What's your longest dink rally? In professional pickleball matches,
it's pretty common to see rallies that last 20 or more shots.
What makes those players so consistent?
Is it possible that your dink rallies are shorter because you lack consistency
and therefore maybe lack a little confidence?
You feel like you have to attack before you make a mistake and get attacked?
Stay tuned.
Hey everybody, it's CJ Johnson.
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A non attackable dink is one where the apex of the ball bounces below the net,
making it more likely that your opponent has to hit up on the ball to hit a
successful return.
One of the things that makes the pros so consistent with this shot is their
footwork. If your footwork is sloppy,
it's easier to lose control of the paddle,
and if you lose control of the paddle,
you just might change the trajectory of that shot and make it an attackable
shot.
Consistency in sport is created from the bottom up. Think of a cannon.
A cannon sits on a stationary base and then the top moves to fire.
It only has one moving part. What if you had a second cannon?
This one has a moving base and a moving top.
Which one would be more accurate? Of course, the first one,
the one with only one moving piece. In sports,
our lower body is like the base of a cannon. Unfortunately,
it can't remain stationary. We need to be able to move to get to the pickleball.
What we need to do with our lower body is move it in an efficient manner so that
we create support for the upper body.
Consistent dinks start with consistent footwork. Begin at the ground up.
Here are three drills that I like to use to create better footwork while you're
on the run. Yes,
there is footwork when you dink.
We need to be moving correctly and the easiest way to learn that is actually
without your paddle. This is a no paddle dinking drill.
Jeanie and I are going to pretend like we're dinking,
controlling the trajectory and we want the ball to land somewhere between the
pieces of tape that I have down on the ground. So Jeanie,
walk forward and touch the piece of tape right somewhere between there and the
net that makes the dink much less likely to be attacked.
So we're here and Jeannie has a ball and we're going to put this in play.
Now as I do this I'm making sure that I'm using my correct footwork,
this would be my backhand footwork.
I'm bending knees and hips and I'm watching the ball all the way to my hand.
This is one of our favorite warm up drills and we use this all the time to get
our minds right, to play pickleball,
to get us huffing and puffing a little bit and to work on our footwork.
We're going to start this relatively small. We're going to make a small X,
whoever feeds the ball will hit the ball straight over the net.
That person then hits it cross court.
So if you're just starting to learn this drill,
we're going to make a relatively small square staying between about the middle
of each non-volley zone. So okay, let's go ahead.
We're hitting dink shots and what we're trying to do is warm up our bodies a
little bit, use good footwork, move ourselves laterally.
Make sure we stop before we hit each shot.
As we get a little bit more warm,
we start to go further and further
along the court.
This drill is probably the most challenging of the three drills.
We need to have a little bit of cardio cause we're running back and forth.
We also need to make sure that we're stopping our feet prior to hitting the ball
just like we did in the last drill.
So in this drill Jeanie is going to be at the non-volley zone.
I'm going to start at the non volley zone.
After I returned the dink over the net, I'm going to turn around.
I'm going to run back to about mid court and then run forward to hit the next
shot. Oftentimes in pickleball,
we're running from the baseline to the non volley zone.
When we don't stop our feet to hit, the dink shot is when we get into trouble.
This drill is training us to stop and hit the shot.
Okay, let's go.
That's one that makes you huff and puff just a little bit as you can tell,
but the purpose is to make sure that you're stopping your feet before you hit
the shot.
Another great thing that it does for you it helps with your vision and watching
the ball.
You need to quickly look and anticipate where that next shot is going.
If you've had trouble with vision and watching the ball,
make sure you click on the video right over here. Until then,
share this with your pickleball playing friends because together we can.
Train Smart, Live Bold and Age Well.