Peter Chen Serve

[johnyandell]

Peter Chen Serve: Rear View

[johnyandell]

Side View

Peter Chen Serve: Side View

[johnyandell]

What does everyone have to say about Peter's serve??

[klacr]

First, I do like the hat in the first video. Sun protection is important. Glad to see Peter takes it seriously. Sun takes its toll for the grinders on court all day working on their games.

I'd love to know what The student thinks about his own serve. What he is trying to accomplish and what he is feeling when he hits good serves and bad serves.

A few things I see on Peter's serve...

I do like his set up. Seems like he has a purpose and target as to where he wants to serve. Appears like he has a nice lose grip as well, feels the weight of that racquet head as it falls down behind him.

After the toss, he takes a big step to the right in what appears to be an attempt at a pinpoint stance. But his foot moves more out to the right than it does up into the court which comprises his weight transfer.

Not much deep knee bend either. His angle is straight up and down as he is in that trophy position. Something that has been discussed in John's Myth of the Archer's Bow (Cue for Geoff Williams to enter stage right )

Another issue is that although he seems to start off with the proper grip, during his backswing he releases his fingers and shifts the racquet over just a tad in a slight grip change. This also affects how the racquet approaches the ball as it is not entirely on edge thus leading to a flattening on the shot and a pushing motion due to lack of internal arm rotation.
The topic is described perfectly in this article about Andy Murray's Serve.
http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/.../murray_serve/

The toss is also a bit too far to the right for my taste.

Those are a few of the big things that stick out to me. I would love to hear opinions and observations of others. Hope my thoughts aren't the only one. Let's help Peter out!

It's funny. Seeing this video initially it seemed as though this player's serve was good for an amateur and many players would love to have it. But after watching it a second time, you pick up things, which lead to other things and other things along the chain.


Kyle LaCroix USPTA
Boca Raton

[stotty]

If not too much trouble it would be great to see Peter's serve at normal speed. I find you get to see the rhythm better this way.

[pvchen]

Thanks, and questions

Thanks so much for commenting on my serve. This is awesome to get this feedback.

As far as my goals are concerned, I would like to have a serve that is more consistent, that I can add spin to, and has more consistent power and direction. My experience has been that my serve will often break down during play, losing power and control. So, I’m trying to correct my fundamentals with the information here in tennisplayer. Here are some specific questions:

1) Anyone with a suggestion as to how to correct my stance problem?

It’s not something I do on purpose and I am not even conscious of how I step on my serve until seeing it back in video. I’ve experimented with trying to shift my weight back, trying to change the amount of lag in my windup, all in an attempt to convert to platform stance, or at least to stop the lateral step that opens up my hips, but to no avail. I have a hypothesis that stepping is caused by the timing of the trophy pose with respect to the deepest knee bend achieved, but no solution yet.

2) How is my racquet drop?

John Yandell has stressed this as the starting point for evaluating serve mechanics. When I look at the deepest dip in the racquet, it seems OK, but by the time my shoulders turn the racquet has not aligned to the right side of my torso. I gather from Brian Gordon’s articles that this may be an issue related to a premature leg push or too much torso tilt and not enough lateral torso bend? Or is it related to my windup? John Yandell has advocated a circular windup, and in this serve I feel like I am bending my elbow (although on video not as much as it feels). Or is this not even a big issue? The serve hit the fence after one bounce, which is good power for me. I’ve made some real progress after subscribing to tennisplayer just by focusing on externally and internally rotating the shoulder. Maybe my racquet drop is as good as it can be given my relatively inflexible shoulder?

3) Any comments on my toss?

An inconsistent toss has also been a major problem for me. I’ve tried keeping my arm straight and releasing like petals on a flower, but I still have major problems getting the toss where I want. The information in the path has been helpful and I think the ball is traveling from right to left in this video. Perhaps not enough to the left, as Kyle has pointed out?

Thanks again!

[gzhpcu]

Something you might try for a more consistent toss and to keep your arm straight and unbent, is the "ice cream cone" toss. Hold the ball as if you were holding an ice cream cone.

Another more radical approach against bending joints is to hold the ball initially with your hand pointed down and then go up. This was suggested by Vic Braden in his book "tennis 2000". I found it helps...

[GeoffWilliams]

Whole motion is too slow, coil is not right, drop not deep enough, leg drive not in time, opens too early, etc. Too many things to work on. Just pick one and work on that one thing at a time.

[johnyandell]

Peter,

Which video is more recent? There are some fairly big differences.

[stotty]

1) Anyone with a suggestion as to how to correct my stance problem?

It’s not something I do on purpose and I am not even conscious of how I step on my serve until seeing it back in video. I’ve experimented with trying to shift my weight back, trying to change the amount of lag in my windup, all in an attempt to convert to platform stance, or at least to stop the lateral step that opens up my hips, but to no avail. I have a hypothesis that stepping is caused by the timing of the trophy pose with respect to the deepest knee bend achieved, but no solution yet.

That lateral step is something I do on my serve. Many other servers have done it in the past. It can work if you can sew it in correctly. But I am not sure if yours hasn't been caused as a consequence of throwing the ball too much to the right and you are stepping out to self-correct your balance...the lateral step in your case may just have become a habit of that.

I learned my lateral pinpoint from watching others of my era.

Here is my serve, so you can see how I sew it in. Once you have seen it I will remove the the link to it as I don't want to detract attention from your serve in any way. The lateral step maybe something you choose to get rid of in your case.

I will be looking at your serve over the next day or so and will post my analysis then. As Geoff said, there is plenty to work on and you cannot do it all at once. We/you need to choose the right place to start and take things one at a time from there.

It would be great to see it in real time. Slow motion is great for checking positions and so forth, but I find it very difficult to get a sense of rhythm unless I see it at normal speed.

Rhythm is a big factor for me...serving has a lot to do with rhythm.

[pvchen]

Here is a video from the same day as the original post, in real time.

http://youtu.be/81LHOKwiJrg

John, the sunny day video is later. I tried to lag my hitting arm behind the tossing arm after reviewing the night time video, and tried to lay my wrist back to get the shoulder more externally rotated on the backswing. I'd be interested to hear what you see as the differences. I myself see videos of serves that went great and others not so great and often they look identical to me.

Coach Slotty, your serve is very smooth and it looks like you make the pinpoint work well, and don't open up your hips as I do. If mine looked and felt like yours I probably wouldn't try to fix it. I'm just wondering if my footwork is a major technical flaw causing me to lose power.

[don_budge]

The Peter Chen Serve…Preparation to go into the Forwards Swing

The Peter Chen Serve…Preparation to go into the Forwards Swing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81LHOKwiJrg&feature=youtu.be

It would be great to see it in real time. Slow motion is great for checking positions and so forth, but I find it very difficult to get a sense of rhythm unless I see it at normal speed.

Rhythm is a big factor for me...serving has a lot to do with rhythm.

Yes...rhythm is a big factor in the serve and the real time look was an absolute must in this case. But without proper sequence rhythm is impossible to achieve...so we look at the sequential steps...in sequence.


First we look at the set up. First things first. The step before has great bearing on the next step in the sequence...the next link in the chain. A good set up is essential for a good backswing.

Set Up Position...

Proper balance and aiming in the setup are fundamental to developing a sound rhythmic swing on the service motion. Your bent knees and legs should be straight or nearly straight in your setup position...their initial movement will be a slight dipping as your hands descend into your backswing. Raise the racquet tip and aim it at your target. You should be leaning into the court with your weight 60% to 70% on your front leg with your back foot directly behind your front foot in line with your target. You are aiming your feet in order to get your body aligned properly. Do you see how your hand holding the ball is actually behind the baseline? It should be a foot inside the baseline along with your racquet. By setting the racquet forward with ball hand you are creating the potential energy for the racquet to backswing almost by itself. If you drop the racquet from the position that I recommend you will see what I mean. In your set up position I would have your left shoulder pointed at the left net post moreso.

Backswing...

Your backswing is artificially slow and this is due to the fact that your weight is not positioned forwards in your set up position. If you position your weight forwards as I have recommended you merely have to begin turning your shoulders and drop the racquet in order that your weight will come towards your back foot as the racquet descends into the backswing. By synching your weight transfer and your backswing you are beginning to develop the kind of rhythmic backswing that you can duplicate all the time. It will be an inner clock for you in times of pressure or duress. The path of your backswing looks fine. Try to turn your shoulders towards the right net post to encourage rotational movement back towards the ball when you swing.

The Toss Motion...

As you have realized this is where a good deal of your potential energy is disappearing. If you do not place the ball in the right spot it is impossible to release all of your swing into the path of the ball as it is leaving your racquet. By mistakenly placing your toss hand where you do in your set up you leave your self only one option in getting the ball into proper position. But what you do with the toss is what will naturally occur with such a set up. You throw the ball only incrementally into the court...in fact I wouldn’t be surprised if you sometimes throw it so that it would land on the baseline or somewhat behind it. With your tossing hand set a foot into the court in your set up position you will drop your hand towards your front thigh and then raise it along the same path to place the ball well into the court so that you will endeavor to “reach” or swing into the court. This is going to encourage you to swing to your target. Try to throw the ball on the line to your target...this is another facet of the aiming process. I like the way that you release the ball with a mere opening of the hand without allowing the ball to roll off of your fingers. The hands do not merely go "down together and up together" they go "down together and up and out together". Both hands are going away from the body as well as up.

The Footwork...

Another power depleting move. Between your poor tossing technique and the fundamentally bad footwork you are losing all kinds of potential energy. I recommended setting that back foot in line with your front foot towards the target in your set up and it is vital that you keep it in line throughout your motion. By bringing that right foot forwards to the position that you do you are wasting a lot of potential energy by actually hitting your serve from an open stance...ala Stan Wawrinka. Once that racquet is at the top of the backswing, your shoulders and feet should be somewhat in line with each other.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vc3_pUFSgI

Take a look at this video from Rick Macci on the serve. He is advocating getting your “shoulder, shoulder and elbow” in line and at the same time “tilting”. Because of your faulty set up and footwork it is not possible for you to do this. It would throw you totally off balance. But if you reconsider your set up position and work on aiming your motion throughout your swing you will find more balance and rhythm in your swing. You need that degree of separation between your backswing and your forwards swing.

Finally...I think that your back foot should swing into the court...after you push off of it...in the direction of your target as well. I have my students serve and have them continue right out of their motion to walk towards the target. In this way you get all of your energy in line and going towards your target. Your back foot must be in line to drive your self towards your target. As it stands now you are taking a more or less futile swing without any kind of real energy behind your swing. This is why it feels weak and you are unable to apply any kind of serious spin on the ball.

This is the preparation for the forward swing. You must connect these dots in order to have any hope of going forwards to the ball with any kind of real intent. But once you do this it appears to me that you have everything within you to go forwards meaningfully.

[stotty]

Where to start...

The first thing I would tackle is the way you initiate your serve and the subsequent wind up. If you can synch your arms so they are setting off together it might promote better rhythm. I also feel there is little effective weight transfer going on in your serve. Players can transfer weight in many ways but the easiest way is to start with the weight mostly on your front foot and then rock back onto you back foot and then forwards again into your serve.

At the moment your racket arm sets off before your tossing arm and you are virtually "standing" to hit your serve with little rocking motion or rhythm.

Synching the arms with a rocking motion seems easy in theory but often students find it tricky. Once timing elements have become wired a given way it’s hard to change them. The best thing is to shadow stroke the motion many times over and then try to translate it into actual serving. Be warned, overriding your present mechanism may not be easy.

As to your lateral step, I would be inclined to experiment eradicating it. It serves little purpose and looks more like a stagger for balance. It also doesn’t repeat. In each of the clips the lateral step ends up landing in a different place. I would go for a platform stance and see if you can pull it off. If you toss the ball slightly more centrally it may take away the feeling you have to step out like that.

Your stance to commence serving seems to vary. You are very sideways in one clip yet point your front foot more forward in another. As don_budge suggests, I would opt for one foot behind the other and have the front one pointing a little more toward the net post. Setting up like this takes no skill and everyone can achieve it. The pro's have extreme serving stances but they are the one thing club players shouldn't copy. Better to start orthodox and the let your stance morph naturally as your fundamentals progress. This is what happened with all the pro's years before they hit the TV screen

I think Klacr pointed out the issue of you changing your grip as you go through the trophy position phase. This is very common; many students are guilty of this. It just signals you are uncomfortable with the grip and so subconsciously seek to change it close to impact. Just make yourself conscious of this "sneaky grip changing" and try to stop it happening. Once you master the correct grip it will be for the better.

I would leave everything else such as racket drop, etc. for later and mostly concentrate on synching the start of your motion.

It would be great if you could post video attempts/results. Diagnosis is one thing, correcting quite another, so it would be great to see what coaching tricks are working and which aren’t. I have the patience of a saint so don’t worry how long it takes to get anywhere...or nowhere as the case maybe.

[klacr]

The first thing I would tackle is the way you initiate your serve and the subsequent wind up. If you can synch your arms so they are setting off together it might promote better rhythm. I also feel there is little effective weight transfer going on in your serve. Players can transfer weight in many ways but the easiest way is to start with the weight mostly on your front foot and then rock back onto you back foot and then forwards again into your serve.

At the moment your racket arm sets off before your tossing arm and you are virtually "standing" to hit your serve with little rocking motion or rhythm.

Synching the arms with a rocking motion seems easy in theory but often students find it tricky. Once timing elements have become wired a given way it’s hard to change them. The best thing is to shadow stroke the motion many times over and then try to translate it into actual serving. Be warned, overriding your present mechanism may not be easy.

As to your lateral step, I would be inclined to experiment eradicating it. It serves little purpose and looks more like a stagger for balance. It also doesn’t repeat. In each of the clips the lateral step ends up landing in a different place. I would go for a platform stance and see if you can pull it off. If you toss the ball slightly more centrally it may take away the feeling you have to step out like that.

Your stance to commence serving seems to vary. You are very sideways in one clip yet point your front foot more forward in another. As don_budge suggests, I would opt for one foot behind the other and have the front one pointing a little more toward the net post. Setting up like this takes no skill and everyone can achieve it. The pro's have extreme serving stances but they are the one thing club players shouldn't copy. Better to start orthodox and the let your stance morph naturally as your fundamentals progress. This is what happened with all the pro's years before they hit the TV screen

I think Klacr pointed out the issue of you changing your grip as you go through the trophy position phase. This is very common; many students are guilty of this. It just signals you are uncomfortable with the grip and so subconsciously seek to change it close to impact. Just make yourself conscious of this "sneaky grip changing" and try to stop it happening. Once you master the correct grip it will be for the better.

I would leave everything else such as racket drop, etc. for later and mostly concentrate on synching the start of your motion.

It would be great if you could post video attempts/results. Diagnosis is one thing, correcting quite another, so it would be great to see what coaching tricks are working and which aren’t. I have the patience of a saint so don’t worry how long it takes to get anywhere...or nowhere as the case maybe.

Peter,
Numerous issues on your serve as several forum contributors have mentioned it. They have also mentioned starting at the beginning. No doubt this is the best plan for you. Many times, despite the numerous issues in a player's stroke, having the right start at the beginning of stroke will naturally correct and/or eliminate the other issues that hinder the swing. Stotty and don_budge gave you thorough, detailed and genuine guidance. Something to be said about advice given to you from the heart.

You will get a lot of information on this thread about what to do and how to go about it. I know I did when I posted my strokes
Your best bet...take it all in. Savor it and learn from all of it. This is all a learning experience, for us and for you. All this information that people are willing to share is so valuable, whether it significantly helps you or not, immediately or in the distant future. Latch on to an idea or visual that engages you makes sense. The service motion is the trademark and brand of anyone's game (Think of all the different star player's service motions that people mimic and can identify in a silhouette form).

Take the time to learn it and improve it and keep us updated. And once you think you have it mastered, keep going and improving. The journey never ends.

Kyle LaCroix USPTA
Boca Raton

[GeoffWilliams]

He also does not cock his upper body against his hips, which is something sampras does and no one mentions how crucial that is.