A New Year's Serve

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Abbreviated Homunculus

"Homunculus" because named for a graceful little fellow with long arms (Tom Okker or Ben Hogan). "Abbreviated" because the arm work sends the racket not in a circle but straight line-- sideways.

http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/flash/hom.html

Circle enters the picture from hips rotating first and shoulders rotating from the gut second.

At contact, less contorted than a golfer, you almost face the net.

If you hit one of these special forehands long, take a counter-intuitive measure immediately to hit another-- open the racket as part of the continental-gripped backswing. This will exaggerate forward arm roll in the opposite direction.

Reflect on the event here. The body is rotating the racket around but the arm is not doing that, but rather accelerating the racket head sideward in a straight line, so there is a good split in function.

Your hand is smoothly gaining on your gross body (pulling away as in a race). And the racket head, through rolling, is pulling away from the hand (again as if in a race).

Key to understanding these arm and hand stratagems, which conclude before contact (!), is your decision to loop the elbow into your side ("Hogan's secret") and meld this effort into a push beyond your side again while extending and rolling your arm.

And then the arm of course, as sideways becomes forward, bowls through the ball and continues far away from the body in full followthrough that finally circles back.

For fun, try one now that's all hips and no shoulders.

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Tommyhawk

And for fun, since tennis is all about fun, we'll try on the Tommy Haas forehand.

Can't be done? Of course it can. Anyone can imitate anything.

Well, I see the flip as the one where forearm inverts as wrist lays back-- pretty simple. Followed immediately by a nice wipe with Accu blade rubber insert. So set up with slow, sensuous rear part of the loop, so that both events-- the flip and the wipe-- can seem to happen all at once as in a shortstop's throw to first.

Reader, you won't have to worry so much about arm-straightening as in a Federfore.

Just make a comfortable loop that gives you a comfortable arm length for the actual shot and keep a light grip.

Reader, you may have developed a certain musculature through all your hitting of straight-arm shots. Or of double-bend shots with right angles all over the place. If you've trained your muscles and nerves with both, I recommend an arm length somewhere in between. That's what Tommy Haas' arm length looks like to me.

Does this decision to try on the Tommyhawk mean that all other forehands shall be abandoned?

Of course not. The Hunc Hogan, short for Homunculus Hogan, is a hell of a good shot (bounces low). And so is The ATP Forehand (bounces high).

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/pro_men/tommy_haas/th_forehand/th_fh_center/th_fh_center.html?THFHCenterFront1.mov

But I don't know. When, three years ago, I was about to take my big bus ride from Winston-Salem north to Detroit to see what was what, I was told that if I had one of those hair bob thingies at the back of my head like Xavier Malisse, George Carlin or Tommy Haas, I could just jump on the bus and go home to North Carolina.

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Observation

The Homunculus Hogan may be hit with weak grip (more forward roll of arm before contact) or strong grip (less or no forward roll).

WHIHTTY: Warning however; I haven't tried this yet.

Last Wednesday, I had three Synvisc One jabs in the side of my knee and am forbidden tennis until next Wednesday.

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Design Feature to be Transferred from Upper to Lower Register

In one of my design features for a rear-footed serve, brought about by necessity, I hit upon a down and up toss rhythm followed by a drawing back of the upper arm (in tandem with backward hips rotation to coil rear leg as if to throw a stone while lifting front knee up on its toes).

Then comes a bottom up throw that depends on transverse stomach muscles rather than frontward hips rotation. I see this method in the serves of Tony Trabert and the golf swings of Ricky Fowler, although Trabert certainly is firing off of the front leg.

I like the elegance and simplicity of 1) lift hitting arm out front 2) draw it back 3) twist upper arm through pre-determined range in reflex to body throw.

This serve is pretty good for upward spin though not for pace. I get more pace when most of whatever mechanism I choose happens down low.

So I'll try: Down together up together but the "up" will keep the elbow in bottom-most position so that only the racket tip rises as elbow bends and upper arm twists-- a little-- and toss occurs.

Well, how much should the upper arm twist? Whatever of it you use early you won't be able to use later, right?

How flexible are you? The more flexibility you have available, the more you can put the significant upper arm twist behind you so that it makes the racket tip go DOWN.

But suppose you're not flexible. Remember how Justin Gimmelstob, as a good tour player, used to complain about Pete Sampras' God-given flexibility before he-- Justin-- became well known as an announcer?

"You use what you got," Vic Braden said.

My interpretation of that statement has now changed to the point that I say, "Well, if you haven't got much, then steal from your overhead. It's bad enough that you can't stretch the racket tip as low as you'd like, but does that mean you have to have a limited throwing action, too? Why not give yourself a fighting chance? Why not give yourself something to work with?"

I agree with coaches who say you can eventually get elbow to about 10 degrees above the shoulders line or clavicular line or spine of scapula line when SOS is parallel to the clavicle.

Before that however if you are extremely inflexible, your upper arm twist-- in resistant or "pre-load" mode-- might even take the racket up and over the top before it starts down.

The rotorded server needs the same amount of tract as anybody else for equivalent racket head speed.

Where this is going: Down together up together with racket tip rising maybe only an inch. The initial racket tip rise becomes carefully calibrated through the experience in competition of actual serves.

Special case in all this: Rear-footed server. His feet are close together. He stays tall for a long time. The down together up together toss is uncomplicated by body turn, which happens later. "That's a sneaky serve," my favorite opponents say.

The new design feature will permit me to sink and coil my body while I once again draw my upper arm back (the beginning of its rise), a feel I like very much.

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Snarling Letter from Ocelot Camp

"In late March of 2013 you wrote a post or posts at tennisplayer.net claiming that Ocelot Camp for Rotorded Servers has been in existence "for decades" when in fact Ocelot welcomed its first campers on June 6, 1911 and recently celebrated its Centennial along with four other successful businesses in the Ozarks which I shall not name.

"You act, in your posts, as if you coined the word 'rotorded' when in fact there's nothing new under the sun, and that goes for your idea of lower register elbow take-back in a rear-legged serve.

"You think you're far out when you suggest a racket tip rise of one inch as part of a rhythmic down together up together tossing motion.

"But the most rotorded server ever to come through our front gate is playing Futures tournaments right now. For him, we found a better solution.

"Raise the racket tip one inch? Hardly. I won't give the real name of the player, simply will call him "Harry" since I don't wish to stigmatize him as rotorded, but rotorded he is.

"I will send you video but only if you request it. Harry does bend his arm on the toss but pushes his racket head downward at the same time. This creates extra reverse twist in upper arm in time for the elbow draw-back."

Sincerely,
Louis Lew
Director
Ocelot Camp for Rotorded Servers

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Ocelots

https://www.google.com/search?q=Ocelots&hl=en&newwindow=1&rlz=1C2CHFX_enUS519US520&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=WXBXUdjNGIeeywGU3YCQDw&ved=0CAoQ_AUoAQ&biw=1422&bih=790

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What's the Best Amount of Variety in One's Game?

Chris Evert won't advocate too much. Hana Mandlikova might espouse more-- or would she? Is she still burning from the extra losses she incurred by becoming too fancy? Or is she still pleased from the variety that enabled her to win The U.S. Open?

Isn't it awful the way through the decades John McEnroe's forehand always looks the same?

Having more than one or two forehands is a lot of fun-- that's all I know. So long as they're not all in "a state of slight disrepair," to use a phrase from the tennis writer John M. Barnaby.

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Awfully good...Mats Wilander might say

Isn't it awful the way through the decades John McEnroe's forehand always looks the same?

Mats Wilander did say that "John has a way of making you feel awful on the tennis court", immediately after McEnroe dismantled him in the finals of the 2012 Champions Tour in London, England.

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Self-standing and requiring no response.

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Rotorded Servers, Lend Me Your Ears

You gotta have a throwing motion. Which means, supposedly, that the racket must go way deep down behind your back.

But MUST the racket go deep? Let's word the thought differently, and simply say that the upper arm must freely twist one way before it twists the other.

Once you accept this idea, you're ready to design a new serve. Will it be everything you want? Of course not. But it will be a full throw.

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Arm Roll in Rosewallian Slice: Maximize, Minimize or Moderate It?

The best slicers keep backswing adjustable rather than use one level for all (Thanks, Stotty).

The best slicer (Rosewall), in addition to whatever else he is doing, rolls his arm forward to the ball and discontinues this roll from the ball.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WR7kvBGntW8

But not everyone should roll. There is a populace that will hit better slice if they eschew the roll. And even the best slicers will eschew the roll some of the time.

If I say my name is John Eschew, you can decide for yourself in which group I belong.

To eschew or not to eschew. To roll or not to roll.

But if one does choose to roll, one should contemplate the level of one's elbow IN RELATION TO THE BALL.

We've all heard about keeping the racket head above the wrist, but how about keeping the elbow higher than the wrist at the same time-- as a choice or idea?

Rosewall does that in his best slice, hit at comfortable level, in the above video.

Suppose that racket tip starts high, even vertical, as in the video.

Now the strings must get down to the ball. How may they do that? 1) Lower elbow 2) Twist racket head down 3) Do some of both.

These are variables to play with, an example in tennis of where a bit of conscious thought is good.

Special note: tpa tennis, Tom Allsopp's evolved website from Philadelphia (it was pretty wonderful in the first place), is up and running. http://tpatennis.com/

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Elbow Level: What Could Bore More?

Wrong. The subject fascinates. We're still on Rosewall slice. As conversation piece. Everybody has an opinion. We start on the same page.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/classiclessons/trey_waltke/the_slice_backhand/the_slice_backhand.html

This is a great, great article, but try right now not to be distracted by any greatness other than that of Ken Rosewall's elbow in the 12-frame photo montage in the middle of the page.

No, don't be distracted by Trey Waltke's own more horizontal racket at top of his backswing. His elbow already is high. More simple? Reader, you do what you think best.

Rosewall, now-- he keeps his elbow down through frames 1-4 . In frame 5 it comes up. And there it stays in frame 6 as whole arm straightens.

Reader, good luck! I hope you pick the better of the two options-- different for different people, situations and days I would guess.

Note: Don't think you (I) know everything. In frame 5 the elbow goes up, but how does it go up? Twists up? Maybe, but in at least one of the sequences in the video of the previous post Ken Rosewall's elbow first stretches up without turning, then turns at the top.

Confusing? Ain't life a bitch.

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Rotorded Servers! Roll backhand Slice Like Ken Rosewall

Why?

For revenge against those who have ostracized you by whupping up on your first AND second serves, and against those tennis instructors who have maintained a knowing silence when contemplating your grim plight, and to demonstrate to yourself once and for all, that, while your upper arm twist is limited in one direction it is unlimited in the other.

We start with the Stotty-provided 1954 Davis Cup clip full of amazing goodies. This video is hard to stop for analysis of anything, at least on my computer, but is short enough for plenty of repetition.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WR7kvBGntW8

In the backhand volley sequences of Ken Rosewall, he gets his elbow high, where he wants it, then keeps it still while he cocks the racket underneath it.

In the full slice sequences of Ken Rosewall, he keeps his elbow low, then lifts it, then twists it while keeping it still.

You can hit these two shots, rotorded servers. So can anyone. But should we tell him?

As demonstration, stand racketless and face wall with upper arm parallel to floor. With opposite arm, push your serving hand back. How far does the upper arm, held parallel, twist back?

Now wind up for a backhand slice on the other side of your body, adopting the same construction. See how far your upper arm can twist back? You see?

Remember, to hit rolling slice, you roll to the ball but don't roll from the ball. It is of extreme importance to keep the elbow still in the vertical or up-and-down dimension if you are bold enough to expect Rosewallian result.

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Rotorded Ones! Vic Seixas Backward-Leaning Smash as Model for Rotorded Serve?

Okay, okay, there won't be any linear weight transfer toward the net, so maybe you can compromise with a tiny bit of forward head travel. Think of the Pancho Segura rock-and-roll. He hit the ball with a perfectly erect body, not a body angled toward the net like Venus Williams or Maria Sharapova.

We're still in Stotty's 1954 Davis Cup video of the previous post. As Vic Seixas hits an overhead, there is plenty of angular weight transfer toward the net, starting with legs scissoring to rotate hips in the direction we like. Upper body, too, rotates from the gut toward the net. Despite his body going backward, the shot produces big power.

Could we siphon off a bit of it, rotorded servers?

Well, have I tried this? Of course not. Once I try something, I usually don't write about it, preferring as I do to write about the next thing.

The farther back the body is leaning, however, the more upward arm twist will make itself available to us.

But if we are egging the ball (putting pop-top on it) there will be a bit more forward runway available, too.

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Developing Slingshot in the McEnroe-esque Forehand

First one must strip down every movement to its essence, specifically adopt down up down backswing rhythm in which each of these three moves (two in backswing and one in transition) are small.

After I've tried this for a while, I love to expand the whole cycle into a Tom Okker spin-off that is huge while trying to keep the same proportion.

Eternal optimist that I am, I think everything will eventually work in competition, but I'm not so dumb that I don't know the short stroke will prove best in almost all cases.

One great aspect of the short stroke is that the arm gets straight early, removing a variable.

So hand has just started down and inward toward body.

That is the time for leg and hips to fight the falling arm.

Personally, I don't think I should worry too much about leg and hips sequence. Some say leg then hips. Some say hips then leg. Some say use hips but stay down. What is best? An upward, unified spiral? Kinetic chain is a pain and how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?

What is wanted is conflict between the core and the hand. Geoffrey Williams has been very good in explaining this phenomenon for all tennis shots.

Steve Navarro, golfer as he is, has been very good in explaining that the forward rotating hips, begun at the perfect time I'm trying to identify, will continue the arm down and in for desired inside-out swing.

At contact, in this shot, the arm is rolling. Time I guess to quote Steve again.

"My arm rolls with the weight of the racquet head coming over and through the ball."

The roll is not the slingshot. The roll does send the weight of the racket ahead of the hand = more acceleration. But the roll is incorporated within the slingshot.