Hi guys Nick here from Intuitive Tennis. In today's video I want to discuss the most
important technical elements of Rafael Nadal's forehand. Also is the Nadal
forehand something that you can copy? Check out today's video and find out.
Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal arguably have two of the greatest forehands in
the history of the game. Nadal's forehand however, is rarely copied and
often labelled as extreme. It is actually far more conventional in some technical
aspects and people tend to believe.
One technical element of Nadal's forehand that's rather conventional is
his grip. So Rafael Nadal does not have an extreme forehand grip. He uses a
semi-western forehand grip which is the most commonly used forehand grip
worldwide. There are other players on tour that have far more extreme grips
then Nadal such as Djokovic, Kachanov and Jack Sock.
Nadal's take back is also rather conventional. There's nothing unorthodox
about the way Nadal takes his racquet back. So he will have a loop like the
majority of other players on tour. He will start with the tip of the racket
and pointing forward towards the other side and then he will close the strings
upon the racket drop. This part of the swing he had tinkered with in the past
sometimes he would drop the racket a little bit lower and other times he
would kind of close the strings down towards the ground like Federer. So he
has a very conventional take back.
Rafael Nadal has a straight arm forehand meaning that the arm will straighten out
once the racket drops and then he will maintain the straight arm in the forward
phase of the swing all the way to the contact and even after contact the arm
will continue to be straight and it will start going into a bend when the tip of
the racket is pointing towards the sky and the arm will start going into a bend
again. Rafa is not alone with this technique other players like Federer,
Chung, Verdasco and Dimitrov also use a straight arm forehand, however the
majority of the players on the ATP top hundred use a bent arm.
And the reason why people label Nadal's forehand as extreme or unconventional is
this finish and it's not to be confused with the reverse finish. The reverse
forehand finish is a term labeled by Robert Lansdorp and refers to a
forehand that finishes around the same shoulder and we all do this shot and we
get put under pressure or if we catch the ball a little bit late it's often
not planned it just happens intuitively. We catch the ball a little bit late and
then we simply put the racquet up around the same shoulder like this and what
this gives us the ability to swing fast in a upward motion on the ball
and we can get the ball into the court with decent pace it is however very
difficult to hit winners this way and it is more of a defensive shot.
The reverse forehand is a shot that every tennis player should have in his or her
repertoire and even the best players in the world including Federer will do the
reverse forehand shot almost in every game and this is something that's often
not planned it happens intuitively when the ball gets behind us a little
bit. I'm going to try a few out. Let me see here if the ball comes deep enough.
Okay so basically it's very simple shot to execute. The racquet will go over the
same shoulder which happens to be my right shoulder and we get nice topspin
on the ball and we get to hit it with decent pace and we can redirect the ball
back in play. Oh this one was actually perfect because it came a little bit
faster. This one's perfect too. So you can get the ball back in play it is however
very difficult to hit winners with the shot. So this is why I call this more of
a defensive shot. Try one more. Perfect.
Nadal's forehand however is not
a defensive shot or a reverse follow-through shot. It is a ultra
aggressive shot and if you ever had the pleasure of watching Nadal play in
person the sound the ball makes when Nadal hits a forehand is something that's truly
unbelievable and the ball sounds like it's cracking or exploding
something that I haven't seen from any other players that I watched live even
Federer. So this is a shot it's one of the most deadly weapons in the history of
tennis, and the reason why it's not a defensive shot is Nadal's finish.
Nadal does not go over the same shoulder which would be his left shoulder and see
he finishes across the body like all the other players do as well so it is not a
same shoulder finish it is an across the body motion where he usually aims for
his right ear and the racket goes in a very vertical way and towards his right
ear and then what happens next is, the racket flips back around his head
and so this is a big advantage because all players finish across the body.
There's different styles, some players will finish over the shoulder like this
the Djokovic style, or some players will finish at a Federer way around the elbow
or some players will finish around the waist like Gael Monfils. Nadal is very
similar in that aspect that he also finishes across but his racquet path is
a lot more vertical so he goes towards his right ear and then back around his
head like this and his intention is to get the ball as high as possible and
also hit it as hard as possible. Rafa is truly unique in this finish I have not
seen many other players have this around the head type of finish. Novak Djokovic
is the only other player that I've seen finish this way sometimes and I
believe this finish came to Nadal intuitively because of Nadal's intention
on his forehand. His intention was always to get the ball as high as
possible and to hit it as hard as possible, and he has a big advantage
being a lefty and hitting that high, hard, high bouncing forehand to a righties backhand
is truly an absolute nightmare to a right-hander because now the
right-hander can try to take the ball early off the bounce which will probably
result in a lot of mistakes or he chooses to back up and let the ball drop
and that ball is not gonna drop very much and he's going to end up hitting
defensive backhands. So this Rafa Nadal forehand
with the fact that he's a lefty is truly a nightmare for right-handers
What is the role of the wrist on the Nadal forehand? Well he will sometimes use the
wrist and sometimes not. So Nadal will use the wrist if he goes for an angled
shot he will have the wrist go up this way or if he hits one of his banana
shots where the ball curves into the court he will actually use the wrist a
little bit more like that, but on most of his the super-hard deep forehands
that bounce high his wrist is actually passive and we can see this in super
slow motion footage. After the contact Nadal wrist will remain passive and when
the racquet gets about right here. This is where the wrist gets activated.
So Nadal uses a passive wrist on his hardest forehands and when he goes more
for a finesse forehand where he's curving the ball into the court when
he's hitting an angle or topspin lob he will use the wrist a little bit more.
Another example where he uses the wrist could be a low ball if he's flipping the
ball up from a lower spot he might use the wrist a little bit more here to get
the ball up.
Why does Rafa finish in a conventional way when he's practicing?
So Rafa will finish between his elbow and his shoulder when he's practicing most of
the time. He will go around his body like this across and then finish between
his elbow in his shoulder around here however once he plays a match instincts
kick in and he's trying to inflict maximum pain onto his opponents, and his
natural finish of going towards his right ear and then back around the head
like this that comes out. So I'm speculating that when Nadal's practicing
he's trying to hit the ball a little bit harder a little bit straighter and it's
hitting back and forth with the other person but as soon as he starts playing
points his instincts are not only to hit the ball as hard as possible but also
they hit the ball as high as possible because he knows that when he plays like
that he can inflict the most pain onto his opponents
Is the Nadal finish something you can copy as a
recreational player? Well I think it's going to be very difficult to get
control on the ball if we try to attempt a Nadal finish. It is a lot easier to get
a proper shape of the ball where the ball goes up and then down if we have
more of a conventional finish. Around the shoulder, in between the shoulder and the
elbow, or even around the elbow. In my experience and when we hit the ball very
hard and we go towards the opposing ear like this, like Nadal does, there's a
tendency to spray the ball long and to over hit it, so I think this shot
requires a lot of practice and I would not recommend it for recreational
players. I'm gonna attempt to hit a few Nadal forehands and I'm also going
to hit a few of my own forehands. I do not have a straight arm forehand
like Rafa does. I play with a bent arm forehand but still it's going to be interesting to
see what happens to the ball when we hit it the Rafa way. So first let me hit a
few of my regular forehands and we'll see what happens to the ball and I'm
going to try to go inside out first, and see I have a fairly low trajectory
over the net I have more of a tendency to hit the ball straight, few more
okay that was better, a couple more, that was better
now let me try to hit a few inside in, The ball machine is hitting deep. Here last
one, okay and now let's go the Rafa way. Let's see what happens. I'm going
inside out first. That was better, and again a Rafa
forehand. I'm trying to aim for my left ear and then back around the head I
sprayed this one. Try again, that was better and see the height is
significantly more over the net, that was a shank. Let's go inside in
okay a little better and there's an interesting leftward
trajectory when I go inside in and see how the ball curves slightly to the
left after it bounces, right there.
and last one, inside in the Rafa way good. A couple of interesting notes about
me trying to attempt the Nadal forehand. Number one I had a slight
leftward trajectory on the ball when I tried to go inside in and actually
inside out as well and this is great for Rafa because he's lefty and when he hits
this shot a cross-court like this. His ball is actually going even further away
from the opponent's backhand, so this is one thing that's an additional bonus
from hitting the Rafa forehand. One disadvantage I found was that I did miss
a two or three balls long and it's always worrisome for me if I'm missing
balls long in practice situations under no-pressure
I shouldn't really be making those mistakes. So again the difficulty in
trying to hit the Rafa style forehand is that the ball might spray long and it
does require a lot of practice. Another interesting thing about me trying the
Nadal forehand was that I felt a little bit of a strain in my bicep and tricep
area now this could be due to two reasons number one I don't really
practice a shot and I've never really tried it in this particular way.
So I'm not used to hitting it in that style and this could be why I'm getting
a liberal strain in these areas also I do not have Rafa's bicep obviously, I
got pretty skinny arms so my genetic predisposition probably doesn't allow me
to hit it quite like Rafa. Thank you guys for watching this video. Hope you enjoyed
it. Please hit that like button. Write a comment in the section below I will be
happy to respond and subscribe if you haven't already. I'll see you next time.