Anna hi how you doing how's your tennis going are you playing a lot
yeah i started going to delray clinic. you going to a clinic?
how many times a week twice a week ago oh that's nice and then you play with
other people too or yeah it's a bunch of people who are
interested in tennis no but i mean outside the clinic do you play by
yourself i go to the wall nice nice
and then you play with me like once a week yes so this is great you're almost
playing every day so officially i can't call you a
beginner anymore now you are intermediate player but you know i saw
you actually posting something on TikTok of yourself playing on the wall
yes and i noticed on your forehand a little technical thing that i like to
help you with today okay okay okay anna so go ahead and hit
a few forehands i'm going to point out to you
you took your you took your sleeves off how come why
i don't know people don't like it seems like
people are people are obsessed with the sleeves okay
but you the way the way you explained to me is for sun protection right yes
because you don't want to get like sunspots. I live in florida i want my
of course in my neck i put spf and i just take care of myself
of course you do that's very smart with the sun is dangerous go ahead and go on
the baseline there i'm gonna point out the little thing
that i saw on your forehead when i was watching it on the wall
so the way you're doing your backswing is not necessarily wrong but there's a
better way and see what you're doing you're going from the bottom
and then the racket kind of stops right here and then you go back forward
you're not really generating any momentum see the racket is going
back and now you have to bring it back forward as opposed to going
from a higher place and then the racket naturally falls down and the gravity
helps to create a little bit more momentum
yeah with gravity does that make sense you're going up and then the racket kind
of falls. what did I do? so look you're going from the bottom
and then you come in here on top and you bring the racket back down
so I do extra movements
you're doing extra movements but what's actually happens to a lot of players
that do take the racket back from the bottom
without a loop they end up pausing and waiting here
right the best place to pause on the forehand is with the racket being to the
side like this and then when you initiate the
stroke that's when you actually start the backswing meaning that the racket's
going to go back like this there you go that's where the stroke
starts and also when you're setting up the stroke
you have been setting up the stroke by going down here and then kind of running
like this and this is not a good way to set up if
you ever watch sprinters they always have their hands closer together
when they're set up so when you're setting up the stroke meaning when
you're tracking the ball your hands are going to be to the side
and then when you're in a good position and ready to strike
the racquet will start going back so the first progression i'm going to teach you
is to for you to get comfortable with bringing the racquet up
before it goes down so go ahead and place your racket in front of mine
in front of mine like this and hold it with one hand i'm gonna drop the ball
and now you're gonna go over my racket and you're gonna hit the ball underneath
my racket okay so you're building a loop into your
stroke okay i'm going to drop the ball and you hit it this way
there it is beautiful
momentum from this little looping action can you
feel the difference do it again
very nice and do one more very nice okay now do it by yourself
make sure you're going up and then down. up and down
very nice job
beautiful forehand that was the best one you hit so far. Anna i'm going to show you
a natural way how to get to this loop so you don't even have to think about it
so in a ready position you're going to be switching to your forehand grip
once you see the ball going to your forehand and now simultaneously you're
also going to be turning towards your side so the first thing you're going to
do is turn your grip and also turn your body
to this side and see how naturally the racket ends up
a little bit higher one thing that tells me that you're in a forehand
grip go ahead and stand right here is that the strings are going to be
orientated towards the side so go ahead and find the forehand grip which is
right here correct and now you're also going to turn
look what happens see how the strings are orientated to the side yeah and you
get the loop automatically so if you are in your ready position
have the racket head a little bit higher when you're waiting for the incoming
ball and as soon as you see a forehand you're gonna be in your
continental grip right and you're gonna see it's a forehand you're gonna turn it
here and you're gonna make a body turn look
the strings are orientated to the side that's all i want you to think about so
look again ready position ball comes to your forehand turn the grip
and then point the strings towards the side that's the beginning of
every forehand stroke once you're in this position now you can
set the forehand up you can move you know forward or backward or to each
side in this position now the hands are going to be closer together it's going
to feel a lot more comfortable and when you initiate the stroke from
there you automatically have the looping action okay anna so let's
work on this natural way of creating the loop
so i'm going to feed your ball to your forehand you're going to
change your grip and then you're going to turn the strings towards the side
okay see there that was more of a normal take back so there was more of a normal
take back you went like this with no loop nothing
okay so go ahead and go in your ready position again
turn your forehand grip and then turn the body to there and you're gonna wait
to initiate your stroke from there and the stroke is initiation starts when the
racket starts going back that's how you initiate the stroke
this is very important because if you look at the what's called the modern
forehand all modern forehands have this loop in
common it's very important because of several
other factors
now the first move you can make very quick so you have time
so if you do it slowly you run out of time so that first move you can do you
can do fast see fast yeah and so you're waiting here
okay in other words in context of the incoming ball
as soon as you see the ball going to your forehand in the ready position you
go like this and now you set up so that
first part can be very explosive very fast
so let me cut the stroke a little bit in half and we're going to wait
we're going to wait here like this so put your racket here you can have the
hand separated but put the left hand right next to it
right next to the racket and just wait like this and hit it from there
do it again
okay anna so you're doing a really good job waiting for the ball on the side but
you have a little bit of a hard time with the rotation
so you're not sequencing the rotation properly see what happens on
this modern forehand is that the left arm your non-dominant arm is going to be
across the body like this okay because you're holding the racket and then when
you let go the racket goes back and what this left hand needs to do it needs to
start the chain in motion so the left arm needs to get out of the way
so you can start rotating the body and because what needs to happen is the
contact needs to occur with the dominant shoulder in front so again watch what
you don't want to do is wait here too long and then swing like this you're
going to make contact too far behind that's what's happening now
so the left arm needs to get out of the way and start this whole process which
is going to initiate the torso rotation Anna i'm going to show you a really easy
way how to practice this sequencing of the torso rotation okay so
which part of the body leads the whole torso rotation and it's
your left arm so all you're going to do is you're going to stretch your
non-dominant arm across the body you're going to hold the ball
and now you're going to have the racket to the side like you did before
and i'll simply drop the ball and then hit a forehand see naturally what
happens if you do that let me show you towards
the camera you can stand on this side if i don't get my left arm out of the
way in other words if i drop the ball and i keep my left arm here i'm going to
whack myself in the hand so naturally as i drop the ball the left
arm gets out of the way watch because i need
to create the space in front of me so my racket can comfortably swing
around the body and this is the perfect timing for this
torso rotation to be initiated by the non-dominant arm
so go ahead and try it out stay right here on the baseline and i'll stretch
the non dominant across the body holding the ball the strings are going to be
pointing towards the side let the ball go and then get the left
arm out of the way okay when you do that you need to swing
the arm out of the way and do what i call the handshake tuck
because this arm can't be like floating around in the air like that
you need to start here look and you're going to come around you're going to
tuck it in imagine shaking somebody's hand and at
the same time you tuck in watch again here
and then you just you just tuck it in now while it's pulling away the torso is
rotating you see this robot yeah remember that and now tuck
it in pull it no no it's not rotating you're
waiting you go you're going like this and now you're waiting
watch me you see this
you're doing like here and then you're waiting waiting and then going
so you're hitting the ball behind
so here i mean you're
yourself yeah but the leading motion for the hit
is coming from from the left side from the body the body and then it takes
place as a chu chu train absolutely absolutely 100
percent the body leads the body leads the arm
and in specific it's the left side of the body that leads
the rotation that's the first link in the chain yeah but you have to be very
careful not to do this too early because the sequencing of it
is very subtle in other words you can easily start
going too early here and now you're you're opening yourself up too much and
too early so it's a very subtle timing where the
practice with the ball is excellent for that because once you
drop the ball then racket goes back and you start pulling it away
so you have to suddenly start moving early with that left side exactly
tuck better tuck it in keep going though
you're waiting look you're going here and then you're
waiting and then going it's once you start the rotation doesn't stop
anymore you let it go yep and what's going to happen the
racket's going to come afterwards it's going to lag
behind okay but just keep it going the racket will follow
okay much better that was the best one you hit so far
much better
very nice did i feel different
from the forehand before so you're using the whole body now yeah all right so
let's try it without dropping the ball i'm going to feed it
to you
it gives me kind of like a motion
how i feel it's like like that yes that's what it feels like
yeah so this goes as a momentum of the body it does
it does but one thing is that go ahead like i'm just like saying like
roughly the idea of the movement that's how you interpret it like that
okay this is actually very good thing you you bring up
the one thing i don't like about it is that when you do this movement you see
how loose the arms are right it's too loose you're not gonna be
able to put enough control on the ball if the arm is too loose it's
gonna be too sloppy the racquet head is not gonna be stable enough
so you do need to hold the racket with a little bit of firmness now obviously not
too tight but not too loose either this is usually going to result in a lot of
mistakes but generally the idea of that is
correct but i do want you to to hold the racquet with some stability
and some firmness okay okay so we're going to start here right start
here the same process as before you're going to be in a forehand grip
and now just pretend like you're tossing the ball to yourself and pulling that
left arm out of the way remember strings to the side it's very
important to wait here now it doesn't have to be far away it
can be also bent oh yeah whatever is comfortable yeah as long as the strings
are towards the side
all right very good so the next progression let me actually rally with
you a little bit we hit back and forth and you try to do the same technique
okay see now the thing you're not doing is you're not turning
fast you're like waiting like this okay so you got to make a fast turn
remember ball comes to the forehand go here
remember don't wait here if you wait for the ball here now the
whole stroke is going to be too fast so if you wait for the ball here then
you're turning and swinging at the same time it's going to feel rushed it's
going to feel hectic so the first thing you do
is you're going to turn like this
much better maybe the best one you hit so far good job
nice
nice anna
good let's try to rally come on back to me
so what happens is when i start rallying
with you and the ball starts coming quicker
everything goes out the window you know you start to rush and all of a sudden
you know what the racket looks like it's going like this you know it's
swinging like crazy there's no more technique there's nothing you start to
panic a little bit so take your time you got plenty of time
believe it or not you don't have to rush yeah see with most players panic sets in
once the ball comes back a little quicker so they first thing they do is
they start taking a racket back very quickly the first thing they do is
think about how they're going to hit the ball
back and they forget to turn the body they forget to set up the ball
all right thinking too much don't think too much i just want everything
would be perfect you have a you have a really good forehand the one thing i
want you to focus on is as soon as the ball is coming to your
forehead side i want you to turn and have the strings towards the side
this is what we're learning today we're learning a loop
and the loop is going to happen naturally if you make this first move
correctly yes all right let's do it again
that was a good rally nice
excellent anna wow
wow
so good it's amazing that's the modern forehand
anna do you understand now the concept
oh it's so exciting yeah
right the whole body the whole body's working where before
the arm was working a little bit over time it was just the arm was working by
itself now you're using the whole body to help
the arm out so when you hit the ball really hard
this way it's going to feel like you're not putting any effort into the stroke
yeah i have a glimpse of how it
should feel that's great so i want to practice
awesome awareness and body consciousness you know awesome all right
great job let's do a racket tap awesome.