Mystery of pronation on serve

[FiReFTW]

@Toby14 @r2473 I went today for 30 mins ( didn't have more time ), and I think I caught on to what it needs to feel to really pronate throughout.

One issue when I look at the video seems to be tho, that my wrist ends up in flexion after I hit the ball, but when looking at Roger his wrist keeps being between Flexion and Extension, so it keeps being somewhere neutral.

Why do you think this is the case, do you think my swingpath is a bit too down and a bit too less up? Logically when I think about it, that could be the issue, because if you are relaxed and you swing ur arm down ur wrist also flexes down.. this deal is quite hard but I will master this!

 

[r2473]

@Toby14 @r2473 I went today for 30 mins ( didn't have more time ), and I think I caught on to what it needs to feel to really pronate throughout.

One issue when I look at the video seems to be tho, that my wrist ends up in flexion after I hit the ball, but when looking at Roger his wrist keeps being between Flexion and Extension, so it keeps being somewhere neutral.

Why do you think this is the case, do you think my swingpath is a bit too down and a bit too less up? Logically when I think about it, that could be the issue, because if you are relaxed and you swing ur arm down ur wrist also flexes down.. this deal is quite hard but I will master this!

Nothing obviously wrong to my eye, but others might see something. @Chas Tennis , how does that look to you?

How did your serve look / feel? At slowish pace, I feel like I could make 95 served out of 100. And I feel like I have control over placement and depth. Are you feeling like your motion gives you good command and control? If you don’t have this at slowish pace, when you increase the pace, you will never be comfortable.

Like I said, from your video, everything looks fine. If I were you, I’d experiment with different amounts of pronation/ ISR. Different swing paths. Different amounts of “up” swing. Just get a feel for what different things do.

Something you already know but I’ll just reiterate, but as with pretty much all strokes in tennis, if you swing with your arm or have tension in your arm, you can look perfect, but nothing works. At best it’s inconsistent.

A fun serve I like to practice for control and feel is the “rainbow”. How high over the net can you hit the ball and still have it arc in. From that extreme, you can take a little arc off and add a little pace. If you can master this, you are on your way I’d say.

 

[FiReFTW]

Nothing obviously wrong to my eye, but others might see something. @Chas Tennis , how does that look to you?

How did your serve look / feel? At slowish pace, I feel like I could make 95 served out of 100. And I feel like I have control over placement and depth. Are you feeling like your motion gives you good command and control? If you don’t have this at slowish pace, when you increase the pace, you will never be comfortable.

Like I said, from your video, everything looks fine. If I were you, I’d experiment with different amounts of pronation/ ISR. Different swing paths. Different amounts of “up” swing. Just get a feel for what different things do.

Something you already know but I’ll just reiterate, but as with pretty much all strokes in tennis, if you swing with your arm or have tension in your arm, you can look perfect, but nothing works. At best it’s inconsistent.

A fun serve I like to practice for control and feel is the “rainbow”. How high over the net can you hit the ball and still have it arc in. From that extreme, you can take a little arc off and add a little pace. If you can master this, you are on your way I’d say.

I feel like before I could get 100% pace when hitting "flatish", and when hitting spin I lost alot of that pace, since alot of energy went to the spin because the racquet swing path was past the ball and not directly into it, but now it feels like I can get both.

So my feeling was I got more pace and much more spin than usual, infact the ball curved down into the court alot more.

Thinking about it a bit, I assume it makes sense.

Without proper pronation you go through the ball to hit "flat", so lets say you get 100% direct energy into the ball and 100% pace, lets say this is swing #1.

If you want alot of spin you don't go directly into the ball anymore but past the ball, so you lose some direct energy, so lets say 30% goes to spin and 70% of the energy is left to go into pace, so lets say this is swing#2.

Well with this it almost feels like you get both.

Since you are actually hitting kind of past the ball with your swingpath, not directly into it it feels almost like swing #2, so alot of the energy goes into spin, but instead of 70% energy being left to pace, this forearm pronation turns the racquet towards the court as your swingpath goes past it, so it makes up for that 30% of the pace you lose with swinging past the ball, and you kind of almost get swing#1 pace with swing#2 spin.

Maybe im completely off, but that just seems to make the only logical sense to me.

 

[Hmgraphite1]

@Toby14 @r2473 I went today for 30 mins ( didn't have more time ), and I think I caught on to what it needs to feel to really pronate throughout.

One issue when I look at the video seems to be tho, that my wrist ends up in flexion after I hit the ball, but when looking at Roger his wrist keeps being between Flexion and Extension, so it keeps being somewhere neutral.

Why do you think this is the case, do you think my swingpath is a bit too down and a bit too less up? Logically when I think about it, that could be the issue, because if you are relaxed and you swing ur arm down ur wrist also flexes down.. this deal is quite hard but I will master this!

I see what you mean about you finishing in flexion. Before I had even heard of pronation I was always trying to go from radial to ulnar as the racquet comes up on edge. You may want to try this on kick / top slice serves or maybe for flat flexion is better. Do we know which serve fed was hitting in the video?

 

[FiReFTW]

I see what you mean about you finishing in flexion. Before I had even heard of pronation I was always trying to go from radial to ulnar as the racquet comes up on edge. You may want to try this on kick / top slice serves or maybe for flat flexion is better. Do we know which serve fed was hitting in the video?

I also kind of assume its bigger flex for a flat serve, that would make sense as some servers that serve more flat sometimes like Djokovic or Murray get more flexion than Fed, Fed actually never serves flat, even his "flat" serves have a ton of spin so I wouldn't rly call them flat, more like topspin or topspin slice alot of times, maybe thats why his finishes are all similar to this.

Maybe its also because I was serving at the service box, where you need to serve more down, that could also add even more to this effect.

 

[Chas Tennis]

Nothing obviously wrong to my eye, but others might see something. @Chas Tennis , how does that look to you?
........................

At 60 fps the camera captures one frame every 16.7 milliseconds. (millisecond = 1/1,000 sec.)

At 240 fps the camera captures one frame every 4.2 milliseconds. At 240 fps I see about 7 frames of rapid ISR leading to impact. That time of strong ISR before impact is about 29 milliseconds (4.2 ms x 7 fr).

A 60 fps camera would capture one or two frames at random times during the critical ISR of 29 millisecond leading to impact. I can't evaluate the fastest parts of the serve with 60 fps.

240 fps with small motion blur. About 7 frames of fast ISR before impact, 29 milliseconds. Lasts only 1/4 second when played back at 30 fps. Look carefully or you will miss it. 240 fps captures 4 frames for each frame captured at 60 fps. The camera is looking along the ball's trajectory so some of the arm and racket angles show up well. The rapidly changing forearm-to-racket angle shows up well with 7 frames captured. Look at the shadows at the elbow. Masking tape markers would be clearer.

To do stop action single frame on Vimeo - click Vimeo, full screen, hold down the SHIFT KEY and and use the ARROW KEYS. Sometimes frames are skipped on Vimeo.

A poor and possibly misleading way to examine the serve at 60 fps would be to repeat many serves and assume that they are all identical. 3 or 4 markers, blue painter's tape, could be placed around, just above and near the elbow (between the elbow and shoulder joint) to indicate the ISR of the upper arm. The camera would have to catch the elbow close up and motion blur would have to be small.

With a frame or two here and there somebody could make sense of it with many serves. But you really do not know the time of impact either with 60 fps so it might be a statistical challenge to work out the event vs timing, particularly the 25-30 milliseconds of ISR before impact.

Anyone interested in tennis strokes should get a high speed video camera with a very fast shutter speed (automatic shutter speed in direct sunlight). Some smartphones have 240 fps and a fast automatic shutter. 240 fps shows the positions well but is too slow to examine strings and ball distortions.

At 100 MPH an object moves 1760 inches per second.

1760" / 240 fps = 7.3" per frame

1760" / 60 fps = 29.3" per frame (are you recording 60 or 120 fps?)

 

[FiReFTW]

I just don't get it, I went out today to practice some 2nd serves, I started inside service box and then moved gradualy back (not yet completely to behind baseline) and really went from very near and very slow speed, and gradually went further and further and increased the swing speed a bit.
I really wanted to get a good feel for the 2nd serve.
I also played around with the toss a bit, throwing it above my head, or a bit before my head, or a bit behind my head, to really see the differences.

In any case I thought I got quite a good bounce, sometimes it was more up (when the throw was not as behind my head) and sometimes it was more sideways really kicking away (when the toss was behind the head), but to me it seemed the ball bounced extremely high into the air, like 2 meters sometimes.

Also looking at the footage, everything seems solid, good racquet drop, good swingpath, good body position at contact (not overrotating).... the only thing thats not working is the pronation after ball contact and in the finish, I just don't get why I don't have it and I do everything right, but its just not happening... the finish is more of that dirty diaper thing that Jeff Salzenstein was talking about in some of his videos.

I seriously don't understand this anymore, I feel like im missing 1 little thing here and I have no clue what.

When I focused solely on pronation last time I went to practice (but that was a flat serve) it seemed to have worked decently, because I focused on that pronation to hit the ball inside the court.. but with this kick when you hit it and then that pronation occurs after contact its just so weird and I don't get it.

@Chas Tennis @r2473 what can I do? I rly dont get it, this is getting quite frustrating and annoying at the same time, this pronation thing is killing me

 

[bitcoinoperated]

Your serve looks like mine from recently, everything was working bar pronation.

What made it click for me (other than staying sideways longer and not dropping elbow!) was that the pronation seems to be triggered by the forearm reaching proper full extension while relaxed, ie:

this seems to trigger it

 

[FiReFTW]

@bitcoinoperated But in the vids it seems that my arm does extend fully

 

[Deleted member 54265]

I just don't get it, I went out today to practice some 2nd serves, I started inside service box and then moved gradualy back (not yet completely to behind baseline) and really went from very near and very slow speed, and gradually went further and further and increased the swing speed a bit.
I really wanted to get a good feel for the 2nd serve.
I also played around with the toss a bit, throwing it above my head, or a bit before my head, or a bit behind my head, to really see the differences.

In any case I thought I got quite a good bounce, sometimes it was more up (when the throw was not as behind my head) and sometimes it was more sideways really kicking away (when the toss was behind the head), but to me it seemed the ball bounced extremely high into the air, like 2 meters sometimes.

Also looking at the footage, everything seems solid, good racquet drop, good swingpath, good body position at contact (not overrotating).... the only thing thats not working is the pronation after ball contact and in the finish, I just don't get why I don't have it and I do everything right, but its just not happening... the finish is more of that dirty diaper thing that Jeff Salzenstein was talking about in some of his videos.

I seriously don't understand this anymore, I feel like im missing 1 little thing here and I have no clue what.

When I focused solely on pronation last time I went to practice (but that was a flat serve) it seemed to have worked decently, because I focused on that pronation to hit the ball inside the court.. but with this kick when you hit it and then that pronation occurs after contact its just so weird and I don't get it.

@Chas Tennis @r2473 what can I do? I rly dont get it, this is getting quite frustrating and annoying at the same time, this pronation thing is killing me

Dont be too hard on your self, serve is the most complicated stroke in tennis and it just takes a lot of time and practice. You got your fundamentals, congrats, it looks pretty good. Now it is time for fine tuning.

To progress from this stage, my advice to you would to be to work with a good coach. You need someone live by your side, it is ok with video, but I would suggest a few hours with a really good pro.

I have been working for a year (yes a year) with a top level pro on my serve and there are still a lot of fine tuning going around. My fundamentals are ok, but there is just so much more to work on. Sometimes I see him training top juniors and pro level players (Davis Cup Team), who serve amazing, and still they are working on their seve too.

It just takes a lot of time, not any easy fixes, just a lot of practice. Remember some days the serve just seem to be better for no reason, some days it just seem to be off, so dont be too hard on your self. My experience when learning (and unlearning old habbits) is that you sometimaes will have a initial drop in level until the new mechanic is solid. What we do in practice with my coach, is a lot of slow motion shadow strokes, then a little faster, then with a ball (40% speed) every other stroke, then with balls but still slowly (40-60%), the and the end bump up speed. We are told to always practice serve like in match play: never hit 2 or 3 ball after the other (you dont do that in a match, so dont practice this), take time between each ball (even shadow stroke) like it was in a match, concentrate, take your time, let the ball drop if the toss is not good (this is also good practic for match play) if you miss a serve the next is a 2nd serve that has to be in.

I will take your video to my coach and ask him to look at it (if this is ok with you), he will see things that I will not even notice.

Keep on working, fundamentals is looking good.

Cheers, Toby

 

[FiReFTW]

@Toby14 you are right, I do have very solid fundamentals and I only need very small tweeks. I dont know why I expect to have a Federer serve in 1.5 years of play, or expect to fix 1 thing in 30 mins, im a bit too optimistic sometimes and expect way too much from miself.
Its probably going to be a slow process and I need to take it slow and one step at a time, and I need to have alot of patience.

And yes if you would take my video to ur coach, I would really appreciate it! I cant thank you enough for even suggesting it.

 

[bitcoinoperated]

@bitcoinoperated But in the vids it seems that my arm does extend fully

I had another look through a caught a few clear frames and yeah, you do. Where is goes awry is here:

Look at novak's racquet angle, he keeps it facing inside rather than open. In the next frame look at his elbow which is bent rather than straight.

I'd try focusing on finishing on the right hand side of your body and not dropping your elbow or shoulder too quick after impact otherwise your forearm won't rotate inwards. With the shoulder-over-shoulder movement visualise a front crawl swimming stroke.

You are so so close to getting it and the rest of your serve looks great.

 

[FiReFTW]

@bitcoinoperated @r2473 @Toby14 I think I got it, I went to practice for 45 mins today, and my ONLY focus was the finish, and getting the feeling of fully pronating. I didn't focus on anything, not the toss, not anything, only on pronation.

I started inside the service box, and choked up the grip and started like that, then slowly I moved back, 1 feet at a time, and slowly choked less and less up on the grip, and I got to like the middle between the service box and the baseline before finishing up for today.

Sadly my camera died, so I only have the more close up serves... but I think I really got the feel down now.

Now my objective will be to go out and practice as much as I can for 45 mins each, at least 3-4 times a week (so I don't overdo it) and really always start slightly further back and slightly less choked up on the grip, and start very slowly and gradually move up in speed.

I think thats the best way for me to get the feeling down and muscle memory.

It feels better I must say, I swing with much less effort and much more casual and get the same bounce or even higher at times than before.

I know this will take many weeks to perfect, but im on a good track I think! I expect in about 3-4 weeks im going to be consistently able to do this automatically by muscle memory from the baseline and have a very solid 2nd serve, then its just a matter of building up from there and practice.

Look how nice it looks, and also look at the friggin bounce, and im swinging extremely extremely casual and slow here and not even tossing that far behind my head to get that really awesome kick, it feels amazing lol:

I will not rush this, I think thats a mistake, it might be a bit boring, but I think going very slowly and really getting the muscle memory down is key, so I expect to go like 1-2 more times before il even move as further back to the baseline, slowly, but I will get there!

 

[heninfan99]

sweet location

@bitcoinoperated @r2473 @Toby14 I think I got it, I went to practice for 45 mins today, and my ONLY focus was the finish, and getting the feeling of fully pronating. I didn't focus on anything, not the toss, not anything, only on pronation.

I started inside the service box, and choked up the grip and started like that, then slowly I moved back, 1 feet at a time, and slowly choked less and less up on the grip, and I got to like the middle between the service box and the baseline before finishing up for today.

Sadly my camera died, so I only have the more close up serves... but I think I really got the feel down now.

Now my objective will be to go out and practice as much as I can for 45 mins each, at least 3-4 times a week (so I don't overdo it) and really always start slightly further back and slightly less choked up on the grip, and start very slowly and gradually move up in speed.

I think thats the best way for me to get the feeling down and muscle memory.

It feels better I must say, I swing with much less effort and much more casual and get the same bounce or even higher at times than before.

I know this will take many weeks to perfect, but im on a good track I think! I expect in about 3-4 weeks im going to be consistently able to do this automatically by muscle memory from the baseline and have a very solid 2nd serve, then its just a matter of building up from there and practice.

Look how nice it looks, and also look at the friggin bounce, and im swinging extremely extremely casual and slow here and not even tossing that far behind my head to get that really awesome kick, it feels amazing lol:

I will not rush this, I think thats a mistake, it might be a bit boring, but I think going very slowly and really getting the muscle memory down is key, so I expect to go like 1-2 more times before il even move as further back to the baseline, slowly, but I will get there!

 

[Digital Atheist]

I really wanted to get a good feel for the 2nd serve.

Since developing a good 2nd serve is your focus, have you ever tried some version of "serving from the knees"? It might help more than just focusing on pronation:

 

[FiReFTW]

Since developing a good 2nd serve is your focus, have you ever tried some version of "serving from the knees"? It might help more than just focusing on pronation:

I will for sure practice this a bit yeah, quite an interesting drill!

 

[r2473]

@bitcoinoperated @r2473 @Toby14 I think I got it, I went to practice for 45 mins today, and my ONLY focus was the finish, and getting the feeling of fully pronating. I didn't focus on anything, not the toss, not anything, only on pronation.

You are supinating, not pronating. Look at the frame in the bottom left. Can you see your wristwatch?

By the way, you were pronating in the video you posted earlier in the thread, so somehow you got turned around.

http://www.hi-techtennis.com/serve/pronation_example.php

 

[watungga]

Yes, I will try my best, of course I like to help other people as much as possible.

Add this Soderling serve to your "new serve" regimen:

Also, the "urge" to pronate is pretty much very early from the backscratch position. Racquet speed makes the early pronation looks like its applied at "exact amount of time" the ball is hit.

 

[Chas Tennis]

The present problem with using the term "pronation" for describing the tennis serve.

 

[FiReFTW]

Since developing a good 2nd serve is your focus, have you ever tried some version of "serving from the knees"? It might help more than just focusing on pronation:

I will for sure practice this a bit yeah, quite an interesting drill!

You are supinating, not pronating. Look at the frame in the bottom left. Can you see your wristwatch?

By the way, you were pronating in the video you posted earlier in the thread, so somehow you got turned around.

http://www.hi-techtennis.com/serve/pronation_example.php

Check my vid from post #113, I think im pronating properly here.

 

[r2473]

Check my vid from post #113, I think im pronating properly here.

You can decide that for yourself.

 

[Kevo]

For second serve, I think your toss is a little too far forward as your arm is swinging through contact before the "pronation" comes through. I think that is why you are getting a little wrist flex. That makes your strings face down into the court rather than more towards the side fence. So I think you need to make contact a little more overhead and slightly lower in the swingpath so you can brush up and then pronate and then let the arm come down more from the racquet pulling it down than you singing the arm through. If you frame step from 4 seconds onward you can see what I'm looking at.

The way I normally have people train pronation, or ISR, or whatever we're calling it is by starting with the arm extended overhead and the racquet top aimed roughly towards the back fence. Then we toss the ball right in front of us just about 18-24 inches overhead and the turn the racquet into the ball. We only hit with arm rotation, no swinging from the shoulder. We do this over and over most of the time it takes 3-6 lessons for beginners. Once they can hit the ball in the box without swinging the arm, then we add in the swing and other elements.

You would probably be able to get the feel of this in 15-30 mins given how close you are already. The main trick is to concentrate on letting the pronation hit the ball and not swinging the arm. This really gives you a good feel for hitting with arm rotation and not with an arm swing. It also helps with the feel of the wrist and keeping it stable through the turn.

 

[FiReFTW]

For second serve, I think your toss is a little too far forward as your arm is swinging through contact before the "pronation" comes through. I think that is why you are getting a little wrist flex. That makes your strings face down into the court rather than more towards the side fence. So I think you need to make contact a little more overhead and slightly lower in the swingpath so you can brush up and then pronate and then let the arm come down more from the racquet pulling it down than you singing the arm through. If you frame step from 4 seconds onward you can see what I'm looking at.

The way I normally have people train pronation, or ISR, or whatever we're calling it is by starting with the arm extended overhead and the racquet top aimed roughly towards the back fence. Then we toss the ball right in front of us just about 18-24 inches overhead and the turn the racquet into the ball. We only hit with arm rotation, no swinging from the shoulder. We do this over and over most of the time it takes 3-6 lessons for beginners. Once they can hit the ball in the box without swinging the arm, then we add in the swing and other elements.

You would probably be able to get the feel of this in 15-30 mins given how close you are already. The main trick is to concentrate on letting the pronation hit the ball and not swinging the arm. This really gives you a good feel for hitting with arm rotation and not with an arm swing. It also helps with the feel of the wrist and keeping it stable through the turn.

Interesting, will try this!

I agree about your assesement of the toss.

 

[Friedman Whip]

Now the pronation on serve is quite a missunderstood concept still i think, however most experts agree it is an end result of a proper swing and mechanics and a loose arm.

Lately ive been looking at some vids of serves in slow motion and noticed a distinct difference between some servers.

For example Fed, Isner and some others supinate prior to contact then pronate into contact and then fully pronate after contact so that the racquet face faces the side of the court.

But some other servers, for example Djokovic or Murray they supinate and pronate into contact but then after contact have almost no more pronation amd the racquet face is more towards the ground.

I have always throught that this full pronation after serve adds more pace but considering murray can hit 130mph serves and djokovic can hit fast bombs too this is quite and interesting revelation now.

Not sure what to think of this now.

@Chas Tennis ur the expert in serves whats ur take?

The Sampras FLAT first serve with full pronation and a follow through that ends up with the hitting side of the racket face pointed toward the right fence is a different serve than the Salzenstein 'dirty diaper' topspin kick serve where the hitting side of the racket face ends up pointed back toward your stomach. Different resulting spins and speeds, different bounces, different amounts of pronation at different times during the swing, different advantages and disadavantages. And a continuum of variations in between. If you want to be an advanced player you're not trying to learn how to hit just one kind of serve.

 

[FiReFTW]

So today I tried what @Kevo suggested. First 10-15 minutes I actually had my arm up supinated and threw the ball into the air and simply hit it by pronating through the ball fully, without any swing at all.

Then I slowly added the swing whilst doing this.

I think this helped me a ton of getting the feeling for it, because from the videos im looking at, I seem to be really doing it quite well on all my swings, so this helped me a ton.

After that I did some more swings with pronation (started in the trophy pose) and practiced that a bit, then incorporated those into full swings, overall it worked well.

And then I tried what @Digital Atheist suggested and served from the knee position, which really forced me to hit up and get a nice arc on the ball, I found this drill quite interesting and I think it was also helpful to see how different tosses (its quite hard to toss very accurately in this position) changed what happened to the ball, it gave me some experience in this regard, how changing the toss slightly more forward or backward or left or right changes the shape of the shot, if all other things stay the same.

It also helped me get much more arc when I finally started serving standing up, infact I got so much arc that alot of shots went too deep, after a while I started throwing the ball slightly more infront and that helped the issue, I still got big arc but the ball landed inside.

Im going to be doing these drills all the time now and really practicing and going slow, im starting to see that by practicing these things and experimenting, you really get a good feel for how certain things affect the serve.

And from my experience thus far, I think its going to take a few weeks (probably around a month) for me to get a really good feel for all this, and actually start having a very technically solid and consistent 2nd serve that I can place inside the box in my sleep 100 times out of 100, after that its just about drilling it further and improving its pace and spin.

A little sample vid (last one for a few weeks, now im rly going to focus on just working hard on this, and see how I build the serve up in 1 months time) :

Again, thanks to everyone who offered tips, now its time to really work on it hard and build it up, to have a strong 2nd serve... after its 100% consistent and im 100% confident in it, then il slowly start working on improving it, and simultaniously start working on my 1st flat, spin and slice serves, and the placement for them.

 

[onehandbh]

Looking good.

Thanks for sharing your progression and practices with us.

 

[Hmgraphite1]

Don't be hesitant to occasionally hit as hard as you can, using a strong leg drive, ab tightening, bending at the waist with left arm pull down and in while airborne cartwheel half twist. Your serve looks really good just continue the practice and couple with stretchy band shoulder rotation exercises.

 

[FiReFTW]

Don't be hesitant to occasionally hit as hard as you can, using a strong leg drive, ab tightening, bending at the waist with left arm pull down and in while airborne cartwheel half twist. Your serve looks really good just continue the practice and couple with stretchy band shoulder rotation exercises.

Good tip about band shoulder exercises, I should do that! U think 3-4 times a week is a good amount?
Im already doing medicine ball exercises where I throw it into the wall and then catch and bend legs and rotate back, to work the muscles that u use in groundstrokes and work that body weight transfer.

 

[Hmgraphite1]

I usually try to do before and then after, a little more weight. Could be part of a daily routine of stretching.

 

[Kevo]

Looking better. It still looks like you might be covering the ball a bit too much. For second serves you really want to maximize the spin and for me anyway that means hitting the ball a little lower (earlier in the swing) than I would on a first serve. I think of the pronation on the second serve as a way to keep me from blowing my wrist out. In other words I can swing really hard up at the ball and then instead of my wrist deviating or flexing my arm rotates/pronates while the racquet decelerates.

It did look like a couple of those serves that went long in your video were coming off at a good angle, out instead of down, but the spin wasn't there to make them really dip early enough. I think if you keep playing around with it you'll get it.

I usually teach the first serve first using the drill I described before. Learning to rotate the arm so the strings come almost directly through the ball helps with getting the hang of pronation, and it's a more direct approach to hitting the ball so I think it's easier to grasp. The second serve with it's spins and angles is very similar mechanically, but quite different with the timing and swing path. You have to understand that you don't need to hit through the ball to make it go where you want. It just depends on the direction the strings face at contact. The spin is more from the path the strings are traveling at contact.

Check out this vid and notice on the very first serve (step through starting at 6 secs) how he has the arm turned out (supinated or ESR) to start with, rotates to get the string face angle he wants, then brushes all the way across the ball and then pronates (finishes the arm rotation) after the ball is gone. Also pay attention to the racquet arm angle and just think about the force on the wrist if that pronation wasn't there to allow somewhere for all that energy to go.

 

[FiReFTW]

Looking better. It still looks like you might be covering the ball a bit too much. For second serves you really want to maximize the spin and for me anyway that means hitting the ball a little lower (earlier in the swing) than I would on a first serve. I think of the pronation on the second serve as a way to keep me from blowing my wrist out. In other words I can swing really hard up at the ball and then instead of my wrist deviating or flexing my arm rotates/pronates while the racquet decelerates.

It did look like a couple of those serves that went long in your video were coming off at a good angle, out instead of down, but the spin wasn't there to make them really dip early enough. I think if you keep playing around with it you'll get it.

I usually teach the first serve first using the drill I described before. Learning to rotate the arm so the strings come almost directly through the ball helps with getting the hang of pronation, and it's a more direct approach to hitting the ball so I think it's easier to grasp. The second serve with it's spins and angles is very similar mechanically, but quite different with the timing and swing path. You have to understand that you don't need to hit through the ball to make it go where you want. It just depends on the direction the strings face at contact. The spin is more from the path the strings are traveling at contact.

Check out this vid and notice on the very first serve (step through starting at 6 secs) how he has the arm turned out (supinated or ESR) to start with, rotates to get the string face angle he wants, then brushes all the way across the ball and then pronates (finishes the arm rotation) after the ball is gone. Also pay attention to the racquet arm angle and just think about the force on the wrist if that pronation wasn't there to allow somewhere for all that energy to go.

Thats a good point, I did feel the same thing, that a few times that I hit it earlier and pronated a bit later after the ball was gone as you say, I got more spin, I need to play around with this and find a good balance.

 

[Deleted member 54265]

Looking better. It still looks like you might be covering the ball a bit too much. For second serves you really want to maximize the spin and for me anyway that means hitting the ball a little lower (earlier in the swing) than I would on a first serve. I think of the pronation on the second serve as a way to keep me from blowing my wrist out. In other words I can swing really hard up at the ball and then instead of my wrist deviating or flexing my arm rotates/pronates while the racquet decelerates.

It did look like a couple of those serves that went long in your video were coming off at a good angle, out instead of down, but the spin wasn't there to make them really dip early enough. I think if you keep playing around with it you'll get it.

I usually teach the first serve first using the drill I described before. Learning to rotate the arm so the strings come almost directly through the ball helps with getting the hang of pronation, and it's a more direct approach to hitting the ball so I think it's easier to grasp. The second serve with it's spins and angles is very similar mechanically, but quite different with the timing and swing path. You have to understand that you don't need to hit through the ball to make it go where you want. It just depends on the direction the strings face at contact. The spin is more from the path the strings are traveling at contact.

Check out this vid and notice on the very first serve (step through starting at 6 secs) how he has the arm turned out (supinated or ESR) to start with, rotates to get the string face angle he wants, then brushes all the way across the ball and then pronates (finishes the arm rotation) after the ball is gone. Also pay attention to the racquet arm angle and just think about the force on the wrist if that pronation wasn't there to allow somewhere for all that energy to go.

Look at body position at contact 1:00 is almost sideways, this is IMO one key element for proper pronation that is often missed.

 

[Chas Tennis]

Look at body position at contact 1:00 is almost sideways, this is IMO one key element for proper pronation that is often missed.

It is hard to estimate that angle from that viewpoint. The rare overhead view is best and there are very few samples available.

Composite picture made by Toly from rare Fuzzy Yellow Balls overhead high speed videos.

 

[Kevo]

Look at body position at contact 1:00 is almost sideways, this is IMO one key element for proper pronation that is often missed.

Yes, I read this from you before on other threads. As I've mentioned before it's hard to judge what you are actually meaning or envisioning when you say that. Sideways relative to what? I've posted other vids of players that have their chest facing the net at contact and I think that is contradicting evidence to what you claim, but again body position will vary relative to the court, the ball, and the direction the ball is hit in depending on what serve a player is hitting, where they are standing along the baseline, and which part of the service box they are aiming for.

So I'm not real sure how helpful that advice is without further clarification.

And thanks to @Chas Tennis who seems to have a database of pictures and videos available for posting at a moments notice. Those pictures do illustrate fairly well I think about the body position varying for different serves. The starting position is almost identical but there is a clear variance in trunk rotation at contact, at least between these two specific serves.

Also, in that vid the serve is a kick serve out wide in the ad court with the pronation happening mostly after the ball is well gone. So the body position being more facing the side fence than the net is due to the need to extend the arm upward to get the strings up the back of the ball, which is not happening with pronation, and also the need to have the strings facing the ad court sideline at contact. Hopefully that makes sense.

 

[samarai]

your serve looks pretty good. Its got all of the major points covered. Sure if we break it down frame by frame it wont have all of the attributes of a
pro serve but thats why we are not pro's. Every thing has to fit into place, timing, toss, acclereation, unit turn. As a recreational player theres no way thats happening.

 

[FiReFTW]

Also, in that vid the serve is a kick serve out wide in the ad court with the pronation happening mostly after the ball is well gone. So the body position being more facing the side fence than the net is due to the need to extend the arm upward to get the strings up the back of the ball, which is not happening with pronation, and also the need to have the strings facing the ad court sideline at contact. Hopefully that makes sense.

Yeah from what I felt in court and also what I see in some of these vids, the pronation happens during contact on a flat and slice serve for sure, which is logical because with flat and slice you hit more into the court, so your arm supinates more and the pronation is more pronounced, and also you contact the ball later in ur swing when ur arm is almost fully extended.

But for a 2nd serve, pronation seems to happen during contact for more aggressive topspin serves, I would almost call them topspin slice serves, as some here call them, because what serve also has a slightly more forward swing and the contact is a bit later in the swing.

But for a true kick serve, the contact seems to be later in the sense that the ball drops down more, so you contact the ball earlier in the swing and also the swing is more sideways so supination and pronation is a bit less pronounced, so the full pronation does not yet happen during contact, so you brush up the ball and then full pronation happens slightly after contact when your arm is fully up and extended.

Thats what it feels like anyway and from what I see in vids.

Btw I have to thank you again, that drill of yours where you have ur arm extended and only hit the ball with pronation trully helped me unlock this, so really really thank you again!

I was still consciously doing this pronation in my strokes, but today I was practicing some swings at home and videotaped miself (I was actually hitting a fluffy ball drawn with circles around in order to see how different strokes affect the spin, quite fun) and I actually did not consciously focus on pronation AT ALL, I was only focusing on having an extremely loose and relaxed arm, same as before... but before I did not get the full pronation on my swings, but now I seem to be getting full pronation on all my swings, these are only 3 swings from a flat, slice and 2nd serve "topspin slice" serve, I actually had like 200 swings or so, and im basically fully pronating on every single stroke now without even thinking about it, it just happens and yet before it did not.

During training I actually thought this movement must be conciously made, since it didnt happen naturally before... but it seems its just something that you need to get a feel for, and then your body gets used to it, and you swing in a way that it just happens... im still not sure how, but it just happens automatically now.. interesting to say the least.

Heres the vid, you guys can laugh a bit if you want of me hitting a soft ball with drawn lines haha.. but im quite happy with this breakthrough

Looking pretty good huh?

 

[Hmgraphite1]

Pro Nation

 

[Deleted member 54265]

It is hard to estimate that angle from that viewpoint. The rare overhead view is best and there are very few samples available.

Composite picture made by Toly from rare Fuzzy Yellow Balls overhead high speed videos.

This is even harder to look at - there is no racket or body movement only ball movement.

 

[Chas Tennis]

This is even harder to look at - there is no racket or body movement only ball movement.

Your post

Look at body position at contact 1:00 is almost sideways, this is IMO one key element for proper pronation that is often missed.

The overhead picture shows the upper body angle relative to the baseline at impact. The upper body is not almost sideways at contact.

The upper body angle in the Federer picture is not clear from cameras placed around the server at ground level. Overhead pictures show the upper body angle better. But there are no overhead pictures in the last decade.......

If you want to see the body position vs time the Fuzzy Yellow Balls videos are still out there.

 

[Deleted member 54265]

Yes, I read this from you before on other threads. As I've mentioned before it's hard to judge what you are actually meaning or envisioning when you say that. Sideways relative to what? I've posted other vids of players that have their chest facing the net at contact and I think that is contradicting evidence to what you claim, but again body position will vary relative to the court, the ball, and the direction the ball is hit in depending on what serve a player is hitting, where they are standing along the baseline, and which part of the service box they are aiming for.

So I'm not real sure how helpful that advice is without further clarification.

And thanks to @Chas Tennis who seems to have a database of pictures and videos available for posting at a moments notice. Those pictures do illustrate fairly well I think about the body position varying for different serves. The starting position is almost identical but there is a clear variance in trunk rotation at contact, at least between these two specific serves.

Also, in that vid the serve is a kick serve out wide in the ad court with the pronation happening mostly after the ball is well gone. So the body position being more facing the side fence than the net is due to the need to extend the arm upward to get the strings up the back of the ball, which is not happening with pronation, and also the need to have the strings facing the ad court sideline at contact. Hopefully that makes sense.

Body position relative to the net, but it is not static but part of a movement.Then the arm move more freely and pronation just happens very natural as the body comes around, you dont even have to think about it. But hey, there are many variations, and just use what you can from my advice. I am not trying to sell you anything, these are just my observations, and the way my coach has build my serve. I never think about pronation, it is just there as a natural part of my serve motion.

Cheers,

Toby

 

[Deleted member 54265]

Your post

But there are no overhead pictures in the last decade.......

Here you go:

What I am trying to tell is to keep your body sideways as long as possible, and then use the body rotation as a powers source. Most players that I see go early frontal and loose power and natural pronation. In order to train this, I emphasize staying sideways perhaps a little too much, but in a learning process is is good. Hope this makes sense for everyone.

here is another good video for those who understand German, filmed from above @ 14:05

Cheers,

Toby

 

[Deleted member 54265]

This guy is really good

Kick Serve:

Slice Serve:

 

[Kevo]

QUOTE="Toby14, post: 12246719, member: 54265"]Body position relative to the net, but it is not static but part of a movement.Then the arm move more freely and pronation just happens very natural as the body comes around, you dont even have to think about it. [/QUOTE]

It may come natural for you, but that's not common. It's much more common for people to think they are doing it even when they aren't. Older players are sometimes the worst about this. Kids normally trust the coach (unless they're very young), but older players and adults will often swear they are doing something even when they aren't. I've had to video players and show the video to them before they will believe me. It's happened on quite a few occasions.

I have noticed that people that pitched baseball when younger tend to have a natural grasp of the motion and don't usually require much tweaking once they have the toss position and swing path.

Have you ever watched video of yourself serving? Did you notice anything off? I had a friend watch a match of mine one time and he shot some pics with his DSLR. Some of the things I saw were great, and some things I noticed were a bit off that I thought were good. It's very rare that what we think we are doing and what we are actually doing is completely the same.

 

[Kevo]

What I am trying to tell is to keep your body sideways as long as possible, and then use the body rotation as a powers source. Most players that I see go early frontal and loose power and natural pronation.

That's good advice and observation. I didn't read your previous posts as that, but the more literal being sideways at contact. Thanks for the clarification.

 

[FiReFTW]

Im noticing (from what I see on my videos and then thinking what I did) that apart from the sideways thing @Toby14 said, a big factor is also that you throw the racquet and arm into the ball and into the air, if you really throw your arm and racquet into the ball the pronation seems to happen naturaly.
But the challenge is overriding your natural tendency of your arm taking over prior to contact and swinging (pushing) through the ball.
Instead you should just throw the arm and racquet and completely let go.

If that makes any sense.

 

[Deleted member 54265]

QUOTE="Toby14, post: 12246719, member: 54265"]Body position relative to the net, but it is not static but part of a movement.Then the arm move more freely and pronation just happens very natural as the body comes around, you dont even have to think about it.

It may come natural for you, but that's not common. It's much more common for people to think they are doing it even when they aren't. Older players are sometimes the worst about this. Kids normally trust the coach (unless they're very young), but older players and adults will often swear they are doing something even when they aren't. I've had to video players and show the video to them before they will believe me. It's happened on quite a few occasions.

I have noticed that people that pitched baseball when younger tend to have a natural grasp of the motion and don't usually require much tweaking once they have the toss position and swing path.

Have you ever watched video of yourself serving? Did you notice anything off? I had a friend watch a match of mine one time and he shot some pics with his DSLR. Some of the things I saw were great, and some things I noticed were a bit off that I thought were good. It's very rare that what we think we are doing and what we are actually doing is completely the same.

Yes I understand this, I use to be a pro athlete (volleyball) before turning my interest into tennis a few years back. I guess I might have some leftovers from volleyball serving techniques, also I use to be a handball player in my youth so I am good at "pitching". I have been taking lessons from day one, so my technique has been build by some great coaches I have been fortunate to work with, I never developed home made strokes but have been "schooled" like the junior players. So for me something has become natural, because this is the way I have been taught. I think this is not the common path, but this is the way I have become a tennis player. I try to give knowledge back that I have learned from my very competent coaches, they sometimes exaggerate (like staying sideways in the serve) in order to build the stroke mechanics the right way. Hope this makes sense.

YES I have filmed my serve (and other strokes) many times in slow motion, it is a great tool to figure out things that I can work with together with the coach.

Cheers, Toby

 

[Deleted member 54265]

Im noticing (from what I see on my videos and then thinking what I did) that apart from the sideways thing @Toby14 said, a big factor is also that you throw the racquet and arm into the ball and into the air, if you really throw your arm and racquet into the ball the pronation seems to happen naturaly.
But the challenge is overriding your natural tendency of your arm taking over prior to contact and swinging (pushing) through the ball.
Instead you should just throw the arm and racquet and completely let go.

If that makes any sense.

Makes very good sense.

BTW when you throw a ball you start sideways

 

[bitcoinoperated]

Im noticing (from what I see on my videos and then thinking what I did) that apart from the sideways thing @Toby14 said, a big factor is also that you throw the racquet and arm into the ball and into the air, if you really throw your arm and racquet into the ball the pronation seems to happen naturaly.
But the challenge is overriding your natural tendency of your arm taking over prior to contact and swinging (pushing) through the ball.
Instead you should just throw the arm and racquet and completely let go.

Yeah, this helps me with it. I visualise myself pulling the racquet through ball rather than hitting it which helps.

During training I actually thought this movement must be conciously made, since it didnt happen naturally before... but it seems its just something that you need to get a feel for, and then your body gets used to it, and you swing in a way that it just happens... im still not sure how, but it just happens automatically now.. interesting to say the least.

This is a real danger with self analysing video, it is hard to know what is deliberately done and what is a side effect of doing something else right.

 

[FightMeAtTheNet]

Just skimmed through this thread, but based on the videos in OP, Djoker is definitely pronating after contact, his swing path and follow through is just a bit different than Isner’s. I think Ian’s video here breaks it down pretty well.

I also feel Tomaz does a good job explaining how the pronation of the wrist translates into easy power / racquet acceleration in this video as well.Particularly at 14:00 when he simply pronates downwards and sends the ball flying off the bounce. I find it similar to the concept of “whipping your forehand” where you can get a lot of power by pronating a loose wrist.

 

[FiReFTW]

Just skimmed through this thread, but based on the videos in OP, Djoker is definitely pronating after contact, his swing path and follow through is just a bit different than Isner’s. I think Ian’s video here breaks it down pretty well.

Maybe, but there are alot of WTA players who don't fully pronate, and from statistics they all hit 105-115mph serves easily.

On the ATP all the higher servers fully pronate tho.

So considering short WTA players who don't pronate get such high speeds it proves you can hit very fast serves without fully pronating, but certainly considering the best of the best do pronate, pronation does add some extra pop, the question is how much?
And also pronation is less stressful for the arm, elbow and shoulder, which helps prevent injuries.

Im not sure if its possible to measure or if we will ever know just how much more RHS pronation adds.