If you know what you do
with your body
you can do what you want
on the court
Movement and brain Key words Goals The off court workout FATP for You
Learn how to improve
your movement quality
FATP is created on the principles of the Feldenkrais Method® linked with coaching sciences and learning theories. It's not only a sequence of mechanic exercises but a complete system to teach the brain how to coordinate muscles and skeleton in the best way to reach your GOALS.
It's a completely new technique that can help the players to find the best way to use their potential.
The Feldenkrais Method®
The Feldenkrais Method® is a form of somatic education that uses movement and directed attention to improve motor control, skills and enhance human functioning. The Feldenkrais Method® is based on principles of physics, biomechanics and neurophysiology. This unique technique is supported by recent studies in neuroscience and this is one of the reason why the scientific community of sport and rehabilitation is very interested in it.
The Feldenkrais Method® can be taught only by certified professionals.
FATP focuses on the relationship between movement and awareness exploiting the brains most important characteristic: the plasticity. This facilitates the continuous creation, adaptation and changing of new sinapsys (brain connections). In this way, you will develop a more accurate perception of your body increasing the number of available choices. In other words, trough FATP you create in your brain more details about movement that will help you to control your body in a precise way. This is a process based on the stimuli received by the brain throughout the movement and on how they are elaborated and applied. Let's discover what FATP can do for tennis players at any level!
Brain plasticity and motor learning
Main Key Words
To play tennis your body has to be programmed precisely to solve different situations during the practice and match.
All the parts are integrated by the brain to produce an action and each coach helps the players choosing from a big variety of general and specific exercises. How can FATP help this intent? Let's discover many key words...
Muscle confusion
Try to use the racquet with your non-dominant hand...
What happens?
Differentiation to set the order in your movement
When your muscles are in confusion it means that something in your motor pattern is missing or not clear. There is no differentiation in the movement. The brain cannot make a precise selection of the muscles involved and it tries to find a solution that often is not the right one. Differentiate the movement means to analyze the habits feeling what you do and divide the sequence into small parts trying many different combinations, sometimes unusual, to let the brain discover new details in your body parts and make different choices to use the body in specific situations. In order to improve, you don't need efforts or certain goals but only to set the right conditions to learn. FATP teaches you how to improve all the movements that you need on the court by simply using them more effectively. The results are amazing and you might be very surprised!
For sure the feeling is not like with your favorite hand. The cause lies in the fact that the brain doesn't have the necessary connections to send to the muscles so the bones do not receive the clear information to coordinate the movement. The muscles work in a confused spectrum affecting the smoothness of your movement results. When the brain doesn't know how to use the body to make an action, you think to do something and you do something else. In other words, your intention doesn't match with your action. It is just an example like many others but the main point is: we can set an order in this confusion and it is easier than you think.
Integrate FATP in the movement
Gather the details together to have a more effective action
If differentiate a movement means to give the brain the possibility to experiment new schemes and variations in the way you use your body, the second step is the integration. The FATP helps you to discover and gather together all the details that are the part of your motor behavior in a different order: you will integrate new choices of movement to your motor pattern to do more effective actions. This approach is developed to support you in and off the court. Your brain will become sharper and faster to choose the motor answer you need in different situations.
Develop your timing
Improve the flexibility
Increase coordination
Reduce useless efforts
Improve body awarness
Recover after strong sessions
Prevent and recover from injuries
Better forehand, backhand and serve?
Increase Body Awareness 360°
FATP can teach how to better channel fatigue and optimize the movements, we ask our body, are performed. You will learn how to get rid of an excessive stress that may influence the performance in various degrees that unfortunately reduces the smoothness and effectiveness of a skill and limits the players ability to express their potential.
FATP and on court practice are complementary: you will discover a new approach to your movements that will improve your performance both in practice and in competitions. Doing FATP exercises you don't stress the muscles and you don't feel fatigue.
Anyway, your usual on court practice and physical workout are totally different but of course they are essential. Beware who claims that you can have results without working hard...
Just do not forget...
Prevent injuries and stress
Playing tennis at any level sometimes could be a great stress often followed by high risk to overload and experience injuries. Improving flexibility and body awareness throughout FATP teaches you how to reduce this risk for muscles and joints and gives you the chance to use all your body without any stiffness. You can make this decision to enjoy playing your 100% in the safe way.
In the group lessons FATP teacher guides the players to try many variations. It is not necessary to be in a tennis court and you can do these exercises before and after your tennis practice or match. The subject of the lesson can be decided considering what the players need according to the FATP teacher.
Individual sessions: a program fully customized for you
Group lessons
Workshops and daily practice
Each individual session is created for the player without a standard program because each person is different. The technique is called Functional Integration of the Feldenkrais Method®. The FATP teacher helps the player to explore the motor patterns throughout the touch and verbal instructions. Each movement is specific to help the brain to differentiate and integrate the motor functions without muscular interference. There is no limit to what you can accomplish with your movement!
How FATP can be applied
FATP subjects to support your practice
- Use your strength without overloading your arms and shoulders
- Differentiation of using your trunk, pelvis and head rotation to improve the
swing fluency
- Improve your overall balance and stability
- Better integration of your vision and body movements to develop your timing
skills
- Learn different warm-up exercises to begin your workout or your match
- Cool down routine to restore muscles
- Learn how to involve the forces from the ground to the racquet by using your
skeleton strenght without overloading your arms and shoulders
Prevention and body awareness
- Increase your trunk mobility and release your lower back muscles
- Improve the range of motion of your shoulders, hip joints and ankles
- Make your spine more flexible in torsion and flexion
- Improve the flexibility of your extensors and flexor muscles
- Recover from many kinds of injuries that affect the movement control
- Eliminate muscular compensations that affect movement quality and smoothness
FATP guidelines
- Be curious but not ambitious
- Don't do more efforts than necessary
- Focus on the feeling of your body
- Do the movements simply
- No need of any specific equipment
- Use your body, brain and a mat