A New Year's Serve

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Good points. Such a fast action seems awfully tempting, doesn't it? When you watch Dogopolov serving in slow motion you can almost feel the weight gathering on the feet and the total focus of his action.

I'll bet there are servers who could benefit from going slower and others by going a bit faster without going as fast as Dolgopolov.

I'll bet there are servers caught up too much in every little detail of a protracted serve and quick servers who will never pay enough attention to any detail.

Then there is the Matthew Syed thinking about ten-year "chunking" of an action through repetition so it can get faster and more unified in a very natural way deeply affecting one's nerves and physiology. One would hope that a server going in that direction got the details right at the outset-- but to me that seems doubtful. No one ever gets the details entirely right at the outset or even halfway through their tennis career-- just part of life.

It was interesting to hear Dogopolov after he won Washington (how Querrey and Haas must have hated it) say that he's a total risk-taker and that's how he lives his life and plays his tennis.

Wow, an Evil Knievel! What a high when it works though.

Someone willing to forego neutral shots and consistency? A teaching pro's (his father's?) worst nightmare? Or did the old man contribute to the madness and the two became distant from one another for other reasons?

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Re-Drawing the Engine Room of a One-Hander Topspin Backhand

What spoils a one-hander topspin backhand is the elbow moving out from the front edge of the body too soon.

One can do "cling" backhands as an exercise to fight this. 1) Straighten arm from hips. 2) While keeping elbow touching front edge of body, clench the shoulderblades together. 3) Swing from shoulder ball to finish stroke. You have to since your clench is all used up.

Now, staying in an office environment, move the racket and arm away from the body a few inches. Don't even think of a swing yet. You're shifting the whole apparatus directly toward side fence. The cling is gone but now you're a Klingon with more leverage, i.e., more radius.

Why couldn't you backswing to this new position? Why couldn't your flying grip change set your elbow there (a few inches out) rather than close to or touching the body?

But I don't want to eliminate the option of an in-close backswing in which the racket then moves out during hips turn and arm straightening to preserve flashlight-- unless this robs time. Will have to find out.

Now that I've started making the distinction between clench swing and shoulder ball swing, I can't see how I ever lived without it.

Either stroke-- cling swing or Klingon swing will work, but the second one should be wider, stronger, looser, funner? Will have to find out.

And the Klingon swing starting position, farther out, opens racket more, which means you have to roll it shut before contact.

Contact point for these extremes of shot is on the same line moving out from body roughly toward the left fence post for a crosscourt shot.

Basic pattern doesn't vary-- inside out. The swing is an arc that briefly coincides with your target line. Coincides with but never crosses it in either direction.

Hips phase of this shot is "arm straightening phase" is "flashlight" phase. Clench phase is the "get the strings around to outer edge of ball phase."

Does this essential alteration-- of keeping elbow back for longer-- bring contact point back, too?

Unquestionably. But, as Ivan Lendl suggested long ago, if contact is too much out front you lose everything-- well, you lose power he said in the book IVAN LENDL'S POWER TENNIS As Told to Eugene Scott.

The revelation here is that shoulder ball swing and scapular swing both produce arcs, but the scapular arc veers more sharply right for a right-handed player.

I hope I don't have to correct this post. In some ways I've been through these ideas a thousand times before; in others, it's all new.

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Progression Parades

1) The silly backhand just described: Not so silly? Not to be dismissed without sufficient trial? Dropping balls only, I produced easy flat backhand without much spin. For bigger spin did hips then clench (level part of stroke) then lifted the arm all before contact. But kept the circular path that produces coincision. Surprising how quickly the added step of shoulder ball arm swing still brought the racket tip around since it was lifting hard at the same time.

One avenue of possibility here, again taking into account the scapular-shoulder ball sequence: Play with "bird," i.e., that moment when arms go up like wings. Nobody ever said or should have said this had to occur precisely at contact or one and one-half foot before or any other set place.

If one is scapulating from leading edge of back before the arms go up to complete the shoulderblades clench, would not the flying arms then slow the whole body for more shoulder ball acceleration?

2) Short angle. In World Team Tennis broadcast: Luke Jensen after Venus Williams hit an amazingly acute short angle: "Here's a point that a lot of people don't seem to understand. Great players have great shot selection."

Tom Avery in the following video urges us to never remember any more than
two items out on the court. No, just remember the one. Get back knee lower than front knee.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xb_Rch1MOUQ

Get back knee lower than front knee. Oh, sorry, did Tom or I or somebody else already say that? Get back knee lower than front knee.

There, it's been said three times. You're supposed to remember it now. Me, too.

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Flashlight

I was watching the Tennis Channel spot again where Nick Bollettieri emphasizes "flashlight" in ground strokes. It's good stuff, but Robert Frost emphasized, that, in English expression, there's always a point where metaphor will break down.

The video shows something that maybe the words don't: Butt cap ought to keep moving toward the opponent but it's going to turn a minimal amount, too. In other words, the flashlight will not perfectly illuminate the puss of one's opponent at every single micro-instant.

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Rotorded Serving with Leading Hip Thrust Out

Flat feet (B) get racket tip just as low as (A) the flat front foot, rear heel up on toes model we often see.

(A) places more weight on front leg soon.

The (B) option may not look as appetizing to rotorded servers (servers with limited, axle-like twist available to them in their shoulder rotors) whose two legs enjoy equal health, but every avenue should be explored.

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To Try on Serve

Address Position: Bent legs with rear knee lower than front knee.

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Backhand

YOU know better than to fiddle with YOURS. I'm not only going to fiddle with MINE, I'm going to fiddle with the FIDDLING.

On the theory that Algebra helps English and Basket-Weaving helps Algebra, I'll start with Swimming and Canoe Paddling, but not Kyaking or Rowing. Three Dad Vail championships and two IRA's (Intercollegiate Rowing Association regatta) and two Eastern Sprints and one Olympic Trial plus fifty zillion reunions, commemorations and alumni rows and one plaque on the Hunter Marston boat house (I personally made initial contact with Mr. Marston as a matter of fact), a lot of Sports Information Aggression and two years of coaching say I've done enough Rowing/crew for a while.

In swimming, I'll will the front crawl stroke I want to go out and then back. Recovery and re-entry to be led by the thumb. The best live swimmer I've seen so far short-arms and splashes at the catch. Don't want that. Release to be led by the pinky. On the drive, described distressingly as "adduction" in one electronic document, the hand first goes slower than the body. If it's going sideways (out), of course it will go slower. I'll supinate, goddammit. I'll slowly scissor arm in the long middle sections when hand pries the body forward, everything at one speed. I'll pronate to lead with pinky on the release. And press inward at the same time since if I pressed outward at the beginning I'll do the opposite at the end. And do everything like Ginger Rogers with the left hand, too. Hand speed to exceed body speed at the end. Reps to build automatically, not like tennis where one has to find a drone player, a ball machine or a wall.

In one-hand backhand, flying grip change is the key to overall, significant change. Straighten elbow a bit more on this change. Now hips can counter scapular adduction a bit better. And racket tip will therefore get around faster, i.e., turn farther.

Residual arm straightening and scapular adduction and scapular retraction all will have occurred during the fast hips turn. Isn't economy, some would say elegance, others brute force when it all may be the same, the goal?

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Flashlight Comparison

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/high_speed_archive/phantom/Roger_Federer_HD_HS/index.html?dir=Forehand/RF_FH_Arm_Action&stroke=RFFHInsideOutArmActionSide1_500fps.mp4

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/high_speed_archive/phantom/Roger_Federer_HD_HS/index.html?dir=Backhand/RF_BH_Arm_Action&stroke=RF%20BH%20ArmAction%20Wide%20Front2%20500fps.mp4

These are just two films, almost randomly chosen. In the first, forehand, one can see a long period of flashlight or spearing or horizontal telephone pole.

In the backhand video, no such phenomenon is readily apparent. Yes, the butt cap leads the strings in a significant way-- a way just as essential for generation of the desired pathway and racket head speed but caused rather by the degree to which racket tip is turned around in the backswing and transition of the stroke.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/high_speed_archive/phantom/Roger_Federer_HD_HS/index.html?dir=Backhand/RF_BH_Arm_Action&stroke=RF%20BH%20ArmAction%20Center%20Side%20500fps.mp4

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Deep Sleep for the Player: Fitful Sleep for the Coach

The coach has instructed himself to have tennis ideas every night while he is asleep. At first this was hard. He would wake up every morning with his head full of his distant lover.

In time, though, the instruction began to work. The secret was to repeat it every night.

Finally, he'd wake up with thoughts about how to improve Buddy's short angle, his approach shot, and his chopper. "Whatever you do, stay away from his forehand," he would tell Buddy at breakfast. And he'd think to himself, "Look at this kid. He's as cross as my third wife." And he'd say, "So what do you want to do? Go back to bed for three more hours? Have you ever considered that if you stopped tweeting and went to bed three hours earlier, this wouldn't happen?"

Sometimes of course there wasn't a coach or a player, just one or the other. Then the coach would have to be the player. At such times he chose carefully: nine hours of restful sleep or six of creative restlessness. Which? As if he had control.

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Logical Imperative from a 30-70 Split?

Chris Lewit has showed us an easy way to subdue hips turn in a kick serve. (Immobilize them. Pull up a heavy object through which they can't twist.)

Pat Dougherty, the serve doctor at Bollettieri, prescribes 50-50 hips to shoulders on a first serve, 30-70 on kick.

Such a small percentage of hips turn immediately suggests flat rear foot to me--
not what Dougherty has in mind. He wants rear heel up and body rotations to occur over the front leg. Sure, but his front leg is less sprained than mine.

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Rog Backhand, Djoko Forehand, Rog Fo'hand

Re Post # 1253, "Flashlight Comparison," I'm not selling private lessons right now, but if I were, and my student had a one-hander topspin backhand, and a forehand modeled on either Novak Djokovic or Roger Federer, I'd have her hit forehands of both type for an hour.

"Djoker now," I'd say, feeding balls or keeping a single one in play. "Another Djoker. Roger. Roger. Djoker. Roger."

The rationale would not be that the U.S. Open is taking place but rather to make Audrey more aware of contact point. The theory: Contact point is easier to identify when Audrey has something to compare it with.

"Your Roger isn't far enough in front. Your Novak isn't far enough back. Roger (gasp), Roger. More out front, Audrey!"

The trouble with making arcs in the air, which is something that tennis players do, is that it's all too abstract. Just where is the perfect contact point? Are we going to give the student an old-fashioned astrolabe to measure longitude and latitude at sea?

"Djoko, another Djoko, bent arm, all the same backswing. Now Rogers. Just Rogers. Keep hitting em. Balance. Where's the balance (gasp)? On three from now you get a backhand. Backhand. And another. Where's the tumble? Feel the difference? Long part on the forehands. No long part on the backhands. Way round instead!

"Backhand. Forehand. Which forehand will you hit? Straight arm. Bent arm. All the same backswing. Very good! Very good! Feel the difference! Come to the net. Block it off! But stick it next time. Need a break?

"No? Keep going? Okay okay, five with either (gasp). Fed. Novak. Backhand. Forehand. Which was it? Call it out! Didn't hear you. Louder! Good, Audrey, best shot all day. No it wasn't, it was a Novak. Here's another ball. Hit the forehand you like! Now hit the other. Know both! Contact point! Telephone pole! Backhand. Way around! Prop! Pull that shoulder! No pole! Pole's on the forehand!

"Forehand! Sweep the pole! Ship the pole! Bowl the pole! Point the pole! Shove the pole!"

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Applying Tom Avery Spin Lesson to One's Full Federfore

The lesson: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xb_Rch1MOUQ

The goal: Already stated.

Required Knowledge: Physiological distinction between shoulder ball movement and shoulder housing movement.

The argument: The common belief that the more you take racket out front the more it opens holds true only for shoulder ball movement and only then when racket bowls close past body in a straight line.

Shoulder housing movement (scapular retraction, scapular adduction) can go in different directions but essentially is a part of core body not altering pitch.

In a Federfore, one can use "solid swing" to perform a flip, where "solid swing" means body and hand go together as a unit. The flip or mondo I have in mind rolls forearm (clockwise for a right-hander) while laying back wrist while performing scapular retraction.

A fourth element or possibility would be upper arm twisting in its socket (shoulder ball rotation), but why would one ordinarily want to fool around with pitch that much at such a delicate and crucial late micro-moment in the stroke?

After the flip (scapular retraction) one can bowl the racket butt (shoulder ball movement).

The bowling will open the racket to desired pitch as in the Tom Avery video, for a more vertical wipe with no forward egging of the ball, at least not by the arm.

Scapular adduction will still be available to put extra RPMs on the ball.

Results: None yet. Am on eastern shore of Lake Huron in Canada. No tennis courts there, not for someone who purposely didn't bring a tennis racket with him.

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Canadian Romp-Whomp

We return to the states today. We only had one heated argument with our very conservative host. He didn't want to play eightball for a second night in a row on his own pool table down in the basement of his big house. "Phil lost?" his wife said. "That never happens." "Well it did," Phil said.

Of course. If anybody scratches on the eightball in the first and second games, his opponent is going to re-discover form in the third and fourth. Probably depends on the length of his apprenticeship in the bars of Winston-Salem.

Anyway, Mitt Romney has a Canadian house a few hundred yards from this cottage which our hosts-- friends of the Romney family-- offered to us on condition that we would leave fifty dollars for a cleaning lady.

As we head back for American tennis courts I'm thinking, "For how to crack an egg, go to Google. For how to parallel park, go to Google. For how to hit a forehand, go to the Tennis Player articles on forehand by Gordon-Macci-Yandell and then carefully consider ALL responses to them in this forum."

(I'm writing this post in small handwriting on the back of debit card receipts.)

The beauty of a Federfore is that it takes some Chet Murphy wisdom on reverse action from A TREASURY OF TESTED TENNIS TIPS and slightly modifies it whether through applied brain-power or evolution, more natural but probably taking twenty-four centuries.

The flip or mondo we think about is reverse action as much as arm going back to counter forward turning shoulders. Of course arm still does go back if you add scapular retraction to wrist layback and racket winding down from the arm.

So, during "solid part of the swing" one can focus on flip. But will this tract of swing still be "solid" then? Who cares? Just make it work.

Early flip followed by straight bowl from the shoulder ball followed by scapular reinforced upward brush should equal a pretty good forehand.

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Iteration and Reiteration

Before I even get myself to the court, I think I'll perform a bit more design work.

This will be speculative of course, but the people who detest speculation are doomed to mediocrity forever, and I don't care if that cast-net includes the top ten mullets in the world.

Doesn't matter how good they are. They could be ten times as good again (I like the number ten today) if they would only introduce more speculation into their lives.

Scary, I admit. There you are with improved unit turn particularly on the forehand, with shoulder all the way under your chin. You're moving well. Here comes the ball.

As you start your backswing (lift and extension more backward than downward from the elbow) it's time to try forward rotation from the hips. This will be Ted Williams all the way, in which "hips turn marginally ahead of shoulders."

When Ken Harrelson tried to take Williams' advice, of course, nothing worked. Some of the old Washington Senators, apparently, were making better progress with the new information than he even though he was a far more natural (Cabreran) batter in that sport-- baseball.

Ted Williams set Harrelson straight by teaching him to link backward and forward hip rotations more closely together.

Tennis players, who far too often are as left brain as right-wing politicians could try that, I suppose, but only if nothing else worked.

Let's keep things simple. That's the mantra. So we'll let the forward hips rotation become the fourth ingredient of FLIP along with wrist, forearm, and scapular retraction.

This means, with a 3.5 strong eastern grip, you could aim palm of your hand toward your opponent's backhand on almost all of your own forehands if everybody is a right-hander.

The added body segmentation from making the forward hips turn more conscious will help produce the racket flashlight one wants.

Then, as shoulders turn marginally after hips, you'll bowl straight from the shoulder ball. This is the weakest thing you do during the forward stroke. Good therefore to combine it with the strongest thing you do, a hearty shoulders swing from your newly stretched gut.

If it all doesn't work out just say, "What the hell." Keep hips-shoulders sequence in operation however. Just don't try consciously to connect any part of it with some specific arm move.

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Rotorded Serving Requires Some Pretty Slick Invention

As we all should know, the twerp who captured Kirsten Dunst by winning Wimbledon in the movie WIMBLEDON won the Wimbledon men's final by keeping his arm up for longer when he served.

But one of the TV announcers-- was it Mary Carillo...I don't think so-- recently spoke about getting arm out of the way of a really good serve. And Jim McLennan has always taught bringing toss arm down to initiate a unified throw involving both arms.

So here is one of the conundrums found everywhere in tennis. Opposite ideas begging for the first-rate mind that can put them together. (Don't look at me.)

Actually, the word "sod" is stronger than "twerp," but I wouldn't feel right using it since I'm not a Brit.

When I watch films of Tanner or Dolgopolov serving however, I see just a bit of cartwheel before contact (and a lot of it afterward).

The rotorded server can't get the racket tip very low, so he wants to manufacture whatever lowness he can for a long time.

Does this mean he shouldn't cartwheel at all? I don't think so. If racket already is close to the ball he might as well let everything go.