Federer Serve

[tcoach]

Good article on the Federer serve. I also try to teach all my students a Federer type serve.

BUT I noticed that Federer takes a small step with his front foot similar to Roddick who lifts his foot off the ground. Is there a good reason they do that or his it just habit? I fight my students to the end if they take their front foot off the ground.

I also don't like to let my students move their head as much as most these guys, they can shift their weight as in golf but I like them to keep their head pretty still until their final drive up into the ball. If you have any comments on that good or bad I'd love to hear them.


Thanks,


Ed (Phoenix, AZ)

[johnyandell]

Ed,

That step if, it has any impact, is very minimal. I wrote about a possible explanation in the Roddick serve articles--but it appears to be smaller with Roger and since he pushes off the front foot something that is not important to copy.

Tell your players that once their serves model his perfectly it's ok with you for them to experiment with a two inch step...

Regarding the head. A lot of good servers duck the head like Roddick and Rusedski. Sampras and Philippoussis keep it up the longest. Federer's position looks pretty good to me and he does appear to be looking at the contact area. Don't think it's wrong to stress keeping the head up, and I advise that.

To be totally honest, it apparently doesn't make a huge difference in some of the best servers, although Roddick lands off balance and I sometimes wonder if the head is a factor in that, being the heaviest thing in the body. but advising someone to intentionally pull their head down sounds disastrous.

Regards,
John Yandell