A New Year's Serve

[tennis_chiro]

Never Give In!

Re #'s 692 and 693:
...(although I don't renounce that constant effort).

Good stuff, Bottle.

NEVER GIVE IN!!!

don

[bottle]

Double-Gravity Service Rhythm: Very Good Stuff

Re #'s 692 and 693: These are extraordinary communication.

Although I haven't even gone to the court yet to introduce tossed balls into the new (or slightly new) service motion, I've been following Don's directions out on the lawn here, using a normal racket and another with a 12-ounce ball peen hammer tied to it.

That racket is a little tip heavy but works well so long as I take it easy, and I suspect that we'll buy or find another ball peen before we ever take the 12-ounce one off.

Clearly, the service structure Don's exercises and explanation can produce is superior to anything I've ever tried to invent on my own (although I don't renounce that constant effort).

[bottle]

The Weirdest Tennis Book in Captivity?

And you can have it for free-- don't buy the DVD! Just go to "Tennisforall.com" or possibly to "The Animated Tennis Book" or google the phrase "Tennis books will never be the same."

Is one of these phrases the book's title or do they all qualify if run together? And who is the author? It took me a couple of hours to partially find out. Have you ever, reader, seen a book where the author's name was not readily available? That's a new one on me.

But, during the search, I was multi-tasking and therefore was having fun. One gets to see animations of great strokes, videos, too, with good perceptions-- the author is especially good on contact point.

Additionally, the photos are good. But the shy author states: "The most important part of these pages is the writing, because writing is the medium through which knowledge is passed on."

The book comes to us from Great Britain, I would imagine, since the people over there may be more inclined to believe in words.

The author, I finally learned, is variously self-described as "Ewwy" or "Ewwy-Ewwy." I don't know about your computer, reader, but mine sometimes makes those two w's at word's center look like four v's . And that would be eight v's in Evvvvy-Evvvvy as in Evelyn, a woman. But then there is Evelyn Waugh, a man. But the author was covering a tournament in Key Biscayne, Florida where he repulsed Mary Joe Fernandez with his hirsute presence. Sounds like a male to me.

But who is the real author behind "Ewwy," reader? Do you know? Would someone ask Mary Joe? Would she or anyone share the secret here? I thought maybe, because of anti-intellectualism directed at Boris Becker and the author's positive though rambling and gossipy review of Andre Agassi's autobiography, and Ewwy's disdain for Pete Sampras' refusal to sign a boy's autograph one time, and Ewwy's allusion to the 16th century essayist Michel de Montaigne, that, he was, perhaps, Michael Mewshaw.

But then I remembered that Mewshaw's positive review of Agassi's book was pretty tight.

So Ewwy-Ewwy must be somebody else. Euuw?

[bottle]

I'm tying a 3/4 pound weight to the center of a racket with ordinary string right now.

[tennis_chiro]

I linked the wrong post

In reading "Your Strokes: Arthur Gosnell: Serve," I see a big argument for using John's windmill exercise along with Don's figure eight exercise if you are a rotorded server.

The argument is that, in the racket drop, you may actually hit your back with the racket, and that would be all right-- maybe not in your best serve, but this is an exercise to take you toward your best serve.

To go from that to what I personally want to do right now, I will next do normal figure eights and finally a few abnormal ones, where racket hits the back, then regain smoothness but with racket continuing to pass through the deeper vicinity.

The two exercises are close enough that THEY SHOULD BE DISCUSSED TOGETHER IMAO (In My Arrogant Opinion).

Sorry, should have linked the above post to this one.
don

Here you go:

Bottle,
have you tried using a weighted racket: place a 1/2 lb to 1 lb (max) weight on the middle of the racket face; just use some regular string to attach it. Then you will really feel the effect of gravity. If you start the swing with your hands about shoulder height and the head of the racket at about eye level, you need ALMOST no energy to get the racket up to where it will drop...and with the weight it will really drop. Then, just before it drops to the "pro drop", start your upward motion to the contact point area. In addition, try to initiate this motion with your hips (the feet together forward drill is good for feeling this). As the weight pulls the racket head further down the muscles of your throwing shoulder will get loaded for the upward hit. But with the weight, don't swing fast; just easy to get the racket up to full extension, allow full internal rotation and pronation trying to emulate the "Sampras downward racket post contact position" and then let the weight pull you around to the completion of the figure 8 which is, of course, the beginning of the next fig 8. If you do this right, you use only a little effort to swing up to the ball and an even lesser effort to get the figure 8 to do the loop on the opposite side of your body back to the beginning of the motion. Let gravity do the work. All in relative slow motion. Then go back to your own racket and try to feel the weight of the racket head. It will now feel like a twig so you have to work a little bit to find it. Then try to generate the same kind of pulls and feels swinging the regular racket, but still not at full speed. Focus on effortless continuous movement. Then start throwing balls into that motion: practice swing, hit, practice swing, hit. With two balls, you get 4 swings. Hopefully, you are practicing a perfect swing with the dry figure 8 and you can carry some of it over to the actual hit. And no steps allowed.

Try it out and let us know if that helps.
don

[tennis_chiro]

Use a weighted racket

When one gets overly technical in tennis, which to most players means getting technical at all, one has to ask oneself, "Are the distinctions I'm making helpful? Am I being too left brain? Am I being left brain enough? How can I put this stroke together?"

For a while in these posts I've been having a discussion with myself and even conducting a series of experiments over when to turn the body backward during a serve.

The subject is big, e.g., it involves initial stance, stability of the tossing shoulder, using or not using change of direction to fold up the arm, loading axle-like twist into the upper arm, etc., etc. and of course depth of pro drop.

So which is better-- early or late backward turn? Or is that even a good question? Today I'm going to compromise by spreading the turn out to keep racket moving on a straight line for as long as possible as it falls and rises like a roller coaster per don_budge.

In this way, the shoulder will be moving backward a little but not very much as I toss (with body gliding slightly forward).

Bottle,
have you tried using a weighted racket: place a 1/2 lb to 1 lb (max) weight on the middle of the racket face; just use some regular string to attach it. Then you will really feel the effect of gravity. If you start the swing with your hands about shoulder height and the head of the racket at about eye level, you need ALMOST no energy to get the racket up to where it will drop...and with the weight it will really drop. Then, just before it drops to the "pro drop", start your upward motion to the contact point area. In addition, try to initiate this motion with your hips (the feet together forward drill is good for feeling this). As the weight pulls the racket head further down the muscles of your throwing shoulder will get loaded for the upward hit. But with the weight, don't swing fast; just easy to get the racket up to full extension, allow full internal rotation and pronation trying to emulate the "Sampras downward racket post contact position" and then let the weight pull you around to the completion of the figure 8 which is, of course, the beginning of the next fig 8. If you do this right, you use only a little effort to swing up to the ball and an even lesser effort to get the figure 8 to do the loop on the opposite side of your body back to the beginning of the motion. Let gravity do the work. All in relative slow motion. Then go back to your own racket and try to feel the weight of the racket head. It will now feel like a twig so you have to work a little bit to find it. Then try to generate the same kind of pulls and feels swinging the regular racket, but still not at full speed. Focus on effortless continuous movement. Then start throwing balls into that motion: practice swing, hit, practice swing, hit. With two balls, you get 4 swings. Hopefully, you are practicing a perfect swing with the dry figure 8 and you can carry some of it over to the actual hit. And no steps allowed.

Try it out and let us know if that helps.
don

[bottle]

Spreading Out the Backward Turn

When one gets overly technical in tennis, which to most players means getting technical at all, one has to ask oneself, "Are the distinctions I'm making helpful? Am I being too left brain? Am I being left brain enough? How can I put this stroke together?"

For a while in these posts I've been having a discussion with myself and even conducting a series of experiments over when to turn the body backward during a serve.

The subject is big, e.g., it involves initial stance, stability of the tossing shoulder, using or not using change of direction to fold up the arm, loading axle-like twist into the upper arm, etc., etc. and of course depth of pro drop.

So which is better-- early or late backward turn? Or is that even a good question? Today I'm going to compromise by spreading the turn out to keep racket moving on a straight line for as long as possible as it falls and rises like a roller coaster per don_budge.

In this way, the shoulder will be moving backward a little but not very much as I toss (with body gliding slightly forward).

[bottle]

Hit the Back

In reading "Your Strokes: Arthur Gosnell: Serve," I see a big argument for using John's windmill exercise along with Don's figure eight exercise if you are a rotorded server.

The argument is that, in the racket drop, you may actually hit your back with the racket, and that would be all right-- maybe not in your best serve, but this is an exercise to take you toward your best serve.

To go from that to what I personally want to do right now, I will next do normal figure eights and finally a few abnormal ones, where racket hits the back, then regain smoothness but with racket continuing to pass through the deeper vicinity.

The two exercises are close enough that THEY SHOULD BE DISCUSSED TOGETHER IMAO (In My Arrogant Opinion).

[bottle]

~

Well, if somebody can be confused, he will be confused. When people are talking about a maximum use of gravity while serving, the term "first drop" could refer to the two hands falling and becoming separate.

In fact the "first drop" I mentioned in "Be an Animal" refers to "first drop" BEHIND BACK, possibly a not very low and almost imaginary backscratch somewhere near the spine.

I add this because I think the "Be an Animal" serve is effective and worthy of examination by any server who's rotorded.

For a definition of "rotorded," see Post # 666 .

[bottle]

Be an Animal

I finally played. Once again, I have to say, "Simplest is best." That would be a serve in the animal kingdom in which the hips turn gently back as the two arms fall.

From that decision, one concentrates on figure eights over and over again. Because that first turn of the hips now is out of the way, the separate parts of the serve are more clearly delineated. Toss and bend become more pure.

But I am not just a rotorded server-- I am an English teacher. And I fault tennis instructors across the board for insufficiency of articulation of what happens at bottom of the drop. First drop, pro drop, stretch-shorten cycle, windmill exercise-- I'd like to say I hate it all.

Actually, though, I only hate "stretch-shorten cycle," which makes me think, out on the court, "Drip-drip-- I have to run home and turn the dial on the washing machine."

And I hate "pro drop," which is no drop, because, to me, the expression implies extraneous motion somewhere in the arm when body alone should carry elbow forward and slightly more upward at this point of the serve.

It is the body alone that carries the racket tip out to the right and creates a parallelism for a viewer standing directly behind the person who serves.

That parallelism occurs when arm finally starts its triceptic extension. The two ends of the racket seem to rise at the same speed-- to that imaginary or real but impartial viewer behind.

With all of that said, I love the idea of the windmill exercise even though I don't think it applies to me, only to slightly less rotorded servers than me. You wind the arm and racket forward around and around like a windmill and maybe at top of the sixth gyration let your slightly open racket drop naturally down behind your back.

I'm sorry, but for the most extreme forms of rotordation, I have to recommend an infusion of more sideways-ness into the loop.

This happens better with figure eight pattern than with windmill. Which predicts a serve in which near the outset the hitting arm comes up slightly to the right-handed player's right.

I also love the expression "first drop" because that happens no matter who you are. The racket tip can't possibly point all the way down at the court until the body tilt does it.

So how many of the available internal and racket tip lowering arm actions should the player have completed at the bottom of "first drop?"

All of them.

[bottle]

In More Detail

If you're going from traditional (turn, bend, thrust and turn) to 8-board (turn constantly), you may decide that you've given away one third of your time.

How are you going to make this lost time up? Well, if backswing never hits a ball, you can either slow it down or speed it up-- shouldn't matter, not technically, at least, but you'll need to revalue the timing for either case.

I tried a unified but quick backswing today and liked it. Hips go back and arm goes back even faster (simultaneous) with racket folding under, i.e., the wrist humps. Is fall of racket gravity-driven? No, it goes down faster than that. It uses gravity but adds to it.

Rather than subtracting from racket head speed, this change increased it.

But how far to shift weight forward (as hips turn back) and when to "reverse" the hips become the variables now, i.e., fun things to fool around with.

I have to put the word "reverse" in quotation marks since a true reverse never happens. The front hip goes down as it turns back. The front hip goes up as it turns forward. The rolling, sinuous nature of this continuous action is sculptural (in three dimensions) rather than flat.

[bottle]

8-Board Serve

O, twist again
Like you did last summer
O, twist your wrist
Like you did last night
O, twist your hips
Like you’re a chubby
O, twist your bips
Now you’re a teletubby
Now twist your hips up
And you won in Davis Cup
Now twist your hips down
And come up from the ground

Around and round and round
And round you go, don’t you know,
Well what the hell, just serve like this
Yeah you should see my little sis
You should see my little sis
She really knows how to toss
And when she rocks her serve
Is a hoss, my sis is boss
So don’t be cross

My daddy is sleepin’ and mama ain’t around
Yeah daddy is sleepin’ and mama ain’t around
We’re gonna wristy wristy wristy
Till the Davis house come down
Now take me by my little hand and go like this
Eh oh twist baby baby twist
Ooh-yeah just like this
Come on little miss Davis let’s do the twist

[bottle]

The Serves were Working. So Did I get Bored? Possibly.

Okay, "phylum" is apt to refer to well known primary divisions within the animal or plant kingdoms, so today, in plant, I'll take the racket back long and low with a creeping motion exceeding the progression of simultaneous hip rotation, which also is backward (in a way of speaking).

Does this windup still employ gravity? Yes, the racket drops down, proceeds a long way, then rises up like a tendril whose growth is surrealistic through being perceptible to the human eye.

My idea is to gradually shift weight forward and perform one's toss during all of this, which may seem a compromise of earlier ideals of keeping front shoulder still or rising at that point.

The way it can work is if the toss starts up while shoulder is still tilting (slow diving) down. Then, in middle section of the toss, the shoulder reverses direction and comes up for support. After release, the shoulder keeps rising as part of the overall motion that is a moebius strip in which, actually, there is no backward or forward or pause, just flow.

This serve more than any I've hypothesized increases the range of overall loop behind one since racket first comes up butt first with strings inverted quite far beneath it.

[bottle]

Animals, Plants and Essays

Although the most severe critics of my method have been laying off for some time, I have to ask myself, isn't there a point where I ought to simply shut up and enjoy my discoveries, implementing them in play but not trying to tell the world about it-- and isn't this what any good player does when he finds something that is new and effective, knowing that the pen is mightier than the sword but that the tennis racket is mightier than the pen?

No, I want things both ways just as I refuse to settle, when it comes to serving, on animal domain or plant domain, I'll keep both, thanks, if that helps me win a match; on another day I'll keep to one or the other. A basketball coach would hate me and cut me from the squad. A guy who overhauls his foul shot mid-season?

I have something to prove, I guess, to myself if not to others, that language per se isn't worth a thousand worms any more than a single picture is. It's just that words, like the single picture, take too long for a majority of jocks. I go with the dance instructor I saw from the New York City Ballet. He simultaneously used words and demonstration, and all of his students, advanced, completely absorbed the lesson in one take. They went away after a single hour with eight new full routines.

If a serve is like a foul shot, you don't want to mess with it, you want to repeat it over and over until one day it becomes very good.

But I am not even playing tennis as the owner of this website once pointed out, and that is certainly true right now this summer.

I am going to play tennis, however, and not the same way.

To combine the realms (and by the way, reader, am I correct or is there a third or fourth service realm I don't know about?), I'll need to concentrate on toss.

Toss is definitely the foul shot I don't want to change, the commonality I can take from the one service motion to the other.

So, in animal kingdom the hips turn early and body can then be still for the toss after which one bends under the ball. Where did the arm point to begin the toss? Use that memorized position as the guide for an even more extreme stance in the plant phylum serves?

This thinking doesn't seem bad although it raises a problem of orchestration.

If I'm going to have two basic motions, I want them to be startlingly different, and a plant should normally extend but not jump up in the air.

This serve could be hard on a reconstructed left leg. One needs to be up on front toes and perfectly unweighted for a ground-connected but well-oiled pivot.

So, be careful. This is a warning to myself and anybody else who tries this.

[bottle]

The Easiest Backhand to Hit (in the World)?

Since people, for unknown reasons, actually listen to me at this website, perhaps I should make a suggestion, in grateful payback-- something that could render life easier for an innocent person.

This backhand, seen here, might be the easiest kind to hit.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/pro_men/stanislas_wawrinka/sw_backhand/sw_bh_wide/sw_bh_wide.html?SWBHWideClosedStanceCourtLevelRear.mov

Now I don't want that assertion to plunge myself into some brutal argument that pits all two-handers against all one-handers, of which this is an example.

My own two-hander only lasted for a year and a half, so I recuse myself from that discussion, don't know enough other than to say that keeping track of one hand on the racket might be easier than of two.

What is simple, and therefore easy to imitate, about Stan Wawrinka's backhand, and is this opinion of mine based on faulty or correct assumption? And would this matter? Why? You can try the shot I propose whether it's authentic Wawrinka or not.

My assumption is that Wawrinka's arm gets completely solid with his body before he starts his forward swing.

So, 1), hips glide forward, which levels the shoulders and lowers the racket, and this action is vigorous and definitely integral to the swing. You can easily keep your left hand on the racket for this.

Then, 2), even more vigorous, you swing your shoulders while keeping them level, and swing your arm independently from the shoulder too-- do both things at once.

Try the full swing easy. Try it hard. What a simple shot!