A New Year's Serve

[bottle]

Toward a Better Wave Trough

Once one has decided on the 1htsbh not to swing stiff arm like a board but rather do something more sensuous, interesting and organic, one can apply wave metaphor in greater detail.

This iteration has the player (I or perhaps you) turning shoulders as essential part of movement to the left. But this horizontal rotation turns into vertical rotation (a wave rising) as rear shoulder goes up to initiate hitting step with right foot.

So what is the bent arm doing through this? Well, one could, like Richard Gasquet or former NCAA tennis champion Bea Bielik, get elbow way up high. More moderate thinking might leave elbow where it is for a more moderate stroke but with less to do.

The self-suggestion I want to try is bending arm a little more as wave goes up.

[bottle]

In the Wave Trough of Great Simultaneity

Since I haven't heard anyone speak much about hips on the one handed topspin backhand in the past week, I might do it. I was thinking that some pretty cool reference points are available for shoulders and racket butt during that part of the stroke I call "racket trough of the great simultaneity" but maybe the hips information in my head is not quite so well focused.

So here's a full recipe or prescription, and since we're mixing metaphors already by taking both Julia Child and Dr. Spock out surfin', let's try for a real blend or smoothie with half a banana to take us down one wave and up the other, or is it all one wave-- who knows?

Forward shoulders turn (and stop) perpendicular to left net post. Racket going down and forward cocks to where its barrel points to left fence post, which is inside the net post. Hips carry power pocket toward...where?

Instead of trying to gain the answer by observing players or films of players this time, let's deduce it from another fine reference point. If one holds out both arms in a maximum stretch caused by clenching shoulder-blades together and then observes where the arms point, it should be directly at the target.

So, point at target in this way and then run the stroke backward until shoulders are getting perpendicular to net post and racket butt is easily slinging at fence post. Where are the hips and what are they doing?

Joker factor might be, "Did you step out, and if so, on what angle toward the net?" The 45 degrees specified by Arthur Ashe is good.

To my reckoning the front hip is now pointing as much to the right of the racket butt as the racket butt is to the right of the net post.

But how did the front hip get there? As if delivering a hip check in hockey, i.e., the hips were going out and lowering the back shoulder behind them but didn't turn much and didn't do this timed action with more than controllable force.

So, since this great simultaneity is leading to a shoulder-blades clench, is there more hips turn available for a ground-up supplement?

Yes and no. Front hip won't now pivot freely (it can't while leg presses muscularly against the court!) but will come back toward right fence slightly as leg-and-body extends to make you tall.

But where were right toes pointing? That will make a difference in direction of any final hip turn.

[bottle]

Gathering Arm, Wrist and Rear Shoulder to Top of a Wave

In post # 451 I bent the arm a little more as wave went up. If that works better, why not bend the wrist in unison as well? Not what John McEnroe does but so what? It's one wrist motion going forward then instead of two.

Remember, however, that I'm using the JM grip with its hunched wrist to hit the ball, during which process the forearm rolls the wrist flat as in dealing a card.

An eastern grip player by contrast may start his forward stroke with wrist concave and end it with same side of wrist convex.

The continental grip player may start convex and have wrist straight by contact. Or, he can start concave and then use two different motions to get wrist hunched then straight while coming over the ball-- like McEnroe.

This doesn't require astounding genius (the standard cop-out for not doing anything interesting in tennis) but a clear and simple view.

If I can hit both single and double-wrist motion continental topspin backhands, I should then be better prepared to evaluate the advantages or disadvantages of either.

One is more simple and the other trickier. Hoorah for simplicity but hoorah for trickiness, too. The jury is out.

[bottle]

Cue

When further cueing the new backhand (for which one gathers arm, wrist and rear shoulder in a single, rising wave), I suggest working on shoulders rotation to shoulder-blades clench transition first. It all swings the front shoulder around, doesn't it? So maybe that's the way to think of it-- a continuity.

The clench adds muscular power but first and foremost stops rotation of both shoulders, which helps accelerate the arm (and front shoulder).

That's how it's supposed to work-- so let it!

After that, perhaps start thinking about the abrupt change of direction that occurs to the racket during this process.

I've spoken of "the trough of great simultaneity" in all of this wave analogy, along with compass points involving net post, fence post, and ideal position of the front hip while knees still are bent.

Too complicated? Then why not index this navigational information with a single image-- a trident or three-pronged fork.

As clench begins, one re-asserts essential big body, small body sequence-- no more simultaneity in other words.

Body goes marginally before arm and wrist.

[bottle]

John Should Change his Backhand

If John has a great backhand, he would have an even greater one if he could eliminate one needless component.

To see how to do it, if your name is John, read post # 453 .

In a test, new method beat old from the very first shot.

Since my name is John when it isn't Bottle (the old Detroit carpenter and head football coach I met the other day quickly re-named me "Bottie-John") I'm speaking here to myself but also to John McEnroe, him, too.

[bottle]

1htsbh Trident

At least one impressive tennis mind advises paradox and irony as a way to realize tennis strokes. Not exactly the same as those who always cry, "Simplicity," is it? I just think that every TV tennis announcer should warn against under-thought exactly as much as over-thought.

What often happens if you are the rare tennis player on a prolonged journey of exploration is that you finally develop some principle or generality but later find the exception or maybe even an opposite view which now seems equally valid.

In my statements about "the wave trough of simultaneity," I've got to look now for the opposites if I genuinely believe in science. On the serve a wave through the body is at work. (Think of "longitudinal body release" if you must.) The same should be true of a driving ground stroke unless one wants to sacrifice half of the power possibility. And that much remains constant.

However, in a 1htsbh front hip can go out (like a hip check in hockey) followed by shoulders rotation followed by shoulder rotation-- a nifty sequence. That doesn't mean there can't be overlap.

And the shoulders rotation can still be simultaneous with spearing racket prong. I stick with my trident, a three-pronged fork.

[bottle]

Working with the Rotordation Nation

A Mr. C.M. Jones wanted to see serves come from farther back, i.e., hand well behind neck and not squeezed up against it.

But we rotorded servers, if determined enough, will try anything to get hand in lower relation to the toss, which frequently means a big clenching together of the two halves of the arm and probably too soon.

One can keep the halves glued together for a long time and finally throw arm straight from this completely bent, needle-like position but with what effectiveness? A flexible jock throws with a much healthier mix of arm power, i.e., more internal rotation from upper arm and less arm extension, from 80-degree bend say, which is only slightly more than half the availability.

Full bend, half bend-- is there a big difference? I've never heard or seen the subject sufficiently discussed but suspect there is. Half bend definitely puts hand farther back than full bend and achieves more of a pro drop parallel with body out to side.

Operating on my suspicion, I'm bending arm much less when it's behind my back, just forming a slight curlicue to start back there. And I'm finally coiling arm to 70 degrees as part of reflexive elbow lift transitioning into "shoulder abduction," which isn't a kidnapping but rather a lifting of the arm straight up.

If abduction is transition, as tennis minds G, M and Y agree, then why can't it be classified either with what lies ahead or with what came before?

How much can you keep hand back from delaying the bending of your arm?
The less you've already bent it, the more you'll need to bend it (and vice-versa) if you accept, say, my arbitrary, final figure of 70 degrees.

This is a very different looking serve, possibly awkward, maybe ugly-- I don't know and won't care if it works.

The feel is of a very late shrink-wrapping of the arm structure rather than simply inverting it while it remains set at a constant size. And such shrink-wrapping will, possibly, fool the oppositional muscles into allowing triceps to contribute to more unfettered racket head speed.

Should this experiment become preferred serve? Or should one return to completely squeezed together mode if that is most natural, through previous practice, for the server?

The result is to be determined, as ever, by upward RPM's generated and effectiveness of any serve against tough opponents.

[bottle]

Stick BHV, Simple

Coil upper body a lot while coiling arm a lot out front and pointing the racket butt at oncoming ball a lot. The elbow's high a lot, too, it seems to me.

The power for this shot comes (or "can come" if you prefer) from clenching shoulder-blades together, which straightens arm in a delightfully passive way.

[bottle]

New Year's Serve has a Complete Nervous Breakdown

It was just my serve that had it, though, gratefully not me. The breakdown occurred during a free initiation or "ignition" or complimentary first lesson before one joins at Eastside Tennis Facility, Detroit. The teaching pro, Sebastien Foka, wanted to see a much higher toss and full arm bend, with action down and up behind the back rather than around right side and with elbow getting high sooner and some other things.

Before long, I couldn't even put the ball in-- a new problem.

But by end of lesson the balls were starting to go in again. I think my serve will recover partly because the advice was good and partly because I've taught myself the language of serving in these on-line posts.

By "language" I don't just mean words or useful terms but the movement or dance of the thing. If I want to take racket up sooner I can do it since I've done that many times before. Same thing if I want to prolong high sideways movement across the back like former NCAA singles champ Bea Bielik, maybe the neatest looking serve I've ever seen.

"Have you ever watched film of your own serve?" Sebastien asked. "Never," I said. "We have a camera here, you know."

If I remain in the doldrums, I'll let you know that, too, readers. I think this computer crash or service breakdown was mystically but closely related to the final double fault from Elena Dementieva's new serve in her retirement match at Doha, Qatar.

[bottle]

Phoenix Serve (though I've only been through on a Greyhound bus)

Note: The following serve has not yet been tried.

Whatever the central idea of my last serve, it wasn't good enough. But there'll be no quitting like Elena. Out of the ashes comes a flaming phoenix bird going "Caw, caw!"

The terms that describe it are:

."wave theory simplissimus" in which one shoulder rises higher than the other, which then rises higher than the first one all in linked sequence like the ocean

."rear door hinge," which limits the phenomenon of shoulder-blades clench we talk so much about to one half of itself-- the half that can occur during one's toss-to-release without spoiling overall toss in any way

."long bow propulsion," which relegates leg compression and extension to a mere subset of bending then releasing an archer's bow

."three hip-shoulder combos" lifted from hula hoop and kinetic chain fads. "The hips turn marginally ahead of the shoulders," as Ted Williams used to say. And then the shoulders catch up to those hips, at least in the first two of the three combos, which we will keep minor and almost inconsequential.

."the big enchilada," which refers to the third of the combos, where shoulders not only catch up to the rotating hips but turn right past them

."independent, horizontal motion of arm in its socket backward around the body." That description seems self-explanatory but offers a subtle distinction. We refer here to arm motion that doesn't ease the right shoulder-blade in toward body median and is best learned by immobilizing said shoulder-blade against the back of a chair.

The design:

1) The hands drop together, separating. One can start bending knees then too but I think not this time.

2) Right arm goes up first in a shoulder wave and rather out to the right side.

3) Left arm goes up second using a shoulder wave combined with back door hinge.

4) First hip-shoulder combo along with pulling back of bow and weight shift toward front foot and independent motion of arm in its socket horizontal and backward around the body and gradual bending of the arm as well.

5) Second hip-shoulder combo, in which the shoulder catching up section is coincident with release of the bow.

6) The big enchilada which may or may not include braking from left arm and makes a subset of all final arm movements.

Done properly, back door hinge won't compromise toss. That means you can proceed far along the path of desired motion even by the time the ball is released from your hand. The other time-making move is a very high toss (remember, you got some shoulder-wave into your old toss as an additive). Beginning stance is way around to minimize backward body rotation.

[bottle]

Result

I hoped to report the first broken string in 30 years. Still, this seems like a pretty good serve.

Now for the caveat. It seems like a pretty good serve if one starts compressing knees and performs the first hip-shoulder combo as hands go down. And if one blends the following motions during the toss and cock of the longbow: the two high, horizontal arm motions previously discussed and bending of arm to about 90 degrees. But arm is swinging up from shoulder at the same time having received a gravity assist from the drop. The various moves combine to a rise of the hand at about 45 degrees. These moves are more simultaneous (a good right brain word) than not, but there's some sequence in when the arm starts to bend-- halfway or maybe two thirds up.

Vic Braden seemed to describe an inspection for cooties with a mirror held in the palm. Regardless of the cue that may work, the cootie move needs to be practiced all by itself and imbued with great feel. Look hard for those lice.

I think that if arm is still going back a little as second hip-shoulder combo begins, the arm will be more likely to stay on a single, controllable track down and up behind one's back to the ball.

Another crucial factor may be willpower not to lift elbow overly high. It should be high but not overly high even among servers in the rotordation nation. Too high creates a "pinch" sapping leverage out of the serve.

The teaching pro who helped me, Sebastien Foka, noted a lot of body motion in my serve. Well, I just took some out by making first hip-shoulder combo happen early. Rotationally speaking, the body then becomes still for a while. Although it is shifting and bending right then, that's entirely different.

[bottle]

Oh-oh

A new idea. Perhaps first hip-shoulder combo can overlap hands going down and tossing hand rising up. Since nobody's shoulders can ever go perfectly over one another in any direction as if a vertical wheel, comfort results from using diagonals-- about three times in this case. During the toss, shoulders can be turning slightly backward to catch up with hips-- that is my point.

[bottle]

Fiddling with the Possible Types of Backward Arm Movement

What are they?
.Down and up
.Around from shoulder-ball or "shoulder-ball"
.Around from middle of back or "middle of back"
.Bending arm
.Twisting arm

If there are more, I don't want to think about them just now. And if somebody wants to substitute "supination" for "twisting," it's their privilege, but I'll take English over Latin at least for today. Also, "abduction" has been kidnapped. Abduction does not exist in the present iteration. The elbow does rise slightly upward in a reflexive way but only once, because I have no more desire to pinch upper arm and head together like two stupid pincers.

Why even think about such confusing details? Because I worked a long time on service and want the pay-off. I seek the specific structure that allows the racket hand to go quickly down and up without whirling sideways out of alignment.

So, how best to fiddle or play? This usually comes down to sequencing which later it's best to forget. The down and up combined with arm motion around are going to lift hand at 45 degrees to start. Let's try shoulder-ball only this time and bend the arm at top of the ramp so even this bend can feel gravity-assisted.

So far so good. But what else has happened in this time? Quite a lot, e.g., toss and weight shift and cocking of the longbow.

Well then, where are we? It's time for second hip-shoulder combo. As hips go counter-clockwise slightly ahead of shoulders then, the two halves of the arm can squeeze easily together as whole arm comes clockwise slightly around toward the net from middle of the back.

[bottle]

Superstition in American Tennis

When Paul Annacone says that Pete Sampras' serve was "one in a million," does that mean that nobody in the rotordation nation should ever try to learn anything from it?

One can draw a similar conclusion when somebody else says that trying to learn John McEnroe's serve is the ultimate act of tennis masochism.

Such statements, always postulating the inimitableness of some tennis genius, may be just as true as the clear inference I mentioned is untrue.

Basic ideas such as leftward lean, high arching toss, landing on inside foot, accentuated body stance, accentuated body turn largely come to us through McEnroe and Sampras.

Is the criterion well worked out for what we should steal and what never from the tennis geniuses of the world? I think not.

Every man and woman is pretty much on his/her own in this, especially Elena Dementieva. By far the easiest thing to do is shun genius altogether. In this, the rotordation nation can take its cue from the retardation nation.

"Simplify, simplify, simplify," said Ralph W. Emerson but not George W. Bush.

Service works best when arm whips about the body, Bill Tilden suggested, not when one groans and moans and lurches this way and that.

So now I'm going to eliminate the first two of my hip-shoulder combos but keep the third.

[bottle]

Questioning Eastern One-Handed Topspin Backhands Again

The wrist action on continental backhands is simple; it's complicated on eastern backhands. Hand starts high relative to wrist on eastern but low on continental. Eastern is perhaps better for absorption, i.e., hand can roll backward a little during contact. Continental is better for altering a deep crosscourt into a short crosscourt with nothing other for the change than a bit more smooth closing roll from forearm and wrist.