During my 33 years as a Professional Sport Psychologist, I have been disheartened by the volume of young athletes who describe coaches that “coach” by intimidation, threats and humiliation. While I understand that many of these coaches are successful, what the coaches don’t seem to understand is that their success is a result of motivated young athletes who will tolerate these methods, rather than the method itself being the reason for the success.”
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Hi- I am interested in the article you mention re: coaching by intimidation. My daughter who is an excellent tennis player is being coached by a great “techniques” coach but he uses intimidation to run his academy like a kingdom. He beats her down if she shares any information with us (parents) regarding her thoughts on training and the way the program is run. There is no middle ground. I find it infuriating but also feel helpless to do much. We do not have a ton of money and recently had to reduce her lessons from 2 a week to one. He has for the last 3 months given us a “free” lesson in addition to the one which we pay for each week. However, it has become apparent that the lesson is not actually “free” as he brings it up constantly to her that he is providing it and she should be SO grateful and humbled, even if the lesson is crap and it often is, now that it is “free”.
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Hi again, Doug:
What ever happened with your daughter’s tennis and the coach?
Dr. Jack
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