How to practice serves? I'm somewhat limited in resources..

[enwar3]

I can never attend group or private lessons at the local club because I'm working a full-time job. And I've only got a couple cans of tennis balls. I really want to learn how to serve, but I don't see any way aside from taking six tennis balls out and trying to build a serve from scratch on an empty court.

How could I go about working on a serve by myself? Is there any kind of step-by-step, or drills that I could work on?

[godprint]

i need help in this area too...
normally what i do is i haf a basket of trainers...and then jus try to smoothen the motion
by hitting...

sometimes i feel it's wrong. but i can't think of a better way alone.

[mucat]

Take at least 30 balls (does NOT have to be new), find an empty court and start hitting. Since you do not have coach and can't take lession (like a lot of us), you will have to experiment and discover things about the serve yourself. Of course, you can ask questions here and if you can, post video here always help.

[spc9999]

I went here

http://www.**************.com/how-to-play-tennis.html?hop=jco872

And found the instructed progression to building a serve the only thing which stopped me going insane. I'd been working on similar lines: beginning from the final motion and working backwards, but he made it much easier.

You can also start the drills against a wall to cut down on retrieval time: I found the mechanics, particularly how each movement transitions into the next, took a while, so I spent a considerable time on a handball court just trying to smoothly get the timing and not worry about where the ball went.

Now, if only I could get a consistent toss and find 1000 hours to practice hitting the ball precisely anywhere in the service box, I'll be happy :smile:

[spc9999]

Sorry, I didn't remember links were suppressed.

Search for Tennis For Beginners or Tomaz Mencinger to find his site.

[Mystikal]

I practiced with only 8 balls, I just dealt with it.

[ubel]

Download videos of pros serving, preferably in slow motion and high FPS, and watch how they execute their serves. All pros have many similarities in all their strokes, for the serve it's pronation and acceleration through the contact point. If you watch enough video of yourself and of pros you'll see some striking similarities..

My advice is you start with the basic parts that matter most in the serve: your trophy position (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y25/skimmons/safin_pinpoint.jpg) , direction your arm and racquet travel in (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y25/skimmons/arm-racquet_path.jpg), what part of your arm you're pulling to get the racquet to the ball (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y25/skimmons/forearm-pull.jpg), how well you're both extending your arm/wrist and rotating your forearm to allow for pronation (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y25/skimmons/rotation-extension.jpg), and what kinds of spins you're imparting through your swing paths.

All of the above can be seen in videos of pros serves, but higher FPS videos that you can view frame-by-frame without blur are the best for analyzation and developing an understanding for what you're doing. Once you've mastered those basics, you can work on incorporating things such as knee bend, leading with the hip, varying your ball toss, etc. If it all seems a bit complicated, that's only because it is in the beginning :D

But if all that seems a bit too much, you can always just get a hopper and enjoy hitting a few serves at some cones ;)

[horridvolley]

not really the most important comment to add, but do yourself a favor and try to find a court where the balls can't go through the fence... and if they can, try to find one where there aren't a bunch of thorny blackberry bushes right on the other side.

[shindemac]

With just one can of balls, u might want to serve against a wall. Helps in retrieval time. Sure, there r tons of drills u can do. It depends on what u want to work on.

Place 3 cones on the court. On the T, wide, and center. Try to aim for the cones. This will help develop your placement. U can use cans if u don't have cones, it doesn't matter.

Put a towel on the ground, and get on your knees. Try to serve and get the ball in. This will teach u to hit up on the ball to develop topspin. This will teach u the proper arm motion/mechanics for the serve since your legs r isolated.

Start serving from the service line. Slowly move back and serving further back until u reach the baseline. This will allow u to fine tune your serve so u learn how to get it in.

Throw your racket like u r serving. This teaches the proper mechanics of serving.

Throw a ball as far/fast as u can. This teaches u to use your body to generate power.

[Dink]

Here's my advice:
You've got to invest some more money into this. Get a hopper and some more balls. A Gamma hopper (sold on Amazonriver.com) will set you back $20. A can of Walmart balls is $1.50.

Develop topspin before power.

Make the most of your time. Don't just go out and mindlessly beat balls. Everytime you miss, think about what you did wrong. Everytime you hit a good serve, think about what you did right.

Feel free to experiment (try serving like Roddick, McEnroe, Becker, Federer, Sampras, or Rafter.)

Download videos of pros serving, preferably in slow motion and high FPS, and watch how they execute their serves. All pros have many similarities in all their strokes, for the serve it's pronation and acceleration through the contact point. If you watch enough video of yourself and of pros you'll see some striking similarities..

My advice is you start with the basic parts that matter most in the serve: your trophy position (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y25/skimmons/safin_pinpoint.jpg) , direction your arm and racquet travel in (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y25/skimmons/arm-racquet_path.jpg), what part of your arm you're pulling to get the racquet to the ball (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y25/skimmons/forearm-pull.jpg), how well you're both extending your arm/wrist and rotating your forearm to allow for pronation (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y25/skimmons/rotation-extension.jpg), and what kinds of spins you're imparting through your swing paths.

All of the above can be seen in videos of pros serves, but higher FPS videos that you can view frame-by-frame without blur are the best for analyzation and developing an understanding for what you're doing. Once you've mastered those basics, you can work on incorporating things such as knee bend, leading with the hip, varying your ball toss, etc. If it all seems a bit complicated, that's only because it is in the beginning :D

But if all that seems a bit too much, you can always just get a hopper and enjoy hitting a few serves at some cones ;)

Videotaping your own serve won't hurt none, either.