A New Year's Serve

[bottle]

Three Forehands from Li Na Running Position with 3.5 Grip

1) Slightly drop racket head then straighten arm and hit a Federfore, finishing around left shoulder.

2) Keep arm bent like Djokovic and finish over shoulder.

3) Go from bent arm to straight from contact for maximum extension like Li Na.

[don_budge]

The Game of Singles in Tennis...Talbert and Old

These likenesses of Donald Budge compel. The use of thatchwork to portray shadow in drawings # 2 and 3 of the 8 gives a good sense of hips turn. The authors of THE GAME OF SINGLES IN TENNIS, William F. Talbert and Bruce S. Old, knew that drawings can present emphasis even better than the photographic frames from which they are taken.)

Those are some fantastic drawings. Any idea when they were made. My guess is around 1970 or so. He looks just a tad younger than when I knew him. The artist caught his skinny calves and legs alright. The motion looks exactly as I remember it, particularly sketches #1 and #2...more so than that video when he was younger. As it was he was such a distinguished gentlemen and he was getting older gracefully.

That is a fine book on tennis...Talbert and Old's "The Game of Singles in Tennis". There is a sister book too..."The Game of Doubles in Tennis". Both fantastic and classic tennis books. I use to have them, or rather I should say my father had them. Somehow some of his books end up in my library. But these two somehow went out and were discarded in one move or another. I regret that they are not in my library.

[bottle]

Forehand Waiting or Running Position

I often don't like TENNIS magazine articles and columns but have found much to admire in the Nov/Dec issue.

I'd like to draw attention in particular to the waiting position of Li Na, illustration # 1 in "Li Na's Forehand," an article by Rick Macci in the Great Shots section.

This seated forehand look, with left shoulder under chin and the hands just split and straight left arm pointing at right fence can all be achieved in unit turn.

Then one can go running or not as needs be.

This position seems good for any grip or planned arm length, but I must confess that, personally, my left hand still is on racket at this point.

Hope to get to Li Na's more athletic position soon.

And install next a cluster of octopus's suction cups, i.e., miniature radar, sonar and humidity detection devices all along the straight left arm to produce a fly's eyes composite image of oncoming ball.

[bottle]

Cleverness

Cleverness most often is an irritant, as suggested by the strained, artificial smile frozen on the face of Mitt Romney or the vapid joviality of both him and Paul Ryan.

Very personally speaking however-- which is exactly what I advise that everybody in the world do-- I've never found more cleverness anywhere than in the book TENNIS MADE EASY by Lloyd Budge or in any tennis stroke produced by his much younger brother, the former baseball player J. Donald Budge.

This is not to say that their technique surpasses the future. It doesn't.

But Lloyd and Don were extraordinarily clever men. And cleverness, as nowhere else, is a virtue in tennis.

So we all should observe and listen to these two dead guys however we can.

[bottle]

Second Gear to First

So much more fun playing with an energy-saving device:

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DB1stSRear.mov

Face it, miserable youths, with the shuttle lift-off method that you presently employ, you have to overcome your body weight and then hope that you have enough energy left over to create some velocity.

And everybody knows that young people are becoming more obese.

Self-instruction for next service session: In after school driver's ed, work more on downshifting, i.e., focus on second gear to first gear hips transition as exemplified by Donald Budge's turning first of his right heel and then of his left. Then, if it's Monday, proceed directly to tennis court for a 20-minute session with basket in which you keep all attention beneath the knees.

Serve from the heels. Let them be the foundation.

[bottle]

Progress

[bottle]

Drawings and Video

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DB1stSRear.mov

So, through repeated viewings, can we notice anything else? There’s always the chance that the repetition will ensure that we notice less.

In forward action, however, the right heel pivots before the left heel does. Some people might say that this is a change of gears.

The shoulders bump out toward target a lot more than the hips simultaneously bump back toward rear fence, with hips spiraling up at same time to lend starch to the plot.

Now, finally, the Ed Vebell drawings (but give me a while to get them up):

[IMG]Budge Photos_0002.jpg[/IMG] Yikes, I've got to see the little paper clip. Before I see that, I can do nothing, and it's not coming up right now. (Just go to the next post, reader, and notice at first how wonderful these drawings are. Arriving at this verdict will put you in an unusually good mood to learn something new. These likenesses of Donald Budge compel. The use of thatchwork to portray shadow in drawings # 2 and 3 of the 8 gives a good sense of hips turn. The authors of THE GAME OF SINGLES IN TENNIS, William F. Talbert and Bruce S. Old, knew that drawings can present emphasis even better than the photographic frames from which they are taken.)

That’s why the professional field of scientific/medical illustration exists.

Also, Talbert and Old, tennis players themselves, may have been exerting their belief in competition—or was it an editor who was responsible for there being different illustrators in the same book: Old Vebell then author’s wife Katharine D. Old with a second “a” in her first name like Hepburn, third Stephen P. Baldwin, who made countless diagrams of points.

It’s all good stuff, but, we’re spoiled by the one great video we have:

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DB1stSRear.mov

And we wonder if Donald Budge ever did use his hips to screw down his front foot into its original flatness. Or was that mere “educational emphasis,” i.e., projection of the verbal instruction that left foot “pivots only slightly throughout.”

Certainly, if we like this serve enough to imitate it, we can try both methods: screwing the front foot down or leaving the heel up as in the video.

[bottle]

Exploration

A leaning toss while keeping weight on close back foot per Donald Budge is one of the greatest feelings in the world. You're tall!

Up until now I've believed that the slight body angulation that occurs and reverses in these serves ought to be accomplished at end of wind-back of shoulders.

That will be no less true if one assigns this whole double-wriggle to the weight shift scheduled to happen only as ball starts to descend.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DB1stSRear.mov

[bottle]

Mistake

Rod Laver's the guy who won two Grand Slams. But Don Budge was first person to win a Grand Slam.

[bottle]

On Two Trips to the Court

Don Budge's serve got him two separate grand slams, so it couldn't have been too bad. And he certainly encountered plenty of politics when you consider his match against Gottfried von Cramm, which really was against Adolf Hitler, it turned out, with von Cramm, after his defeat, getting consigned to the eastern front and a miserable life. To commemorate miserable politics in general and tonight's debate before it happens, I'll inject some politics into this post.

Before I do that, however, consider this change to your imitation Don Budge serve if you combine it with a full rock forward and back before the real action starts-- a habit you probably picked up somewhere else.

It's not appropriate for this serve since you need lots of body time to establish the "leaning tower of Pisa" and controlled toss. Just starting from back foot like Don Budge or Charlie Pasarell easily solves the problem, and in fact, if you serve a basket of balls this way you'll feel as if you've cut the usual energy you would expend in half.

The well deserved politics now:

http://isearch.avg.com/images?s=sideNav&cid=%7b9964ABE8-B9E4-4049-AC8C-B45AE2D3B933%7d&mid=c320ad2a679d47d1abe2d14acce4e9e6-365535d64004f1a67909292933bdd755870c53b3&lang=en&ds=ins10&pr=&d=2011-12-28+14%3a03%3a17&v=11.1.0.12&sap=dsp&q=i+screwed+you+all

[bottle]

I Just Saw Stotty's Post (#1299)

I can be just as facetious about people who've spent all of their energy getting up into space. Now they're recalling their experiences on waterbeds as they try to figure out how to have best sex in weightlessness.

There doesn't seem to be anything to push against and Anais Nin wouldn't like it. She used to get both fists under the small of her back, she wrote.

Of course, some people do figure out how to serve well in Air Jordan mode. But complete release of energy? One person in a thousand succeeds at that.

I don't think any energy is lost when hips bump one way, shoulders the other and some poor hockey player goes crashing into the boards. Not if one has learned to ride ground force properly. And if one has the good sense to play shoulders against hips for heaviest ball. If there's too much looseness in hips-- no, you've lost. But if shoulders are thrusting toward net from the almost braced hips, which sway backward only a bit and that for counterbalance?-- no, that would be different.

Does energy just go up? I thought it went down first. Jack Broudy is interesting on this. He thinks it starts from the rotating tire in the middle and goes both down and up. I wonder if the half that goes down then comes back up and joins the other that already went up or would that be "leading from behind" or next trolley car?

If you saw me limping around Chicago for the past three days, you'd know why I'm serving the way I presently am.

Which is all about putting a big emphasis on rotational elements while staying close to earth. Also, the Detroit Tigers made it to post-season baseball, and all of their pitchers send their energy along the ground rather than up into the weightlessness of present textbook serving instruction.

[bottle]

Release, Apogee, Contact

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DB1stSRear.mov

Release, apogee and contact are the benchmarks.

When does the small wind-back of hips take place? During the lean and toss.

When does shoulders' wind-back countered by small wind-forward of hips take place? From release to apogee.

When do hips cock toward net? As ball begins to descend.

After that, reader, you (and I) are on our own.

[bottle]

Putting Weight on the Serve

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DB1stSRear.mov

Slant is completed by ball release.

This doesn't qualify as weight shift, in the quoted views of Donald Budge and his service coach Tom Stow.

Not that they explicitly make the distinction. But they both agreed that weight shift only begins as ball has reached its apogee and changes direction.

The only way we can watch the above video and believe them is to say that leaning of the Tower of Pisa doesn't qualify as shifting of any weight.

In learning serves, people focus on every possible power source. Here it makes more sense to contemplate Donald Budge's perfect stillness of head from ball release to apogee.

[stotty]

Post rule change service theory seems, if one believes those who actually talk about it, to admire early generation of a maximal ground force.

This ground force, like fast-moving sap, spreads then through successively smaller tree limbs as it converts from slow brute force to maximal racket head velocity.

So where in the body does this brute force come from? Quads, mostly. It's just dumb muscular push.

The old serves whether fully understood or not don't work like this. While the quads, a part of the subsidiary kinetic system, are intricately involved in extension and cocking the scapula for ten per cent more racket head speed, they don't push down as hard as they could.

If they did, Don Budge's front foot wouldn't pivot on its toes the way it does in the following video, but rather would be rooted and stuck-- non-twisting-- in place.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DB1stSRear.mov

Note: I now would like to contradict all earlier exposition whether from me or anyone else in history on the subject of a straight line up left leg and right arm in these serves.

The left leg and the right arm sure are straight, but there's a big jog of upper body (toward the net) in between them.

Seems to me energy cannot be fully released if a player has to keep one foot on the ground. So where does that unused energy go...back down to the waist...double over...out through the arse? (or ass where you come from). Or does some energy stop at the waist and go out through the arse before it can get any higher up? Those guys must have conceded a lot of energy/power by having to keep one foot on the ground...

[bottle]

Staying Light on Front Toes

Post rule change service theory seems, if one believes those who actually talk about it, to admire early generation of a maximal ground force.

This ground force, like fast-moving sap, spreads then through successively smaller tree limbs as it converts from slow brute force to maximal racket head velocity.

So where in the body does this brute force come from? Quads, mostly. It's just dumb muscular push.

The old serves whether fully understood or not don't work like this. While the quads, a part of the subsidiary kinetic system, are intricately involved in extension and cocking the scapula for ten per cent more racket head speed, they don't push down as hard as they could.

If they did, Don Budge's front foot wouldn't pivot on its toes the way it does in the following video, but rather would be rooted and stuck-- non-twisting-- in place.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DB1stSRear.mov

Note: I now would like to contradict all earlier exposition whether from me or anyone else in history on the subject of a straight line up left leg and right arm in these serves.

The left leg and the right arm sure are straight, but there's a big jog of upper body (toward the net) in between them.