the serve backswing (upper body) by Brian Gordan

[cgirard55]

Hi i have a question regarding the lateral bending of the spine during the serve backswing. I want to be sure that i understood this move. If i am standing upright , do i have to lean my upper body to left (i am righthand) at the waist.

Your opinion!

Thank you

Christian

'To create the additional lean, the player initially leans back slightly at the hips and/or extends the spine. Then, as the body turns into the shot and faces more forward later in the backswing, the tilt continues to increase due to a lateral (sideways) bending in the spine to the left side. This bending is referred to a "cartwheel rotation" of the trunk.È

[BrianGordon]

Christian-

Lateral lean is the lean as seen in a BACK view (from the back fence towards the net) towards the left along the baseline. With knee bend in the windup the body will tend to lean that way some.

As one pushes during the back swing, the lean will increase some for most. Early in the backswing, servers are generally turned side to the net so the lean increase is from the hips and/or spine extension.

Later in the backswing, the hips will rotate (twist) towards contact some making this lean more a function of lateral (sideways or cartwheel) spine bending - depends on how much turned the server is towards contact as the backswing progresses.

These actions will occur without trying if you let them and you use your legs properly.

The lean increases most during the upward swing (as a sideways cartwheel) for reasons I will attempt to describe in my next article. I know this is confusing (ask John) - because the orientation of the torso is changing (twisting) during the backswing, the spinal motion that causes a lateral lean to the left also changes. - Brian

[bottle]

Getting Racket Tip Lower

"Extending the spine"-- that's really cool! It could get a couple of inches more for anyone, particularly if they weren't ramrod straight from back
of head to knees to begin with. Knees could be good, shoulderblades could
even be somewhat clenched, but the person might not be aware of this extra possibility having forgotten that they once read The Alexander Quartet by Lawrence Durrell.