Hi guys Nick here from Intuitive Tennis. Can we actually see the ball touching the
strings and coming off the strings when we hit a forehand or a backhand? Check out
today's video and find out. We have all seen Roger Federer hit his forehand
hundreds of times and what Federer does it's something that's very unusual.
Federer will keep his head head down at the contact point well after the ball
has left the racquet and sometimes until the racquet who goes about right here
Roger Federer will still have his head down at the contact point. So what is
Roger doing there? Is he watching the ball touch his strings? Absolutely not and
there's absolutely no way a human being can see a ball on the strings that last
maybe 2 to 5 milliseconds. It's simply too fast for the human eye to see. So how
do I know that Roger Federer cannot see the ball when it makes contact? Well, I know
because we have all done shots as such as between the legs or behind the back
where we make clean contact and yet there's absolutely no way we can see the
ball we're not looking down at the ball when we hit it between the legs and
we're not looking back here and when we do a shot behind the back like this. We
simply line up the ball perfectly because that's a very important element
of tennis is tracking the ball perfectly and setting up for the ball and when it
comes to the strike we do this almost blindly. If we take the best players from
the last ten years the big four Andy Murray, Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and
Roger Federer. Roger Federer is the only player that will keep his head down at
the contact well after the ball has already been struck. If you look at Novak
Djokovic he does it the exact opposite way and Novak Djokovic doesn't even
appear to be watching the ball at all. His head is actually looking forward
like this as he makes contact. Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray will look down at the
contact zone and then the head will follow the racquet like this.
Keeping the head down at the ball well after contact could be a problem for
some players. Federer has one of the best forehands in the history of the game but it
doesn't mean that this forehand and the way he keeps his head down at the ball
can work for other players. If you think of the contact point on the forehand. The
way we made contact is with the dominant shoulder in front that is the optimal
contact point on the forehand. It is a very open contact point because we
already started the rotation and by the time we made contact it is somewhere
around here and then we just continue this rotation. So if we are rotating
towards the left and backwards if we keep our head down at the contact. See
this is kind of inhibiting in this rotation if you look at it from this
angle. Keeping my head down here would inhibit my rotation and I would rotate
less. Well Federer, even though his head is down he still
rotates a lot and you see the other players such as Andy Murray, Nadal and
Djokovic rotate the same way as Federer but they do not inhibit their rotation
because their head follows the ball as they finish towards their left or
the right in Nadal's case. On the one- handed and the two-handed backhand it is
quite different, because when we make contact on the one-handed backhand we
are in a sideways position. So in a sideways position the head naturally
will stay down at the level of the ball much longer and there's a lot less
rotation then there is on the forehand. If we look at the two-handed
backhand there's more rotation than on the one-hander, but still the
dominant shoulder will be in front of the non-dominant shoulder and so our
head and it will not be as open as it would be on the forehand. If we compare
this to the lefty forehand the contact will be here and so if I keep my head
down this would be a difficult thing for some players. On a two-handed backhand
see my left shoulder is a little bit behind my right shoulder at contact
and therefore and my head naturally will stay down on this side a little bit
longer to about right here and then it will come up as I finish like this.
I have a fun exercise that you can try next time you're on the practice court
basically you can make contact with the ball with your eyes closed and I
guarantee you your stroke is not going to change one bit.
You'll still hit the ball clean you're not gonna frame it so you track the ball
perfectly and then as you are about to make contact you close your eyes and
then keep them closed and open them up and you'll see you'll hit a forehand
just like any other and it's exactly what I'm gonna demonstrate now.
I'm gonna try a few forehands with my eyes closed. You take a look at my eyes at contact you
can see that nothing changes the contact is clean as always. The eyes are closed
and I'm actually keeping my head down at the ball only so you can see my eyes
being closed I'm gonna do the Djokovic forehand now where I look forward to
actually framed one with my eyes open how weird is that. I look forward and I
don't worry about the contact it's gonna be there. Again eyes forward and it helps
my rotation actually. So you track the ball perfectly line it up and just strike
it. Next time when you're on the court try closing your eyes.
You're gonna find something very interesting and the ball will not change
whatsoever.
If you are comfortable with keeping your head down at the ball and if it doesn't
inhibit your rotation then don't worry about it and continue doing this type of
stroke. If you feel like the head down at the ball inhibits your rotation then do
it the Djokovic style. Have your head follow the ball as the ball leaves the
racquet.
I'm not advocating to not watch the ball tracking the ball and watching the ball
is one of the most important things in tennis you must watch the ball to pick
up whether it's gonna be short or deep how much penetration the ball is gonna
have and how wide it's gonna be how high or low it's gonna be and these things
are very important if not crucial to have a successful shot, but I'm just
simply stating that the forehand and backhand is executed at a very high
speed and we simply cannot see the ball on the string as it leaves our racquet
Does this apply to the recreational level as well? Yes it does even at the
rec level the forehands are still struck at let's say 50 60 70 miles an
hour and it's still too fast for the human eye to see. So you must realize
that as much as you try to see the ball you know leave the strings and some
players even try to see the ball through the strings as they hit it it's simply
not gonna happen and it's pretty much a waste of time and much more better
practice is to track the ball better to try to read the ball better try to
figure out how this ball is gonna come to you and set it up perfectly and when
it's time to hit the ball and just strike it and don't worry about it
it lets your intuition play a little bit and you will make contact cleanly more
often than you think. Thank you guys for watching this video. Please leave a
comment in the section below I will be happy to respond. Hit that like button
and please subscribe if you haven't already. I'll see you next time