What do you think is the most important tip you could give for serving?

[Brett]

Just wondering on your inputs.

[Loco4Tennis]

many aspects tyo a good serve, but keeping the toss consistent is a big one with me
if you can have the ball go to the same spot everytime, then you can work on that

[WildVolley]

I have difficulty narrowing it to a single tip. Here are my top tips.

1) Use the continental grip. This will encourage the proper motion from the very beginning.
2) Relax and let the racquet drop.
3) Toss with a straight arm and point your tossing hand up in the air at the ball prior to your hit.

[patrick922]

keep the elbow straight on the toss and keep your left hand up longer-- keeps the head up longer as well

[Nellie]

^^^^ Keep you head up and look at the ball. Toss and high and do this, and many, many service problems almost solve themselves.

[Supernatural_Serve]

Spend 5 minutes every day practicing your toss. You can get 50-100 tosses in easily.

A room with a high ceiling, step outside your house, it doesn't matter.

Just do it.

[A.Davidson]

Don't let your head drop as you prepare to strike the ball.

[FH2FH]

< 3.5, pronation & correct grip. How many people use a forehand grip to serve and never change it? I'd bet at 3.5 and below it's at least 50%.

[quicken]

Concentrate on your toss.

[hewittfan3]

For me if I concentrate on this during my serve it is so much better.

I really think about bending my knees. Atleast with my serve I feel like thats most important atleast power wise

[ericwong]

For me, I would practise placing the ball instead of tossing. To me , tossing means throwing up the ball without any intention. Placing the ball means putting the ball at the right height for me to hit. Knees bending and pronation will come naturally after you have mastered the placing

[dpfrazier]

Keep your front shoulder up, and hit up at the ball using power from your legs.

[raiden031]

Learn to put topspin on second serves

[KBlade Pro]

Keep your arms loose and derive your power from your legs and trunk. This will give you a more powerful serve, and more control because you're not trying to muscle the ball with your arms and shoulders.

[10s talk]

depends on the level :confused:

[tbini87]

when you are having problems, get your first serve in!

[BeHappy]

throw the ball to the left

Unusually high quality advice in this thread, good info in pretty much every post!

[ShooterMcMarco]

Keep your head up and watch the blur of your racquet go by

[BeHappy]

Keep your head up and watch the blur of your racquet go by

hmmm, I don't lik this one so much, good for groundstrokes but not serves methinks...

your sig had me rotflmao ;)






your signature had me ro

[ShooterMcMarco]

Yeah, Aykhan always has the funniest posts, even though I don't think he intends for them to be that way.

[mordecai]

1. Make sure you are balanced with your knees bent before you start your toss.
2. Get into the trophy position underneath the ball after your toss, line up your left arm, shoulders and right elbow up pointing up to the contact zone
3. Get your right arm extended fully so that the bottom of the handle of your racquet is pointing straight forward underneath the ball and pronate your whole arm through the ball.

[my_forehand]

...Get the ball in?

[Tempest344]

keep your non hitting arm up(throwing arm) for as long as possible
the second you drop that arm it opens your body up and can make you twist..making it harder to get the serve in

[rosewall4ever]

weight transfer and consistent ball toss...become a tosser!

[daddy]

Many said it - toss the ball. Want to serve big like croats style ? Watch those guys and their motion. Weight transfer from back leg to front, lean in and of course toss consistantly and just a bit forward. Spin shoulders for extra kick, hold the left arm up then swing with it to generate extra pace.

Really no way to give one tip. ;)

[NLBwell]

Make you toss consistent.

[Rickson]

Learn the backscratch.

[gunbuster]

Keep your arm loose like a wet noodle.

As good as all the other advice is, it is for naught if the server is relying on their muscles to do the work...

[Tikiman53]

Hit slow, easy, solid warm up serves. Don't hit your first warm ups or first match serves as hard as you can or with as much spin as you can possibly hit. Just keep it simple, keep a good rotation, and follow through the ball. As long as it goes in with a decent amount of pace, it's fine. Then as you get your rhythm, start adding stuff.

[Rickson]

Make sure your arm is straight at contact.

[gta_grp]

well, i just started tennis like less than a year ago. and mai coach and his like all star son sez that i can play like a 4.0. mai serve iz probably like the strongest part of mai game. it mostly depends on the typer of serve that u r hitting. but, mainly, try to minimize the length of the swing (which im pretty sure that u do), get ur racket behind ur head (which im like positive that u do), and most importantly, SNAP UR RIST!!! i cant stress that enough. without u snapping ur rist, u get only brute muscle power. but if u snap ur rist, u get the velocity of the racket plus the muscle power. well, i hope that i helped. probably not though. well anywayz, i wish u luck in ur tennis game.

[Vermillion]

<3.5 - grip
3.5+ - if the toss is right, then you will almost always hit a decent serve

[ShooterMcMarco]

well, i just started tennis like less than a year ago. and mai coach and his like all star son sez that i can play like a 4.0. mai serve iz probably like the strongest part of mai game. it mostly depends on the typer of serve that u r hitting. but, mainly, try to minimize the length of the swing (which im pretty sure that u do), get ur racket behind ur head (which im like positive that u do), and most importantly, SNAP UR RIST!!! i cant stress that enough. without u snapping ur rist, u get only brute muscle power. but if u snap ur rist, u get the velocity of the racket plus the muscle power. well, i hope that i helped. probably not though. well anywayz, i wish u luck in ur tennis game.


Tanx fer da tipz yo. Lahst tyme i snapt mai ristasis, i had to see da docter

[vndesu]

bend knee.
high ball toss.
toss ball forward.
hit it.
pronate.

[Josherer]

Go Forward (ball Toss In Front)

[Bungalo Bill]

Just wondering on your inputs.

Keep your head up and watch the blur.

[Djokovicfan4life]

well, i just started tennis like less than a year ago. and mai coach and his like all star son sez that i can play like a 4.0. mai serve iz probably like the strongest part of mai game. it mostly depends on the typer of serve that u r hitting. but, mainly, try to minimize the length of the swing (which im pretty sure that u do), get ur racket behind ur head (which im like positive that u do), and most importantly, SNAP UR RIST!!! i cant stress that enough. without u snapping ur rist, u get only brute muscle power. but if u snap ur rist, u get the velocity of the racket plus the muscle power. well, i hope that i helped. probably not though. well anywayz, i wish u luck in ur tennis game.

Ummm, worst advice (and typing) in the history of TW? :shock:

[shadowrtype]

well, i just started tennis like less than a year ago. and mai coach and his like all star son sez that i can play like a 4.0. mai serve iz probably like the strongest part of mai game. it mostly depends on the typer of serve that u r hitting. but, mainly, try to minimize the length of the swing (which im pretty sure that u do), get ur racket behind ur head (which im like positive that u do), and most importantly, SNAP UR RIST!!! i cant stress that enough. without u snapping ur rist, u get only brute muscle power. but if u snap ur rist, u get the velocity of the racket plus the muscle power. well, i hope that i helped. probably not though. well anywayz, i wish u luck in ur tennis game.

For a relaxed and fluid toss and serve, avoid trying to read posts like this that can cause your neck to twitch. Ugh my head hurts!

[zebano]

relax your shoulders. Find a habit to metally a physically relax just before starting your serve (modeling this after Djokovich or Sharapova will probably cause you to lose your practice partner).

[Djokovicfan4life]

...Get the ball in?

How inspired!

[pines2222]

Agreed that this is a good post.

For the basics toss and grip are the most important. For more power, toss serve farther out front. Learning to pronate is also useful. I'm a pretty good server, so all that's usually covered.

When I'm missing a lot of first serves or double faulting, it's usually because of one of three things that relate to fatigue or laziness:

a) the arm (grip, wrist, elbow, shoulder) is too tense and therefore I'm not getting enough spin or power.

b) I'm opening up my shoulder too soon; solution is usually to keep head and toss arm up a little longer.

c) My back foot isn't where it should be...I haven't found that there is one correct method to what the back foot should do (different strokes for different folks; for me it should move right behind my front foot), but you need to make sure that whatever you do, you do it consistently. I find that a lot of intermediate players don't realize what their feet are doing during the serve - if they saw videotapes, they'd be amazed.

[quicken]

Agreed that this is a good post.

For the basics toss and grip are the most important. For more power, toss serve farther out front. Learning to pronate is also useful. I'm a pretty good server, so all that's usually covered.

When I'm missing a lot of first serves or double faulting, it's usually because of one of three things that relate to fatigue or laziness:

a) the arm (grip, wrist, elbow, shoulder) is too tense and therefore I'm not getting enough spin or power.

b) I'm opening up my shoulder too soon; solution is usually to keep head and toss arm up a little longer.

c) My back foot isn't where it should be...I haven't found that there is one correct method to what the back foot should do (different strokes for different folks; for me it should move right behind my front foot), but you need to make sure that whatever you do, you do it consistently. I find that a lot of intermediate players don't realize what their feet are doing during the serve - if they saw videotapes, they'd be amazed.

To add on letter A).
Keeping the arm relaxed is crucial for a fast/spinny serve. Relaxed arm really helps to generate some good racquet head speed. I failed to recognize this in my early days, but now I understand that relaxing the arms really help to create some solid serves.

[1337Kira]

Get your toss down. So oft neglected, but so important.

[2ndServe]

1) toss consistency, hit the ball at the apex of the toss or just as it's coming down. That is your target zone as the ball will stay longer in this zone as it's going from going up,stopping/coming down

2) barely grip the racket with a continental grip, grip it like egg, makes for a very loose wrist/arm/shoulders that allows maximum velocity, spin and pronation

3) develop a strong 2nd serve, it is the corner stone of holding serve

4)swing up, keep your head up don't let it drop, don't let your waist bend

5) good knee bend and weight transfer, explode to the ball

6) good should turn

Basically if you could find videos or servers like Roscoe Tanner, Pancho Gonzalez, Sampras, Stich, Krichek they all basically had these same traits.

[fridrix]

Many said it - toss the ball. Want to serve big like croats style ? Watch those guys and their motion. Weight transfer from back leg to front, lean in and of course toss consistantly and just a bit forward. Spin shoulders for extra kick, hold the left arm up then swing with it to generate extra pace.

That is nice, I shall work on that! Am I wrong, or does Ivanesevic serve with a Western forehand grip?

[(Blank)]

I don't think any pro serves with the western grip. The continental grip is versatile enough to hit slice, flat, and kick serves while I'm not sure what one could hit with a western grip haha.

Another tip is to get that tossing shoulder and arm up! I recently noticed that I never did that and I'm getting a lot more pop on both 1st and 2nd serves.

[montx]

The Toss (or place). Keep your arm straight when tossing let go of the ball at the same point near head level. Toss higher at first...adjust as needed.

[richw76]

On the toss I try to keep my release point consistent, and have my arm follow the same path.

I also practice with targets when possible. Before I serve I relax, bounce the ball twice and think about which of my targets I'm hitting.

Also I used to do some crazy stuff with my other arm, now I just kinda bring it in not all exaggerated like I see sometimes I just bring it into my side like I'm pumping a fist in.

If you know what I'm saying you're probably already doing it so I guess I'm not helping much :-)