Why I Prefer the Pinpoint Stance

[jimlosaltos]

https://youtu.be/T_5osrG-fGI?si=s6s_usy91Yp0miKH

This is a serve lesson with Taylor Fritz. He addresses the stance.

Great video! Thanks stroke, for sharing.

Excellent server boils it down. His view: Pick a stance, any stance, just get to the launch position. That will annoy some.

Curious: No hit up. No kinetic chain (all at once and forward, he says repeatedly. Helps to be 6 ft 4 in? ). No rotation discussion. Obviously he has excellent long-axis rotation. But when Fritz picked key elements to focus on, he didn't include any of that.

I don't know if this is a good way to teach the motion but Fritz has a clear focus that works for him.

[don_budge]

We'll agree to totally disagree on your perspective. You're entitled to your opinion but it doesn't make it right....sometimes we need to learn and not think like we have to teach our viewpoints to become better at our trade. The serve is one of the most poorly understood and taught skills in Tennis which is why I became the Serve Doctor to help with that

Agree to totally disagree? Totally unnecessary. Entitled to my opinion? Doesn't make it right? Hmmm...interesting response. Let me put it this way...during my stint here as forum contributor I have very, very rarely ever used the words agree, disagree, right or wrong. These kinds of words strike me as rather inappropriate when discussing nebulous subjects and topics as in tennis or even politics for that matter. It strikes me...that even more important than the sort of sucking up and contentious discussions that can evolve is to express your position as clearly as you can and as eloquently as you can. You can try to win hearts and minds...or you can just call it like you see it. This forum is what it is nowadays. It has evolved or devolved depending upon how you might happen to see it. Point of view is everything. Perspective. In the case of the forum...it became a numbers game.

I read your article and I think that you made some interesting points. Your comment regards the serve being poorly understood is spot on. There is a very, very small fraction of tennis observers nowadays that understand anything beyond "MPH" or "spin rates". The serve is a long, long story. It is well over a hundred years old. There is a tremendous history about it. Many great, great servers over the years. Did I mention that it was Don Budge himself who put the "finishing" touches on my motion? I can honestly say that I had a great serve. Fifty years later players that I knew back in the day always say something about my serve. I did it with a wooden racquet. All the spins. The big flat one. Tactics. Left handed even. I know a lot about serving. I preach the "frictionless" motion. We rarely see the likes of this any longer. Roger Federer was close. I always felt that there was a little bit of his own interpretation in his initiation of the downswing and sometimes wondered if might have had some potential for development in that phase of the motion. That's the way I see it. If it isn't perfect...it's not.

I want to see frictionless motion. Perfectly lubricated motion. No hitches. No glitches. No interruptions or hesitations. I want to see perfection. I was that way with my own serve motion. I tried to grease it all along the way. I tried to let gravity dictate the path of the racquet head. I believe that I had it right. I worked very hard at it. Whenever I see pinpoint stance...I see compensatory moves. Adjustments. Imperfection. I want to fix it. I always tried to change the pinpoint server to platform.

"Federer, Djokovic, Sampras and Dimitrov are all platform servers who used spot placement serving accuracy as a weapon. In addition, they have a great tactical plan of using variety of speeds and spins to set up flat serve opportunities on first serves and set up combinations of serve plus one on both 1st and 2nd serve scenarios. However, they were not known for having the biggest power serves in the game."

I ask the student...what is power? It's rhetorical question...the answer is "control is power". We see this in life and we see it in tennis. What is control? The three elements of control are speed, spin and placement. But you must know this already, even if you haven't actually said it in so many words. Being a good doctor it wouldn't surprise me if you started making this kind of argument from know on. You see the brilliance in it. You used these words accurately enough when describing the serves of "Federer, Djokovic, Sampras and Dimitrov". You first mention "spot placement as a weapon". Excellent observation. You mention the spin and placement and the sum of it these elements define the limitations or the expansion of tactical acumen. Then you conclude that they are not known for "the biggest power serves in the game". I would contend that the Federer and Sampras were the most powerful servers during their respective careers given their ability to control their service games. These two had the biggest control of their respective repertoires in their respective eras. Not to mention the most beautiful motions that seemed to get better given any extra pressure being put on their games. The motion just got better when the chips were down. This is a characteristic that all truly great servers have. By "coincidence" both players served from platform stance...as you noted.

Djokovic is an excellent example of somewhat great serving. His ability to control his service game is done with extra emphasis on extremely good placement with subtle variation of spin. He doesn't serve the fastest ball in the game...but then again, he doesn't seem to need to. Dimitrov is not in the same class I don't believe as he has a very perceptible hitch in his backswing that I have forever wanted to take a grease gun to and iron it out. I believe that a hitch like this can come creeping into the serving psyche at the most inconvenient time...when the chips are down. Or when serving out a nerve wracking match. Not that he has a "bad" serve...but it certainly has room for improvement.

Truly when I think of power...I think of control. This is very true in the golf swing as well. It is great to be able to hit the ball a mile...but there is a very wise saying that goes "the woods are full of big drivers". Great speed comes at a price...a lack of control. In the case of the serve...pinpoint placement. What element of control is the most important? Speed, spin or placement? It's hard to say. But one thing is for certain...it is the combination of those elements in any given situation that saves the day. The variations of the elements that at the command of the given server is based on the motion and the ability of that motion to dictate speed, spin and placement.

It seems to me that over the years the platform servers have been in control of most major championships over time. Not always of course. There are pinpoint servers who have been great champions but coming up with one seems to evade me. Another thing that I wonder about is what percentage of professional players use which stance. You have made examples of Tsitsipas and Sinner in your posts. Tsitsipas has always had a lot of room for improvement in his service motion as he has an even more obvious glitch in his backswing than does Dimitrov. His fiddling around with the pinpoint stance is merely a reflection that he knows and can feel that something is not right with his motion. So he is searching. It is really a shame too because he has such huge potential left in that motion. I don't feel that changing to pinpoint is going to be the thing that will help him realize that potential. He is going to have to address that glitch in his backswing. A little tinkering with his setup and initiation of the backswing is what he needs. Sinner is an interesting example as you note he changed from platform to pinpoint. More accurately...he changed from pinpoint to platform and back to pinpoint. I noticed immediately when he changed to platform and I wrote in detain on the forum here about it. Unfortunately my observations don't get much traction with the brain trust any longer. These contributors are not very sophisticated these days in the subtleties and intricacies of the game. But when I first saw Sinner using platform my immediate thought was that he was going in the right direction and I liked what I saw. Although there was still work to do in ironing out some of the glitches.

So yeah...who cares if we agree or disagree. Who is to say who is right and who is wrong? My philosophy has always been to try and be clear. Paint a picture with words. It makes these types of discussions more interesting and entertaining. Very, very interesting article on a very interesting subject.

When you begin with "finally a voice of reason" you set the tone for my response. Regarding base of support, it is of negligible value when striking upward to hit a serve. If you find platform works best for you and any of your students then have at it. It's just not what I've taught to many big servers today.

[johnyandell]

Glad that we are getting discussion on this! I am a platform guy myself, but you can't say there aren't great pinpoint servers and I am just trying to learn something from Pat. Gonna start a series with his views from the ground up.

[stotty]

Glad that we are getting discussion on this! I am a platform guy myself, but you can't say there aren't great pinpoint servers and I am just trying to learn something from Pat. Gonna start a series with his views from the ground up.

Sounds good to me.

For me, I would like to know how Pat applies his knowledge. How does he develop great pinpoint servers in his junior players? What traps do we as coaches need to look out for? The two stances are going to co-exist for an eternity so let's embrace both and learn to teach both equally as well.

I took a look at Sany's development on YouTube and that is certainly impressive.

[patdougherty]

Sany starts for Harvard now and Top as a sophomore has been number 1 for Princeton since day one. Both very smart and coachable driven players we occasionally get the pleasure to develop from a very young age

[neilchok]

Hi to Pat, John, and everyone. It is very cool to get high level coaches like you guys giving your opinions on things! I am from San Diego, and there was a person I knew who was a really good player, 11 to 12 UTR, better in doubles who got a major spinal injury (Ivan Smith). And I know I saw Pat's name on the list of people in the gofund me page, who gave a sizable donation!!!

So super appreciative of all your guys technical experience, and sharing it for free!!!

I was wondering what you guys think about Andy Roddick's serve. I have kind of switched to that serve motion. I tried to add the service racket lag (with racket down, when tossing arm up, but found my serve percentage went down). After getting access to this website, I was shocked to see Andy moves his front foot back a bit!!! I have tried this for the last three weeks, and even had a bunch of balls going through the fence!! It seems so easy, and makes you really focus on using your legs.

Also was wondering what you guys believe on what Rick Macci talks about the biggest issue on the serve is the racket leak occurring too fast. He has a drill where he suggests keeping your racket up, and just focus on jumping.

Also two last questions, it seems Pancho Gonzales says you need to be at 70% first serve percentage. He thinks if you are lower than that, you need to either slow speed down, or add more spin. It seems a lot of pros are only at 60% or so.

Lastly do you think Sampras and other top pros could hit dimes placed on the other side of the court on serves? Is this true? Lastly any drills you guys have for serves that would be super helpful. Some I know are serving from behind the fence, serving on your knee, serving from one court down to kick it into service box next to you.

[stotty]

Sany starts for Harvard now and Top as a sophomore has been number 1 for Princeton since day one. Both very smart and coachable driven players we occasionally get the pleasure to develop from a very young age

That's impressive work with Sany. I really enjoyed watching the clip. She has a lovely loose arm and her capacity to hit spin at such a young age is pretty amazing. Spin and placement are such huge factors in good serving in my view because then the server is truly controlling affairs. Obviously that clip was a long time ago and Sany has gone on to achieve a good level since then

It was interesting for me to watch Top's clip because you work differently to me. Coaches often come at serves in different ways and prioritise different things. I would have had Top's elbow popped up a little higher at the throwing action phase and probably encouraged a more pronounced break at the elbow too. Top was very young back then and no doubt you went on to do a good deal more development with him. I would be curious to see what his serve is like now.

You come at serves differently to most coaches so your series on Tennisplayer will be interesting to see.

[stotty]

Hi to Pat, John, and everyone. It is very cool to get high level coaches like you guys giving your opinions on things! I am from San Diego, and there was a person I knew who was a really good player, 11 to 12 UTR, better in doubles who got a major spinal injury (Ivan Smith). And I know I saw Pat's name on the list of people in the gofund me page, who gave a sizable donation!!!

So super appreciative of all your guys technical experience, and sharing it for free!!!

I was wondering what you guys think about Andy Roddick's serve. I have kind of switched to that serve motion. I tried to add the service racket lag (with racket down, when tossing arm up, but found my serve percentage went down). After getting access to this website, I was shocked to see Andy moves his front foot back a bit!!! I have tried this for the last three weeks, and even had a bunch of balls going through the fence!! It seems so easy, and makes you really focus on using your legs.

Also was wondering what you guys believe on what Rick Macci talks about the biggest issue on the serve is the racket leak occurring too fast. He has a drill where he suggests keeping your racket up, and just focus on jumping.

Also two last questions, it seems Pancho Gonzales says you need to be at 70% first serve percentage. He thinks if you are lower than that, you need to either slow speed down, or add more spin. It seems a lot of pros are only at 60% or so.

Lastly do you think Sampras and other top pros could hit dimes placed on the other side of the court on serves? Is this true? Lastly any drills you guys have for serves that would be super helpful. Some I know are serving from behind the fence, serving on your knee, serving from one court down to kick it into service box next to you.

Why don't you post a clip of your serve. You might get some decent tips on how to develop it.

[patdougherty]

Thanks for the feedback....it's conceptual teaching that evolved years ago as a result of the feedback from my extensive video series I did for Nick B. People didn't retain the words so much but always spoke of the conceptual concepts I introduced. I then took the same approach on court instead of sequential teaching that we grew up with from motor drive sequences in magazines. Simpler way to teach effectively and it crosses language barriers much better.

We can often hyper focus on producing perfection in our students too early on which prolongs confidence producing successes and their will to strive for achieving closer to perfection. When they understand the concepts of great serving and work hard many aspects begin to fix themselves. Andre was an eye opener for me to work with when I was much younger and he was a teenager. I quickly realized he was one of one in so many ways that I needed to stop looking for little details that might not be perfect and instead, studied his every move to come up with ways to best convey and teach it to lesser talent.

[stroke]

Thanks for the feedback....it's conceptual teaching that evolved years ago as a result of the feedback from my extensive video series I did for Nick B. People didn't retain the words so much but always spoke of the conceptual concepts I introduced. I then took the same approach on court instead of sequential teaching that we grew up with from motor drive sequences in magazines. Simpler way to teach effectively and it crosses language barriers much better.

We can often hyper focus on producing perfection in our students too early on which prolongs confidence producing successes and their will to strive for achieving closer to perfection. When they understand the concepts of great serving and work hard many aspects begin to fix themselves. Andre was an eye opener for me to work with when I was much younger and he was a teenager. I quickly realized he was one of one in so many ways that I needed to stop looking for little details that might not be perfect and instead, studied his every move to come up with ways to best convey and teach it to lesser talent.

Your "Serve MPH" video and "Strategic Serve Placement and Spin" were great instructional videos. To me, the best serve videos I have seen.

[florin]

I don’t know if is related but “Moreover, these data are similar to those of Renoult (2007), who analysed the two stance techniques during the 2007 French Open and the results showed that 72.4 % of the players used the feet up technique.“ and “as according to Martin (2015) expert players using the feet up technique generate on average more ball speed (173 km/h vs. 166 km/h)” from https://itfcoachingreview.com/index..../view/372/1127 …one thing that i cannot make any connection, why higher toss for junior’s means higher speed? does pinpoint stance increases the height of your contact?

[florin]

Missed on the first read: “Furthermore, following this author, the feet up technique produces a greater ground reaction force than the feet back technique (2.1 times body weight compared to 1.5 times body weight)”.“the stronger upward momentum after bending with this stance allows them to hit the ball at a higher point, finding better angles and placement on the serve, to move the ball further away from the opponent when opening the court.”

[johnyandell]

Neil,
Wow that's a lot of questions. On your serve I cannot say anything with out video. The way players think they are serving is often way different from what they actually do. On your other points I Iike Rick's drill which he got from Brian Gordon. But you may or may not need it. Pancho played in the days of wood rackets and serve and volley and one foot on the ground when serving so I wouldn't stress over that. Dimes no. The 4 corners yes. Drills? Would someone else take over on that??

[neilchok]

John,

Thanks! Let me look at this. Yes I heard rumors that Pete could hit dimes places in the service box in a couple serves. I feel strange that people's serves are so low percentage, around 60%. I think Pancho was serving pretty hard, but not sure. Let me try to get a video of me serving, a little camera shy .

Neil