A New Year's Serve

[bottle]

Takes Time to Poach a Lob but Takes Time Too for Lob to Come Down

Steve and I were discussing the mini-smash of Pancho Gonzales when Steve was over here in the United States (page 67, TENNIS BY PANCHO GONZALES).

Pancho obviously had a mini-smash and a maxi-smash, but for many people a smash is a smash-- not for me.

In between strokes in tennis can be very useful.

I want the mini-smash for doubles poach on a high ball in ad court when I am playing the deuce court.

The footwork for this shot obviously has to be amazing with any 76-year-old likely to fall on his keester but I'm willing to take the Allison Riske.

Now that I've figured out the footwork (did it in the last paragraph but do see subsequent discussion), I'm ready for abbreviated racket work which I relate to my splitting of logs. (Just bought a three-and-a-half pound axe to remind myself of heating by wood for 20 years on a Virginia mountainside-- it all has to do with a good chopping block.)

Racket to go up perfectly straight perpendicular to court and sky like the tail of a skunk about to spray.

The hand goes forward which causes the racket tip to lay slightly back (see serve of Mr. Hulot in the Jacques Tati film MR. HULOT'S HOLIDAY). The lagged racket head then catches up. Then whole arm goes out but because forward must go down somewhat.

Mini-smash...perfect. They never had a chance.

II. The Necessary Footwork

I make this up as I make everything up. Then the dance instructor shows me the error of my ways.

Start with a double-pronged (neutral) split step. Favor left leg as body rises up which frees slightly pivoting right foot to replace closer to ball but nearer to rear fence too. Front foot replaces where it is by turning toes inward-- in opposite direction to the splay of a standard unit turn. This move takes time but is necessary to avoid falling on keester and be able to skip backward successfully on a slant under the ball.

Don't forget to turn out arm at outset of the movement to get strings square to ball-- no pronation or upper arm rotation or internal shoulder rotation (ISR) or whatever you want to call it during the actual hit in Pancho's mini-smash. This is a case where simplicity is good.

Reader, have you ever played with a partner who could smash every lob wherever it was in the doubles court?

I have (for one set one time) and I've never gotten over it. It elicited for me the Rod Laver book in which any lob equals a smash.

You call such a person "the designated smasher."

Does he exist in senior senior's tennis horribilis?

I don't think so. But with great fortitude, willpower and footwork one can skip backward in that direction. The worst your partner can do is kill you. (You may be grateful.)

[bottle]

Upper Arm Post as Foundation of all Forehands-- Groundstrokes and Volleys Both

From mentalblock:

I had no idea ... that the upper and lower arm segments were pulled clockwise prior to snapping back counterclockwise for the "doorknob" or "wiper" thing.

I know you’re trying to interpret Brian Gordon here, mentalblock, but after conducting personal self-feed experiments on this subject, I concluded that clockwise arm movement and wrist layback worked best as simultaneous mondo or flip. Simultaneity seems more economical and easy to control but most important simply works better for me in the forehands of my particular competitive doubles.

In other words I tried wrist layback first then arm roll as the mondo. Then I tried arm roll first then wrist layback as the mondo. And I reject both of these ideas from personal experience—a conclusion that may not be wise for somebody else.

Another idea in this rich forum that recently struck me hard was somebody telling about a personal visit to Brian in which Brian opined that a straight backswing was better than a loop in hitting the topspin forehand that he has worked so hard to research and communicate. The forum member's conclusion was that Brian has subsequently modified this view in favor of loop.

To me this report astounds. Not that one way is better than the other and that Brian may have changed his view but that he ever entertained both possibilities in the first place.

Since I am doing seniors revision from what I did before to a common wait position for volleys and ground strokes both like that of John McEnroe with racket low and cheated over for the backhands, I’m especially interested right now in level backswing possibility.

For a middle separation forehand volley key racket on the post of upper arm with whole arm in the shape of a right angle. Helpful would be if one had done experiment with hitting the forward part of a forehand in this farm gate hinge way. But now the “keying” or twisting of the upper arm post goes mostly into backswing in a ratio as high as 10 to 1 . This could be 20 inches of racket tip backswing compared to a 2-inch volley in which forearm rolls backward at contact to caress and control the ball. But the upper arm does make quite level forearm key forward like some kind of a T-wrench in auto mechanics. But only for volleys at medium separation from body. For the big stretch volleys that frequently happen or ought to happen whole arm movement from the shoulder makes more sense. But in either case one more effectively “keys” the racket back. Why? Because one is operating that way with a shorter bat if we can call forearm and racket together a “bat,” also from McEnroe’s cheated over wait position one has to get strings into their distant position fast.

Forehand groundstroke from same wait position presents a different challenge. First of all the body turn in both directions is going to be much greater. But racket could be keying level in a variety of distances and speeds at same time the body turn is happening. Anybody who has followed me would know that I favor a down and up backswing for my composite grip forehands. But now I go to a strong eastern with level waist height keyed backswing for norm on a full topspin forehand.

How can pitch work in this arrangement? Well, if cheated racket wait position is a bit out from body the strings will be more closed. Similarly if one lifts forearm for a higher ball the strings will close more. Regardless, the change to a keyed backswing is huge simplification to the ATP3 as I understand it in which loop and dog pat bring hand down to waist level. No, hand already is at waist level.

Obviously, experimentation, innovation, and meaningful change is half of my fun in tennis. My writing or conceptualization however is way ahead of my actual game. I haven’t yet done the poached mini-smash from deuce court recently described. I’ve also put my recent see see or topspin angle ideas on hold to give them a chance to work into my nerves. Both things are coming to me though, and so is this level forearm basic “waist high straight round backswing” topspin forehand, good as one gets older.

[bottle]

Doubles Poach to Recessive Arm Side Utilizing Mini-Smash

Steve and I were discussing the mini-smash of Pancho Gonzales when Steve was over here in the United States (page 67, TENNIS BY PANCHO GONZALES).

Pancho obviously had a mini-smash and a maxi-smash, but for many people a smash is a smash-- not for me.

In between strokes in tennis can be very useful.

I want the mini-smash for doubles poach on a high ball in ad court when I am playing the deuce court.

The footwork for this shot obviously has to be amazing with any 76-year-old likely to fall on his keester but I'm willing to take the Allison Riske.

Now that I've figured out the footwork (did it in the last paragraph but do see subsequent discussion), I'm ready for abbreviated racket work which I relate to my splitting of logs. (Just bought a three-and-a-half pound axe to remind myself of heating by wood for 20 years on a Virginia mountainside-- it all has to do with a good chopping block.)

Racket to go up perfectly straight perpendicular to court and sky like the tail of a skunk about to spray.

The hand goes forward which causes the racket tip to lay slightly back (see serve of Mr. Hulot in the Jacques Tati film MR. HULOT'S HOLIDAY). The lagged racket head then catches up. Then whole arm goes out but because forward must go down somewhat.

Mini-smash...perfect. They never had a chance.

II. The Necessary Footwork

I make this up as I make everything up. Then the dance instructor shows me the error of my ways.

Start with a double-pronged (neutral) split step. Favor left leg as body rises up which frees slightly pivoting right foot to replace closer to ball but nearer to rear fence too. Front foot replaces where it is by turning toes inward-- in opposite direction to the splay of a standard unit turn. This move takes time but is necessary to avoid falling on keester and be able to skip backward successfully on a slant under the ball.

[bottle]

Reversions are Painful but Sometime Necessary

In doubles, the new backswing McEnrueful was good. But can be better. As Steve suggested, I need a good hitting partner with whom to work on stuff.

Back to simple down and up arm work in the backswing. Worked on this for a long time after all, with emphasis on the relation between the two arms. No need to alter something good. Hit it with different lengths of rise-- sure. Isn't that an advantage of such a backswing, that it offers more feel than the mechanism does in loopier strokes and can therefore more organically be figured out?

If this weren't true, no teaching pro in existence would ever have commented on how a student's game immediately declined when the pro tried to graduate him from straight back preparations to looped preparations. But I don't think the teaching pro in this universal situation then advised a reversion. Instead, everybody plunges ahead, with the thought that eventually just as much feel (or more) will develop-- just takes time.

But what if this envisioned second generation of feel never comes about? Who's going to take the player backward in the progression? The player himself, I would guess, if he's still interested in tennis. The transition from straight back to loop is a great winnowing out, is what I'm trying to say, in which many players fall through tiny holes.

But a John McEnroeish forehand backswing is anything but straight back in the first place. It's more like a bowling or golf backswing, 100 per cent feel.

Natural contrast I guess is Andre Agassi whacking balls over two or three fences as a kid. Did he ever take the racket straight back or down and up like Mac? I don't know but doubt it. More likely his father bullied him into a loop from the beginning. And it worked.

[bottle]

A while ago I decided that this was a bad idea, but, self-contradiction is what the best scientists do. (Richard P. Feynman, certainly the funniest, probably rejected his first Nobel Prize in winning his second.)

When one has opposite hand off of racket for one's overhead the way John McEnroe does, pointing elbow then fingers at the ball becomes easier than ever and closely related to what the other arm is doing at the same time.

Lift fingers to the ball. Forget the elbow. Going elbow first might be smart (Vic Braden, that clever man, preached it) but I choose to go dumb, not smart.

I propose this different course because of all the times one tosses the ball to serve in a tennis life. Why not build on the deep grain of this?

[bottle]

Cageman as Model

Who was smarter: the teaching pro to whom you paid $100,000 in lessons or your first singles opponent who told you to hit a one hand backhand with a figure eight?

Depends on personal philosophy and how many warts you have. Warthogs vote for other warthogs, as my Yale linguist brother-in-law, who teaches Russian and Czech intricacy at Wake Forest University often says.

Having spent most of a lifetime to try to decipher a one hand backhand-- which according to director of tennis at Indian Village Detroit John Boris is nothing unusual at all-- I can easily put myself in the tennis shoes of a complete beginner and say this:

If you don't roll the racket backward before you roll it forward with all of this in the quick part of the stroke you won't get around in time.

And, personally speaking, I'm unimpressed by players who try to look like Stan Wawrinka by continuing the forward roll long after contact. Well, a bit of this could be okay but not a lot. Where forward roll really does its stuff is from backward roll to contact.

Also, since I've never before mastered the one hander to my own maybe impossible standard, I opt for Cageman's racket head just behind his butt. You can see where the racket is because you can see through his butt which is the nature of Cageman.

I want my strings there at end of the backward roll, not farther around the body. I take the racket in my hand and put the strings there. I memorize where the hand is. Now I've got it.

[bottle]

In doubles, the new backswing McEnrueful was good. But can be better. As Steve suggested, I need a good hitting partner with whom to work on stuff.

[bottle]

A Good Backswing-- I mean Sideswing-- for Maximized McEnrueful

Was just at the park doing self-feed since I won't play doubles till Thursday.

At the park, I've noticed, although I self-feed satisfactory McEnruefuls all day long, when I use them in actual play as service returns some are spongy and not decisive enough.

The other day, against Leon, a pretty good server, I decided to shorten my backswing. "Where did that come from," he immediately said as the ball whizzed by him.

"Aha," I thought, "here's the way to go," viz., an editing of John McEnroe's bowl down and bowl up along a single vector.

My McEnrueful, more Welby Van Horne than John McEnroe, resembles the basic instructional forehand in SECRETS OF A TRUE TENNIS MASTER by Edward Weiss.

But the backswing retains the down-and-up characteristic. Now, say I, keep left hand on racket and let body rotation push the racket sideways. Then let the hitting arm go backward (and up). With all motions very small except for body rotation which continues with firm point across.

The racket doesn't care that it just went in two different directions. And forward emphasis has been achieved, i.e., the mechanics of the stroke are now situated farther forward.

As I've already asserted, this backswing is smart. But whether smart is better is yet to be determined. As Jim Courier said, "Don't expect to find logic in top level tennis." I won't but if I somehow find it at any level I'll be happy as a clam.

[bottle]

Completion of the See See Plot

So now while playing deuce side in doubles we have hit a good see see into the alley but we announced our intention by bending upper body from the hips.

This announcement incurs a breathless charge from the keen-brained but flawed far opponent who should have and would have S&V'd if he had any real sense.

Still, his late charge prevents the cc from becoming a clean winner, the worst outcome for all involved. Sure it would be nice to have the point but we on our side need rather to think long range and run the other guys until they drag their sorry asses.

But are we ready with low wait position cheated over for a backhand to volley to exact same spot? All we need do is slightly lift the arm. But do we also turn it as we lift it to insure a closed racket face? Possibly. What however if we didn't approach close enough to the net and the ball comes fast in front of us? The answer is a short arm volley from posted elbow directed to the exact same alley spot with slight backward roll from the forearm to take speed off and provide the necessary control.

(Thank you, Luke Jensen, for your more generalized speech to the ladies of the Grosse Pointe Yacht Club on this exact same subject.)

[bottle]

A See See for the Ages?

This shot shall be based on an old literary saw: "Into the destructive element immerse." Well, what is destructive? What you (I) most hate? Or rather what you have slowly convinced yourself that you do not like?

I've progressed toward early separation of the hands within forehand design which I've found can work quite well. Now I reverse the iterations for the new see see (topspin angle) I have in mind.

Left hand stays on the racket as body turns it not backward but toward the side fence. The left hand starting low stays close to the body. If it changes this relationship at all it pulls even closer into the bending body.

This is a subtle variation of down-and-up principle. You can barely notice the racket go down but go down it does as your head leads you in some direction.

Now comes the "up" as the hands finally separate and the hand presses steeply upward on a perpendicular to the net. How much? From one to six inches. This closes the racket face to the pitch you want.

In the quest for best see see through a hundred designs, one constant prevails-- racket must be closed or the ball won't stay inside of the target line.

How best to close the racket face-- whatever one's grip-- then becomes important feature. There are more ways of doing this than one may have thought possible. I propose here bending body from the hips like Ellsworth Vines and do this while low racket presses into body cave thus formed.

Then hand can close racket more by moving straight toward net while remaining in good natural position for bank down and up again.

Feet stay flat during bank down. Rear or right heel for the right-hander then spirals up in tandem with solid shoulder banking up.

[bottle]

The Heretical Words of Ivan Lendl

How much substance existed in these long ago issued words of Ivan Lendl which were noticed by only a few tennistas?

"Note that my hips only move as a product of my entire upper body movement. In a sense the hips only follow the action of my arms, legs, and upper body. Unlike golf, the hips do not play a major part in producing power-- the idea being that if every part of your body explodes forward like the swing in baseball or golf, power may be gained but control is forever lost." Page 37, IVAN LENDL'S POWER TENNIS AS TOLD TO EUGENE L. SCOTT.

Could this clearly anti-kinetic-chain-theory viewpoint be applied to a spin-off forehand patterned on watching John McEnroe, clearly not Ivan Lendl's favorite person at least when both were young?

I don't see why not. Despite Lendl's own warning I would add to this formula mix the wise advice of the old Scotch golf teaching pro Percy Boomer: You take the amount of backswing that will permit you to accelerate two feet past the ball. This could in the case of a banking dependent stroke be a very small backswing indeed.

[bottle]

Point Elbow then Fingers at the Ball

A while ago I decided that this was a bad idea, but, self-contradiction is what the best scientists do. (Richard P. Feynman, certainly the funniest, probably rejected his first Nobel Prize in winning his second.)

When one has opposite hand off of racket for one's overhead the way John McEnroe does, pointing elbow then fingers at the ball becomes easier than ever and closely related to what the other arm is doing at the same time.

[bottle]

When (or When Not) to Add a New Backhand Slice

A person can know that Ken Rosewall could produce infinity (a "galaxy") of backhand slices but that doesn't mean anybody knows what they are.

Me, I've got drive slice with a little drop built into it, cross slice, double roll chop, single roll chop backward where lower rim sands around bottom hemisphere of ball and others I may temporarily have forgotten.

That backward roll chop hit with late, muscular straightening of the arm suggests an unimagined drive slice with similar roll.

But suppose we do want to invent that? Will we straighten arm during forward swing or straighten it first? Ninety-seven per cent of climate scientists say man-made contribution of greenhouse gases is significant to the global problem, which reinforces my romantic belief since I like winter sports that a towering wall of ice ought to appear any day above the treetops as in the Thornton Wilder play THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH but something has gone wrong.

I'm sure the 97 per cent, were they all tennis players, would say to straighten arm from hips rotation before the swing. So that's the possibility I'll explore first-- I don't want to waste time.

Can't hurt, might be significant. If not I'll back off. Just backswing with racket face more square than usual. This points elbow down. So arm straightening can take hand down better but one can leave strings up for reasons of strong wrist and turn strings backward during contact to slide under bottom of ball.

[bottle]

McEnrueful Service Returns

The arm work in the McEnroe spin-off forehands I have come up with is almost irrelevant. Kinetic lowering and raising of the hitting shoulder (the aeronautical term "banking") is the important part. The hips rotate beneath one with both feet held flat. As this happens your right wing (if you are a small plane) drops down. Lastly, the continuing hips cause the rear heel to spiral up as the wings return to level or a bit more.

The blended nature of horizontal body rotation and banking shoulders contains some promise of magic.

So arm setting doesn't affect technique.

Obviously arm would be set farther forward for a see see (crosscourt topspin angle).

For returning a fast serve, independence of arm work can be almost nonexistent, i.e., very short and in some cases steep.

[bottle]

More Respect for Cageman

Cageman's racket doesn't really fall a thousand feet as I suggested in an earlier post about his one hand backhand. In fact, his racket fall is quite modest, especially when compared to that of Richard Gasquet or Bea Bielik.

Also, one can see, since Cageman is transparent, that his racket head never goes farther around his body than his hips, an indicator of modesty again.

The composite grip drive backhand I have been working on uses a John McEnroe solid body backswing but then keeps hitting shoulder lowered through the hit.

A timed double roll is the essence of this shot, requiring less grunt and physical exertion than the very great topspin drive backhand of John McEnroe.

My proposal (or self-proposal): Lift arm just a little as shoulder winds down and around to allow a bit more space for easy double roll the way Cageman does it.