Have a Question for Me?

[johnyandell]

OK then! Subscribers to what if you don't mind me asking.

[glacierguy]

Subscriber to his newsletter "A Thread of Order".

And welcome! I'm not sure why no username appears, but it would be easier to say Hi if you had one!

[johnyandell]

Yeah weird eh? Checked out newsletter...pretty dense...

Yeah I'm not sure why my username doesn't appear. My name is Hugh (username is hmclarke). I started writing the newsletter around the start of 2022 as I moved countries and had some time off. Just trying to learn as much as I can about the game after playing and coaching for a while.

What did you think of the newsletter John? I might have to refine some points/theories after reading through here a bit.

[johnyandell]

Dig in and see what you find!

I played tennis in the late 80s and early 90s and it seems like I was totally unaware of several of the rotational hitting concepts and wrist movements that are prevalent in the game today. Maybe my memory is failing me or I was a bad student, but I distinctly remember being told not to use the semi-western grip and to not break my wrist.

My questions are: 1) What was the development timeline for these modern hitting concepts between the end of the wooden racquet era and the emergence of players like Kuerten, Federer and Nadal, 2) How and when did instruction change/evolve after the end of the wooden racquet? 3) Who were the pioneering coaches that figured out how the swing needed to change post-wood?

[johnyandell]

Wow. Big questions. And I don't have the answers. Semi westerns were definitely in by the 90s. But it wasn't just the rackets, it was the strings. The wrist? Well that's a debate that has never been settled. I think the whole coaching world evolved together. But on Tennisplayer I would look at my articles in Advanced Tennis particularly Roger Fed and evolution of the modern forehand. Also all the Brian Gordon articles on the forehand and the Rick Macci stuff as well--who was deeply influenced by Brian.

[don_budge]

John...I am having difficulty accessing the "Stroke Archive" and "High Speed Archive". I can see one video, but then I cannot see another after the first one. Help!

[don_budge]

For instance...recently I posted on the old thread "2015 Barclay's ATP World Finals..." and in posts 43 and 44 I have referenced a couple of Roger Federer's serves. I try to pull them up and I get a message that "Not Found...the requested URL is not found on this server" etc.

[stotty]

I can't access the latest Chris Lewit article. I get the same problem as don_budge in his post above. When I click on Lewit's post I get:

Not Found
The requested URL was not found on this server.

[johnyandell]

Huh I can get there...

https://www.tennisplayer.net/members/tour_strokes/chris_lewit/favorite_drop_shot_games/

DB Same on Stroke Archive I can get there...will have Jeff look into it if it continues...let me know...

[don_budge]

The Andy Murray Setup Position??compared to Roger Federer's





Who said anything about being fair? I had a close look at the motion and compared it to that of John's modern model??Roger Federer. Here's a few thoughts that I came up with.

It doesn't compare does it? Not artistically and not fundamentally either. It is poorly engineered right from the setup position.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/...LevelSide2.mov

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/...DeuceSide2.mov

What better way to critique a serve than to compare the two motions side by side? If only I had the skills to put the two side by side so that we could see them simultaneously with a magic voice over. Put me on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine.

Let's begin by counting frames. Andy Murray's service motion from the initial movement back is 54 frames to contact. Roger Federer's motion is 62 frames from the initial movement back until point of contact. I am assuming that they were filmed at the same speed.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/...LevelSide2.mov

The Federer Setup Position??

Right out of the book??and you know what the book is. It's don_budge. Roger's weight is squarely positioned over the front of his front foot with his back foot poised on his toe. Left leg absolutely straight and bearing the weight. Take a look for your self...a picture in this case is worth a thousand words. The thing to keep in mind with the service setup position is that the backswing is largely dependent upon the setup. Rogers posture is rather erect with a slight bending at the waist and leaning over his front foot.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/...DeuceSide2.mov

The Murray Setup Position??

Not quite Andy. Andy's weight is shared and distributed with his head forwards and his butt back. Most of the weight is centered in his front foot and not nearly so pronounced forwards in the foot as Roger's weight??Andy's weight is more in the middle of his foot. While Murray's back foot appears to be on the toe it is definitely bearing more of the weight than Federer's and it is because of the weight that appears to be balanced in his ass position. Also note the position of the ball in his hand compared to Federer's??he has the ball more positioned in the head of the racquet whereas Federer has it squarely in the throat of the racquet.

The Comparison...

See how much further Federer has his racquet head into the court than does Murray. The whole positioning of Federer from his weight to his racquet head has a more pronounced forward balanced look to it. Forward emphasized setup position as worldsbesttenniscoach may have said. Roger's chin appears to be over the baseline and his racquet hand appears to be almost over the baseline as well. Murray on the other hand has his chin and head set back noticeably from the baseline and look at the position of his racquet hand. The Murray setup looks to be decidedly backwards emphasized. See how Roger's toe is just barely behind the line and Andy's is a couple of inches behind. Another indication in the difference of the two setups??forwards emphasis versus backwards emphasis.

Try the links in this post. I get the message "Not Found...The requested URL was not found on this server."

[johnyandell]

You can compare them in the side by side section on the site

[jeffreycounts]

Those links are pointing to our old video format. Can you send me the page where you copied the links from so I can look into it?

[don_budge]

Those links are pointing to our old video format. Can you send me the page where you copied the links from so I can look into it?

I got the links from the old post that I recovered from the forum. I posted the quoted post two posts up from yours new way to train tennis players :cst club bells tennis in this thread. But I have had difficulty retrieving videos from old threads as well. Another example is the "My Thoughts on the McEnroe Backhand" thread that is currently residing on page two of the forum. When I tried to view those video links I was unable to view them.