A New Year's Serve

[bottle]

Trial, Not Theory

Re # 966, with regard to flatter version: I liked 0 inch and 11 more than the others. Longer elbow travel (11 inches) changed nature of the required roll. And no elbow travel (0) spread out roll so much that I felt like continuing it after contact to end of the followthrough, a simplification. And outgoing ball had more pop on it after bounce somewhat similar to topspin variation-- which is more effective? Should I eliminate one or the other?

Decisions like this could also be termed morchestration, i.e., "more orchestration."

In passive arm straightening topspin variation did better if I discarded numbers from the outset and simply tried to get racket butt as close to ball as possible before unleashing the roll. The roll is quick enough that racket tip may reach its rolled-up-to-highest point before the end of the followthrough, which then will be farther along and perhaps a tad higher.

Questions: How will this pure topspin version fare in doubles and singles if one alternates it with slice? Will one have need of a flat backhand or has that now become redundant and mere self-distraction? The delayed roll offers good control of racket pitch anyway. So which is better-- flattened topspin or more topspin added to flat?

This last question seems relevant because of the difference in mechanics now introduced between these two drive shots. I'm rolling or starting roll sooner for the attempted flat shot.

[bottle]

Calibration for These One Hand Backhands

From rear shoulder rising like a wave, try inside out swings in which you become aware of how far the elbow, independent, has traveled by contact. Try 0 inch,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10, etc. Like arpeggios in singing, go up and then down, i.e., increase with each dropped ball and then decrease with each dropped ball. You're searching for combinations you like best, no?

[bottle]

Four Stars

Yay****

[bottle]

Morchestration

If you've got a bassoon, then get a piccolo. If you've got a Korda-modeled backhand, forget Petr Korda, who has nothing to do with your venture. If you've got a Ferrerfore and you like certain adjustments to it that you've made, try applying them to your Federfore.

Keep-the-elbow-in backhand: Everything is about putting strings on outside of ball and hitting not pushing the shot. Topspin and flat backhands both: 1,8 grip applied to inside out swing. Flying grip change continues its energy to open the racket face and carry tip farther down and around. Forearm slants down to make an electrical connection with the court (see post # 945). Rear shoulder rising concludes the backswing. In forward part of these strokes immediately send elbow around and up but slow at a single speed and on a single rising plane for as long as possible.

Topspin backhand: Body movement plus elbow travel naturally/passively straighten the arm. Sudden but rhythmic roll of straight arm which takes strings vertically up back of ball (don't egg it!) does not affect speed of the slow-swinging elbow.

Flat backhand: Body movement plus elbow travel plus early arm roll plus muscular arm straightening all is simultaneous and regulates slow swing.

Forehand: Ziegenfuss (conservative). Small round loop followed by arm swing at ball. Body then chimes in. Catch racket about where Valerie Ziegenfuss and Ivan Lendl did.

Ferrerfore: In my version arm doesn't get much farther back than pointing at side fence but a big shoulders turn has taken place by then. Arm and mondo then take racket tip back in response to forward body rotation as if this shot is a horizontal serve.

Federfore: Try same thing but with straight arm. This shot will have nothing to do with Roger Federer, who among his other achievements is simply a man who starts long trains of thought in others.

[stotty]

Stars

I have never voted on threads. I only just realised the 'star" feature was there. Anyway, I just awarded your thread with some stars...

[bottle]

Three Stars

The rating for this thread has declined from four stars to three. If you nevertheless want to buy my tennis book, mostly written when my rating was four stars, simply go to the following link: http://bottle-booksandstuffbyjohnescher.blogspot.com/

[bottle]

Same Contact Point for CC and DTL

Flat BH: For CC (I surmise), one need only keep shoulders slanted down a bit longer.

[bottle]

Re-Orchestrating the One-Handers

Who am I to defy the common wisdom that one hand backhanders need to hit through the ball more?

Let's say for purposes of argument that I have a topspin backhand that works well. I've certainly described it enough. It features early travel of the elbow which aids passive straightening of the arm. The strings then roll vertically up the back of the ball. That move is accelerative while elbow keeps traveling at a slow even rate.

The park attendant who keeps one net up for me through the winter loves this shot. He says I can make it land deep in a two foot square patch all day long.

(Yes there are people who encourage me in my madness.)

But I'm not happy with my attempted flatter version of this shot. Today I'll try different mechanics. Roll will occur immediately, well before the ball simultaneous with both an active component of muscularly regulated arm straightening and the same early-off-the-mark elbow travel.

Strings will ease into the plane of the subsequent long arm swing in other words, and if this won't work immediately in competitive play, I'll of course return to my mental drawing board.

[bottle]

This was good. I know it helped clarify my thoughts. And I think I'll be trying both almost any time I play. Once you become a student of slice, which many players won't even try, you discover all kinds of variations-- I think. Then I guess it becomes a matter of how much you want or need to specialize. You wouldn't want to have some variations that were in disrepair since you didn't use them enough.

Also, a lot has to do with what works for the individual. I know that in social doubles on Friday I tried some simple chip service returns, which didn't work as well as when I tried the Steffi-slice. Not definitive, I know, but maybe somebody did something in the past that provided some kind of foundation?

There's individual physique of course and individual ability to learn something (to learn something that had better be soon in my case). And relative difficulty of the subject.

Which is easier to learn, Ken-slice or Steffi-slice? Monica certainly had great respect for Steffi's slice.

Personally speaking, I don't think people knew too much about Steffi-slice although it was right out there in public for everyone to see. I know that my understanding started with a vague image of something that looked like a sea serpent or maybe a dolphin and I started from there.

I think learning either-- Ken-slice or Steffi-slice-- is going to take a long time for most people. No, let's not say "learning" but rather "mastering."

[stotty]

Thanks. But excessive slice! I want it.

No, I don't want the ball to hover, but if the slice of Graf, Dolgopolov and Federer all is excessive for us ordinary players' purpose, can we not add that each produces the excess with different technique?

Actually, I'm not yet prepared to analyze Dolgopolov, but he did use this slow slice yesterday to help dispatch Gilles Simon (on TV).

But the way that Steffi and Roger produce the excessive rpm's deserves comparison right now. Both use double arm roll as one would expect. But Roger's backward roll (and for that matter some of his forward roll, too) occurs behind his head. And as one would expect of a Swiss gentleman, his stroke is tidy, reasonable, and well timed.

Steffi-slice on the other hand is way out front and employs a lot of Wagnerian surf. First the rear shoulder goes up. When a comber rises like this, I can only think of the black stallion rising in a poem by Stephen Crane. Stephen Crane would always use the objects of land to describe water. A rearing horse with short forelegs pawing the air (Oh, I added that part) to describe a rearing wave. Before one's impression is over, the horse as it rears actually seems to be inside of the rearing wave.

In his short story THE OPEN BOAT almost all of Stephen Crane's seascape is described through land images, e.g., big mudflats. And Ernest Hemingway, who worshipped him, attempted much the same effect in THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA although I'll have to check.

These guys were geniuses, so why not use their perceptions wherever we can to produce excellent tennis strokes?

In Steffi-slice, let's say first that her rising shoulder is a wave. And then a cliff. And then her racket head tumbles down the face of the cliff rolling this way and that. And then-- CRASH-- the wave breaks right on the ball as she takes her body bow, with rear foot pulled up even from the racket work.

A stroke with body jackknifing like this affords opportunity carefully to calibrate the amount of body weight pressing through. Depth of shot is therefore easy to achieve. Withholding weight will be smart for the short angle. But if ball hovered, then hit the next one like Ken Rosewall with level shoulders but still make it sizzle "with venomous spin." (Expression from John M. Barnaby.)

Yes, give me Rosewall any day. No jackknifing here. Just effortless fluency that is only possible through wonderful technique. Rosewall could hit passing shots with his sliced backhand...can Federer or could Steffi...I doubt it.

[bottle]

Venomous Spin

Thanks. But excessive slice! I want it.

No, I don't want the ball to hover, but if the slice of Graf, Dolgopolov and Federer all is excessive for us ordinary players' purpose, can we not add that each produces the excess with different technique?

Actually, I'm not yet prepared to analyze Dolgopolov, but he did use this slow slice yesterday to help dispatch Gilles Simon (on TV).

But the way that Steffi and Roger produce the excessive rpm's deserves comparison right now. Both use double arm roll as one would expect. But Roger's backward roll (and for that matter some of his forward roll, too) occurs behind his head. And as one would expect of a Swiss gentleman, his stroke is tidy, reasonable, and well timed.

Steffi-slice on the other hand is way out front and employs a lot of surf as in Wagner's opera THE FLYING DUTCHMAN. First the rear shoulder goes up. When a comber rises like this, I can only think of the black stallion rising in a poem by Stephen Crane. Stephen Crane would always use the objects of land to describe water. A rearing horse with short forelegs pawing the air (Oh, I added that part) to describe a rearing wave. Before one's impression is over, the horse as it rears actually seems to be inside of the rearing wave.

In his short story THE OPEN BOAT almost all of Stephen Crane's seascape is described through land images, e.g., big mudflats. And Ernest Hemingway, who worshipped him, attempted much the same effect in THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA although I'll have to check.

These guys were geniuses, so why not use their perceptions wherever we can to produce excellent tennis strokes?

In Steffi-slice, let's say first that her rising shoulder is a wave. And then a cliff. And then her racket head tumbles down the face of the cliff rolling this way and that. And then-- CRASH-- the wave breaks right on the ball as she takes her body bow, with rear foot pulled up even from the racket work.

A stroke with body jackknifing like this affords opportunity carefully to calibrate the amount of body weight pressing through. Depth of shot is therefore easy to achieve. Withholding weight will be smart for the short angle. But if ball hovered, then hit the next one like Ken Rosewall with level shoulders but still make it sizzle "with venomous spin." (Expression from John M. Barnaby.)

[stotty]

Re # 953: A better cue than teeter-totter: The slight twirl counter-clockwise of a baton.

Or switch back and forth from one cue to the other. Or invent a third. The desired action is all that matters.

Also, in re-watching the following clip of Steffi (at 22 point), I see preparatory turning down of shoulders followed by a jackknifing of the waist while on the ball-- two different actions in different parts of the overall cycle.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8RibH0lB3w

The baton twirl backward, however, is in the same half-cycle as forward roll of straightening arm from the shoulder.

Both arm rolls are melded together in just the forward action in other words.

But the body rolls-- that's a different story. If you buy my premise that Steffi-slice is a two-part rather than three-part creature, then the front shoulder goes down twice and it all could be called "a big dig."

Never liked the way Steffi did that...point 22...it created too much slice... made the ball hover....never really noticed the over-slicing until I saw her live at Wimbledon...clips only tell you so much....watching a player in the flesh tells so much more...

Loved the 954 post, bottle...great stuff.

[bottle]

Improvement on Teeter-Totter

Re # 953: A better cue than teeter-totter: The slight twirl counter-clockwise of a baton.

Or switch back and forth from one cue to the other. Or invent a third. The desired action is all that matters.

Also, in re-watching the following clip of Steffi (at 22 point in the video), I see preparatory turning down of shoulders followed by a jackknifing of the waist while on the ball-- two different actions in different parts of the overall cycle.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8RibH0lB3w

The baton twirl backward, however, is in the same half-cycle as forward roll of straightening arm from the shoulder.

Both arm rolls are melded together in just the forward action.

But the body rolls-- that's a different story-- they're more spread out. If you buy my premise that Steffi-slice is a two-part rather than three-part creature, then the front shoulder goes down twice and the whole stroke could be called "a big dig."

Last but not least, the force of the jackknife carries Steffi's left foot up to her right. This is straight out of John M. Barnaby if one gets one's tennis from instruction books, or right out of video if one is a paragon of visual transmission.

Regardless of where one obtains ideas, one can take this re-balancing step right out of the present video and do it oneself and maybe continue on to the net.

[bottle]

SOS Pointing THAT WAY!

If I can't think about spine of scapula too much, then I'm going to look at different illustrations and descriptions and learn about this subject in every which way I can which is how the scapula works anyhow.

Always, I think, I've had a fondness for human anatomy-- that ought to help.

Once in my youth I made my way into the bedroom of a Harvard medical student from Wichitaw Falls, Texas. I won't reveal her name since she subsequently became a very famous person conducting medical research in South America and I wouldn't want to embarrass her or myself.

In fact however very little happened between us in that tiny room except that she reached under her bed and pulled out a handsome wooden box and slid back the cover and pulled something out.

"The clavicle," she said, "the most beautiful bone in the human body."

What is sex? Maybe not what most people think. Maybe sex isn't even sunlight as D.H. Lawrence thought.

And what is a clavicle other than a collarbone? When one googles clavicle and clicks on "images," one sees among the countless photos of decolletage a bevy of distinguished female models with well pronounced collarbones just under the skin.

Does a clavicle move? Not if the woman doesn't. It's fixed and independent-- the reason it's easy to break one, something I don't recommend.

On the posterior side of the body, the spine of scapula wiggles this way and that. It's the excrescence atop the scapula and therefore is one unit with the unstable scapular bone, which stretches on muscle in all kinds of surprising directions and is pretty large and appears the shape of Ossabaw Island ten miles from Savannah, Georgia.

Of all the wonderful information just provided by Doug Eng at "Coaching Tools Required to Fix This" I single out this included link, particularly post # 2 because of its compelling description of scapular instability.

http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showthread.php?t=395796

We tennis players subscribe to kinetic chain without ever considering that a chain is only as good as its weakest link, and as we learn from Eng's posts a lot of people think the backbone is connected to the armbone and leave out Ossabaw Island.

No wonder that Mike Mussina could pitch a perfect game and give up 12 runs four days later. No wonder that Roger couldn't serve worth a damn against Nole in Abu Dhabi.

Everything having to do with scapular throw is inspiration. The scapula is uncertainty itself. A basic shape of bodily construction however seems ideal. That would be the spine of scapula lined up with clavicle and upper arm at the moment of greatest transmission of energy-- a matter of simple leverage.

The clavicle as I'm receiving the information (and Doug Eng uses the term "clavicle" as much as anyone else) becomes a rough guide for what the spine of scapula ought to be doing since clavicle is in the front of the body and easier to keep track of.

But SOS could point in any which direction and frequently does. We'd like clavicle and SOS to point in the same rough direction-- a challenge in that all of this human bone tends to be curved.

"Line up the levers"-- no?

[bottle]

Negative Experiments are Positive: Keep Hand Still

Re # 944, "Oregano," which was about introducing a bit of looseness into the stroke tract of Steffi-slice, don't do it.

The hand becomes the fulcrum of a teeter-totter. Then shoulder becomes fulcrum for a second roll, this one in the forward direction.

Mess not with this.

Sometimes change isn't glacial and evolutionary and doesn't involve ages and eons. I knew after two missed shots.