Need Help w/Serve - Criticism Welcome!

[undertakeress]

So, I am playing my first tournament in 14 years this weekend, and while I've gained about 80 pounds from my high school/college playing days, my strokes are still pretty good....my serve, is driving me nuts however.

These are me warming up and working on the motion of my serve, not going for power... I prefer placement anyways.

My fiance filmed me service a few...The first one, I know I was majorly foot faulting, and I need to keep my head up

The second one was better but now I'm doing some Radio City Rockette kick...I know a lot is repitition with the toss to get back into it, but any other criticism would be much appreciated!

~Amy

 

[undertakeress]

Epic fail on adding the video links before posting!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u10xExIDwpo

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keF_MZP0pb8

 

[KiNG]

Your serve is actually pretty good in the second video !! I can tell you got good foundation. I love the "no hitch" style. It takes great timing.

I'd say work on your slice serve. Make a slice serve your second serve. Good luck in ur tournament!

 

[undertakeress]

Thank you King! Yeah, I was told to always hit a fluid serve - don't wait for the toss to come down - hit at the top...need to keep remembering that. I usually can spin a second serve in, I just want to get my rhythm back..... and others to help point out what I'm not seeing

 

[nfor304]

I think you're squaring your hips to the court too early by stepping too wide with your back foot. I would try and keep my back foot placed just behind my front rather than side on to the front foot after the step. You should get a little more power since you will be bring your hips through at the same time as your shoulders rather than just before as your are now.

Andy Murray is a good example.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywANrKM8v7c&feature=related

 

[charliefedererer]

I just wanted to wish you good luck in your upcoming tournament.

It's clear you have smooth athletic movement, and it's only a matter of time and more playing before you'll have your old serve back - or maybe better than your old serve.

I woudn't worry about that tendency to take a step and foot fault right now. The solution to work on after the tournament will be to go into a slightly deeper knee bend, steeper shoulder tilt backwards, with your front hip going forward to counterbalance the backward tilt of the upper body. You need to hit "up the mountain" more http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlPVdppfYGs

So how does that keep you from taking that step forward with your back foot?

By sinking your body weight more with a deeper knee bend onto both feet, your essentially pin your feet to the ground until you push up equally with both legs as you launch that serve up the mountain.

But again, that is a task for another day, and may demand some more conditioning that you clearly are going to be getting by playing more tennis.

Welcome back to tennis!

 

[LeeD]

I wouldn't try to change anything until after the tourney.
Then, stand sideways more, reach up higher on the toss, LOWER your rackethand down to around mid chest on the takeback and trophy.

 

[undertakeress]

Thank you all for the wonderful advice! Wow, I remember the "up the mountain" term when I was a kid!

Apparently there weren't enough singles entries for the women, so I'm just playing mixed doubles, but that works for me, I don't have to worry about conditioning as much as in singles...

Thank you LeeD. I've always had my right foot pointed a little more to the front (partly due to a congenital defect in my hip), but I will go back to basics and try from the side again.

Been throwing tosses up all day...wait that sounded bad!

 

[vote4Pedro]

Your serve looks very good. Thanks for sharing your video

-Pedro

 

[Visene77]

Very fluid racquet pathing/movement up till contact point, bullwhip like. That is an extremely hard thing to teach, you have a great foundation to build on.

 

[1stVolley]

I think you're squaring your hips to the court too early by stepping too wide with your back foot. I would try and keep my back foot placed just behind my front rather than side on to the front foot after the step. You should get a little more power since you will be bring your hips through at the same time as your shoulders rather than just before as your are now.

...

I agree 100% with this post. In fact, you're actually foot faulting with your back foot sometimes as you bring it around and step on/over the baseline before hitting the ball. Your ball toss and swing look smooth and you're not overarching your back, so you shouldn't run into any back problems

 

[nfor304]

http://www.tennis.com/articles/templates/instruction.aspx?articleid=306&zoneid=13

The Johansson serve was a thing of beauty... Check out step 7 to see the importance of uncoiling your hips at the right time.

 

[Nellie]

I definitely agree that you need to hit up more. Imagine, in the motion, that you are trying to throw up the racquet as high as possible instead of trying to hit the ball as hard as possible. By directing your energy up, you naturally (because you get to a point where your arm cannot go up any more and has to whip out) get a more powerful serve. It will also help you to stay sideways and to keep the right, tossing arm and head up as long as possible.

I also agree with the advice above about not stepping with left leg. What you want to emphasis is a back to front weight shift and you will get this by leading with the right leg.

 

[escii_35]

You are the type of pard I want for my mixed. A serve just good enough not to get picked on and smooth movement to the net.

Get up to that net and proceed to destroy your opps. Let your pard do all the run downs and give him a little extra room on the baseline.

 

[undertakeress]

Thank you so much.... I almost need the rope to put around my hips to prevent me from going forward too quickly. I will definitaly focus on this next week and try another video. My fiance is going to try to video me tomorrow playing doubles so maybe that will help a little more as well.

Thank you for the compliments too... It took me a lot of practice to get that timing right, and now I get to do it again! LOL

 

[KiNG]

Thank you so much.... I almost need the rope to put around my hips to prevent me from going forward too quickly. I will definitaly focus on this next week and try another video. My fiance is going to try to video me tomorrow playing doubles so maybe that will help a little more as well.

Thank you for the compliments too... It took me a lot of practice to get that timing right, and now I get to do it again! LOL

Yea its hard. Very hard to do. I have the same problem too. I mean openning my hip too early. Thing is..its ALMOST impossible to keep yourself sideway when you have your right foot stepping so much forward.

If you can do it, serve with a PLATFORM stance. That kind of fixes this problem. Good luck! I still fail to correct it.

 

[5263]

A lot of good things in that serve!

Next step is getting some shoulder turn.
I think this is what Lee is talking about when he says to get more sideways.

 

[SirSweetSpot]

I agree that you seem to have too horizontal a mindset for the serve...make it much more vertical, and in doing so, remember to keep your head really still, have a relaxed facial expression (this will keep the rest of your body from tensing up), stare the cover off the ball until well after contact, and really whip that racquet head at the last instant before impact. But don't hurry the rest of the swing...keep it almost lazy and loose.

After a few thousand of these then you can start to incorporate a true rhythm...meaning proper breathing as a sort of metronome to help your timing.

 

[zapvor]

your serve is actually a lot better than most women i have seen.

 

[jwbarrientos]

No that bad, everything looks goot, anyhow that tendence to move around the racket (overhead) could be improved.

BTW how are your first serve/rate?

 

[undertakeress]

Right now I haven't kept any stats, and having had it timed in years, I could pull in about an 85-90 mph in my prime.