A New Year's Serve

[bottle]

Previous Post on Serving (# 396)

The person who is bad at absorbing street directions will be bad at absorbing topspin serve directions as well. (He may be bad at using modern technology too-- especially when he wants to post a pair of drawings.)

If you're a teacher, you'll really need to simplify your instruction for such a person as he, perhaps through drawings instead of using terms like 60 degrees (topspin with slice), 45 degrees (highest bouncing topspin), 30 degrees (topspin with kick).

In the drawing in 396, the imaginary line farthest to the left with no arrowhead on it runs from where you're standing. It's perpendicular to the net, the service lines, the baselines, the end fences.

The first arrow is designed to produce a topspin/slice/big pace mix; the second arrow topspin/big pace mix; the third arrow topspin/kick/big pace mix.

Question: Which arrow points at the net post? (Note: You remember something better if you figure it out for yourself-- therefore I won't tell you.)

Another fair question: What are these arrows really about? They are indicators of where your racket should point after contact but before it crosses to left side of your body.

Because of the pace requirement in these three serves (see linked article in 396), a new drawing is required. I'll try to put it up. In case I fail, however,
let me tell you that it's a very simple drawing. The difference between it and the first one is that there is forward motion toward the net before the racket
changes direction off to the right. Forward motion will continue through the ball even as racket glances off to the right as well.

[bottle]

Finding One's Way out of Topspin Serving Jail

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url]http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/mystheavyball/john_yandell/heavy_serve_practical_implications/heavy_serve_practical_implications.html[/url]

[bottle]

Adjusting the New Shot to One’s Particular Game

The experiment (post # 394) is positive but why change any present grip system, i.e, carry out the letter too much of Lau’s law?

The next to last thing anyone wants is to hit a home run, last to hit the ball into the net.

If I had a two-handed backhand I’d nevertheless be even more interested in flat hands hitting.

Since, building on my working change of direction slice, I’ve gone to considerable trouble to learn topspin off of a same continental grip with quite similar
preparation, I’m not ready to now overhaul my entire backhand side once again.

So my left hand rides somewhere between handle and throat as it has for 20 years. For staple slice including approach shots and service returns I slowly send the barrel toward the net then clench shoulderblades together—this whips racket on loose arm in a new direction.

To prepare, one tries to see an imaginary ring on one’s middle finger, an effective cue for getting strings near best possible pitch.

But I haven’t permitted myself a really huge slice since I passed though a tennis adolescence which in my case occurred when I was 50 years old.

Consideration of Lau’s law now suggests a writhing sea-serpent form that looks exactly like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9g28DDm02g

Or: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qp4FsjUQn8g

Or: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8Rib...eature=related

[bottle]

Two Hand One Hand Flat Hand Slice

A certain scheme met a court test even though I hadn't tried it when I explained it (post # 392). I like this approach, believing that too much standardized testing drains the verve not only from public education but from tennis explanation. More tennis ideas, crazy and sane, are what I crave.

When Hope and I made a recent trip downeast my brother-in-law who used to pitch in the Orioles organization explained flat hand hitting in baseball in 16 seconds or less.

A luminary of national seniors softball, he has at least one home run in each of the past 50 seasons. Last year he didn't get a home run until the last game; this year he got it in the first game.

As we stood in my sister's and his kitchen he pulled out LAU'S LAWS OF HITTING, which explains the two hand one hand underspun shot now favored by most major leaguers for distance hitting.

So, put one palm on top of the handle and one palm under and swing the racket as an arm-and-body solid unit. Then stop the swing as in the first paragraph of post # 393 . I'm for keeping the front arm bent and relaxed until you stop your shoulder. The arm can centrifugate straight with no internal boost at the elbow from you.

I have another slice, one I'm perfectly happy with, but wouldn't mind adding this one depending on how well it works.

[bottle]

Undoing an Idea

The old idea was to exaggerate the upper body rotation in a one-hand backhand and then stop it abruptly so that the arm accelerates in a circular path about the body.

The new pattern instead utilizes two wrist changes (post #392) to bring racket tip down and around at uni-speed before the arm ever moves out of its railroad station.

The uni-speed then continues in arm roll as the arm lifts sensuously in straightforward rather then circular fashion-- this might be a definition of "good extension."

Additionally, this more feeling stroke employs the one bit of technical advice that all tennis hacks always give on the BBC: to "keep the strings on the outside of the ball."

Personally, I find the new method a far more easily produced, less frenetic
and more liquid way of hitting and sometimes even of caressing the ball.

[bottle]

C-grip 1hbh: Control the Roll

I've had luck, at least in thinking, by slowing everything down-- the hunching of the wrist, the straightening of the wrist, the rolling of both halves of the arm. In fact, I've decided on installing a governor in my backhand automobile so that I'll never burn too much gas at any one time.

Speed of hunch is henceforth to dictate all, well, nearly all. It pre-sets the speed for corner-turning and roll of the arm. This is a basic idea from rowing but so what? Is there something wrong with rowing? In rowing a constant hand speed organizes all motion on the recovery.

Here the speed of wrist hunching shall determine the speed of wrist straightening and arm rolling even as that arm flies out (at some unrelated speed).

Of course this deliberateness will mean an earlier start to straightening of the wrist. This straightening will begin right after the hunch.

For a while I had a moment where there was no turn other than the body's small, unconscious thing and the shots weren't half bad. But the new approach should work better, giving the arm more to do so it doesn't get in trouble.

We've made body turning and wrist straightening simultaneous before; this
time we'll simply do it more unhurriedly.

[bottle]

Re: # 388

Jeff, I did it.

[bottle]

Step Press Hit

That's a good way to organize a lot of 1hbh information. The step lowers the body. The press lowers the racket head some more. The whole idea is more provocative than it first may seem since it says that great linear transfer just as you hit the ball is too chancy to rely upon every time.

In a C-grip JM-type backhand during the "press" the wrist also hunches the racket head low. The eastern backhanders, a resistant group, may not like this; nevertheless, that's what happens.

The eastern backhanders can still have a happy life by finding more exotic ways to get the racket tip low. One thinks of Ivan Lendl, who spoke to his forebears, negotiating exceptionally long strong fingers on his left hand that could steady his racket even though they were hyper-extended.

Or, like my brother, any person can simply adopt a western grip and henceforth egg the ball and think he's got it made in the topspin department. I knew a player like this-- Ricky-- played third on his college team. The trouble was, as he got older, his great backhand sometimes wouldn't kick in until the third set.

So, returning to C-grip "syndrome" as its opponents might call it, let's examine how today's experimental backhands once "step" and "press" are out of the way may crack up.

We may have to revert to some early tennis incarnation before we had our own tennis mind, back in the days when we simply did what we were told
like any sheeple or tennis players bleating "Baaahhh, baaahhh, baahhhh
three bags full."

Racket went back straight to left thigh on a relaxedly straight arm. I was permitted to find out for myself how far away from my body my racket should hover-- three inches in my case.

Briefly, the teaching pro was intrigued by this shot. The arm would suddenly and simply and unhurriedly lift. Straight up topspin, also depth and accuracy would result.

However this same teaching pro observed me playing a cabinet maker,
an unusually strong specimen of mensch from wielding a hammer all day every day.

"You need to do something more, Bot," the pro said. "That's a good shot against weaker players, but he's overpowering it every time."

My present flourishes decades later permit enough power but where's the straight up spin? So we'll press through the old 3-inch spot today, then straighten wrist to trigger a gradual roll to keep strings parallel to net regardless of contact point.

[bottle]

Another C-grip 1hbh to Try

The arm gets fairly straight-- early-- in all of these shots. And wrist hunches the racket tip down as shoulders straighten up a little to bring it a bit lower than that.

This is the starting point for a next experiment. Instead of simultaneously rolling the arm and straightening the wrist, we'll delay both items.

The result will be A) a delayed roll that can lead to more gradualness in this action, so that the strings can stay perpendicular to the net regardless of slight variations in contact point (Remember how Vic Braden would stick a stroke pattern of balls in a fence to serve as a guide for this perpendicularity) and B) The body, which always rotates a little whether we want it to or not, can be the sole agent to bring hunched wrist slightly around. C) Straightening wrist can then complete the essential "turning of the corner" while also triggering in a sensuous way the whole arm turn and arm swing or arm bowl or both.

This latter part (bowl-swing) occurs slightly before contact and continues a long way afterward.

[jeffreycounts]

Maybe drop from front shoulder going up and wrist hunching the racket down is all you need as part of the hitting action.

(I'm thinking of relegating UBR-- upper body rotation-- once again to the variability of the unconscious.)

Swinging arm around the body is a basic yet usually underestimated principle in tennis applicable to all kinds of strokes.

You do get some power from simultaneously cranking UB and arm (arm as if it's an old fashioned car crank) and flattening wrist, but you may be able to eliminate or at least sublimate the UBR part of this if you coordinate racket drop and bringing around of the racket tip as a directly connected motion.

You might or might not have been able to do this when pronounced UBR was part of the equation, but what I'm suggesting is to try this simplification.

This would be maximum use of arm drop and snap just leavened slightly by subtle rotation of the body.

I don't view such experiments as fawning, sycophantic, adulatory or celebrity-worshipping (i.e., deferring too much to the prime NBC tennis analyst). The fact is however, no matter who John McEnroe is, he knows how to hit a one-hander while keeping his elbow in, and if one tries every possible way of administering that JM verbal cue one is assured sooner or later of stealing a smidgeon of the JM magic.

Well, maybe if one possesses very good movement and timing first.

Hi Bottle,

Got a quick question for you. Could you send me an email: jco872@gmail.com?

Thanks,

Jeff

[bottle]

Cutting Down on Body Rotation in a C-grip 1hbh

Maybe drop from front shoulder going up and wrist hunching the racket down is all you need as part of the hitting action.

(I'm thinking of relegating UBR-- upper body rotation-- once again to the variability of the unconscious.)

Swinging arm around the body is a basic yet usually underestimated principle in tennis applicable to all kinds of strokes.

You do get some power from simultaneously cranking UB and arm (arm as if it's an old fashioned car crank) and flattening wrist, but you may be able to eliminate or at least sublimate the UBR part of this if you coordinate racket drop and bringing around of the racket tip as a directly connected motion.

You might or might not have been able to do this when pronounced UBR was part of the equation, but what I'm suggesting is to try this simplification.

This would be maximum use of arm drop and snap just leavened slightly by subtle rotation of the body.

I don't view such experiments as fawning, sycophantic, adulatory or celebrity-worshipping (i.e., deferring too much to the prime NBC tennis analyst). The fact is however, no matter who John McEnroe is, he knows how to hit a one-hander while keeping his elbow in, and if one tries every possible way of administering that JM verbal cue one is assured sooner or later of stealing a smidgeon of the JM magic.

Well, maybe if one possesses very good movement and timing first.

[bottle]

I Now Hate the Word "Bowl"

and regret that I ever used it. The trouble with "bowl" is that it violently changes racket pitch every nano-second. And lends weakness to the human arm, which is stronger when swinging AROUND the body. Finally, shoulders going around lend force better to arm if it goes around, too. (But yeah, sure, the arm lifts as it swings around.)

[bottle]

Free-wristed Strokes

I don't even know if I'll get to a tennis court today. When I do however I'll try a more simple version of JM-modeled backhand.

The big questions have been just when to hunch wrist and whether to straighten it again and if so when.

One looks for guidance anywhere, most obviously in videos of John McEnroe hitting backhands. And he does re-straighten wrist. When does he do so
however and when before that does he hunch that wrist?

Answer: At different times in different videos. Clearly then it's time to stop worrying about John McEnroe and start worrying about me.

I'm going to hunch wrist as upper body does its small tilt backward. I'm going to close wrist in sync with forward rotation from the gut to take me to contact. Will there be independent motion of the arm toward the net in this phase? Maybe, maybe not. And maybe I'll delay the hunch-straighten sequence to closer to contact later for special effects.

Suppose that this experiment is 100 per cent positive (unlikely, I know). Then, this question arises: "Are you going to be entirely satisfied with your Federfore, a pretty good stroke, Bottle, though successfully exploited by an old Lebanese cut-shot artist, or are you going to explore free-wristed continental grip strokes on the forehand side as well-- a place you've been before?"

The Australian tennis writer Paul Metzler suggested that modern players are so basically ignorant that they don't even know what true free-wristed groundstrokes are.

Metzler in one book defines them as groundstrokes in which laid back wrist near fence closes in sync with body rotation all the way to contact.

[bottle]

Myth and Videotapes

Pardon me for enjoying my search for something I may never find. The goal is an effective minimalist backhand in the style of John McEnroe. The ball is supposed to fly up and hit an overhead lamp. The ball is supposed to wound my wrist and maybe even break off my hand.

So far none of this has happened.

As I suggested in post # 338 however I still have unresolved issues in that part of the forward stroke where the hand is closest to the body. Elements of confidence: "body body arm" to give a broad description. The upper body tilts backward, the upper body cranks, the arm flies away. This much is certain.

A great deal of paralytic, deductive reasoning however is a threat to athletic excellence's reliance on smoothness and magic. The jocks of this world, closer to Tom Sawyer than to Huck or Jim, are romanticists who go exclusively for "feel."

My alternate hope is for relentless elimination of what's extraneous until the logical nub of some stroke emerges.

But one has only a dry plan then, so this is the time when one ought to turn back in the direction of "feel," mysticism, and breakthrough magical discovery.

Go for magic too soon and you lock yourself forever at your present level of mediocrity. This applies to Nadal, Williams, Federer or anyone else.

[bottle]

Crazy Cats

I once saw a very good backhand. The racket seemed to come out of the teaching pro's stomach. That appears a characteristic of John McEnroe's backhand too. The period in which hand and racket bowl up together seems about as long as possible. So I return to the earlier construction "body body arm" knowing that any cat hearing those words will become confused. The difference between this and some earlier iterations will be that I'll use a little more backswing and possibly even delay straightening of the wrist. There would be a sequence in that case between UBR from the gut and straightening of the wrist. I had both hunching and straightening of the wrist happening during the horizontal gut action at one point. Now I'll put the wrist straightening at beginning of the upward bowl. I don't know the answer, may or may not find it at the court. The important thing is to keep some meticulousness in the fooling around to evaluate all possible combinations as I see them (I believe).