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Your comments on Paulo's forehand really resonated with me. The left arm is very important in the forehand, and hard to follow without slow motion video.
Like Paulo, my forehand looks good at the top of the backswing (good coil, nice straight left arm), but my results are inconsistent. So at my Thursday lesson, 12/8/05, my teacher had another student's parent video a few of my forehands to look at my contact point.
The contact point was inconsistent, but the most striking thing was that as the forward swing started, my left arm drooped by my side like a limp piece of spaghetti, like it was paralyzed, constricting the right arm's ability to swing. Different from Paulo's helicopter blade left arm, but equally destructive to the end result, and to consistency. My pro called this "invisible technique", meaning it's next to impossible to see without video.
Then at today's lesson came a different slant on the left arm. We started a game: how many times out of 10 can I make 3 crosscourt forehands in a row. The answer was 3, but the striking thing was that at the end of a few drills like this, my heart rate (I always play with a Polar heart rate monitor on) was around 175 (too high; I'm 55).
So we shifted gears, trying to bring the heart rate down, focussing on hitting with a relaxed upper body, while letting the legs do the hard work (split step; athletic height; unit turn; crossover step, etc).
It turned out a lot of the muscle tension was in the left arm when I moved it straight across the body. I was really "spearing" it out there, imitating the world class players. This made me work harder, and when the racket began to move forward it was harder to relax the left arm and let it bend and fold into the body.
So when I relaxed the left arm, keeping the same form, I got my heart rate down to 145-155, still hitting with pace and spin, and started hitting with more consistency.
It was the first time I understood the concept of trying hard and relaxing at the same time.
Like Paulo, my forehand looks good at the top of the backswing (good coil, nice straight left arm), but my results are inconsistent. So at my Thursday lesson, 12/8/05, my teacher had another student's parent video a few of my forehands to look at my contact point.
The contact point was inconsistent, but the most striking thing was that as the forward swing started, my left arm drooped by my side like a limp piece of spaghetti, like it was paralyzed, constricting the right arm's ability to swing. Different from Paulo's helicopter blade left arm, but equally destructive to the end result, and to consistency. My pro called this "invisible technique", meaning it's next to impossible to see without video.
Then at today's lesson came a different slant on the left arm. We started a game: how many times out of 10 can I make 3 crosscourt forehands in a row. The answer was 3, but the striking thing was that at the end of a few drills like this, my heart rate (I always play with a Polar heart rate monitor on) was around 175 (too high; I'm 55).
So we shifted gears, trying to bring the heart rate down, focussing on hitting with a relaxed upper body, while letting the legs do the hard work (split step; athletic height; unit turn; crossover step, etc).
It turned out a lot of the muscle tension was in the left arm when I moved it straight across the body. I was really "spearing" it out there, imitating the world class players. This made me work harder, and when the racket began to move forward it was harder to relax the left arm and let it bend and fold into the body.
So when I relaxed the left arm, keeping the same form, I got my heart rate down to 145-155, still hitting with pace and spin, and started hitting with more consistency.
It was the first time I understood the concept of trying hard and relaxing at the same time.