Hi guys Nick here from Intuitive Tennis. Today I want to teach you how to hit the
perfect two-handed backhand.
So some of the best two-handed backhands are Djokovic, Nalbandian who was measured
having the fastest two-handed backhand of all time measured at 110 miles an
hour and a young player currently doing really well Alexander's Zverev. He has an
amazing two-handed backhand also. On the WTA Tour and most of the players have
really good two-handed backhands as well. So in today's video let's get into what
makes these backhands so great and also what makes them different.
So let's start off with the grip. What's important on the grip is that the hands do not go on
top of each other. I see a lot a lot of recreational beginners and they start
over lapping their hands on the backhand. You don't want to do that. You're
gonna lose stability that way so the hands shouldn't be too far apart either
like this. They should be right next to each other
and also what we want to do is separate the index finger from the
middle finger a little bit. There should be a slight gap between the index and
middle finger on both hands even on the left hand. That's going to allow us to
drop the racquet much easier if we need to hit a low ball. Our right hand is
always going to be in a continental grip on the two-handed backhand and so the
base knuckle on the bevel number two and on the left hand the perfect place for
the left hand is between the eastern the lefty eastern grip if you come from the
lefty side and the lefty western grip that edge right between those two
grips that's what we place our left base knuckle and that is the perfect position
for the left hand and this is what Djokovic does and most of the players
have their left hand right at this angle.
So the first thing that you're gonna do on your backhand is once you realize the
ball is coming to your backhand you're going to make a small turn and don't
make an immediate shoulder turn like this because that's gonna make your
movements very robotic. So first you see the ball coming to your backhand
and you just make a slight turn like this and now you start setting it up and
the setup usually is going to be a lateral step across the body which gives
us an automatic shoulder turn. Something like this. There's going to be
circumstances on a stationary backhand or if the ball is very close and there
we step more in this direction then we have to force the turn a little bit more,
but usually when you get pulled to the side and you want to make a lateral step
like this and you get an automatic shoulder turn and now you're ready to go
into your swing. So another thing that some of the best backends have in common
like Djokovic and Zverev, they have a high take back and it starts in the
ready position and so if I'm waiting like this for the ball and I see it's a
backhand my racquet is up here. I'm simply going to stay like this and in Zverev's
case he even takes the racquet up a little higher like this and then waits
like this for the ball and Djokovic is something like this where he will drop
the front shoulder like this and the racquet is up like that. However this
is not absolutely necessary, if you have this it might give the racquet a little
bit more acceleration as it drops down into the slot here but somebody like an
Agassi had a little bit more of a lower take back like this and so you got to
play around with these take backs and see what works best. So another thing
that the best players do on the backhand is have a really extreme racket drop and
where the racket will drop sometimes all the way down like this and then from
here it goes into the contact here. This is however not something that you can
control it's a very intuitive thing. You are accelerating the racket so fast it
kind of drops on on its own. You have to make sure that their hands are relaxed
and if you start a little bit higher and the racket will drop down and then go
into the contact something like this.
Now the contact is where all the magic
happens. So what we have at the contact is a little bit different from player to
player. You have guys like Nadal and Agassi have both arms straight at
contact like this and then they finish across this way and you have WTA players
and who have great backhands or somebody like Zverev, they have both arms bent
like this and then you have Djokovic and Nalbandian two of the greatest backhands of
all time who have the left arm straight like this at contact and the right arm bent.
So the arm structure on the backhand on contact is not something that you
should force and whatever comes naturally you should continue with that
and as a matter of fact you a lot of times are not even aware
whether you're straight or bent at contact anyway and a lot of players are
worried that if they hit the ball like this and they see slow-mo footage of
themselves and to see this contact and there's absolutely nothing to worry
about. You have somebody like Zverev who
has probably one of the greatest backhands right now on tour or some of the
great WTA players. They all have this type of contact. So this shouldn't be a worry at all.
What is important however is that the contact is in front whatever
arm structure you have you have to bring the racket in front of you this way but
not all the way like this. The left shoulder on right-handers is always
gonna remain slightly behind the right shoulder at contact regardless of arm structure.
So the contact is where all the magic happens on the backhand.
Whether it's Djokovic, Zverev or Agassi, all these guys hit across. All the
great WTA players on tour who have great backhands, they all hit across and what
happens at contact is this. Regardless of arm structure and let's just take Djokovic
for example with a straight left arm and a bent right arm and what's
going to happen next is the tip of the racket is going to go forward like this
but look at my arms. My arms are going across like this this is the
straight left arm the left arm is going across and I simply continue the
rotation until my right elbow goes towards the back fence. And remember the
rotation starts and the forward phase of the swing we already started coming
forward with the left shoulder, well before contact and then once we make
contact we simply continue the rotation across and then we reach the finish
somewhere around here.
So let's summarize what we need to do on the backhand.
We're going to be in a ready position and we're going to see the ball and we're
gonna make a small turn like this and we start setting it up and let's assume
that the ball is in front of us and we can step forward now we have to make a
big shoulder turn and to where the back is pointing towards the other side and
now the racquet is gonna be up and now we solely focused on the ball and we start
the forward swing we start rotating make the contact in front and then continue
going across all the way. We bring the left foot around the body like this and
finish all the way towards the back fence.
Thank you guys for watching this video. I hope you enjoyed it. Please comment in
the section below if you have any questions I will make sure to answer. Hit
that like button if you can and subscribe to the channel if you haven't
already. I'll see you next time.