way it should be, but in my experience, that’s the way it is.

Here’s something that might help you understand the landscape: I recently did a workshop with coaches where we brainstormed all the different types of value that tennis lessons provide. We came up with eleven different things: activity, energy, workout, fun, entertainment, friendship, socialization, technical insight, therapy and venting, tactical strategy, connecting with other players, childcare, being a sounding board, hope and mental toughness, and the thrill of playing points against a pro.
Technical insight was just ONE item on that list.

If you’re reading this and thinking, “Wait, I thought lessons were for getting better at tennis,” then you’re probably part of the small minority of players who actually want transformative improvement. You’re not crazy. You’re not asking for too much. But you ARE operating in an industry where most coaches have learned to deliver something entirely different because that’s what most players actually want.
The coaches who focus on real habit change exist. I promise you they’re out there. But they’re hiding in the nooks and crannies of the industry, fighting for the scraps of players who genuinely want what they’re offering.

So what do you do with this information?

First, stop blaming yourself for past frustrations or wasted money. Nobody told you how this actually works.

Second, get brutally honest with yourself about what you really want from your tennis. If you want fundamental improvement, accept that it won’t be comfortable or immediately fun.

Third, do your research before investing in coaching. Watch lessons. Ask direct questions. Be explicit about your goals and don’t apologize for them.

And finally, understand that if you’ve been banging your head against the wall trying to get better despite years of lessons, you’re not broken and your coach isn’t necessarily incompetent. You’ve probably just been mismatched in terms of what you wanted versus what they were providing.

This is a conversation that doesn’t happen nearly enough in tennis, and I think it needs to. Because somewhere right now, there’s a player just like Joel walking onto a court expecting one thing and getting something completely different, and they don’t even have the framework to understand why they’re so frustrated.

If this resonates with you, share it with someone who needs to hear it. Let’s start having more honest conversations about what we actually want from our tennis and what we’re actually getting.

Your Coach,

-Ian