Javier Llanes: Top Coach and Fitness Expert "Body Awareness"

Jack Broudy:  Hi, I'm jack brody and welcome to the living at the 45 today. My guest is Javier, I'm gonna let him uh you know introduce himself a little bit right now, but we've become pretty good friends in the last couple of months. I just found out that he bought, He bought one of my boards many years ago, 15 years ago almost. And I didn't know that we were just chit chatting here and we've got a really interesting conversation coming today. He kind of changed it on me, which is good because I like to stay on my toes and uh I wanna introduce you to Javier right now to the tennis world. Javier say hello to anyone who's watching
Javier Llanes:  guys, how are you to everybody. And anyway, I just want to say thank Jack for first introducing me to the neighborhood, you know many, many years ago. And then what happened since then, you know, I think being on one of these facebook groups, I start seeing Jack broadly broadly board and whatnot. And
Jack Broudy:  to
Javier Llanes:  tell you the truth a couple of years ago I was trying to buy the a board but I couldn't find it again and I didn't know who really made it. I saw the board, I bought it, you know, and finally I realized that that was you. So
Jack Broudy:  you wanna you wanna you wanna know something funny? I know what I know, but I'll tell you what, I really don't know what I don't know in business. I have not been a great businessman and so we had some problems with the board back then. we had to change the name of it, It's a whole different board, it started breaking of course, you know, and I just, I sort of gave up on it for a little while and then and then about a couple of years ago brought it back as the brody board. Yeah, so you know, you should stick to what you're good at, you know what I mean? Because
Javier Llanes:  so
Jack Broudy:  now I thank God I have business people doing my business because I'm terrible at it. Anyway, that's that's how that all happened.
Javier Llanes:  Yeah, so, so basically just to give you a little bit background, I read on your website, I went a couple of weeks ago and I did your course, your certification. Um and what I was gonna say is that after kind of reading your history, it cannot happen the same situation to me. I always felt that what I wanted to do is to hit a better ball. I felt like I couldn't achieve, I couldn't achieve what I could have done as a tennis guy because I think I couldn't hit a better ball. I worked really hard.
Jack Broudy:  Yeah, me too, me too,
Javier Llanes:  you know, so that was the main thing that I tried to pick up when I decided to start teaching tennis and and basically going back one year, I'm playing a tournament and I was able to be the guy, you know, with a DB points and kind of look like I could play some tennis and my parents asked me, what do you think, are you gonna keep playing? And I say, I think I have a problem and my problem is that there is a limitation and I don't know how to pass it and I can see it, you can talk about technique, strategy and all, but I think there is something that I just can't do it and there are some people doing it better better than me and the way that people taught me, it doesn't make sense because he didn't and for many years, my dad, I will tell you this, Jack and this is interesting when I was 12 years old, my dad used to tell me, listen, you are 10 times better athlete than these people and you're losing to them, it doesn't make sense. And going back, you know, I was the national championship in taekwondo, so I was flexible, strong, very coordinated. And and what used to happen is it didn't make sense that the more I play tennis, the more pain is starting to happen. And and at the age of 16, you
Jack Broudy:  mean physical pain or emotional pain,
Javier Llanes:  no physical pain injuries, injuries. My back, we used to be a nightmare shoulder. I mean,
Jack Broudy:  even when you were a kid, even when you were
Javier Llanes:  young, 16, yeah, 15, 16, 17 because because I, I really think and I see it with many, many kids, I'll see this, I think when you increase volume and you don't have correct technique, you're gonna break down. It's just a matter of time. Yeah. And basically that's what it leads me to say something is not really quite right now. I learned to play with the sword back with shoulder, messed up, you know, Because I think we all think that always you play tennis a lot, you gotta have pain the reality, that's not the reality. But I think when you ask the players, most of the people, they have different pains due to bad mechanics. And anyway, so back forward, I keep going through my tennis career at some point, decided to quit when I decided to quit, I wanted to learn to understand what happened, why why I have these things that I had, I got involved with fitness eventually. So but more important when I get you're a board, it makes sense to me now, what happened? Is this all the knowledge that you hear from PTR all the different techniques that people talk about does not go along with the idea of the born, I was like ship what do I do now? Because because now I have this thing that I think is works very well but all my idea of teaching tennis, it didn't click with it because because you can't talk about controlling the racket of maneuvering the racket phase and think about the A ball because the body maneuvers the racket around you,
Jack Broudy:  right?
Javier Llanes:  So so this change for a long time, it was very difficult for me to deal with this because I'm trying to teach kids and I'm saying kind of what I think you're saying that this is what I was so excited when, when, when I saw your method, because you basically have a couple of principles that I think they they they control the whole system and they control the art, does it make sense?
Jack Broudy:  And
Javier Llanes:  and I believe that I jump in with you and I want to support what you said because I think people need to understand and be able to enjoy the game of tennis, like, like everybody should because we played because we want to win. But in the reality there is nothing better than hitting the ball the correct way.
Jack Broudy:  Yeah, that's when that's
Javier Llanes:  right, right,
Jack Broudy:  That's right, just hitting it, just hitting a good ball. I mean, you know, as well as I do when we were playing when I was younger and you're almost young enough, but when we were younger, sometimes you just remember the days you go out with your doubles partner, you turn on the stereo and you'd hit cross courts for an hour or you have quick valleys for a half an hour. Yeah, so the pleasure of tennis really goes beyond just the score.
Javier Llanes:  Exactly.
Jack Broudy:  In fact, sometimes I would win a match sometimes in the juniors and I would almost be walk off embarrassed because I want ugly, ugly, I would chip, I wouldn't hit topspin backhand, I would chip. I would try to get to net really fast because I knew the guy couldn't pass me. I tried to play on everyone else's weaknesses instead of just hitting a great ball. You know, guys like Agassi, I used to love watching Agassi because I'm like, well he just steps up and he just pounds the ball from side to side. He doesn't have to bullshit his way through.
Javier Llanes:  No,
Jack Broudy:  he just plays a great game. You know, I had to bullshit a lot. I had to be in good shape and just say, okay, I'm gonna stay out here all day. This guy's gonna he's gonna have to win the 0.10 times and I would just run. I was kind of a pusher, I was kind of a pusher.
Javier Llanes:  Yeah,
Jack Broudy:  so yeah, no, you're right, hitting a great ball is what we all want to do. And even now that I'm older, I don't play much competition anymore. But I do go out with a guy a little bit younger than you actually. He's 35 And he was # one in his country Belarus and we play once or twice a week, but he just likes to hit, he says you stand in one place and run me around because he wants to still play tournaments. I don't care, I don't have to run around, I don't want to hurt myself. I just love that he likes to play with me, I'm just happy he wants to play with me, that's all,
Javier Llanes:  Yeah,
Jack Broudy:  so
Javier Llanes:  basically, yeah, so that's what kind of started and I think, you know, and I think if you think about your, your system and your ideas, what I, what I love is that the movements that you're claiming with, we're talking about the wave, the figure eight, they apply in every movement that we do with the body, if we're swinging a racket, a baseball bat, if we're running, if you're jumping the waves, it happens in every movement. What
Jack Broudy:  I find interesting that I didn't know until our discussion right now is that you were a tai chi or a taekwondo expert. Well when I discovered this, this figure eight stuff was about 25 years ago I was taking tai chi courses.
Javier Llanes:  Oh
Jack Broudy:  yes, I was, I, you know, I ended up dating the teacher, she was really cute, but I really got into tai chi because I was, and I was thinking, you know, you know, the ward off right and ward off left, you know those and and then you do the stance, the horse, the horse stands and I was learning, you know, all these things and I just started and I'm also a surfer, I used to, when I lived in southern cal I was yeah, I surfed a lot, I lived on Okay, yeah, so between the surfing and the tai chi and of course being obsessed with tennis and Agassi was big, big and Rios Rios was big and I just I always was like how do these two guys that aren't six ft tall, Rios is tiny, right? five ft
Javier Llanes:  eight? How
Jack Broudy:  do these guys hit other players off the court? Like Safin, how do they outhit? Safin was six ft four, how do they do that? And so it really all those three things, that's how it all began, you know tai chi surfing and and and tennis and I was just fascinated and I think and I kept saying there's a correlation and there was figure eights in tai chi But no one ever talked about it in tennis, you know, and they talked about the vertical axis in Tai chi and the 45 and and that's so it really wasn't tennis that that brought me to this, it was sort of a combination of life.
Javier Llanes:  Yeah, so yeah, so so basically that's why I love your system and and and you know, to me it's like like you're bringing some other sports, you know, I was fortunate or crazy enough to get into bull riding just to try it And what I learned what I realized it is is two things first in the body, there's not that many moves, you can't control your body with your conscious your muscles are gonna do what they need to do and gravity is one of the things that is going to affect how we move, but also every muscle works in opposite.
Jack Broudy:  That's right, that's right, that's that's a good point right there. It's a system of polarity, right?
Javier Llanes:  That's
Jack Broudy:  right. When one hand is up, the other is down, when one hands, that's right, that's right,
Javier Llanes:  and it has to be and the whole body is like that and because it's such a complex system, you can't break it down. So when I see all these teachings of the USDA saying, okay, you're gonna drop the head of the racket, you gotta lift, you gotta turn out to finish above your shoulder, you a certain degree, a certain degree in the, in the racket when it goes down. I think those, those concepts don't apply and they don't work now, I think some coaches have had tremendous success despite what they said and I think that's that's it's kind of a bad thing. Um I would say something I got so kind of down in the sense with the with the idea of of of of thinking about tennis, how the PTR or USDA talks about tennis that I get to the guys will say, you know what we'll go to a lesson, I will not talk, we'll just hit because I felt like just by hitting some stuff will fall into place, but I think if you have the knowledge that you have, okay, you can accelerate the process because you're not getting confused with some of the other stuff that is around Because if you understand that this is the a figure eight, then there is a 45° angle that you gotta hit. That you got to move your arm in a field of emotion kind of like a wet and everything is gonna synchronize together is much quicker the process because I was just hearing for many years, I was just hitting with kids, which
Jack Broudy:  I think is which I think is a great idea actually if you're a nice hitter and they can watch you a little bit and you hit a steady ball, like I I think live ball is the best,
Javier Llanes:  but
Jack Broudy:  sometimes you have to teach, sometimes you have to put them on the board, Sometimes you have to put the lines because not everyone is a great athlete. So, so you do have to teach, but in general, once you get a player to a certain
Javier Llanes:  level, there's
Jack Broudy:  nothing better than hitting the ball playing
Javier Llanes:  better, right? Yes.
Jack Broudy:  Yeah. I mean those drills where you hit one ball and then go to the back of the line. It's so unrealistic.
Javier Llanes:  Exactly, exactly.
Jack Broudy:  And even some pros, some pros don't even feed well, have you ever seen pros, sometimes they muscle their feet or sometimes they actually hit down. You ever see a pro hit that, I'm just like, wow, that's never gonna happen. Why would you feed like that?
Javier Llanes:  Yeah, 100%, no, no 100%. And you know like, like you said, you know, I got into the fitness and I realized that running, it's the same motion that is the same for your age and muscles help. You don't, don't force you to do the movement. So that's why, you know, like I said, I love your system because it's simple and I think you can teach from the beginner to a professional same way,
Jack Broudy:  same way, same way
Javier Llanes:  if you have a little bigger swing doesn't matter because everybody will accommodate within the system and you're finding the common pattern that you need to have in every swing. And I'm gonna give you one more price praise because I think you taught me valleys the past two weeks because I never understood the forehand valley, but after seeing the video with the bodies, how how the body moves on the forehand valley, I understood that it is not a punch and I would be, I mean I can value pretty good, but I used to think there was a punch in the valley maybe. But seeing your video when you were explaining to a young lady about how to value and how the rocket cannot move forward and then you bring your hip to to impact the ball. It was night opening for me,
Jack Broudy:  it's funny you bring up the volley because that must be the most misunderstood stroke. I mean it's the smallest stroke, right? It's the smallest stroke you would think,
Javier Llanes:  but
Jack Broudy:  how many pros forget forget regular players because most people can't most of the kids stay in the backcourt and wallop the ball now, very few kids come to net but think about the pros, how how you can count on one hand, everyone knows the same values. They all start with Edberg.
Javier Llanes:  Yes,
Jack Broudy:  everyone starts with Edward Sampras and then
Javier Llanes:  and
Jack Broudy:  and and and Federer and then other than that nobody talks about the volleys because there are no there haven't been a lot of great volume. Henman Henman was a good volume.
Javier Llanes:  Yes,
Jack Broudy:  but I mean you can pick them out but when you say good backhands, oh my God, you know Wawrinka chang Bjorn borg Connors, you can name a billion good backhands volleys, there are so few good volume. It's kind of strange and sad because you would
Javier Llanes:  think
Jack Broudy:  that would be the easiest shot in tennis.
Javier Llanes:  Yes, yeah, 100%. In theory it should be because there is less moving parts right? It's a much simpler shot if you know what you're doing.
Jack Broudy:  Yeah, you know what I mean? But it's not as simple as they like to make it where all they tell you is turn your wrist step, always step, which is funny because when you watch Federer he's always stepping back, right? He's always he's always doing this beautiful step backwards, he's not always stepping forward. In fact, he rarely steps so yeah, I think the mechanics that are taught, but I guess I want to go back really quickly because you're fun to talk to because you've done a lot of things with the taekwondo and and I dabbled in all the things you really did. I even told my wife I love bull riding, you know, I told you that once I watch it every I watch, I watch T. V. R. I watch PBR every weekend and it's exciting and I'm going to the, I'm going to the rodeo here in Wyoming um in two months and we're going for the bull riding event, it's gonna be phenomenal. But I've been thinking a lot about bull riding in the last two couple of years, but more since we've talked and of course it's got to be polarity when the bull goes one way, you must compensate and go the other way and you have to be fluid and flexible if you're too rigid then the body is not gonna work. It's bull riding is fascinating. But there is a,
Javier Llanes:  you
Jack Broudy:  know, there's a comparison with, believe it or not, it's shocking to me, but there is
Javier Llanes:  so that when you, when you think about like, you know, with the hand in the bull riding where the hand is and then the moment that the the hand gets out of sync, which
Jack Broudy:  were finished
Javier Llanes:  so you're out of the bull period and you can outmuscle the book
Jack Broudy:  okay
Javier Llanes:  and and to me to me if I have to talk about tennis, I always said to kids death, if you can do a movement with a heavy object, you shouldn't do it with the light object. So tennis it's a light object, but if you hit it many, many, many times you'll get hurt. Oh it doesn't matter.
Jack Broudy:  Oh yeah,
Javier Llanes:  you know, so, so every time that I have somebody with a problem, I said, okay let's do, let's grab something heavy and let's try to do that one time you tell me if this is something hurts and and most of the time we say ship that hurt, I shouldn't do that so we shouldn't do it with the racket. And I think this is where many techniques that we see don't make sense in tennis because many of the movements that people are saying that there are fundamentals or they are important to do. I mean I would say, I don't think that the really, really, really good coaches would say that stuff or the really, really good players because for example, I have Brugada in my mind because I like a lot of the spanish people,
Jack Broudy:  I met him once, I met him, I like bruguera, he's met him on the beach in Barcelona in, in the spain pliable pliable or Oh
Javier Llanes:  yes, so so they talked about things that you should try to do like for example now I think I mentioned in the facebook group the other day. But one of the things that he wants, he goes like I want the racket to stay in the path of the ball. I want the record to go faster through impact and I want the impact to be clean. If you do the brownie system, you will get those three things. And he said, I don't care how you get to do that, but you gotta try to do that. And he doesn't talk about elbow, shoulder, hand risk.
Jack Broudy:  None. And
Javier Llanes:  I think this is where your your your your your system is so good. And this is what I'm so excited is because I have been able to basically put in name to what I've been experienced with my different tools. Okay. Because before I didn't have the signs. I couldn't tell you man the way or the energy, but I will tell you something. I did the Battle of Road 15 years ago and I said, Shit, I do this. And I hit a better ball. You know, I could explain why, but I
Jack Broudy:  could tell you,
Javier Llanes:  yes, I couldn't tell. I couldn't tell you why, but I knew I hit a better ball.
Jack Broudy:  And that was the exercise that was the exercise with ropes. I've never done that. But it's fascinating. I use it a lot in my explanations and it's a sign wave and it fascinates me. But yes, it gets you moving in a in a very nonlinear, nonlinear way. Not mechanical, not mechanical.
Javier Llanes:  I I also also for for 6, 7 years I've been using a web because I was training, this is what happened. I was training baseball players to swing faster. So and I didn't know baseball. I was lucky to be working in an academy because I took a break a little bit from tennis Tennis direct. So I was working with baseball players to train them. And when I get there the guy said to me, I need these guys to swim faster and throw faster. Okay, I say I don't know baseball. Alright, so how do I do this? So I grew up this is what I did. I grab a medicine ball that it has a thing that can measure how far you can throw the med ball. And then I bought a bunch of bats that help you to me to measure. But speak. Okay. So what I did is this I measure myself swinging the bat, throwing a ball and I measure myself throwing the met ball. So what happened is after I do that, then I measured this kid, all of them. They throw the med ball much slower than me, but they swing the bat and throw faster than me. I see. Shit. I and I said here I got something. So it means to me then throwing a med ball. He has nothing to do with the tennis swing. Because if that would be the case I would
Jack Broudy:  say that's interesting. Well you know what that makes me think of, that makes me think of well the ready position, you know the best returners in tennis, like Agassi was a great returner. Nadal is a great returner. Serena is a great returner but they always have this move very similar to the base. You ever see the baseball players when they're eating and what they're doing right? Right? But they're moving and what they're and even golfers you see they have a little bit. I think what it is is when you realize that it's two sided right? You have to it's it's like it's like electricity, right? If you just have
Javier Llanes:  when
Jack Broudy:  they invented electricity, it was only positive current. It didn't work. You couldn't use it. It has to be positive and negative current, right? And that's the same with sports, you can't just go on the swing fast, you have to get this connection between the lower body and the upper body. And once you feel it the swing is basically just an extension kind of like the return of serve, right? You're like this and then and then all of a sudden you widen it out. But it's the same, it's the same. The swing in tennis is really the same as just waiting in this nice little fluid figure eight movement. It's really the same thing. Only bigger.
Javier Llanes:  Only bigger. But so so that's what you know that's what happened to me about probably about 67 years ago when I started with the baseball guys. And, and it just opened up my mind said, you know what, what this guy was talking about with the airborne, it's, it's the way to go now. The question was, how can I put this together? And I struggled because you know, we have all these tennis I. Q. That he used to, that it goes opposite to this, these concepts that you brought in because I, I think, I mean maybe I'm, no,
Jack Broudy:  no, it's totally opposite. It's totally,
Javier Llanes:  I, I really think it goes opposite
Jack Broudy:  really well. They tell you to rotate your shoulders and, and they don't talk about very few people talk about the hips.
Javier Llanes:  Exactly, exactly. And, and you know, you know, and so so that opened up basically it changed my concept and it took a long time and by the time I put it together, I about a month ago I saw your stuff again, you know, and it's like ship, I could have saved myself a lot of time and I would have to find this guy eight years ago
Jack Broudy:  because I wanted,
Javier Llanes:  you know, you're
Jack Broudy:  really, oh yeah, well you're an interesting case and in some ways, I think you explain it better than I do because you have other sports that you're proficient at. I mean I'm a tennis guy, I'm a pretty okay surfer, I guess some people say, but I'm not, but, but between the taekwondo and the bull riding, you have many different areas to pull it together and say, hey, this is the way you move, forget tennis, this is the way you move to be efficient and effortless and to not put strain on any one part of your body.
Javier Llanes:  I always said you would like this and I think you will explain your system, you know, I always, when I have a kid coming, when I trained them, for example, you want to jump or you want to move, you know, everybody said, well, you, you, you, you don't wanna just land on your, on your heels, you don't want you want to land on your toes or
Jack Broudy:  whatever. I
Javier Llanes:  always said to them, I said, listen, think about you're a kangaroo jumping in the middle of Australia, do you think that the kangaroo knows how to land or he's just jumping, he's just jumping and finding exactly how he needs to land. He doesn't know why he should land on the hill or or on the toe or in the middle of the foot, but it happens unconsciously and I think the main mistake that we make with tennis is that we try to think of it and you asked me, you saw the kid that I trained this number one in
Jack Broudy:  the,
Javier Llanes:  he's great, but one of the things that the guy has and I think every single good player has and they kidnapped starts very, very young, he's a rebel. So you tell him dude, you got to do this, he doesn't listen to you, he feels his body and and and and and I and I think the key on my system and I think your system is the same And this is I mean again I took I stole from you the figure eight is that I try to install on players more and more body awareness because the more you can understand and feel your body separately, the better you can maneuver it. And I could come and tell you many different things but it already matters is that you can have your own awareness. Because I think this if I ask Federer what do you feel when you hit the forehand? His answer will be very very different than the beginner. The muscles where where the tension and the relaxation it is and at what point would be very very different. So I think as the old coach of mine said to me the better you are as an athlete, the better you would be able to teach because your body awareness increases and you you know exactly what it feels. That's why many times I don't want to be good to people. But I said if you don't if you can't do certain moves would be very difficult to explain it. And I think that's why I love the tools that you have because the tools that you have, it tells you exactly what you should feel the airborne the rocker that that's why I was so crazy. I said, listen, I want to get the rocker. Yes. And I know and I know you're gonna say, man, I don't, don't make this one anymore, but I would love the one that spin.
Jack Broudy:  Oh right, right. You know what? I can make one special for you. You would like that
Javier Llanes:  if you get it, I'll buy from you and I will sue you if I fall
Jack Broudy:  okay,
Javier Llanes:  I will sue you. But, but definitely because I really think that all these tools that the cover I think is phenomenal just is high level. I think
Jack Broudy:  it's very high level.
Javier Llanes:  Okay. That's, that's what I, I really, I really think, but but again I love the system because of all these things because it makes it easier for me to explain to my kids how things should be, doesn't make.
Jack Broudy:  Yeah, yeah, no, it doesn't. And I see why you wanted to change our topic today to body awareness by the way folks that I wanted to talk about. Something. I don't know anything about, which is this, this I domination. He says no, no. Next. Next we have to do a whole thing. You and I because because people have tried to explain it to me and I don't even know what that is and I just, I just play tennis, you know, and I, and maybe I'm old and I do believe in my system and I think that's very revolutionary myself. But the eye thing, I've never really jumped into it. I don't have bad eyes, so or maybe I don't have a dominant. I maybe I do, but it seems like something that
Javier Llanes:  I don't
Jack Broudy:  really want to know about because it's just gonna bug me if I know about it, but I do want to know about it because I because I have here a lot about it, you know, I hear you've mentioned it. Some of the guys on facebook mentioned it. Bill, you know, mentioned books on it, but I've asked people to explain it. I've read the books, I am thick because I still don't get it. I still don't want
Javier Llanes:  me to try to make a simple explanation.
Jack Broudy:  So you can change the body awareness, which I appreciate.
Javier Llanes:  It is the same. I think they're connected and they are connected big time to your to your system.
Jack Broudy:  Okay.
Javier Llanes:  I want you to think of in the, in the vision system, You have muscles the same way that you have muscles in your entire body. Okay.
Jack Broudy:  Okay, I'll buy that.
Javier Llanes:  Okay, Okay, so these these muscles move the eyes in different directions. Okay.
Jack Broudy:  Okay,
Javier Llanes:  so so what happened is this the the basically because it's a complex move sometimes could be atrophy if you don't really move properly the same way that you can have muscles in your body not to work very well. It could happen with your vision. Okay, not everybody has, but it can happen okay, what is interesting is this, I'm going to start with when I started working with the baseball academy. Okay. I I have I have spent I'm a crazy dude, I spent about $30,000 on equipment for vision. So every single equipment you think you think I have it? Okay, I have it. Yes, because again my goal was how can I become a better training or understand the tennis? And I will say this, I was training at some point, a guy that was trying to get 80 points and this is what happened. I always thought that when when you don't hit the ball very well and you don't set up properly, it's for the ball in the correct timing, it's because you have bad technique or your footwork is bad. So this was my, my thought, you know, every time that I ran into the ball, I said, chef, I don't have good movement and I don't have good technique, so, but when it came to my head, because it used to happen to me, so I'm working, I'm actually in a tournament with this guy in colorado playing the colorado opened in Denver And he's playing this match and I'm watching him, I'm watching him, this is 2009 and I'm watching and says shit, some of the balls that he's mis hitting, they're not coming fast, they're not coming fast, these balls are not coming fast and the guy is not setting up properly. The technique, it's not perfect but but you know but but I think he should be able to connect with this book. So that was the thing. So I said you know what? He finished the match and then go like you know what we're in America, you have hockey, you have baseball, you have all these sports that require a lot of precision in your vision. They have to have something here for vision. That's how that's how we started. Okay, so I bought the first thing that I saw, I started using it. I said okay I'm gonna try this. I don't know if this is true but I'm gonna try. I don't know because what I'm not gonna lose anything with me trying. So I bought a system from the guy that talks about their perception. So you pro you mentioned that perception and you were dead on
Jack Broudy:  the 45. Yeah that's the only listen Javier that's the only freaking thing I know is that you're at the 45 and you're shooting let's say a bow and arrow or a gun. And one eye is a little see how this size a little closer ones closer to the target than the other. They triangulate and it gives you depth perception. That's all I know better than that. I don't know about dominant, not dominant but I do know that if you're facing like this, you don't have depth perception. Like the deer mouse gets hit by the car because its eyes go this way right? And so the predator, predator, their eyes go in the prey, their eyes go straight or out. So that's all, that's all I know.
Javier Llanes:  So, so basically basically what what happened is this, we have all these muscles that we need to have them working properly. Now, what we're trying to do with the vision is to align the eyes that both of the eyes are doing this. The strangler thing I'm pointing at what you're looking at, the better you do that, the quicker you can do that, the easier it is to know where the object is in the space. Okay, so then if you do that properly, you can talk about peripheral vision, you can talk about reaction, you can talk about tracking something that moves. But the first skill that you need for playing tennis or for for any sport is to be able to connect the both sides on the same line. That's basically what your training, there are many different different exercises, but that's what your training. What I wanted to show you is I have here, if you can see it's like a little pair of glasses, it is a baseball tool.
Jack Broudy:  I've seen it, I've seen it before.
Javier Llanes:  Okay, so you could put this here and what it does is it makes you look like you have a bigger nose
Jack Broudy:  basically.
Javier Llanes:  So what happened is you have to turn your head in the direction that you're looking at the 45 because otherwise this thing in the in the in the glasses will cover your are
Jack Broudy:  and if
Javier Llanes:  You're not in 45
Jack Broudy:  oh that's brilliant.
Javier Llanes:  You follow me. So so basically within my system what I do, I train kids to be able to convert and divert the eyes properly because like I said, we are muscles that get tired and when you're tracking something or you're trying to read you get tired your eyes is said man, I'm a little tired because the eyes are working and what you do is you you make them you put them together and then you give them the endurance of the muscles to do this movement more and more. That's why let's say you take a picture of fed when he's hitting the ball and you can see the eyes are lacking in the position. That's basically
Jack Broudy:  okay. I've been waiting for someone to make it simple.
Javier Llanes:  So
Jack Broudy:  that's what
Javier Llanes:  it is. Makes sense. So
Jack Broudy:  let me go ahead, go
Javier Llanes:  ahead. No no no no please
Jack Broudy:  let me ask you. So so I've been playing for the last, you know I left California 67 months ago. And so now I only play a couple of times I used to play you know 5678 hours a day. Even at my age I was coaching now I play maybe three hours a week indoors lately but but I play with a very good player. He's got you know he's like a U. Tr 12 easily you know let's put it this way. He beat dog pull off in the 14 and unders oh he's
Javier Llanes:  a baller
Jack Broudy:  baller so he's a pretty good player. So I find and I just have been just attributing it to me being old but with the first half hour I can't miss I mean I can't miss but then as a and then he'll he'll spank something down the line and I'll try to get it and I'll get a little and I can feel I'm getting a little tired and then this and I always have to really work hard. The second half hour we play about an hour because you think it's my eyes that get tired because I start to miss it and I concentrate more than ever and I think okay and I say to myself okay I'm not missing another ball.
Javier Llanes:  I I let me let me let me I'm gonna say something that it's a bit different but it's interesting and I think you you will make sense. So so let's go back to what I said that regarding we have muscles in the body right? Everybody every part of the body has muscles.
Jack Broudy:  I never thought about my muscles but I believe you. Yeah okay
Javier Llanes:  so so what happened is this the eye movement. It's a it's a complex movement is is much more you need a lot more coordination from the brain to control your eyes then you need to control your legs.
Jack Broudy:  Really? Okay.
Javier Llanes:  Okay. Okay, so it requires more effort. Okay, so what it will happen is this when the body gets tired, the precision in here it goes away. Okay. So if you're getting tired, it's most likely that your vision will will suffer. I give you an example if if we if we are in a situation where we are in danger, the peripheral vision will disappear because we need we need we need right now right here. So my peripheral vision will be chris because when I'm very relaxed, I could have proliferation everything. If you test me, I need to get rid of this problem that I have right here in front of me so we we shrink what we can do. Okay. Does it make sense? Because we gotta survive? And the focal vision is more important than the peripheral vision. Now, I give you an example when you tell me if this, you used to experience this, you get in the match is the first point most likely people have the tendency to shank when they first, when they start,
Jack Broudy:  she made me
Javier Llanes:  nervous, my swings are short, not necessary, but what happened is you're thinking that that ball in it is not in a position that it needs to be because your eyes, I'm moving a little bit faster than they should
Jack Broudy:  and
Javier Llanes:  the tracking it changes, it's not as accurate now. I think you probably have experienced this every time you go and play much, sometimes you think that the things are moving much faster than they actually are, then you relax things moving slower, you can see that ball big. So when there is tension, I think the smoothness of the movement of tracking gets worse. That's why I think if you get too much and anxiety, you'll have a problem playing tennis because you're not going to be able to stay calm to pay attention to what is coming. So for me, that's why one of the things that I try to always hit with players, because I think timing is extremely important and it's more important than technique.
Jack Broudy:  Oh yeah, oh yeah. You know, before, before I started doing the methodology that I do now for the last 20 years, I was just a regular guy, I guess, you know, regular coach worked everybody hard, work myself hard and just thought, well, you work like, my father would say, you work hard and you'll get what you get what you want, which is not true. I mean, I can work as hard as I want. I'll never play like Federer, I mean, you know, that was the problem, it's really not true. Hard work doesn't make you a great player if you do everything right and you work hard and get lucky. I used to do something back in my twenties when I played college 19, when I was a college tennis and then after I played a few tournaments for another 10 years, you know how it is until you're about 30 years and I played the Jensen, I played luke Jensen in doubles
Javier Llanes:  and
Jack Broudy:  and you know he served with both hands and I just, my one thing was I didn't, we lost we lost like three and three or three and two and and I didn't want to get a taste. That was my one thing anyone, you know, you know what I did with him to slow down his service big, he's a big guy, he's intimidating really and
Javier Llanes:  I
Jack Broudy:  started doing this thing because I noticed I played a little bit better talk about timing, did you ever do back bounce, hit, you know, or or you know bounce hit, you know, bounces, you say right, we did, we all did something like that or 123. So what I did with luke was I said well I need to feel like his service not so fast, so when when he let go of the toss,
Javier Llanes:  I would
Jack Broudy:  say toss and when he hit the serve I would say hit and when it bounced I would say bounce and then I'd say hit, so it was tossed, hit bounced, hit and my technique didn't change, but what it did was it felt like I had more time
Javier Llanes:  and
Jack Broudy:  I didn't even realize what I was doing, but I guess that's what I was doing, was trying to make myself relaxed by giving myself more time. And if you can say four things toss it, bounce it, then certainly it's not that fast,
Javier Llanes:  It's not that fast. Yes, and I mean, and and you'll find trying to find a way to synchronize to to to put an starting point and you know, and an ending point, so to kind of, I would say cannot measure the time in a way.
Jack Broudy:  Sure, well, I used to tell my kids pretend the balls on a string and and you're just pulling, you're pulling the ball through the string and you have, I think that's one reason we like watching certain matches, you know, like I've always liked watching Federer Nadal, I like watching uh Andy Murray Federer that's a good match. And I think, I think the matches we like that are the best matchups are when they have this given to, you know, you see one following through while the others taking their backswing and they work well together almost as if they're one person and they flow together. And then when you get players, like
Javier Llanes:  I
Jack Broudy:  know we talked about it, I think once Rosette ski or Taylor Dent or people that just, you know, block the ball and then they throw your rhythm off, You never get a nice match, but when you get to players that have good strokes, you have these incredible points. And and like I said, like I said, I'll admit when I was a young kid, I was probably the guy that threw people off, you know, I remember hearing people say, I remember hearing the other side of the court, I remember this at least five times. This is the worst tennis. I can't believe I'm losing to this guy and I would be on the other side, kind of smiling going, I got him now, I got him, but I knew what he was saying, I knew he was right because he had a nicer and nicer ball than I did, but and I can understand why this might be the worst, but I would lob I would chip, I would drop shot, I would bullshit. Yeah. And that's the thing when you watch too real players like Murray and Federer and Djokovic Nadal, they have these points because they really have
Javier Llanes:  a
Jack Broudy:  they're similar and they both hit a good ball and the ball, it does seem like it's on a string. It does seem like it's on a string and they really almost like the two good players relate to each other.
Javier Llanes:  100%. I I think, you know, I have had, I mean, a lot of kids that are not very, very coordinated and this is what is very interesting for me when you get a kid that that is a stiff. You know, that kid said, man, he's stiff,
Jack Broudy:  mechanical
Javier Llanes:  most of the time. What it will happen is he doesn't have if if I would put him in one of the machines that gave me a score and I checked the tracking with the vision is always bad. You never have a kid that is a stiff, that has good vision.
Jack Broudy:  Oh really?
Javier Llanes:  That's that's one thing and and every time that that you get a kid that is very loose and relaxed, his vision is very good. So, so for me that's that's the relationship that there is there because I and it goes back to what I was saying to you regarding to the more co ordinary you are, the better you trackable because basically it has to everything has to flow and the movement has to be smooth. And if I'm a stiff, my movement is jerky, my movement is jerky on my vision, my movement is jerky on my swing. So we're doing everything, you're doing everything with your system to make the movement more fluid correct. So let's say if I think about the vision, I want my vision to be smooth and fluid because for example, if you think about tracking when ball is coming, you don't follow the ball all the way you see the ball far away, then you you go into whatever and then you track the ball away again, It's not like you're checking the ball and your eyes are exactly moving this all the way to 60 ft but you gotta pick where that ball is in the space and the speed and then you made it again, but that requires a lot of coordination and precision. And I think again, I think many people have perfect vision and I think if you take, let's say you take the best players, I'm 100% sure they don't need vision training because you don't get to that level. If you have a problem here,
Jack Broudy:  I see that
Javier Llanes:  makes sense. I
Jack Broudy:  Mean, it does well, I'm starting to understand a little bit the eyes I am, I am and I never really, I never really considered him much other than the 45 gives you that that nice sharpshooter vision. I never really considered it that much.
Javier Llanes:  And I, and I think, you know also, if you think about vision, if you get a guy that is very good, let's say tennis player, probably you put him to shoot pool and it's not terrible with with pointing or shooting. You always see these parallels or comparisons because I think when you have a good system, a visual system, it translates to other skills. Does it make sense?
Jack Broudy:  Yeah, it does. It means, you know, it makes me think of we all in college, we would all play basketball a little bit and everyone had a pretty good shot and had pretty good touch. And it also reminds me when I was a little kid before I played tennis, I would play football in the neighborhood. And I always remember when a guy and I like to catch but I like to throw, I like, I like all sports but but I would, I would like to run so I would say go I'm gonna go along
Javier Llanes:  so
Jack Broudy:  he would throw it and I would play around when I was little, I would play around with you see the arc of the, of the row of the football and right before like two seconds, one second before I would close my eyes, seeing if I can measure the arc of the ball and I would close my eyes and I would
Javier Llanes:  catch it
Jack Broudy:  and I would and I didn't know what I was doing, I was just a kid, I was just having fun but you can catch the ball without even looking at it if you understand the ark the path, the pathway of the ball, you don't even have to look at it. Yeah.
Javier Llanes:  So what you just said, I'm going to share with you something that was very interesting. So when I started this, this idea about the vision and whatnot, I was looking at the one guy that was a professor and University of Houston, he was, he was teaching kids how to read okay. And and he came up with the system very simple with a few exercises that are based on balance and tracking balls. One is juggling one is bouncing the ball very simple exercise is very, very simple, but what he pointed out and I have done all those exercises for a lot, a lot
Jack Broudy:  and I teach, I teach all my kids to juggle right away. I teach all my kids, I think it's very important to learn how to juggle three balls.
Javier Llanes:  Yes, So, so so this guy, what this guy said is like if you want to train your brain, if you want to train your brain, you need to train your body because your your brain is based on the movements that you do with your body. And what did you find out? And he said this, even though it doesn't seem an extra movement, he said for me to do any movement with my body, I have to create a picture in my head of what I want to do, okay, if I want to throw a ball into a basket with my eyes or my, I have to see my brain is going to measure how much force do I need for that ball to land on that basket. So he basically was saying, sports are abstract and he's saying that's why when you have a kid that is very good, you show him a picture and he made that picture and he said in his head and he just does it. And the kid that is not really good, he can't put that picture in his head,
Jack Broudy:  that's why that's why it's so important to watch great tennis. I always tell my kids watch fetter, you wanna you wanna play better tennis, watch him, you'll you'll play better automatically. Yeah. You know, it's funny when I was a kid playing tournaments and whatnot. Um you know, of course when I started in the tenant unders 12 and unders it was always don't double fault, don't double fault.
Javier Llanes:  But as
Jack Broudy:  I got older, I took that number one, I took the negative out and I put,
Javier Llanes:  let's
Jack Broudy:  hit this one in the corner, let's hit this one down and you told yourself. And then, and then I would picture myself hitting it down the t as I was bouncing as I'm bouncing the ball. I'm picturing my serve going down the T. So it's kind of like a quick a dress rehearsal.
Javier Llanes:  Exactly. So I think, you know, you know, like I said, I think a lot of these things we all feel the we we know them for me. I think I I understood some of the things I didn't have the theory that you presented with the broad attendance system and you put it basically very simple, you're saying, hey, this is why this is why I would say I couldn't tell and I would say this, I never knew that I was hitting the ball when I hit it well at 45, But after you say, I said Shit, he's right, you're here at 45 and you know, I'm gonna stand up, I want to show you something. So when you swing with a baseball bat, okay, well with the baseball bat, if you want to send the ball to that corner, you do the same rotation, but you contact a little further back.
Jack Broudy:  That's it, that's it.
Javier Llanes:  But the mechanics doesn't change. And again, you go another example,
Jack Broudy:  you just hit the ball and on the different part of the sine wave, just on a little different part and that's how you disguise your shots. That's why that's why it was so difficult for Andy Roddick when he started coming to net, that was a big mistake. He started coming to net because Gilbert said, oh, go to net, well Federer was just a boom boom because he could, he could disguise his shots right? It looked like he'd go down the line, but then he'd catch the ball on this piece of the string and it would go cross court and and and erotic, poor guy. He should never have come to that
Javier Llanes:  Never,
Jack Broudy:  never, no,
Javier Llanes:  that
Jack Broudy:  was the end of his, that was the end of his career was going to net.
Javier Llanes:  So basically, like I said, you know, I I think you you put you were able to put the science or some things that I that I perceived with my training and this is why like I said, you know, and and and I don't mean to to go crazy, but I think, you know, for me it's it's very pleasant to see that I was not so far off because even when I went in my, in my club and I said this is how you're gonna do it, many people go like you're nuts,
Jack Broudy:  you're not telling
Javier Llanes:  me the opposite of what people telling me and he's like well you know, I think you should do it this way.
Jack Broudy:  No, you don't
Javier Llanes:  tell me anything when
Jack Broudy:  I went through years and years of people pointing their fingers for sure, but I gotta tell you, I am, it's nice to hear it come back to me, it's almost like you explain it better than I do because you had to go through, I did it through studying a guy named Steiner, Rudolf steiner and I studied and it was mathematical, you did it through trial and error through bull right
Javier Llanes:  through
Jack Broudy:  taekwondo and and in some ways because you went through all that, I think in some ways you put it better than me, I think you're gonna put me out of a job. No, no,
Javier Llanes:  not at all,
Jack Broudy:  you know, I
Javier Llanes:  bought your
Jack Broudy:  board
Javier Llanes:  board and and, and and like I said you know, I mean I'm just very happy that I bought the board when I bought it, I'm very happy that I, I, I saw you and I knew who you are about a month ago, two months ago and I really put it together and say oh this is the guy with a bow because I, I really think that in, in, in, in this, in this world there is a, there is a, there is water for everybody. So I don't sweat, you know, I mean I I just, I'm passionate body what what what I learned and and I like somebody that cannot uh this is the same way that I see it because for me that's basically you you see in this game in a way that I see it because I, I mean you're older, you started, I wish I'd like I said, I wish I would have seen you six years before, I won't have to go to trial and error on many different aspects, you know, But it made it easier and you're giving me a confirmation or what I was thinking
Jack Broudy:  and you give and you give me a confirmation
Javier Llanes:  to, well
Jack Broudy:  listen, I think he'd like everyone, you know, Javier now everybody is, is on our page, he's the first one actually and when his beard wasn't so good and he's the first one on our certified pros. But I think you'd like all the guys, there's like 30 or 40, 50 pros, there is getting more and more every day. But I think you'd like everyone because we all think the same. They're all really good guys and they're all open minded and they're not stuck in the past, you know, so many pros are stuck with, well this is how I learned. So if it's good enough for me, it's good enough for you. Uh, and they're a little closed minded and uh, and I think everyone in our group is quite
Javier Llanes:  a
Jack Broudy:  good person, open minded and they really, their goal is to be better and to make others better period. That's it.
Javier Llanes:  No, exactly. And you know, just to, you know, to give you an example, you know, the Russians, the signs, Russians, they say. And this is why also I think you, you're so right on on all the things that you, you, you said, they said the athlete, professional, elite athletes, his awareness is completely different of the beginner. And because of that, you can't really ask. You can't really ask to a beginner to tell you if you're teaching him right or wrong. So therefore all the information that he gets or the feet like that he gives you when he's a beginner, it's very inaccurate. And I think that's what I mean. He kind of, I would say if I don't think that maybe I'm not qualified to train. They say feather because there are many things that may be further. You can do it. I don't even understand how he does it. You know, you are helping me to understand feathers motion, but I could not feel what he should feel at that speed, but at the same way that maybe that's a little harder. I think for guys that are much, much lower level of it's killed with the racket. They shouldn't be teaching tennis unless you go through the brownie system.
Jack Broudy:  Hey, listen, that's a whole another, that's a whole other conversation. I mean that's
Javier Llanes:  That's 1 1 thing because I think I got injured as a player because I was taught by a guy that didn't understand me
Jack Broudy:  well, we lost him
Javier Llanes:  there
Jack Broudy:  and it's a good thing because we could have gone for hours and hours anyway. Thanks again for listening. And and if we're living at the 45 and we'll see you next time.

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