Hi everybody!
Nadim here for Online Tennis Instruction.
Today I would like to give you a very important tip related to
proper footwork and proper positioning
so that you can execute your strokes on
much better balance and staying in much
better balance throughout before, during
and after the stroke.
What exactly am i referring to? I see a lot of players
struggle with not knowing exactly what
their feet are doing or what the role of
the feet are in order to execute an effortless shot.
Being in the right
position, transitioning the weight properly.
So here's what I want you to
pay attention to for today.
When the incoming ball is about to bounce...
let's take it even a step further.
You see the other person hitting the ball.
That's when you should go into your
split-step and immediately get into your unit turn.
Number 1: Here's the
important part...at this point your upper
body should not do very much and you
should adjust your feet based on where
the ball is and this concept that I'm talking about today
applies to all 3 stances.
Whether it's an open, semi-open or neutral stance.
I will demonstrate the neutral stance
just for simplicity purposes but I want
you to pay attention to 2 main concepts here.
Number 1: When you align
yourself to the incoming ball, you
obviously have to have good distance
but what's important for me today
to point out is that however many steps you have
to take to actually get to the ball...
I want you to get that outside leg loaded.
so it is the last step I'm taking
before i move to contact.
So i want the outside leg loaded with the
toes pointing to the side fence
and that weight is fully on this leg at
this point in time, before I then transition and
take the last step if I have to take a neutral stance.
So, I'm loading the outside leg and not only that but I want
to make sure that this outside leg is
aligned with the incoming ball.
That tells me now I'm ready to transition my
weight downward and forward and then I come back up.
The key here is not to stay
in that low position for too long
otherwise you get stuck!
So you want to make sure you can do your split-step, unit turn,
you adjust your feet however you have to...
load that outside leg
significantly and line it up with the incoming ball.
Then you transition your
weight downward and forward and then you
push back upward and that's how you can
stay on balance throughout the entire shot.
All right so let's
take a look at it from this angle here
and before I go into it, you know at the
OTI here we work with progressions so
it's important that you try and
implement this first with shadow swings
and then of course by self feeding the
ball before you have a ball machine or
somebody else feed you balls because here
it really comes down to letting your
body tell you what it's used to and if
you haven't been able to do this
properly before it will take some time
and if you add the ball to it too
quickly you'll probably again focus on
the ball before you actually feel what
your body is doing.
So that's very important to understand.
Now, like i said this doesn't really matter whether you
have an open stance, semi-open or neutral stance.
I will demonstrate the neutral
stance because this is one of the
more basic positions to be in when you
hit the ball and this is what I suggest you do.
If you're obviously more advanced
and you get pulled out really wide then
the stance still takes place like I just
mentioned but you will be loading and
unloading from that outside leg whereas
when you do a semi-open stance, it's
similar okay, you still load the outside
and then transition up to the front leg.
But the neutral stance is slightly different.
There is much more weight transition going forward.
So 1 more time....
I want you to pay very close attention.
When i get to that ball
regardless of how far it is and again for
the purpose of this video i'm going to
show you neutral stance.
You want to make sure that the outside leg is number 1,
Aligned with the incoming ball okay and
Number 2: Good enough distance
so that I can transition my weight
downward and forward and then come back
up and out. That is the key!
So i have to feed the ball in a manner where
I can do this.
So lets try a few here and just watch my loading and then my
weight transition and I can fully finish on balance.
So split, turn, I make this mark
movement here, I load the outside leg...
step forward downward and come back out.
And see if I can finish on balance the whole time.
So split step, turn, move, load
that outside leg...really feel the weight
on that outside leg and you will see I'm
not particularly low yet.
I will go lower from here, down
and come back out.
The idea is that i don't stay down for very long.
I want to be explosive! So I need to be very
careful in how late or how early I set
up this outside leg.
So again, split-step, unti turn, smaller steps to adjust, set up this
outside leg to really feel the weight,
feed, down and up. Okay you will see
I'm totally on balance. My weight is going
forward and upward and that can only
happen if I properly load and properly transition.
So what exactly is happening
when players don't get this concept of
loading the outside leg and aligning the
outside leg with the incoming ball properly.
The main things that I see
occurring over and over again is one of
the two main points I would say is
players hit the ball too late, or you
hear your coach say "hey! you hit the ball
to late or you're too close to the ball".
What they mean by that is you pretty
much set up your feet in a manner where
there's no more transitioning, no more
loading and unloading is possible.
So in other words instead of truly loading the
outside leg and then transitioning the
weight up forward and upward.
You have taken that outside leg just like another
step and you've placed the front foot
way too early! And once the front
foot has been placed, there is no further
transitioning and all I have left is my
upper body to generate any kind of power.
So my swing path will change and
everything else will likely go astray if
I don't set up my feet properly.
So that outside leg needs to be fully weighted
so to speak and then I got a transition
down and up as I go forward.
So basically you're setting up the front
foot too early.
It's number 1 for the weight can no longer
transition and second of all is people
just generally stop moving or don't move
at all and do everything with the upper body.
You've got to make sure that when
you get ready, if you watch other videos
that I've posted it's all about preparation.
So the second you see the
ball coming, you want to be in your split-step
and your unit turn and then you really
want to do everything with your feet
right up until you go to contact.
So if you find yourself doing all kinds of
movements with your arms rather than your
legs before you hit the ball, that's a
good indicator that you're really not
understanding the concept of getting
your feet in place first before you can
strike a balanced shot.
And that is very important!
So what I suggest you do is you film yourself
from either angle, either this angle
right here or the side view and see how
you set up your feet before you hit the ball.
Then you can go and
look at this video again and
see whether you're actually properly
loading the outside leg on your forehand here.
For me that's the right leg.
On the backhand it's the left leg.
The leg and toes are pointing to the
outside fence in either respect...
and then you truly transition your weight
upward and forward!
So give this a shot and I hope that this gives you more
effortless power and a lot more
balance on your strokes!