Changing the pace of your forehand.

[Mac33]

I've always struggled to put the ball away on relatively easy short balls and on slow,deep balls to my forehand.

Today - I seemed to stumble across a thought that appeared to help me.

During play today my strategy was to think consistent or NUKE meaning full pace - depending on the quality of shot from my opponent.

When I saw what I considered to be the 'right ball' to attack - it was maximum RHS and I do mean MAX RHS.

Anything less than a full pace swing for me anyway and the tactic just doesn't pay dividends as the ball can be retrieved by a fast opponent.

Around half went in and half out mostly long. They were hard moderate flattish topspins not flat drives.

One particular comment from my opponent - 'where did that come from' showed committing FULLY to the RHS will result in developing more pace.

 

[10isMaestro]

1. RHS can translate in additional pace, additional spin or both. If you insist on accelerating your shot, you do not need a much bigger swing to make it happen. You need a slightly different swing than for a rally ball;

2. You do not need to hit very hard to outplay even some of the fastest tennis players you can find. Additional pace sometimes is warranted, but in my experience amateurs almost systematically privilege going for a faster ball when they benefit from an offensive opportunity which, frankly, is often both wasteful and pointlessly risky. If you must know, the reason professional players and other high level players hit so hard when attempting to convert an offensive opportunity, it is due to duration of their window of opportunity. In your case, it is very likely that just a tad faster than your rally ball is plenty enough to capitalize on your chances;

3. Do note that even if you are going to play more of an angle, say to capitalize on a good forward court position, you still need to decently accelerate. You'll barely ever manage to hit a good angle by trying to just guide the ball there softly.

 

[Aretium]

When I get a slow short ball, I focus on my feet, timing and making sure that my ball has the spin to dip and go deep whilst being relaxed. The deep slow balls, I do the same but I try to really hit through the ball really relaxed to get the extra length as I am obviously deeper in the court, you don't need as much spin here.

 

[steve s]

If you are missing 50%, of your forehands, on the "right ball", does not indicate to me that you have made a break thru.

Putting away a short ball is not about pace.
On deep balls I do not have the fire power to hit winners, so I aim deep.

 

[user92626]

It all comes down to level. Your best shot against a higher level player is a puff ball whereas your puff ball against a 85 yrs young opponent is over will. Don't over complicate things.

 

[tlm]

I've always struggled to put the ball away on relatively easy short balls and on slow,deep balls to my forehand.

Today - I seemed to stumble across a thought that appeared to help me.

During play today my strategy was to think consistent or NUKE meaning full pace - depending on the quality of shot from my opponent.

When I saw what I considered to be the 'right ball' to attack - it was maximum RHS and I do mean MAX RHS.

Anything less than a full pace swing for me anyway and the tactic just doesn't pay dividends as the ball can be retrieved by a fast opponent.

Around half went in and half out mostly long. They were hard moderate flattish topspins not flat drives.

One particular comment from my opponent - 'where did that come from' showed committing FULLY to the RHS will result in developing more pace.

I used to try and attack short sitters the same way and like you it was a 50-50 chance of the ball going in. This summer working with the local college coach he had me not swinging as fast as I could. He taught me to hit a good solid shot with spin to the open side of the court.

He said to quit thinking about hitting winners and trying to hit to hard. Not saying to hit soft or not follow through, but hit a good solid shot that will be in most of the time. This helped me big time, we spent a lot of time working on this. We would rally from the backcourt and after a few shots he would hit a short sitter that I would come in and attack.

After learning to just hit a good solid shot and stay in control I rarely missed this shot. He said with a good solid shot to the open court the most the opponent can do is float back a weak shot that can easily be put away at the net.

 

[Dan Huben]

I googled RHS. I came up with riverside high school tennis team. I think it's illegal to talk hitting and high school in the same paragraph. Help a newbie out with RHS


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[Bender]

I googled RHS. I came up with riverside high school tennis team. I think it's illegal to talk hitting and high school in the same paragraph. Help a newbie out with RHS


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Racquet head speed

 

[Dan Huben]

Gotcha. So if I hit with a faster racquet, my ball will go faster. We all may want to wait a second and let that one sink in. I hit with a faster racquet and the ball flies long everytime

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[Dolgopolov85]

I've always struggled to put the ball away on relatively easy short balls and on slow,deep balls to my forehand.

Today - I seemed to stumble across a thought that appeared to help me.

During play today my strategy was to think consistent or NUKE meaning full pace - depending on the quality of shot from my opponent.

When I saw what I considered to be the 'right ball' to attack - it was maximum RHS and I do mean MAX RHS.

Anything less than a full pace swing for me anyway and the tactic just doesn't pay dividends as the ball can be retrieved by a fast opponent.

Around half went in and half out mostly long. They were hard moderate flattish topspins not flat drives.

One particular comment from my opponent - 'where did that come from' showed committing FULLY to the RHS will result in developing more pace.

You need two or three types of forehands for that putaway ball, it's not one size fits all. If the ball is above the net but not above your shoulder, you can swat it with a flat trajectory (just holding an extreme grip will suffice to generate spin).I wouldn't say very high RHS is ALWAYS required for this shot; it depends on the pace of the incoming ball. You can also use this shot for slow, deep balls. If the ball is above your shoulder, you need to bring the racquet up to down with a closed face. If the ball is dropping below the net, you need to exaggerate the down to up motion a little bit so that there's enough spin to keep the ball in on your approach/finishing shot. Developing different forehands according to the nature of the incoming ball should help improve your strike rate from 50%. In particular, short angle cross courts can be very useful to put away short balls because you don't need to blast such balls off the court if you can get it away at a short enough angle that the opponent can't get to. Esp on typical public courts where there isn't so much space on the sides of the court as there is in the show courts that the pros play on.

 

[tlm]

You need two or three types of forehands for that putaway ball, it's not one size fits all. If the ball is above the net but not above your shoulder, you can swat it with a flat trajectory (just holding an extreme grip will suffice to generate spin).I wouldn't say very high RHS is ALWAYS required for this shot; it depends on the pace of the incoming ball. You can also use this shot for slow, deep balls. If the ball is above your shoulder, you need to bring the racquet up to down with a closed face. If the ball is dropping below the net, you need to exaggerate the down to up motion a little bit so that there's enough spin to keep the ball in on your approach/finishing shot. Developing different forehands according to the nature of the incoming ball should help improve your strike rate from 50%. In particular, short angle cross courts can be very useful to put away short balls because you don't need to blast such balls off the court if you can get it away at a short enough angle that the opponent can't get to. Esp on typical public courts where there isn't so much space on the sides of the court as there is in the show courts that the pros play on.

This is a good description of how to attack short balls.

 

[Mac33]

For the last few years I've been concentrating on increasing my racquet head speed - and frankly I've not really improved overall.

Now,for the next few months I'm gong to try what I term the 'Gilles Simon strategy' - play consistent and when the right ball comes to my forehand only - just explode on it with max RHS.

Reckon Simon has one of he biggest changes of pace on the Tour.

Some of his b/h cross courts winners are just scary both in pace and angle.

His change of pace on the forehand is pretty impressive too.