A New Year's Serve

[bottle]

More Racket Head Speed in Lloyd Budge Kick

I fully realize that I may be the only person in the world actively working on this particular challenge, but that doesn't mean somebody else shouldn't try it.

I wish to orchestrate this serve with my Don Budge imitations (flat and slice variations) while emphasizing one commonality between the two brothers, their threshing heels.

In Lloyd Budge kick, as seen in the illustration of Post # 1342, one can wind back hips early during the tossing phase as front heel goes up, and continue shoulders wind after that while holding hips in place.

In the other two serves, forward hip rotation is involved in front heel going down as rear heel goes up and shoulders continue their winding back.

Instead, I propose to hold the hips where they are for good sideways position and to draw more simple force out of the gut.

That keeps front heel up through major administration of force but with heels to swap level by contact.

Could work. We're here to experiment. Anything goes when looking for more RHS.

[bottle]

The Serenity of Serena and More Tango

You see it in her serve when she plays her best. By her own admission, she didn't practice the serve for that match.

The question then for us ordinary tennis players is not "What does this mean?" but rather "What COULD it mean?"

That one has experimented and practiced plenty, i.e., has thoroughly paid one's dues, but isn't about to confuse practice with performance.

If you have a good serve, you'll come up with the very best version of it under situational pressure in a tight match rather than in practice, and this is good.

Am talking about confidence here, and in the case of a type A man, the most macho confidence possible as expressed in the song "Libertango," the key words of which are "Home with anyone he wants." I'm about to repeat those words now not because I advocate libertinism but because it's dance lesson time.

Home with anyone he wants.
Slow slow quick quick slow.
Slow slow tango close.
Home with anyone he wants.

Three syllables ("anyone") on one quick beat? Craziness. Of course. Crazy confidence.

Great God, I yam free!
Slow slow tango close.

[bottle]

Two Drops in a Don Budge-Patterned Serve

Not cough drops or condensation but one gravity fall succeeded by active work of the arm, specifically:

Acceleration upward with palm facing down.

Squeeze of arm to graze an imaginary mirror in palm of hand across the back of one's head (to check for cooties, of course. The cooties are in your peer group, no?)

Opening out of racket. Although some persons might call this a second drop, I choose not to because of the pro-active arm work-- more of a swirl...but this stirring of a pot does take racket tip down and out toward next desired phase, which is:

Racket along right edge of bod.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
What are we trying for here anyway? A good pitching motion. First drop is at 32 feet per second per second-- all gravity-- so we needn't worry about that.

The faster the upward rise, however, the more time to check for cooties.

Once the cootie check is done, the serve gets immediately fast.

At least my one or two aces in four sets of doubles at 6:30 a.m. were struck in this manner. Opening out of the closed racket was the suddenly remembered innovation worked into figure eights while the other three geezers chatted.

Previously, I kept palm down all through the loop.

I apologize to somebody for the detail but not to myself. A detail here or there is what this current project is about.

[bottle]

No, but my ex (thanks to the influence of Hungary) and her new husband have. They are both experts on renewable fuels.

Maybe I'd better try that again. My ex and her new husband visited Cuba, according to my son. Something to do with renewable fuels, I think. But they didn't go to Cuba because of the influence of Hungary.

No, my ex became my ex because of the influence of Hungary. Hope it's all clear, and Hope may hope that too if she ever reads this.

[stotty]

Swimming, flip...and Cuba

I see your point about the arms. A couple of other things:

1. Strange how Karsten's left arm peels right away from his body; almost like doing the breadth stroke, before folding in like it should.

2. Karsten has a very undramatic/minimal flip compared to Djokovic.


Have you ever been to Cuba, bottle?

[bottle]

Paul Laxalt and the Karsten Popp Forehand

Senator Paul Laxalt, the former boy's champion of Nevada, once saw me sweeping the High Knob Mountain Virginia tennis court and suggested that that was the way I ought to hit my ground strokes.

He may have been right, he may have been wrong. And I guess that neither he nor his close friend President Ronald Reagan was a fan of Pete Seeger:

I may be right
I may be wrong
Bring em home,
Bring em home
But I've got the right to sing this song.
Bring em home
Bring em home

But the good Senator may have been right about my forehand. (I'll work on my backhand later.) His own forehand, a dipsey-doodle learned from Helen Wills while she got a Reno divorce from her Moody husband, seemed to me nothing like a sweeping, industrial-sized broom but rather a sudden, totally unreadable flail.

When, in sober post World Series light (the poor Tigers!), I re-evaluate Scott Murphy's latest article,

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/classiclessons/scott_murphy/traditional_forehand/

, I look at the repeating video of Karsten Popp and notice something new: THE LENGTH OF HIS ARMS.

One's arms don't usually change their length much once one attains initial growth but the tennis player can always adjust his elbows for different scope.

I'm talking about waiting position: Karsten Popp's racket is way out toward the net. Different people ought to try this.

[bottle]

Ha!

[don_budge]

A wave of the hand...that meant nothing in particular

Hungarians are good for aphorisms and proverbs. The great Hungarian film director Alexander Korda, whose production company was behind "The Third Man" (1949) directed by Carol Reed and starring Joseph Cotten, Orson Welles, Alida Valli, Trevor Howard and the zither of Anton Karas, came up with a proverb that goes, "If you have a Hungarian for a friend, you don't need an enemy."

Well, I have had just one Hungarian girlfriend in my life and don't ever want another. But after just one tennis lesson she hit good topspin. And among many talents, she wrote songs, one of which contained the English words "this way and that way."

When she came to this phrase she would lift one arm from her guitar and twist her hand this way and then that way.

Another fascinating post bottle...if you don't mind me saying so. That business about the Hungarian girlfriend is tempting for me to comment on but I will refrain...for now. I knew this Hungarian girl and she also sort of tossed her hand this way then that. When I first met her and offered her a ride home I asked her where she lived and she made that exact gesture and I never gave it a thought. I just dropped her off somewhere and I assume she would find her way home. She had a lot of difficulty with the backhand probably due to the same sort of ambivalent motion with her hand. Funny that you mentioned that.

[bottle]

This Way and That

Hungarians are good for aphorisms and proverbs. The great Hungarian film director Alexander Korda, whose production company was behind "The Third Man" (1949) directed by Carol Reed and starring Joseph Cotten, Orson Welles, Alida Valli, Trevor Howard and the zither of Anton Karas, came up with a proverb that goes, "If you have a Hungarian for a friend, you don't need an enemy."

Well, I have had just one Hungarian girlfriend in my life and don't ever want another. But after just one tennis lesson she hit good topspin. And among many talents, she wrote songs, one of which contained the English words "this way and that way."

When she came to this phrase she would lift one arm from her guitar and twist her hand this way and then that way.

Some tennis players would say "pronate" and "supinate," or "internally and externally rotate"-- not the same as in my friend's song but if you don't understand the difference, esteemed reader, sorry, I can't tell you.

Vic Braden thought a server ought to keep his palm faced down the better to form a natural loop. But John M. Barnaby thought the in and out of this contraption-like loop was unnecessarily complicated for a human being, so the aspiring player should open out his racket near the rear foot instead, then drop the racket from overhead straight down.

The part of the Pete Sampras serve that Steve Navarro specifically points to in Tennis Player relates to Steve's notion that one's serving loop should be full and natural. If one follows this clue, one may find that one's racket turns this way and that way, which subsequently may make him more philosophical about life.

What I remember from my "imitate-Pete-Sampras-days" (before I correctly perceived that everything in his serve is predicated on extraordinary human flexibility) is the abbreviated wind up (early bent arm) in which palm faces down. But in the split-action frames provided here by Geoff Williams and narrowed down to possibly "key" by Steve, the racket next turns the other way, i.e., opens out behind Pete Sampras' head.

And after that in good serves as we all have been repeatedly told, the racket lines up with right edge of the body.

Is there news here? I think so. I see new transition probably never before expressed or comprehended between racket fall otherwise too parallel to back and racket lining up with right edge of the bod.

Note: By mistake I put this post here rather than under "My take on the Sampras serve. The things no one else talks about"-- a sentiment that certainly can apply to more than one or two aspects of this amazing shot.

[bottle]

A Trio of Forehands from Karsten Popp's Takeback Only with More Protracted Body Turn

1) Long-armed and flat with no wiper but rather a modicum of poptop. Catch followthrough or cross wrists, touching them together.

2) Short-armed and flat-- a shot perhaps as different from 1) as 1) is from a Federfore. Catching followthrough or touching wrists together is a good possibility.

3) Federfore.

2) probably needs most explanation in context of posts already written, and also by virtue of my not having had time yet to air this redux version on a court. For me, 2) is a return to something I did way back only off of straight back preparation.

Played five sets of indoor doubles with five different partners last night losing first two sets and winning last three concluding with a 6-0 . Different people think about different things after they lose or win. Me, I'm apt to come up with something like 2) .

2) will be a shot in which the right-angled arm never alters length. Well, that isn't strictly true since a Karsten Popp looking backswing

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/classiclessons/scott_murphy/traditional_forehand/

with right elbow offset toward right fence in waiting position will start with two halves of arm at acute angle (see note at end of this post).

As racket comes back in slot-- at good elbow separation that will maintain as well for 1) and 3), I'll, you'll, we'll, they'll, it'll want a timing drop to correspond to the straightening and reverse through flip and contact and beyond of 1) and 3) .

Why do I say that? Because, in the tango lessons we're taking, I'm learning that the special language of "slow, slow, quick-quick, slow" is what personally helps me do this dance the most. Or "slow, slow, quick-quick, slow, slow, quick-quick, tango, close" (sixteen beats) and a few other eight-count variations, e.g., "quick-quick, quick-quick, quick-quick, slow." The two instructors can mold my posture and connection and mood and get me to turn my belly button more toward my partner and other technical stuff, but, if I can get the rhythm right, I can pretty much do anything I want and lightly push Hope counter-clockwise all around the edge of the floor (line of dance).

Same with 2), the redux shot proposed here. Elbow of bent arm maintains good separation from body-- we already know that.

So, simply adjust arm to no more than a right angle as you circle elbow in to body. Same timing, same style, same game.

Then-- and here's the big difference-- the forearm swings around (forward) on top of everything else as if one's elbow is the hinge on a gate.

Think that through again. Independently, the forearm sweeps around perfectly parallel to the court. Finally, elbow lifts to desired followthrough.

This is a shot that absolutely kills balls of a certain spin (or non-spin) and height. And is useless in countless situations, which is why you need 1) and 3) or different but equally potent shots.

Note: The first video of Karsten Popp clearly shows that the two halves of his arm are at obtuse, not acute angle to each other. So, if one wanted to obtain 2) from this construct, one would shrink rather than expand arm to a right angle as one circled the elbow in.

[bottle]

Self-feeding

Just as "flip" improved on "mondo," so "self-feeding" is better than my "dropping balls and hitting them." Once agreeing to some such verbal improvement, I try to use it from then on.

The language of tennis as of anything has far more power to shape than people usually understand or acknowledge-- the main reason I've always thought that teaching pros should be talk genre linguists or writers or English majors (or minors or miners).

Here is the sentence that originates "self-feeding" for me. It occurs in the Scott Murphy article "The Traditional Forehand: A Living Model" and has to do with Scott's decision (temporarily as it turned out) to obliterate his classical roots and commit to the modern game: "For hours I would self-feed and work on hitting copious spin."

Note: In recent posts I have extolled the Karsten Popp backswing over that of Roger Federer (admittedly a bit sensationalist of me). And the backswing of Roger Federer over that of Juan Del Potro.

The true goal of such statements however is not, "My daddy can whup-up on your daddy," but rather the development of critical insight. You see, I expect reward for all the years I've spent on my Federfore. But what reward? A forehand like Roger Federer? No, a forehand somewhat like Roger Federer which coincidentally is the most reasonable I can find anywhere in the world or discover on my own as if none of the world's examples and models has any pertinence to me.

The elliptical backswing of Karsten Popp is spare and therefore more useful for me than that of Roger or Juan. Karsten and Juan however hold on to their racket with left hand for longer to meet the universal turn-the-body requirement. Both point at side fence with left hand but not to turn the shoulders more the way Roger Federer does.

Am I on to a bit of Roger's greatness here? Perhaps. But why should I care?

Because I can hit the ball with more consistency and accuracy and pop or spin if I turn back my shoulders for a longer time to keep my backswing more of a single piece.

[bottle]

We Think And Then We Conclude

The world is full of mystery and surprise. The greatest forehands are never the most sensible ones. The forehand backswing of Karsten Popp, more economical than that of Roger Federer, can be used to hit either classical Karstenpop or Federforian top.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/classiclessons/scott_murphy/traditional_forehand/

[bottle]

Goose, Gander, Forehand, Backhand

A decision to protract the turning back of one's shoulders on both sides using Roger Federer as forehand model and John McEnroe as backhand model is significant occurrence in the tennis life of the hacker/recreational player.

He or she will probably need to do something very clever to buy the time necessary to manufacture such dramatic improvement.

Improvement over what? Not turning in time and/or not turning enough. Abruptness of preparation abetted by weapons of mass tennis instruction.

Does abruptness work in a good golf stroke? A good billiards stroke? A good baseball stroke? A good tennis stroke???!?

So what is the magic or "clever thing" that will allow anybody to keep turning his shoulders backward as he runs so that those shoulders just become fully cocked as he seamlessly arrives at his destination and strokes the ball.

I'll tell where and what I think it ought to be-- different on the two sides-- but first I need to stress a simultaneous unit turn and leaning of the head in the direction you want to go. This is the first requisite. And this is only the beginning of the long turn of the hitting shoulder.

If the ball's coming right at you on your one-handed topspin backhand side, you may want use opposite hand to "yank" the racket as far as it will go toward the rear fence, as Nick Bollettieri once advised for one-handed backhands all the time in an early book. Or yank it toward the side fence if you're so thoroughly strapped for time that you want to shorten up.

YANK! What does that mean? Plenty of abruptness, right? And complete turning of the shoulders backward as part of the unit turn and flying grip change all of which is simultaneous.

Well, it was an emergency.

In the longer geometry of a ball hit away from you, you can stop at a convenience store and buy some milk, i.e., you can turn your shoulders as you run or drive your car. Your car has a player in it and you're going on a long trip so you may as well bring along some talking books.

Flying grip change in that case would get the racket back but not the shoulders-- not yet. Of course if you're John McEnroe no grip change is needed. He is truly set up for a slow winding back of his shoulders perfectly timed to the ball.

On forehand side, I've already said what I think you/I should do (post # 1344): Wait in an offset position which closes racket since the goal for both sides is to subtract arm motion from a groundstroke equation in which body dominant solid protraction equals rhythm that is nothing if not smooth.

Most simply, this instruction preaches less waving around of your arm as the counselors taught you at Camp Nippeewaukee in order to consign you to mediocrity. And preaches a great and super-early break for the ball that will at least give you a fighting chance to initiate and attain the timed and gradual takeback of a big league tennis player.

[bottle]

In Praise of Lopsidedness

Building on post # 1336, "Two Bubbles in a Typical Federfore," which outlined four factors contributing to Roger Federer's closing of his racket face to hit a forehand, I should now like to eliminate one of these factors once and for all.

"Eliminate useless motion" is either a well known maxim in tennis or should be.

The factor I wish to eliminate is the first bubble in the stroke where Roger pushes his elbow mid-motion out toward the right fence.

Totally unnecessary in my view. One simply modifies one's waiting position so that opposite elbow is tucked more into left side, and the right elbow has more space between the body and itself.

Possible downsides to this change: 1) Atypical oncoming ball may require more closing of the racket face than the new position offers. Solution: Put some bubble back. 2) The new waiting position will disturb the one-hander's ten-year myelination of his backhand backswing. Solution: Use a vigorous flying grip change that all at once takes the racket quickly back and deposits it anywhere and in any attitude that one chooses.

Altering one's waiting position seems radical departure but isn't half as radical as abruptly tucking one's left shoulder under one's chin as part of one's unit turn-- a proposal tried out in hits with good players and in this thread and in doubles and now intensely disliked by me.

[bottle]

More Ifs for the Iffy Tennis Player

Starting from the premise that tennis is golf on wheels, one wants a slow, smooth body turn at the heart of one's backswing, with backswing here defined as everything in a forehand that isn't forward swing.

Holding hand in front to measure oncoming ball for too long will rush the latter part of one's backward shoulders turn. Either that or one won't use enough of a backward shoulders turn and thereby will diminish power.

Zinging backward so that opposite shoulder immediately tucks under the chin as part of the unit turn creates an abruptness which is overly conceptual, mechanical and schooled.

I understand why so many tennis instructors advise this but think it's a mistake. Sure, too many players don't get back in time. Does that fact dictate however that one should sacrifice the essential smoothness of a more protracted backward turn like that of Roger Federer?

No matter how rushed he is, Roger always has time for smoothness. Not that his shoulders don't stop similar to the top of a good backswing in golf. Perhaps one should say they "pause" if there is a difference between "pause" and "stop." In either case, the shoulders aren't stopped for long.

When I watch videos of Federer, I see his shoulders slowly swing back similar to one's pulling back of a pool cue in pocket billiards. I see his shoulders briefly pause then while his arm straightens. Before his arm has fully straightened however, his shoulders have started rotating in the opposite direction.

Forward rotation then drives the last bit of arm straightening and the flip.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/high_speed_archive/phantom/Roger_Federer_HD_HS/index.html?dir=Forehand/RF_FH_Center&stroke=RFFHCenterOpenStanceRear4_250fps.mp4