One tip that will definitely not improve your serve is snap your wrist. If you do
this not only will you not improve your serve but you might also cause an injury
to your wrist. And if you try to snap your wrist here is what it would look
like. What you would have to do in order to accomplish this is slow down the contact
point so that you can then consciously snap the wrist and this will lead to an
abrupt stopping of the service motion looking something like this.
And this is a very dangerous way to serve because all the pressure is being absorbed by
the wrist and the rest of the body is really not helping out at all and this
can potentially cause a wrist injury. See what happens on a serve that has the
correct fundamentals is that the wrist is actually protected and supported by
the proper mechanics of the serve. So if we execute a flat serve for example the
wrist will be slightly extended and slightly turned towards the right and
now even if we have continuing pronation or no continuing pronation the wrist is
in a passive state and fully protected by this action. And because the wrist is
in such a protected shape now we can execute the maximum amount of power
without the danger of injuring the wrist
See on a kick serve there might be a little bit of wrist movement but it's
not something that you have to consciously do. Naturally as the tip of
the racket is pointing towards the left at the moment of contact and if we now
have a more lateral swing path there might be a little bit of wrist
involvement on this serve. But you don't have to consciously execute it it will
naturally happen as you execute the correct kick serve swing path.
And the best way to think about the wrist on the serve is to not think
about it at all. If you apply the right fundamentals on all your serves the
wrists will be in a protected state and the risk of injury is very low.
Another tip that's going to cause problems on your serve is to lower your
toss and try to hit it on the apex. So what I mean by that is that if we toss
the ball and try to hit it before the ball starts to drop this is very
difficult to do and will cause problems on your serve. All tennis players hit the
ball on the way down. Now there are some players with very fast service rhythm
ala Goran Ivanisevic or Nick Kyrgios and they will hit the ball on the
way down but it's only slightly falling so they're pretty close to hitting the
ball on the apex. There are some players that actually hit the ball at the apex
such as Alex Dolgopolov and Roscoe Tanner. So you're talking about a handful
of players that are able to serve like that and there's a reason why not more
players serve in that way and that's because it's very difficult to execute
this serve with such a speedy rhythm. I'm gonna try to hit a serve and hit the
ball at the apex and let's see what happens to my technique as a result of
it. So I actually don't think that I was able to hit the ball at the apex I think
it still slightly dropped but overall I felt my arm more on a serve like that
and this type of style just doesn't match my genetic predispositions. See the
vast majority of tennis players will not have the right genetic predispositions
in order to match a serve that requires such a fast arm and such quick body
movements. So if you can pull this off to have a quick serving rhythm like this
and hit the ball at the apex or when it's slightly falling then go ahead
and continue doing that but do not force a serve like that because in my
experience the vast majority of players will benefit from a toss that's hit on
the way down.
And there's a lot of benefits you can get from letting the toss drop, you don't
have to rush your take back, you can let the racket gradually accelerate and also
if you happen to have a pinpoint stance there's a little bit more time for you
to pull that back foot up to the front foot. And there actually might be a
little bit more power in a serve that's hit with a falling toss. See on a
volleyball serve players will draw power from throwing the ball way up into the
air and then the ball will pick up momentum as it's falling and the
volleyball player uses that momentum to generate more power. So if I hit a serve
where the ball is actually falling down before I make contact there will be
more momentum established by the ball itself.
So do not be afraid to toss the ball higher on your serve. You will get a lot
of benefits out of it. On a windy day when you're playing outside you can
always adjust and throw it a little bit lower but what you shouldn't force is
try to hit the ball at the apex. Another bad tip for your serve is to try to
consciously pronate and i've covered this subject in depth and i want you to
check out my video titled fake pronation and also a video titled serve
acceleration. These videos explain why pronation is so bad for your serve in
great detail. But to summarize what I think pronation is a really bad thing to
work on on your serve is that basically pronation into the contact and
continuing pronation takes place in such a small timeframe, literally milliseconds
and this fact makes it impossible for us to time this action at a conscious level.
But besides this fact just think if you are going to practice pronation into the
contact and continuing pronation, because this action is going to take
place so quickly if you accelerate on the serve, you're not gonna know whether
you did it or not. So what that means is you have to record every single one of
your serves in slow motion and then after each serve you'll have to go back
to your phone or your camera and check whether you have pronated or not
and this is a very counterintuitive way to practice. So I recommend that you do
not worry about pronation. It will take place on its own it's a direct result of
sound fundamentals and serve acceleration.
And finally the worst tip ever on the serve is to try to jump into your serve
or in other words drive your legs or use the power from the ground up. All these
things are gonna make your serve worse. And let me show you what it looks like
when we jump and drive the legs. So now I'm gonna try to consciously jump on the
serve and my timing is going to go away. See look what happens I'm gonna jump
and drive my legs and I'm spraying the ball all over the place. Let me try one
more I'm gonna try to jump into this serve. And I've covered this subject in
great detail. I have two videos that you can watch if you're interested. And one
it kind of gives you the history of the leg drive. It shows you the best players
of all time and how much the legs are part of their serves and this video is
titled the leg drive. Now I have another video where I talk about how to do it
correctly. How to use the legs properly on the serve and this video is titled
the passive leg drive. See my students are amazed when I show them how to do
the passive leg drive. Here's what happens to them.
I show them how to set the serve up correctly and then when they accelerate
it they end up getting off the ground and landing inside the baseline on their
non-dominant leg without ever being conscious of doing so. So if you execute
all the power sources of the serve in unison and you lean forward you will be
able to be catapulted off the ground and then you will land inside the court
without ever being conscious of it. Let me show you how it's done.
Basically I'm gonna throw the ball inside, I'm gonna lean forward, I'm going
to accelerate and it's guaranteed that I'm going to land inside the court. I'm
gonna become airborne and I'm not trying to do it it'll happen completely
on its own.
And the only way for the passive leg drive to not happen would be if I
consciously tried to hold my feet on the ground.
See naturally as I get on the toes this allows the feet to lift up. So if
you get on your toes, if you bend your knees and if you can arch your back as
much as you can comfortably, then once you accelerate the serve upwards and you
are leaning in at the same time naturally the body will lift up off the
ground and you will land inside the baseline and that's how all professional
serves are executed. So if you want to have a high level serve forget about
trying to jump on your serve forget about the whole idea of the leg drive.
This will only cause you headaches and will definitely not lead to serve
improvement.