hitting spin serve very wide

[tom-selleck]

curious as to how to put a spin serve out very wide.... i did post this before and got a couple of helpful hints, but looking for me.

i find that i often end with a hard cutter that goes right at the returner, which works well but decent players get used to it.

i really want to take my opponent out wide and then have open court for next shot.

the few things that help somewhat are:

aim more to the sideline (somewhat obvious??)

hit more over the corner of ball vs. the side (doesn't make sense to me, other maybe topspin accentuates the curve.

someone said don't hit the serve as hard.

what has worked for other people????... what grip is best for spin serve?? i've seen continental and eastern forehand....

thanks in advance!

[GugaGuga]

I practice the wide serve all the time, because I like the idea of having it in my reperatoire. I am getting better and better at it, but it takes time. The key is to learn accuracy with your serve in general.

In the adcourt, I use the kicker to go wide off the sideline. In the deuce court, I use the slice serve.

Just hit the ball there--it's that simple. Obviously the percentages are lower--the net is higher and there is less court to work with--but that's the point. Practice practice. There's is no magic. You don't change anything technically--maybe a little less pace--that's all.

[kicker75]

I find the most important thing in hitting an effective slice out wide serve after placement is racquet head speed. The better the racquet head speed, the more slice you will be able to generate. (So, the harder I swing (of course with a slice motion) the better the ball skids out wide and low. If you swing slower, you will still put spin on the ball, but it will not carry out as wide as with a extremely fast swing as most of the ball movement takes place after the initial bounce.

...in general, for all serves, the more racquet head speed, the better, unless you're trying to "change-up" the returner.

[SageOfDeath]

If you slice and its going to the right of your opponent then that means right the way you see it or to the right as in the right of your opponent how he sees it?

Slice is more effective on one side obviously for the reason that you can take your opponent out wide on one side.

I've heard that backhand eastern is best for spin but I didn't buy into that and stuck with continental. You can try it if you want though...

I don't really understand what's wrong with your serve as of now.... Is it your placement? Is it how much spin you are getting into the ball? Is it how much power?

Some people think that putting a tremendous ammount of slice of a serve is the best way to bring your opponent out wide but it doesn't really work out on both the deuce and ad sides. The best way to bring someone out side is to be able to place the ball. Obviously hitting the ball flat or with slice will make the ball bounce lower but placement if very key.

Also hitting less deep and with more angle is a good way to bring someone out wide. Then you can go in and volley their return in the wide open court.

[kevhen]

I can serve outwide onto my neighbor's court but still find it hard to control placement when the ball is curving several feet in the air and will often miss wide, so I tend to place the ball deeper and more in the center of the court and try to force errors than to drive my opponent off the court, but I like to mix it up too. Usually I will serve while standing way out wide when serving slice way out wide on the deuce court. You do expose yourself to large returning angles but if you opponent hits a conservative return, you will have a large open court to hit into. I take some pace off when serving short angled and very wide.

I don't consider it a strong serve through since fast, smart players will get to it and do something with such a slow serve to their forehand so I rarely hit these. It's a risky serve that can often win or lose points very quickly for you but I don't like to take too many risks with my service games.

[Kana Himezaki]

I can't really say anything extra, and probably shouldn't since my own slice serve isn't as great as the rest of my service game.

But what's helped me is to just try the normal motion, except meeting the ball and tossing out to the side, from 2-3'o'clock.

You should be pronating on every serve. As soon as I make contact with the ball for a slice, I pronate through the side. The pronation should create teh spin, rather than trying to brush all the way around.

Doing so has given me a decent serve that moves off to the side after the bounce. It doesn't curve way off the court, which I feel any decent returners would pounce on and attack as producing so much spin would limit the pace, as kevhen said.

But it's much less attackable, and still creates more of an open court (given not as much, but I'd rather not deal with a return ace).

[Kathy]

What you mentioned about "stating the obvious" is very true. First, make sure you are taking dead aim at a spot in the service court.

Many players don't really "gather themselves" before serving. You may need to just pause a second, taking a breath and making sure you are fixed on what kind of serve you're going to hit and taking dead aim at the wide corner of the service court.

If you're a right-hander, you can't serve as wide to the ad court as you do to the deuce. That's because there's relatively little sidespin on a twist serve. But on a slice serve, you can get a lot of sidespin. The more slice you get on a wide serve to the deuce court, the more the ball curves for you.

For more slice, toss more to right. It feels like you strike the right side of the ball a glancing blow.

Note, however, that it only FEELS like you do that. You don't actually strike the right side of the ball a glancing blow. (If you did, the ball would go due west.) What you really do is strike the back of the ball with your racket-head tracking toward the right. That's what puts the sidespin on the ball.

As mentioned above, greater racket-head speed translates to more rpm's = more spin = more curve.

If you can get away with it, stationing wider gives you a better angle, enabling you to serve wider. You'd be surprised how many receivers won't notice if you vary your serving station a little. Try it and see if the receiver adjusts his receiving position. If not, he probably doesn't notice.

[MRG]

As a right hander, I will use kick to serve wide at ad court. It works quite well when playing doubles as i can move to the left a bit more for serving position.

Just my 2 cents.

[kevhen]

Yeah the 3.5s won' adjust when I move far right to serve but most 4.0s and up will move.