Favorite Singles Practice Drills

[skiracer55]

Tennis is Not an Arm Sport, Part 2

In Part 1, we were working on efficient footwork as a means to get to a spot on the court where you can hit through your ideal hitting zone. As I suggested, footwork drills can improve your footwork, but they can also bring an awareness of what good footwork is and what it brings to the court. I believe this awareness alone will help you to find yourself in the spot where you can use your ideal hitting zone more often than not. So what's next?

Well, basically taking your footwork up a notch to produce more power when you hit an offensive shot through your ideal hitting zone. Anybody here want more power? At and above the NTRP 4.0 level, lots of things improve...consistency, spin, placement, and so forth. But I believe that from the 4.0 level up, you have to have the ability to put pace on the ball. A hard hit ball takes time away from your opponent and can produce errors or setup shots that you can easily put away on the next ball. As the fighter pilots say, "Speed is life." I'm talking here about groundstrokes, and if you've noticed, the pros can hit groundstrokes in the excess of 100 mph, and they are not all guys, either. The Williams sisters, particularly Serena, can hit groundstrokes incredibly hard. How do they do it?

Well, by two things:

(1) Using the kinetic chain, which is the windup of the whole body (a lot of this happens in the torso) and the subsequent uncoiling of the chain.

(2) A powerful stride off the back foot onto the front foot through the ideal hitting zone.

The basic level of movement on the tennis court is:

(1) Using good footwork, move to the "ideal hitting zone" spot on the court.

(2) Stop.

(3) Hit the shot.

(4) Starting running again to recover.

What you see the top players doing is running to the "ideal" spot, slowing down slightly to set up (but not stopping), then uncoiling the kinetic chain and striding from back foot to front foot through the stroke itself. I watched one of the former CU players do this in the final of a Men's Open tournament last year. He was setting up behind his ideal hitting zone, then making a huge stride, almost a running broad jump, off his back foot through the stroke and ending up on his front foot while the kinetic chain unwound.

Sound radical? You bet it is, and it's not for everyone, but I think all players ought to at least try to get the sensation of what it's like. To do that, first go get yourself a Frisbee. You can do this anywhere, but I think it's more meaningful if you do it on a tennis court, on the baseline.

The Frisbee drill for the forehand is simple: just take the Frisbee and wing it like a discus thrower would. I think, as athletes, track and field stars are among the best, and I love watching discus or javelin throwers. So rather than having me waste your time talking about what a good discus throw looks like, just tune into any of the many track and field meets currently being televised and check out the discus throwers. You'll immediately see what I'm talking about, which is that they gather themselves at the far side of the circle, wind up the kinetic chain, get some revolutions going to get the kinetic chain unwinding, and finish by springing across the circle from the back foot to the front foot to release the discus.

When you're doing your forehand Frisbee discus, you don't have to do the actual 360 degree revolutions...but if the spirit moves you, go ahead! This is an experiment in the kinetic chain slash angular momentum coupled with a leap, or spring from the back foot to the front foot...so my advice is, don't hold back!

The Frisbee drill for the backhand is really simple. Most of us wing a Frisbee using essentially a backhand stroke, so just fire off a bunch of throws like this. If you don't know how to throw a Frisbee, your kids will show you. When I hit a really heavy topspin backhand, the stroke itself and the accompanying unwinding of the kinetic chain and the accompanying stride forward feels just like I'm throwing a Frisbee.

Try it, you'll like it...

 

[maverick66]

First, stick with the Darth Vadar all-black look. We've talked about this before, but I'll again note that all-black is quite fierce and Dead Sexy.

I often think this when i see j011ys videos. the all black makes him a sexy beast.

 

[skiracer55]

One additional thought...

Great post. (I am not going to quote your entire novel ) Being in the right position helps quite a bit, but we are all learning it at our levels. What is amazing to me is the ability of pro players to seem to be everywhere at all times when i watch them. Then I realize how quick they are due to their footwork.

...at the risk of TMI (Too Much Information). The top players move really well and they also anticipate really well. Anticipating your opponent's next move is something we can all do better, and it, combined with improved footwork, can help put us in an ideal hitting position more often. Andy Murray is winning a lot of matches lately, and a lot of that is because he's very court savvy. He knows how to use the full court, and he also knows what his opponent is likely to come up with in a given situation and, more importantly, how to best counter it. Murray has an uncanny ability to anticipate the next shot and do something good with his reply.

So how can you better anticipate your opponent's next move? Well, basically in three ways:

(1) First, there's usually a standard move to make in a given situation. For example, you get a short ball on the forehand, the Aussies used to say "Always approach down the line," so you do and follow it in to the net, cheating toward your right so you close off the passing shot down the line. Yep, a cross court pass might beat you, but it's a lot harder than hitting a pass down the line. So, and this is especially true of net play, if you make the standard move to the percentage spot, most of the time, you probably won't have to move far, if at all, to get to the next ball.

(2) Second, every player has patterns and favorite shots, especially under pressure. If you're playing somebody you already know, you already know what they like and do not like to do. If you're playing somebody new, use the warmup and the first few games of the match to figure out their tendencies. For example, Player A, for whatever reason, almost always goes cross-court on a backhand pass. So when I come in on a forehand down the line, I'll shade toward the down-the-line pass, but not too far, and I'll be ready to jump to my left to anticipate and intercept the cross court pass. Player B has great, heavy topsin balls on both sides...but they always go cross court, Player B doesn't like to change direction in a rally and go down the line. So unless I change the direction in a ground stroke rally, I can cheat toward the coming-back-crosscourt side of the baseline.

(3) Third, and this is the most advanced method, you can start the point and try to construct it so that you almost know where the ball is coming back in reply to each of your shots. For example, I have a good slice serve out wide, and I've been setting my opponent up with a lot of heavy serves down the middle in the deuce court. At 30-30, I serve wide to the forehand, come in behind the serve and following it so I cheat toward the left side of the net where I look for the backhand volley which I angle crosscourt and follow it, cutting off the weak down the line reply, which I angle into the open court for a winner, point over.

John Newcombe used to call this "preacting," and the idea is that you take control of the point from the git-go and your opponent has to fall into a pattern of choreographed responses. When tennis commentators talk about players "shortening the point", it's usually not by trying to hit a bunch of impossible winners. It's by using this "can opener" approach, where you start the rally with a forcing stroke, and then tighten the screws so that within a few strokes, you've got the easy winner in hand. We talked earlier about offensive and defensive tennis. All this "preacting" example really says is "If possible, start on the offensive, don't give it up, and make your opponent gopher up an easy ball or an error in as few shots as possible."

The corollary to this is "If you have to, go on defense, but try to neutralize with the next shot, then get back on the offense ASAP." Murray, Nadal, Djokovic, and Federer are currently, in my opinion, the most accomplished ATP players in terms of being able to start a point in the driver's seat, switch to defense for a ball or two when needed, then back to offense so quickly that you hardly know they're doing it. Same for Caroline Wozniacki and Jankovic on the women's side, and Dinara Safina is getting better at it all the time.

You have strengths, I have strengths, everybody has strengths, at whatever level. Try to figure out what your strengths are, how these strengths make your opponent do things he or she doesn't want to do, and try a little preacting of your own...

 

[split-step]

4. Crosscourt/DTL groundstrokes. One player hits every groundstroke crosscourt, the other hits everything down the line. Keep it in play as long as possible, practicing running groundstrokes.

This drill is tiiiiiring.

 

[J011yroger]

What fun!

I did watch the video, and I enjoyed it very much. So thank you! I also like your "light" system for dealing with serves. Although for me a high percentage of serves feel like red lights.

Some quick remarks on your video, and a question.

First, stick with the Darth Vadar all-black look. We've talked about this before, but I'll again note that all-black is quite fierce and Dead Sexy.

Second, I hadn't seen your FH before, and now I understand what you've said about how you developed it and whatnot. Suffice it to say I would pay cold hard cash for that FH. Maybe I could get a deal if I also purchased your slice BH?

Third, do know of any site where you can upload video and then play it back in slow motion? I don't think this is possible with YouTube or the site on which your videos are displayed.

The light system is great, you just need to return a bazillion balls to get the hang of it.

Actually my FH sucks, the fact that I can hit the crap out of the ball with it just kind of covers that up. Goal for this summer is to get it fixed. It is coming around.

For slow motion, the best thing is if I film in high speed 210fps, but it doesn't come out well indoors, so I will do some filming outside.

The high speed is awesome, and looks like this short clip http://vimeo.com/3568081

J

 

[J011yroger]

Good stuff Jo11y.

I know you got some flak from that last 'slice' vid you showed - not that you had asked, LOL, but you know what I mean. So I just wanted to say to be fair, on the second point of this vid, your slice looked much nicer form wise and is likely the one you use most often anyways.

That second point - struck me funny. I have seen that so many times play out just as that point did, with the short stab volley, and the guy in yellow comes up to put it away, and then net's it. That drives me crazy because I have done that myself so many times!

Personally, I think we hold, hold, then rush the stroke on those type of misses.

Anyways, nice vids once again. Always fun to watch.

EDIT - Hey Jo11y - Look at that short approach slice at 124-126 seconds. That is like THE perfect time one might use that cross-behind step we were discussing a few days ago. Not critisizing you at all, you executed well there. But some folks were asking when one might use it, and that is a great example of a place that it helps keep the body sideways and cleaner footwork. Nice approach btw...

Ya, I don't do that cross behind step, ever. It is something that I would have to practice against the wall or such before I employed it in a real match.

As far as hitting those easy passes into the net, I can do that every bit as well as my buddy, but the magic of video editing comes to my rescue.


J