Pros With an Eastern Forehand?

[Grigollif1]

I'm curious. Just the other day I found out that I actually have an Eastern Forehand rather than a Semi western. I thought that I had the Semi western because I usually put a lot of top spin on the ball and Like to ocntrol the court from the back on the baseline. Anway, I read that the Eastern Forehand is not very good to grind from the baseline but, I know the majority of Pros Use the semi. So from the Top of my head I would say: Tim Henman, Pete Sampras and Mario ancic use the Eastern grip any others ?? and which one do you use? (I would say the majority of amateurs use the Eastern as well)

 

[TEAM ZERO]

Agassi and Federer have a eastern/semi-western grip!

 

[Noelle]

I think there are old but very informative threads that talked about this. I did a search and found:

How common is the eastern grip on the Pro Tour?
http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showthread.php?t=75683

 

[slice bh compliment]

I think there are old but very informative threads that talked about this. I did a search and found:...
http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showthread.php?t=75683

Well done as usual, Marius. Not too much has changed.
[Edit: I mean Noelle.]

I would be curious about Stanislas Wawrinka.

If I may add: Hrbaty and the Flipper,
they look like eastern grippers,
the first one's got bad blisters,
the other one's on the beach wearin' slippers.

 

[bc-05]

joachim johansson i think.. but its really a preference.. if u have a really strong forearm.. u can hit with eastern forehand and get em right.. plus i think its more of an advantage coz it lets u flatten the ball out.. which means heavier ball.. but then most ppl are not able to use eastern.. therefore western is the best.. i myself use semi-western..

 

[jtreed2000]

I use eastern, but I'm trying to go more SW from the baseline. It's more automatic spin, less "upward" pull that you have to do for spin b/c the racquet face is closed. Pulling up like that all day long is tiring.

Eastern makes it easier to hit short or low balls, but you have to do more work for the spin. Changing though is annoying. I sometimes fall back into the habit (yanking up) and the ball falls short into the net.

 

[erik-the-red]

Well, according to John Yandell, Federer uses several grips on his forehand. Personally, without seeing any high-speed analysis, I think he is very much eastern.

J. Johansson definitely. Clijsters, too.

 

[bc-05]

yes and u see all the world number 1's are eastern .. well thats wat i believe anyway.. that eastern is the best if ur strong enough to use it.. but i dunno personally i can't use eastern.. too heavy for me especially if i play heavy spinners

 

[killer]

Well, according to John Yandell, Federer uses several grips on his forehand. Personally, without seeing any high-speed analysis, I think he is very much eastern.

I think a lot of pros use a versatile grip on the forehand. Different grips for different height of ball is a fairly wise choice; Lendl (who was the first pro i ever heard of using a versatile grip) used an eastern grip for low balls, progressively becoming more western the higher the ball was. Seems as though Fed may do the same; for balls above the shoulders the western gives you a lot of automatic topspin, thus helping to bring the ball back down into the court.

 

[Ash Doyle]

I use eastern, but I'm trying to go more SW from the baseline. It's more automatic spin, less "upward" pull that you have to do for spin b/c the racquet face is closed. Pulling up like that all day long is tiring.
.

The spin comes from the swing path. Regardless of what grip you use, the racquet face is going to be close to perpendicular with the court at contact.

 

[jtreed2000]

The racquet face closes the more western you go, so you get more spin (without changing path). I realize I have to hit the ball harder to get the same depth, but I have no problem with that. If I try to hammer balls all day long with an eastern grip, more of them will go long than land in b/c I have more power to hit through the ball than keep pulling the racquet from high to low. It's more work and takes more timing IMO to exaggerate the swing path than simply changing the grip. Eastern gives you more options, but it's not so friendly to a heavy topspin game.

If you've ever played with an eastern grip and like to use heavy spin you know what I'm talking about. They're sort of mutally exclusive. It's more work to put spin on the ball, esp with higher balls, so no wonder players w/ heavy topspin use a SW grip.

 

[Ash Doyle]

The racquet face closes the more western you go, so you get more spin (without changing path).

Wrong. Check out some of the threads in the Tennis Tips section, especially Bungalo Bill's. Most heavy topspin western grip players use a "windshield wiper" swing; and that swing is what is generating the spin. Connors used a western grip, and he hit as flat as anyone.

 

[Grigollif1]

The spin comes from the swing path. Regardless of what grip you use, the racquet face is going to be close to perpendicular with the court at contact.

Funny, I use the Eastern Forehand and one of the thing that I've been working on, is hitting my balls flater. I tend to make too much use of the topspin, even tough the Eastern grip is supposed to be a mainly a flat grip. I'm going to start working on the SW Western grip since, it seems to be a very successful to a lot of players. Altough the few times that I tried, the ball went straight to the net due to the closed face racket... Any suggestions on where to work on switching to another grip? (Thanks to Noel for linking that other useful thread)

-thanks