footwork and split step

[pwnxor]

I need a lot of help on my footwork and want to know if there are any drills i can do off the tennis court.

Also I do not get when to do the split step, when rallying or when receiving serve.

 

[[ GTR ]]

If you are starting to learn the split step. You should do a small hope in the the air and land on the ground as the opponent hits the ball. I don't think you should jump too high but if you hardly leave the air, there is no point of it.

Doing the split step is supposed to improve reaction time by alot and if you are just starting out, it will take a while for it to be natural for you. Keep doing it and don't try to be lazy.

You also want to split step on every single shot your opponent hits whether a it's groundstroke, serve, volley, etc..

Another way to sort of know when to time the split step is to watch the pros play and try to split in the same rhythm one player does when his opponent strikes the ball.

Hope this helped.

 

[futuratennis]

mate he basically summed it up.. after playing tennis for ages it becomes like second nature

 

[SystemicAnomaly]

...

Also I do not get when to do the split step, when rallying or when receiving serve.

You should be doing the split nearly every time your opponent is contacting the ball -- on serves, volleys, and ground strokes. Check out the following for footwork drills:

PlayerDevelopment.USTA.com/content/fullstory.sps?iNewsid=116188&itype=7418

tennis.about.com/od/drillspracticegames/a/footworkwarmup.htm


.

 

[jules2]

Also I do not get when to do the split step, when rallying or when receiving serve.

Fuzzy Yellow Balls has a superb explanation of the timing of the split step on the return of serve. When playing against big servers I've gone from just about managing to block it back to having the time to take a big swipe at the ball. That Will guy sure knows what he's talking about.