Doubt about correct techinique

[FREDerer_NadAUGUSTO]

Hi, Guys! How are you doing?
Well, I was practicing shadow forehand swings (semi western), reflecting about the stroke, and thought about applying the "transfer of momentum" concept of serve on my forehand. The thing is, as I keep my arms loose as spaghetti, my right arm, instead of staying bent or "semi-flexed" during contact point, it straighten out in the direction of the target and then get bent on the stroke finish. I ve watched a video on youtube channel "daily tennis lessons", and the instructor said that, in a bent arm forehand, the arm must be bent all the time and, in a straight arm forehand, the arm must be straight all the time (except on finish), because, otherwise, it will lead to a inconsistent shot.
So my question is: should I "control" my arm to stay bent until the end or can I let the momentum straighten out my "loose arm" on the direction of my drive's target?
Note: My takeback is based on thiem's, Kyrgyos' and Sock's, the "next gen takeback" with the racket's edge pointed toward opponent's side, so, it gives A LOT of momentum to the stroke.

 

[Slowtwitcher]

Note: My takeback is based on thiem's, Kyrgyos' and Sock's, the "next gen takeback" with the racket's edge pointed toward opponent's side, so, it gives A LOT of momentum to the stroke.

Not a great idea. Why not start with a more traditional forehand like Agassi or Haas? You'd probably do well if you had these guys' forehands.

 

[FREDerer_NadAUGUSTO]

th

Not a great idea. Why not start with a more traditional forehand like Agassi or Haas? You'd probably do well if you had these guys' forehands.
[/QUOTE

Hey, pal, thanks for the reply!
Well about the traditional agassi/haas forehand, it was the forehand that my instructor taught me when I was a teenager back in 2008, however, since I "discovered" modern technique and windshield wiper motion, I prefer to use those as I feel more natural and "loose" on the execution. And I think Agassi style is not so good to open and semiopen stance.
I can't record a footage of me in court because my city is in quarintine, but I will record my shadow swings and post later

 

[Chas Tennis]

Hi, Guys! How are you doing?
Well, I was practicing shadow forehand swings (semi western), reflecting about the stroke, and thought about applying the "transfer of momentum" concept of serve on my forehand. The thing is, as I keep my arms loose as spaghetti, my right arm, instead of staying bent or "semi-flexed" during contact point, it straighten out in the direction of the target and then get bent on the stroke finish. I ve watched a video on youtube channel "daily tennis lessons", and the instructor said that, in a bent arm forehand, the arm must be bent all the time and, in a straight arm forehand, the arm must be straight all the time (except on finish), because, otherwise, it will lead to a inconsistent shot.
So my question is: should I "control" my arm to stay bent until the end or can I let the momentum straighten out my "loose arm" on the direction of my drive's target?
Note: My takeback is based on thiem's, Kyrgyos' and Sock's, the "next gen takeback" with the racket's edge pointed toward opponent's side, so, it gives A LOT of momentum to the stroke.

A difficult thing to get is a good answer for whether the muscles are applied or relaxed or 10, 20, 50%, etc ? applied. The pros and their coaches aren't talking. You would need very good measurements and understanding to infer muscle forces from videos. Simplified 'all relaxed' beliefs don't seem correct to me because for the bent elbow forehand it seems that the arm should straighten but it can be seen to be bent.

This video shows many Djokovic practice forehands. His arm does not seem relaxed when keeping a bend. You can see his biceps appears firm (see forehands starting at 1:02) It seems as if the forearm would drop down from gravity but rise up from centrifugal force and that he would adjust it for ball height. What is the rationale and science behind believing 'completely relaxed'? If he adjusts the height by pushing his arm down against centrifugal forces, how does that feel? I guess you could rotate with both arms outstretched and not actively applying any muscle forces and see how the elbow and shoulder go to equilibrium vs gravity. One thing is that the forehand gets a lot of racket head speed from the turning of the uppermost body - shoulders are seen to turn back ~90 d. and forward ~90 d. to impact. Watch how rapidly that occurs for ATP & WTA forehands.

 

[Dragy]

I believe you better keep the arm shape. If you let it straighten into contact you loose the across acceleration which boosts racquet head speed through WW. Your racquet kind of “floats“ more without that accelerated recoil/rotation.

 

[Chas Tennis]

Here is a research publication that measures and discusses the muscle activation of the upper body and arms during the forehand. EMG signals mean that you are activating your muscles with nerve signals to shorten to with some degree of force. I am interested in this for the timing between the trunk muscles and arm muscles (I include the shoulder muscles with the arm muscles).

(PDF) Relationship between muscle coordination and forehand drive velocity in tennis

PDF | On Apr 1, 2012, Samuel Rota and others published Relationship between muscle coordination and forehand drive velocity in tennis | Find, read and cite all the research you need on ResearchGate

www.researchgate.net

 

[FatHead250]

Man. Go outside and hit a flat shot. You cant possibly be practicing a new stroke correctly with shadow swings at home. Every good forehand development must start at a flat shot, working on the basic concepts of hitting, then gradually increasing spin as the level of your play increases and balls fly faster. DO NOT try to COPY Western forehands.

All of the guy - Djokovic, Nadal, Federer have gone through that evoltuon on their forehand (and backhand). In the childhood. You can't play tennis well without being able to flatten out the ball, and for that you need to actually feel what hitting a flat shot feels like

 

[Dragy]

Man. Go outside and hit a flat shot. You cant possibly be practicing a new stroke correctly with shadow swings at home. Every good forehand development must start at a flat shot, working on the basic concepts of hitting, then gradually increasing spin as the level of your play increases and balls fly faster. DO NOT try to COPY Western forehands.

All of the guy - Djokovic, Nadal, Federer have gone through that evoltuon on their forehand (and backhand). In the childhood. You can't play tennis well without being able to flatten out the ball, and for that you need to actually feel what hitting a flat shot feels like

That’s quite true in terms of learning to actually hit, drive, smack the ball before trying to put big spin on it. However! I must warn against saloon-door type of flat shot. Basic groundstroke should be kind of pendulum swing, rolling the racquet from the takeback position through low point at hip level into up-and-out towards the ball and further past contact.

 

[FREDerer_NadAUGUSTO]

hey guys! Here some footages of my shadow swings. Just ingnore that I am little overweight at this moment

20200609_143531.mp4

drive.google.com

20200609_175457.mp4

drive.google.com

Note: Please overlook the racket that I am using (six one 90 2010) in the footages, as my default rackets are rf97 autograph 2015, but their strings are destroyed and I can't restring now because of quarentine. But I can say to you, guys, that I've some experience with flat forehands, because I ve played with six.one 90 during 2011-2013, and for recreational players, it's easier to hit a "tradiotional Agassi Flat Follow-through" with a midsize than hitting a windshield wiper. I've changed my style in 2016 (I had already bought rf97 at this time), and the shots started to land in more consistently, but the follow-through was still a federer's bogus emulation with modified-eastern grip. My "new" follow-through with semiwestern grip, unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to test on court due to the damn pandemia.

Note 2: I don't think that focusing too much on flat shots will pay off very much to me, because, unfortunately, I am a shortie (175 cm/5'9") :'(

 

[Curious]

hey guys! Here some footages of my shadow swings. Just ingnore that I am little overweight at this moment

20200609_143531.mp4

drive.google.com

20200609_175457.mp4

drive.google.com

Note: Please overlook the racket that I am using (six one 90 2010) in the footages, as my default rackets are rf97 autograph 2015, but their strings are destroyed and I can't restring now because of quarentine. But I can say to you, guys, that I've some experience with flat forehands, because I ve played with six.one 90 during 2011-2013, and for recreational players, it's easier to hit a "tradiotional Agassi Flat Follow-through" with a midsize than hitting a windshield wiper. I've changed my style in 2016 (I had already bought rf97 at this time), and the shots started to land in more consistently, but the follow-through was still a federer's bogus emulation with modified-eastern grip. My "new" follow-through with semiwestern grip, unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to test on court due to the damn pandemia.

Note 2: I don't think that focusing too much on flat shots will pay off very much to me, because, unfortunately, I am a shortie (175 cm/5'9") :'(

You gotta be joking with the size of that take back!

 

[Bender]

Gulbis called, he wants his forehand back

 

[pencilcheck]

Wow be careful don't hit the vase or furniture, I was worried the whole time watching you do the shadow swing. But I guess you are used to it.

The problem is not really about correct or not, it is about consistency. I think everyone can hit awesome shot in the first 10 mins of their match but once time goes on most people who use inefficient technique will start to frame or not able to aim well.

Therefore I would suggest you to look into using muscle that can allow more consistent shots over long period of time like 30 mins or an hour.

I am uploading one of my slow hits as I am also working on my strokes on both wings, maybe there is something that might help with your question.

Here:

 

[Dragy]

hey guys! Here some footages of my shadow swings. Just ingnore that I am little overweight at this moment

20200609_143531.mp4

drive.google.com

20200609_175457.mp4

drive.google.com

Note: Please overlook the racket that I am using (six one 90 2010) in the footages, as my default rackets are rf97 autograph 2015, but their strings are destroyed and I can't restring now because of quarentine. But I can say to you, guys, that I've some experience with flat forehands, because I ve played with six.one 90 during 2011-2013, and for recreational players, it's easier to hit a "tradiotional Agassi Flat Follow-through" with a midsize than hitting a windshield wiper. I've changed my style in 2016 (I had already bought rf97 at this time), and the shots started to land in more consistently, but the follow-through was still a federer's bogus emulation with modified-eastern grip. My "new" follow-through with semiwestern grip, unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to test on court due to the damn pandemia.

Note 2: I don't think that focusing too much on flat shots will pay off very much to me, because, unfortunately, I am a shortie (175 cm/5'9") :'(

What you personally think watching those shadow swings on video? Any issues? Concerns?

 

[SystemicAnomaly]

hey guys! Here some footages of my shadow swings. Just ingnore that I am little overweight at this moment

20200609_143531.mp4

drive.google.com

20200609_175457.mp4

drive.google.com

Note: Please overlook the racket that I am using (six one 90 2010) in the footages, as my default rackets are rf97 autograph 2015, but their strings are destroyed and I can't restring now because of quarentine. But I can say to you, guys, that I've some experience with flat forehands, because I ve played with six.one 90 during 2011-2013, and for recreational players, it's easier to hit a "tradiotional Agassi Flat Follow-through" with a midsize than hitting a windshield wiper. I've changed my style in 2016 (I had already bought rf97 at this time), and the shots started to land in more consistently, but the follow-through was still a federer's bogus emulation with modified-eastern grip. My "new" follow-through with semiwestern grip, unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to test on court due to the damn pandemia.

Note 2: I don't think that focusing too much on flat shots will pay off very much to me, because, unfortunately, I am a shortie (175 cm/5'9") :'(

Tennis superstar, POTUS45, sez:

Not a Yuge fan of the Kyrgios/Sock takeback. Even less of a fan of this implementation. Your racket head does not need to rise above your own head very often. And certainly never to this extent. I believe that you can still get a comparable RHS with a more conservative loop / take-back.

 

[Slowtwitcher]

Just want to say that people here are super-nice. I mean... really nice.

 

[FREDerer_NadAUGUSTO]

What you personally think watching those shadow swings on video? Any issues? Concerns?

Well, guys...Sorry for late reply, I was busy with academic project.
About the forehand...My shoulder was sore the following day
I think I will try to implement Djoko takeback and see what happens hehe
I will be posting the videos here when I have done the shadow swings or wall training

 

[5point5]