contact point on groundshots

[btca_national]

When coaching beginner we are trying to get our players to prepare so that the timing of their shot is good. By that i mean we want our player to contact the ball waist high, Comfortable distance to the side of the body and just in front of the body. Their will be variations depending on the grip.
When we feed balls to the player we can see what needs worked on. It might be they are not letting the balls drop to waist high or they are to close to the ball or they hit late.
The question i want to ask coaches is what generally is your priority to work on first if the player is struggling with all the above.
Some coaches feed from the basket and make sure the player hits the ball a comfortable distance to the side so it is easy to rotate the body. Some coaches have live feeds and rally with the players and tell the player to wait for the ball to drop to waist high. Som coaches might work on early preperation so the player contacts the ball out in front.
Any theories to what is the best way to approach it

[uspta2448519013]

I don't really believe in a strictly waist height contact point on the forehand side. I believe in teaching students to hit at the settle point (when the ball seems to stop in the air/ just as it's about to start falling). The best position to hit balls in tennis is really anywhere between the thighs and shoulders, that's roughly the strike zone for players and where the majority of good groundstrokes will be hit from. Anything below or above those points drops either the potential power or control of the shot in which case the student needs to learn to play different types of shots from those positions. Hope this helps.

Jason Frausto

[johnyandell]

For beginning players and young players it's great to have a conservative grip and a waist high contact point. Rick Macci discusses this in his recent article:

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/teaching_systems/rick_macci/starting_kids_right_forehand/starting_kids_right_forehand.html

But contact height is influenced mainly by grip style at higher levels. As you go further underneath, the natural contact height goes up. Here's an article I wrote on that:

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/avancedtennis/john_yandell/your_forehand_and_the_modern_forehand/grip/your_forehand_and_the_modern_forehand_grip.html

One point that I personally believe that the hitting arm shape is critical in learning to feel the contact point. If that is set up correctly the player will often feel this naturally. If the hitting arm isn't in position the contact point can't be right.

[btca_national]

Thanks John
When you talk about the hitting arm shape do you mean a bent elbow and laid back wrist(depending on grip)on the forehand. On the 2 handed backhand would you want a straight left arm(if right handed) and a left wrist laid back like most of the men and would you expect young girls to learn this techniqueand on the 1 handed backhand a straight arm.

[johnyandell]

I go into this in a lot of detail in the Advanced Tennis articles.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/avancedtennis/advtennis.html

Virtually all the women have double bend forehand and are bent bent on the two-hander--haven't seen one that has a straight arm with with the front arm. But yes on the one-hander, straight hitting arm at contact like the men.

[btca_national]

would you say the men have a double bend on there forehand hands and a straight arm with a laid back wrist on there double handed backhand and what do you think is best for the forehand and backhand?

[johnyandell]

i don't think you can say "best". Double bend is most common on the forehand and that is probably the way to go at most levels but some of the great forehands are straight arm--or straight some of the time at least.

On the BH, some men are bent straight but there are some great bent bent ones as well. This I think is more of a preference or natural tendency thing. Which ever the player tends toward is fine and you then make sure that the elements are correct in that variation.

I saw a pro player in the top hundred desperately try to change from bent bent to straight straight because he loved Agassi. Didn't happen.