“In January, you fly to Australia and from there, having even one week off is a lot with how busy the schedule can be. Most of the season, you will work mainly on prevention. The goal is to have a player that is fully aware that they can play, and that they feel no pain or soreness. You want them feeling ready for the next match.
“If your player loses early, you have more time to create a bloc of up to five or six days in between two tournaments. Otherwise, you stick to prevention but try to squeeze in a few exercises, which is like salt and pepper on the food. Here and there, you want to put in some exercises so the body remembers what it needs to do.”
The proliferation of fitness technology has helped measure the strength of that proverbial season, Bougy making use of everything from heart rate monitors to motion censors that can track a player’s speed, strength, and power.
“The censors coming give coaches and athletes realtime feedback,” said Bougy. “So, the athlete has a number as soon as they do the repetition, and I believe that gives him or her additional motivation to match achieve a certain speed with a certain weight, or inspires them to improve.”
