Spin/high ball revolutions

[Tiger Paw]

Any thoughts on how to add a super high number of revolutions on one's forehand/backhand so that the ball both jumps and accelerates as ball hits the court... a la Pete Sampers.

I thought pete sampras hit a flat/low spin ball compared to others Clay Courters like Moya, Ferrero etc.. He played with an eastern grip and has a classical tennis game, not a high kick power forehand.

Anyway proper grip + racquet head speed + knee bend + longer backswing + (maybe heavy racquet) will give ya what you're looking for.

[Tiger Paw]

Pete had an exceptionally large RPMs ... something like 5000 vs other playing pros 2500.

I think it has to do with precisely how one adresses the ball.

Moya's whipping pronation may do the trick as well.

Getting this kind of action on the ball is not easy and some people just have it while others don't. What are they doing differently.

[perfmode]

really bend your knees and thrust with your legs.

when swinging through the ball, do the "doorknob" forearm rotation

[TennsDog]

Sampras' 5000 rpms was on his serve, not his groundstrokes. His groundstrokes were rather flat w/o much rpm. However, to get lots of rpm, as said already, a lot of wrist motion like a windshield wiper will give loads of topspin, though it isn't great for your wrist or your strokes in general. I used to have a forehand grip,and still sometimes do, where if I were to hold the racket straight out, the front edge would actually be pointing down lower than the back edge. I lead with my elbow on forehands and whip my forearm and wrist around right before contact. Great topspin, not much penetration or depth. The best groundstroke is one that has a lot of spin and a lot of pace (like a Sampras serve). It is difficult to try to simply and part of tennis down to one aspect...

[JohnYandell]

If you guys go to AdvancedTennis.com, you'll find the actual numbers on the spin of a lot of the players you are discussing. We did this filming to record spin several years ago at the US Open.
A few corrections:
First Pete's first serve averaged about 2600rpm--ranging from about 1200rpm to over 3000rpm. This was a lot hgher than most players hitting at the same speed. this is probably one of the things that made his serve so effective--at times almost unreturnable.
His second serve was around 5000rpm. But this was fairly close to the spin range on the second serve of many players. Again you have to look at speed combined with spin.
Pete's forehand spin rate averaged about 1700-1800rpm. That was roughly the same as Agassi. The semi-western and western guys were 2500rpm plus--even up to 3500rpm or so.
So I wouldn't necessarily say the "best" forehand is high spin and high speed. That may not really be possible--to have both. Certain grips are going to tend to create or allow certain spin patterns, trajectories, and maximum ball speeds.
When you think about the players who hit through the court, they don't hit "flat" that's for sure--they have a different spin speed balance. You'd have to say that Agassi and Pete with relatively conservative grips had probably the two biggest forehands of their era--but it wasn't because of their spin.
We plan to do more work on Federer, Roddick, et al and see what we see there in the future.

[finchy]

plz do ferrero also!!!

[finchy]

talk about sampras serve:

http://www.jericho.bc.ca/tennis/The%...uet%20Path.htm

[JohnYandell]

Yes I've seen this. In fact I wrote it--or more accurately it was lifted from one of my old articles on TennisONE. For unknown reasons, they removed my name and there is no source attribution.

[drakulie]

Wow, John Yandell dropping by on the board. I remember reading that article, and your name was on it. Maybe Tennisone?I do not remember. I remember it being a longer article. Anyway, great to have you here giving your input.

[Tiger Paw]

Thanks John,

I didn't have the time to get the correct numbers. I appreciate your bringing them to the fore.

You are correct there is a trade off between "spin" and "speed" and each player has to find there optimal balance between the two for the job at hand. My question relates to the different grips and timing and images players use to create different effects. Variations affect the balance between hitting through the ball and brushing up the ball in the contact zone.

The shot I want to build is the penetrating drive that kicks strongly as the ball hits near the baseline handcuffing opponent or driving ball further out of reach.

Looking at Rodik I believe they add greater shoulder rotation into the ball and then add whipping spin at the end... ie more momentum going into contact. the character of the contact happens to be whipping spin to keep it in.

BTW, read your article a while ago and very much appreciate it, as well as your videos focusing/imaging key points of the stroke. The power of the mental picture a player employs is paramount. And it is in that context that I am investigating, and offering others here at TW to investigate with me, the mental imagery used to find the ultimate balance of spin and power.

Thanks.

[Tiger Paw]

perfmode

Thanks.

I will re-emphasize the leg bend and see how it works.

[JohnYandell]

Yes, well my name was on that article when it was on TennisONE and it will reappear on my new site. I guess it's flattering to have people on other sites take your stuff, but they should probably at least ask first...
Regarding the forehand question. I don't think you can magically make the ball jump--hit the ball hard, flat and penetrating and then somehow it acquires heavy spin in the last instant.
The whole thing starts with your grip and stroke bio-mechanics. My experience is that often times players focus on adding one thing to create a certain outcome they think they want, say more spin--but they have fundamental flaws in their turn, coiling, hitting arm postions, fololowhtoruhgs, etc that preclude reaching that outcome.
I'm not saying that's the case with you, but the fact is that if you perfect your basic technique with a certain grip there will be a range of variation you can create within that technique without destroying it... Now you zero in on the targets (hitting 3 feet inside the basline or less or whatever) and experiment with the brush or the turning of the hand to increase the spin. See how much spin you can get without changing the arc of the ball or losing speed. But if you have Pete's grip you may not be able to spin the ball like Guga. As you said it's all a tradeoff.

[Tiger Paw]

I agree.

The more one works on strokes, the more one re-visits the basics with increased focus. Good strokes are the basics done well, (squared)

[perfmode]

Originally Posted by Tiger Paw

perfmode

Thanks.

I will re-emphasize the leg bend and see how it works.

When I really make the extra effort to bend my legs and make my thighs almost parallel to the ground in a shot(almost 90° angle), the ball clears the net by about 4 feet and pulls itself backdown halfway between the service line and baseline. that shot gets tiring after a while seeing as I'm not in great shape but I get a lot of spin and it's pretty consistent.