The Valverde Excellence Center (VEC)

The Valverde Excellence Center (VEC) operates at the beautiful Keys Gate tennis and Golf facility located in Homestead, Florida. It is only twenty minutes from the Florida Keys and forty minutes from the Miami International Airport.

My wife Iva and I are combining our expertise, talents and passion for the game to create the unique synergy that brings out excellence in those who participate. At VEC we are working with players and their parents and coaches on all the aspects of the game to help them be totally prepared. We will be working with juniors and pros for different periods of time, depending on their needs. We will be working with a very small number of players or on individual basis, paying attention to all the details of the game. Arrangements for visits need to be made as early as possible.

In the past I mostly focused on the mental part, leaving aside my knowledge of the other aspects of the game obtained by working as an assistant coach of the University of Kansas tennis teams and with several world class coaches. At The Valverde Excellence Center, I will use all my knowledge of the game in cooperation with Iva. Below please find some information about her background.

Iva Valverde’s Tennis Background Information

Iva is from the Czech Republic, trained there from the age of four by Jaromir Bradler, a national team coach. She was a member of her national team, she was ranked top five as a junior in her country and top 150 in singles in ITF and top 50 in ITF doubles. She also played pro tournaments before injuring her shoulder. After that she decided to join the tennis team of the University of South Alabama (Top 15 NCAA Div. I program at the time), where she won the NCAA Division I National Championships in doubles and received All American honors two years in a row. At this university, she was coached by Joey Scrivano, currently a women’s head coach at Baylor University, who also coached last year's NCAA Div. I Singles Champion, Zuzana Zemanova. In 2005, Iva was selected The Citizen of her home city due to her outstanding career as a tennis player. After finishing her career as a player, she was coaching juniors for 3 years in New York and Florida. Iva has been studying the Valverde System and participating with me in the evaluation and counseling of my clients for the past 2 years. Her tennis expertise, based on her career as a player and as a coach, has significantly contributed to the service I am providing to my clients.

We will be coordinating our efforts with the Sanchez-Casal Tennis Academy in Barcelona, Spain, where we will go with our students at least once a year.

Holistic Approach

We will focus on the interaction between all the aspects of a player’s game. When working with a player, it is crucial to address all four aspects of the game as an integrated whole because they are intertwined and interdependent. All the parts of the game (physical, technical, strategic, and mental) are a cause and an effect at the same time and they all work together as a system. For example, a player is nervous before a match (mental), he/she tenses up and as a result, he/she cannot execute her strokes (technical). In another situation, a lack of strategy may be caused by lack of some shots in a player’s repertoire (technical), and this lack of strategy results in high levels of anxiety (mental).  This is the reason why the most effective way to develop a player is to follow a holistic approach. This is why we are taking this approach at the VEC.

Specific Goals

• Maximizing the effectiveness of each practice.  Players need to develop the discipline to set up their mind in the direction that allows them to achieve optimal performance at all times, thus maximizing the effectiveness of each practice. We will teach a routine that helps to achieve these goals.

• Positive attitude during the entire practice.  We will teach specific behaviors and attitudes that will allow a player to deal with adversity and to celebrate the little victories. This attitude will be reflected in his/her body language and thought patterns and his/her ability to focus on the here and now.

• Developing independence and responsible attitude. Tennis players who want to achieve the highest levels, need to mature at an early age and this implies the ability to make decisions effectively regardless of the challenges they face.  This is possible by creating an independent and responsible attitude. We will help players to accomplish these important goals by raising their awareness levels and providing them with tools that they can use daily.

• Improving concentration. Focusing on the right things improves confidence and reduces pressure. We will help players become aware of their internal and external interference (noise) to optimize their concentration and provide them with the tools to achieve total focus.

• Building confidence. Believing in oneself is the most important characteristic of those who achieve greatness. We will help players to achieve this by teaching them about the factors that contribute to the creation of confidence and the step-by-step process to gain and maintain it.

• Evaluation of key factors in the player’s development. Feedback and constant recognition of the different aspects of the game that players need to improve on are the keys to the effective development of a player. We will evaluate each player in order to figure out the possible causes of  the player’s current challenges and how these challenges affect one another.

They include:

• Footwork

• Key strokes

• Knowledge and execution of different strategies

• Fitness, flexibility and quickness

• Life style (nutrition, sleeping habits, organizational skills, etc.)

• Confidence, concentration, emotional control

• Recommending and implementing improvements.  After identifying the areas that need improvement, we will suggest the needed adjustments and the reasoning behind them.  Then, we will work on implementing these changes and incorporating them into the player’s game.

A typical day at the VEC will include the following:

Six hours of on-court and off-court work.  We will arrange the schedule according to each player’s needs. Some players will need more time on the court than others and vice versa. However, in either case, we will provide an environment that will facilitate learning through the use of several teaching tools such as:

• Video Analysis

• Match play simulations

• Challenging drills 

• Concentration exercises

• Self-awareness exercises

• Pattern recognition drills

• Accuracy of ball perception

• Active visualization

In order to accomplish the above goals, we are committed to work only with individual players or small groups of maximum of six players. Iva and I will always work closely together using our different strengths to help each player in the best way possible.   

We are looking forward to helping you achieve your tennis goals.

Contact Information

Telephones: (785) 979-1264 & (785) 979-7490

Email: valverdeinfo@aol.com

P. S. Make your reservations as soon as possible since availability is very limited.