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Federer's Commence Speech
Roger Federer's commencement speech at Dartmouth has gotten a lot of attention, and now this summary by Rustin Dodd at The Athletic (paywall NYT sub).
It was "personal; his agent Tony Godsick is a Dartmouth alum and Godsick’s daughter was a member of the 2024 class."
Much of this article is focused on why Fed's speech was so effective, how he structured it, and why that worked. I'll leave that to the article.
I don't know if it's been covered here, if so sorry for redundancy, but I haven't seen this in the forum. So ...
Items:
The first lesson: Effortless is a myth.
Federer’s point was embodied in the address itself. He and his team spent six months working on the speech, sifting through drafts and making revisions. His delivery was tender and rehearsed.
Federer’s second lesson: It’s only a point.
Fed started by asking his audience what percentage of points he won: “Only 54 percent,” he said.
“When you lose every second point, on average, you learn not to dwell on every shot,” he told the crowd. “You teach yourself to think, ‘OK, I double-faulted. It’s only a point.’ When you’re playing a point, it has to be the most important thing in the world, and it is. But when it’s behind you, it’s behind you. This mindset is really crucial, because it frees you to fully commit to the next point and the next point after that, with intensity, clarity and focus.”
Which set up Federer’s final lesson: Life is bigger than the court.
He also had a realization: “I knew that tennis could show me the world. But tennis could never be the world.”
He ended with: " the paramount importance of footwork on the court, same with the takeback and the follow through. He flashed a grin.
“No, this is not a metaphor,” he said. “It’s just good technique.”
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It was "personal; his agent Tony Godsick is a Dartmouth alum and Godsick’s daughter was a member of the 2024 class."
Much of this article is focused on why Fed's speech was so effective, how he structured it, and why that worked. I'll leave that to the article.
I don't know if it's been covered here, if so sorry for redundancy, but I haven't seen this in the forum. So ...
Items:
The first lesson: Effortless is a myth.
Federer’s point was embodied in the address itself. He and his team spent six months working on the speech, sifting through drafts and making revisions. His delivery was tender and rehearsed.
Federer’s second lesson: It’s only a point.
Fed started by asking his audience what percentage of points he won: “Only 54 percent,” he said.
“When you lose every second point, on average, you learn not to dwell on every shot,” he told the crowd. “You teach yourself to think, ‘OK, I double-faulted. It’s only a point.’ When you’re playing a point, it has to be the most important thing in the world, and it is. But when it’s behind you, it’s behind you. This mindset is really crucial, because it frees you to fully commit to the next point and the next point after that, with intensity, clarity and focus.”
Which set up Federer’s final lesson: Life is bigger than the court.
He also had a realization: “I knew that tennis could show me the world. But tennis could never be the world.”
He ended with: " the paramount importance of footwork on the court, same with the takeback and the follow through. He flashed a grin.
“No, this is not a metaphor,” he said. “It’s just good technique.”
#