Upward serve Positioning

[airforce1]

If you will go to the stroke archives ( not the high speed) and go to the side view of Agassi, Pete, Andy, and Roger, you will be able to see some things that I find to be key to serving velocity. ( I didn't see Andre in high speed and there are fewer views available) These are things that have been used to greatly improve the speeds of several Jrs as well as adults, so yes it is teachable. One Jr has won several fast serve contests by wide margins and won each one he was in.

To start this, pull up Agassi and load a side view (where you are looking at his back) of his serve. If you didn't already know, you can use the arrow keys to go frame by frame, forward and backwards of the video.

Start at the point of contact (best if you have one that catches contact for a reference point to work from) and then arrow back 4 frames. What I can see when I do this; is the frame where the elbow goes higher 1, then near the beginning of the lifting cartwheel motion 2, the move to straighten the elbow 3, and last the straightening of the elbow to contact 4.

If you study these 4 frames on the mentioned players you can see some key points on positioning. You will see how Andy and Pete are clearly past 90 degree bend with a higher elbow as that elbow goes high; and Agassi's is not; Roger's is somewhere inbetween (around 90).
From Brian's article-
"The depth of the racket drop is important because it dictates the available range of motion during the upward swing for developing racket head speed."

You can see how Agassi starts extending the elbow(and wrist to some extent) much earlier than Pete and Andy. You can also see that where it takes Andre frames 3 and 4 to get contact, Andy has almost got contact in frame 3 and frame 4 is beyond contact. (you have to miss contact with Andy and Pete to get positioning in frames 1 & 2 to match up better with Andre.)

Clearly there are many other mental, and physical potential aspects to the serve, but these are some keys we can see and train to put us in a position to serve faster.

I look forward to hearing about what others can see in these frames.
thanks,

[johnyandell]

AF 1,

Post the URLs you are talking about and I'll insert the QT movies in the Forum.

John Yandell

[airforce1]

Great Idea

I sent a couple to your email.

thanks,
AF1

[johnyandell]

[airforce1]

Nice

Nice job.
It's neat how (all at the same time) with this you can take each video to the racket straight up contact position, then bk up 2 frames and see how at that point Pete and Andy's hand is well below the elbow (delayed) with max wrist cock , but with Rafa and clearly with Andre, the extension has started in the elbow and to some extent in the wrist too.
You can scroll up and down to look at each of them 2 frames bk from the contact point.

In Andy's video I had to start at a pt just after contact and he Still was delayed 2 frames back. This really highlights what we are talking about.
Contrast this with Andre, where I started just slightly prior to contact and backing up 2 frames you can see the elbow and wrist extension further along than Andy's where we started after the contact point.
To highlight the extreme difference, look at Andy's from the point just prior to contact and bk up 2 frames, then compare that position to Andre's just prior to contact/ backed up 2 frames. wow!

thanks John

[bottle]

strings parallel to court to strings parallel to court-- a long path

I know you want our attention on the specific frames you mentioned, but once the films are up, they take on a life of their own.

With all of these stars, seen from this angle, a great deal of string is going through the ball, helped by body and everything else.

We hear that the modern serve is vertical, but the evidence here says a great deal of horizontal energy is involved too.

And as John has said, there really isn't much difference-- a little-- between first and second serves.

[airforce1]

Bottle, you make a great point that the difference we are looking at is small.

The small difference that separates the bigger servers is that they don't start to uncoil prematurely.

[airforce1]

Seems the thing lost here,
is that the purpose of this thread is to split hairs between a pro level guy serving 115 and another serving 127.
This isn't a discussion of serving 101 and how to grip the stick and where your feet need to point.

Most of the guys in the video on this site, serve very well and are doing pretty much what they intend to do with their serve. For example, Agassi was not trying to blow past guys with his serve, as much as he was trying to elicit a type of return to set things up. So this is not a cut on Andre's serve by any means. I think he had one of the most underrated serves out there. He also proved he could launch some 127s when he chose to do so!
I would have really loved to see him play more dubs, where the things he does serving would pay even more dividens.

But all that said, simply he is still a great example of a server who uncoils earlier on average and gets a little less velocity because of it.

[airforce1]

Bottle,
It's interesting that you minimize the importance of the vertical aspect of the service motion, since that seems to be the very thing that sets up the forearm stopping on the pane of glass you mention. The legs and torso are driving up in a near vertical path (8-12degrees into the court) like a modified twisting piston, dragging and stretching the arm just prior to forearm extention. This vertical aspect is what lays the plane for where the forearm snaps straight, accelerating the stick over the top.

[airforce1]

We have gotten plenty of views of this thread, but not too many comments. I hoped to hear more on what some of you saw in the 3-4 frames prior to contact. Were you able to see how Andre's extention normally begins so much earlier than Roddick's for example?