Hi everybody! Nadim here for Online Tennis Instruction.
Another tip for the serve
that seems very important and problems
that occur over and over regardless of
the players level.
I see this
happening quite a bit where the fluidity
and the power generation on the serve is
really not optimal.
And very often it is
because of the same thing that players
do incorrectly.
What exactly am i talking about?
When players start a lot of
them go back put a lot of you guys you
go back and what happens your wrist
opens and your racket goes really far behind you.
This position here does not
allow for a good right to left movement
of your head and ultimately the racket
drop which is the position you need to
be in in order to get good power for your serve.
If you're back here you're much
more likely to get into an awkward position.
You can get somewhat of a
racket drop but it's in a very bad
position very far away from your body.
That is not a very good position to be
in because it's very difficult for you
to lead with the elbow up to contact.
In fact all the players who do this you will
see that you're leading with your hand.
You cannot generate enough
fluidity and also no power!
So what I want you to do is I want you to get into
a position where the palm does not open
and the distance of the racket to your
head doesn't get too great.
So I want you
to start by making this turn here and
what I want to utilize is the fence for
this because the fence will tell
you whether you're trying to go too far or not.
So let me take a step back
further towards the fence here, get into
a serving position with about 2
feet from the fence and now I want you
to get into this position right here...
which the points of focus are the palm
is down so the racket face with which
I'm going to hit the ball is pointing
down and my elbow is clearly below my shoulder.
Those are very important
prerequisites to get this right.
So first you're going back here, if you're trying
to do this the fence will stop you.
So you want to make sure you get
into this position your elbow is below
shoulder, racket face and palm are down...
Now the important part here to note is when
you go correctly
right to left over your head and you
don't have a great distance back here.
You will see that the furthest body part
away from your head is your elbow.
So you're truly only bending at the elbow
you're not activating the wrist at all.
The wrist stays very, very calm so you
can get into this right to the left
movement which is the very important
prerequisite so that you can get into a
nice racket drop.
And If you do so
correctly and do so slowly you want to
pay attention to first here elbow below
shoulder, palm down. I bend at the elbow
and at the elbow only to get the right
to left activity and I see that the
elbow is the furthest
body part away from my head.
Now I continue this motion, the elbow becomes
from lower than shoulder to about
shoulder level and then I'm going to be
able to lead with the elbow which will
get my racket into the racket position
that I desire to get a fluid and
powerful serve action.
Now it is very
important that you do this slowly first!
I've done numerous sessions just in
recent days with the four or five
players who are struggling with this.
So this is not an easy concept especially
if you've been playing at a high level for a
long time, your brain and muscle memory
is just going to want to take over so
you need to slow it down.
Again last time.
I want to distance myself from the fence
so that when i start i can comfortably
stay in this position palm down, elbow
below shoulder and then I bend only at
the elbow with the wrist not active so
the face stays down, the face of the
racket and I continue with the racket
right to left so the elbow slowly comes
up to shoulder level and then goes up
beyond shoulder level into the lead
position here so I can get this racket
drop and then I can come up to contact.
If I do so and I do so fluidly this will
be a very powerful serve so go out
utilize the fence to your benefit and
give this exercise a try!