Basic Serving Question

[scottap]

John,

I recently videotaped my serve. One thing I noticed is that as I’m swinging up to strike the ball, my arm pronates too early (on the upswing) and my racket face opens prematurely before striking the ball. I essentially hit the ball flat every time with little or no pronation in the follow through. I know when swinging up to strike the ball, the racket face should be perpendicular to the ball, and only at very the last moment should the arm pronate in order to strike the ball with the open racket face. Unfortunately, knowing this and correcting it are two different things. I’ve not had much success.

Do have any suggestions (drills, ways to visualize it, etc.) that may help? A variation on this question would be, “How do you go about teaching this to someone who trying to learn it for the first time?”

Thanks,

Scott

[kenknight]

If you're opening up too early, it might be that you're arming the ball too much and have some sort of subconscious irk because you might "frame the ball if you don't open up too soon".

I had the same problem.

So, take your mind off the arm. Take your shoulder, and focus on rotating that into the ball instead. Forget all about the racquet. The shoulders drive the elbow and wrist, slinging them forward.

It also makes your racquet drop naturally, and keeps the racquet perpendicular while still opening for impact. As long as your contact point is out in front, that is.

Try it. Make sure your toss is forward though. If you want topspin, the shoulders still apply. In order to compensate for the ball not being out in front, you'll have to arch your back to lengthen the distance your racquet takes to get to the ball.

Hope it helps, it did for me.

[CrazyLefty]

You might want to try kinesthetic modeling with visualization. Look at some of the serves in the stoke archives carefully and then try to model the motion in the mirror. Try to go through the movements very slowly and make sure you are getting to the correct critical positions. I have heard pros use the analogy of trying to cut the ball with the edge of the racquet to keep it on edge and not open the face prematurely. I think Kenknight is correct in focusing attention on the shoulder joint. The internal rotation of the shoulder joint also (along with pronation of the forearm) causes the racquet face to close. An increase in the rotation of the shoulder joint should increase the velocity and spin of the serve.

Good Luck

[johnyandell]

This is all great advice. I have a couple of additional thoughts. Where is the ball on the left to right axis? If it's way out there to the right, that could make these other solutions impossible. Pronation is an effect more than a cause. Trying to make it happens usually causes more problems than it solves. I like the image of giving the ball a high five with the face of the racket (with the continental grip). I find this tends to automatically make the timing of the rotation correct, as well as causing natural pronation. It's only a few milliseconds so you can't decide mechanically when to turn the racket face.

Not everyone is going to turn the racket over in the followthrouhg like Pete--including players on the tour that I have worked with and could serve 120mph plus.

Having said that, really I have no idea how it relates to what you are actually doing. It's just hypothetical. How about sending us some video for Your Strokes???

[scottap]

Thanks for all the great feedback. I want to take some time to absorb and try to incorporate the ideas. Maybe after that I'll send in a tape to Your Strokes.

John, I wonder if there is a bad link on the Your Strokes main page. When I click on the link “How to submit you video to Your Strokes”, it takes me to a page that essentially repeats one paragraph twice and then gives your contact information. If I go to the Fred Bye Forehand article and click the link at the bottom of that piece about how to submit footage, the page it takes me to has much more detailed instructions on what to do. I assume that’s the correct page.

[johnyandell]

Scott--thanks. I won't go into the why that was done the way it was and how I screwed it up--but you are right--we'll go with the Fred Bye page in the future.

I appreciate it when you guys find stuff like this on the site--and most times I agree...