How can you do a kick serve w/o an excessive ball toss?

acer

Rookie
Hi there

I can hit a not bad kick serve but I have been getting a sore shoulder/neck when I do the excessive toss over my head and to the right (I am a lefty). I know the pros can do a kick serve from the same location. Does anyone have any advice on how to do a kick serve without having to do an excessive ball toss?

Any advice appreciated.

Thanks

Acer
 

HyperHorse

Banned
Roll your wrist more, across the ball...
That's how Sampras did it anyway...
Do you stretch before you play?
You shouldnt be getting sore at all from tryin to hit a kick serve...
Post a video if you want more help.
 

acer

Rookie
Thanks for your reply HyperHorse

Thanks for your reply HyperHorse. Yeah I did get more kick from using more wrist motion but then (of course) my wrist was getting sore so now I have avoided it as I don't want a chronic wrist injury. I do stretch before and after (to be honest even more now due to my soreness). Thanks for the input. I still have to get my serve video taped one day.

Thanks

Acer
 

HyperHorse

Banned
acer said:
Thanks for your reply HyperHorse. Yeah I did get more kick from using more wrist motion but then (of course) my wrist was getting sore so now I have avoided it as I don't want a chronic wrist injury. I do stretch before and after (to be honest even more now due to my soreness). Thanks for the input. I still have to get my serve video taped one day.

Thanks

Acer

You have any idea why you are gettin a sore wrist?
Which racquet/string & tension are you using?
Are you sure you are using the right grip size?
There is no way in hell you should be getting a sore wrist from hitting a kick serve...
Do you do any exercises to strengthen your wrist & forearms?
Get a small rubber ball, eg. squash ball and squeeze it constantly when you're not doing anything..
When you've outgrown that, get one of those hand gripper things, i dont know what they're called exactly, u can get them @ any fitness/sports store...
How old are you?
Are you doing anything off the court for your strength & fitness?
Any history of previous injuries? Do you play any other sports?
 

acer

Rookie
Hi HyperHorse

Thanks for your reply. I am a 4.5-5.0 level player who plays about 4 times a week. I use a Pro Kennex Pro 5G tennis racquet, Head Rip 16G Multifilament (nice and arm friendly) string with a tension of 52 lbs. I use the correct grip size measured at 4 1/2. I actually had some tennis elbow before and this has helped me play pretty well pain free. The tennis elbow I got when I first started about 8 years ago when I used a Wilson HyperHammer 5.3 racquet (allot of people on the TW site found that this racquet gave TE).

Anyway, tennis is my only sport. I think what happened is that when I tried to use more wrist on my serve is that I exaggerated my wrist motion too much. Maybe my muscles just weren't used to the motion. I have to say that I did get more kick. In my opinion I think that using the wrist on the kick serve can hurt you if you exaggerate the motion too much. In some articles that I have on the kick serve by Stan Smith, he stated that you should never purposely think wrist on your serve. He said that causes an unnatural strain on your shoulder and slows racquet head speed down. He said that you need wrist on a kick serve but you should let it happen naturally. Also, I never had any wrist problems at all for 8 years until I tried to exaggerate my wrist on my kick serve. I think in my case that I was just forcing it too much.

I will take your advice though and try to gradually add some wrist in my kick serve. I guess I just have to try not to force it too much. For my wrist, I actually do some wrist curls, squeeze a ball and I have those grip squeezers that you mentioned. I want to be able to get some more kick on the serve w/o having to exaggerate the toss so much over my head as this is starting to bother my shoulder. I can see what Patrick Rafter had though shoulder surgeries.

Thanks again Hyperhorse for your help.

Acer
 

HyperHorse

Banned
Hmm... you forgot to mention your age...
But i have more suggestions....
You should only be tossing the ball @ 11 o clock or so..
Do lots of stretching, at least 10-15min before you play... The looser you are, the easier your serve will be and you'll be able to hit a kick serve with more spin than before since your muscles will all be relaxed.
Maybe take up Tai Chi, this might help you relax mentally.
Last resort, head down to your doctor and get a referral to have an X ray & MRI done on your wrist, shoulder and elbow, just to be safe... and then take it from there... That'd be if it gets worse.
 

jsiu

New User
Assuming you have proper form/technique, take a few more warm up kick serves before you start going for them and stretch those areas more.
 
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