Vaguely in line with your comment, I think if you can tell which is predominant in your serve, leg launch or various torso muscles for rotation and swing, you're doing it wrong.
Push vs Pull serves
- Thread starter sureshs
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Vaguely in line with your comment, I think if you can tell which is predominant in your serve, leg launch or various torso muscles for rotation and swing, you're doing it wrong.
Power Player
Bionic Poster
I've been doing the crossfit open and there was an exercise called the dumbbell snatch. The secret to doing it most efficiently is to use your legs thrusting up from the ground to create the momentum to get the dumbbell over your head. In fact, while it looks like you are pulling the bell up with your arm, your arm is actually loose and you are using your core to get the bell off the ground. That is the toughest part to grasp, but after doing it 50 plus times with coaching, it gets ingrained properly.
Anyway, it really made me reconsider leg drive on the serve. I started realizing how important the knee bend was to the racquet drop and how the leg drive really was what got the racquet lower. Additionally, from there, the swing up to contact was almost pure momentum based and my arm was along for the ride. Short story, I have been focused a lot more on my knee bend and a lot less on my upper body on the serve and it seems to allow me to serve with less effort and a more relaxed motion. Does this sound correct?
SinjinCooper
Hall of Fame
You want to send you dumbbell snatches (and your serve) through the roof? Metaphorically, of course.
Hoisting all that weight from below your center of gravity is inefficiently done with leg drive. Any "drive" works best on weight centered in front of the driving muscles (above, in this case). You'll get a ton more power if you focus on pulling it upward by hinging the hip. The legs do bend, and the drive muscles give an assist, but the bulk of the work is done with the shockingly strong muscles that work in concert to take the hip from a flexed position to a locked-out one.
Those same muscles are responsible for what we call "firing the hip" in the kinetic chain. You can see it in action super clearly in about 99% of the best forehands and the best serves. It's a very small move, but once you understand that that same small move can be used to snatch hundreds of pounds overhead if done effectively enough, you can really begin to appreciate how much it can add to a properly timed serve.
Good on you rocking the snatches, BTW. Great full body ballistic exercise for anybody performing kinetic-chain emphasis athletics.
SinjinCooper
Hall of Fame
That's why it's important to make distinctions that weren't made in the vid, originally.
He's absolutely correct that a front-foot-forward move has the potential to rob a server of any value from the lower half of the chain, because it's easier -- and more comfortable, for most people -- to open and relax the racquet-side hip in order to allow the foot to move up there.
But as long as you use that move in a way that doesn't prematurely open the racquet-side hip, you can use that front-forward stance to bring the hip through with a lot of power afterward, and in a very stable way.
And as with The Serve Doctor's "spring loaded" serves, if you have trouble coordinating a full kinetic chain for any reason, you can also use that motion to pre-load the front hip. Which is to say, don't open it and relax it, but open it intentionally and willfully stretch it forward, which rotating the core and shoulders back the other way. That doesn't allow the chain to be as forceful, but it keeps it intact in a very easy way.
For students who don't immediately grasp the whole kinetic chain idea, all these ideas can fit neatly into a serve progression.
Serve from the knees to grasp upward swing and shoulder-over-shoulder action -> cylinder drill to get the same effect standing up -> spring loaded serve to introduce footwork and the inclusion of the lower body chain -> Safin service motion to make it a fully functional weapon.
Power Player
Bionic Poster
Yep, I know this. without getting into the minute details, I was interested in John thinks the overall concept is similar. I have been doing barbell snatches for years. Dumbbell snatches are more of a new thing.
SinjinCooper
Hall of Fame
Sweet. It's not immediately obvious to many that what the hip is doing in a serve or FH is in some ways distinct from the push of the legs, and that of the two, it's a far bigger momentum generator for most. Not just a reply to you, but a thought to share for future browsers.
If you've been doing BB snatches for years, I have to imagine grooving DB's was a walk in the park. Infinitely less technical.
The Open's no joke. Good luck with your training.
Power Player
Bionic Poster
Thanks. It's just a bit different of a movement with no bar. I am not sure I'd say it's much less technical to be honest. It definitely seems to translate to kinetic change movements in sports, which is why I brought it up.
JohnYandell
Hall of Fame
Mecir,
Wow blast from past. But Mac and Pete are platform and Edberg Lendl were pinpoint--all modern servers land on the front foot not step across and land on the right--Becker being the sometime exception.
Wow blast from past. But Mac and Pete are platform and Edberg Lendl were pinpoint--all modern servers land on the front foot not step across and land on the right--Becker being the sometime exception.
Mecir'sBeard
New User
Great clip, DA.
Really interesting hearing the coach say "60% weight on the back foot". Could have done with such clarity myself! When injury forced me to make
the attempt, couldn't find such a balance.
Also instructive to hear the coach tell his student to start his serve from the hip.
Just looking at the kid loading up though, it looks like Soderling to me. Quite an extreme shape, to make that bow.
Mecir'sBeard
New User
Yeah, the names date me, don't they? Retro is, er, cool, right? Or maybe it just used to be...
Still, those are the players I grew up with, so to speak: for better or worse their visual models are burnt on my memory!
I seem to remember that Boris changed his landing as his career progressed, no? Remember Cash pointing it out on BBC commentary at some point, saying that no one should still be landing on their back foot. Does landing on the front foot automatically mean you had a good push off the back foot? That film of Kafelnikov...
JohnYandell
Hall of Fame
Mecir,
Front foot landing means more legs--front for sure and some back...
Suresh,
True that!
Front foot landing means more legs--front for sure and some back...
Suresh,
True that!
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asifallasleep
Hall of Fame
I've never been able to serve slowly and always utilized racquet head speed. I am realizing that was more or a pull serve with the arm/upper body rotation driving the motion. With a push serve, the lower body with legs, knees, hips etc utilizes the kinetic chain and shifts the body weight forward first and then the arm follows. Push serve is a lot smoother and is definitely way better on the body and arm.
I am not doubting the science and pushing off the back foot gives more power..But it looks the oldtimers like Pancho Gonzales, Rod Laver and Ken Rosewall all had to serve off the front foot due to jumping restrictions back in the day..Also as we get older that jumping and landing on the front foot puts a lot of stress on that front leg as the match wears on etc
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