Tenicity Coaching Insights | October 2026
By Harsh Mankad, Founder, Tenicity Tennis
Over the past week, I’ve been reflecting on my experiences on the tennis court and connecting them with some of the learning I’ve been doing away from it.
I’m currently reading two books: Learning To Be An “Ecological” Coach by Rob Gray and Make It Stick by Peter C. Brown, Henry L. Roediger III, and Mark A. McDaniel. I’m also taking an Instructional Design course through the University of Illinois on Coursera. I’m about halfway through these learning resources, but several ideas are already influencing how I think about coaching, learning, and player development.
Great Coaching Isn't Always About Giving More Instructions
One of my most meaningful takeaways from Rob Gray’s book is that effective coaching involves much more than telling players what to do. A coach can demonstrate a technique, explain a movement, and provide corrections. But learning an athletic skill is a complex process, and more instruction doesn’t necessarily translate into better learning.
An ecological approach to coaching emphasizes the thoughtful design of practice environments and the use of constraints, such as modifying activities, rules, or playing conditions, to support skill acquisition and player learning. In other words, sometimes the activity itself can do much of the teaching. This resonates strongly with my own experience growing up and developing as a tennis player. I don’t remember my coaches being overly prescriptive about exactly how I should execute every stroke. I’m grateful for that freedom because it allowed me to develop my natural playing style, learn through experience, and develop a feel for the game.
Today, as a coach, I’m reminded of the importance of finding the right balance between instruction and exploration, and between coaching and over-coaching. The objective isn’t to teach every player to hit a forehand the way I do. Rather, it’s to guide each player’s learning and help them develop the technique and movement solutions that feel natural and effective to them.
Rob Gray describes this process as self-organization, where athletes adapt their movements in response to the demands of an activity and their own capabilities. This shifts the focus from prescribing how a skill should be performed to facilitating each player’s development of effective skills and movement solutions.
Learning How We Learn
In Make It Stick, I’m exploring research on how people learn, retain information, and apply knowledge.
One concept that has particularly interested me is retrieval practice, which is the process of actively recalling what we’ve learned rather than simply reviewing information or moving on after a training session. For example, instead of repeatedly reminding players of certain coaching points, we might ask them to recall what they practiced, explain what worked, or identify what they would do differently. Research shows that activities such as quizzes and recall exercises can strengthen learning and long-term retention.
The broader message from the book is equally important: some widely accepted approaches to teaching and learning are less effective than we might believe. Methods that feel familiar or produce immediate results don’t necessarily lead to deeper learning. For me, this reinforces the importance of not becoming overly attached to how we were taught, what we’ve observed others doing, or what is traditionally considered the right way to teach. Instead, we must remain curious, ask questions, challenge our assumptions, and seek out new approaches informed by research and practical experience.
As coaches, our responsibility is to continually learn and refine our methods so that we can create better learning experiences for our players.
Why Coaches Must Continue Learning
My journey in tennis as a player gave me an invaluable education in understanding the game, high performance training, competition, and player development. But I don’t believe that how I learned or trained 20–30 years ago should automatically determine how I coach today.
The science of learning and skill acquisition continues to offer new insights, and I believe we have a responsibility as coaches to remain curious and open to improving our methods. Much of this work happens behind the scenes. Parents and players see us on the court delivering lessons, but what they may not see are the hours spent reading, studying, reflecting, analyzing player development, and designing learning activities.
I’m also exploring instructional design principles through my current course, learning how to structure educational experiences around learners’ needs, clear objectives, and thoughtfully designed activities. These structured methods are particularly relevant as we continue strengthening our on-court programs and begin developing online learning opportunities for Tenicity players.
My goal is to combine practical coaching experience, research-informed methods, and thoughtful lesson design to continually improve the learning experiences we create for our players.
Progress and Learning Across Our Programs
We’ve enjoyed an extended period of warmer fall weather in Minnesota, allowing us to continue outdoor private lessons and training. One particularly encouraging development has been seeing players who have spent several seasons in our fundamentals programs becoming eager and ready to take their next steps. Some are now complementing their group lessons with private training for additional and focused skill development time.
Across our programs, players from ages 5 to 18 are exploring tennis, building skills, and progressing at different stages of their development.
We’re also transitioning into our indoor season. Our fundamentals classes in Bloomington have begun with over 15 participants, and we’re preparing to welcome more than 40 players to our indoor programs at Centennial Middle School. It’s rewarding to see this continued engagement and to have our coaching team guiding players through their individual journeys. These experiences also provide opportunities to observe, experiment with coaching methods, and reflect on how we can improve the learning environment.
A Continuous Journey of Learning
An exciting aspect of coaching is the opportunity to continually learn, grow, and improve our methods. Our responsibility isn’t simply to pass on what we know or reproduce the methods through which we were taught. It’s to continually improve our understanding of how people learn, how athletic skills develop, and how we can better support each individual player.
I look forward to sharing additional insights as I continue studying, experimenting, and applying what I learn in our coaching programs. At Tenicity, developing better players also means continually developing ourselves as coaches.
Harsh Mankad is the founder of Tenicity Tennis, a former ATP professional, India No. 1 singles player, Davis Cup representative, and NCAA Division I National Singles Champion. Through Tenicity, he works with players across beginner, intermediate, and high-performance levels, emphasizing long-term player development, positive learning experiences, and the integration of coaching experience with research-informed practices.