Hi guys Nick here from intuitive tennis. This is video number three from the role
of the wrist series and in today's video we're going to talk about the role of
the wrist on the volley.
Let's start off with the forehand volley. The most important thing on the forehand
volley is to maintain an L shape when striking the ball and we want to
basically have the racquet parallel to the net because we're going to try to
deflect the ball back over to the other side and what needs to happen with the
wrist is a wrist extension. Even if we take the racquet back a little bit in a
lag and you see a lot of great volleyers have a little bit of a back swing
when they're trying to put a little bit more power on the volley and now from
this position we're going to simply maintain this wrist extension. What I
don't want to see is a straightening of the wrist into a neutral position
because we would experience a loss of control immediately if we did this on
the volley. So the wrist is going to remain passive
on the forehand volley and wrist extension is very necessary.
On the backhand volley there's gonna be a slight take back as well if we want to
achieve a little bit more power and in this case we're dealing with a little
bit of radial deviation as we take the racquet to about the shoulder level and
now as we go into the contact and we're going into a slight wrist
extension, because we need to create stability at contact and many
recreational players, even juniors, will have an unstable backhand volley and
with the wrist kind of straightening out and collapsing. So there's a little bit
of a tightening and a wrist extension necessary and to create control at the
contact point. What happens next depends on what kind of volley we're trying to
accomplish. If we're just simply blocking the ball back and we're going to just
maintain the slight wrist extension and the tightening of the grip. If we're
trying to put side spin or maybe a little bit of an inside-out backhand
volley there might be some ulnar deviation involved as we drop the tip of
the racquet down and there's a little bit of ulner deviation happening here. If
we're trying to create a little bit more of a put away volley, we're going to lead
with the elbow and go more across the body and keep the tip of the racquet
pointing to the side like this and in this case we're also dealing with
slight wrist extension. So it's very important that we do not straighten
the wrist as we hit a backhand volley, because we can experience a loss of
control and you must slightly tighten the grip and have a slight extension of the wrist.
Let's start off with the forehand volley. So wrist extension is
very crucial when it comes to the forehand volley. Now let me demonstrate a
few forehand volleys and basically I'm trying to keep my wrist extended at
contact and have as little wrist movement as possible. In this case I'm
just basically blocking the ball back and if I want to create a little bit
more power I might even lag the racquet behind and
then freeze it right at contact, and in this case we're still only dealing with
wrist extension. Many recreational players will have an active wrist like
this and they will lose control of the ball almost immediately so that's
you don't want to do. You want to tighten the wrist a little bit at contact and have very
solid wrist extension. One exception where we could get a little wristy if we get
a volley that's close to the net and we might give a little bit wrist movement
like this, but this is an exception. I would say on the majority of the volleys
we're gonna have that wrist as solid as possible.
On the backhand volley we again
we're dealing with slight wrist extension not as much as the forehand
volley and maybe if we're trying to do specialty volleys a slight ulner
deviation. So let me demonstrate a few backhand volleys and again we're trying
to keep the wrist as firm as possible at contact so that we achieve as much
control as possible. The across the body movement will help promote the
controlling of the contact port by keeping the racquet face parallel to
the net as long as possible. I'm gonna try a few volleys with side spin where
we drop the racket head down and there's a little bit of ulner deviation involved
there. On a volley drop shot like this again we're gonna use a little bit more
ulner deviation and now with the take-back going for more aggressive
volleys. We maybe are using a little bit of radial deviation and then wrist
extension at contact.
Tune in two weeks from now when I cover the final video
of this series and in this video I'm gonna talk about the role of the wrist
on the serve. As for now I want to thank you for watching this video, please hit
that like button, subscribe if you haven't already and I'll see you next time.