A New Year's Serve

[bottle]

Same Contact Point for CC and DTL

Flat BH: For CC (I surmise), one need only keep shoulders slanted down a bit longer.

[bottle]

Three Stars

The rating for this thread has declined from four stars to three. If you nevertheless want to buy my tennis book, mostly written when my rating was four stars, simply go to the following link: http://bottle-booksandstuffbyjohnescher.blogspot.com/

[stotty]

Stars

I have never voted on threads. I only just realised the 'star" feature was there. Anyway, I just awarded your thread with some stars...

[bottle]

Morchestration

If you've got a bassoon, then get a piccolo. If you've got a Korda-modeled backhand, forget Petr Korda, who has nothing to do with your venture. If you've got a Ferrerfore and you like certain adjustments to it that you've made, try applying them to your Federfore.

Keep-the-elbow-in backhand: Everything is about putting strings on outside of ball and hitting not pushing the shot. Topspin and flat backhands both: 1,8 grip applied to inside out swing. Flying grip change continues its energy to open the racket face and carry tip farther down and around. Forearm slants down to make an electrical connection with the court (see post # 945). Rear shoulder rising concludes the backswing. In forward part of these strokes immediately send elbow around and up but slow at a single speed and on a single rising plane for as long as possible.

Topspin backhand: Body movement plus elbow travel naturally/passively straighten the arm. Sudden but rhythmic roll of straight arm which takes strings vertically up back of ball (don't egg it!) does not affect speed of the slow-swinging elbow.

Flat backhand: Body movement plus elbow travel plus early arm roll plus muscular arm straightening all is simultaneous and regulates slow swing.

Forehand: Ziegenfuss (conservative). Small round loop followed by arm swing at ball. Body then chimes in. Catch racket about where Valerie Ziegenfuss and Ivan Lendl did.

Ferrerfore: In my version arm doesn't get much farther back than pointing at side fence but a big shoulders turn has taken place by then. Arm and mondo then take racket tip back in response to forward body rotation as if this shot is a horizontal serve.

Federfore: Try same thing but with straight arm. This shot will have nothing to do with Roger Federer, who among his other achievements is simply a man who starts long trains of thought in others.

[bottle]

Four Stars

Yay****

[bottle]

Calibration for These One Hand Backhands

From rear shoulder rising like a wave, try inside out swings in which you become aware of how far the elbow, independent, has traveled by contact. Try 0 inch,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10, etc. Like arpeggios in singing, go up and then down, i.e., increase with each dropped ball and then decrease with each dropped ball. You're searching for combinations you like best, no?

[bottle]

Trial, Not Theory

Re # 966, with regard to flatter version: I liked 0 inch and 11 more than the others. Longer elbow travel (11 inches) changed nature of the required roll. And no elbow travel (0) spread out roll so much that I felt like continuing it after contact to end of the followthrough, a simplification. And outgoing ball had more pop on it after bounce somewhat similar to topspin variation-- which is more effective? Should I eliminate one or the other?

Decisions like this could also be termed morchestration, i.e., "more orchestration."

In passive arm straightening topspin variation did better if I discarded numbers from the outset and simply tried to get racket butt as close to ball as possible before unleashing the roll. The roll is quick enough that racket tip may reach its rolled-up-to-highest point before the end of the followthrough, which then will be farther along and perhaps a tad higher.

Questions: How will this pure topspin version fare in doubles and singles if one alternates it with slice? Will one have need of a flat backhand or has that now become redundant and mere self-distraction? The delayed roll offers good control of racket pitch anyway. So which is better-- flattened topspin or more topspin added to flat?

This last question seems relevant because of the difference in mechanics now introduced between these two drive shots. I'm rolling or starting roll sooner for the attempted flat shot.

[bottle]

The Julia Childs Ratatouille Drive Backhand

Ingredients:

. Steffi-slice tilt of shoulders
. Steffi-slice double roll of arm during forward part of stroke (sometimes used by Ken in Ken-slice as well)
. 1,8 grip
. Muscular straightening of arm during second half of the double-roll
. Early departure of elbow from Petr Korda railroad station (slow elbow leaves simultaneous with backward roll)
. This backward roll can be continuation or perhaps just reinforcement of spillover energy from flying grip change applying slight pressure downward from palm.

Instruction:

Roll arm backward from bent elbow rather than from hand. Once arm is straight, roll racket at moderate speed to end of followthrough.

I haven't tried this shot yet. Bon appétit !

[bottle]

A NEW YEAR'S SERVE Goes Viral on Public Access

I'm no longer a virgin. I've been on television. I took A NEW YEAR'S SERVE as a third of the "Sport, Fiction and Insane War Trilogy" down to the huge Grosse Pointe War Memorial on the banks of Lake St. Clair here in southeastern Michigan.

John Prost, the amazingly professional host of The John Prost Show, didn't want to talk about the time Katharine Hepburn and I beat her brother and my brother in tennis. Nor did he want to hear my carefully prepared discussion of the novel MURDER IN GROSSE POINTE by the anonymous author Andrew Hartwood. (Andy could be anyone. John Prost? John Escher?) In fact, I'd say John Prost was more interested in insane war than tennis or fiction, but all three topics received their informal discussion due.

"So, of the 27 jobs you've had," the host asked, "which did you like most?"

"Crew coach," I said, explaining that when you teach English and you permit yourself excitement about a book, your students say to themselves, "Oh, Mr. Escher is enthusiastic about that book," but this isn't enough, you want the students themselves to get interested, but when you teach tennis or rowing, thoughts translate immediately to legs, back, arms and hands, which suggests to me a deeper level of effective instruction.

Oh well, I forgot to recite the titles of my three books. But the cute operator of the three television cameras is going to flash the url of my website up on the screen. I know I know, this url is too long for anyone to copy down, but Google spat back all of my earlier suggestions:

http://bottle-booksandstuffbyjohnescher.blogspot.com/

[bottle]

A Little Alteration for a Cold Morning

The ratatouille backhand, post # 968, was too complicated. But a one-way roll which spreads that roll out to the max remains a solid shot (and therefore good contrast to the airier fanned topspin described earlier).

In this newest conception, both shots-- topspin with hit-through component and flat with top-spin component-- can start with sensuous connection of forearm to court (see the earlier explanation that alludes to the pole, ski and electrified roof of a bumper car).

In either shot rear shoulder goes up to conclude the backswing, and since these are two-part not three-part swings, in the flatter version the forward roll can start coincident with the various body rolls (about three of them) and not conclude till end of the followthrough.

This version wouldn't work if arm couldn't straighten while it rolls, and continue to roll after it's straightened, but it can.

[bottle]

Ratatouille Forever!

I'll save the ratatouille name for my newest hit-through backhand, which is complicated enough to qualify either as ratatouille dish or ratty shot.

Whatever one calls it, it's a good shot for a tall person, whose arm, left undisturbed, maybe doesn't get around as succinctly as that of a midget.

You add a bit of constant roll to overall swing of your arm. In so doing you edit the shot down to bring it under control.

A slow roll is more like continual adjustment of pitch than part of a separate
effect producing lift as in the fanned version.

[bottle]

Re 971: One can hit this flatter shot softer and closer to the body if one rolls more. The extreme would be a bowling motion of the arm with complete dependency on roll to bring the racket around to outer edge of the ball.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DBBHFront3.mov

The opposite extreme, much more powerful, strikes the ball at hearty separation out to side as in more typical Don Budge backhands.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DBBHRear.mov

Within this range, always roll from the elbow, not from the hand, to take the racket head even with the ball or lower.

A more technical explanation would say you're rolling from the shoulder and you'd better not forget it. Forget it. Go with the more kinesthetic not to mention copacetic, verbal choice.

Note: I include these clips because I think they illustrate generally, not specifically, what I'm getting at. In the soft backhand, Don Budge does not roll to end of the followthrough as I'm preaching. I'm well aware of that. And his grip is different, his thumb partially up the back, etc. And his racket is heavier. And he's Don Budge. And I'm not.

[stotty]

Re 971: One can hit this flatter shot softer and closer to the body if one rolls more. The extreme would be a bowling motion of the arm with complete dependency on roll to bring the racket around to outer edge of the ball.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DBBHFront3.mov

The opposite extreme, much more powerful, strikes the ball at hearty separation out to side as in more typical Don Budge backhands.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/golden_legends/donbudge/donbudge_sa.html?DBBHRear.mov

Within this range, always roll from the elbow, not from the hand, to take the racket head even with the ball or lower.

A more technical explanation would say you're rolling from the shoulder and you'd better not forget it. Forget it. Go with the more kinesthetic not to mention copacetic, verbal choice.

Note: I include these clips because I think they illustrate generally, not specifically, what I'm getting at. In the soft backhand, Don Budge does not roll to end of the followthrough as I'm preaching. I'm well aware of that. And his grip is different, his thumb partially up the back, etc. And his racket is heavier. And he's Don Budge. And I'm not.

Really lovely that second clip of Don Budge's backhand. His racket face looks to be laying open right up until contact with the ball, yet he manages to hit over it to produce what looks like a slight roll of topspin. So the racket face is open but he still manages to brush up? What's going on there? I guess the racket face must just manage to get on edge a fraction of a second before contacting the ball? Wonderful clip...it really is.

[bottle]

I've loved this Tennis Player clip for a long time and think there's more of a free will or intentional base to a shot like this than is generally recognized.

By that I mean that coming to the ball closed like Federer or Ivan Lendl is not inherently better or even easier than coming to it open like Gene Mayer or what we see here.

That idea isn't mine but Ivan Lendl's in the book that he collaborated on with Gene Scott. (Lendl only made two books at the peak of his career, and it wasn't HITTING HOT so it's the other one.)

I subscribe to your idea that Don Budge closes the racket face late and then brushes up.

If you stop the video immediately after contact, Don Budge doesn't seem to be continuing the roll. The roll happened before or at the ball or both.

[bottle]

Serve to Try

Down together up together.

Body turn backward has concluded by the time that the free-falling racket is in transition to coming up.

Now there's toss and lift.

With arm bent at 85 degrees, you'd think you're ready for the forward action but you're not. There's one more thing to do. And that is scapular retraction in two related directions: 1) around and 2) down.

Are you gouging backward with your elbow to do this? Yes. Are you starting to clench the two halves of the arm together so as to start a throw? Yes.

Is LATENESS of "arching of the back" advisable? Yes, according to Chris Lewit in his TENNIS TECHNIQUE BIBLE: VOLUME ONE. Will there be any pause between scapular retraction and scapular adduction?

Don't think so.

Will scapular adduction form the low loop behind the back that everyone should want, i.e., help push the racket out to the hitting side?

Yes.