Terrible Day and need some tips/exercises for a faster reaction timing.

LanEvo

LanEvo

Hall of Fame
Hey guys, been a while since I have posted, but I am getting really frustrated with myself. I play in Intramural Doubles Tennis at school, school league sort of, anyway we had out second match today. We play a 2 set, tie-break in the third format. Anyway, my partner and I take the first set easily 6-3, and in the second we keep going even breaking one another and eventually losing the second set 5-7, and then the match with the tie-break 5-7. Anyway, I made mistakes and my partner made mistakes. But my central area of mistakes was not being prepared to return every shot of "run after the ball" if you wanna say whether in or out. This happened on many occasions, where I see that the ball should go out, but lands in and I am only a few feet away, yet I stand there motionless and just let it pass. Anyway to help me get through this? I am thinking I am just not reacting fast enough or accordingly. IDK what is going one? Any help is greatly appreciated.
 
Simple solution: hit every ball (after the bounce) regardless of whether or not you think it will land in.

If it lands out, you can always call it out after you've hit it. If it lands in, you're not sitting there watching it like a numpty.
 
Another thing is... are you actually preparing for every shot? It sounds like on those shots that you aren't reacting for, you simply aren't preparing for them.

It's another story if the balls are simply too fast or well-placed to get, but that doesn't seem to be your case. I find that if I make sure to split step on every ball, I'm never really unprepared for a ball. I may shank, I may hit the net, I may not even get to it... but there isn't a shot that is hit where I'm just standing and watching.
 
vChRiSv said:
Another thing is... are you actually preparing for every shot? It sounds like on those shots that you aren't reacting for, you simply aren't preparing for them.

It's another story if the balls are simply too fast or well-placed to get, but that doesn't seem to be your case. I find that if I make sure to split step on every ball, I'm never really unprepared for a ball. I may shank, I may hit the net, I may not even get to it... but there isn't a shot that is hit where I'm just standing and watching.
Click to expand...

Split stepping every time your opponent hits the ball is really important. I never used to do this but I am working on it now and it helps a ton !

Also as the first responder here said, even if you think a ball is going out you should get in position to hit it as if it were going to land in.
 
and remember, almost everyone's ball judgement is flawed...
but after the bounce, we can see with 20/15 vision....
as said, go after every ball after it's bounce, and in NML, make your call and stick with it.
 
Always split step as your opponent is striking the ball. Check out this series of three videos from Ian at Essential Tennis on exactly how and when to split step:

Tennis Footwork Split Step Lesson, 1 of 3: Technique http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2xAK9p2hIM&feature=player_embedded
Tennis Footwork Split Step Lesson, 2 of 3: Timing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtWMP75377k&feature=player_embedded
Tennis Footwork Split Step Lesson, 3 of 3: Pivot and Fake
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=UG5Z5fs4-Ms#!


You must practice recovering as quickly as possible after every shot you hit.
Do agility drills to teach yourself to hit and recover as quickly as possible by taking a swing at an imaginary ball at every time you have to change direction in the spider drill (page 4 in this link):
USTA agility drills http://assets.usta.com/assets/1/USTA_Import/USTA/dps/doc_437_269.pdf
Keep doing the drill faster and faster.


Pat Dougherty (the Bollettieri Camp Serve Doctor) stresses maintaining an "athletic posture" of continuous balance while on the tennis court. Now you don't need to wear the AP belt to maintain this posture and quick reaction, but watching the video emphasizes being on the balls of your feet with bent knees and in a partial squat throughout the point will allow you to break in any direction after the next ball.
Got Foundation? - AP Belt Training at IMG Academies http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26wKS0udwwg&list=UU2LThnGnWbhJk1a-gqvJhSA&index=5&feature=plcp


Good luck!
 
charliefedererer said:
Always split step as your opponent is striking the ball. Check out this series of three videos from Ian at Essential Tennis on exactly how and when to split step:

Tennis Footwork Split Step Lesson, 1 of 3: Technique http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2xAK9p2hIM&feature=player_embedded
Tennis Footwork Split Step Lesson, 2 of 3: Timing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtWMP75377k&feature=player_embedded
Tennis Footwork Split Step Lesson, 3 of 3: Pivot and Fake
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=UG5Z5fs4-Ms#!



You must practice recovering as quickly as possible after every shot you hit.
Do agility drills to teach yourself to hit and recover as quickly as possible by taking a swing at an imaginary ball at every time you have to change direction in the spider drill (page 4 in this link):
USTA agility drills http://assets.usta.com/assets/1/USTA_Import/USTA/dps/doc_437_269.pdf
Keep doing the drill faster and faster.


Pat Dougherty (the Bollettieri Camp Serve Doctor) stresses maintaining an "athletic posture" of continuous balance while on the tennis court. Now you don't need to wear the AP belt to maintain this posture and quick reaction, but watching the video emphasizes being on the balls of your feet with bent knees and in a partial squat throughout the point will allow you to break in any direction after the next ball.
Got Foundation? - AP Belt Training at IMG Academies http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26wKS0udwwg&list=UU2LThnGnWbhJk1a-gqvJhSA&index=5&feature=plcp


Good luck!
Click to expand...

I will try this out, thanks for the advice.
 
Yea, thanks for the advice everyone, I will definitely try all these things out. As far as split stepping goes, I always do this on serve returns, and when I am up at new. But I will definitely need to do this after returns as well. This match really had me down for a while after, I mean I was serving really well in the first and second, every time I served, I would take it to 40-15 and take the game. I won every game I served, except for one, but we broke the opponents right back after. But in the end, that was what took me out as well. On the very last point, it was my serve and I double faulted.
 
Today's poly strings give the ball a much sharper and harder dip in the trajectory, so a ball looking as if going out can suddenly drop on your baseline.

You let the ball pass?

If you mean it is actually passing you and then hits the line then you are far to far inside the court to receive what is a deep groundstroke and what you should have recognised as such the instant it was hit!

Either that or you intended to pluck it out of the air and then thought it was going out and left it.

Doesn't really matter. You should play as if the ball is going to be in - always - then you can be pleasantly surprised if your partner - who should be calling your lines a little - calls it out.
 
bertrevert said:
Today's poly strings give the ball a much sharper and harder dip in the trajectory, so a ball looking as if going out can suddenly drop on your baseline.

You let the ball pass?

If you mean it is actually passing you and then hits the line then you are far to far inside the court to receive what is a deep groundstroke and what you should have recognised as such the instant it was hit!

Either that or you intended to pluck it out of the air and then thought it was going out and left it.

Doesn't really matter. You should play as if the ball is going to be in - always - then you can be pleasantly surprised if your partner - who should be calling your lines a little - calls it out.
Click to expand...

Yes the only thing is, when I am at baseline and my partner is at net, it is my call right? Not his, even if he sees it out, he cannot call it? We had a bit of a fuss about that with out first opponents.
 
LanEvo said:
Yes the only thing is, when I am at baseline and my partner is at net, it is my call right? Not his, even if he sees it out, he cannot call it? We had a bit of a fuss about that with out first opponents.
Click to expand...

No, this is not so. Quite often, the person closest to the ball does not have the best perspective on the ball. If you are very close to the ball, it may be moving across your field of vision too quickly for your eyes to track accurately -- the angle your eyes must move is too great. For someone who is a bit further away, the ball is only moving across a small angle in their field of vision -- so they can track it more easily.

The other problem is that the person who is closest to the ball should be focused on the ball and their expected contact point rather than focusing on the line. If you focus on the line instead, it may be more difficult for you to track the ball accurately to hit it cleanly. If your net partner suspects that the ball may be bouncing close to the baseline (or sideline), they should turn back to watch the bounce. They should be able to focus on the line rather than the ball -- or, from their perspective, it is easier for them to see both the line and the ball. They can often see a small gap between the ball and the line from their view.

They have every right to make that call on the ball landing near the baseline. However, they may not always have the best view for a ball landing near the opposite sideline. Notice that linesmen are not that close to bounce when calling the lines -- their position is directly in line with the the line but a bit a bit further away -- this makes it easier for them to see the ball bouncing close to the line that they are watching. Notice that the lines person is watching the line and not the ball when it bounces close to the line of interest.
.
 
Last edited:
As others have already said, you should set up and prepare to hit every shot that comes close to the line. Once you are properly prepared, you can then decide to swing or not. Make it a habit to prepare. You should also be split stepping on every ball your opponent(s) hits.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxJLR-IzxEY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVwPRKh1Mdk

Try some Z-ball (reaction ball) exercises to develop reaction time and vision tracking skills. Check out these links:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpKXcVFI8f0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHBw_hl62i4
.
 
You might also try some software tasks to improve reaction time.

Way back in the 90s, there was a suite of computer ECT games (elementary cognitive tasks) known as ThinkFast. Many of the tasks are useful for honing cognitive and visual skills for sports. While that product is no longer available, many of those tasks can still be found on the Cognitive Labs web site.

http://cognitivelabs.com/tests/test1optD.htm
http://cognitivelabs.com/tests/test2optD.htm

http://cognitivelabs.com/tests/test3optD.htm
http://cognitivelabs.com/test5_intro.htm

http://cognitivelabs.com/test7_intro.htm
http://cognitivelabs.com/test10b_intro.htm
.
 
Miracle Drill

Quick reaction and ball stick drill. I first saw this as a hockey goalie drill in the movie "Miracle" but have adpated it to tennis and volleyball as well. Stand in a ready position facing a hitting wall about 15 feet away. Have someone stand behind you and off to the side slightly and have them feed balls to the wall and you will either volley or half-volley them after they come off the wall, depending on the feed.

After you get good at getting strings on the ball you can change the variables by either having the feeder change types of feeds speed angle etc. or you can move up or back. You can also pick a target on the wall to aim your reaction volleys and half volleys.
 
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