Memory, Affordances, and the Myth of the Perfect Technique**

One of the most persistent beliefs in tennis coaching is this:

Players store how to hit a forehand.

It sounds sensible.
Repeat the movement. Groove the technique. Lock it in. Retrieve it under pressure.

But this belief collapses the moment we look closely at how humans actually remember, perceive, and act.

Recent work on radical embodied memory helps explain why.
And it reinforces something ecological approaches have argued for decades:

No forehand is ever stored.
And no forehand is ever repeated.

The Problem With “Storing” Technique

Traditional coaching models assume that movements are:

• learned
• encoded
• stored
• retrieved

This view treats memory like a filing cabinet and the body like a playback device.

Wilford and Anderson (2025) directly challenge this assumption.
They argue that memory is not a stored internal representation, but a relational, embodied capacity that emerges through interaction with the environment.

In other words, we don’t recall movements.
We re-engage with situations.

Applied to tennis, this means:

• a forehand is not a thing you store
• it is a solution you create in the moment
• shaped by space, time, pressure, and intention

If memory were stored as a motor program, then forehands would look identical across contexts.

They don’t.
And they never have.

What Players Actually Remember: Affordances and Invariants

So if players don’t store a forehand, what do they remember?

They remember affordances and invariants.

Wilford and Anderson (2025) describe memory as the ability to re-attune to meaningful relations between the body and the world.
This aligns closely with ecological psychology.

Players remember:

• where space tends to open
• when balls can be attacked
• what information signals pressure
• how certain outcomes feel achievable

These are invariants.
Stable patterns in a changing world.

The ball speed changes.
The bounce changes.
The opponent changes.
The score changes.

But certain relations remain.

A short ball still affords attack.
A late contact still constrains options.
A stretched position still invites recovery rather than aggression.

This is what players become attuned to over time.

Not technique.
Not positions.
But opportunities for action.

Why No Forehand Is Ever the Same

If memory is embodied and relational, then variation is not noise.
It is the point.

Every forehand is shaped by:

• incoming ball trajectory
• player positioning
• opponent location
• task intention
• fatigue
• emotion
• time pressure

From an ecological perspective, repeating an identical forehand would actually signal poor adaptation.

Wilford and Anderson (2025) emphasise that memory is reconstructive, not reproductive.
Each action is newly assembled from past interactions and present constraints.

This explains why:

• players “lose” technique under pressure
• skills look different across surfaces
• improvements don’t follow linear paths

Nothing has been lost.
The environment has changed.

And the player is adapting.

Why Technical Storage Models Do More Harm Than Good

When coaches believe forehands are stored, several problems follow:

• errors are treated as memory failures
• pressure is seen as interference
• variability is labelled inconsistency
• correction becomes the primary tool

This leads to over-instruction and micromanagement.

But if skill is adaptive, not stored, then errors are not breakdowns.
They are explorations under constraint.

Wilford and Anderson (2025) warn that representational models of memory encourage coaches to search for internal causes of behaviour, rather than examining the task and environment.

Ecological approaches flip this.

Instead of asking:

“Why did the technique break down?”

We ask:

“What information changed?”
“What affordances were available?”
“What options did the environment invite?”

This is a fundamentally different coaching lens.

What This Means for Coaching Practice

If we accept that forehands are not stored, then coaching must change.

The focus shifts from:

• repeating movements
• fixing positions
• stabilising form

To:

• designing representative situations
• exposing players to variability
• shaping affordances
• guiding intention, not form

Players don’t need more technical memory.
They need richer perceptual experience.

They need to become sensitive to information that matters in the game.

That is how skill becomes reliable.
Not through storage, but through attunement.

Closing Thought

A forehand is not something a player owns.
It is something a player does, moment by moment.

Memory does not sit inside the player waiting to be retrieved.
It lives in the ongoing relationship between player and environment.

Once coaches understand this, a lot of traditional instruction stops making sense.

And a far more powerful question takes its place: What is the environment teaching the player right now?

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References (APA 7th Edition)

Wilford, K., & Anderson, M. L. (2025). Radical embodied memory. Philosophical Psychology, 38(1), 1–24. https://doi.org/10.1080/09515089.2024.XXXXXX

Gibson, J. J. (1979). The ecological approach to visual perception. Houghton Mifflin.

Davids, K., Button, C., & Bennett, S. J. (2008). Dynamics of skill acquisition: A constraints-led approach. Human Kinetics.

Araújo, D., Davids, K., & Hristovski, R. (2006). The ecological dynamics of decision making in sport. Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 7(6), 653–676. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychsport.2006.07.002