A New Year's Serve

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Time to Integrate Specific Footwork into the Two Forehands

For the McEnrueful, left right left.

For the wipe whip right left right.

These are baseline ideas whether these shots are hit from the baseline or not.

The third step for a whip wipe can be forward, backward or replacement-- whatever works best with oncoming ball to establish semi-open stance.

[bottle]

Report

Needed about half the grip change I thought to get what I wanted. That puts thumb pointer, in my system, loosely on flat part of top of racket. Will know more of course the minute I start to play which ought to be the morning of June 6 since I have that day off and the seniors' outside round robin or "carousel" will have started and runs MWF all summer. Theoretically, I'm in favor of grip changes that are inexact-- many grip changes with all of them permitted to feel like jazz improvisation.

In fact, however, I'm a guy I suspect like many others who needs more structure or "baseline" than that. Which is why I developed a thumb point system.

[bottle]

More Effortless Topspin

The new shot is such a good topspin forehand that one shouldn't hyper-criticize the second of its whip wipe names: 1) "bod whip" and 2) "bod wipe."

First shots tried in self-feed yesterday were loaded with both pace and spin and arced very high. They divebombed late, one would like to think, and bounded very high again.

But what will happen when one wants to flatten them out for a short angle or pass?

They'll go long, that's what. So slide thumb to the next pointy ridge even if one has resisted that move for one's entire life.

And ignore one's slight concern that thumb-pointer is getting too straight-- no longer properly diagonal-- in these heretofore unexplored regions of the racket handle.

For the new way of spinning the ball won't care anything about the thumb or whether it gets a blister.

One can barely graze Mount Extremis or even take the thumb off.

For It's firmed up pinky pulling on the rim that activates the bod whip.

To summarize: Adopt the new grip and make sure the outward elbows are high. With strings about waist level and kept parallel to court employ smooth ulnar deflection in first half of backswing. Exaggerate in second half of backswing backward hips rotation to jut inside knee and lower the shoulder and thus the poised bent arm. Start forward action from elbow and gut. Focus the bod lift by kicking out one's inside foot which lately went up on its toes.

Note: In a McEnrueful, a flat shot hit from composite grip and neutral rather than semi-open step-out, forward hips turn lowers the shoulder.

Here, backward hips turn lowers the shoulder as part of backswing, not foreswing.

That leaves stomach and flying mondo to start the rest of the act.

One commits early to outside foot.

The pushing out of relaxed fist from stationary racket head now becomes comfortable. It is more smooth stretch and less the distraction of a sudden elbow throw.

Bod whip can only happen once-- on the ball.

[bottle]

Overheard from Adjacent Court

"He might be getting paid for what he's doing."

I don't think so.

[bottle]

Ideas for a Post (and Self-Feed)

Bod whirl is primary in a McEnrueful. AB (aeronautical banking) is a secondary additive.

AB is primary in a bod wipe. Bod whirl is a secondary additive.

Well, it's one way of looking at things. To the extent that it is true, one should no longer dwell on loading up the whirl...but rather the bending and straightening instead.

One takes body angle and straightens thus shooting energy both up and down to the tune of Alexander's Ragtime Band.

To carry out the dictates of the Alexander Technique.

One siphons off some energy for this from the bod whirl additive, which has another function too, viz., the administration of poptop.

There is some bod whirl in an eight-oared shell, too. It enables one to be long or overly long at the catch. (One has only one oar.)

The primary sequence however is legs back arms.

Back and legs or legs and back then for the whip wipe. One doesn't need to think about that sequence since legs will always overpower the back.

Might be good to think of the bod whirl as more dance step than propellant.

A whirling jump which from beginning to end gathers momentum and speed.

Kick forward to render bod whirl more secondary at least in the hitting zone.

[bottle]

You were right, bottle, to despise the poor vectors that come with axle-like forehand arm roll of a laid back wrist. The finger pressure only solution you came up with, however, was not as good as what follows.

Realizing the implications of things can be extremely embarrassing, which could be the reason that so many people refuse ever to do it.

Sometime back, someone in this forum suggested that I might be on the wrong track with my effort to twist my racket like a feathering oar.

While feathering can work beautifully in a one-hand backhand, in fact can solve the ancient bugaboo of "turning the corner," the same sort of roll on forehand side, while not a complete disaster, nevertheless drains racket head speed and weakens the force of racket rise.

Worse, it creates unstable directions of one's strings.

The relaxed way of spinning the racket offered by Mr. X in posts 4212 and 4213 is more reasonable.

(But, as I always tell my second graders, "How can you expect to get credit if you don't put your name on your work?")

We should, Mr. X says, pull on butt rim with the pinkie, and see how this increases length of one's lever.

Yes, but why not then lengthen it still more by placing fulcrum at intersection of the two streets known as shoulder and neck?

Thus, instead of twisting the arm (axle-like) or lifting the arm (an inherently weak act) we start the wipe from whirling bod combined with aeronautical banking alone.

And then, immediately after the ball is gone, finish with solo arm work consisting of wrist straighten, elbow fold and roll.

Yes, "folderol" is what it is, the nihilists will say, wrong once again (https://www.google.com/search?q=fold...hrome&ie=UTF-8).

The folderol is decelerative but the continuing bod whirl is not and ensures that both wiper whip and poptop have occurred.

We think we have come to understand, through acquisition of our McEnrueful, how aeronautical banking (AB) works.

The McEnrueful is a flat shot hit with composite grip. Hips rotating forward lower the hitting shoulder for the subsequent AB through the ball.

No reason that same sequence cannot be applied to the strong eastern topspin shot with its narrowed down power column.

Hips can add in a similar way to all lowering of the racket.

Now though, the AB is not through the ball but up the ball.

Transverse stomach muscles provide the solid connection.

Arm though supported by continuing bod whirl can solo onward from there.

The AB, so important in adding pace to a McEnrueful, is now rather used to administer topspin in the narrow column shot.

Body whirl takes over the role of adding pace.

Windshield wipe or rather whip wipe is no longer from the arm.

It rather is from the bod until the ball is gone.

The whip is first from the bod.

Then and only then do arm and bod independently re-assert.

To summarize: Arm and bod take fist forward away from stationary racket tip.

Bod alone then administers the topspin.

Arm and bod then continue the vigorous pull to ensure that proper acceleration happened (Arias).

It is the AB that lightens one's feet.

And that is when you want to be looking back at contact like Steffi or Roger but not Orpheus.

[bottle]

Let Ulnar Deviation be Slow but Kinetic rather than Static

My one-hand backhand has put through a message on its psycho-metric broadcast system.

The message asks that I please not mess with my 1hbh very much, keeping in mind that it seems recently to have gelled.

So the added fiddling will be during wind back of bod on the forehand side.

You're already fiddling with old forehands quite a lot, bot, so just add some ulnar deviation to the mix. Calibrate speed of deviation to speed of bod turning back.

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How to Point Racket at Side Fence

You don't need to read instruction on that, right? Wrong. You need to do it with ulnar deviation whether static or kinetic-- should that matter?

That is, if you want to compress the column on a topspin forehand (from a strong eastern grip). Should I explain more? I don't think so. Figure this out for yourself, reader, or else just point racket at side fence?

Am I being wise-ass or not? I just think a slight lump at base of thumb changes all parameters and means bod and arm can assign racket a bit farther forward with same effect, viz., racket perpendicular to side fence.

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First Self-Feed Modeling Videos from 4212 and 4213

Maybe hit a hundred balls before I got one to hop the truly extra amount I want.

This little challenge is very much about applying some sound thought to my particular decisions of late, firstly to eliminate customary transition between backward and forward bod rotations.

That idea, to me at least, suggests that the forward bod rotation, muscularly speaking, can start while bod still is rotating back.

But that doesn't mean the same formula can be applied to every other action involved.

I'm thinking of a cue to create the lag I want-- that not only does fist pull away from racket but that racket gets momentarily stuck behind an imaginary nail.

[bottle]

Happy Self-Feed Coming Up This Morning

Let the extraneous stuff continue to fall away. The goals it contains can be achieved in ready position. Shoulders just a bit forward, elbows sticking out a bit more, hands starting a bit closer to brain. All this should help ground strokes on both sides, but only concentrate on forehand whip wipe for now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWBbUpn6cZA

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Whip Wipe

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wphQA7ZVNNc

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Swing from the Hips or from the Shoulders?

A much better question than most people realize.

Ivan Lendl once suggested that one could swing from the shoulders and hips could almost follow along.

In the round-a-bout of any tennis forehand it seems very likely that both things-- forward shoulders and forward hips rotations-- take place every time. The questions are to what degree and in what sequence if any and what do you want to do.

One could kick out a foot to slow the hips. For someone with a damaged or replaced front knee, I suggest kicking that one out-- forward-- rather than the other-- backward-- so as to avoid any hop on the damage/replacement.

In a semi-open stance of course one has the option of swinging as if one's stroke is neutral stance. Front foot then stays down and rear foot can stay where it was or slip to the side.

[bottle]

Good Posture Hunch in the Abbreviated Narrow Column Topspin Forehand

We build on image of a hoop.

The hoop is created in first half of backswing, the level part. I've got the hit hand moving out a foot from the point across hand.

Someone in a helicopter can see a hoop formed one fourth by bod, two fourths by bent arms, one fourth of free air.

Now the hoop, keeping shape, tilts as one bent arm goes up the other down.

I've also suggested that upper body should hunch or deviate a bit from its vertical axis during this tilt. Yes, but keep spine straight, not curved. One performs a double-tilt.

Rely on the tilt from the hips to set pitch of strong eastern racket more than by manipulation. I know that tennis technicians myself included have advanced that suggestion, viz. , that hand and arm should twist strings backward to get closed. Now I retract it.

Arm in second half of the backswing should do nothing but stay as it was.

Should we speak more on what will now happen? Perhaps not. On the other hand we have postulated that we will rely on aeronautical banking to supplement the windshield wipe.

Save up your AB then. Don't let it happen too soon. We're still bent a bit from the hips as bod rotates from the gut. The body angle, if you take ball enough out front, should assure that racket is square or slightly closed as it approaches a spot beneath the ball on a narrower trajectory than if you had remained bolt upright. So which was it-- stationary but rotating hips leading to no change of pitch or shoulders from the gut only which would open pitch a bit thanks to the tilt? Or a combination you'd rather not know too much about? The arm is fixed though straightening. The straightening, too, closes racket. Did you know that? Thank Ray Brown the observant neuro-scientist for pointing it out.

Backswing: Level then double-tilt.
Foreswing: Level then double-straighten.

It is instructive to realize that the arm straightening just discussed is sidearm throw from the elbow during level part of the foreswing.

[bottle]

A New Backhand: Are you Crazy, Bottle?

Of course. Come and join my game of Crazy Eights.

"But everybody is saying they like your backhand right now. Why would you change it?"

To possibly make it better. What does anybody know anyway? Every statement in tennis gets contradicted within six hours. And if I don't like the change, I'll go back. Either that or or use both things. Not as much fun as forging single-mindedly ahead but something I've done many times before with occasional success.

Proposal: Instead of using forward hips rotation to obliterate arm work (which consists of straighten to roll), put some starch in lower bod and obliterate with the transverse stomach muscles.

That keeps hips available for a pressing of both knees toward the net.

Yeah, just got up to do some miming in front of a mirror. Learn to hit backhands these two different ways. Ought to wreak havoc within the head of some overly sane person.

[bottle]

People May Claim to Have 1-2 Rhythm Ground Strokes but Do They Really?

I look around. 1-2-3 rhythm ground strokes.

1) backswing
2) some variation of a breaststroke or swan dive
3) foreswing.

I'll go directly from backswing to foreswing, thank you.

Think I'll rush the stroke? Nah. I'll just do everything a bit slower and end up using the same amount of time.