A New Year's Serve

[tennis_chiro]

Okay, ... so go on...

There was the withered arm baseball pitcher Sandy Koufax. There was the withered arm bowler who starred in a famous three-hour-long Bollywood film about cricket vs. the colonials in India.

In the olden days of the holdover sixties, there was a straight tennis player from Maryland, very good at the net, who could only hit flat serves or serves with slice.

Although she reached the quarterfinals of Wimbledon, she knew there was something missing, and that would be a good kick serve, so she went looking for it in the neighbor state.

This was a confusing time for everybody, with the Vietnam war hanging on and on, just hanging until it could become the Iraq war and then the Afghan war.

But this lady whose story bore a superficial resemblance to that of Pam Shriver, who also had a supinated shoulder and was from Maryland but reached the U.S. Open Final at sixteen, was growing stronger every day.

Pam had dark hair, Pym red hair, and I don't think they ever met. To call either a girl would be a mistake-- they were women. And when I say that Pym Morris was "straight," I don't mean in the sixties sense but refer instead to her posture and bearing. Pym was so straight and tall that her opponents would quail. The match was usually over the first time they met at the net.

Pam Shriver hired a hitting partner, Hank Harris, from Rappahannock, Virginia, I believe, but Pym Morris went down into Virginia looking for a tennis playing chiropractor she'd heard about, and everybody knows the story of what happened next.

As she drove along, she looked out from her car to see people lying prone or supine everywhere since Virginia was for lovers.

She found the chiropractor she was looking for in Front Royal, Virginia.

"You shouldn't develop hangups just because your shoulder is supinated," he told her. "You were born that way. Your shoulder socket hangs a bit low. It's the only thing about you that isn't straight. Look, can you move it? Does that hurt? No? When you pull it down and back like this, that's scapular retraction. When you lift it up and forward like this, that's scapular adduction. So let's go out on the court. I want to see if you can snap the shoulder up into the more traditionally correct position and beyond just as you hit the ball."

Okay, Bottle, you have me on the edge of the chair...

don

[bottle]

The Lady Who Couldn't Hit A Kick Serve

There was the withered arm baseball pitcher Sandy Koufax. There was the withered arm bowler who starred in a famous three-hour-long Bollywood film about cricket vs. the colonials in India.

In the olden days of the holdover sixties, there was a straight tennis player from Maryland, very good at the net, who could only hit flat serves or serves with slice.

Although she reached the quarterfinals of Wimbledon, she knew there was something missing, and that would be a good kick serve, so she went looking for it in the neighbor state.

This was a confusing time for everybody, with the Vietnam war hanging on and on, just hanging until it could become the Iraq war and then the Afghan war.

But this lady whose story bore a superficial resemblance to that of Pam Shriver, who also had a supinated shoulder and was from Maryland but reached the U.S. Open Final at sixteen, was growing stronger every day.

Pam had dark hair, Pym red hair, and I don't think they ever met. To call either a girl would be a mistake-- they were women. And when I say that Pym Morris was "straight," I don't mean in the sixties sense but refer instead to her posture and bearing. Pym was so straight and tall that her opponents would quail. The match was usually over the first time they met at the net.

Pam Shriver hired a hitting partner, Hank Harris, from Rappahannock, Virginia, I believe, but Pym Morris went down into Virginia looking for a tennis playing chiropractor she'd heard about, and everybody knows the story of what happened next.

As she drove along, she looked out from her car to see people lying prone or supine everywhere since Virginia was for lovers.

She found the chiropractor she was looking for in Front Royal, Virginia.

"You shouldn't develop hangups just because your shoulder is supinated," he told her. "You were born that way. Your shoulder socket hangs a bit low. It's the only thing about you that isn't straight. Look, can you move it? Does that hurt? No? When you pull it down and back like this, that's scapular retraction. When you lift it up and forward like this, that's scapular adduction. So let's go out on the court. I want to see if you can snap the shoulder up into the more traditionally correct position and beyond just as you hit the ball."

[bottle]

One-Sided Scapular Adduction Off Of The Ball

A big first serve sometimes happens for me, and I try not to think about it too much.

Second serves are a bit more conscious and dependable. How good are they, though? Not very, if one suffers from rotordation in the shoulder.

Today I envision the racket on edge with tip held down as it comes up to the ball.

So what's going to hold the racket tip down? Well, one factor can be some delayed scapular retraction.

The big question relates to Jack Groppel's assertion in Post # 793, which we hypothesize is true. And we know that one-sided scapular adduction does add sling-shot-like force to any serve.

Applied in one direction it can add weight. Applied in another, it can add spin?

[bottle]

Thanks so much.

[stotty]

Sounds like a bargain!

[bottle]

Well, good luck, Bottle.

[bottle]

Why At Kindle Store?

The reason I'm putting A NEW YEAR'S SERVE: PERSONALIZED TENNIS STROKE DESIGN in the Kindle Store before I even try to sell it in the literary marketplace is my long experience with agents and publishers. They promise a lot but never come through for me.

Also, I'm 71 years old. Given the state of American publishing, I estimate that I'll be 81 before I sell this book-- and circulating it is not how I plan to spend the next ten years. I'd rather play tennis.

This decision means a much lower price, $6, for anyone who wants to buy it, have it all, or give it to their buddy who doesn't subscribe to Tennis Player, etc.

[bottle]

Note To Self In Which Numbers Are Estimated mph

Instead of 4 3 2 1 0 for a normal serve, keep the arm at 4 4 4 4 4 for wide slice. Worth the experiment anyway.

[bottle]

Wide Slice As Big Ziegenfuss Upside Down

A Ziegenfuss is a forehand in which the arm swings at the ball first and then the body chimes in.

A Ziegenfuss is hardly an example of kinetic chain, is it? KC would be DRY BONES with arm bones pretty near the end connected to the hand bone, no? With hand bone connected to the...racket bone.

So let's take our Ziegenfuss and windmill it toward the net and up over our head.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/famouscoach/denn_ralston/developing_the_slice_serve/developing_the_slice_serve.html

Watch how Dennis Ralston, in the first video, swings his arm first (and then the body chimes in).

You can see it in the buckle at the rear of his cap. That buckle doesn't move and then it does.

[bottle]

Rope Trick (Lariat) Artistry: Applying Figure Eights To An Old Post

Well, here is an old Tennis Player post with a new response to it for A NEW YEAR'S SERVE: PERSONALIZED TENNIS STROKE DESIGN, my forthcoming book about to go up at the Kindle Store.

A Septuagenarian's Response to a Tip from "Dr. Jack"

The tip: “When trying to spin the second serve, let your wrist snap. Don't try to pronate excessively. Your elbow and shoulder rely on the pronating action as a follow-through mechanism to decelerate after impact. If you try to force the pronation, there is no follow-through and tendinitis could result (Page 171, HIGH TECH TENNIS by Jack L. Groppel, Ph.D).

The response: When I first read this, I mocked “Groppel’s WMD warning” as needlessly manipulative fear-mongering and dowdiness, but now, some years later, want to steal any good idea I can. For totally opposite viewpoint on the technique here, see the YouTube videos of “Coach Kyril,” who recommends very early internal rotation of upper arm on spin serves. Reader, run your own experiments on this one and reach your own conclusion.

Since I haven't yet reached my own conclusion, I'll go to court today (but what kind of a court, Bottle) and apply this older action to see if Jack is wise, that I'll get a longer follow-through out to the right and presumably with racket still high, and whether this improves upward spin still more.

It's an old action. Like everybody, probably, I used it for years, then changed, then changed back, etc. The difference is that I'll work it in to my presentation through the use of figure eights, i.e., down and up rhythmic motion forming a moebius strip, actually, through the addition of an arbitrary curlicue at the end which enables one to stay continuous for as long as one wants.

Continuous motion, I believe, is the reason that the most eager people are able to master the incredibly complex motion of the rowing cycle in crew in a relatively brief time, i.e., in less than the 10,000 hours everybody talks about and far less than ten years. The best college crews achieve mastery in less time than their four-year academic program.

Figure eights, windmills, too, are great. They relax a person, loosen him up, grease the neuronal pathways. And if you want to perform any little experiments like this present one, your figure eights will give you an advantage by providing more of the norm you need for comparison.

Just relax and get your service action the way you want it before you try it with a ball or two, and then stop the eights and hit normal serves. Wrist this way? That way? No problem.

[tennis_chiro]

Try the orange ball

Any ideas of an activity that could be compared to Futsal/Soccer for tennis? The only idea I could think of would be a smaller court, full sized rackets swung at full speed, but with a slower moving ball that is especially receptive to spin. Almost like a whiffle ball used for pick up baseball that someone has cut ridges into, curveballs that start eye level and drop to the shoe laces of batters.
Perhaps a higher net by a few inches, even?
Long rallies, spin emphasis, side-to-side movement, exciting play.
Drop shots that stop on a dime, kick-serves jumping over opponents heads, etc.

The more I think about it, it sounds like clay on amphetamines. And the clay court players have come to dominate the sport.

You should try playing with an orange QuickStart ball or even the red one on two facing service boxes. Have you ever seen video of the 10andunder championship matches in Europe? Awesome!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUQLwaRBj8Y&feature=related

If a 60 foot court is available, use it. But just working the ball in the service boxes will serve the purpose. Playing "dinkem" is effective in building feel around the net. And the simplest answer of them all is simply hit on a backboard, either with an "green" ball on a quick backboard or on a GTTS "The Wall" type backboard. I forgot to mention that there is a cheaper, smaller alternative to "The Wall" at GTTS. You can pick up the Strokemaster backboard for $500.

http://www.tennisbackboard.com/buy_now.asp?product=2

I am an advocate of The Wall and I haven't seen the Strokemaster in person, but it looks like a great alternative for limited funds and/or space.

The way Coyle talks about the little girl doing "deep practice" phrase by phrase; I believe in building tennis strokes and then tennis games and tennis players with those kinds of building blocks. So I've become known as too much of a technician. I agree, but not until you get past the part where you have to be a technician. So I like all my little drills and using the machines and the walls. GBA sounds great, but I think I can enhance it. But that's also why I told you not to forget to play!

don

[westcoast777]

The Futsal of Tennis

Any ideas of an activity that could be compared to Futsal/Soccer for tennis? The only idea I could think of would be a smaller court, full sized rackets swung at full speed, but with a slower moving ball that is especially receptive to spin. Almost like a whiffle ball used for pick up baseball that someone has cut ridges into, curveballs that start eye level and drop to the shoe laces of batters.
Perhaps a higher net by a few inches, even?
Long rallies, spin emphasis, side-to-side movement, exciting play.
Drop shots that stop on a dime, kick-serves jumping over opponents heads, etc.

The more I think about it, it sounds like clay on amphetamines. And the clay court players have come to dominate the sport.

[tennis_chiro]

Thanks from me, too, Bottle

My copy of The Talent Code just arrived today. I just got done reading the first chapter. Fascinating. Inspiring. Motivating. I feel a little bit like Edwin Link with my Global Tennis Teaching System. Especially the way everyone ignores us.

How do you practice for the kind of play the top 4 players in the world were demanding of one another this weekend. No one else has been able to make Rafa go where he had to go against Nole this weekend. Only a few guys in the world can even get close. He needs to practice hitting away from the source and there has to be someone on the other side who runs that ball down and is able to hit it away from him. Two on one's work to a certain extent, but even one hitter is too expensive for most lessons. As a young teaching pro, I was glad to try to be a foil for Paul Annacone and while I was a pretty good player, I was no match for Paul. And it ruined me for the rest of my teaching day, so I had to schedule it accordingly.

But with my GTTS system, I can push even a Nadal or a Federer to levels no one else can. I can give them patterns to practice (up to 9 balls) and I can create shots that actually simulate spin on the order of a full Nadal forehand (true we top out at 80 or 90 mph, but we can make it really heavy). That is what Coyle is talking about: "deep practice". But so far, I haven't been able to convince anyone that we have something special. It's a little frustrating.

And the futsal story is very hopeful when thinking about under-10 tennis. It also tells me we are going to be way behind in the US or at least in CA for another 10 years because we are still not adopting Quickstart in a big way as they are in Europe and I am sure the rest of the world. Kids can't develop the myelin circuits they will need with rackets they can't swing in the way they will swing them when they are bigger and stronger. The kids that go through extensive competition(a couple of years) in Quickstart are going to have a big lead on kids in the US who are developing incorrect circuits with equipment that is too big for them. And this has to happen when they are 6, 7, 8 and 9. So our kids won't make it until they are entering a comparable system at age 6 or 7. So we are at least 10 or 12 years away from catching up with where the rest of the world is going!!

don

[don_budge]

Thanks bottle...

Dear Professor bottle...

From those 27,007 hits, a number of them have been mine...I made it a point to be the 22,000th just so I could introduce myself. I'm glad I did. I thank you for your efforts and your messages and the inspiration that you generously spread among us...your readers. I read every word...Big Brother!

don_budge

PS...after trying to serve blind...try it with your "Eyes Wide Shut"!

[bottle]

Serving Blindfolded at 27,000 Hits

Yes, Boss, this is a great idea. Even in rowing, I used to blindfold my college kids, but if there were ice skirts on the Monongahela River or on Fish Creek running out of Saratoga Lake ten miles into the Hudson River, I'd wait for the warm phase of global warming since if someone caught a crab they might go hypothermic and die.

I'll be sure to try my version today, now that you've re-invoked the exercise, while remembering that I have the old VHS film of Vic Braden's assistant pros serving blindfolded, too, but while jumping on a trampoline, and I agree absolutely that rhythm is the most important thing. That's why I'm so taken with figure eights. Before a major study is conducted on every tennis student that Don Brosseau (chirotennis) ever taught, I'm going to estimate a saving of 5000 from the usual 10000 hours because of Don's rhythmic eights.

Every time one makes one's continuous, never ending moebius strip through the air, with or without a racket that is weighted or not, a little more goop accrues on some neuronal pathway.

This can be done blindfolded or not, but if someone really likes to be blindfolded, she can...no, he can remain that way while we play a singles match.

In post # 781, "Hysterian Serve," I recommended that one arm go up at 4 mph, the other at 2 mph-- an idea I stole from somebody else and not too bad. But now I'm thinking,

Both hands can drop straight down from a point where racket is at eye level. Using the 32 feet per second per second rule for determining acceleration, one should be able to figure out a single speed before the two hands separate. But don’t do that.

Instead, say that tossing arm does go up at four mph. And that it may have gone down at four mph—who cares? The difference now will be in supposing speed rate of the racket arm. Aim for four mph, then three mph, two mph, one mph, and no mph as arm finally bends to a right angle.

Don Brosseau’s figure eight exercises, available at Global Tennis, YouTube in the form of videos, will prove especially good for doing this. And play with the numbers mentioned here until one obtains good serves?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Some people think that I am "very, very personal," especially a certain New York literary agent. But if I weren't that, I'd be nothing.

There's a certain number in my life that for five or six years I swore I would acknowledge today, and now I'm going to do it. Like any number, it starts with another number, and that would be the 27 different jobs I've had in my lifetime.

From that we go to the 27,000 hits I obtained at Talk Tennis before elephantiasis burned me in effigy, and we both were banned from there, me lifetime.

Tennis Player, as you know, is a smaller site than Tennis Warehouse, and as you also know, reader, you pay outright for Tennis Player.

So I am proud, very proud, and my pride comes from listening to nobody.
Here it is: 27,007 hits today, and thanks.