I think it's pretty safe to say that for most of us,
our backhand is not as consistent as our forehand is.
Guess what? Today
Laura Fenton Kovanda is going to help us to get more consistent off our backhand
side. Stay tuned.
[inaudible]
Now she probably doesn't need an introduction because you see her on this
channel fairly often, but Laura Fenton Kovanda who is again,
got a brag on her cause she doesn't brag about herself.
She's a four time U S Open Champion.
She's been in Tahoe giving some clinics and some camps over the last week.
And tell us why this video and working on backhand has come about.
Well first of all, how much fun, you know, how much I love coming to Tahoe,
but having such a variety of ages of men and women, skill levels.
And one of the biggest things that I see everywhere I teach is we have a
commonality of people struggle with their backhands.
So the first part of this drill or learning how to hit a backhand really starts
with our feet. That's why we call it footwork, making the feet do the work.
Every time we hit the ball,
ideally we want it to be the same distance from the body, the same height,
so we become consistent every time we hit a backhand.
But we have to start with our feet. Most people, two things,
they don't get their feet turned and keep that body facing that fence and they
go back this way, which means they're likely to fall over.
Or they get back to here and stop and then just swing with the arm.
So momentum's going backwards, try to swing forward. We're not as consistent.
And that's what we're trying to work on with our backhand is getting to that
ball. So when we swing, we're the same height, same distance from the body.
Every time we hit that ball. So here's an example, I'm going to drop, step,
go back, may have to go back to this way to go forward. There's my swing,
whether I'm in the front court, middle court off to the side.
Our feet need to do the work.
Point number one.
When we're facing the net and maybe we're the kitchen line or mid court
transition area, the very first thing we want to do is drop step.
So we're going to drop step and the paddle is going to go back.
So we're going to drop step, paddle back,
so we're ready to go backwards behind the ball. Ready?
Ready. Hey, so we're going to drop step and go back.
Now if you will notice CJ does not have both feet shoulder width apart facing
that fence.
She's got part of her body open and many times we tend to just swing with our
arms. So we've got to fix this. Come on back up.
We're going to do this in slow motion so we learn it up here. Okay,
so CJ we're going to take our left foot because the balls on this side and we're
going to drop step. Both feet are going to face that fence. Good.
Now we need to go back as quickly as we can so we get behind the ball because we
want our momentum to be going forward. So step number two,
we're going to side step back and our paddles are back.
We're going to get back behind this ball because the ball is bouncing up here.
Now we want to be able to go forward.
We've got to get our momentum going forward because many times people are very
good at getting back to this point,
but then they stop their feet and still swing with their arm.
And instead we want the entire body doing the work. We want one smooth,
complete motion starting with our feet. The body moving,
the extension of the arm.
Our arm is just an extension of what our body is doing.
So how do we get to that point?
We're going to push off of this front leg like we're going forward because it
gives us a little extra momentum. So we're literally going to point that foot.
We're going to push off of that. There's our step and our swing.
Though if you notice at the end of the swing,
our eyres should be on the ball. Seeing that ball hit the paddle,
our shoulders are over the ball, so when I take that swing,
I should be able to freeze almost like I'm a trophy. When you're on balance,
you know that you've done it correctly.
If you feel like I'm here and I'm going to fall over or I'm reaching way out for
the ball, you're totally off balance. Something's not right.
Usually your feet are not doing the work. Keep in mind,
sometimes when you're playing a match, we've got wind or their spin on the ball.
So even if we drop step and we go back towards the baseline,
we may actually have to go backwards the other way as well.
We may have to go back this way to go forward into our shot.
So again, our momentum always wants to be going forward.
Now we're going to put this whole thing together.
We're going to play follow the leader in real time. Ready? You got it.
Set? Drop step and you go back, back, back, back to go back to go forward,
take our swing, eyes are on the ball.
If you're one of those people who happens to have a better backhand than you do
a forehand.
You're in luck because we have a forehand footwork video on this channel,
and I'm going put a link right over on the side.
But if you happen to get value out of this last video,
give it a thumbs up because together we can.
Train Smart, Live Bold and Age Well