COLUMBIA — During a demonstration, Rock Bridge tennis coach Ben Loeb slowly wobbles in a straight line, toe to heel. His arms span perpendicular to his tall, upright body.
He's walking an imaginary tightrope of competitive balance. On one side of the rope, there is emotional control. Competitive fight is on the other.
"If you just have emotional control and you don't have competitive fight, you're not going to get anywhere near to what you're capable of doing," Loeb said. "If you have competitive fight but don't have emotional control, you're going to be off-center."
The competitive balance tightrope is one of the many psychological concepts Loeb instills in the brains of his tennis athletes. This is Loeb's 21st year coaching the Rock Bridge tennis teams, and since 2011, he has taught a sports psychology class at Rock Bridge.
His psychology teachings aided his Bruins tennis players as they won nine state titles, including two since he started teaching his sports psychology class.
"Honestly, on numerous occasions, they have helped me," said Rohit Rao, a senior on the Bruins' boys team. "He (Loeb) puts a focus on energy being like a river, having that flow. That one really helped me."
There are many more techniques Loeb implements outside the river and tightrope analogies. Another is having the athletes imagine a circle with a dot inside it, which represents being mentally balanced and "centered in the here and now."
Rao and Rock Bridge senior Phoebe Boeschen recalled another of Loeb's mid-match ideas, which is to imagine a color that tranquilizes their negative emotions.
"Deep, vibrant blue is a strong, bold color that represents confidence, strength, yet also it’s a calm color," Loeb said. "You can use that in competitive athletics as a cue image."
A cue image is a part of Loeb's ABC's, a system of guidelines for his athletes on responding to the end of a tennis point.
The A stands for "act," which asks how a tennis player responds to the point. B is for "breathing." And C is for "cue word" or "cue image," a symbol that is positively oriented.
"You can’t say with certainty what’s going through their mind," Loeb said. "Having said that, I try to give them some tools that I hope they will utilize in the competitive arena."
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