A New Year's Serve

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Dare You Eat a Peach?

Also, reader, dare you take the dampeners off of your tennis rackets? From SECRETS OF A TRUE TENNIS MASTER: "Like a violin, the racket is a stringed instrument and requires proper feel and touch to be used properly..."

"...Welby does not like the use of string dampeners in rackets because it diminishes the sound of the hit, thereby reducing the utility of the learning tool of hearing the hit. (Of course, if you need the string dampener to reduce vibration because of tennis elbow, by all means use the dampener.)"

It is fun to examine every photograph of a tennis racket in this book. Some of the rackets include dampeners but most don't.

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Slowing Down One's Strokes

Being able to swing both slow and fast isn't going to hurt anyone. Entranced as I've been for a long time with the concept of self-feed in the game-- a new/old program that Scott Murphy embarked on after hitting with Karsten Popp, something that passing players, pros and non-tennis players are apt either to mock or praise (more likely mock), consider this simple exercise from Welby Van Horn, page 106, SECRETS OF A TRUE TENNIS MASTER:

"You can not only practice swinging in slow motion in front of a mirror, you can also practice it on the court. The best way to practice it on the court is by using one of Welby's many unique drills. In this drill, the student tries to complete the proper follow through on the groundstrokes at the same time that his or her shot lands on the other side of the net. This drill really forces the student to slow down the swing since at normal speed the follow-through finishes considerably before the ball bounces on the other side. The drill teaches racket control and touch and, like all slow motion drills, develops feel of the correct stroke."

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Arrival of an Important Book in the Mail

A pretty humbling experience, if you ask me. The book, SECRETS OF A TRUE TENNIS MASTER: WELBY VAN HORN and his TENNIS TEACHING SYSTEM, by Edward Weiss, is about 300 pages all of which I have read in the past 24 hours.

That is no way to read a book full of tennis basics that insist all by themselves to be returned to again and again in intervals with enough time and practice in between for stuff to sink in.

But it's a start.

One hopes, immediately, that one's waist high forehand volley contact will henceforth be characterized by racket butt pointing at left hip.

One realizes immediately (or could) that the more unusual aeronautical term "banking" is far superior to "cartwheeling" as a verbal device useful in developing better serves and ground strokes both.

Will one reset one's outside foot just a bit to the right at the end of a square step forehand? Do the same thing if retooling one's basic serve? I can't see why not.

TRUE TENNIS MASTER is a great book I expect to spend a lot of time with.

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I see now, in re-reading this whole Welby Van Horn article, that getting racket away from body is what the whole "palm down" vs. "palm up" discussion is about.

The lady's palm in "basic serve" is slightly down as racket goes down and even up but then opens a little to form a nice tomahawk preparing for very full pronation.

While I love both dead guys Van Horn and Braden, I don't see the "imagined mirror in Braden's palm" preparing for examination of cooties in the back of anyone's hair.

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Bone on Bone: Back to Welby Van Horn\'s \"The Basic Serve\"

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/teaching_systems/welby_vanhorn/welby_learning_perfecting_serve/welby_learning_perfecting_serve.html

We went to the movies this weekend with another couple, Gretchen and Frank. My friend Frank, who designed the hood ornament on a lot of Detroit cars as well as the one on top of the Chrysler Building as you drive up I-75, used to be a good skier and a good tennis player.

As I walked behind him through the movie lobby, I realized that he could barely lift up his feet. The walker he was pushing would barely go unless Gretchen pulled on it. I decided right then that I am never going to have a knee replacement.

So what if my brother-in-law, who is the same age as Frank (80) has had two knee replacements and still hits lots of home runs in national level seniors softball.

I have a dark side that makes me identify more with Frank, and I don't think I should give in to it.

Instead, I'll wait for distribution of the new arthritis medicines or give myself an injection of W-D 40 .

In the meanwhile I'll revert to Furniture One in the above article, good enough for my purposes.

Note how the lady in the video practically keeps her front foot flat. See how she opens up her racket behind her head. I don't care if Welby Van Horn advised palm down. That palm faces up so far as I am concerned.

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Oh goodie

Something weird to try from the Stockholm Open before abandoning it. When Alejandro Falla serves he opens his racket extremely much during his first drop then closes it extremely much as it goes up behind him.

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Commentatoes on John McEnroes

There aren't John McEnroes. There is only one.

Patrick McEnroes: A few more there.

What about John McEnroe commentating upon himself? He doesn't do it very much, preferring to speak with his racket.

Or John McEnroe on McEnruefuls, which are imitation of John McEnroe strokes.

Again, reader, you won't get much from John, who is more than happy to speak about any other kind of player under the sun, male or female.

For good comment on John McEnroe, try Jimmy Arias.

Even there, though, Arias isn't apt to say much about John's use and lack of use of arm roll in his ground strokes, so we few players who love our McEnruefuls are pretty much left to our own devices in making this stuff up.

What is likely to happen to us, over time? Well, we always will learn from John McEnroe volleys the more trouble we take to study them, but we probably will have given up on his topspin backhands some time ago because of the unique structure of his grip and wrist.

And his serve? Impossible.

That leaves his forehands. One can be imitative there if not too closely so. Today as on many days I contemplate a single subject, arm roll in an Australian gripped McEnrueful-- more adaptable than the roll in all other forehand grip structures, in my view.

I advocate a down and up backswing as the lynch-pin of this forehand grip. The racket falls a bit to the outside and then cocks up slightly to the inside though still in the slot.

I don't even know any more how bent or straight the arm ought to be. Slightly bent at the cusp of those two possibilities.

Well, if down and up backswing is basic what about a shock and awe overhand loop? Fine if it brings racket head to the same stopped place to hit the normal slap-shot.

Reader, if you are capable of shock, you may be shocked by my word "stopped" over "slowed."

Sorry, but that's what I believe. The slap of slap-shot then includes forward roll. The rest of the stroke is a Chris Evert forehand, finishing at shoulder level and out to the side. One puts so much stick on the ball that one can, optionally, over-roll to egg it and still clear the net thus creating what Tim and Tom Gullickson used to call "pop-top," especially if facing heavy topspin coming the other way.

For a short angle off of a low ball, the roll is later and therefore completely different and more upward.

Yes, John McEnroe has freaky hand-to-eye but common sense is available also in the adaptability of Australian grip.

And the overhead shock and awe version of this forehand offers easy opportunity for grip change and abbreviation into dog pat of a Federfore/ATP3 .

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Briefly, Reader

Don't think too much. Don't think too little. Find the perfect cusp between the two (different on different days).

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Setback

Again and again, the question arose of when legs should extend in a serve, early or late even during contact ("late coming up to contact") Vic would argue, which at least gives me something new to try with my evolving Chubby Checker serve now that it includes simultaneous rotations of hips and shoulders to raise the hitting elbow while maintaining perfect alignment of the elbow with the shoulders line.

Through the past year or two I have combined forward hips turn with front leg extension to form an early brake for quicker release of the gut.

Tenniswise, these posts are useless unless I report setback along with advance. I must now advise levelness of shoulders for longer if I want effective use of the Totkan tomahawk illustrated at 3:11 of the following video, the very last service sequence of which shows Naomi kicking very late body bend in before its release.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ds6CZ4qCXD4

Throwing a dull tomahawk or old tennis racket over a fence into soft dirt should help lead to vertical end-over-end serve.

One can or cannot analyze this all one wants. I only know this vertical spin should barely miss the ball and be reinforced by late release of body bend if not by exhalation of one's breath. Reader, where are your mishits? Some mishits seem essential for showing yourself that you are getting frame close enough to the ball before it naturally turns slightly out. Hit the ball too flat and you have lost.

Now-- the idea of SIM upper and lower body rotations from Australian grip for short angle forehand "pro shot" does appear effective at least so far.

Just not as part of my or any serve.

Better seems to withhold UBR (upper body rotation) altogether until after contact for control. The difference between a down the middle serve from deuce court for a right-hander and his out wide slice could then be scapular adduction withheld vs. used during contact.

I now review the Totkan sick kick. Does Naomi lift her hitting shoulder like Pete Sampras? Only a smidge and very late SIM with late leg drive creating late body bend and release of same. (Careful here old guys.)

Note: Since I'm now maintaining double scapula retraction started before this late body bend and lasting throughout the contact area (some would call this "arching the back") I'd like to add a large volume of air to the internal mix in the upper chest. Perhaps that entails holding one's breath and turning red in the face like Boris Becker but consider how bad he looks now in middle age as he sits in Novak Djokovic's corner. Does he do something or does he just sit there for show like Clarence Thomas getting ready to vote with Anthony Scalia?

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Vic Braden's Instructive Debates

He answered everyone's email and before email answered snail letters with snail letters.

I at least have a letter on stationery taped to the front inside cover of my copy of TENNIS FOR THE FUTURE which is all about the different segments of kinetic chain.

It isn't signed "Vic Braden" but rather "THE VIC BRADEN TENNIS COLLEGE STAFF" but I think from the style of the emails I later received in various letter boards that it was written by Vic himself.

I won't quote it here (probably did somewhere) since my ideas about kinetic chain have moved past that letter and I have no wish to speak ill of the dead.

Our written exchanges happened long before I met Vic in person at which time I made no attempt to connect the letters and posts with him since I wanted to hear what he had to say with no interruption for schmooze.

Well, we (I) tried to read all of Vic's correspondence with tennis players of every country and stripe.

Again and again, the question arose of when legs should extend in a serve, early or late even during contact ("late coming up to contact") Vic would argue, which at least gives me something new to try with my evolving Chubby Checker serve now that it includes simultaneous rotations of hips and shoulders to raise the hitting elbow while maintaining perfect alignment of the elbow with the shoulders line.

Through the past year or two I have combined forward hips turn with front leg extension to form an early brake for quicker release of the gut.

But the "paradigm" was different, a word I hate to inflict on a tennis player such as yourself, reader. The paradigm was some sort of deceleration-acceleration now to be replaced with Totkan tomahawk.

Hence my latest wrinkle (and tennis without constant search bores me silly).

I haven't gotten to the court because of multifarious dentistry but hope to do so this morning replete with penicillin, steroid, valium, Motrin and all.

UBR (upper body rotation) and LBR (lower body rotation) shall occur SIM (simultaneously) but on moderately bent knees with front heel still up.

Foot flattening leg extension will then occur SIM with skewed Totkan tomahawk in my attempt to achieve the Totkan sick kick (accurate but slow).

Note: Ice better than an ice pack is rounded ice in a small dixie cup whether applied to left inner knee where bones jam together or to right Achilles heel or to upper lip.

One rips off a small strip of the cardboard and paints the injury and does this soon or forget it.

If repeatedly crossing upper lip with the dixie cup one can lean forward over a sink to catch the melt and stretch hamstrings at the same time.

One of two alternatives here-- breaking the forward hips rotation through quick lowering heel SIM with extending leg, or, same leg and heel occurrence but not until after the shoulders and hips rotations are done low should provide a new 'digm (dime).

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On Hooped and Sticked Full Slice Backhands and Related Backhand Volleys

"Build tension between opposite hand and back of upper hitting arm," I said, but the idea is growing toward placing the conflicting pressure points even farther apart.

How did this change of mind come about before I could even try out the first design?

From a head numbed for the dental implant performed today. And valium. And steroids. And penicillin. And Motrin. Together, a full cocktail.

Along with 10 minutes of ice applied to mouth alternated with 10 minutes (without ice) all day long.

A regimen like that is bound to lead to revised stroke ideas.

Philosophy: The two scapulae are bigger than the minor shoulder muscle putting pressure on upper back of the hitting arm. Not that we (I) shouldn't use any minor shoulder muscle too. We want to sum the available forces so long as they are easily produced. Forward hips rotation while straightening knob of racket toward ball will matter too. But we add to all of this the indexing design of scapular retraction on both sides of the back.

This is a different shot from the very good slice Oscar Wegner has shown on video in which one pulls hand back to where one can see a ring on the middle finger and gently start racket barrel toward the net then clench the shoulder-blades abruptly to change direction thus increasing racket head speed.

In MY proposed shot, the hands stay connected for a longer time. The double scapular retraction builds tension preparatory to sudden release of the two hands (known in the upper levels of tennis I think as "cutting the wire" as when firing a catapult).

This shot involves the entire circle of the body. I have spoken of a "hoop" before but some of its hoop arc ran across the front of the body. Now, force or tension can build up in large muscles on rear edge of the body.

One wouldn't want to use this as volley form for a very fast oncoming ball as most are these days.

In that case a simple block is better.

But if ball is slow or slightly slow or hanging just a bit, as always, one can set the racket face quiet as first step of fundamental form.

And still have time for tension build-up through shrinking of the package and cut-the-wire release.

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Backhand Volley Drill in the Light of New Design

Assume that feed will put oncoming ball in the exact same place every time. Maybe a very good ball machine would.

Block one volley down the line. Stick the next crosscourt.

Establish this alternation and keep it going for a long time.

Then reverse the assignment. Stick down the line and block crosscourt.

But with what nature of stick? And with what nature of block? I have a feeling that after someone has played for a decade or more, they volley the way they always have volleyed no matter what changes or refinements they would like to implement for themselves.

But who should endorse such inertia? Other than a perfect sizzler, any volley could be cleaner, crisper and sharper.

For blocked volleys, try the Mercer Beasley formula from bent arm getting gradually straight. One uses fine muscle control to ease the strings into the path of the oncoming ball. Body skates easily forward at the same time. The purpose is to be very solid and use oncoming speed for one's power and not impose any of one's own.

To stick, try a cut the wire mini-slice backhand. Build tension between opposite hand on the throat of the racket and back of upper hitting arm.

Then cut the wire so that passive elbow, with no muscular effort from extensors shoots toward straightness.

If this method is not immediate improvement go back to unthinking volleys of the type you (I) have always used.

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Use SIM for Simian Pro Shot and Sick Kick

The tragic flaw of kinetic chain is that those who don't understand it-- most people-- use it to supply the form of some shot.

In fact, kinetic chain is best used as insertion of an energy stripe into some other form that looks different.

Regardless, one ought to shrink down kinetic chain farther and even eliminate it when hitting "the pro shot" or a "sick kick" serve.

"The pro shot" is the short forehand crosscourt that finishes the point as if just hit by a chimp who never misses.

That's one way this shot is SIM. The other is a combination of forward hips and shoulders at once. The hips turn from the legs, the shoulders from the gut, but both things happen at once and not in the sequence (SEQ) of heavier shots.

Similarly, in "sick kick," one can try for the sound of tearing silk and not much else. Because one's chest is open to the sky one can simultaneously rotate hips from the legs and shoulders from the gut to lift the elbow very high without compromise to elbow's alignment with the shoulders line.

Both this "sick kick" and "the pro shot" end with a lot of arm.

If pro shot is a McEnrueful, one uses a lot of roll, more than could feel good in classical eastern grip.

If serve is sick kick one can fire one's skewed tomahawk-- skewed because of arced toss and highness of elbow-- for a contact in which hand and strings are at same level.

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Self-Feed 10/8/14

1) There remains a way to go with the new tomahawk prominent spaghetti arm serve but what should one expect? NEVER PUSH A SERVE AGAIN. Present judgment on this serve: Promising.

2) Cut the wire flat, mild topspin, or slice short angle backhands: These shots can be bent arm if you get close to the ball. What does this matter if arm is passive, straightening in response to previous tension between opposite hand and back of upper hitting arm?

The reason not to do this might be that you could get hurt.

But if arm is relaxed and passively getting straight you do not get hurt because, at contact, nothing forwardly muscular is going on within the vulnerable middle of the arm.

I think I mentioned that one can pit the two mentioned pressure points against each other to form radial deflection of wrist and added bend to one's spring at the elbow.

3) Soft forehand topspin off a low ball hit with an Australian grip. What is the point in owning a grip east of an eastern and not adjusting for low balls-- the only sensible use for it in the ridiculous conventional view, e.g., "Well it might be good for a low ball: That's the only good thing I can say about it."

Remember, reader, there is a spectrum of arm bend for all the grips. If you don't believe me, observe the picture of Geoffrey Williams' extreme western forehand in his most recent article here in Tennis Player. From 1982 to the present in all the tennis matches I've played whether in singles or doubles I've never seen a forehand with arm as bent as that. Which is not a criticism but a recommendation.

At opposite end of the spectrum are Australian and even beyond that continental, both hit with a straight arm. Well, if you've got bone on bone in a knee you may no longer be what the girls in gardening call a "bendable." Maybe you'd like to bend some but to get strings low enough for a ball almost on the court a straight arm will definitely help.

Ray Brown, the neuroscientist and teaching pro, also pointed out that as you look down the spectrum you should notice that the progressive straightening in the milder grips naturally closes the racket face a bit. Converse of this is that if Geoff Williams didn't bend his arm so much he would with his favored grip hit the ball straight down into the court-- it wouldn't clear the net.

Going Australian, one can loft easy topspin for a short soft crosscourt angle. Backswing down and up to the outside helps. So does an adjustment in when one rolls the racket. I like to feel back knee, loosely bent, pushing around. And racket rolling up from forward low point (I feel that I should bowl in both directions) to get approximately square just at contact. I think this roll should be slow, an adjustment within the total stroke. Followthrough can keep the racket square.

For soft deep topspin off of same grip and arm length one can also crowd the ball and roll to square with followthough then keeping the racket square. The only real difference is that one uses normal backswing.

These two Australians are in marked contrast to a third that maybe even the Australians don't know about. Reader, do the slap of a slap-shot while closing the racket face to square. Then hit a flat shot like Chrissie when she uses an eastern grip with heel of hand on panel 2 . A slightly bent arm like Chrissie will be good too. But heel of your hand should rest on 1.5 . And save the straight arm Federfore/ATP3 hit with 3/3 (not classical eastern) for when you need it.

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Totally.