Bopping your Wrist on a One-hand Backhand
I am a person who is always looking for a new kinesthetic cue. They say that Tom Watson is the same way in golf, so this is not necessarily a recipe for disaster.
The more I play with a John McEnroe type backhand only with heel of hand on pointy ridge at 7.5, the more I realize how much more compact I'm becoming every day.
Keeping the arm bent as you take it back, stepping...keeping the arm bent as you simultaneously lower by virtue of upper body straightening and racket tip keying down-- did I already say the next thing I'm about to say here?-- with arm still bent-- makes you very compact indeed, almost as if you're on the face of a medallion with a motto along the bottom: "PERFECTLY PROPORTIONED JOCK."
You may disagree, may always disagree, but the next thing is pure Oscar Wegner, is "feeling for the ball." One of the items the misunderstanders don't get is that Oscar has you still adjusting hand to the ball at a moment that seems much too late but isn't. Then you are on your own about how you're going to, in a continuous motion, take racket back and bring it forward to touch the ball. That's right. Oscar wants you to invent. How unusual for a tennis instructor!
In my case I'm going to use my port-side feathering motion from shell-boat racing fifty years ago (three Dad Vail national championships for emerging collegiate rowing powers). I slowly roll my wrist straight as I extend my arm, then roll the whole arm a little more, then return my wrist to concave before I hit the ball with a big rabbit punch.
This last independent motion of the wrist-- the return of it to concave-- is the bop, bop, re-bop of my backhand. And it's a large addition. Not only does it get the racket tip around as never before, and with seemingly no physical effort, but it is a zero at the bone sensation that is a distinct marker in the continuous motion.
So, when I'm pantomiming without a racket (I'm doing it right now with my pen), I wave my arm around in front of me-- or so it would look to a beautiful woman sitting up next to me in this bed-- but each time I bop with the wrist it's a DTL, a DTC, a deep CC, a short CC. Do I bop with the wrist at different points in the stroke circle? Sure. Why not? What's the advantage of altering the basic structure of the stroke? You might make the next shot but miss the one after that.
I am a person who is always looking for a new kinesthetic cue. They say that Tom Watson is the same way in golf, so this is not necessarily a recipe for disaster.
The more I play with a John McEnroe type backhand only with heel of hand on pointy ridge at 7.5, the more I realize how much more compact I'm becoming every day.
Keeping the arm bent as you take it back, stepping...keeping the arm bent as you simultaneously lower by virtue of upper body straightening and racket tip keying down-- did I already say the next thing I'm about to say here?-- with arm still bent-- makes you very compact indeed, almost as if you're on the face of a medallion with a motto along the bottom: "PERFECTLY PROPORTIONED JOCK."
You may disagree, may always disagree, but the next thing is pure Oscar Wegner, is "feeling for the ball." One of the items the misunderstanders don't get is that Oscar has you still adjusting hand to the ball at a moment that seems much too late but isn't. Then you are on your own about how you're going to, in a continuous motion, take racket back and bring it forward to touch the ball. That's right. Oscar wants you to invent. How unusual for a tennis instructor!
In my case I'm going to use my port-side feathering motion from shell-boat racing fifty years ago (three Dad Vail national championships for emerging collegiate rowing powers). I slowly roll my wrist straight as I extend my arm, then roll the whole arm a little more, then return my wrist to concave before I hit the ball with a big rabbit punch.
This last independent motion of the wrist-- the return of it to concave-- is the bop, bop, re-bop of my backhand. And it's a large addition. Not only does it get the racket tip around as never before, and with seemingly no physical effort, but it is a zero at the bone sensation that is a distinct marker in the continuous motion.
So, when I'm pantomiming without a racket (I'm doing it right now with my pen), I wave my arm around in front of me-- or so it would look to a beautiful woman sitting up next to me in this bed-- but each time I bop with the wrist it's a DTL, a DTC, a deep CC, a short CC. Do I bop with the wrist at different points in the stroke circle? Sure. Why not? What's the advantage of altering the basic structure of the stroke? You might make the next shot but miss the one after that.
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