"3 Tips To Improve Your Service Game."

[thomas daniels]

Before we get into the tips, for your serve.

Make sure that you get in the reps during practice, because the serve and the return of serve, are the two most important shots in the game.

And the one mistake that I see happening at the junior and adult level is...

(Lack of reps on the court).

Whether that be in their lessons or during practice.

So, again, Let me stress this to you.

Make sure you are getting in your daily reps.

Okay, moving on to the tips.

Oh yeah.

By the way.

"These tips are simple and easy to implement into your match play game, but they will have an immediate affect on it".

One.

Take some pace off your first serve.

We see this at the junior and adult level.

They blast the first one out, then they push over a second one!!

When what they should be doing is taking some pace off their first serve and applying more spin or slice to get a higher percentage of them in.

This also reduces doubles faults as well.

Two.

Vary your positioning when serving.

Nothing too dramatic here.

Just move more towards the doubles serving postion sometimes, then move back to the single one.

This will keep them guessing(your goal) and off balance when trying to read your serve and make sure you learn how to hit different serves with the same toss.

I know, I know, it takes a lot of practice, but the more you practice doing it in practice.

The easier it will be able for YOU to do, in your matches.

Which brings us to number...

Three.

Serve like a pitcher.

Let me give you a good example.

In high school, we had a asian kid who never lost his serve(well a few times) and he didn't have a big serve at all, but what he did have was great racket head control and a good slice and spin serve and he would mix things up on his opponents in every game.

His placement was always on TIME and his mindset was just like a pitcher and he never let his opponents get into a rhythm against him while serving.

See what I mean.

NOW.

This what you have to do.

Adopt the same type of mindset from today.

Get in more reps daily, add more spin and placement on your first serve, while changing your positioning when serving and always use the pitcher mentality when serving in your matches.

As YOU can see.

All 3 of those tips are interconnected as a WHOLE and play off each other in some kind of way, so when you combine them in your matches.

No one is going to be able to break your serve again my friend, in the future.


Anyway, please like, share and comment!!!!

Would love to hear your take...

 

[SV10is]

"Take some pace off your first serve." I agree that many amateurs overestimate the value of power over placement, consistency and movement. As I have suggested in the "serving and volleying as amateurs" thread, movement on the ball really is what tends to kill the return. It makes getting a really clean contact off much more difficult. Stefan Edberg used to almost only rely on slice and kick serves during the 80s and 90s as a S&V player and you will tend to see top players hitting quite a few kick serves as first serves even nowadays. A very popular option is the out wide serve on the Ad side because the kick tends to have the ball drifting even further out after the bounce on this side for RH players.

"Vary your positioning when serving." I do not believe it is a particularly good idea in singles to move too far away from the center of the court. However, it is true that many RH players will shift their serving position towards their backhand side. Assuming you are not going to stay at the baseline, that maximizes the number of forehands you'll be hitting and it exaggerates the angle on your Ad side kick serve. Well executed, the guy will often make contact (with their backhand, if they are right handed) in or even outside the doubles alley.

"Serve like a pitcher." How much you can do here depends on your level, but it is true that varying your serve on occasion is useful. In doubles, I tend to serve from a very wide angle and I tend to prefer to go out wide or body. Occasionally, players will start cheating or moving early and that's usually when I'll bust out a flat serve down the T. I'll also occasionally trade my kick serve for more of a slice on the deuce side in both doubles and singles, but I can just as well aim body as I can aim outside so it's not that easy to counter even if you can tell I'm about to slice. In that same line of thought, the guy from intuitive tennis as this cool faking trick on the Ad side: he purposefully messes up a kick serve motion as if he was going out wide, but it ends up being a slice down the T. That's a good one, but it's tough.

Another good one is taking some pace off. If they're standing far back and are getting used to that kick serve, shave off 10mph and try to get an angle on it... It's usually so surprising people just screw up the return.

 

[S&V-not_dead_yet]

I like #1.

The problem I have with #2 & 3 are related: I may not have the control to consistently execute them.

By varying my positioning on the serve, I'm not only changing things for the receiver, I'm also changing them for me. If the serve is the most important shot and I'm struggling with it, changing my positioning will likely make it worse.

Also, standing in a doubles position to serve is not a good idea for a S&Ver like me; I'm leaving way too much line open.

And by varying my serves, I risk becoming a jack of all trades but a master of none. I'd rather have one reliable [if predictable] serve than five unreliable ones that I vary a lot. Or, as Bruce Lee put it, "I do not fear the man who has practiced a thousand kicks once; I fear the man who has practiced one kick a thousand times."

 

[xFullCourtTenniSx]

Tips for holding serve - just be a better server.

Honestly, anyone can use these tips (except varying the positioning, that is exclusive to baseliners). Taking pace off is just the general "get 2 out of 3 of first serves in" tip. Varying positioning forces the returner to stay focused. Even if they know the correct response, it doesn't matter if they autopilot and don't execute them. Serving like a pitcher is far more executable than people think, even with a limited serve arsenal. Even if you can only hit one type of serve, being able to hit it to every part of the box makes a HUGE difference. Against lower level players, I'll know pretty quickly if they only feel comfortable hitting one type of serve, then I'll camp it hard and punish them or force them to hit sometime/somewhere else. Players that consistently move the ball around, even if it's the exact same serve, give me way more problems than players who hit the exact same serve over and over again. The only way you can hit the same serve to me over and over again without getting punished is to show me you can consistently go big in the other direction.

I can say with confidence that variety beats mastering only one serve to the same spot, at least against the good returners. They will find a way to pound the hell out of it if they know you're not going to do anything else with the ball.

 

[S&V-not_dead_yet]

Another good one is taking some pace off. If they're standing far back and are getting used to that kick serve, shave off 10mph and try to get an angle on it... It's usually so surprising people just screw up the return.

A variation is to use your 2nd serve as the 1st serve: they're expecting the flat, faster serve and when you throw in the slower slice/kicker, it may mess up their timing.

 

[S&V-not_dead_yet]

Tips for holding serve - just be a better server.

Honestly, anyone can use these tips (except varying the positioning, that is exclusive to baseliners). Taking pace off is just the general "get 2 out of 3 of first serves in" tip. Varying positioning forces the returner to stay focused. Even if they know the correct response, it doesn't matter if they autopilot and don't execute them. Serving like a pitcher is far more executable than people think, even with a limited serve arsenal. Even if you can only hit one type of serve, being able to hit it to every part of the box makes a HUGE difference. Against lower level players, I'll know pretty quickly if they only feel comfortable hitting one type of serve, then I'll camp it hard and punish them or force them to hit sometime/somewhere else. Players that consistently move the ball around, even if it's the exact same serve, give me way more problems than players who hit the exact same serve over and over again. The only way you can hit the same serve to me over and over again without getting punished is to show me you can consistently go big in the other direction.

Definitely agree with the bolded part.

I can say with confidence that variety beats mastering only one serve to the same spot, at least against the good returners. They will find a way to pound the hell out of it if they know you're not going to do anything else with the ball.

Just to be clear, I'm not against variety per se. I do believe, though, that many think variety itself will save them when it actually hurts them because they haven't practiced those variations enough. I see it not so much with the serve but with GSs.

 

[SV10is]

A variation is to use your 2nd serve as the 1st serve: they're expecting the flat, faster serve and when you throw in the slower slice/kicker, it may mess up their timing.

This assumes that I am using flat serves most of the time on my first serve, but the variation does work in the other direction. I tend to rely on action rather than pace to earn cheap returns on the first serve, but I'll occasionally throw in a flat serve for good measure. I tend to do it on important point (like 40-15, or 30-40 would be cases where I'd try it). It's not consistent enough to be a really great option, though. I tend to practice my kick serve and my slice serve a little more, so I'm hoovering around just 1/3 of flat serves in and it would need to be around 1/2 to be useful. I need to fine a workable balance of pace and consistency on that shot -- unlike the kick serve where you can hit like a maniac and it just makes it even safer.

I guess that goes back to your comment about variety being difficult to acquire because you need to practice a lot of different things.