My forehand is incredibly strange and unreliable, help :(

[justinwearspants]

Hey! I've been playing tennis for a while now, and there's something super strange about my forehand that I have developed. I believe I am using too much wrist and opening my face way too high on the take-back before contacting the ball. This leads to me feeling super inconsistent and not being able to rely on my forehand as a weapon. I hold an eastern grip, and have tried to "pet the dog", meaning the strings face the floor, but it just feels so uncomfortable and does not really fix the problem. Attached are some images of my forehand before contacting the ball, and a video of a doubles match (long video, so i just cropped out pictures of my forehand). The time stamp for the video of me just overhitting forehands is around 4:00. Thank you in advance for helping me!

Forehand timestamps: 3:53, 4:01, 5:55, 6:15, 6:23, 7:03, 10:50, 11:18, 17:01, 19:35

forehand 1

forehand 2

doubles match

UPDATE!!!

This is me doing a drill with my friend to fix my forehand, basically trying to aim the butcap more at the ball rather pointing above it!
forehand drills

 

[Dragy]

Yeah man that range of motion is ridiculous Racquet head falling so much down is possibly associated with the fact that your hand isn't moving anywhere at that point. I suggets getting your whole arm farther back - maybe try "elbow your enemy" concept - and then pulling your racquet handel forwad so that racquet head is trailing behing, not dangling down.

As a side note, your very conservative eastern grip is not likely to work well with the kind of swing you are using. Going to full SW might be very relieving in terms of stroke cleanness and consistency. But not before getting rid of dangling racquet head.

 

[justinwearspants]

Yeah man that range of motion is ridiculous Racquet head falling so much down is possibly associated with the fact that your hand isn't moving anywhere at that point. I suggets getting your whole arm farther back - maybe try "elbow your enemy" concept - and then pulling your racquet handel forwad so that racquet head is trailing behing, not dangling down.

As a side note, your very conservative eastern grip is not likely to work well with the kind of swing you are using. Going to full SW might be very relieving in terms of stroke cleanness and consistency. But not before getting rid of dangling racquet head.

This is an awesome video! ill definitely give it a go next time I'm on the court! Thank you
and yeah I know the motion is soooooo weird, I don't even know when I developed it. Also, I've really been thinking about switching over to semi western but all of the times I've tried, it just felt so strange because I could not generate enough drive. I think I lay in between eastern and semi, so like a modified eastern

 

[Fintft]

When you take the racquet back, do it with the elbow away from the body(elbowing the enemy).

That way the head of the racquet would not fall back.

 

[justinwearspants]

When you take the racquet back, do it with the elbow away from the body(elbowing the enemy).

That way the head of the racquet would not fall back.

Absolutely will give it a shot next time I play! What should my wrist be doing though. I've been told that it should be relaxed but I'm 90% sure that's why my forehand is weird

 

[Dragy]

Absolutely will give it a shot next time I play! What should my wrist be doing though. I've been told that it should be relaxed but I'm 90% sure that's why my forehand is weird

It’s typical that you don’t fix such things by focusing on them directly. Wrist better be loose, but everything else should be correct so that this loosened plays well Work on your arm, your spacing, your torso engagement, and your wrist issue will likely solve itself.

 

[justinwearspants]

It’s typical that you don’t fix such things by focusing on them directly. Wrist better be loose, but everything else should be correct so that this loosened plays well Work on your arm, your spacing, your torso engagement, and your wrist issue will likely solve itself.

I understand you completely haha, yeah it has just been on my mind for a while now and I thought i'd try to fix it

 

[BallChaser]

Absolutely will give it a shot next time I play! What should my wrist be doing though. I've been told that it should be relaxed but I'm 90% sure that's why my forehand is weird

Your wrist is too loose and that makes your shot inconsistent. I would practice drop-feed and try to maintain the racket head at least as high as your wrist, to overcompensate for your racket head drop. Wrist should be relaxed, but there is a limit.

 

[justinwearspants]

Your wrist is too loose and that makes your shot inconsistent. I would practice drop-feed and try to maintain the racket head at least as high as your wrist, to overcompensate for your racket head drop. Wrist should be relaxed, but there is a limit.

Yeah so I've been seeing that you're supposed to aim your butcap at the ball, but mine is way above the ball

 

[Chas Tennis]

Compare your forehands to high level forehands in this post. On Youtube single frame using the period & comma keys. Always select the video with alt key + left mouse click, otherwise the video starts playing. For most accurate comparisons select videos from the same camera angles. Go to impacts and single frame back and forth comparing single frame at similar racket positions. You can go full frame and come back down and the video stays on the same frame.

Forehand timestamps: 3:53, 4:01, 5:55, 6:15, 6:23, 7:03, 10:50, 11:18, 17:01, 19:35

To mention a few things -

Shoulder Turn & Separation. You don't appear to have much shoulder turn or separation, so you lack two of the greater sources of racket head speed. I've discussed & illustrated these flaws in many threads. Search forum : forehand separation shoulder turn Chas

Separation involves twisting the body between the pelvis and uppermost body. If you have back problems, don't add more separation to your game without knowing it is OK for you.

High Speed Video to Observe Racket Head. You need clear high speed videos to catch your racket head just before impact. You probably should have a Semi-Western Grip. ?

Positioning for Stroke. The other player has no trouble with your serve and hits strong returns. You don't move your feet to go in or out and instead reach down or up to impact the ball. At 4:05 the returner hits a high one that you should know will also bounce high and is probably slower. You move back and take it at a higher impact point than you would have had without moving, that is, you moved away from the easier lower shot. Your racket is not near level as it would be for ideal forehand technique and impact height. At impact, your racket face looks at an uncontrolled angle. Consider moving in or out for a better impact height. Use feet to control distance from bounce and therefore height of impact. Try to get impact height toward your most practiced stroke height. For low impacts at 4:26 & 4:13 you point the racket down but your legs are near straight - bend your knees for low ones. Tilt your body as you see high level players doing. Watch pros for how they move to favorable distances from the bounce and bend to get better lower impact heights. The idea is that you want a practiced forehand technique and that you want to position yourself - as best you can - so that you are closer to the practiced technique as often as possible. The forehand technique has a reproducible racket face angle if the stroke and grip are the same.

To practice moving your feet more, study the split step and move your feet more than usual, even when is is not necessary.

Off arm. For high level forehands the off arm is often sped up before the forward swing starts and then the off arm is pulled into the body with timing. This transfers rotational momentum to the uppermost body, adds to racket head speed. See videos of ATP use of the off arm.

The videos set up above will show you differences in forehand techniques especially if you can find more videos that show what better doubles players are doing for forehands. ATP doubles may not be good examples for everything because they are very, very fast. But take a look at what they do and list all differences. Post your differences.

If you or your friends do not want to post all your stokes on the forum you can post them to Conversation with another member that you know on the forum. You can't open a Conversation with yourself. See envelope icon.

 

[user92626]

There's a gazillion slo mo clips on youtube of textbook ground strokes. Why don't you mimic one of them? Can you tell where there's a big difference between your stuff and pro stuff?

 

[eah123]

You have waiter's tray error with your serve. And you have some how duplicated the same problem on your forehand! Basically your only real solution is to stop playing matches all together and to rebuild your forehand from scratch. 3 years of incorrect muscle memory will be very hard to reverse. In your case, I would HIGHLY recommend switching to a 2-handed forehand.

 

[Bagumbawalla]

Well, first the positive things. You
seem to be moderately athletic, you have potential, and,
despite your forehand, you are on par with the three other
players.

It was hard for me to see on the screen I was using, but it seemed like
you had the one forehand grip for everything- including your serve and volley.
If that is not so, correct me. All 4 of you could use some professional help.

My suggestion is to look for a well-respected instructor and all 4 of you chip
in for a couple lessons to get back on the right track.

Just my personal bias, but stay away from instructors who tell you "to pat the dog".
If they teach you a correct stroke, the racket position should flow naturally, without
affectation or forced motions.