What would it feel like to play tennis without being able to use the non-dominant arm?
I'm about to find out because I'm going to immobilize my left
arm by taping it behind my back.
So it turns out that the non-dominant arm is even more important than I
thought and let's start off with the forehand. The first thing I had
difficulty with on the forehand without using my non-dominant arm was the grip
change. So the grip change occurs with the non-dominant hand and what should
happen is when we change the grip it's actually the non-dominant hand turning
the racket a while the hitting hand is holding the racket very loosely. If we
don't have that, now we have to flip the grip with one hand and it's very
difficult to find the correct grip this way. As I was hitting these forehands my
hitting arm got very tired and I came to realize that the non-dominant hand
supports the hitting arm very much on the forehand. So what happens is when we
prepare to hit the forehand we're gonna start off in a ready position holding
the racket with both hands and now as we release the racket the hitting arm does
its thing and then once the stroke is finished the left hand will grab the
racket here and we'll give the hitting arm a much-needed break. And without this
break in between the shots the hitting arm gets very tired
just doing the entire action on its own. So you got to remember that you must
hold onto the racket with both hands in between your shots. If we don't use the
non-dominant arm our balance on the forehand gets completely thrown off so
as I initiate my take back and the racket starts to drop my weight is
shifting towards this side and there's nothing supporting it on the other side
so I have too much weight over where the racket is dropping. So by using the
non-dominant arm it gives us a nice balance to even out the body as we're
executing the forehand. Another important job of the non-dominant hand on the
forehand is the timing. So I like engaging the timing by the release
of the non-dominant hand and the hitting arm. So once this gets released that
initiates the stroke. So if we don't have this and if it's just a racket doing it
it feels very uncomfortable and there's a chance that the racket might come in
here too early and you end up with a hitch in your swing. And most importantly
I felt like my rotation was hindered by not having the left hand on
the racket so I felt like I wasn't turning as much as I normally do and
also as I was finishing I wasn't rotating as much as normal. So we
have to realize that the left hand is a big factor when it comes to the upper
body rotation.
Hitting one-handed backhands without the use of the non-dominant arm is also very
difficult. Just like the forehand the grip change is very tricky if we don't
change the grip with the off hand. In addition to that, because of the arm
being weaker on this side meaning that the back of the arm is going forward
that's why it's called the backhand, my arm got extremely tired as I was
swinging the racket just with one arm. I felt like I was getting a lot less power
without using my non-dominant arm and one of the reason is that I wasn't able
to engage my back muscles. So the back muscles on the one hander get
engaged as the non-dominant arm goes in the opposite direction of the dominant
arm and now I feel a squeezing between my shoulder blades
and that is a big help when it comes to acceleration. As I was hitting the one
handers without this action, I felt like I was arming the ball and
therefore I was lacking a lot of power. The one-handed backhand has less
rotation than other shots in tennis however there's still a little bit of
rotation and it occurs when we go into the shoulder drop and we normally hold
the racket with both hands and then as the shoulder starts going up and you start
straightening the leg there is a little bit of rotation that you can see that
the torso rotates a little bit now and some players that might not rotate
anymore they might stay sideways some of the players will continue to rotate and
by not having the non-dominant arm on the racket when the shoulder drops it
felt like I was losing my balance and kind of falling over to the front
The volleys were actually very interesting I did not feel like my
forehand volley it was affected much by not using a non-dominant arm however on
the backhand volley without the non-dominant hand and my arm I got very
tired. So what happens on the regular volley is that we hold the racket with
the non-dominant hand by the throat and then as we approach the contact we let
go and this little support of the racket gives a lot of relief to the arm
And a great drill that you can try is putting the non-dominant arm behind your
back and then volley for maybe five minutes or so. What you'll find is that
the arm that gets extremely tired because it doesn't have that support of
the non-dominant hand and you will therefore be able to strengthen your
forearm and stabilize your wrist.
And then once this five minutes is over you take your non-dominant hand back to
the racket you start volleying and it's gonna feel so much easier and you will
actually, get a lot more pop on the volleys.
The serve would obviously be very difficult without being able to toss the
ball with a non-dominant arm and being forced to toss it with the hitting arm
however I want you to remember that on the overhead where we don't toss the
ball you have to use the non-dominant arm to get that non-dominant shoulder
above the dominant shoulder and then as you initiate the racket drop you're
going to start dropping that front shoulder and you're going to get that
cartwheeling effect that's gonna allow you to get more power on the overhead.
So make sure not to ignore your non-dominant arm. It plays a big role in
every shot in tennis. It can help you change the grip correctly it can support
the hitting arm so it doesn't get tired it can help your timing and your balance
and most importantly it can help your torso rotation so you can play with more
power.