#31: Mikael Tillström – Academy & Tour Coach

In this episode you are going to listen to Mikael Tilström, Mikael was a professional player himself reaching a career high of #39 in singles & #15 in doubles.

Mikael has been the Coach of Thomas Enqvist, Magnus Norman & Andreas Vinciguerra & in 2011 he co founded the Good To Great Tennis Academy with fellow Swedes Magnus Norman & Nicklas Kulti. Since then he has been the lead Coach of Grigor Dimitrov & is currently coaching Gael Monfils.

In this episode you’ll get to know:

– How Good To Great determine whether to accept a new player into their program or not

– The difference on coaching an established professional player like Monfils & the up & coming junior players from Good To Great

– The blessing & the curse of having Roger Federer at the top of tennis for so many years

Enjoy the show!

Timestamps

01:30 Story of Good To Great
04:10 What Nicklas learned outside of tennis
05:40 How Mikael came to work with Monfils
08:30 How Mikael keeps a good relation with his family while on tour
10:53 The acceptance process at Good To Great
14:05 Getting to know your players
15:46 Why you should not play tennis for money & fame
30-40 to put away money
19:39 Why tennis players need to be stubborn
20:36 The person before the player
21:53 Allistair Mccaw
22:38 Shared philosophy with Allistair
25:10 Why all Tour Tennis Coaches are a bit crazy
26:30 The blessing & course of Roger Federer
28:30 Why Monfils shook his head at Mikael
31:01 The best part about being a Tennis Coach
31:30 How Mikael gets better
33:20 What Mikael has changed his mind about
34:16 Mikael’s advice