Thanks man, i notice lots of room for improvement in my serve too and would be thrilled if i could serve 90mph.
Lately i have been focusing on technique and i think i have translated that a relaxed arm means a slow arm, i am going to fix my swing speed right away while keeping my arm relaxed.
See how in that comparison to federer picture my trophy pose is all wrong, as my racket and elbow are not straight and pointing at the ball.
Should i aim to copy federer trophy pose.
Thanks for all your help.
Well first, since you need to improve your swing, forget about all that knee bend and body movement. First focus on the fundamentals and in your case, your swing motion and trophy pose. It's best to first learn a flat serve and what your doing in the vid is spinning the ball way too much. I used to serve like that 1 year ago and now I'm serving 80-90 mph with room for improvement (i'm 14).
First lets start with your toss. Toss atleast 2-3 feet above head level (you'll start tosssing higher once you get used to the service motion) and make sure there is some kind of pause (trophy pose) in your swing motion after the racket take back. So in the trophy pose, since your learning the motion, you don't need to bend your knee too much and stuff cause it'll interfere with other mechanics. During the pause your racket head should be around your head area (yours is like pointing up at the sky). And because this might be new too you, you don't have to hold the pose for long; it can be like a split second long but the trophy pose is important. Here's why. After the trophy pose (when your toss starts descending), you drop your racket to your back area and swing up to contact. This motion is sort of like a spring rotation ( sry I didnt add this earlier but your serve stance should be 45 to 90 degrees into the court) so there will be some body rotation. And if you want pace and dont want the spinning aciton, when swining into contact, reach high. As you unwind from trophy/racket drop to contact, your feet might even leave the ground. That's good, it means your using your body in your serve technique (a must if you wanna serve hard).
Now, the follow through after contact. If you find that your serve will go long (99% it will), snap that wrist. You dunno how much pace you can generate from that small part of your arm. (IMPORTANT: when you snap your wrist don't muscle the ball down too much or you'll screw up your arm. Keep it semi-loose). You should think of it as you are putting a sword back in it's sheath as you followthrough. For a flat serve, followthrough toward your backhand side but don't go straight across to that side or it might screw up your motion. If you see Fed serve, he sorta followthroughs downwards (like 90 degrees) and then bring his racket to his backhand side.
Practice the motion (if you understand the gibberish I said above) slowly first. You should never swing so hard on a serve that you lose your balance.
You have to swing fast but in a loose way. Unless you realize this feeling, you'll probably not end up serving good.
If you think what I said up there was too hard to follow, watch some Fuzzy Yellow Balls (google it) and watch their serve progressions sections under Lessons. Once you sorta get the hang of it or if you still don't really get it, watch how the players do it. Mimic their motion.
Sry if this is too hard to follow and ends up messing your serve up.
