Essential Tennis Podcast

Podcast 99: How often do you communicate with your doubles partner? During and after points? During changeovers?

ianw — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 10:40:44 +0000

One of the biggest ways that amateur doubles players can improve their results is by communicating with their partner better! In today's podcast Mark Hammelman and myself discuss the importance of communication as well as specific ways to do it during point, between points, and during changeovers. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game. Tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now here's Ian. [Ian Westermann] Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by somersetsportsperformance.com. Thank you very much for joining me today on episode #99 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Episode 100 is just around the corner and if you have any ideas on maybe something fun or special to do for the 100th episode, send me an e-mail and let me know. I'm curious what you guys think about maybe something a little bit different to do for the 100th show and to be honest I don't have any great ideas. And so if nobody sends me any ideas that I like, or if I don't hear from anybody. I'll just do a normal show as usual and I'm not want to really make a big deal out of it or anything, but I'm curious to see if you guys have any cool ideas on how to kind of celebrate the 100th episode. So let me know if you have any ideas at ian@essentialtennis.com. Well let's get started with today's topic, it's going to be about doubles communication. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] My guest today on the podcast is a good friend of mine, a teaching professional and also a past guest on the podcast-- Mr. Mark Hammelman. Mark Welcome back to the show. [Mark Hammelman] Hello, Essential Tennis. What's going on Ian? [Ian Westermann] Yes, it's good to have you back. It's been a while since I had you on the show last and I think the last time I have you on the show we were talking about doubles and that's what we're going to be talking about today as well. I like talking to you about doubles, because you and I are kind of on the same page after having played together in college and you are a real solid player and a good teacher. So I like having you on the show to get your opinion and converse about topics having to do with doubles. So thanks a lot for coming back on the show. [Mark Hammelman] Anytime. I mean you just never invited me back on I think. [Ian Westermann] Sorry, I've been slacking. [Mark Hammelman] [inaudible] No that's good. Especially I like doubles, because that's a lot of times I think people have trouble understanding it and it's not too tough as long as you play [inaudible] the idea behind what you need to do and what not. Opposed to singles which is so wide open as doubles strategy, especially it's really beneficial [inaudible] [Ian Westermann] Yes, there's a lot of nuances to doubles because you have double the players on the court, there's just a lot more going on. There's a lot more action and I think that for players who are not really experienced at it, it can be difficult to figure out and it's kind of easy to feel lost out there. I definitely remember when I started playing doubles in college, like a lot of college players, I played singles in high school exclusively and so you kind of just get thrown in there in college. I remember kind of hating that at first, but after you gets some experience and you kind of watch good players around you play and kind of learn the game first hand it can feel a little more comfortable, but yes there's definitely a lot more to it than singles, because there's so much going on. [Mark Hammelman] Right, definately. [Ian Westermann] So let's get to today's question and it comes to us from Dana Mark who's in Nebraska. And Dana is definitely an important part of our forums. He posts quite a bit along with his son Bryan and here's his question. He said, 'When playing doubles what types of communication are most helpful? I know it is good to let your partner know when you want to switch or when you are switching. I don't communicate much at all with my partner. What things are good to communicate for playing effective doubles both between point, during points and during change-overs and how can I get myself and my partner to communicate more during points?' So let's split this up into the 3 categories that Dana laid out for us and the 3 topics that he wanted us to talk about are, what to communicate about drawing points or when to communicate, also between points and during change-over' as well. So let's break it down into those 3 categories and we'll start off with drawing points and Dana mentions definitely the most common and probably the most well known reason for communicating and that is during the switch usually when you or your partner get lobbed and the net player is not able to cover the lob. They're not able to get to it and the other player ends up having to go cover for them and a lot of times a switch is called, because the off player's going back behind the net player to cover that lob. And so this is probably the most well known type of communication. Once you go ahead and throw out one other example Mark, one example that comes to mind right away when you think about communicating during the doubles points. [Mark Hammelman] OK. Yes. Another obvious one is balls down the middle of the court. Who's going to take it, forehand, backhand, kind of balls that could go either way especially lobs and overheads, short lobs. Any ball that either partner could get, I would definitely recommend communicating. You know this is fairly obvious, one thing I saw a lot is that you know you can't over communicate in doubles. Any ball down the middle of the court especially, definitely I tell my lessons if anything your partner can get out of the way. So that's one definitely and I think that's fairly straight forward. I got it, you got it. Keep it short and to the point. I've heard a lot of different expressions, but just let them know. It's yours or mine. I've heard too much, even at a decent level, 'Oh, I thought you had that ball.' They kind of laugh with each other and then I kind a laugh with them too, that's funny of it. In my head, I'm thinking, I tell you 10,000 times start laughing and hit the ball. [Ian Westermann] Yes, it seems like it probably an obvious one to a lot of listeners, but I totally agree that I see it way to often as I'm teaching and as I watch club matches. It happens way too much that both players say nothing on a ball down the middle-- and you're right whether that be a drive, a passing shots, attempts down the middle or a lob. It doesn't matter. I see it way too often that both players kind of make the assumption that the other person is going to get it and both just kind of stand there and kind of stare at each other as the ball goes down the middle and that's a crappy way to lose doubles points. You guys, I'm going to say my theory on this Mark and I'm going to talk about the ball that's driven first down the middle and I'm curious to see what your thoughts are on my opinion to that, but I think amateur players way too often are concern with stuff like who's forehand is down them the middle. I think that most of the time that the players who is closest to the net should be taking that regardless of forehand or backhand and I find that a lot of club players are kind of surprise when I tell them that, but I think that takes away a lot of the guess work of whose it is. I feel like amateur players a lot of times get really caught up with minors details. Again like the forehand or the backhand volley or whose side it's on. In my opinion if you're closer than your partner and you're able to reach it, you're able to get to it, most of the time you should be going for it. Kind of no questions aske3d and if you end up of not being able to make a play out of it then your partner who's a little farther behind you or maybe even back on the baseline hopefully made a move as well and hopefully be able to cover it, but I think when the ball is driven down the middle specifically, I don't think there should be a whole lot of talking. There's not a lot of time. I think both players should probably go for it and whoever closest usually should take it,] if it's that's all possible. Well, what do you think about that Mark? [Mark Hammelman] Yes, absolutely. Yes, one thin the forehand takes middle. And yes that's true, if you are both even. You're both equally [inaudible] [Ian Westermann] Yes, how often does that actually happen though? [Mark Hammelma] Right exactly. I mean you really both should be both at the base line where you probably lose a lot of points. I mean it happens, but yes let's say I've got a back hand volley and my partner has a forehand ground stroke, I don't care, I'm taking the back hand lobbey. Even if my weakness and let's say my partner's strength is his forehand. I'm still hitting my backhand volley, it's just a better play. So yes the net person, or even the closer person [inaudible] then worst case scenario, [inaudible] I mean who knows. Let's say you're going for the volley, you missed it since you're the closest person, I mean your partner should have you backed up. But really, there are no arguments that I can hear, where the closest person should take the ball. [Ian Westermann] I agree and now let's talk about the other kind of type of shot the could be down the middle and that's the lob which definitely throws a couple of more variables in there, because they're so much time that both players have to be able to react to the ball. And I think this is a little more tricky than the drive where as both of us just said, you guys should be using the person that is closest to the net to try to cut that shot off as often as possible. On the lob when you guys have some more time to actually set up and hopefully take an overhead. I think there's a couple more things that come into play. If you're both right handed or if you're weird enough to both be left handed then I think that whoever is most easily able to get a forehand overhead on the ball should probably take it. I think this is where communication really is very, very crucial. Because on a lot of these shots-- the lobs down the middle it's probably really possible that both people could have a play on it and I think this is a little bit subjective for both players and I think somebody just needs to take charge as quickly as possible most of the time. Kind of like outfielders in baseball calling each other off-- whichever person feels most comfortable I think really needs to take charge both vocally and physically and really take the shot. I think a lot of times club level players almost kind of try to get into a discussion and it would be like 'you got it?' Then the ball goes out. You got it and there's some confusion. I think that if you guys were going to do anything, just be assertive and either say yours or mine or I got it or I mean I got it would be probably the best or if you just don't feel comfortable, say yours and let your partner take it, but I think probably the key is to do it as quickly as possible. What do you think Mark? [Mark Hammelman] Yes, definitely. I mean whatever you're doing has be done right away and your first movement will probably come before anything comes out of your mouth anyways, you never know your initial reactions. So both players I think initially and this relates to almost any shot, should be going after the ball and then I think the verbal should come very quickly later and after that and then get the heck out of the way. One example, is my partner in College who was after you Ian, his name was Kyle and he had a great overhead. And the overhead is not my best shot, so he had no problem... [inaudible] [Ian Westermann] What about your sharp angle slice overhead. Didn't you like that shot? [Mark Hammelman] [inaudible] I quickly learned that's not my best shot. There's nothing wrong with that and [inaudible]. But there's nothing wrong with that. A lot of that too is that we play together for a full year or two [inaudible] any overhead down the the middle with his and even some balls that were on my half, [inaudible] he would take them. And I was completely fine by that and even a couple of times where it would clearly be on my half and he would say mine and I would literally come up and be like no I got it. [Ian Westermann] Sure. [Mark Hammelman] Because one thing too, if it falls on your half, It's supposed to be yours. So I think it happened a couple of times where my partner will say I got and then I call him off and say I got it. And there's still a little time for him to get back into position, but yes we're constantly communicating. Even if it's obvious, I mean just make the effort, say something and too often, I hear nothing. [Ian Westermann] Yes and those of you listening hopefully you watch doubles on TV at least once in a while. I know that it not on terribly often, but when you guys do watch professional level doubles or maybe if you get a chance to watch a college match-- some kind of high level of tennis. These are players who have tons of playing experience with each other. Whether just in practice or actual competitive matches and they are talking constantly and it's interesting to me that typically the lower the level of doubles player in tennis, the less they talk. When in fact it should be the opposite that these are probably players who have not played together very much. In fact they are probably switching partners often. And these are players who are obviously not as confident with their strokes as obviously a professional player or a top level college player and yet there's such a lack of communication and Dana is being very honest by saying, 'I really don't talk much at all. I don't communicate with my partner very much at all.' Well, this is the way that Dana, you and all the rest of our listeners can absolutely set yourselves apart by-- as Mark said a couple minutes ago, kind of over-communicate and when you guys watch top players on TV, they're constantly talking during points, between points, during change-overs-- all the different examples Danny gave and this easy over head is a great example of that. And like Mark said, either player can take it if there's a lot of different variables that are coming to play, but the big thing here is communicate as often as possible, whenever there's any doubt at all. Even if you think it's obvious, go ahead and communicate something and say if you've got it. I definitely will say I've got it when the ball is directly to me and even if it's the easiest overhead in the world, I will still call it, because it just takes care of any possible confusion. [Mark Hammelman] Right. [Ian Westermann] Alright, so I've got 2 other examples here of communicating during a point that I think could be helpful for Dana. One would be after putting up a weak lob, let's say you and I are playing Mark and maybe I'm returning serve and our opponent has hit a really good serve to me and I'm doing all I can just to kind of touch it and I throw up a lob. There's nothing wrong guys with letting your partner know that you're about to put them in a tough spot. As long as you don't wait until just before your opponent hits the overhead and slams it at your partner which obviously is too late anyway. What do you think about letting your partner know Mark when you put up a kind of a sitter and your partner's about to be a sitting target? [Mark Hammelman] Yes absolutely. Whoever hits the shot, they are the first ones to know the quality of their shot. [Ian Westermann] Yes, sure. [Mark Hammleman] After a weak lob, I definitely let my partner know. [Ian Westermann] Yes. [Mark Hammelmann] If anything just they can get out of the way. But more often or not, they'll hopefully gets 3 or 4 steps back, they won't get back to the base line most likely, but they'll probably getting into no-man's land. And that's one of the few times where I'd say it's better to be in no man's land and service line, because you're returning [inaudible]. At least it gives you a couple of seconds to react and if anything you partner will like you, because that's the correct place. We talked about it in previous podcast-- That's the correct place that your opponent should be hitting the ball right after you. So yes definately, if my partner let's me know, I'll back up a little bit and lot of times I'll get some racket on it, and who knows, sometimes I'll win the point. [Ian Westermann] Sure. And a good way to let your partner know is myself personally I'll just say short. I'll call out short as soon as I realize that the ball has come weakly off my racket and it's going to be a weak shot especially if it's a high shot. I'll just say short to my partner so that they know it is about to be a weak shot. Any special way that you communicate that Mark? [Mark Hammelman] Yes. My backup partner, yes, that definitely works too. And one other thing, if your partner is doing the correct thing, he's not going to know if it's a weak lob at all, because he shouldn't be looking back. [Ian Westermann] Sure, right. [Mark Hammleman] [inaudible] So if your partner's doing the right thing, you absolutely have to let him know what's going on, because they're going to have no idea and [inaudible] [Ian Westermann] Yes. I agree. One more situation here where I personally like to talk during points, and that is kind of to give encouragement to my partner. I tend to be during competition pretty animated and fiery which is interesting, because it's kind of the opposite of my personality, but Mark knows that I get pretty into matches. Let's say for example a weak volley has been hit or maybe a drop volley or an angle volley and it's obviously a well hit shot to my partner's side and they're starting to go for it, but it's going to be really difficult, a lot of times I like to kind of shout a word of encouragement-- you go it or go or something like that to kind of spur him on. And this might be for everbody's partner, but I kind of like to be vocal like that and kind of give my partner a kick in their pants sometimes when their really hustling for a shot and working hard. Any other circumstances like that or maybe comments on that circumstance? [Mark Hammelman] No, that one is good too. I think that's much more a bi product of your enthusiasm-- helping them get to the ball, but it definitely can't hurt. I do the same thing too-- 'Just get there! Go, go!' [Ian Westermann] Yes. [Mark Hammelman] Who knows maybe you see that as the drop shot or what not before you partner does, but yes I do the same thing, but you know that's good too. There's maybe a few times and maybe [inaudible]. At times it's not good to communicate with your partner for example to tell him where he should be standing. Sometimes you have to worry about what you're doing. You shouldn't be telling your partner what he should be doing, and certain circumstances like that [inaudible] [Ian Westermann] You mean during the points or between the points? [Mark Hammelman] No during the points. [Ian Westermann] Alright, yes. [Mark Hammelamn] That should definitely happened after a points or after a match [inaudible]. And maybe you should move up a couple of steps. A lot of times I see unnecessary communication, sometimes too, but over all I would say the lack of communication is definitely there. I don't see that quite as often. [Ian Westermann] Yes, let's save topic for a different day. I know what you're talking about. You are basically saying kind of the over bearing partner who is trying to coach their doubles partner and kind of take the person [inaudible] or somebody's trying to fix your stroke. Like you're trying to play. [Mark Hammelman] That's a great analogy. [Ian Westermann] I think there's fine line there. I think you want to be on the same page with your partner and definitely talk about tactics and maybe their doing something that's being detrimental. I think there's a certain way that you can definitely approach that and end up being a good call and help out your chances of winning a match, but if it's a constant thing and you're constantly telling your partner 'you going to do this, you going to do that, you got to change your aim for that shot or you got to swing' Certainly you should not be saying you should swing this way. That can definitely be detrimental for sure. [Mark Hammelman] Yes, I just wanted to put it out there, because I know maybe a lot of our listeners [inaudible]. And one just popped into my head too, that you can let your partner know let's say a hard shot is coming at them, they are at the net. And I'm sure we talked about this before on the podcast, but just let them know, just let it go, because a lot of times I understand that you have a better angle. [Ian Westermann] Yes. [Mark Hammelman] Sometimes all it get out on my mouth is just let it and that's one of the few times when you can tell your partner that, 'Hey, I think it's going out.' [Ian Westermann] Yes. [Mark Hammelman] Just make sure it's going out I guess. [Ian Westermann] No that's a great one. I'm glad that you thought about that. The way I usually communicate that is by yelling no. Kind of call him off and no don't. Meaning don't hit it and yes I agree with what you said that you should probably really be pretty sure about it to call them off as they're getting ready to hit the shot, because it can be disruptive, but if you know it's going out, it's not always like you said its not always obvious to them. So over communicate. [Mark Hammelman] Yes, yes. There's been a couple of times where my partner has his racket up and it just comes up [inaudible]. [Ian Westermann] Sure. [Mark Hammelman] But yes that's definitely another way to improve your communication. [Ian Westermann] Alright, let's move on to our next topic which is what to talk about between points and what you guys should be doing between points is definitely encouraging each other. Trying to keep a positive attitude and definitely positive communication. You should never be showing your partner any negative reactions. We've talked about that on different mental tennis podcast's, but besides that there's a lot of tactical things that definitely that are beneficial-- things such as where you're going to aim your serve, whether be at the body, down the middle or out wide. Can talk about poaching-- maybe you're going to fake and stay or maybe you're going to actually plan on crossing over and cutting off the serve. So that's something you're definitely going to let your partner know so that they cover behind you. And there's other things as well. What are somethings that comes to mind right away Mark as far as communication in between points? [Mark Hammelman] Just being positive I think and it's not talking to body language. Sometimes I'd like to run back to my partner. [Ian Westermann] Yes. [Mark Hammelman] After good or bad points, you see the [inaudible] sprinting in between points. [Ian Westermann] Yes. [Mark Hammelman] I love it when my partner comes over and says great shot. So I think non-verbal cues too. Put that a lot, but yes definitely in between every points I would at least make eye contact. Let your partner know what's going on. Even if you're using signals. A lot of people say that they use signals, well, you still need to give them something. I don't know why maybe it's just a routine or habit, but it's a habit that a lot of good tennis player have. [Ian Westermann] Yes. I think it's good emotional support and definitely from personal experience I know that after a double fault or after a missed return of serve, often an easy serve. Definitely, after an easy mistake, I really appreciate it when my partner makes the effort. I like how you're talking about actually like jogging back or running back to the base line to be like, 'Alright, come on let's go.' That just show so much support and kind of positive energy and speaking from experience, that helps a great deal. You were always good at that Mark. You're a good supporter. [Mark Hammleman] Yes, sometimes I had to be Ian. [Ian Westermann] Nice. Good one, Mark. You did. [Mark Hammelman] I don't know sometimes I'd run back Ian, and give you a high 5 and sometimes after points that we'd lose. And you would slap my hand so hard, but I have to stop doing that for a little bit because I wasn't ready for the next point. [Ian Westermann] Yes I think that's a good point and even if your partner is seemingly in a bad mood. If you just kind of let them be on their own and kind of let them sulk back there on the base line, chances are they probably are not going to pull out of it on their own. And so be a good partner and do your best. It might not help immediately, but if you continue to support them and you continue to stay positive, that's probably going to be your best chance to turn things around at least for your partner and hopefully give them some positive energy and get them back into the match. But yes definitely something that I definitely need myself personally. Again my tendencies to be pretty intense and really into it. I kind of have big ups and downs. It's kind of my personality on the court which I've been working on a lot recently. Since college, since then I really realized that's been a big thing that has definitely held me back, but if your partner is like that. They really would appreciates some support even if it doesn't look like they do overtly. If you just leave them alone they're probably going to feel worse about themselves. [Mark Hammelman] Yes that's true. [Ian Westermann] Alright, one more thing before we talk about during change overs and that's tactically I think you guys should be talking about your opponents strengths, their weaknesses. What's strategies that they are trying to implement. You should be talking to your partners and say, 'Hey, I noticed that they're trying to do this when you serve on the ad side, etc' And notice their tendencies. What shots they like to try so that you guys can talk about that and as a team start to anticipate and play together and kind of form a strategy around that. If you guys don't talk about those things, a lot of times it won't be until after the match that you realize that whenever they were up in a game they always hit hard down the middle on return of serve or when they were down they like to lob on the ad outside or something like that. If you guys don't talk about that stuff, a lot of times it will kind of pass you by if you just don't pay much attention to it. So I think tactically players should be talking a lot as well. Anything to add before I go the last? [Mark Hammelman] No, that was good. [Ian Westermann] Alright, so change over's-- this will be the last little bit. Personally what I wrote down here on my little outline is I think that change over's should kind of be a time to relax and kind of unplug a little bit and just kind of take a little break. During games I tend to be pretty intense once again and I think it's good to just kind of sit, relax for 30 seconds, get some water, kind of get up, kind of refreshed again and get back into it. I think it might be dangerous to stay up and fully alert all the time and not giving yourself a little break to calm down and relax a bit, but maybe you have a different point of view on that Mark. What do you think? [Mark Hammelman] Yes, definitely you shouldn't be talking too much tactic on change overs. Maybe simple things, but hopefully going into the match you have some stuff that you want to do. Yes, definitely, it's definitely time for yourself. A lot of times I see people over analyzing things on change overs. [Ian Westermann] Yes. [Mark Hammelman] I do like to get my partner simple reminders. [Ian Westermann] Sure. [Mark Hammelman] Just keep it simple. So a change over is kind of time to grab your drink. Keep your mind fresh. Maybe go over 1 or 2 things at most. And yes and then when it's time, get up and get out there. [Ian Westermann] Good stuff. Well, I'm going to wrap up the topic with that and Dana hopefully that answers your questions and gives you a good kind of broad overview of communication in general. Mark and I went over some of those things kind of quickly and went into more detail on others. If any of you listening would like more details on any of those specific topics, definitely let me know, but I think that was a good general outline of what you guys should be doing during a doubles match and obviously I don't know how many individual ways to communicate you and I just talked about Mark, but there's obviously a lot of different circumstances and ways and reasons that we should be talking during a doubles match and so hopefully our listeners got a lot out of these, but Mark thanks very much for your insights as always. It was good to talk to you about this and I look forward to having you back on the show again soon. [Mark Hammelman] Your welcome. [music] [music] [music] [music] [Ian Westermann] Thanks very much for joining myself and Mark on today's show and for today's shoutouts I'd like to give up a shout out to a very special group of people. Myself and Mark just finished the second Essential Tennis clinic in Palm Springs, California yesterday. It was on the 2nd and 3rd of January and we had 12 people come out for a clinic that myself and Mark ran and first of all, Mark I'd like to thank you for the time that you put in. I would not have been able to make the event a success without you. So thanks very much for the time and the effort that you put into it and myself and everybody who attended really appreciated it. So thanks very much. [Mark Hammelman] No, actually I'm still waiting for the car you promised me though. [Ian Westermann] Did you say a car? [Mark Hammelman] A car. [Ian Westermann] Oh, I said card, sorry. [Mark Hammelman] Well, that changes things. I had a good time. Now it's a good time. I definitely like giving instruction to people who are really looking for it. Half the time I say stuff to people and it's like I'm just going through the motions. [Ian Westermann] Yes and with that I want to recognize everybody who attended the clinic and I completely agree with Mark. These are people who went out of their way to come to California, most everybody was not from California. They traveled from somewhere other in the country and these are people who have a big passion for the game. They love the sport. You guys all worked very hard and Mark and I just had a really good time working with all of you. So Angie, Nikki, Sherry, John, Mark, Lynn, Crissy, Bryan, Ben, Gary, Tobby and Nuam. You guys are all awesome. Thanks very much and people traveled again from all over. We had attendees from Pennsylvania, Utah, Louisiana, Arizona, Texas, Illinois, Oklahoma, and 2 people from California as well. So people really came from all over the country to attend. It just really makes it exciting for myself and Mark to do what we do and teach and so, again we're great to work with. Anything else Mark before we wrap it up? [Mark Hammelman] No, I mean for those of you that didn't make it, you should definitely look into it. I mean for the money especially, it's a great deal. How many times, I think one of our best session was the video session and I don't think too many teaching pros are going to the hassle of doing that, stopping and analyzing your strokes. So that alone, I think was worth it for those that made it to the clinic. I really had a great time too, but they got a lot out of it. [Ian Westermann] Yes, we really, I did my best to try to cover a little bit of everything and on Saturday we worked on technique. We did work on ground strokes and volleys as well. So we did kind of an over all technique day on Saturday. On Sunday, we worked on strategy both singles and doubles and as Mark was talking about, we did a video analysis session in the conference room at the hotel where we were staying. So we all sat down together and we reviewed stroke technique and also singles and doubles strategy of all tape that I had filmed the day before of the attendees. So yes, that something I'm going to continue doing in future clinics and if you're interested in participating in one of these, just make sure that you keep on listening to the newest podcast and in the near future I'm going to have a section on the website where you guys would be able to view upcoming clinics and you've be able to sign up on essentialtennis.com for upcoming clinics and I'm looking to do another Palm Springs clinic in probably the fall of 2010. So I'm looking forward to that and Mark hopefully you can help us out for that one as well. [Mark Hammelman] Absolutely. [music] [music] [music]

Podcast 100: If you’re a 3.0 player now will it ever be possible to beat a 5.0? Listen to the discussion with Jason.

ianw — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 10:46:03 +0000

So exactly how good are 5.0 level players? How about 6.0 players? Do you think that you could win a set against somebody a full NTRP level ahead of you? How about a game? Listen as Jason and Ian answer these questions and talk about differences between different level players in tennis. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and wants to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game. Tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now here's Ian! Ian Westermann : Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Thank you very much for joining me on today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast and today's a little bit of a milestone in the show, we are celebrating our 100th episode. I want to thank everybody who has been with me. Some of you guys who have been listening from the very beginning, I really appreciate the support of all of you who listen to the show and download the show on a regular basis. You guys are the reason why I continue to do this show and thank you very much for your support. Also I want to thank my forum members. They're probably the most enthusiastic and the most passionate of the people who follow the podcast and you guys are always a great encouragement to me. Thank you everybody who posts on the forums. And I want to thank my guests as well who have been on the show. Some people many times and it really helps make the show much more interesting and more interactive. So thank you to guests as well who have been on the show. Well, let's go ahead and get on to today's topic and by the way, I got good suggestions from several of you for what to do for the 100th episode and I've probably asked that question a little bit too late-- just didn't have enough time to really plan anything special or fancy and I'm not really one to do that anyway. So today is just going to be a regular show besides this intro, but one more time, thank you everybody whose been supportive and helping me as I keep on going. Hopefully, not too far in the distant future we'll be doing show #200. Let's go ahead and get to today's topic. I'm going to be talking with Jason Kohl and answering a listener question. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] My guest on the show today is my good friend Jason Kohl. Jason and I played college tennis together at Ferris State University and he's been my good friend over the years. We shared suites in college and shared a lot of time on the court and spent a lot of time even since college and it's really good to have you on the show. I enjoy talking with you about tennis. [Jason Kohl] Thanks, buddy. We've had a good run so far. [Ian Westermann] So today's topics is going to be interesting and it's something that I've talked about briefly on the podcast before, but not very in depth and I think it's an important subject for our listeners to understand exactly what differentiates different NTRP rating levels and quite possibly more importantly, I really wants my listeners to understand the differences between amateur level players, even let's say top amateur level players and low professional level of players or just professional level players in general and it's something that I feel so many amateur players don't give enough respect to professional players and exactly what they're watching on TV. And so we're going to be talking a bit about that today in answering a question by a listener and somebody who posts on the forums. But before we do that, Jason can you please take a couple of minutes and I want people to kind of know where we're coming from as far as our own playing level. So can you please give people a quick kind of background on exactly what level of tennis that you've played in the past? [Jason Kohl] Well, I've played doubles in college and then [inaudible] run to Europe and Canada and several other places and played some teachers and what not and then I was an assistant coach for the University of Virginia which currently is the #1 team in the country. [Ian Westermann] Nice. So in college as an example, I mean Ferris State when you and I played there, it was usually ranked in like in the 30s nationally in division II is that correct? If I remember correctly. [Jason Kohl] I think we were around 20. [Ian Westermann] Was it? [Jason Kohl] Whatever somewhere around there. [Ian Westermann] Alright, Jason and I are both played for one of the upper divisions II schools, not the best college tennis in the country by any means, but certainly up there and Jason played well ahead of me on the team, he's definitely a much stronger player than I am. I played the bottom of the lineup there and in the past have played in 5.0 leagues as well. I don't have any experience really in playing after college while Jason he mentioned traveled around and actually played some lower level professional events. So both of us and Jason also as you said was a college coach at UVA, which some of those players are actually tour players-- they are actually playing ATP events these days? [Jason Kohl] Yes well [inaudible] was the #1 guy in the team. He won 2 national championships while I was there and he is currently ranked like 130th in the world. [Ian Westermann] Nice. [Jason Kohl] Pretty much everybody on the team is ranked somewhere around 900 or below. [Ian Westermann] OK. [Jason Kohl] So they've all got points as juniors. They've been winning [inaudible] titles and stuff like. So it's really that they are quite talented people. [Ian Westermann] Alright, I just wanted to go over that briefly so that listeners get an idea of the experiences that we've had around top level players and people that are very, very talented. I just want people to know we're not just making stuff up and we've got some decent experience between the two of us. Neither of us made it as a professional tennis player, but we've definitely been around our fair share of high level players. So I just want people to understand that we've got some good experience working with-- and Jason and I now both teach full time at private clubs where we interact a lot with 3.0 players and 3.5 players. And so I just want people to get a good picture of the range of players that Jason and I have experience with. Now let's go ahead and get to today's question. So it take me a couple of minutes to fill you guys in exactly on everything that this question asker wants us to talk about and then Jason and I are going into a discussion of different levels of players and give this person some pointers on somethings maybe he can do to get better and trying to beat a player that's a lot better than he is. So this comes to us from Flame Yu in Southern California. He writes and says, 'Hi, I'm 22 years old and have been playing and had limited coaching from a 29 year old former pro for a few years. I've lost 6 matches 6-0, 6-0 and earned no games. I only win a few points here and there with some luck.' Now he goes in to some details about both of them and I'm going to skip over some of these, but I wan to give you guys an idea of his perception-- the differences between himself and this playing partner that he has. He says, His background easily beats D2, D3 college tennis players, is in good shape, but not his best. He's a very good coach and played for China in the past. He's playing style is 5.5 or 6.0 attacking, ruthless all quarter, pros he knows my pros and cons better than me. He's mentally strong and focused. He disguises his shots well. Instant footwork also unlike me. ' He says that this player's cons are he hits a one handed backhand and dislikes a high backhand and he dislikes low slices to his semi western forehand. Now Flame Yu for his own playing style says that he is a 3.0 to 4.5, very wide range there and he says that his pros are that he is a strong fast thinker, focused and simple, he has low unforced errors with medium power. He says he has a big forehand hitting zone and he's a very good slicer/pusher. He says he's cons are difficulty reading a disguised shot of this opponent. Has sub part footwork and reaction time, relatively weak physically. He says his flat forehand shots are 50/50 in terms or errors to making the shot. He says he has an OK 2 handed backhand, serving, returning-- 5 years of total tennis experience and 2 years competitive experience with coaching. Now he lays out a couple of tactics. He says, 'I always play calm. Never panic, plan A is avoid pointless forehand exchanges with this player. ' He tries to hit high and deep to this players backhand and he says, 'Don't dare to go into the net against this guy for a fear of a passing shot to the face. Sounds like he's probably smart. Now he says. 'Results, these types of players are in a whole different level, you sense they are ultra competitive and hold nothing back. I truthfully won't win a match, but the goal is to earn a few extra games off him. Please share your wisdom on top level players. I'm looking to be more mobile against players that are way better than me and have sound strokes. Alright, so sorry for the long introduction there, but I wanted the listeners and Jason as well, to have a good sense of where these guys coming from and we've got 2 players here who clearly have a wide difference and ability level between them and this is something that I can relate too walking on to the college team at Farris. There were players on the team currently that were ranked in the top 10 in division II tennis and were incredible athletes. I had to figure out how to compete with these guys and they were experiences that I'd never had before. And so I know where you're coming from Flame Yu. This can be really tough and having not won a game yet against this player, I'm sure it's starting to get a little bit frustrating. Now Jason the first thing I want to talk about is the differences between NTRP levels and you and I were talking on the phone about this a couple of days ago. And Flame Yu makes it kind of tough, he puts himself between a 3.0 and 4.5. Jason and I have seen video of Flame Yu hitting and he and I put him around a 3.5 or so based on our opinions. So let's say that this opponent that he's playing against is in fact not currently, but previously like a 6.0 level player and Flame Yu currently is a 3.5 or 4.0. Exactly, how much of a difference in terms of technique and competitiveness and talent in general-- Exactly how much of a difference are we talking about here. Let's make people aware of exactly how big the difference is. [Jason Kohl] Well, I hate to be the Grim Reaper here, but that's just a massive difference. If you go on to the USTA website, you can find that they described somebody at the beginning of a player level as in a 3.00 can be easily beaten 6-0, 6-0, by somebody whose at the end of that same level which would be a 3.49. If you're jumping up an entire level legitimately then you should be beat 6-0, 6-0 by that person. So I think at the club level, a lot of the times what you'll get is somebody whose potentially the best player there and everybody thinks they are a 6.0, because they are clearly better than anybody else. [Ian Westermann] Right. [Jason Kohl] And then they don't really get an accurate reading, not necessarily in the example of what we're talking about, but even that Michael I do know is that there's one guy who is clearly the best and everybody thinks that's he's a 5-0, 5-5 and in reality, he is kind of a weak 4.5. [Ian Westermann] Two things, first of all and yes I was unaware of that kind of general benchmark that you just laid out. That half a point, I don't know if that's exactly a point or half a point, but from a beginning 3.0 to, OK half a point. So that half a point difference that the USTA actually has published saying that it should be a 6-0, 6-0 match between those 2 players? [Jason Kohl] Yes. [Ian Westermann] Wow. [Jason Kohl] Yes it's on there. [Ian Westermann] I think that should put it in the prospective for people right there. If you're dealing with a player whose 3 half a points in front of you, that's clearly a huge difference. I was talking about somebody that who not only is capable of beating you 0-0, but can probably do it quite easily without even trying very hard. That sounds about right? [Jason Kohl] Yes, it should be a toy job-- at that point it should be a yoyo. Not to be harsh, but if you're playing a full point ahead, 3.0 to 4.0 or something of that nature, it really shouldn't be much of the match for the 4.0 and would be kind of boring. It's the way that it's supposed to be described. Now a lot times you get someone who is a true 3.5 or something of that nature, playing in a league and everybody gets beat by a certain guy 6-2, 6-2 and everybody thinks that guy is a 4.0 or 4.5. [Ian Westermann] Right. [Jason Kohl] In reality he might just be a 3.9 based on their rating. So it's kind of a tricky game to keep someone in an accurate rating and just because you get beat by that person doesn't mean that they're 10 points ahead of you. [Ian Westermann] Yes. I think that's really important for listeners to understand and realize and I think that you really accurately pointed out a few minutes ago that I think players misjudge and give too much credence to players who are better than them, but not by so much, because they just don't have much frame of reference-- have a lot of experience on the court against players who are in a wide range of levels. Most club players or amateur players play with players that are like them and they might watch upper level players play from the side lines, but never actually experience with an actual 5.0 player is like on the court and I think you're right that leads to a lot of inflated of opinions on NTRP ratings. Now I also want people to understand the differences between let's say top amateur and a low level professional player. Somebody who is let's say a top of division I tennis plays futures and challengers that's sort of thing isn't winning full level ATP tournaments yet, but he's doing the challengers and futures and first of all let me point out that a 5.0 level player. I tried to find the link to the USTA page that talks about the current ratings, but 5.0 players make up something like 3 or 4% of all tennis players in the United States and 4.5 and above is like I think 8 or 9%. So just going with the 4.5 or 5.0 players, we've already got pretty high level of players. Now let's take a difference Jason between somebody who is winning matches just at a challenger or future level. Tell everybody the difference between somebody whose a low level professional player compared to a 5.0 league player. [Jason Kohl] 6.0, 6.0? Quickly. There's the difference between the 5.0 and 6.0 like I said it's a full point that's not really a competitive match in the list the footwork pretty-- much every aspect even if it's not the professional strength would be significantly better than what a 5.0 brings to the table. The difference there is about the same as the difference between the 2.0 and the 4.0 or 4.5. You seeing drastic differences. [Ian Westermann] And these are the players that are not-- not to talk down the players who have gone out and tried the tour or maybe not been that successful, but these are the players who are not even really 'Making it' on the tour are they? [Jason Kohl] No, but that's a little bit tricky and a lot of those players could just see a few points of two games away. It does get very competitive on the tour and the time travel and there are a lot of reasons why you might be struggling. If you've earned 700 or so ranking, you're up there. [Ian Westerman] Sure. So these guys who are playing challengers and futures and maybe having moderate success winning a match here and there-- not winning actual events yet. What's the difference between them and somebody whose ranked in let's say the top 100 on the ATP tour? [Jason Kohl] You know, honestly a few points or few games, a small weakness here and there, it's not nearly as big as the difference between the 3.0 and the 4.0. [Ian Westermann] Really? [Jason Kohl] You see all the time that it happens-- in futures you have the #1 seed ranked 300, 400 something like that. And you'll see somebody who is unranked in the future. That's says something. [Ian Westermann] So you're saying essentially the top 750 or 1,000 players are all pretty close in level, what differentiates them? How come some guys are consistently in the top 20? [Jason Kohl] Well, there's obviously differences. Their better, more consistent at strokes, more consistent with their level from day to day. Mentally tougher and then the big difference, well not big difference, but there's a consistency difference between say a top 50 guy and a top 20 guy. [Ian Westermann] OK. [Jason Kohl] [inaudible] In daily consistency. That would be said, their strokes and everything should be at a really high level. [Ian Westermann] Alright, so these 5.0 players-- usually most club players in my experience-- I mean the best tennis that they ever see personally meaning on the court right in front of them is probably a strong 4.5 or maybe a 5.0 level. So these top club players are just not anywhere near even a low professional level. Is that correct? [Jason Kohl] Yes, nowhere near. [Ian Westermann] Alright, I hope that [inaudible]. [Jason Kohl] It would essentially be a different sport they are watching there. [Ian Westermann] Yes I hear you. Well, hopefully that puts some prospective for our listeners then. What you guys are watching when you're watching tennis on TV, the top players at your club or if you don't play at a club, if you just play at a public facility, the top players that you will ever see out there are just not anywhere near. I supposed that goes without saying, but I just feel like players a lot of times just inflate the ratings and I think give too much credence to upper-level amateur players and there's a huge difference between the two. Now let's get back to Flamiel, Jason, and where do we start with this? When we're talking about a 3.5 or even if we say a 4.0 level player with Flamiel. What can we do or if you I were coaching him or teaching him, where do we start with actually trying to improve his game so that he can start to take some games off of this player that he's playing against? [Jason Kohl] Well, even the difference in levels that he has mentioned, I would say the only legitimate chance of him winning games would be to pick up a monster serve, that can give them free points. Making up like 3 and a half level or 2 and a half levels of difference-- your talking 10, 20 years at least. So I would say if you're looking to go out and win some games sometime in the next 5 years and be more competitive, than you really need to work on that serve and make some things happen there. [Ian Westermann] When you say a difference of 10 or 20 years, you're talking about time used to train I assume? [Jason Kohl] Yes. You can move from the 2.5 to the 3.0 quite quickly with practice. Move from the 3.0 to the 3.5 even quickly. Once you're talking about moving from a 4.0 to a 4.5 or 4.5 to the 5.0, that's taking a lot of years unless you're a junior whose [inaudible] or something. That's a good opportunity to train assuming he's not in that category. You're looking at a lot of time put in to beat the person at an overall game. If you are looking to get cheap points, just pick up a monster serve. [Ian Westermann] Yes and where Jason is coming from with that everybody is basically, once these 2 get put on level ground and it's just in an exchange back and forth and the point has essentially started and they're both on neutral ground, this upper level players strokes are just not really going to be fazed by the ground strokes of Flamiel. He has seen in the past so much more pace and so much more spin that Flamiel's ground strokes are going to have to pick up in levels significantly to really ever be able to pressure this guy consistently and that's what it is going to have to take to win games, is consistently pressuring him from the base line. It's not going to be-- I'm going to get a big forehand and when I hit that big forehand one shot I'm going to win a point. Against players like this who have good anticipation and incredible quickness and really good athleticism, it's going to take more than one good shot per point to be able to win points consistently and that big serve that Jason's talking about could tip points in your favor by giving you an offensive opportunity right away to set off the point. [Ian Westermann] It might not be an ace or an actual service winner, but you could at least set yourself up with an easy ball, that you could hopefully then attack and again and put away, but starting off on neutral ground, his entire games really going to have to pick up a ton to be able to win games off this player, isn't it Jason? [Jason Kohl] Yes, that's improving your forehand, your high forehand, your slice forehand, your backhand, your slice backhand, your high backhand, your first shots. There's so much more work to be to complete at a ground stroke to ground stroke level with this guy, but that's really a lofty goal. And I've seen even against [inaudible] who was obviously 2 time national champion-- amazing player. I've seen people with huge serves get a lot more games then they should've. If they were to have started with a drop feed, they would've won 6-0, 6-0, instead these guys are [inaudible] 3-3, 4-4 just because they are starting so many points off on the advantage. [Ian Westermann] Yes. That's tough. Alright, so #1 Flamiel is probably the serve and in going through your YouTube videos Flamiel, I wasn't able to find any video footage of your serves. I'm not sure what kind of shape it's in right now, but if you post a video of it on the forums at essentialtennis.com, I'd be happy to give you some pointers. I'm sure Jason would as well. What would you rank after that Jason? And we just talked a little bit about how essentially you've probably have to just pick up the whole level of every other stroke in your game, once the serve has been put back in play, in order to really consistently compete with this guy and win a couple of games, but if you had to pick one thing to maybe rank 2nd after the serve, what would you tell him to work on? Whether be stroke or tactics or fitness or what do you think would be 2nd most important? [Jason Kohl] If I can bundle footwork and fitness together, then I'd go there. [Ian Wetermann] OK. [Jason Kohl] Usually one of the huge things that separates players is simply their footwork., their court coverage. When I use to play against the player like [inaudible] who was clearly a better player than me. I could rally with him with for 6, 7 balls. Problem is he's pressuring me through those 6 or 7 and putting me in a bad spot and then come the eight ball, he's got a relatively easy shot to take the point. If he's playing with this guy and actually in rallies and he's going to need to be able to last that 6 or 7th ball and not be at a negative point after it and not be so tired that he can't play the next point. Usually that's where people fall off. [Ian Westermann] Well, not only that and yes certainly just having the stamina in general is going to help him a lot, but if he wants to attack and actually be able to ever pressure this player, he's going to have to be in impeccable position in my opinion, to be able to actually attack and do it consistently and hit an aggressive shot that's ever going to pressure this player and something that Jason and I both noticed for sure while watching a couple of videos of Flamiel rally, was that the footwork was just not there. It just looked lazy. It just wasn't doing much for his feet. In between shots, he would literally walk back to the center of the base line and that's not just ever going to cut it against this players is it Jason? [Jason Kohl] No. This is a kind of a blanket statement, but as a 3.5 or 4.0 player, in a base line to base line rally, will pretty much never ever hit a winner on a 5.0, 5.5, 6.0 player. The better player should be in position and ready to move unless you're just [inaudible] like crazy and taking one in a million chance, you're not going to hit a base line to base line winner. So if you can't keep up with the fitness and you can't hit winners, where hitting winners against somebody that high is a foolish goal, there is no way you can pull that off. [Ian Westermann] Alright. Well, Jason anything else to add to this before we start wrapping things up. Any other thoughts on differences between NTRP levels or differences between amateur and professional level players or any other last tips for Flamiel before we start wrapping things up? [Jason Kohl] Well, good luck. I didn't mean to sound negative but I would say if you get a chance, watch the fitness of people who are higher level than you. Obviously, there can be some people who are heavy and just hit the ball real clean and have a great history, but usually as you see a better player, you'll see a more fit player. And it's just hard to get around that. So good luck sir, I hope that you can take this guy a little bit closer than you have in the future. [Ian Westermann] In the past I think you mean? [Jason Kohl] Well, in the future taking closer, but you have [inaudible] on my part. [Ian Westermann] Just want to clear that up. Well, and yes let me reiterate what Jason just said. Yes, Jason and myself talking about this topic, it certainly was not our intention to discourage anybody or talk down at anybody, definitely not in the least. On the other hand, we want to make sure that everybody's realistic and knows exactly what they are getting into when they talk about raising the level of their game by 3 halves of a point. And it's not that it is impossible, it's not impossible, but if we're talking about the difference between a 3-0 and the 4-5 or definitely 3-5 and 5-0. You guys need to be prepared especially if you are past your 20s. You need to be prepared to really focus on this and be in it for the long hall, because it's not a simple thing. Its not an easy thing. The tactics and the technique of it, is probably something that you understand and you can see the differences, but actually being able to do it and do it consistently. Jason was talking about the differences between the lower level professionals and the upper level professional players is being able to hit that better shot consistently again and again and again. And that's kind of the same thing between a 3-5 and 5-0 is well, actually that's not correct, because techniques are very different there. Let's say between 4-5 and 5-0. 4-5 players are able to definitely hit solid shots, but not quite at the same consistency level and just not as often as the 5-0 player. So anyway, you guys just need to be prepared to work hard and Flamiel I hope that you have success as well in the future and let us know if you have any further questions and hopefully we gave you some things that you can actually work on and try to improve to get closer to this player. Well, Jason thanks very much for you time. I appreciate you talking to myself and our listeners, it's always great to have you on the show and I appreciate your input. [Jason Kohl] Thank you too. [music] [music] [music] [music] [Ian Westermann] Alright, that does it for episode #100 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you for joining me today and I hope today's show was interesting and informative for you. And today's shout out I'd like to give a shout out to 2 people who took the time to send me an e-mail. There was a lot of suggestions for show 100 in the forums. The 2 people who sent me e-mails were Colorado Lane and also Peter in Sweden who sent me some suggestion for show 100. Sorry I didn't use your guys ideas, but I really appreciate the input. Lastly before I wrap up today's show, I want to remind you guys about Essential Tennis live. Myself and Ron Miller are going to be doing an Australian Open preview show this Thursday live at 8:30PM Eastern Standard Time. If you want to listen to that show live or call in and give your predictions. You can go to blogtalkradio.com/essentialtennis or go to essentialtennis.com/live and follow the link there to go to the show page. [music] [music] Alright, that does it for today's show. Thanks again everybody. Take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast 101: What can you do about an opponent who hits passing shots over and over? What is the exact timing of a correct split step?

ianw — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 10:58:21 +0000

Have you ever played an opponent in singles that hits incredible passing shots against you every single time you approach the net? What types of strategies or tactics can be used to be more successful? I also discuss the exact timing of the split step in tennis. Should it be before contact, as contact is made, or after contact? Listen in! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Announcer : Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian. Ian Westermann : Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free expert tennis instructions that can truly help you improve your game. Thanks very much for joining me on today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast. I'm really happy to have you listening. Thank you for downloading the show. Before we get started with today's listener questions, I'd like to make an announcement, and that is for the next upcoming Essential Tennis Clinic. And this clinic is going to be held on March 20th and 21st in Fremont, Nebraska, which is close to Omaha, Nebraska. This is going to be a 2-day clinic. It's going to feature instruction by myself on technique and doubles and singles strategy, and I'm going to have special guest instructor with me to aid with me on the court. His name is David Groemping. And David Groemping you guys may recognize that name from the podcast. He's the mental expert and mental tennis coach that I often have on to answer mental tennis questions. He's going to be with me there and he's also going to be giving a workshop during the clinic about mental toughness during your tennis play. So you're going to get not only technique and strategy instruction on the court, around 10 hours of instructions on court, but you also going to get a mental tennis workshop. So you're really going to be working on all aspects of your game at this clinic. And again it's in Fremont, Nebraska March 20th and 21st. If you're interested in attending this clinic, you need to let me know quickly. The first two Essential Tennis clinics have run of both sold outs. So if you'd like to work with me on your tennis game and with David Groemping, definitely let me know. There's going to be a sign-up on the websites soon, but in the meantime feel free to send me an e-mail at ian@essentailtennis.com. Alright, let's get to today's questions. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, let's get started with today's show and our first question comes to us from Dropshot on the forums at essentialtennis.com. Dropshot wrote and said, 'I have a question about being at the net. I'm quite comfortable positioning myself at the net, but I have problems. Not so much with players that selectable really hard of me, but it's those guys that take just a bit of pace of their passing shots and aim it really well dipping low just over the net with good top spin, and landing usually with an inches of the side line. Either I'm really slow in my old age or they've hit a really excellent passing shot for which there is no defense. Is there a way to train for this type of shot? Are there side lunges or some other high performance exercises that you can recommend to improve my odds here? Or it is just the inevitable being slowing or reflexes that comes with age?' And he says that he is 51 years old. 'I returned to playing tennis 2 years ago after a 30 year hiatus.' Well, Dropshot that's a good question. And I don't think that most of these has to do with your age or conditioning. That's the good news. [laughter] No, I don't think that you're out of luck here due to your age. There's several things that are within your control that I think if you improve and focus on and do to the best of your ability you'll have a much better chance against these players. So let me go through my outline here answering your question. First of all, anybody who's able to hit the shot that you describe and hit it consistently is a very high level player. And yes, that's an amazing shot. And you don't say what's your play ability here is Dropshot. You don't say what level you play at or what level your opponents are. But the shot that you describe to be able to hit that shot a couple of times in a match would be awesome for most players. And you described several different variables. You talked about the ball barely making it over the net dipping low. So I'm assuming with some good top spin here. And you talked about being in angle. Has to and landing with an inches of the side lines. We're talking about a really high level shot here. Now if you're playing somebody who can do this consistently, then you're playing against somebody who's really high level of player. And it may be that they're just extremely good at this shot and yes, you're going to have a hard time winning, and coming up to the net is going to be difficult. But again, there's a couple of things in your control that you need to really pay attention to, and practice so that you can have the highest degree of success possible. Now when it comes to coming up to the net and approaching, there's a couple of things that you need to do and really keep track of. And the first one is the quality of your approach shot. And a big mistake that amateur players often make when they do come to the net is they decide to come forwards and approach off of a shot is not great. And it's not a shot that's really challenging their opponents much. Now I'm a big proponent of my students coming forwards and coming to the net, because it's a big pressure to their opponents. And gives you all kind of benefits. You're closer to your opponent side of the court so you have use your access to angles and it's easier to put the ball away the closer you are. A lso you take time away from your opponent, because you're closer to them. But the flip side is, because you're closer to your opponent you also have less time to react to their passing shot or to their lob, and so that means that you can't just wander up to the net on any old shot. You just can't do that. You can't hit an average shot to your opponent and just run up to the net and expect to be successful all the time, because if they're in balance and they're comfortable and they have plenty of time to react to your approach shot, the likelihood of them hitting a good passing shot against you increases exponentially. So we need to make sure that you're coming forwards on a good approach, especially against the player that you're describing that obviously has the skills to hit a great passing shot. You cannot risk coming forwards on an average shot. Now it may be that you plan to come into the net and you want to hit a good approach shot, but after making your swing, you identify that this is kind of going into them. It's not very challenging. At which point I would recommend that you just back up again and you just change plays. And just kind of throw that plan out of the window, because you can't afford to set yourself up over and over again for a passing shot from your opponent. Now what is the quality approach shot? There's two variables here that I feel are most important. First of all, I feel that depths is very important. And you need to place your approach shot deep in the court. And when you do this your opponent is going to have very little time--one or two things is going to happen. Either they're going to have to back up to account for the depth of your shot so that they have time to react and hit the ball comfortably in which case great. Your giving them more distance to have to carry the ball and to have to try to power the ball or angle the ball past you. And so the deeper the better most of the time. Sometimes you'll see pros approach the net off a drop shot. That can be successful as well. But you're bread and butter should really be a deep strong approach shot. The second option that they'll have if you do hit a deep is to take it on the rise nd this can be very tricky, meaning to take it right off to the bounce assuming that they don't back way behind the base line to account for the depth of your shot. Either way here you're really pressuring them a lot. And so I think you should really practice pretty near approach shots to deep. If you come in on a ball that land around the service line. You're giving them plenty of time to react to the ball after it bounces and that time is going to equal a comfort level for them and probably a balance that they are able to be in and try to hit a quality shot. And we don't want that. So try to keep your approach shot deep. Secondly, I recommend that most of the time you come into the net after hitting a down the line approach shot. And this is so that you can most easily cover the court and cover the angels on the court. When you hit the ball down the line, you are in a better position automatically to cover the possible angels. If you hit cross court, you leave open a lot of court down the line for your opponent to hit a passing shot. Now this is not an ironclad law and you don't always have to approach down the line. Sometimes down the middle can be successful. Sometimes even cross court can be successful. But in general, I would go down the list in that order of success. Possible success. Down the line down the middle cross court. Cross court--unless you hit a really good shot--is going to really open up a lot of court for your opponent to pass you. This is kind of difficult to describe with words via audio. I'm actually getting ready to put up a video at essentialtennis.com/video that really demonstrates this. When you really see the court it's easy to kind of understand this. But I'm just kind of leave it that for now and just make you aware and make sure that you're aware Dropshot and the rest of my listeners that down the line is usually the way to go in singles when you're approaching the net. So when it comes to quality of shot those are the two important criteria: deep and down the line. Now, once you've hit your deep down the line approach shot and you're pressuring your opponent with this shot, make sure that you position yourself on the side of the court that you hit the ball. And so if you hit a forehand approach shot on the do side, it was a short forehand you were over on the right side of the court if you're right handed. And you direct that deep down the line right in front of you to the right. From your prospective. You want to position yourself a little bit to the right of the central line, and this because it's going to be much easier for your opponent as around the run to get to your approach. It's going to be much easier for them to hit the ball straight than it is to catch the ball early and hit a big angle. Now you describe your opponent here being able to hit these big sharp angles. And we're going to talk just a little bit later about what to do about that. But you should be usually covering down the line first and positioning yourself in front of wherever you hit your approach shot. So if your approach to the left, you should be a little bit on the left side of the court. If you approach to the right, you should be a little bit to the right side of the court. This is called ' shading. ' And basically the rule of thumb is that you should be following the ball. What ever direction you hit your approach shot to, that's should direction you should be moving as you position yourself. Alright, so that's my #1 piece of advise for you Dropshot, is to come forward on a quality shot and position yourself correctly. If you do those two things then the amount of times that you get past should drop quite a bit. I'd be willing to bet that a lot of these passing shots that are being hit on you are the result of not challenging your opponent very much, and not putting yourself on the right spot. Now I have three other pieces of advise here for you. First of all, make sure that when they do hit a good passing shot, you're stepping across your body for the most amount of reach. Like a launch that you suggested earlier in your question. So if you're right handed and you are stretching out to your right to try to get a ball that has been hit well and you're going to have a hard time reaching it, you should be stepping with your left foot. This is very important. If it's a backhand and you're moving to your left, you should be stepping across with your right foot. This is going to give you the most amount of reach as you step across your body and into a lunge type position like you were talking about. So make sure that you were doing that and you're not stepping with your out side foot. Your right foot for a forehand and your left foot for a backhand. That's going to limit your amount of reach quite a bit. Secondly, pay close attention to the tendencies of your opponents and anticipate. Just about everybody you play is going to have a preference. When you hit to their forehand side they are going to usually like a certain type of passing, whether be down the line or cross courts or hard and flat or top spin or maybe they like to lob. When you hit to their forehand or backhand, they will have tendencies as far as what they like to try it first. They are going to have probably a favorite shot or maybe two favorite shots that they like to try to hit when you do come forward to the net. It's your job to pay attention to these. And Dropshot you should not get beaten by the same shot again and again and again. If you approach on a quality approach shot and you position yourself correctly and you get beat cross court with a sharp high quality angle, you need to put that in your mental log book. If you do it again: approach to the same spot again with the quality of approach and you position yourself correctly and they pass you again with the same shot, OK. At this point after they've done it a hand full of times successfully. At that point you need to start altering your strategy and either approaching to a different place or approach to the same place and anticipating where they are going to go. And you need to change your position on the court accordingly. Do not continue to do the same thing and get beat by the same shot again and again. And this obviously sounds really fundamental and it sounds very obvious. I guess you'll have to point this out. But this is where matches are win and lost and the patterns of good shots being hit, and one player or the other not making any adjustments. So make sure that you're paying close attention to your opponent. You're watching their tendencies. And then start to anticipate them and make adjustments accordingly. Now last piece of advise here for you Dropshot. Being in better shape and being stronger can always help. So I'm not going to tell you, 'No don't work out. Don't get in better shape. Don't get your legs stronger.' No, I'm not going to tell you that obviously. I mean all those things cab definitely help you. But I just want to point out the several tactical advantages you can have and also the placements of your shots in your technique. I gave you some shots to work on: hitting deep and down the line of a short ball. Doing exercises and getting your body strong can definitely help, but compared to everything else that I talked to you about it's probably going to be the least important part of covering the passing shot correctly. And covering it effectively. So Dropshot, hopefully that answers your question. If you'd like me to go into any more depth to any of these topics individually, definitely let me know. And yes, I mean you're obviously not as fast as you were when you were 20 years old. That's just how the body works, but if you're smart out there and you know what to look for and you know where to place your approach and where to place yourself. You should definitely be more successful. So good luck with this. Please let me know if you have any more questions, and I'd be happy to help out. [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, next step we've got a question from Bruce. Bruce wrote to me and said, 'I watched the YouTube video today that demonstrated these footstep. My question concerns the timing of this footstep. Should I make the jump when my opponent contacts the ball? When he-- usually he--begins a backs swing or some other time? Cheers. Bruce.' Bruce good question. And this footstep is a very, very important topic and something that most amateur players don't do at all. And very often the ones that do, do it, don't do a great a job of it and do it at the wrong time and it's really all about the timing. If you're not split stepping already. I'm speaking to everybody here. If you're not already split stepping, you need to begin that as soon as possible. You need to start putting that into your game, because it's going to help you being balance. It's going to help be more agile. It's going to help anticipate more shots, because it just gets your body moving and gets it in a good balance athletic position and gets your body prepared to actually move. And its so important. And if you're already doing it. Hopefully my explanation today of how the time is exactly helps you do a decent more efficiently. And so that's an excellent question Bruce. And the timing is incredibly crucial to actually having this be a benefit to your game. Now the pros split step and land just after they make contact by their opponent. Now they begin the process of split stepping just before contact. You'll see them kind of get going on their tip toes, maybe get a couple of steps, and then they actually make the actual split step which is a splitting apart of the feet, and the feet usually leave the ground for a short period of time, and then they land in a wide athletic stance with their knees bent and facing forwards. That's this footstep. And usually they begin this process of doing that right before their opponent makes contact, meaning when the ball actually touches the racket. A nd then the professionals typically land on the balls of their feet just after contact has been made. I used to think that this was timed exactly with contacts and the balls of their feet were landing just this contact was made, but I learned otherwise based on good video that Will a Fuzzy Yellow Balls created. And he showed several examples of professionals and slow motion timing their split step. And the pros will land just a little bit. When I say a little bit I'm talking a split second after contact. Now when an amateur playing tries this footstep and screws it up, it's usually, because they're too late. And it's not that they're after contact. They'll actually make this split step after the swing is done and the ball is already off the racket, and that's when they'll actually make the entire split step. And that's much too late. And so typically I teach and I instruct my students to time their split step with contact. And so I ask them to land on the balls of their feet as contact is being made. And in reality it's usually a later than this for most players. Most players struggle definitely at first if not just in general and timing this correctly. And I encourage you guys just to start working on this as soon as possible, because it takes most players--especially if you're picking tennis a little bit later in life. It takes most players quite a bit of time to be comfortable with this, and to actually time it correctly and make it a habit. Ultimately that's our goal is to do this automatically without even thinking about it. You don't want to have to think about how the time or split step during a match, because that's just going to completely get in the way if you actually playing tennis. So that's very important. So I really encourage you guys to start practicing this on the practice court as soon as possible. And the timing of this is so important. So again usually amateur players are late when they do mess this up. It's very rare that in my experience that an amateur player does the split step and it's way too early. And they're just kind of sitting there on the balls of their feet waiting for contact to occur. Usually players try to do too much with their feet, and this often happens in the serving volley where a player will hit the serve and start rushing forwards and trying to get too close before they make their split step. The ball gets hit then they split step after the ball is hit and by the time their feet are touching the ground on the balls of their feet. The ball is already there. And that defeats the whole purpose of making this split step. So this is why I instruct players to make their split step a little earlier than the pros actually do it, because I want to make sure that they do it on time. And my reasoning for this is that if you do it early--and let's say for example that my student does exactly as I instruct them and they do it a little bit earlier than the pros do. And maybe they hit their split step even a little bit before contact. Well, you may not be positioned optimally. You wasted a little bit of time that you could have used to move your feet and maybe get your body to a little bit better spot on the court. But at least your body is in balance and you're ready to move. In a split step after you finish with it. You're in a perfect ready position. And you're ready to move in any direction on the court. This is as opposed to being late and your position maybe better on the court, because you use more of your time to move your feet towards some place on the court. either it would be recovering back to the center of the base line, or moving forward towards the net after a return or a serve in doubles. Maybe your body's in a little bit better place on the court. B ut once the ball gets to you, you going to be much more rushed and you're going to be off balance and not ready to move for the ball--or maybe away from the ball if it's coming right at you--because you used up so much of your time to move your feet and you didn't get your self balanced. The perfect example of this is the serving volley. After you serve and volley you want to get close to the net. The closer the better. Because it's going to make your volleys or have foul is easier in general. However, if you don't split step until after--well after--your opponent hits their shot. Again, by that time your feet touch on the ground the balls already there and you have very little time to react to the ball once you actually balance your body and you're ready to hit the ball. I would rather that you be a couple steps farther away from the net by the time you make your first split step and be balance and ready for the ball and calm and relax and waiting for the oncoming ball so that you can start moving again, whether it be to the right or the left or forwards or backward or whatever. I'd much rather that you're little farther away and be in balance and ready for the ball then closer to the net and rushed. And not ready for the shot. And so that's my reasoning there. I've much rather you be a little bit earlier than a little bit late. So Bruce hopefully that answers your questions fully and again I recommend that you make your split step so that your feet actually land on the court as your opponent is making contact. By the way, you might notice first I haven't said anything about your opponent's b ack swing or when the ball bounces on your opponent side or even what type of shot their hitting. It doesn't make any difference. You want to time this with when they make contact. And so it's going be a little different every time. You want to watch the ball travel to their side of the court and then identify what type of shot they're hitting, hat position they're in, so that you can see when they're going to make contact and you want to begin your split step right before they start to actually swing forward towards the ball. And I really shouldn't even say that, because it really depends what type of shot they're hitting. If they're hitting a volley and there's not much of a swing there, and so you have to time this on the fly with how your opponent and the ball are intersecting, and where they are in the court, and when the balls actually getting to the racket. So this is tricky. It's not an easy thing. Its not simple. Just like a lot of things in tennis, but it's going to take you sometime. So Bruce thanks for your great question and hopefully that answers it. Let me know if you have anything farther. Good luck in implementing the split step into your game. Is such an important part of playing good tennis. [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for the Essential Tennis Podcast episode #101. Thank you very much for joining me today. And in today's shout out I would like to thank Brian and Dana and Renata in Fremont, Nebraska. And they've been instrumental and helping me get set up the upcoming Essential Tennis clinic in Nebraska. So I want to thank them for their efforts in helping find courts to play on and local hotels, and all kinds of stuff like that. And the three of them have been big supporters of the website. So I want to give a shout out to you guys and say thank you for everything that you've done for the podcast and for the website. And I look forward to working with all three of you guys on the tennis court in March coming up pretty quickly. And again send me an e-mail if you're interested in attending that clinic. I would love to have you and I'd love to help you improve your game. Just like I have many other people at the first two Essential Tennis Clinics. Alright, that does it for this week. Have fun watching the Australian open everybody. I've got it playing just to the right of me right now as in recording, and lots of great tennis already. Make sure that you catch a lot of that action. Its so much fun to watch the pros play. Alright, take care everybody and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music]

Podcast 102: Do you ever experiment between different strokes? Which should you use? When you’re stuck indoors for the off season what are some ways to practice?

ianw — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 11:00:30 +0000

Have you ever experimented between a one and two handed forehand or backhand? Is it ok to keep using two different shots on one side, or is it best to just pick one and stick with it? Also I talk about different ways to work on your game at home during the off season. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Announcer : Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you lave tennis and wants to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now here's Ian! Ian Westermann : Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Thank you very much for joining me on today's show. And I've got two quick things to talk about before we get to our listener questions and answers. First of all, I want to let you guys know that there's a new section of essentialtennis.com that has just gone up in the last day or so. And it is essentialtennis.com/clinics. It's also up in the main menu, and all of the headers of the website. And in this section of the website you guys can see which clinics are upcoming, t heir locations, the price, descriptions, etc. And go check it out. The Nebraska clinic which is coming up in March is the only one listed there right now. I'm going to have more added pretty soon. But you can sign up for the Nebraska clinic there. There's only 12 spots available. So definitely check it out. And sign up if you think that you'd like to make it. Next up, I want to talk to you guys a little bit about something that's available on the website, and that is the option for donations. And I don't like asking for money. I don't like that at all, but I'll be honest. It would really help me out a lot as I've do more and more on the website. Some regular donations would really be helpful. And this is a way that a lot of big name podcasters support what they're doing is through donations from listeners. I would just like to ask you guys to consider donating to Essential Tennis. And it doesn't have to be much. In fact, $5 a month, a reoccurring donation would really be appreciated a lot. If you guys go to essentialtennis.com and go to the front page, on the bottom right there's a link that's says donate. You guys can check it out there. B ut there's an option for $5 a month to $10 a month, $20 a month or a one time donation as well of an amount of your choosing. B ut I would just ask you guys if the podcast has helped you. If it's made a difference in your game. If you can prove your tennis game, because of the website or because of the podcast please consider giving a donation. And especially a monthly one would really help me out a great deal. Tennis lessons usually are $50, $60, sometimes $70 an hour. And I do 2 hours of audio instructions free every month. So we're talking about a $120 if you're to go out and take 2 hour private lessons a month. Now obviously the podcast is not the same thing as private instruction, but I think $5 dollars a month for 2 hours of instruction is a pretty darn good deal. So please consider that. And I would appreciate it very much if you were to be on board and support me with small donation each month. Alright, let's go ahead and get to today's show. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Alright, our first question that I'm going to answer for today comes to us Mayia and Mayia I hope I'm pronouncing your name correctly. It's Mayia and for location she gives USA. So hopefully I'm saying that right. If I'm not I really apologize, B ut I'm going to go with Mayia for the show. And she wrotes to me with the following question. 'This maybe a question that would not apply to many. However, I am interested of your opinion on keeping and practice 2 types of forehands: single and double handed. In the last year and a half I have been working exclusively on my new single handed forehand, but I can hit double handed as well. However, it needs to be practiced as everything else. I think that a double handed option keeps opponents surprised, and and it is an asset I should not lose. It is also kind of fun to have more options what is your opinion?' She also says, 'P. S. I don't know if this will play a role, but the backhand is my stronger side. ' Alright Mayia, good question. And this is my opinion. I don't think that what I'm going to tell you here is necessarily written in stone. I mean nothing I really say on the podcast is written in stone. Some things maybe more than others. B ut my opinion of this is--and there's kind of a over used cliche that I think describes it well, at least my opinion and my view points. I don't believe most of the time in having too many irons in the fire. So to speak. And having a lot of different things going at once if it's not really necessary. In my opinion, you want to have a good feeling of cohesiveness. You want to have confidence when you walk out and you're running to go hit a forehand. In my opinion, you want to be as reliable and confident as possible every time you hit a forehand. And I think the best way to do that is to practice with the same swing again and again. Now it's good to have options. F or example I like for players to have a slice and the top spin, or drive swing on each side. And this is for offense or for defense. And to play a variety of different shots like a drop shot or an attacking shot, etc. I mean, don't get me wrong here. I don't want you guys to be one dimensional. A nd I don't want you to be overly predictable where your opponent always knows exactly what you're going to do. But on the other hand I feel like with using either one or two hands on your forehand side you should be able to come up with a wide variety of different shots just within that one stroke. Without having to use a completely different technique and stroke. And by the way, there is a vast difference between a 1 handed and a 2 handed forehand. It might seem like they're basically the same thing if you're hitting both with top spin, and they're both on the right side of your body. It might seem like they're very really similar shots, but really, when it comes to using your body they are very, very different. And so for the purpose of being able to develop your game, I would much rather that you just pick one and go with it. A lot of times students asked me when they're first coming out for a lesson with me and maybe they're beginners. A lot of times students ask me what should I should use on their backhand side: 1 handed or 2 handed backhand? And I always have students that have questions like that. I have them tried both in front of me and I watch them hit both. And we decide together which one is most comfortable and feels most natural to them . And then I very strongly encourage them to stick with it and allow it to develop and improve and become-- again I like the word cohesiveness. To become a cohesive part of their game. Something that just become second nature and something that they don't have to think about which one to use. I like players to have a go-to shot. And so for that reason I would encourage you to pick one or the other, Mayia. Now you say that your backhand is stronger side. And I can't help but wondering if maybe this has something to do within and my assess that you said a 3. 5 player. I don't know how long you've been playing for Mayia and I don't know also if you also switch between a 1 handed and 2 handed backhand. B ut I can't help but wonder if switching on your forehand side back and forth has something to do with the fact that you're backhand is your more confident side. The vast majority of tennis players prefer their forehand side, because it's their dominant side, and it's just the side that usually their most coordinated on just most comfortable with. And so for that reason, the vast majority of players with rather hit a forehand than a backhand. So you're a little bit different in this regard. I t's not that no players prefer their backhand. That's not true it all, but a large enough percentage prefer their forehand that I can't help but wonder if this switching back and forth has something to do with you preferring your backhand side. Now if you've always hand the same backhand, I kind of have to assume that this does have something to do with it. If you've always been switching back and forth on both sides, then maybe you're just most natural on your backhand side. But I've never seen you playing. I'm not sure how long you've been playing or what the details are, so I can't be positive. I'm kind of guessing on this. But the bottom line is if you were my student I would have you pick one and stick with it, because in my opinion it's going to be much easier for you to advance one stroke on your forehand side then it is going to be just have 2 different strokes on your forehand side, and try to advance and improve both of them at the same. It just adds more things for you to work on it. It adds a layer of complexity that I don't think it's necessary. And you talked about keeping your opponent surprise and catching them off guard. This is something that really probably has a much lesser effect on your opponents and you probably think. At a 3. 5 level you're opponents probably aren't nothing much when you switch and go from one hand to two. It's probably not even big enough difference that most of your opponents are even noticing. And even if they do, I don't think where there going to be like, 'Oh, wow, she just hit of 2 hand instead of one,' and like lose concentration and missing the next shot or something like that. And even if they do, this is probably somebody that you were going to beat anyway. And even if you do beat them, because of that, that's an effect that's really going to go away after awhile. Once you get up to 4.0 and 4. 5, the novelty factor really is going to ware off. And players are probably going to start picking on that shot, because they'll see that you're not quite sure what's you going to using that day. So anyway, those are my thoughts. And again my opinion if both are dancing quickly go ahead and stick with it if you'd like to, but if you're taking lessons from me I would definitely try to get you to stick with one or the other so that we can really improve that one shot. Good luck with your game and definitely let me know how you're doing. And I'd be curious to see what you decided to do and how it's working out as well. Best of luck with that. [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, next step we had a question from Matt in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Matt wrote to me and said: 'My question has to do with staying sharp in the off season. I've made a lot of strikes in my game this year and I'd like to start of strong when spring rolls around. I cannot afford to join the local club, but I was going to take a lesson or two. Beyond that, are there any drills that I can do even down in my basements against the wall? I have a good amount of room that I might be able to work on certain to aspects of my game. ' Matt has a second question as well. I'm going to answer this one first. Well, Matt it kind of depends on exactly how much space you have. And I remember when I was a kid and my family didn't have a lot of money either. So I actually I did this myself in my basement. We had a cinder black wall down in our basement. And I remember moving a laundry lines that mom used hang the laundry down in the basement. So I would move those out of the way and I probably had I would say probably 12 or 15 feet square. So not a lot of room. And what I would do down on the basement of the wall was basically practice with a continental grip and hit slice type shots or volley type strokes. And I was able to hit off to the wall and have it rebound back to me in the air and practice my volleys. And I would also practice half volleys of the wall, again with the continental grip and I would just kind of, I really just had enough room that I could kind of punch the ball forward. The ceilings were pretty low as well. So I just didn't have a whole lot of room. So I would practice compact type shots. And this was still good practice. I mean it wasn't great. It wasn't like hitting against an actual backboard on a tennis court, but I could still work on my eye-hand coordination and my concentration. And I feel like it was good practice and it was worthwhile. Now if you have enough room to make a full swing at the ball that's awesome. That totally changes things if you have a high enough ceiling that you can make a full ground stroke swing and not hit the ceiling, and if you have enough room to make a full ground strokes swing and have it rebound and have enough space to really like come up to the wall back to you. And you're going to need like a good probably 20 or 30 feet. Maybe even a little further than that. Maybe 3-0 or 40 feet of length to really make a full ground stroke swing. A top spin or drive swing at the ball and have it come all the way have enough room to have a bounce come up and then come back to you. Now if you have that much room-- or actually either way. Whether you only have enough room to use compact swings or if you have enough room to make a full swing either way make sure of 2 things. First of all, make sure you have a target. And you can use tape to do this or you can paint or marker or whatever. But make some kind of marking on the wall and masking tape would probably be good way to do this without damaging the wall or without making it permanent. But I would definitely put up--if you have enough room to do this-- I would definitely put up a line that represents the net and remember that the net is 3 feet high in the middle and then tilts upwards slightly from there. So make it accurate. And make sure that the net lower in the middle and kind of tilts upwards as it goes away from the center of the net. And besides the net I would also making actual target and I would make a box that's maybe a foots square. Maybe 2 feet square. Again with tape or some paint. And whenever you go down there to practice whatever type of stroke it is, make sure that you have some kind of physical target like that. Something you can actually aim for an actually try to hit. Secondly, once you've got your target up there and you're practicing against the wall, give yourself some kind of objective or goal. And this is going to really help you stay focus and keep on task. And when I say objective or goal what I'm talking about is--let's were doing volleys off the wall. A nd by the way you going to want to put a volley target quite a bit higher than a ground stroke target so that the ball doesn't drop and bounce on the ground before it gets back to you. But anyway wherever your target is I would recommend doing something like trying to hit it 7 times in a row. O r go down there and maybe to warm up, hit the target with your forehand 30 times. And then hit the target with your backhand 30 times. And then maybe try to hit it a certain number of times in a row and hit it with slice and with top spin and then do the volleys. But make sure that you have a physical target to aim for, and give yourself some kind of goal. It's going to make it more fun that way and it will keep you--again. It will keep your concentration sharp and it will keep you from wasting our time and just aimlessly just hitting the ball without really thinking about what you're doing. Now there's 3 other main things that you can do during the off season besides actually hitting balls down in your basement. First of all, you you can read and there's a lot of good tennis books out there. And you can get them on audio book. Maybe you've a long commute like I do, and you got times to listen to audio books. That would be great. There's instructional books out there. Also historical tennis books. Books on mental tennis. I would definitely do that and you can further educate yourself during the off season and make yourself a better player that way. You can also work on your fitness. This is very easy to do at home. I would yet in agility latter and maybe some resistance bands or some free weights and you can do a lot of--maybe a medicine ball would be great. And you can use a medicine ball against that wall in your basement to work on your core strength. And you can really strengthen yourself physically during the off season by training and doing some fitness work and some footwork work. T hose are all things that you can do in your basement. That would be definitely worth of your time. Also you can listen to the podcast. You can listen to the Essential Tennis Podcast. We have 100 episodes now. I haven't actually set down and done them Matt, but I think it's like up to 60 or 70 hours of tennis instruction. And that's a lot. That's another way that you can spend your time , and another use of your time that can actually improve you. Believe it or not. A nd it kind of surprised me my self and you can, but you can actually make your game better by listening to this show. So go to the archives and every episode is listed in the archives at essentialtennis.com. All you have to do is sign up for the free newsletter, and you can download every show and listen to them there. So in case you didn't know that go ahead and check that out as well. So hopefully that gives you some ideas Matt. And I'll go ahead and go to your next question. Matt wrote and said: 'When I practice with my playing partner. I seem to strike the ball well and we can get into some pretty good rallies. But when it comes time to play. All my works seems to go out to the window. How do I transfer my practice into my game?' Well man, this is a very, very common mental toughness problem. Something that I would actually say every player deals with a t least at one point or another. Definitely something that I have dealt with when I was playing in college. I didn't really deal with this problem in high school, but I did in college quite a lot. Where I would go out--and I know totally what you mean. It would be like I was a completely different person and different player. All of a sudden, all my confidence would go away and I would just be kind of tight and tentative. Or I would go out and over hit and be too aggressive. And beat myself. It was difficult for me to transfer the skills that I had in practice over to the competition court. So I totally know what you're talking about. So don't feel like you're alone with this at all. Now what I want you to do--and I'm going to go back to the podcast archives again. David Groemping is a mental tennis expert. He's a mental coach. Mental toughness coach. He actually trains several listeners of the Essential Tennis Podcast. And he has done several shows with me. I'm not sure if you've listen to this already or not Matt, but we have discussed and answered basically this exact same question several times on the podcast. And so I want you to go download all of the shows that I have done with him. And I think he and I have done 5 episodes now together just answering listener question having to do with mental toughness and mental tennis. And they're very, very good episodes, and again we discussed this exact problem. All you need to do is sign up for the archives. Go to the podcast archives page, open up the archives and then do a search for that page. Do a text search. And just search for David. And you'll be able to go directly to those shows. And again I believe there's 5. So download all 5 of those shows that I've done with David and listen to them. I'm not going to go into detail on the answer to that question here, because we've already discussed it before. Not only that, but he does a much better job of explaining this than I do. However, I will tell you Matt, that one of the biggest things to do is to continue practice competing as as often as possible. You not only need just spend time practicing your strokes in a purely practice situation where there's nothing on the line. There's nothing it's stake. There's no pressure. And you can swing freely and not worry about losing a point or losing a game or losing a match or losing to your friend that you've never lost you before. All these different mental anxieties. It's easy to do it when there's nothing on the line. But you need to not only do that where there's no pressure, but you need to practice competing as well, and you need to do this as often as possible. Practice whatever your A game is in competition. And set this up on purpose with your practice partner. And even put something on the line to even make it better practice. That's game whoever win, whoever losers has to buy a Gatorade after the practice session. Or has to buy dinner that night. O r whatever. Or put 5 bucks on the line or something or. I'm n ot condoning gambling really. But put something on the line where there's actually some pressure to make it something that you really want to win and you don't want to lose. And then go out and practice playing your game confidently and do it again and again and again. And you might lost these matches sometimes, but that's part of the game, but you're going to lost sometimes. But do something to put pressure on yourself and then be purpose for about practicing playing confidently. The more times you can do that, the more used to competition you'll get and the better and better of the competitor you'll be. So that's my quick answer, but again go download the podcast with David Groemping. Listen to those and that's really going to be the most help for you. Matt, thanks very much for your questions. I appreciate it. Hopefully my answers give you some stuff to work on and good luck training in the off season. And good question by the way. It's great to see people out there who are passionate enough about the sport that, even though they don't have a club membership, still want to do something to improve their game. So it's great to see that Matt and keep up the good work. Let me know how you're doing. [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for today's show, the Essential Tennis Podcast episode #102. Thank you very much for joining me today. I appreciate it very much. And just one more thing I want to talk to you guys about before we wrap up. First of all, I wanted to do another answer here, but looking through my next couple questions that are in line, they're definitely going to take sometime to go through. Just have a couple of minutes left during the regular show time. So I'm going to save those for later. But I want to tell you guys about something that myself and Will from fuzzyyellowballs.com were going to be doing together. And that's going to be upcoming during the Australian Open Final, which is going to be the 31st. And it's obviously a really early match time here in the US. I think you're on East Coast it is something like 3:00 in the morning. But he and I are going to be doing a live broadcast during the Australian Open Final. And we're going to be doing commentary throughout the entire Australian Open Finals Match. The men's finals match early on Sunday morning the 31st here in the US. So keep your eyes open for that. Something that I think it's going to be a lot of fun and we're going to be interacting with viewers live and answering questions and reading you guys' comments during the broadcast. I think it's going to be something that's going to be a lot of fun for everybody. So keep your eyes open for information on that. I can't tell you guys where to go exactly yet, but if you are either subscribed to the newsletter at Essential Tennis, or if you're following Essential Tennis on Facebook at facebook.com/essentialtennis. Or if you are getting my Twitter feed at twitter.com/essentialtennis. All 3 of those ways you'll be able to get information. I'll definitely be sending out links and letting you guys know where to go. But just be aware of that and keep your eyes open and I'm looking forward very much to doing that. I think it's going to be a fun experience. Alright, well that does it for this weeks show. Thanks again everybody for downloading and listening. Take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music]

Podcast 103: Do you struggle keeping focus during practice sessions? When should you change up your strategy and tactics during a tennis match?

ianw — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 11:07:56 +0000

So many amateur players walk out onto the practice court and waste their time, don't be one of them! Today I talk about how to put together a practice that will help you keep your focus. The rest of the show is dedicated to strategy, namely: how do you know when you bail out on your "A Game" and change up your strategy? Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast, if you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann : Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast, your place for free, expert, tennis instruction that can truly help you to improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by ProTranscript.com. ProTranscript.com transcribes every podcast show that we do, if you guys go to essentialtennis.com-- click on Podcasts and there is a little drop down menu that says 'transcripts'. You can go to the transcripts blog and from there you can read the transcripts of each show on the website, or download them as Kindle files, Word files, PDF files-- so you can take the podcast with you and read it if you like besides just listening to it normally. So thank you for ProTranscript.com for being a sponsor of the show. I hope you guys enjoyed the Australian Open final. I had a great time watching it with Will from Fuzzy Yellow Balls and we did a live video webcast and did commentary and answered questions during the match, had a really good time doing that with him. And congratulations to Roger Federer of course, for winning yet another grand slam title-- congrats to him. And I don't know about you guys, but I was really moved by Andy Murray's response and his emotions during the trophy presentation. I really hope he can win a grand slam some time soon, both for himself and for the UK. I think it's just a matter of time, he's a great player but needs to learn how to play a little bit more aggressively. But hopefully you all enjoyed watching the match as well and I can't wait for the next grand slam-- the French Open. OK, let's get to the questions, sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Alright, let's get started on today's show. And our first question comes to us from Francisco in New Valda, Texas, which is a little bit west of San Antonio. He wrote to me and said 'hey Ian, I have a few questions' and we're going to take his questions one at a time here-- he's got 3 great questions that I'm going to get to today. His first one has to do with how to maintain a high level of focus or play during practice. He said, 'I was recently hitting with a friend of mine and was hitting really good for about the first hour, then we took a break and I couldn't hit as well. I was making more mistakes than before-- I don't know what happened.' Well Francisco, this is going to be a short answer-- I've talked about this in the past on the podcast about how to practice effectively-- in fact, I've done a whole episode on how to put together a practice session, which was I think specifically for singles, but go check that out in the archives-- I'm sorry but I don't know off the top of my head which episode it was. But if you just do a page search for practice, you should be able to find it pretty quickly. Now, I basically have two tips for you-- I have two pieces of advice for you to be able to maintain a higher level of quality and a higher level of concentration in your practice play. First of all, you need to have a plan. And this is probably the number one mistake that amateur players have when it comes to their practice sessions and this is the number one reason why amateur players, or club level players don't have very productive, or very high en-focused practice sessions as they don't have any kind of plan. They walk out onto the court with their tennis bags, their rackets, their water and they go out there and they just hit. Now, that's certainly better than nothing and if you're happy just doing that, and you're getting what you want out of tennis by going out there and just hitting balls back and forth without any real focus to what you're doing, then that's perfectly fine-- I'm not going to yell at you for not being super organized about it. It's perfectly fine if you want to go out and just hit the ball and you're happy with that. But if you want to improve faster, and if you want to hit better, more consistently and not have these let downs like what Francisco is describing, let me encourage you to walk out onto the practice court with your practice partner and a written plan. Write it and sit down, think about what you need to work on and write it down ahead of time. And I've got 4 things that I think you should do when it comes to having a plan in your practice sessions. First of all, make sure that you have specific drills and this does not have to be complicated-- it doesn't have to be fancy. If I personally was going out to practice for my tennis game, right now, if I was going out with a partner who was my level, what I would probably follow would be something like this-- I'd go out and we would start out with short courts, rallying from the service line for a couple minutes. We would then rally down the middle of the baseline for probably 15-20 minutes. We would then rally cross-court from the baseline with a specific target in mind, and that would be to the correct half of the courts and past the service line and we would probably do that on each half of the court for 10-15 minutes each. I would then want to do volleys, and we would do that by having myself at the net, him at the baseline and we could either just go down the middle of the court or also direct the ball to each half of the court as well. I would do overheads, mixed in with volleys and then we would do serves and returns. And that's basically just a little bit of everything and that would probably take myself and somebody the same level as me-- if we did this specifically to work on our games, it would probably take us an hour or an hour and half or so. And that after that, we would probably compete. So have specific drills like that. And if there is a part of your game that you really need to work on that is just obviously much weaker-- for myself, that would be my backhand ground-stroke-- spend more time on that or come up with different drills just to work on that. Now, that's number one-- have specific drills. Number two, is have specific goals or achievements for each drill. So let's say for example I would want to work a little more on my cross court backhand from the baseline-- when I say specific goals and achievements, I would put a cone out there or if we didn't have a target, I would pick a specific place on the court and that would be between the service and base line. And I'm left handed, so my cross court backhand is across over on the deuce half of the court. So I would aim for that box in the back part of the court, and me and my partner would rally until I hit a total of 50 backhands that land in that area of the court. Or maybe me and my partner would keep track of our shots together and we would go until combined, we've hit 100 good cross court shots on the baseline, on the deuce half of the court past the service line. So that would be an example of a specific goal of achievment or if you have targets, if you have some little plastic cones to use, maybe we could go until each of us hits our target three times or as a team, until we knock the targets 5 times-- something like that. This is going to help you keep your focus and concentrate on what you're doing as opposed to just hitting the ball and not really having a target or a purpose. So make sure you have a specific goal, a specific achievement and make targets a big part of that-- doesn't have to be a physical target, it can be a certain area on the court as well. Thirdly, make sure that you put in competitive games and put something on the line during your practice session. And this could be ground stroke games from the baseline, it could be games working on specific parts of your game, maybe an approaching game or working on your volleys and on your partner's passing shots-- or it could just be a set play as well. But come up with specific ways to compete and then again, put something on the line, make it worth something-- and this could be sprints afterwards, some kind of workout, pushups, or the loser has to do 20 pushups etc. Make it something that neither of you guys want to do afterwards so that it puts a little bit of pressure on both of you. And this is really important because it's going to train you to be a better competitor. It's going to train you to be more focused and to compete at a higher level. So that's number 3, competitive games with something on the line. Fourthly, stay on task. Have the concentration and have the focus to stick with your plan-- first of all have a plan, and then stick with it. That's number four. So that all falls under the category have a plan when you go out there to practice and underneath that heading-- 4 things, have specific drills, have specific goals or achievements in mind for each drill, do competitive games with something on the line and stay on task. If you do those four things Francisco, I guarantee you, you will have more productive practice sessions and you will not have these let downs-- I mean don't get me wrong, you are still going to have days where your game varies and you are going to have good sections and bad sections of your practice. You're not always going to play 100% every single time you walk out onto the court. That's just a given-- but you are going to consistently play better when you actually have the focus to have a game plan like this. Now, lastly, I said there was two things I was going to tell you to improve this-- number one was have a plan. Number two, practice with a plan and stay on task. Once you learn how to have a plan and go out there and make the most of your time on the practice court, you need to practice doing it. And you need to continue to do it until it becomes a habit and at that point your game will start to improve faster. Those of you listening to the podcast right now are listening because you want to improve your games. I would love to see a survey of everybody listening right now and see how many people are doing all four of the outlined items that I talked about, about having a plan in their practice session. If I had to bet, I would bet that out of the club players, people who aren't on a tennis team who have the benefit of having a coach set this type of practice up for them, I would bet that less than 10% of you listening do anything like this now. And so that leaves most of you with a way that you can really improve your tennis game. So have the concentration to go out and do this with your practice partner. Francisco, thanks for the great question. [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, I'm now going to take a couple seconds here and I want to communicate my appreciation to a couple of very important people this past week-- I had three new people donate to essentialtennis, to the podcast, and I just want to thank those people briefly before I get to my next question. First of all, Richard in Mass sent a $15 donation-- thank you. John M. In Texas who was with me in Palm Springs for the last essential tennis clinic, he started a $5 a month subscription donation and John thanks very much for your support, I appreciate that very much. And lastly, Ben in Utah, who was also at the clinic in Palm Springs, California, Ben sent a little note with his donation and said that he's going to send a $5 donation for every win that he has in the tournaments that he's playing in. So he sent me a $10 donation for the 2 wins that he had this past December in the last tournament that he played. I think that's a creative way and a cool way to give back to essential tennis and donate for every win-- Ben I think that's awesome and thank you for your support as well. All three of you guys, Richard, John and Ben, thank you guys so much for your support and if the essential tennis podcast has improved your tennis game and helped you out, please help me out by donating-- it doesn't have to be a lot, but every little bit helps with the expenses that I have here as I run the website. Just go to essentialtennis.com and click on the big button on the bottom that says donate. [music] [music] [music] OK, moving on to the 2nd and 3rd questions from Francisco in Texas. He's got some great questions about tennis strategy. And I enjoy talking about strategy a lot because it's another big way that you guys can improve your tennis games and it's not like stroke technique where it really takes a lot of repetition and hard work and it takes a lot of patience. Strategy is something that you can improve very quickly, it just takes awareness and it does take practice as well to be able to implement it correctly over and over again. But I think it's a really great way for you guys to be more aware of ways you can change the way you are playing in order be more successful. Now his second question is, how do you know when to change the direction or hit greater angles, or go for a more aggressive shot. My sister had played in a USTA tournament and even though she was consistent and kept getting everything in, she still lost. I feel like if she had been a bit more aggressive or changed the direction of the ball, on short balls, she might have won more points in the match that she lost 6-1, 6-7, 8-10. Francisco, this question really makes me think about the match between Andy Murray and Roger Federer just last night here in the US. And in that match, we saw Andy Murray who is very steady, he's patient, he likes to try a wide variety of shots and he kind of likes to play cat and mouse type games a lot of the times. But his game style is very steady and consistent. It's not that he never hits the ball hard, he certainly has weapons but his default game style is to just be slow and steady from a professional perspective. He obviously hits the ball much harder than most of us do-- pretty much all of us, but from a professional player's standpoint, he is slow and steady. Now he should've been more aggressive last night against Roger and it is kind of a very similar situation from what you're describing with your sister. Federer came out very aggressive, pressuring Murray and Murrary didn't really try to go right back at him until the 3rd set. And even then when he did a good job of that and he got up a break, he went right back to just being steady again and Federer put the pressure right back on him and got the break back. So this is very similar type of scenario to what you are describing. Consistency will only get you so far in tennis and there is obviously different degrees of consistency and there is consistency within different levels of strokes-- in other words, you can be a very consistent player at a 3.0 level, hitting 3.0 level shots but just because you are consistent there doesn't mean you are going to beat a 4.5 player who is just an average 4.5 player. It doesn't work that way-- consistency is different from level to level. However within her own level, she is going to have develop some weapons or angles or some different strategies at some point, if she wants to move up to a completely new level and challenge players that are above her right now. So at some point, she must develop weapons. And when should you change what you're doing really is your question. When should you start going for more angles, when should you start to be more aggressive and the answer to that is when it becomes clear that your opponent can out hit you consistently. And what you don't do is, let's say your sister A game is to be steady and consistent, and I think that's great by the way. I think that should be the first thing that you learn as a tennis player, is just how to be steady and keep the ball in play. But, you don't want to go away from that strategy too early. If it's, let's say, 2-2 in the opening set of your match and your opponent hits a huge forehand winner that you are never even close to touching, and maybe he's hit that twice now-- you guys have played 4 games, you are in your 5th game right now and he's hit this winner twice in the match. That's not the time to go ahead and change your game plan. Your staying even with him, this is a competitive match. Maybe at some point later in the set, you might have to pick it up a little bit to finally get that edge and win the set but this is not the time to jump ship and change your strategy or change your sister's strategy. When you would want to change is when it is clear they are beating you on a consistent basis. So if they win the first 3 games in a row, and you really haven't made an unforced error yet, you are being very steady and consistent but you are losing 0-3. At that point, you've got to say to yourself, this is clearly not working-- I'm not missing, but my opponent is just that much better than me right now. They are hitting shots that are that much stronger and you've got to do something better. You have to start pressuring them more-- just putting the ball in play isn't good enough. So, it depends on the situation, who you are playing against and exactly how well they are playing to determine exactly when you want to change up that game play. But starting off steady and consistent is not bad, it's a great way start off a match. Now let's go to his third question. And it's also a strategic question-- 'do you change how hard you hit or strategy according to the player? For example, if it is a pusher or counter puncher, do you move them around more and go for more directional change and against a hard hitting player, do you play it consistent and get it in as many times as you can? This one is also from my sister-- she played consistent against a pusher and lost and also lost against an aggressive base-liner. How would she have played these matches differently? Would she go for more on her shots? That's a really good question Francisco, and what you're asking would be a great product to kind of layout every different type of game, or ever different style of tennis play and you name a couple here-- pusher, counter puncher, aggressive baseline player, other types of players who might play are maybe somebody is just really aggressive on each shot or maybe a net rusher-- somebody who comes to the net a lot. There is all kinds of different descriptors that we can put on different types of players and in general, there is usually a strategy that is best to play against them. It's not always the case and within each of these different types of players, there is also many different subsets. Everybody is a little different and this is a part of what makes tennis fun and interesting and also very frustrating at times. Everybody that you play is going to have different strengths and weaknesses so you have to learn how to adjust and so in short, my answer to your first question-- Francisco asked, ' do you change how hard you hit or your strategy according to the player?' And my answer to that is yes, yes, yes! You need to know how to change your game up, and change your strategy based on your opponents. That is what strategy and tactics is, is being able to change up your game based on your opponents. You have to be able to do that. You should have an 'A' game, where this is what suits your strengths best, and this is your style of play. And for me, personally, I never really did a good job in my competitive years of doing that. I kind of would just go out and just try to hit good shots. And I never really had a focused style of play or strategy out of the gate where I knew this is what I'm going to do. I knew what my strengths and weaknesses were but I never really had a style mapped out that I was going to try to stick with. So you should have an A game, and that is what you should start your match off with and see how things progress. If you are winning, then don't change anything, stick with it and stick with what you are comfortable with and that is going to work out fine. But if you're losing, and if you're losing consistently it becomes apparent that this is not working out, you have to be able to adjust based on the strengths and weaknesses of your opponents. Real quickly, I'm going to go over 4 different types of players and real briefly give you an example of what you would have to try to do against those players. Number one, the pusher & counter puncher-- you have to be able to pressure and attack but be steady and consistent at the same time. Just being steady and consistent against a pusher is usually not going to be good enough because that is their game play. That is their style of play and nothing can be more boring than watching two pushers play each other because neither of them are good at attacking and it just becomes a push fest back and forth. So if you want to beat a pusher, you have to be able to pressure them somehow and Francisco pointed out hitting the ball harder, hitting more angles etc You have to be able to do that against a pusher and do it steadily because if you miss every time you try to hit the ball a little harder or you miss every time you try to open up the court by hitting angles, then obviously the pusher is going to win anyway. And on the other hand, if you just push back, they are probably going to win as well because now you are playing their style of game. And this is why the pushers are so frustrating and so tough to play for most people. By the way, in the archives you'll see a show I've done just on playing pushers. So that is style number one, the pusher. Style number two, super aggressive dummy is what I wrote down and you are going to play people who just love to hit the ball hard and they are very aggressive on every shot-- this is kind of a style that I'm guilty of having played in the past. Somebody who goes out and tries to hit everything hard. And this is somebody you want to be steady and patient with. Don't try to out hit them when they come out in the first game and hit every shot really hard, don't be intimidated by that if they only make 75% of them. Certainly if they only make half of their shots and the half that they do make are incredible and hard and really tough, but then they miss the other half because they were trying to be so aggressive. You want to be steady and patient against this type of player. Don't try to out hit them, allow them to make mistakes-- that's number two. Style number three is the net rusher. And when you play somebody who makes it apparent that they are going to come up to the net a lot, you have to be prepared in advance to be able to hit aggressive and accurate passing shots. And that is just how it is-- if they are coming up to the net every point, you have to have the ability of passing them. You can't give them a lot of volleys because that is what they are hoping for and they want to be able to work the point from the net. Being able to hit good lobs would also be valuable. Also if you hit deep ground strokes to begin each point, you are going to keep them off the net a little bit more often. Lastly, the all court steady and aggressive player and this is somebody who is just a level or half a level above you. They are able to hit good shots from anywhere on the court, they are able to hit aggressive shots from anywhere on the court and it just seems like this person just has it all. They are just really good. And when you play this type of player, you have no choice-- you have to elevate your game and try to out hit them over and over again. You cannot just be steady and hope for them to make mistakes because they are better than you are at the point in time. And you have to elevate your game and at least try it. And that means that you might make some more errors than you usually do but if you don't try something, they're just going to take over every point and beat you anyway. This is kind of what happened with Murray the other night-- he played Roger who was attacking as often as he could, he was attacking very steadily, so for Murray to just be consistent wasn't good enough. And he had to elevate the level of his game and go for more than what he would normally be comfortable with. So Francisco, that's a brief overview of several different types of players and how you would change up your strategy and your game play according to the player. And this is real important for you and your sister and everybody else listening, hopefully your sister listens to the podcast as well and she needs to go out and start practicing these different styles of play for herself so that when she plays different opponents, she is able to actually change her game up and do the right thing. She should not be playing the exact same game play for every opponent because different opponents are going to react differently and they are going to have different strengths that are either going to be good or bad depending on the situation. Francisco, thank you very much for your great questions today and hopefully my answers have been helpful. Please feel free to let me know if you have any further questions on any of this and everybody else listening, I've got a list of questions from people to answer on the podcast-- if you'd like your question to be featured on the show, send me an email at ian@essentialtennis.com [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for the essential tennis podcast, episode #103. Thank you very much for joining me today on the show, I appreciate it. For my shout-outs for today, I want to give a shout out to a couple of essential tennis listeners and members who joined myself and Will to watch the Australian Open final live which shows some dedication here in the US since the match started at 3:30am here on the east coast. But the people who said hi in the chat room during the show were Steve, FightFan, and Charles to name three. Those three I remember just off the top of my head. If there was more of you in there, I apologize for not remembering. I will probably remember a couple of people later and kick myself. Thank you to you three for joining us and throughout that show, over 3,000 people tuned in to watch our commentary so we are really happy with that and we definitely intent on doing it for the other Grand Slams this year at least. And I'll be looking forward to interacting with you guys during the next Grand Slam Final event. Alright, that does it for us this week. Thank you very much everybody for tuning in and we'll catch you again next week. Have a great week and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast 104: Often times amateur players scoff cooperative hitting drills saying that they’re “boring”. Today my guest Andy Zodin explains why they’re so important.

ianw — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 11:09:50 +0000

Cooperative hitting should be a big part of your practice routine! If it's not already then definitely take a listen to today's podcast episode. My guest on the show is Andy Zodin who hosts "In The Tennis Zone", a tennis radio show in CO. He and I discuss why cooperative hitting is so important. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! . Ian : Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast-- your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by ProTranscript.com. Today my guest is Andy Zodan who has been on the show before and we have a great conversation about cooperative helping and how it can help improve your tennis game. Real quickly, I want to remind you guys about the next upcoming Essential Tennis clinic-- it's going to be in Fremont, Nebraska which is near Omaha for complete information, please visit essentialtennis.com/clinics and at this point we're going to need some more sign-ups for it to go. So please check it out and if you're interested at all in learning from myself in a live tennis instructional environment on the court for a full weekend, definitely check it out or send an email to me at ian@essentialtennis.com. Alright, let's get down to busy. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] My guest on today's espisode of the Essential Tennis podcast is Andy Zodan and Andy is the host of 'In the Tennis zone'. Which is a tennis radio show in Colorado and you can also hear that as a podcast on the iTunes music store. Andy welcome back to the essential tennis podcast. Andy : Thanks a lot Ian, it's great to be with you. Ian : To start off, why don't you tell people briefly about your show, and I know that the 3rd season is set to kick off soon, on the 14th? Andy : Yeah, we start on valentines day and what we're trying to do Ian, we try to blend tennis at both the local level, from a junior and adult stand point. [inaudible] high profile guests over the course of the first few seasons, including Rob Laver and Billy King, and Brad Gilbert and the Brian Brothers-- all kinds of exciting guests. But we also try to make sure that we recognize some of the junior and adult players and as I say at the local level that work really hard to help us grow our sport and are worthy of our recognition. . Ian : Well it's a great show, and I definitely recommend that my listeners go check it out. And I was just looking at it on iTunes-- you have something like 200 episodes on iTunes which is awesome. Andy : Well I think those are probably 200 different segments. We've actually done 64 shows-- it's once a week for 32 weeks and I think they break those off into segments. For each 2 hour show, there will be 6 segments so it would be 3 per hour. And we try to give each segment 15-20 minutes so that we're able to get into some good detail with the topics but not go on and on with it. So I think we found a pretty nice plan. Ian : Cool, let's go ahead and get started with today's topic and I'd like to thank John M in Texas who suggested this topic. I posted on the forums at essentialtennis.com and asked for topic suggestions for a show with you and by the way, Andy and myself have previously done an episode on the podcast, and it was #88. I suggest you guys go check it out-- it was a good discussion about using modern techniques that you guys often see the professional players and using and whether or not they are applicable to the amateur game. So it was a good discussion and today's is going to be as well. Here is John's question and topic that he wanted us to talk about-- 'how about elaborating on a topic you discussed in the last podcast with Andy, cooperative tennis. Why is it important? What are the benefits? How can a rec-player incorporate cooperative tennis into their practice routines. Can you provide examples of specific of cooperative drills for ground strokes, volleys etc? I know you stressed cooperative drilling in the ET clinic in Palm Springs. And John was with me in Palm Springs for the last clinic that I did, and we did a lot of cooperative hitting. And it's something that I believe in a great deal and I believe that the average player is not doing it enough. I think the average player goes out onto the practice courts and hits a few practice balls without any purpose and then plays a couple of sets or baseline games. So Andy, what's your take on this, about cooperative hitting and the recreational or club level player? Andy : Well, I think it's a great question Ian. It's something that I spend a tremendous amount of time and if some of the students that I work with on a regular basis heard that question, and I was going to be the one asked to answer it, they would probably have to laugh at how much I stress that. And I think my main point to really get to the bottom line of it all, is that I believe that the most productive practice sessions that you are going to have are the ones that involve great rhythm in your rallies. For instance, as you say you go out and hit balls without purpose, I don't think that you are really building a foundation of a game that is going to hold up under pressure. I think that people come out onto the drill court specifically, and they have no pressure what so ever. They can just kind of [inaudible] and go for what they want and not have any consequence to whether the ball goes on or out. And it's good to be able to work on aggressive tactics as well but I think we forsake the importance of the rhythm in the rallies. If you go to the US Open and you go back to the practice courts-- I remember I used to watch Andre Agassi and Brad Gilbert hitting, and you'd see Brad at the net and Andre hitting ground strokes. It was going back and forth, the exact same shot. There was nothing agressive-- obviously, Andre was hitting the ball but it was a very nice rythm. If you watched Muhammad Ali, working out in the gym, you'd see him hitting the speed bag, well he isn't going to go into the ring and just beat on somebody's forehead like you would a speed-back. But he was working on the rhythm and the speed of his hands in a way that wasn't necessarily what he would be doing competitively. People said to me we don't do this in a match and I say football players don't run through tires in a game but they do it as they prepare to become better football players and work on the skills that make them a better player. I look at your asking players to do as the foundation of their game and if you want to build a good foundation to your house, you got to pour a nice 3 foot of concrete slab. You can't just go 2 inches then go 'OK, let's build the house'. That's the way your game operates. If you don't have the type of game that's going to hold up under pressure- you know one of the best compliment I ever got as a player was when I was hitting with Tommy Ho, and he was a great tour player, and I could never stay on the singles court with Tommy. But I could go out and work with him and at least hit enough balls back to make it a good session for him. And I used to apologize and tell him I can't stay on the court with you in singles, and he would say 'well, you are solid and the ball comes back pretty much the same way every time.' And I took that as a huge compliment from a guy like that. I've always taken a lot of pride in that and I think that players hold up over a period of time if they go out there and they work on the rythm drills that make them consistent and that make them steady and they gain the confidence more and more as that becomes part of their game. Ian : You said a lot of great stuff in there and let's go and start to break this down a little bit. The first thing I'd like to talk about is a very common excuse or complaint that I get from my students when trying to implement drills like this that are cooperative and steady. I like that you use the word rhythm to describe these drills but often times, I hear the complaint 'why am I practicing hitting back to somebody? This doesn't make any sense. What happens when I go into a match and I've been practicing all this type hitting to a person. I'm just going to do that in a match then, aren't I?' What's your response to that? And you've kind of answered it a little bit, and I like the analogies you gave about football players and boxers doing things that aren't necessarily what you do during competition but they just help to lay a groundwork and maybe I just answered the question-- sorry. . Andy : Actually, if you want to have a complete practice regiment, you have to go out and do the things that we're talking about right now Ian. You have got to go out and have those drills where you've got 2 volleyers at the net and two ground strokers at the baseline, and maybe you're having the volleyers track the ball a little bit and move side-to-side and stay in the formation. And their goal is to not let anything through-- they aren't trying to attack the net, they are trying to defend the net. When you watch the Ryan brothers play doubles, you want 2 guys moving seamlessly together, covering court to where it is almost like two rotating soccer goalies because every ball that is struck, that comes to them, is not necessarily going to put them in position to do something aggressive with that ball. Sometimes it is juts a matter of being a crisp, solid volleyer and making the ground strokers hit 4 or 5 or 6 balls. A lot of times the players that you work with are going to go out and play against an opponent that if you give that person enough rope with which to hang themselves, inevitably they will. But you can't just go to that game if you haven't practiced it. You can't flip the switch and say 'well normally, I play really aggressively and that is all I ever do, but these guys are overly aggressive and if we can just play steady, then we can get them to make a bunch of errors-- let's just flip the switch even though we haven't practiced doing that, it's not going to happen. So what you have to do, is you have to go out and practice the drills where you go OK, I'm going to make sure that today when I play the net, I'm going to be the most crisp, solid, error-free volleyer that I can be and that's going to be my strategy with which to win. Now that's not your entire strategy and then you have to go out and you have to to apply what you are using in a competitive setting. So if the player's that you are working with are only coming out onto your court and onto the drill court to try to prepare for match play, they are leaving a lot on the table. Because if they aren't going and setting up matches with their friends, and going out and playing practice sets, then going ahead and being a little bit more aggressive and using competitive tactics, then I think that they are not getting the whole picture of what it takes to become a complete player. But if all that you are worried about is every time you are on the tennis court, hitting the ball by somebody, I think you are missing a lot of what the essence of the sport is, which is just that feeling of just a beautiful long rally-- guy goes out and hits with his wife in on the park on a Sunday etc. They are playing tennis... They aren't playing against each other, they are practicing together and there is sort of a beautiful simplicity to that, that I think a lot of people miss out on. If they are only on the tennis court to make a blood and guts affair, I think they miss a lot of what the essence of the sport has to offer in terms of a very peaceful game and something that you can go out and get some nice exercise with and have it be something that's not necessarily all stressed out and turning into knots. Learning how to relax and just be that steady player... And you watch some of these pros that you go to locally and you see just the beauty and the ease with which they'll hit nice drop shots, a nice angle volley or a nice lob etc. You see Federer do that even at the highest level and there is a tremendous artistry to that and when you learn how to play that game, it's a lot of fun to play and it's also very effective. Ian : I like how you describe that a lot. You said there is a beautiful simplicity to watching two players who are able to do this, and are able to control the ball back and forth. And this is the draw for your average player, or even player's like me or yourself who didn't make it as a professional player-- who didn't make it to the top ranks-- that's the draw to going and watching professional players. And you talked about going back and watching the practice courts and yeah, there is something beautiful about it. Seeing two players who are just master of controlling the ball and keeping it in play. And it might seem boring to the average player, and especially if they've only been playing for a short period of time, they perhaps just picked it up a year or two ago. They are watching tennis on TV and seeing all these big flashy shots, it might seem boring to a lot of players to walk out onto the tennis court themselves and just try to be steady and consistent. But something that I try to remind my students of, is just the stats in your average tennis match show that most points end with an unforced error. This is really across the board-- there are professional matches where there is more winners then unforced errors, but even at the professional level, often times there is more mistakes for both players then there are winning shots or winners that are hit. And then when you go and you look at your amateur or club player, certainly we can't expect them to hit more winners then unforced errors. So, I think a lot of times it becomes managing errors and what better way to practice that then to have some kind of focus and try to build a rhythm, like you were talking about Andy. Anyways, I like to point back to the stats to kind of show what players should be spending most of their time on. Does that make sense? Andy : Absolutely. I was going to say, you use the word error-management and that was going to be my next point. If you talk to the greatest golfers in the world, they all talk about at one point or another in respect to their performance golf tournaments, golf course management. And I think tennis players have to have that same mindset with respect to what they are going out and doing. And you're right, every player that comes out and tries to play the sport, can't necessarily emulate what the top players in the world are doing. No offense to anybody listening, but you just aren't athletic enough to do what Roger Federer is doing, or what Andy Murray or Nadal is doing. This is a level of athlete that is almost super-human. And so, when I was growing up , the average to slightly above average athlete could try to emulate what the top players were doing. Weather it was Jimmy Connors or [inaudible] , those strokes gave a lot of margin for error the the average to slightly above average athlete to be able to emulate and try to play [inaudible] , a largely lesser version of those players but nowadays, you can't just take a kid who is trying to get onto his high school team and say 'OK, before you go in to those tryouts, I'm going to teach you the [inaudible] forehand. Let's just face it, it's not going to happen that soon. You are going to have some kids that are going to come out and with the technology that we've got, they are going to watch some TV and be able to emulate some of that stuff and if you see that the kid can do it, you certainly can embrace that and give the kid the opportunity to play to the highest level. So for every player to come out on the floor and to think that the are going to throw out these weapons on the court that we watched at the Australian Open recently, I think people are kidding themselves. What they should be thinking about, is how can I take today's technology and the brilliance of what Babala, Prince, Head and all these racket companies have done putting into these frames, and then try to play that steady or maybe old fashion game and play it at a higher level. I think they are going to have much more success with that and I think in large part, probably much more injury free as well. Ian : I agree. I've got 2 more questions for you. After those, I'd like to go back and forth and give a couple-- John asked for some drills, some cooperative drills. So I'd like to talk about that for a couple of minutes as well. Just two more questions having to do with the essence of this idea of being cooperative. First of all, what would you say to the player who says to you, after suggesting cooperative tennis drills, what would you say to the person who says 'well, that's boring. I'm going to lose interest and that just doesn't sound like a lot of fun to cooperate back and forth. Andy : Well what I say about 3 times a week and the answer is, there is a big difference in playing against each other and practicing together. Now, when I played in Austin at the University of Texas on the team out there, we'd go out and we would hit cross court fore and backhands and we would do hours of that and we did that in all the junior programs that I grew up in as well. And the fact of the matter is, is that if you don't like it, then maybe you are too ADD or maybe there is something that you're not getting about the importance of being able to hit the same shot over and over again. There is a certain monotony to some of what it takes to become a great player. But I think that holds true for any sport. I think there are certain things that you have to be able to do that show how bad you want to be great because you are willing to put in the work, and have everything not necessarily 'Oh, this is so much fun. ' Well it's not always fun. Part of becoming great is putting in the work and work is not always fun and it doesn't always have to be boring. It doesn't always have to monotonous but there are going to be elements. If two people are standing inside the service line doing reflex volley drill, or 15-20 minutes at a time, there is a period of time at which you go, 'can we go onto something else?' And you know what? No, we can't yet. We need to make sure that we are working on our hand speed, that we are working on our hand eye coordination, that we are getting our footwork lined up with where this ball is and trying to get the proper seperation between the body and the ball. All the little things that keep you balanced-- those aren't necessarily a tonne of fun to work on, but if you want to be a great player, those are the things that you've just got to suck up and take it for the team. So I tell them that on a regular basis and I just say, 'look, there is somethings that you are going to enjoy from this later on and it's called winning. It's a lot more fun to win than to lose and I'm not one of those 'winning is everything'. To me, what I look for is the enjoyment of the game. If you go out and you play well, and you've made your opponents do what they had to do to beat you and you come off the court and you lost 7-5, 6-4 but you made them play and you didn't beat yourself, you are going to gain a certain level of enjoyment from that. But I think that if you only make it about having fun, every time you are on the court, you are missing out on a lot of what it takes to become a player that can perform at a pretty consistent level every time out. And I think some of these drills, you just have to say if you want to be good or not. You can't necessarily just give into the fact that a person didn't enjoy every single 5 minute increment of their practice routine and making them realize that there is-- getting back to boxing, when those boxers go out and do that road-rock and they are running miles at a time with that car right behind them, you think they are having fun doing that? - But it's a hell of a lot more fun to laugh and be able to go into the later rounds of a fight and not just keel over because you put in the work. I just have to make the analogy that it's a lot of fun later if you do the work now. Ian : Really good answer Andy, great stuff. I want to ask you one more question before we talk about some drills, and what I'd like to ask you next is what you feel is the right ratio and you're talking about having fun versus working hard and maybe we can compare those two-- cooperative versus competitive drill situations, maybe not all the time. It depends on your personality etc. But how would you split up the time spent between each-- for our listeners out there, who are club level players, you are recreational level players, how would you recommend that these types of players split up their time between the hard work and the repetition and the cooperation, and having fun? More playing out points? Doing more competitive stuff? What do you think? Andy : Well, I think a lot of it has to do with the particular group that you are dealing with and in my case, it has to do with the fact that I'm a guy that is at high altitude-- remember, I'm in Denver, Colorado where your grandmother can hit the ball hard here. It's not a matter of generating pace at high altitude, it's a matter of accommodating pace. So for where I am, it's probably a higher percentage of time spent with the cooperative type drills because it sort of brings people back down to where they worry more about that pace accommodation then generating pace, then those are the people whose performance graphs end up being a little bit more of a steady line from match to match, as opposed to, 'well I played an indoor match and there were no elements to compete with and I played great, but next week I played outdoors and it was windy, and I couldn't see in the sun, but I still tried to play real aggressively and I couldn't hit the broad side of a barn, and you played awful. So I think here it's a matter of 50-50 with that. The other thing is, who are you dealing with? If I'm out there dealing, there is a group of ladies that I deal with on a weekly basis, they are competitive, 3.5, 4.0, senior players-- 55 or 60 years old. And nothing bores them, they go out there and they just want to play well and they are happy to do whatever it is but then later on in the afternoon, I have a group of junior kids coming out and you know those are the ones that want to play. So we'll make them do the work, and they'll do the rhythm drills, and maybe in an hour and a half, we'll spend the first 30-40 minutes making sure that we are sort of using our game like a transmission-- we'll start in 1st gear and shift into 2nd gear and make sure that we are hitting some good clean balls, do some nice cross court ground-stroke work. I like to do a tracking drill with 2 volleyers and 2 baseliners and I'll feed from behind the volleyers and move the [inaudible] around and make sure we are working on our court positioning. Make sure that we are covering the areas of the court that are the highest percentage areas of the court for our opponents to hit to. That type of thing and once I think that everybody is warm and has a good sweat, and they've really shown that they've dialed in their focus and now we want to get into some ground stroke ralley points and do some singles, doubles and maybe some half court. And then maybe play some tiebreaker or set work at the end-- that would be a typical day of a junior program whereas with some of the adults maybe I would spend a little bit more time with the cooperative stuff just because they have a tendancy to have more of an appetite for that because they can conceptualize why the hard work of becoming a steadier player is going to pay off in the competitive format whereas the kids are just like 'bring it on.' Ian : Alright, let's finish up with just a couple minutes of suggestions for John and everybody else that is listening to today's show and let's give one or two suggestions for cooperative drills for the single's player and a couple for those of you listening who play mostly doubles. Because there is definitely some differences between the two and what skills should be cultivated. What's your number one drill or two drills you would suggest for a single's player that is cooperatively based? Andy : I like to do a live ball drill with a cross-court rally, with a volleyer and a groundstroker both in the deuce court-- the volleyer is slightly inside the service line, the baseliner is slightly behind the baseline, and they are just playing it out like a cross court rally and normally with one up and one back like that, you get a nice frequency of balls being hit. You get a volleyer that is working on a nice, consistent volley-- kind of like what I saw Brad Gilbert and Andre Agassi doing for several minutes at a time and just having that baseliner go right back to the volleyer every time and then maybe even have the volleyer move the ground stroke or around a little bit and have the volleyer be in the point position that this ground stroker has to hit this ball back to this volleyer. The volleyer is going to move the ground stroker around a little bit more and give that ground stroker a little bit of a workout. But the idea is to hit him a ball that he has to move for, but can definitely get for pretty easily and go like a minute or two at a time like that. It's a great workout, and it's a great consistency drill both for the volleyer and the groundstroker and it's not going to take anything away from your ability to distill or tweak that into an aggressive mode you are working on your wind, your foot-speed, you are working on your ability to, under all circumstances, but that ball back into the court which I think is something that players loose sight of, when all that they are trying to do is hit the ball by somebody. You can hit the ball by somebody and it can hit the fence in the air, and you've accomplished your goal! [laughter] But if your goal isn't a little bit more fine-tuned with respect to a spot in the court that is in play, then it's not doing you as much good. So that's a drill that I like a lot as far as [inaudible] and I think their are certain things that there is just no reason to reinvent the wheel-- cross court backhands, cross court forehands. Just up the line shots where one person hits the ball across court and one person hits the ball up the line and moving back and forth like that. But I think whatever puts you into a situation where you are generating a consistent rhythm and that drill, I think Ian, is critical because that rhythm is what's giving you that sense of 'I'm hitting the ball in the center of the strings every time. This feels good, I feel confident and I can hit this shot in my sleep.' And you get that level of confidence with one particular stroke, or if you're lucky enough to have it happen on both sides, then that will manifest itself by way of confidence that you can take into a competitive situation, then shift it into a more strategic utilization of those skills but if you're not working on it from the standpoint of generating rhythm first, I think you are putting the cart before the horse. Ian : Let's finish up-- give please one suggestion for those doubles players out there, people who play all doubles or mostly doubles, what would you suggest for a good cooperative drill for them? Andy : I love that drill that I was kind of describing earlier, that tracking drill with 2 up and 2 back, and the ground strokers have to stay back. And I know it's not necessarily the way that you would want to play, but I think if you watch pro doubles, you'll see that there are situations where these guys just aren't invited into the net. The situation has not presented itself and too often, at the 4.0 or 4.5 level, people will just come in behind anything. My wife, when she and I play mixed doubles, she'll hit a return of serve and she is coming right at a 5. 0 guy who has a shoulder high volley, and I know what's coming. I see the big smile on his face and I realize what he's going to do-- he doesn't even have to hit it hard.. Just any shot that will put her off balance and I think people have to realize that you can't just come into the net. So for 2 up and 2 back, and for those groundstrokers to just have to feel like they've got to learn to feel that they are patient and hit a good groundstroke and the volleyers to just say, OK, all we are here to do is defend the net. Not attack the net, we are here to defend the net and there is a lot to that. If you watch the top doubles players in the world, maybe one out of every 5 opportunities of a shot to put away comes along as opposed to the other 4 out of 5, I've got to put this one back deep into the court. Got to put this one over there. It's not a matter of always getting in there and taking the racket back like it's a machete, you're going to hack away at a volley. It's keeping your hands forward, it's moving to the proper position, it's as I said before, going to an area that is a high percentage area for your opponents to hit to, knowing where that is and why. And knowing based on where the ball is, who of the two of us, should be taking that ball and making sure that we are not both standing in the same area. A lot of that can be cleared up in this tracking drill, where you move side to side, and you cover the court. Just make sure that our goal is to not let anything through. And man, does that make you a nice, solid team that will be steady and hit a lot of balls back, and when the opportunity comes to move forward and close on a volley and put it away, your competitive instincts will, in all likelihood, will takeover and you'll know to do that. What you won't always know to do is to just tone it down a little bit and keep it in a steady mode where 'gosh if these guys are going to hit the ball this hard, this often, if we can make them hit 3 or 4 balls per point, we can beat this team and we don't have to incur much risk in doing so. Ian : Andy, thank you very much for being on the show and for talking about this topic with me. And John M. , I'm sure you've had your questions answered here today. If you have any follow up questions or anybody else listening, if you guys have any comments or questions, please feel free to email myself or post in the forums, and I can send those along to Andy as well. - But Andy, thanks very much for your time. You've been a great guest, I love having you on the show because it's very easy to tell by listening to you talk, that you have a love for the game and a passion for the sport. So thanks very much for spending the time with me and my listeners. Andy : It's always fun to be with you Ian, and you ask great questions so it makes it easy for me. So I look forward to reciprocating and having you come on in the Tennis Zone here in the next few weeks, so be sure and let your listeners know that we're going to do that and we'll definitely have some fun and it's always a good time, so whenever you need me, I'd love to come on with you. Ian : Awesome. I'll definitely let my listeners know when I'll be on your show and I appreciate that very much. And in the meantime, definitely check out Andy's show that is going to be starting in the next week, Andy's 3rd season will be starting up and you can check that out on... What's the website again? Andy : Well if you go to TennisZone1510.com you can get all the archived pod casts anytime and then milehighsports.com -- my show is from 10-noon on Sunday's and that is mountain time. So out on the east coast, it would be 12-2, milehighsports.com you go to listen to live and you can catch it live on the stream. Ian : Awesome. Andy, thanks again and I look forward to having you back on the show in the future. Andy : Thanks a lot Ian. [music] [music] [music] . Ian : That does it for today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast-- episode #104. Thank you very much for listening to today's show, I appreciate you downloading the file and supporting Essential Tennis in that way. Next up, I want to do a shout out to four very important people this past week that donated to Essential Tennis and some real nice donations this week and I really appreciate these people so much. First of all, Carl in Texas donated $120 to Essential Tennis -- Carl you are the man. I appreciate that so much. Also, Carlotta in New Jersey start a $5 a month subscription donation. Norman in California sent a $50 donation to Essential Tennis. And William in Missouri started a $10 a month subscription donation. So Carl, Carlotta, Norman and William, thank you to you four new donators this past week. I appreciate that so much and I want to let you guys know, I don't take these funds and go to Pizza Hut. [laughter] Or buy myself a new TV. This really go towards paying my hosting services and I have several monthly expenses that are associated with the website that control all kinds of different parts of the website and I am always trying to come up with new ideas as well, in fact this past week, I experimented with some new software that I just purchased that will allow me to do live video conferencing and do live video technique and also tactical and strategy analysis for memebers in the future. I'm working on that right now-- I just did a test run this last week with several members of the forums so these funds do really go to help improve the website. So thank you guys so much and if this podcast helped you improve your tennis game, please consider donating to Essential Tennis. Just go to essentialtennis.com and on the front page on the bottom, there is a link that says donate. Alright, that does it for this week. Thanks again everybody. Take care and good luck with your tennis. [music]

Podcast 105: What do you do when ‘Plan A’ doesn’t work in your singles play? How should lefties strategize for singles?

ianw — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 11:13:48 +0000

Today I answer two great questions having to do with singles strategy. The first question has to do with changing up your strategy once you realize that your A Game isn't cutting the mustard. Learn how to mix up your strategy and try something new during competition. Secondly I talk about the Wardlaw Directionals and using left hand dominance to be an advantage in singles play. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this Podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian : Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast, your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by ProTranscript.com. Thank you very much for joining me today, and before we get to today's questions that I'm going to be answering from listeners, I'd like to remind you guys about Essential Tennis Live. Essential Tennis Live is a live call-in show that myself and Ron Miller, from [inaudible] do together every week and that show airs live on Thursday nights at 8:30pm EST. Ron and I have a great time doing that show-- we talk about different topics having to do with tennis every week. We take calls from listeners and there is a live chat room. Check us out this week and you can do that by going to blogtalkradio.com/essentialtennis. Or go to essentialtennis.com slash live and hopefully Ron and myself will see you this week. Alright, let's go ahead and get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Alright, let's kick off today's show by talking about some singles strategy which I always enjoy talking about. And this question comes to us from James. James wrote to me and said 'Hi Ian, I thought of something that hopefully might make a good topic for the future-- I suppose it would fall under the title of strategy, putting together a plan A and a plan B. This is my dilemma. Having listened to your Podcasts, I have put together my own plan A in singles which is always as follows: serve and volley as much as I can. Generally try and hit to opponents backhands as much as I can. Wait until I hit a very good shot and then attack the net. Try and attack the net as soon as possible and especially against better opponents. I believe that this is a similar strategy to your own, and I feel puts my strengths, my volleys, against most of my opponents weaknesses-- their backhands. I love this strategy, but what I struggle with, is I don't really have a plan B. Plan A usually works well, although one of my opponents has incredibly good forehand passing shots, and a reasonable backhand so I have to make sure that I only attack the net on a very good approach shot deep to his backhand side. These opportunties are very limited so he usually ends up beating me around 6-2 in set play. Is this a case where a good plan B could make a difference? And if so, what would be a good strategy? From experience, I know that reverting to baseline to baseline rallies does not work for me as it is not one of my strengths. Grateful for any help that you can offer-- James' Really good question. I want to start off my answer by saying congratulations on being so aware and intentional about forming your plan A to begin with. You're very aware of your own strengths, you know exactly what you are good at. You know what you're not the best at and it sounds like you've really done a good job forming game plan around what you are most comfortable with and what you're best at. And everybody listening should really be taking notes on this, and paying attention to how well you formed your plan A. And congratulations on that because a lot of people don't even have a good plan A. So don't feel badly that you're struggling trying to find a plan B because you've done a great job up until now. That doesn't mean that we can't continue to improve, but I just want to tell you, keep up the good work on continue to play such close attention. Now, it sounds like this particular opponent that you're talking about even when you're playing your plan A strategy well, it sounds like they are a good half level above you. It sounds like this person is really pressuring you and you're being smart about it. You aren't just coming in off of which is what you have to do. Unfortunately as you play better and better players, this net rushing strategy is only going to work so well because they are going to have more and more of an offensive reply to whatever you are coming into the net on. So you do have to be careful. It does sound like you are being reasonable about this. I mean on one hand, you do want to stick with your strengths against this player but on the other hand, you can't just run in off of any old shot or else he is going to pass you easily. So it sounds like you've tried different things but nothing is realy working and I'm basically going to split this up into two sections-- I'm going to give you two suggestions of other plan B's that you can maybe try. And then I'm going to tell you what I think the real answer is. So I will give you a couple of suggestions which you asked for, but the long term solution to this is going to be a little bit different from having a different plan B, which is what I think you think is the answer is going to be to your question. So first of all, plan B suggestions from me, using what you have right now and going out and trying to beat this player, you've already tried to modify your plan A which I think is probably the smartest plan B, which is to continue to try to attack that backhand and only come into the net when you know you have a good opportunity and not just run in off of anything-- that's your current plan B. I think that's a pretty good plan personally. It hasn't worked so well so far, and we're going to get into what you are going to have to change to make it work better in the future in a little bit. If you want to go out and play him today and try something a little bit different, I've got two other suggestions. First of all, you could stay back on the baseline and push. And nobody seems to respect the pusher but you could just stay back on the baseline and just be steady and consistent and wait for him to make the error. I know this isn't very exciting, and I know it's not your strength-- I know staying back at the baseline is not what you are good at, but I'm not suggesting that you stay back there and play aggressively or offensively, what I'm suggesting is that you sit back there and just be steady and consistent-- literally just aim for the middle of the court, over on his side of the court and just put it back into play. Try to get him impatient. Try to get him to make a couple of errors, you could still slip in sneaking up to the net and catch him off guard. And kind of confuse him and make him not sure about what kind of game plan you are trying to use exactly. But this could be a different look that you could give him and I'm guessing this is something you haven't tried yet because his ground strokes are his strengths and they are not yours, so I'm guessing you probably haven't tried this. But you could give it a shot and see how it works, at least for 3 or 4 games. And just see what happens. If he ends up dictating every point and he just crushes you, then we'll know it's not working. But at least it is something else that you could try. My second suggestion for plan B would be to stay back and hit short on purpose and bring him up to the net. You didn't say anything about his volleys at all, and I'm wondering if he has the ability to hit volleys or overheads. You might want to think about staying back, hitting a drop shot or not necessarily a drop shot, but just something low and short that's going to force him to come forwards and see if he likes to volley or not. See if he likes overheads. A lot of times baseliners have terrible overheads, so you could hit him a short ball, kind of get him to sneak forwards, get him close to the net, and then just hit the ball up in the air and see if he knows how to hit overheads. You didn't say anything about his net skills, so I'd like to see you test that out and see if he is competent up at the net-- you might want to think about doing that. Now, let's go back to what I think is the real answer, the real long term solution to this problem, which is playing against this opponent. And I want to highlight something that you said in your question, which was, 'I have to make sure that I only attack the net on very good approaches deep to his backhand. These opportunities are very limited, so he usually ends up beating me around 6-2.' This is really the big problem here, is that you only have limited opportunities to approach the net. Now at some point, you are going to have to increase the level of your ground strokes. You are not going to be able to move up a half a level from where you are now-- let's say you are 3.5 right now. You're not going to be able to every beat-- well I'm not going to say ever, that would be dumb. But you're never going to consistently beat 4.0 players until you do raise the level of your ground strokes because you pointed out the problem here, you love the net, you love to volley, but you're not going to be very successful unless you put your opponents at least a little bit off balance first, before you come forwards. Otherwise, like this person you are talking about are going to pass you pretty easily. There is just no way around this. So as you play better and better opponents, you must have a way of making them uncomfortable before you come into the net. It's not that you're going to have to give up your net play, and your plan A or your A strategy of getting to the net and using your volleys. It's not that you're going to have to give that up, you just can't get away with coming to the net after hitting an average shot. So just being steady from the baseline, is not going to be enough against these players. And coming into the net off an average shot, isn't going to be enough either, so the long term solution to your problem here James, is that you are going to have to develop a weapon from the baseline. You are going to have to be able to pressure this player consistently if you want to beat him consistently. He's a half a level above you now, and so you're going to have to bring the level of your ground strokes up. Now, if you have any questions specifically about raising the level of your ground strokes, I'd be happy to help you. I'm not going to get into that now since I've answered your question. And I want to get to other questions today. But that's my answer to your question, is that you're going to have to come up with better ground strokes and that means hitting with top spin, that means swinging aggressively over and over again-- not on every shot, but when you have your opportunities, and that means it's hacking at a backhand and doing it over and over again with an aggressive shot. Then you'll be able to come forwards and continue to be successful with your volley game. But until you do that, you're going to be falling back on plan B's that are basically going to be hoping that he screws up. And that's only going to get you so far. So James, hopefully that answers your question. Thank you very much for the great question, and again, keep up the great work. You're really doing a good job. I'm happy that you are paying such close attention to the game, keep it up and feel free to write me again if you'd like some tips on how to make your ground strokes more aggressive in general. [music] [music] [music] Next up, I just want to do a quick shout out to two very important people this past week. Two people donated to the Essential Tennis Podcast this last week, and I really appreciate that so much. First off, we've got Andrew K in California, who donated $25 to Essential Tennis-- thank you Andrew. Also, John M in beautiful Alpina, Michigan, which is in the north eastern corner of Michigan, I've been there before and it's a pretty part of the country. Real close to the Macane bridge. Anyways, John M donated $60 from Alpina, Michigan-- thank you John very much. So John and Andrew were my two donators from last week. I appreciate you guys very much and if the Essential Tennis Podcast has helped your tennis game, and you appreciate that, please send me a donation and help support the Podcast and the website. Just go to essentialtennis. Com and on the front page on the bottom right, there is a button that says donate. Thank you Andrew and John. [music] [music] [music] - Next up is a question from Bruce that also has to do with singles strategy. He wrote to me and said, 'I'm a 3.5 player, playing in a USTA league-- suppose I'm in a rally and neither side has a particular advantage, what are some strategies for gaining an advantage on my opponent and hopefully winning the point? I'm a lefty and I'd like to use this to my advantage if possible.' You bet Bruce. I happen to be left handed as well and have definitely won many matches by using my left handedness to my advantage and it's something that is definately fun to do as a lefty. There is not a lot of left handed tennis players out there-- I mean there certainly out there, but compared to rightys, it's just something you are usually not used to when you play a lefty. Not many people practice with lefties. So it's something that's often times difficult-- so that's definitely an advantage for you. Now, I have three different things here in my outline that I think are going to be the biggest things for you to focus on when it comes to gaining the advantage in a singles point. And I'm going to go through them one by one, only one of them really has to do with being a lefty specifically, so the first two apply to all of you listening. The third one is going to be especially for you lefties out there to give you some ideas of what you can do as a left handed player to really gain an advantage throughout a match. Now, my first of three things that I want you to concentrate on is the use of the directionals. And if you're not familiar with the directionals, I'm going to talk about that for a couple minutes right now. They were made popular by Paul Wardlaw and are typically referred to as the Wardlaw directionals. And basically it's a set of rules or guidelines for playing a point that states when you are in a baseline rally, back and forth with an opponent, and you get an outside shot, you should go cross court. When you receive an inside shot, you have the opportunity to more safely go down the line. Now let me explain inside and outside shot. An outside ball is one that is traveling away from you and is towards the outside of the court. So as an example, if you are right-handed player, since I know most of my listeners are righty. I'm sure you are used to switching things over as I am, over to a right-handed example. But if you guys are a right handed player, and your opponent has struck one of their forehands cross court over to your forehand, and it's traveling at an angle away from you, away from the center of the court and out towards your forward side, that's an outside shot-- it's traveling away from you and it's going farther and farther away from you. It's an outside ball, it's going to the outside of the court. An inside ball is a ball that is traveling towards you and it's coming in towards you. An example of that would be if your opponent strikes a backhand, if they are right handed and they hit a backhand on the ad half of the court, over on their side of the court, and the ball is coming towards you-- let's say you are standing right in the middle of the baseline, and they hit a shot from their backhand side that's coming towards your forehand. So, it was basically a down the line shot but it was angling in towards your body.. That's an opportunity where you can start to hit down the line. Really the most common way that you'll see an inside forehand is if you're running around your backhand to hit an inside out forehand. And so, for you rightys out there, that means you are shifting to your left a little bit-- you are on the ad half of the court which is your backhand side, but hitting a forehand. That's often times an opportunity for you to go down the line. Let's say your opponent just hit a backhand cross court over to your backhand side, but you run around it to hit a forehand instead and the ball is coming in towards your body , it's angling in towards your forehand, towards your right side of your body, that would be an inside forehand. At that point in time, you have the opportunity to more safely go down the line, or you can go back cross court and hit the ball inside out. Going down the line would be called inside-in off that particular shot. Hopefully I haven't lost you guys. Hopefully I haven't confused you guys there-- I'm trying to explain the difference between inside and outside shots and hopefully make it clear for you guys. If you don't understand that, I've got a video-- if you guys go to EssentialTennis.com/video, I've got a video where I talk about the directionals. Anyway, you want to use the directionals Bruce. That's probably the number one thing to understand and you're usually going to get mostly outside shots which means you should be usually hitting mostly cross court. And cross court is the way to go for several reasons. The court is the longest when you hit cross court, from corner to corner, you've got more space to hit to. The net is lowest when you hit across the center of it-- it's 6" lower in the middle than it is out at the nut posts. And also, when you strike an outside ball cross court, you are hitting it back where it came from which is usually a little bit easier to time as opposed to the ball coming across your body, traveling away from you and trying to time your string to push it down the line without it trailing farther off to the side and going wide. Not only that, but you've got the higher net and the shorter court when you go down the line off an outside ball. So, those are the three main reasons why cross court is usually the smarter play. And often, times you guys will see professional players, in a cross court rally, kind of feeling themselves out and they'll hit 4, 6, 8 shots back and forth to each other cross court. And players who don't understand the directionals, often times will say 'why are they hitting back to each other? They keep hitting back to the same place.' And it's because neither player wants to take that risk of going down the line with an outside shot. It's not that the pros will never try it, when they have an easy enough shot and they can kind of warrant the risk of going down the line, with an outside shot, they'll go for it. But, for amateur players, I stress to them to stick with that pattern. So, that's number one-- be aware of that and even if maybe it's your weakness and you're hitting towards your opponents strength, be patient and keep it cross court most of the time. Now that brings me to point number 2-- be patient. Once you understand the directionals and you start to see how they can work for you and once it starts making sense to you, why certain shots should go certain directions, it's really important especially at your level, to just be patient, stay in the point, keep the rally going and try to work your opponent and you said here that we're assuming that neither side has much of an advantage and this is really where you want to minimize your errors and minimize your mistakes and stay steady, stay relaxed. Don't panic, don't try anything fancy and just play the high percentage directions and the high percentage shots. And that's how you are going to win the majority of your points at a 3.5 level. Most points end at a 3.5 level with an error-- with somebody just messing up for no good reason. And so, if you can know the directional, and know which direction is safest and smartest, and if you can be patient and steady, and not get all crazy and start going for incredible shots and trying to hit winners, that's really how you're going to be the most successful. Now, eventually you're going to want to develop some weapons and I talked about that in my first question today. But you really want to have a good solid core and foundation of being steady first and understanding basic tactics and basic strategy like the use of the directionals. So those are my first two suggestions to you Bruce-- first of all, use directionals. Second, be patient, be steady. And now number three, this is going to be for you leftys out there. Bruce, you need to work that backhand-- your opponent's backhand. You need to hammer that backhand over and over again. And this is where the directionals are a beautiful thing for a left-handed player. Let me describe to you how I play 95% of my singles points. My forehand, and hopefully your forehand is your strength like mine, so this benefits you the most, but my forehand is by far my stronger side from the baseline and usually the opponents that I play, they are right handed and their backhand is their weaker side. And sticking with the directionals, that works out great for a left handed player because when I take my forehand and I hit it cross court, it's going to my opponents weakness. It's going to their backhand, it's going to their weaker side. So, most forehands that I receive, I hit cross court and my opponent knows that after the 2nd or 3rd game, they know that I'm hitting over 90% of my forehands cross court and I'm going to continue to pressure that backhand over and over again. Now, inevitably, they are going to start trying to hit that backhand down the line because they want to try to get it to my weaker side, to my backhand. And this is where I have the opportunity to run around my backhand and continue to hit forehands and that's where often times, I'll get an inside forehand and I'll be able to continue to pressure that backhand shot, or I have the opportunity to go inside out and hit it away from my opponent where they were just on the ad side, hitting their weak backhand. If I'm able to run around my backhand and hit a forehand, I can either continue to pressure their backhand, or I can go inside out and get them on the run. Basically, I'm trying to dictate these points using my forehand as often as possible because the more forehands I hit, the easier it is for me to keep it to their backhand side. And this is such a huge advantage and I love it. Against a player who is my equal of maybe a little less strong than I am, it's just so much fun to just dictate point after point using my forehand. And I've definitely played sets where I've hit backhands. I just hit as many forehands as possible and they all go towards my opponents backhand side. And again, I don't care if they know my strategy or not-- they are going to know right out of the gate that they are going to have to use their weakest shot and they are going to have to hit it all day long. Now, if they are stronger than me or even with me, it's very possible that they'll play this strategy right back at me and they are looking for forehands to hit to my backhand. And so it's kind of a battle of who can dictate these points first using their stronger side. And it becoes a really interesting tactical battle. So that's for all of you lefties out there and some thoughts on how to dictate points, how to use your strength and pin it against your opponents weakness as often as possible and just do it over and over again. Also with your serve-- last thing I'm going to mention here, the lefty tactics for singles players, Bruce your serve, your left handed serve, naturally goes from left to right. If you have any slice or any spin on your serve at all, it's traveling from your left to your right and from your opponents point of view, it's from their right to their left, which means that your serve will naturally trail towards their backhand side. And that's another great advantage that us lefties have, to be able to get the ball to our opponents weaker side as often as possible that can start off the points in an advantageous way for us for sure and just keep hammering that backhand. So anyway, Bruce this kind of seems simple but it takes some practice, it takes concentration and it takes some repetition to really see these patterns and be able to play them over and over again. - Please write me back and let me know if you have any follow up on this but again, the three main points were-- use the directionals, outside shots should go cross court, be patient and be steady. Remember that most points are going to end with a mistake and find that backhand as a lefty and make them hit as many backhands as possible. If you follow those three guidelines, I guarantee you are going to win more points. Well, Bruce thanks very much for your great question. Again write me back if you have any follow up, but good luck with your singles points and good luck in your league play this coming season. [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for this weeks show-- Essential Tennis Podcast episode #105. Thank you very much for joining me today and if you have questions that you would like me to answer on the Podcast, feel free to send me an email at Ian@essentialtennis.com or if you go to essentialtennis.com and click on Podcasts, on the Podcast page, there is a button that says 'ask a question' and that will take you to a little form to fill out and you can ask a question and submit it that way as well. Well, I hope you guys all have a great week. I hope you get out and play some tennis and here where I'm living, that's not possible yet, at least not outside, but hopefully where you are, you get a chance to play this week and put to use some of the things that we talked about this week about singles strategy. Thanks guys. Have a great week. Take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast 106: Should you really be copying what the pros do on TV? Today my guest is Andy Zodin. We talk about the windshield wiper forehand and western grip, are they for you?

ianw — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 11:20:26 +0000

My guest today is Andy Zodin of the "In The Zone" tennis radio show/podcast. Together we tackle two specific techniques which are typically linked to the modern game and discuss weather or not you should be considering them for your own game. Techniques discussed are the windshield wiper follow through and full western grip. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann : Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert, tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by ProTranscript.com. Well today's episode of the Podcast is going to be a re-run. I'm going to chose one of the most popular podcast episodes that I've done, and that is my first interview with Andy Zodan and this was originally aired as Podcast #88. The reason why I'm doing this is my wife went into labour two days ago on the 20th, at about 8pm or 9pm and she gave birth to our first child on Sunday the 21st around 5am EST. So needless to say, I'm a little busy. And my wife and daughter are still at the hospital-- she needed me to come home to grab a couple extra things for her. They are both doing great and I'm really proud of my wife and I'll be heading back to the hospital in a couple or minutes. But I haven't missed a Monday in two years so I'm happy she needed me to come home to get some stuff so I could re-release episode #88 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. So, with that, we'll go ahead and get to the show. Thank you guys for your understanding in me re-releasing this show, but it's really a great conversation. Several of you guys I'm sure probably haven't heard it before. You definitely need to check out the archives at essentialtennis.com/podcasts-- there is so much good content there. Alright, let's go ahead and get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] My guest today on the Essential Tennis Podcast is Andy Zodan-- Andy, welcome to the show. Andy : Great to be here, Ian. Thanks for having me. Ian : You bet. It's great to have you here. Andy is the host of In the Tennis Zone, which is a local tennis radio show in Colorado. Andy also takes the audio from that show and puts it on iTunes as a podcast. I definitely recommend that all of you listening go check out the podcast on iTunes, even if you're not in the Colorado area. Andy has lots of excellent guests that he gets on his show. Some of the names that he's had recently are: Rod Laver, Brad Gilbert, Billy Jean Keen, Justin Gimmelstob--just to name a few. He's got a lot of podcast archives with interviews with tennis greats such as those. A really enjoyable show you put on, Andy. Why don't you tell us a little about what you're doing in tennis while that show is running. Tell us about your teaching background. Tell us a little bit about what you're doing in tennis. Andy : I am basically the director of tennis at a country club here in Denver. I do coach high school tennis as well. Work with a lot of high performance juniors. I grew up--my tennis career started in Texas in the early '70s taking lessons in Dallas. My first doubles partner was a guy named Craig Carden, who actually became a serious tour coach himself in the likes of Martina Navapalova, and Lindsay Davenport. Was coaching players that went to the semi-finals or better at Wilmbledon a number of times. I was just lucky to be in a group of kids that all grew up to take tennis seriously. I played at the University of Texas, and began my coaching career in the early '80s in TX. Then moved to CO in 2001. So I've been coaching here ever since. I started doing the radio show here a couple of years ago, and had kind of spun that off of-- having been a journalist; I did a lot of tennis writing. I've been a coach, I've obviously continued playing as well. Now I've enjoyed doing radio, and as you say, I've been fortunate to be able to --through some great contacts in the sort--get some really high profile guests on the Tennis Zone. It's been a terrific experience. Ian : That's really cool. You're the perfect guest for the Essential Tennis podcast, because the listeners of this show are--I typically describe them as 'crazy.' [laughter] Andy : That's perfect! Ian : Yeah. [laughter] They just have a passion for the game, and it's easy to hear by listening to you talking, and talking about your experiences in tennis, that you're obviously a 'lifer.' This is something you've been doing for your entire life. You love it. As you keep going, you kind of take on more and more and get more into the sport. And into teaching and coaching. It's great to have you on the show. You're a perfect fit for us. Andy : Well, I appreciate it. And I think like yourself, Ian--I think we all realize that as local tennis pros, and guys that aren't out on the tour and big names on TV, that it's important on a local level for us to continue to generate excitement and enthusiasm for the sport. We went through a period of time where the sport kind of flattened out and was a little bit stagnant with respect to growth. I think if people like yourself, and some of the things that I'm doing --and obviously we're not the only two. There are a lot of guys around the country that are helping with this effort. But if we don't get in the trenches and try to make sure we keep tennis in the forefront of people's minds, then we are certainly competing with a lot of other sports, a lot of other interests, and we're going to maintain a good growth level, these are the things we're going to have to do. So thanks to you for what you're doing as well. Obviously taking the time that you're taking to put on this show is a fantastic effort on your part. Ian : Thank you. Yeah, I'm doing my best, and I agree. With many of us working at grassroots type efforts like this to build enthusiasm for the sport, I think it can continue to grow. You're right. There's so much competition out there with other sports. Especially for young kids these days. It's tough to get them to stick with tennis, but I think stuff like this can help. Andy : Absolutely. Ian : Speaking of the modern game and how it's grown recently and really advanced at the professional level--and I guess at the amateur level as well-- as far as how people are perceiving the style of play. The style of play certainly has changed over the last 20 yrs. or so. What Andy and I are going to be talking about today --and I'm curious to pick Andy's brain about 4 specific topics having to do with the modern game. He and I are going to talk about a couple of specific elements that are usually associated with the modern game, and how it's played over the last 10-15 years. And we're going to talk about whether or not these things are necessarily good for the average recreational type player to copy. When we watch the pros on TV, the game is so fast these days. So powerful. So strong. We're going to talk about a couple of those elements and whether or not we feel it's good for you guys to be copying this. Both of us have a lot of teaching experience, and I'm curious to see how we line up as far as our opinions on these topics, Andy. But let's kick things off with the extreme grips. Specifically on the forehand side, the full Western grip, and maybe even semi-Western. I'm curious what your thoughts are on-- And let's keep things around maybe 3, 4, 5 level. You're avg. level club player. Do you feel like copying the pros, and what grips they're using in the modern game, is a good thing for this level player? Andy : Well, I think it can be, but I don't think it needs to be forced. I'm definitely considered by people that know me, to be a very conservative old school guy. With that said, I certainly won't prevent a young player from being able to ascend to the higher levels of the game. I've coached a lot of kids that are playing Division 1 college tennis, and some that have gone into professional ranks and done pretty well. I'm not averse to that, but I think what you have to be careful with is forcing extreme grips and extreme swings on any player. Here's my philosophy. When I started playing tennis, back in the early '70s, you could teach the average to slightly above average athlete to emulate the games being played by the top players in the world. You could teach an 11-year old like me how to slice the ball on a back-hand side like Ken Roswall. You could teach kids how to go through the ball with a long finish, and a long time spent in the hitting zone with the racket head lining up to the target like Jimmy Connors on his backhand. Because there was a lot of margin for error in those swings. If your timing wasn't impeccable, you could still come up with a decent shot. I think nowadays , if you try to teach a young kid to take a swing at the forehand like a Raphael Nadal, or you try to teach a little girl how to do what Serena or Venus Williams are doing, I think you're asking people to bite off a little more than they might be able to chew. I think there's nothing wrong, especially when you consider the technology that we have now. To teach players to swing at the ball similarly to the way Chris Howard did. Similarly to the way Rod Laver did and some of the guys in the old days. You couple of that type of the fundamental some of these with today's technology and you're still able to play a very strong, very reliable game that probably had the tendency to keep you little more injury free than what I'm seeing kids try to do this days. I see a lot of pros that are taking kids from the age of 6, 7, 8 years old and teaching them that real severe over the shoulder finish with that extreme forehand grip and I think it's kind of an all or nothing proposition. I think you got kids and adults that have problems dealing with low balls. I think you have a problem converting over to the ability to play the net with those extreme forehand grips. I think you obviously have you move the grip over very short lead to learn how hit a proper serve and I just think that there's a lot to be done exactly right to be able to master using that grip. And so if the kid comes out and he holds that racket in semi- Western or Western grip and he's hitting the ball clean and his hitting the hit consistently able to hit targets. Nothing hurts at the end of the session. Now might say maybe this kid is a natural for using this grip, but to go out into absolutely taking a grip of take a group of tennis club kids in a campus and, "Okay, we're going to hit extreme Western forehand grips." I think that's were some mistakes are being and I think it's being taken too for granted which is just, because the top players of the world are doing this right now, but that means it's design for everybody to play that way. Think there needs to be a little bit more of the separation they still act like a good girl to has to whether or no to teach that person to play game it's eventually design to be played on a tour versus a goddess designed to be a good 455 of player for the rest of his life. Ian : Lot's of good stuff in there Andy and I agree. I definitely see pros who take both extremes. I've seen pros who you use the term 'old school. ' I've seen pros who are very old school and kind of are still grasping on to their thoughts of how the game used to be played in very classic, and that can be good for some students. But I agree with you that I think where pros really gets themselves in trouble and get their students in the trouble is when they take one style of play or one way to swing the racket and they make everyone of their students do at the same way. Whether it happens to be really old school or really modern or something in between there or whatever. I think you're right. Different people have different bodies. They have different athletic abilities and so--just like we see on tour. Different types of games. Different types of swings. There's certainly similarities, but even among the recreation of players it's not cut and dry. Everybody's got different amounts of talents, and their body works in different ways from other players. So I'm curious. Have you ever actually instructed a student to go to a full Western. Something that's extremes as an actual full Western? Andy: I would say probably not. What I would say I have probably done is I have allowed them to keep it. If it was something that was already working for them, then I would say-- For instance, it was a kid that I'm working with now who's just about to turn 15. He's 14 years old and top hundred player in the country in the 14s. A very good high school player now. When he was 8 or 9 years old and he had that full Western grip, I didn't bother missing with it, because so many of the balls that he was hitting were like my height or higher. So he really almost had the grip to the racket that way and people said to me, 'Well eventually he's going to have to do this that the other,' and I said, 'Well eventually we will.' When he grows. But what I was more concerned with at the time was that he was learning how to win. And to me that's a skill that--when it can be grasped, you let the kid grasp it. Once they've learned how to win. One they have programmed their mind on what to do in a certain situation. To me that's like internal problem solving. That's a skill beyond the tennis court. So that's a lot of kids doing well in the 10 and unders, and the 12 and unders land earning how to win, game changes can then readily be made based on the fact that it is 8, 9, 10 year old kid. This kid has established a lot of confidence in himself to be able to get the job done however need be. Now he turns 11, 12, 13 years old. We starts sending him off to [unknown] Academy for the weekend and doing some high performance training at certain USTA national campus where they can really spend the amount of time necessary . For me to see the kid an hour or two or three a week doesn't allow for me to make a grip change like it does for him to go to voluntaries and spend 6 -8 hours a day on the tennis court for a week straight. And then he comes home a week later with a slightly different forehand, one that I've would have converting him over to anyway. And now his forehand is going to be able to take him to whatever level his game is able to take him. I mean I certainly expect for this kid barring any unforeseen health situations or what have you injuries, could be able to be a scholarship Division 1 level player. And we change that to the game incrementally. I allowed that what that extreme Western grip, but I also knew that the kid had phenomenal hands and was going to be a terrific volleyer, and I didn't want anything to happen to prevent that. So I was hoping that we would move that grip over a little bit to be able to do a little bit more with it. A little bit variety. And that was exactly how was involved. It takes a lot of different sources to be able to build a player's game these days. I don't put it all upon myself and I don't think any pro should. I think if you got all the resources that to have all sort of contributes to the development of a player. I think that's all part of the modern game as well, is realizing that one pro doesn't necessarily have all the answers and I would certainly be the first to admit that I don't. Ian : Alright, good stuff Andy. Let's go ahead and move on to our second topic, which has to do with different forehand follow throughs. The 2 most popular recently have been the windshield wiper follow through and the reverse follow through. Reverse follow through being the one that Nadal has kind of really made popular finishing on the same side of his body, and windshield wiper finishing on the opposite side of the body, but low down by the hip. Just to give our listeners some guidance there in case you are not exactly sure what I am talking about. But what is your opinion on those 2 techniques and how they relate to the recreational player? Andy: I think it's something hat you have to be real careful with, because one of the things that those 2 swings do not promote is an extended follow through towards the target. And again, as we discussed a little bit earlier, I think that margin for error in your game is something that you need to have if you're not an exceptionally supremely gifted player. And when I say exceptionally extremely gifted, player. I mean, if you're not maybe the better sectional ranked player, but normally they are nationally might as well. You want to give your self good margin for error. If you're not out on the tennis 4 or 5 hours a day every day, you want to make sure that you are coming through that hitting zone and giving yourself an extended finish towards your target. So to me--let's start with the windshield wiper finish coming across the body. I think if that happens too prematurely, and if a player that comes off that ball a little bit too early. You're going to have a lot of shank and frame balls as opposed to allowing your racket head to go through the hitting zone and letting that swing evolve into something that eventually finishes back around to the other side through racket head speed that's generated to through the confidence of getting better and better and more and more experience. I think a lot of times crossing nowadays seem do want to put the cart before the horse a little bit and they immediately want people to cover your finish over the shoulder. A little bit that the opposite hit like you were describing, and I don't think that it promotes the racket spending enough time in the hitting zone to give yourself that margin for error to follow through towards your target. If you're giving yourself the extra length going forward through the swing, I feel like if you just a little slightly off with your timing you can still have a good result, because the racket is traveling in the proper direction that it needs to go to create another proper direction with that shot. If you're not absolutely perfect with the timing of the strike point when you're coming up over the shoulder or over the head or with a reverse follow through like Nadal, then you're going to just have a lot of missed hits. And it's really tough to develop any sense of confidence, because you just don't have a lot of consistency and reliability. To me, the essence of this sport the way in the way it was originally designed to be played was it learn how to maintain a rally. You don't have to keep the ball until you don't know how to hit all back and forth with somebody consistently, and then once you master that skill, then you go to adding the bells and whistles. Adding the weapons. I think nowadays with the modern game we go right to the weapons and skip to the whole step of the ability to just hit a nice clean ball back and forth. Maintain a rally 10, 12, 14, 16, 20 times. And I think that's where we're missing a lot in the development about players. That's why I think in this country to a large extent, people scratching our heads as to why are the Americans falling behind with respect to the development of our players. I think we're going for too much too early with such an immediate gratification type of society, and I think that shows up in our game styles with our tennis players. Ian : Yes, it's a very interesting to actually make a social connection there between how people are so infatuated with the power of game being able to hit the ball fast and hard and with the lot of top spin, and actually making that connection with kind of with our society i s like here in America. You're talking about immediate gratification etc. And all of us grow up playing on fast hard courts, whereas, over in Europe there's a lot of clay court play and people have to learn how to develop points and actually get into a rally and be patient. And such a lack of patience here and I feel like--especially the players who are out there out there... I deal, because of my website, I deal with a lot of players who don't have the money for instruction, and they're looking for guidance in how to hit the ball and how to improve their game. And so much with the instruction out there on the internet is: Learn how Roger Federer hits his forehand or How Andy Roddick hits the serve and it's all of this extremely advanced theory and technique. And we're talking about 3.0 beginner level of players who are reading and buying this and trying to implement it. And buying the cart before the horse. I think that’s a good way of describing it. You used that phrase earlier, Andy. I think so many recreational players and beginner players, they are seeing what's happening on TV, and so many people without a lot of experience figure. 'Well look at that. They're not making to look that difficult, it can't be that tough. And they go out and try to actually copy what they are seeing--and at that it can be really frustrating for the player and really frustrating for the pros as well when they come in and try to change those misperceptions that that is how there are supposed to be swinging. Andy: Well, that's it. There's an old saying 'Sex sells.' And Roger Federer's forehand is sexy. So is Andy Roddick serve, right? So when you look at it from that stand point, if you want to sell something, whether what they need or what they want or what's realistic for them, a lot of times people don't care. I mean they just say, 'Hey, listen, People are going to see a picture of Andy Roddick serving.' That's going to gravitate toward it. They are going to see one of best backhands in the world. Or they're going to see Serena Williams take this ball out of the air from three quarters to even a court with this swing and volley thing. This is what people need to try to emulate. The fact of the matter is probably I would say 75% of all the people that are playing tennis in this country will never in their wildest dreams hit a tennis ball like that. Ian : Right. Andy: Now with that said, I think there are certain things that I think can be taken from some of the best players of all time that I think are universally applicable to the average club player or even sharply better. Watch Andre Agassi line at the hit of forehand and the way he uses his left are and he extends that almost at any--let's say 45 degree angle across his body. That's something that you can teach any player to do no matter how they grip the racket on their forehand side and it's going to have give them a better forehand. And that's something that you can look at and study in the pro game. You can say, 'What is it that makes it such a different for Agassi to do that?' Well, you're creating a distance between your body and the ball that is going to give you a consistent contact point #1. You are going to give yourself better balance just like getting that left arm. If you watch somebody on a surfboard that kind of looks the way Agassi did when he lined up to hit his forehand, and you're going to have just great alignment. One of the subjects that I know we're going to talk about was the open stance. If you're going to have an open stance, that doesn't mean that your stance was open to the waist up. It's open from the waist down. But you have still got to turn your upper body to align yourself properly. So if you wanted to look at Raphael Nadal's finish on his forehand, that may not be necessarily something that you want to copy unless you're supremely talented. But I don't care if you're a 2.5 player or 5.0 player. You're going to do what Agassi did in lining up a forehand, because I think that's one of those fundamentals that is truly a fundamental, and not just a press release and trying to emulate one of the top players of all time. Ian : So I've got a question for you then. I like for you describing the difference between something that every pro does and every good solid upper level player has done for decades and decades--such as good rotation with the upper body as you're describing with Agassi-- as opposed to some of the more modern things that only extremely, extremely talented athletes are doing. How do we tell and how do our listeners know the difference between something that is--and this is why I called my website Essential Tennis, because this is kind of my teaching style, is I find what's fundamental and what has to be done in order to be a solid player, and I start with that. As opposed to the more flashy upper level type stuff that see on TV. But how can listeners know what to work on that's solid? What fundamental? What's essential? And what is beyond their grasp? If not for the future, at least definitely starting off. How can our listeners tell the difference between those two things? Andy: Well, I think it's definitely a very fine line. And a guy that lives here Denver by the name of John Vincent, who was a phenomenal tennis coach and tennis player in his own right, used to say, 'There's a very fine line between fundamentals and preferences.' And a lot of tennis pros try to take their preferences and impose those as fundamentals, when they're not necessarily the case. I think when it comes down to it, you want to consult a pro locally. And you want to sort of throw a couple of different options on the table and see what they have to say. I think as far as some of the basic fundamentals that you would be able to get your listeners to really be able to gravitate toward and be able to really trust and believe in, obviously working on your balance. On your feet. A lot of times you got people who you'll see them swing in the air and somehow or other, all their weight is on their back foot. They've lifted their left leg to hit that forehand. One of best tips to that I ever got in my golf game and that I've been able to teach my tennis players it that: Even and equal weight distribution between my two feet. When of course I had time to get that. And I think when you're talking about 3.0 and 3. 5 players, a lot of times the pace to the ball that they hit allows people to take the time and use the proper footwork to get their feet and to get their balance proper. I think that has a lot to do with hitting the ball well. A lot of times a guy will come to me and say, 'I can't hit the backhand.' And I look at his footwork and I can see nothing happening a lot of times. Well, I'll see improper steps. Stepping with the wrong foot. Finishing with the wrong foot. And if they just get their footwork cleaned up and then sink with their swing releases--all of the sudden it's not that they had a bad swing. It's just that the footwork that went into lining up that ball was improper. Let's say they are a right-handed player and they are moving to their left to hit the backhand and the final step which they take to that backhand is a left footed step to the ball, and they end up opening up their stance drastically. Obviously that's not going to necessarily be something that's going to give them proper balance and allot them with the court. If we can just say, 'Okay we'll need to just make sure that with that last step taken to the ball is a right footstep. Bring it to the ball and hold still.' You'll clean up your alignment and probably a lot more accurate and still be able to generate plenty of power--certainly with the technology of the rackets these days. That's what they are designed to do. I think obviously making sure that you are quick on your feet and that you're making lots of short little steps. I don't like little dance steps as opposed to these big Frankenstein long steps to the ball. That's going to be something that's going to help any player out there. As far as the serve is concerned, make sure that you're standing up real nice and straight, and after you release your toss you continue it to let your toss are extend. I call it a toss and stretch. Your know, you see the sort of people who toss the ball up and then their arm just immediately drops. Their body sort of jack knifes forward. They bend at the waist for a little bit. Wonder why every serve was going into the net. There's a reason for that. There's no proper posture, so There are certain things that when I think about all the different lessons that I gave to all the different levels of players, that no matter who I'm with, they're just certain things that I think that I said before are sort of universally applicable: footwork, balance, posture. Those kinds of things. Making sure that you're stepping into the ball with the proper foot. I'm still an old school guy that--I'm anti- open stance, but I think if you've got time to close your stance and step to the ball with the foot furthest from the ball, you are always going to be able to bring a little bit more body power and strength to the shot ,and you also going to have better alignment in hitting the shot. If you don't have time you've going to go open stance and you do it properly. Obviously with the pace of the ball make hit these days there's no way around that. But I don't think you want to necessarily always have an open stance shot even when you have time to close that stance. Ian : Well, Andy, in typical Essential Tennis Podcast fashion , we've only got to half of the topics that we were hoping to, Andy: Sorry to be a long-winded. I apologize. Ian : No. This happens virtually every show. When I outline a show for myself, or when I have a guest, almost to always we don't get to as much as we hoped to. But what we did get to, I think will be extremely helpful, and in closing just for the two topics that we did go over. The full Western or the semi Western grips. The different forehand follow-throughs. I'm going to ask you at one at a time if you feel they are preference or fundamental,. Just to wrap up. So full Western grip. Is that preference or is that fundamental? Andy: Absolutely a preference. Ian : And windshield wiper follow through or reverse. Follow through on the forehand side. Is that a preference or fundamental? Andy: That's definitely a preference as well. The others are old school. I think when you start talking about, 'I intend to play professional tennis,' then your fundamentals are going to become a little bit more extreme as weapons become more important. But as far as the development of the game that's reliable; that will have a tendency to keep you injury free; I think that the fundamentals are a nice long hitting zone coming through the clean contact point--which doesn't necessarily include the reverse follow through or the windshield wiper follow through, or the open stance. Again, I'm not anti to these things, but if you're able to do it and they feel good, then go with it. But as far as if being something that you absolutely have to do to become a good tennis player, I definitely don't believe that. Ian : Well, Andy I want to thank you very much of your time. It's been great talking to you. I've enjoyed it very much. Before we wrap things up, I've already told people to go the iTunes to check out your podcast there. Where can people find you on the web? What's your website address? Andy: Website is TennisZone1510. All one word; no spaces. TennisZone1510.com, and that's the website which is basically the best of the TennisZone. As you mentioned, we have a Rod Laver on there. In the last month of the show we had a Rod Laver. We had Brett Staley, Toni Trabert, Brad Gilbert a couple of times. We had Darren Cahill, Justin Gimelstob. We were very fortunate, Owen Davidson is a dear friend of mine, and he was on several times. And they are just really phenomenal. And it's funny, because I talk to them about a lot of these various subjects. Having been around as long as they have, and seeing the evolution. I'm 48 years old. These guys make me look like I've been playing tennis 2 weeks which was especially [inaudible] they've got. And so we've talked about some of the various subjects and to hear some of the stories on some on the matches that were played back in their days is really fascinating. So I appreciate you letting your listeners know about that website and about my show, and I look forward to having you come on the Tenniszone when we start season #3 in February. Ian : I would enjoy that very much and I look forward to that. Yes, definitely check it out everybody. I've listened to several of your most recent episodes, and you do a great job of doing the interviews. And you can't help-- as being a tennis fan like myself and everybody listening--you really can't help to be interested in and really keyed in on guys like the people that you have on the show. So it's an excellent show. Andy: A lot of fun. Ian : Yes. Well, Andy thanks very much. It's been great having you on. Andy: Thank you Ian. Ian : And I look forward to talking to you again. Maybe we can have you back and talk about the other two topics that we had on the table. Andy: Anytime you need me. I would enjoy doing it and I appreciate you in all that you doing as well, I enjoyed it very much. [music] [music] [music] Ian : Alright, that brings the Essential Tennis Podcast Episode #88 to a close. Thank you very much for joining me today, and I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Andy Zodan as much as I did. Real quick as we wrap up today, I just have 2 quick shout outs and they are going to go to 2 new people that I've been in contact with recently this past week. The first one is Roger in California. And the second is Kevin in Korea. I've send a couple of e-mails back and forth with both of them having to do with their tennis game, and we probably have a couple of topics in there that we're going to use in the Podcast coming from each of them. So great to hear from both of you guys. And it's great to have you both as listeners. And real quickly before I sign off, I just want to again remind you guys about the cleaning in Palm Springs. Definitely let me know if you're interested in that, that's January 2nd and 3rd. And send me an e-mail if you'd like more information. ian@essentialtennis.com. Alright, thanks very much everybody. Take care and good luck with your tennis.

Podcast 107: Podcast 107: What footwork should you use when getting jammed up by a shot? What’s the best way to play in windy conditions?

ianw — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 11:27:28 +0000

Today I answer two listener questions. The first has to do with moving out of the way of a shot that's jamming you up on the court, both returns of serve and volleys up at the net. What stance should you use to do this? Secondly I talk all about playing in windy conditions and give the top four things to keep in mind. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian : Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert, tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by ProTranscript.com. Thank you very much for joining me today, and before we get to our two questions that I'm going to be answering from listeners, I want to tell you guys about a contest that's going to be running all during next week. I just want to give you guys a heads up on this-- I'm going to be giving away a free Flip Ultra HD digital video camera. And for those of you who are on the Internet looking for tennis instruction, which if you're listening to this Podcast, I'm going to go ahead and assume you are. And you know that video is a huge part of what's going on now as far as learning more about tennis and technique etc. And when you have the ability to record yourself and look at your strokes and look at what you're doing-- it's such a huge tool. So I want to give a lucky person out there the ability to do that with HD video and the flip cam is awesome for this-- I've been using this myself. So I'm giving one away, and all you're going to have to do is listen to podcast #108 which is going to be out a week from today and during that show, I'm going to give you guys the details one exactly how you can enter into that contest to win the flip-cam and a lot of other stuff as well. So make sure you tune in next week-- you're going to want to hear the podcast as soon as possible so that you can get entered right away into that contest. Alright, let's get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] Alright, let's go ahead and get going and our first question today comes from Fred in Washington State and he wants to have a little discussion about open versus closed stance in your tennis game. He wrote to me and said 'you recently talked about open and closed stances but you didn't seem to mention how closed and over-closed stances are typically used when running around back-hands and or working around jam shots. As working around being jammed, what is the best way to handle being jammed up on a serve-- like being served at the left foot for a right hander-- is the correct move to step back hard with the right foot and hit a closed or over-closed forward return rather than some awkward and wimpy shot? At 3. 5 and perhaps higher, I find a lot of the more successful servers tend to use jam serves instead of going wide for aces because correctly working around jam returns, is generally a weakness for a lot of players. On wide servers, returners get a racket on a wide shot, can frequently get a return using the power of the serve, plus unlike a wide serve, a jam serve has a lot of court space to miss and will still be a good serve. He means that you are basically aiming for the middle of the box so you've got a good margin for error there. Alright Fred, thank you for the great question, and yeah, the jam serve is definitely one that is underused-- Fred says he sees it being used quite often at a 3. 5 level and that is really good tactically. That's a great play for the people you are seeing doing this. Now, before we get going with exactly how to move your feet, to get around this shot, I want to do everybody a favor here and give the three main types of stances and give a quick definition of those so you guys know exactly what I'm referring to here. And there is basically three main types of stances that you can have at any point in time-- open, square, or closed. A square stance is sometimes referred to as a neutral stance as well. We'll start off with a square stance, or a neutral stance. A square stance is one where your body is lined up 90 degrees to the baseline and your feet are making a line that is perpendicular to the baseline. So if you are right-handed, and you have a forehand coming your way, your left foot would be pointing straight to the right-- if you are looking at the net-- and that is forwards to the right would be the direction that both your right and left feet are pointing and if you drew a line between the toes on your right foot, and the toes on your left foot, they would make a perpendicular particular line across the baseline. So your 90 degrees turn with your stance to the baseline. That's really the main way to visualize it, is if you drew a line between your feet-- between the tip of your right foot and the tip of your left foot-- if you drew a line and continued it, it would bisect the baseline at 90 degrees. OK, so that's a square stance or it's also called a neutral stance. Now a closed stance is one where your left foot is farther across your body then square. So you're not 90 degree anymore, rather than that line being 90 degrees to the baseline-- it's now closed, which means that if you are a right handed player getting ready to hit a forehand, your left foot would be more to the right. So that would be creating a more closed stance-- your back would be more facing towards the net, and your chest would be more facing towards the back of the court. This is a closed stance. Fred used the term over closed which I'm pretty sure he meant closed. I've never heard the phrase over close before but closed is typically what is being used to refer to a stance that is more than 90 degrees. And again, your back is facing more towards the net and your chest facing more towards the back fence. That would be a closed stance. An open stance is the opposite, your left foot is more to the left. If you are a right hander and getting ready for a forehand, that opens you up more if you just stay straight and you are twisting or turning your upper body at all, now your chest is more facing towards the net and a wide open stance would actually have you facing straight forwards and the tips of toes pointing straight forwards and if we drew a line between the tips of your feet, the line would be parallel to the baseline. That's a wide open stance. And there is all kinds of different stances in between. The ones I just mentioned, open is parallel to the baseline. Square or neutral is perpendicular to the baseline and closed is past perpendicular to the baseline. I guess you could say a full closed stance would be parallel to the baseline the other way where your back is completely facing towards the net. That would be completely closed as opposed to completely open where your chest is facing towards the net instead of your back. Alright, now that we have that out of the way, let's go ahead and continue talking about the different ways we can move our feet to get around shots that are jamming. And the most common are return-of-serve, which Fred mentioned, and volleys as well. Players very often get jammed up by volleys when they are at the net. Now the worst thing you can do when you start getting jammed up by a shot, is nothing. Do not stand there and let the ball jam you. The closer the ball gets to your body, the more inhibited you are in terms of different techniques that you can use to hit the ball. Everything gets jammed up-- your arm or racket gets close to you and it's very difficult to hit an effective shot. So you've got to do something and it's a good idea to practice moving your feet to get around a jamming shot. You've just got to make an attempt to get in a comfortable position. So, what should you do? And I'm going to talk about two different circumstances here, one where the ball is coming right at you, and the other that Fred was talking about, when the ball is kind of on one side or the other a little bit, but it's coming into your body, it's not going to be a comfortably positioned shot if you just stand there and do nothing. Let's talk first about a shot that comes directly at you. First of all, I want you guys to pick the stronger side-- when the ball is coming directly at you, you've got your choice. You can pick either a forehand or a backhand and you should be picking the one that you are most confident and comfortable with. Don't feel like you have to hit a forehand or you have to hit a forehand. You should practice moving towards your more confident side so that you can hit the best shot possible. And for myself, it's my forehand and whenever I possibly have the choice between a backhand and a forehand, I always hit a forehand because my forehand is better so tactically it just makes sense to make as many forehands as possible. So how do you do this? Well you want to pivot around your opposite foot, around back in a circle-- let me explain this: For those of you that are right handed, I just want you guys to visualize this-- let's pretend that you are getting ready to return serve and your opponent hits a hard flat serve, that is coming right at your body and again, you're right-handed and what I said was pivot around your foot. So if you are right-handed, I'm going to say your opposite is your left foot and what you want to do is pivot around that foot and turn your body back. And so your right foot should pivot back around your left to get yourself turned to the side. And once you get yourself in a square stance, where your right foot has pivoted back around behind your left and you are in a square stance, at that point you would want to take several small quick steps on the balls of your feet to move yourself back. And that would end up moving yourself to the left, to move yourself out of the way of the oncoming ball, and that's going to move your body out of the way of the ball and allow you to hit at the right side of your body. Let me repeat that one more time-- so you are in a ready position facing forwards, you identify the ball is coming right at you, you are going to want to take your right foot, pivot around your left foot which is going to stay planted to allow you to turn your body back. Turn yourself back so you are in a square stance, take several small steps back which is going to end up being to the left side of the court, and take several small quick little steps to move yourself out of the way of the oncoming ball. That's the best footwork that you can possibly use to get yourself out of the way. If you are a lefty, it would be the opposite-- you would take your left foot and pivot it around your right foot and then move yourself back quickly towards the right.. assuming you are trying to hit a forehand. If you are trying to hit a backhand, it would be the opposite. But this pivoting and turning and taking quick little steps on the balls of your feet, is the most important part. That's what's going to actually move yourself out of the way. That's the best footwork to use. Now what if the ball is coming to one hip or another or as Fred described it, he said a righty with the ball coming towards his left foot. And I can tell you guys that in College tennis when I was playing doubles, we would commonly aim for hips. So if I was playing a righty, I would aim for their left hip and try to jam them up on their backhand side. That would be a common way for me to communicate that to my partner. If the ball is coming towards one side or the other, but it is not comfortable-- if it's not giving you enough space that you are able to hit a comfortable, confident swing and it's going to be jamming you up, then it depends on how difficult exactly the shot is. If you have enough time, pick your stronger side and still move in that direction. So, Fred was mentioning a serve that comes at his left foot-- well Fred, if you've got the time to get around it and you can hit a forehand, then do it if your forehand is better. Don't settle for a backhand if you don't have to. If you have time to get around it, do use your forehand swing-- you just better make sure that you've got enough time to get around that ball and you would use the same footwork that I've described for when the ball comes directly at you. If you don't have enough time and the ball is really getting on top of you quickly and you don't have a chance to get around and hit your more confident shot, then you are going to have to unfortunately settle for your backhand side or whatever side the ball happens to be coming towards. And at that point, you would do the same footwork but you would just pivot around the other way. So for you, a backhand, you would take that left foot, pivot it back around your right, and take those quick steps to the right to move your body out of the way. And this is something you guys need to practice-- and you can practice it without even being on a tennis court-- just practice the footwork, and practice doing it quickly. And pivoting, moving back, probably two or three quick little steps to get to the side, then make your swing. Go back to a ready position, and do it again. It's important to practice this stuff so in the middle of a match, you guys can do it without thinking about it. And obviously, doing this on a practice court, would be very valuable as well. Now let me talk briefly about volleys. I've mentioned that volleys are the other shot that people tend to get jammed during. And the reason for this, is you are close to the net. And so you don't always have a lot of time to react to the ball. It's not like getting a groundstroke where the ball is bouncing and you've got time to set yourself up. The ball is coming right at you, and there is very little time to react to the shot. Now, to avoid it, I've got a couple things for you guys to keep in mind and to do. First of all, you must learn how to use a split step-- this is very important. If you are not split stepping already, you've got to start doing it and this goes for the return of serve too, but especially for the volleys because of your lack of time. You've got to get yourself in a wide, ready position on the balls of your feet. You've got to get your feet moving before the ball starts coming to you so that you're activated and your body is ready to move and your kind of up on your toes, and ready to go. You've got to have that physical readyness to be able to move out of the way of these shots. You cannot be flat-footed and effectively move out of the way of the ball when it comes right at you. So that's number 1-- the split-step. Number 2-- go ahead and have a mentality and assume that you are going to have to move somewhere. Do not be complacent either mentally or physically when you are at the net. You don't have the time to be lazy. And the split-step is the physical part of it and mentally, you just need to be alert and aware and just assume you are going to have to move somewhere. And I think a lot of times where club players make a mistake and really get jammed is they are just waiting for the ball. And they are just like 'alright, ball, come get to me. And whenever the ball gets to me, I'm going to hit my volley', and that's not good enough. You need to have an assumption or a readyness in your head when this ball gets hit by my opponent, I'm going to move somewhere-- it might be to my right, it might be to my left, or the ball might come right at me and I'm going to have to move somewhere. Don't ever think that it's just going to come right to your racket because it's just not going to happen very often. Now, the last thing I'm going to mention here as far as the volleys go-- keep in mind everbody, that a backhand volley is going to be easier to hit when you are being jammed and a lot of club players prefer their forehand volley which is a shame because they go through this big movement with their feet to try to get out of the way with their forehand, when a backhand is a lot easier to hit when you do get jammed up. And the reason for this is, your elbow and your arm can slide out of the way and move out to your dominant side. So if you are right handed, your right elbow would drag out to your right from a ready position, and your racket face can go ahead and slide it right in front of your body. And so you can hit with the backhand side of your racket literally, right in front of your body, if it's an extreme emergency and you cannot get out of the way of the ball. You can slide your arm to your right and get the racket right in front of you and you can play a defensive volley that way. Try to do that with a forehand, it's very difficult-- it's virtually impossible to hit the same shot that is coming directly at your stomach with a forehand volley-- so keep that in mind, that a backhand is probably going to be your best friend when you really get into a pickle and that is a tough situation at the net. Alright, I'm going to add one more thing-- when you do get jammed and you have time to get out of the way at the net, it's the same footwork as on the groundstrokes. You want to pivot around your opposite foot, get out of the way, and get your body to the side so that you can make contact at the side of your body when you are up there at the net. And I'm going to close with that on this topic. Fred, thanks very much for your question. I really appreciate the great topic for me to talk about and if you have any further questions about this stuff, let me know. Thanks very much for being a listener. [music] [music] [music] [music] OK, next up I'd like to recognize a couple of very important people who sent in donations over the last two weeks. First of all, James in the UK, donated $10. John in California donated $100 to the podcast. Thank you very much John. Also, Gerrard in Germany donated $50 and I apologize if I'm not pronouncing your name correctly. Dan in Washington State donated $50 to the show-- thank you Dan. And I had two regular subscription donors-- one from Shelley in New Mexico with a $10 subscription payment this month and John M in Texas with a $5 subscription donation. Thank you guys very much. So to you six, thank you guys for your donations-- I really appreciate it. It really helps me out as the normal expenses I have from week to week and month to month as I continue to run the website and the Podcast, and continue to try to improve them. And if the Podcast has helped you and has helped you improve your game, I would really appreciate your support, if you could do a monthly donation or a one-time donation either way, I always appreciate it so much. So thank you to you six and if you would like to donate to the show, simply go to essentialtennis. Com and there is a link on the lower right that says donate. [music] [music] [music] Alright, let's get back to the and we've got one here from Gorren and I don't have a location on Gorren, but he is a 3. 5 player and he wrote to me and said 'How do I effectively play in windy conditions? Could you address serving strategies and ground strokes? I understand a lot on proper footwork but is there anything else? I have a good attacking top spin forehand but every time during a windy match, my forehands seem to be sailing out a lot or into the net and it really hurts to see my forte go away like that. Sure Gorrad, I'd be happy to talk about that and I've got an outline here that is going to discuss several things that you really need to pay close attention too in the wind. And this is something that all of us have to deal with at some point or another and I'm actually a little surprised that I've yet to talk about this. This is going to be the first time that I've talked about playing in windy conditions, but it's such an important thing to understand and to practice. A lot of times, where I work, where we have both indoor and outdoor courts, when conditions get really windy people like to go inside where it's easier-- don't do that. If you guys have the option, don't run away from elements like that, whether it be sun or wind or outside distractions... Put yourself in the middle of these situations to make yourself a tougher player so that you learn how to deal with stuff like this. First of all, Gorran talks about foot work. Foot work is key and this is the first thing that you need to be aware of-- and I've got four different things that you guys can use to help yourselves out in the wind. The first one is foot work-- I'm not going to spend a lot of time on this as it kind of goes without saying, you cannot stop moving your feet at any time, ever, when you are playing in really windy conditions. The ball will continue to move, it will float from side to side or maybe bounce higher or lower than you are used to and it will catch you off guard. That's just a given when you are playing in really windy conditions and so you have to anticipate that and expect it and you've got to continue to move your feet. A lot of little steps, quick little steps and continuing to improve your position, even when you think you are in the right spot, just keep moving your feet so that you are kind of already going and you are ready to move if the way the ball bounces or travels in the air catches you off guard. So that's number one of four. You've got to keep your feet moving. Number two-- mentally prepare yourself to play safer. You cannot play usually, well I'm going to go ahead and say never, you should never play as aggressively as you normally do in really windy conditions. And adjustments you should make are aiming farther inside the lines-- so if you get an easy forehand and it's a shot that you would normally aim three feet from the line in trying to pressure your opponent. Give yourself five feet or four feet. Give yourself extra room-- you cannot afford to hit your same normal aggressive shots whenever you would normally hit aggressive. You can't hit as aggressively as the wind is going to make changes to your shot that you are probably not always going to be aware of. So when it's really windy, make it a little safer as far as your target is concerned. So be a little bit less aggressive. Also, more height over the net-- using more top spin is very important. You cannot afford to be inpatient and annoyed also. -- Actually let me go back to the second to last one-- the more height with top spin, make sure that it is with top spin and your not just floating the ball up into the air where the wind can grab it and carry it too far. If you are not able to hit with a lot of top spin on your ground strokes, then be careful with this and it depends on which direction the wind is blowing exactly. But be aware of the direction of the wind, and if you are not able to hit with top spin to pull the ball back down into the court again, then just be careful. You just can't be as aggressive. If you are able to hit with heavy topspin, that would be the best because you can aim higher over the net and the top spin will help pull the ball back down into the court again. That's really ideal to be able to hit with heavy top spin and give yourself some good clearance over the net to make it a safer shot. - And as far as mentally preparing yourself to play safer, be patient. Don't get easily annoyed. You are going to make mistakes that you probably normally don't and you can't afford to be inpatient and get angry and start hitting aggressively and trying to finish the points quickly-- at least not most of the time unless you are just having a really good day which in the wind, normally doesn't happy, but let's be honest, normally we don't have good days in the wind. So, you've got to be patient and be safe and take your time out there. You don't want to rush yourself because you'll probably rush into more and more errors. And that tends to snowball for a lot of people and they'll kind of get annoyed and frustrated and as a reaction to that, they'll hit even mor agressively and make even more mistakes and that's just something that you cannot afford to do. So that was number 2-- mentally prepare yourself. Number 3, you must be able to adjust your targets based on the wind. Here is what I mean by that, it depends on the direction of the wind. If you've got a wind that's blowing from side to side, so from right ot left or vice versa, the ball is going to drift into that direction. And as this becomes a pattern, you have to account for it based on which side you are on and that means if the wind is blowing strongly from your right to your left, and you're hitting a cross court forehand and you are right handed, you've got to give yourself more margin for error and hopefully you've already got a lot of experience practicing aiming. I've talked a lot in other podcasts about practicing your groundstrokes and having a target. Hopefully you've done a lot of that and you've aimed for targets, specifically, so that when you get out in the wind, and you are playing in tough conditions, you can literally adjust that target closer inside the lines or closer to the lines. Maybe you are hitting into the wind and let's say the wind is blowing from your left to your right and you're trying to hit a cross court forehand on your right side-- so you are hitting into the wind. Well now you've got to adjust your target to be more to the left than you normally would. So you've got to be able to make these adjustments and to do this, you've got to have some practice hitting for a physically target on the court so you can that you can make these adjustments. Now if the wind is back to front, if it's blowing either at your face or at your back, then your shots are either going to sail much farther or they aren't going to travel anywhere at all. And Gorren, it sounds like this is where you have a hard time because you talked about your forehand always going out or always going into the net when you are playing in the wind. So it sounds like this is where you really have the most trouble and this is difficult on ground strokes. And examples of this would be if the wind is blowing really strongly at your back, you cannot hit the same ground stroke that you normally would. The wind can really carry an aggressively hit ground stroke. So when it is really blowing hard at your back, you've got to aim a little lower and you need to put more top spin on the ball. Again, for those of you who don't know how to hit top spin, god help you. You are really just going to have to aim lower to keep the ball from going farther and you'll probably end up having to pull back on your strokes as well and not hit quite as aggressively. If you do know how to hit with top spin, you should hit with more top spin, less drive. You should not be trying to hit the ball quite as hard but really make it loop and make it come back down into the court-- you cannot afford to just hit the ball up in the air and have the wind carry it. You've got to put some good top spin on it to have it come back down. Now if the wind is blowing at your face really hard, then it's the opposite. You've got to get the ball up into the air because we've got to make it carry. We need to make it go farther otherwise it's going to miss into the net or even if you don't hit the net, everything is going to land short and weak because of the wind that is blowing into your face. So when this is happening, you've got to hit more of an aggressive shot. You've got to get more height so that the ball travels farther and you're not hitting everything into the net or short. Those are some specific examples of things and adjustments you are going to have to make when it is really windy out. So that was number three-- you've got to be able to make target adjustments based on the wind. Number 4, use the wind to your advantage. And you guys can actually take windy conditions and use them to work for you if you are smart and if you really look for your opportunities. I'm just going to mention two specific examples here to give you some ideas but you can find other ways to use wind as well. One specific situation might be to match up your strength that you already have with the wind. For example, if you are right handed and you have a good slice serve on the deuce side and you are right handed, and you are good at serving out wide, if the wind is blowing from your right to your left, that is perfect. And go out there and really try to kick that slice serve out wide and you are going to have to aim a little more to the right than you normally do because the wind is going to carry the ball farther to the left. So you can't aim for the line, you are going to have to aim inside the line, probably a couple more feet than you normally do. It depends on how strong the wind is exactly. But when the wind is blowing hard from your right to your left, use that good slice serve and really put a tonne of spin on it and the ball is going to travel way out to the left and travel from right to left more than it normally would and that's a way that you can actually use the wind. And another example I have is to come to the net when the wind is at your back. When the wind is blowing into your opponents face really hard and it's making it difficult for them to hit shots that are very penetrating and very pressuring to you because the wind is kind of holding their shots back. Come up to the net, it's going to make passing shots and lobs very difficult for them-- so pressure them. And do it on purpose-- if the wind is really blowing at your back, just kind of put the ball up into the air and have the wind carry it deep into their side of the court, run into the net and put yourself there and challenge them. Say, 'alright, let's see if you can hit a passing shot into the wind past me. ' Or hit a lob that doesn't sit up really easy for me because the wind is blowing in your face. So if you really think critically and think about what is going on around you, you can use the wind to your advantage. It doesn't always have to be something that is terrible although I understand it can be very difficult. So Gorren, there is my advice to you and the four tips again were-- use tonnes of footwork, you've got to use your feet a lot. Mentally prepare yourself to play safer. You have to be able to adjust your targets based on the wind. And finally, use the wind to your advantage when you have the chance. So thanks very much for your question Gorren, hopefully this is helpful to you and let me know if you have anything further. [music] [music] [music] That does it for this week's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast-- episode number #107. Remember to definitely tune in next week, and episode #108 will be coming out on March 8th 2010. Usually I release them late morning or early afternoon EST. Not always, but usually around that time on Monday-- so a week from today on Monday the 8th, definitely get that podcast as soon as you can so that you can submit your entry to be able to win that free flip cam, the Ultra HD flip cam. Definitely get your name into the hat there and maybe you'll have a chance of winning. And I've got a lot of other prizes up for grabs as well so it's not just that and all of them are free. So definitely check that out next week. Until then, thank you guys very much for turning in. I appreciate your support of the show by downloading the podcast and listening to it and I will talk to you guys next week. Take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast 108: Listen to Dave “The Koz” Kozlowski and Ian talk about which is more important to tennis players: control or power.

ianw — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 11:35:00 +0000

Today I have a special guest on the Podcast: Dave "The Koz" Kozlowski. Koz has a huge passion for the game of tennis and has been around the sport his entire life. Listen to him give his thoughts on which is more important for ET listeners: power or control. How do you get control exactly? When should you add power? Also listen for instructions on how to enter for a free Flip UltraHD! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and you want to improve your game, this Podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian : Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast-- your place for free, expert, tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by ProTranscript.com. Thank you very much for joining me on today's show and especially if this is the first time that you have listened to the Essential Tennis Podcast-- welcome and I appreciate you downloading this episode. I am going to be giving away a free flip Ultra-HD video camera later this week. Today is Monday, the 8th of March and on the 15th-- a week from today-- I'm going to be announcing the winner. Stay tuned, I'm going to tell you guys how to enter that contest sometime during today's show but until then just please enjoy the interview that I have. Today's show is excellent-- we are going to be discussing power versus control, so listen to this tennis instruction and the conversation I have with my guest. Hopefully it's going to be instructional and informative to you and give you something to work on that can really help make your tennis game better. And sometime during the show, I'm going to tell you also how you can enter to win that free flip video camera. So until then, let's go ahead and get started with the show. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] My guest today on the Essential Tennis Podcast is Dave the 'Koz' Kozlowski-- Dave, welcome to the show. Dave : Hey Ian, great to be here with you. This is exciting-- I know that you are into your third year and you've had over 100 of these Podcasts. You are on the cutting edge and you know that. So thanks for having me on and what do you want to talk about tonight? Ian : Well, let's kick things off by telling my listeners a little bit about you. I want to make sure that anyone that is not familiar with you or your background, know exactly where you are coming from and how much expertise you have in the game of tennis. So please tell my listeners a little bit about your background in journalism and broadcast and instruction. Dave : I'm a humble guy and I'm smiling as you ask me to do this but anything that sounds impressive is only because I've hung around the industry long enough and a lot of people have felt sorry for me and have been good to move which has given me a chance to move up through the ranks. But I've been teaching for, I don't want to say how many decades, but it's approaching 4 decades. I was lucky enough to get into the industry and to be one of the first 17 master pro's in the world and that came about because I was up there early for nominations and I got it before it was a lot tougher to get these days. I was very fortunate to have enough friends in the industry to vote me into USPTA national pro of the year and that was really was a credit to everyone that has helped me along the way more than it was just for me. And as I addressed the group about this award, and certainly, I was very honored and I vividly remember getting this letter-- I thought it was just a form letter from the USPTA-- but I did open it and I started reading it and all of a sudden it was hard to not finish reading it but I was so emotionally distracted that I had to start from the beginning again. I remember sharing the joy with family members and my wife and it was a very proud, joyous moment. But then a half hour later I'm on the tennis court and I'm teaching and I get that same high, that same emotional input to that so that this is as good as it gets. So as good as it was getting that award, you get it every day when you are in the teaching industry, when you are relating to somebody. You quickly find out that you're not teaching tennis to people but you're teaching people through tennis and I immediately knew that that's the award. But as I told so many 1000s of people-- this is a numbers game. And there are 1000s of guys like you but one is chosen per year so there are so many guys in the field that will have the ability and the background and the accomplishments to get it. But it's a numbers game and they may not. So when I received that award, dedicated to all the guys that were better than I am, that are not going to get this reward just because it's a numbers game. But as I have mentioned, people have been good to me and the USPTA in the year 2000 honored me as USPTA broadcaster of the year-- and I had no right getting that because I had no formal training and everything I do is hands-on, learning on the spot, trial and error. But it was a passion that came out and I thoroughly enjoyed that opportunity going to all ends of this country and also that I would never have that opportunity in meeting people. And it's a funny thing when you have a mic in your hand, all of a sudden people will talk to you. So it's been a great experience. Ian : You are a man after my own heart. You not only really enjoy the game of tennis, but you are a person who is passionate about media as well and communicating your enthusiasm to others. - And so I'm really happy to have you on the show and thanks for being here. Dave : It's my honor. It's great to be here. Ian : So, let's go ahead and get to our topic today which I think this is going to be an outstanding show and it is kind of a debate or a topic for the ages as it pertains to tennis and especially to those who listen to my show who are recreational-level players, they are club level players, people who are looking for any way that they can possibly improve their tennis game. And so often the question gets asked, what's more important? Being able to hit the ball with power or with control and it's kind of a trick question a little bit. Obviously anybody would say that they would like to have both, but often times when players are just beginning and they have to pick and choose what they are working on, I think a lot of times amateur players get faced with the question-- what should I work on first? And control versus power, I think, is kind of a conundrum. So why don't you kind of kick us off here with some initial thoughts on that question? What is your first reaction to that question? Dave : Well, my first reaction is that I first all thoroughly enjoy your audience so if they are recreation club players, I know the passion they have for the game, and they are all hungry to improve and to find ways to enjoy it more. So this is a great topic and it's an ongoing question-- power or control, what comes first. First of all to be successful, you need both. Let me share a thought here-- to be successful in any venue in life-- business, education-- you need to have a respect for the tradition before. In tennis, you need to have a tradition and a respect for the tradition of the game. But you also need to have a healthy welcome for changes in the game and in technology. However, I think that most players, in the audience that you are dealing, good recreational players, athletes, but maybe folks that are not going to make the top 1% of the professional ranks. They are better to get a foundation and to get the fundamentals first. And it's so important that they establish a base and that base consists of rhythm and it also consists of learning proper footwork and movement. In today's game where all the emphasis is on speed and power, often times, players find themselves not being able to handle routine situations. They aren't bad and the extraordinary because they are taught to turn and run and to scamper to the ball. But many times, it's just a routine shot down the middle and you need to have some motor-memory so that you produce the same shot 1000s of times-- but this doesn't happen at the club level because time doesn't allow and they are competitive and they'd rather hit 5 minutes of warm-ups and get right into match play so they never really get the shot motor-memorized. But it's so important that they try to get a shot that is repeatable and by repeatable, I mean, being able to produce a strong resemblance to the previous shot several times in a row so that it's a motor-memory type thing. And if you watch other sports like basketball and someone is working on his foul shots, he is going to stand in the same spot and not move more than 2 or 3 inches and just release 50 shots in a row. Some of the greatest golfers in the game, like Gary Claire will go out there and hit the same repeatable shot 150 times for 50 yards, just trying to get the motor-memory. Paul Azinger on the Rider Cup as a player and a coach, and I've seen him do this-- both Gary Claire and Paul Azinger were at the club where I was the tennis director and they would come in for golf exhibitions and seminars. He would take 20 balls and put them around a 2 foot area from the cup-- he would not do another thing in golf that day until he was able to sink 22 footers. Well that sounds like a piece of cake doesn't it? But they do miss, so it's the importance of getting a repeatable shot. And I think that players really need to have an idea of where the racket is finishing. I remember sitting with some legendary coaches in the game-- Ian Crikerton who was from New Zealand, a really fine college coach-- and Bill Tims, one of the legends in the game-- they really stress the importance of knowing where the racket is finishing with a repeatable-type of excursion. And we've gotten a bit away from that.. It's very tough for today's players to watch the pro's on TV because they are seeing extreme moves and it's almost as if it's extreme sports. But they are not playing extreme sports when they go out to play, they are playing routine so they need to get more familiar with routine moves. And if you watch the great players of the game, Justine Ena, who is as pure as they come on the female side and Roger Federer who is as pure as they come on the male side, they have a rhythmatic side-shuffle step. It's so important for players to know there is a [inaudible] . And a lot of times, we are taught to get there quickly, to get their early and they get there too soon and all of a sudden they have to stop the move and there is dead time and it's hard to adjust. But if you watch the great players, it's almost as if they are playing a basketball side-shuffle step guarding a man. They are taking two or three rhythmatic steps side-shuffle facing the net then turn and hit on both sides, the forehand and backhand. And I really believe if the average player can learn that rhythm, that everything starts to fall in place. And sometimes if nothing improves except just that rhythmatic footwork, the game is going to improve for them. Their shots are going to get better, their rhythm is going to get better and their arrival time is going to more accurate. They are going to find themselves being in a better strike zone to contact the ball and they are establishing a rhythm. Ian : Great stuff. One thing that really jumped out to me was you were talking about how often times amateur players can come up with an incredible shot at one point in time and miss a shot later that is completely routine and as both a teacher and a player, when I go out to play, I don't think there is anything more frustrating to me than for me myself, or one of my students to miss the easy shots, to miss the routine shots that should be repeatable or we should have a rhythm to those shots. So let's talk about how can my listeners better obtain that rhythm and you talked about basketball players practicing the free throw and you talked about golfers practicing two foot puts-- so what is the equivalent for that and especially keeping in mind the people who are listening to this show are often times not members of clubs where they are able to go and hire a professional instructor to actually run them through drills and have that expertise in person. Some of them do, but for my listeners who maybe don't have that luxury, how can they go out there and train themselves to have this repeatable follow through and this rhythm that you're talking about? Dave : I think that is a great question and it's all about motor-memory so that when the ball comes-- the big downfall in any sport-- it happens in golf, it happens in tennis when the ball is lying there in a golf swing, or the ball is coming in a tennis bounce-- when you try to do something to the ball. When you try to hit it, that's when various body parts get involved with the swing and too many body parts are being involved or the wrong body parts are too active. So the idea is to literally-- and the pros do this because they have sparring partners-- they are hitting 1000s of balls every day in a non-competitive situation so that it just becomes instinctive and it becomes motor-memorized. The best thing is to try to set a pattern and it's a proven study that a new habit will be formed after 1800 reps. So if you break that down to any month, 30 days, if you do this habit 60 times a day for 30 days, that's 1800 times, then it becomes instinctive. So when that ball is arriving on your right hand side of your forehand, you're not trying to do something to do it. You're not trying to think of what you want to do to it, it's just motor-memory. And simple motor-memory activities can be-- and I'm a strong believer that on the forehand, you really want to have more upper dominance out of the shoulder than you want to out of the hands. The hands are needed to locate the ball, to find the ball. But once you find the ball, the lower arm from the elbow to the wrist stays still and there is more movement out of the shoulder, the bigger muscle. So simply what you want to try to do and if you buy into this concept, anatomically when we stand still, there is a gap between the shoulder and the chin. The gap between the shoulder and the chin is about 6-8 inches. So on a daily basis, if you just merely take the hitting shoulder-- let's say you're right-handed-- take the right shoulder and touch the chin 60 times a day so it's automatic -- with a rack in your hand or without -- and any of these motor-memory exercises can be done in the office, on the road in a hotel, then can be done in your house where it's not needed to have a racket but you are actually getting the motor-memory of the motion taking place. 60 times a day, 30 days, your right shoulder travels and touches your chin -- that's one. The right shoulder travels and touches the chin, that's two. Another good exercise is to actually swing and as you swing, catch the racket in the left hand so that you are giving yourself a reference on extending the arm. And we're so involved with power and you'll see some of the great players finish in a bent elbow position on the forehand but before they've got there Ian, you and I know that there is a period of extension so they are extending but it's happening so quickly that the average viewer see's the quick snap of the elbow and the wrist and they feel that this is the way they hit the ball. Eventually that's the way to finish at the extraordinary and high level but leading up to that, you can't go wrong and you'll see the William's sisters go back to the roots and actually catch the racket on some of their forehand finishes. Are they doing it to correct something from their previous shots? I don't know. Are they doing it to extend out to form a good habit? I don't know that either. Whatever they are doing, they are actually practicing extension. So our listeners can 60 times let the right shoulder touch their chin at the same time they're doing that, catch the racket in the left hand. All of a sudden they are getting motor-memory on what the excursion should be taking place on the forehand. So the next time the ball comes, they are not trying to do something to it. It's automatic, motor-memory response. Ian : There is something I'd like to hit on that you talked about that really hit a cord with me... A couple minutes ago you mentioned that when amateur players see the ball coming towards them, often times they make the mistake of actually trying to do something to it. And I'd like to go back to that for a second. I first heard this concept on a golf Podcast-- I'm actually a golfer as well. Dave : I did not steal this from a golfer but I use that concept because if you try to do something to the golf ball, you are in trouble baby. Ian : Absolutely. Dave : And the average player, if you try to do something to it, you are in trouble again. Our biggest fear in tennis at the most entry level is being afraid of missing the ball when he or she swings. So the attempt is 'I'm going to make sure I don't miss that ball baby. ' Then all of a sudden, they have to make lots of adjustments and compromises to just find where the ball is because they are so inhibited about missing the ball that all of a sudden things don't flow.. They don't become a motor-memorized activity. So, just like the golfer, you really cannot try to do something to the ball and that's when things are going to break down. But I interrupted you, so finish your good thought. Ian : The instructor that I had heard talking about this and it really struck me when I heard him say it, the person who was interviewing him had asked him if you had to choose one thing that amateur golfers do poorly, what would it be that you think they should improve? And he said 'amateur golfers so often try to hit the ball instead of learning a good stroke and a good technique and simply allowing the ball to get in the way of that swing. ' And that just struck me as being so profound that amateur players often times, for instructors like you and me it's easy to pick out a lower level player because they are often times so tense and so tight. I'm curious what your thoughts are on how having a repeatable swing and having that muscle memory and having that grooved into play, goes hand in hand with being relaxed and loose and more efficient physically. Dave : Well, first of all my primary goal with anybody on the tennis court is to make sure that he or she has a good time. I never want to turn them off with too much technique, too much instruction. That's the most fun for me because for us, it's a science and I often times will ask teaching pros 'how many of you teaching pros are teaching for selfish reasons?' And everybody is a bit uncomfortable and won't raise their hand and I raise my hand and say 'well it's obvious, but we have to do it for a living. Wouldn't the world be great if we could teach everybody who wanted to play and not have to charge. But that's not the real world. How many of you are actually selfish that you actually want to learn more than your student is learning? And a few more raised their hand and I raised my hand because my goal when I go out to teach someone is to walk off that court learning as much if not more than he or she has learned so that I'm learning from them and can then pass that on to future students where I'm planning new innovative ways of doing it. - I need to get back to your question that you asked me which was what again Ian? Ian : I was curious... Dave : I had a better answer then I had a response for the question.. Ask it again if you don't mind. Ian : I was curious what your thoughts were on the relationship between amateur players trying to do something to the ball or trying to hit it too much as opposed to just having a repeatable swing-- I was curious what your thoughts were on the connection between that and being loose and relaxed and being able to be consistent. We've all seen Federer play and how easy he makes it look. It looks like his body-- he looks like some kind of dancer out there. Dave : Very smooth. Very rhythmic and there is a real cadence that he brings to tennis and he is a great model to watch and he is so effortless in all of his moves. I will answer the question that you did ask me and I think one of the key things is for them to try to minimize the body movement. And it's amazing with your golf background, you know this for a fact that some people cannot swing a golf club and retain their balance. The golf club takes the body all over the place and this happens certainly in tennis where people swing and all of sudden they lose some balance and in the process of losing their balance, they have to make adjustments or compromises with other body parts to try to get the body back in balance. Well this happens to the great players but they can control the balance and regain balance much better. One of the goals needs to be how well can you swing and actually hold your balance in place? One of the greatest all time-- and I'm not saying just tennis coaches, because this guy was touted by Sports Illustrated as being the best coach in sports. Not just tennis, in sports and his name is Welby Van Horn-- he is still alive and he's out in Palm Springs. He was the mentor of several outstanding world class players and one of them that he taught in Peurto Rico, one of them was Charlie Pasarel. And if you've ever watched him 30 years ago on three days in a row he had wins against Ash, over Laver and Emerson-- bang, bang, bang. And one of the key things with Van Horne was to try to hold the balance in place with some deliberate extension for 3 seconds. And of course I've used it for decades after hearing him say hold balance and to hold the racket in place for three seconds. One thing that I try to do with students when they are hitting to one another-- so Ian, if you and I are going out to rally and you hit the ball and it bounces and I still get it back to you and you are at the baseline and I'm at the baseline, in my mind try to hold that balance until my ball lands on your side of the court then I'll come back to a neutral position. If you get players to do this, and they can do this by themselves, and I learned my tennis on the recreation courts and we had to find ways where there is a wall so maybe there is a way. So anybody can do this with another practice partner but that's a little tough and that's another episode in itself that so many players practice for themselves but they don't practice for their sparring partner, their practice partner. If they would realize that the more they hit to this player, the more balls they get coming back and it becomes beneficial for both. But getting back to the comment is to actually hold your balance in place. One thing that I do on the forehand and most times if somebody is taking private training, I will spend two minutes working on lead-ups, ie a two handed forehand. And one of the things that I really try to emphasize is a continuous motion in two areas-- a continuous motion in the foot work and a continuous motion in the back swing. So the feet are moving and the racket is moving and we are referring to a loop right now, so they learn the rhythm about when to take it back and the speed at which to take it back, so I'll have everybody that really wants to try to improve, buy into this and spend a few minutes working on the side shuffle-step delivery and a two handed lead-up. And what it does, is it gets them closer to the ball. They've got to bring the strike zone in move and anatomically they've got to bend the knees. They've got to get lower. They find themselves coiling the shoulders then uncoiling the shoulders. And all this stuff is a pleasant lead-up to a one-handed forehand. So I'll have them do that for 2 or 3 minutes but then, I'll have them go to one hand and you'll have to listen to this closely because it sounds inane, it sounds stupid but they will hold the racket in the right hand, swing, contact the ball but the moment they contact it, let go of the right hand, catch it in the left, pull it as far out as they can with the left so they do not try to direct or guide the racket and that their shoulder doesn't get locked in-- they don't get muscular in their shoulder. Some of the best forehands they hit that day are these shots where they literally hit the ball with their right hand, grab, catch in the left hand so they are letting go of the racket. And I see this tremendously helping players in learning how to relax the arm. And it sounds silly but what they are doing is allowing their racket head to become more dominant and the racket head starts doing some work. So after they do this for a couple of minutes, then they do the same grab and catch but they retain the right hand on and all of a sudden. They have that motor-memory swing where it is the same swing repeated each time. Ian : Well guys, I want to get to at least one more question here before we run out of time. Dave : Didn't you ever hear that there were no clocks in heaven, nor are there any clocks on the tennis court. I've never looked at a clock when talking tennis. Ian : Well unfortunately, I have to watch it. I wish I didn't because I have kind of a tradition on the Podcast especially when guests are on the show, time just flies. That's how I know I've got a good guest on the show-- it's gone by incredibly fast. I've got one more question I'd love to get your thoughts on. Earlier in the show when you and I were talking, you mentioned that both control and power do have their place in tennis. And all of our time so far has been spent talking about getting a rhythm, having a repeatable swing. Getting repeatable results. So I'm curious what your thoughts are on when is it appropriate-- let's say we have an amateur, club level player, who is really starting to become a student of the game and they are working hard on their tennis. They are hitting with the wall, with practice partners. They are working hard on being consistent. When is it appropriate for this player to them start working on developing weapons and being able to hit with more power? Dave : That's a very good question and the answer that I may have to give is that it has to come quickly because they see all the speed in the game. They want to reproduce that speed. They want to certainly emulate that type of game. So that's got to be exposed quickly and I have a friend that we would discuss a lot of tennis with and he's been in the industry as long as I have and a former great coach. But he would spend a lot of time on this ball control where they would have to hit 5 or 6 balls behind the service line and that sounds like a piece of cake until some players try to do it. You've got to be able to keep the ball at will behind the service line 5 or 6 times in a row. And they would spend a lot of time working on control and trying to reproduce the same swing, the same shot. Then he would tell them at the second half of working on the forehand, and he might do this on the forehand or backhand, it doesn't matter. Now I want you with the same swing, and trying to keep the same body control, and almost the same finish, now to allow the racket head to speed up. Now, let me see how hard you can hit it. And one of the key things is that players and we have all levels of club player, some players never really develop the confidence to allow the racket head to speed up and sometimes you can ask a very simple question. Should the racket speed up or slow down as it approaches the ball? Well everyone knows that the racket should speed up but some players may not know that or appreciate that. You absolutely need to feel that as the racket gets closer to the ball, you want the racket to be speeding up. So it's a slow start, a medium pace, middle there when the racket is gaining some speed but at the end, the racket is speeding up. So I think it's important that when they warm up, they spend time on consistency and that they are also allowed to get back to the baseline and try to hit hard offensive shots. Now one thing that seems to help as well as anything is that and this sounds extraordinary and its certainly an overload principle-- you want them to not hit the ball out of bounds obviously. But you want them to get it as deep to the baseline as you can because depth allows anybody to play with better players and they can't take advantage of you as you are on neutral terms. But if one puts a towel or a target 6 feet behind the baseline, and now I tell John, 'John let's rally the ball but I want you to try to hit that ball so it lands near the towel. ' Yes, it's 6 feet out-- I know that and you know that. But that's where I want you to think where you are aiming and all of the sudden starts to speed up the racket and starts to instinctively to get the ball deeper and he hits it harder but he also aims it higher so without really programming it, now you're working on a lot of power. He's keeping the control but he's allowing the racket head to speed up and 90% of the balls do not go outside of the baseline. They fall half way between the service line and the base line and maybe a third of the way behind the mid-court that they are botched 6 feet into the baseline. So it's important to do both and the same coach that I refer to Jim Fredrica, an old friend, he would have a practice one day a week for his Michigan State team, a Big 10 school, and how many balls do you think he'd give every twosome to go out and practice that one. One ball between Ian and me. So that day, you obviously worked on some ball control. So he mixed it nicely and a lot of our players probably need to go out with 6 balls max to keep the ball in play and then they can start to speed it up and get some confidence to hit up. But they need both, no doubt about it. Although, if I had a chose between a high school kid who had power but not accuracy or consistency and a kid who kept more balls in play, if I wanted a winning record that year I'd opt to play him compared to the guy who misses more but has the power. And that's not going to motivate any of our listeners, I know that, but it tells the story. Ian : Thank you so much for spending this time with me and you're a perfect fit for this show. Your enthusiasm for the game and instruction of the game is very obvious and evident and I know my listeners are going to enjoy listening to this conversation a great deal. So thank you so much for being on the show with me. Dave : Hey I like your listeners. Let me tell your listeners something-- remember in tennis scoring love means nothing, but love of the game means everything. You keep alive your love of the game as you do and you have your tennis listeners keep their love of their game and I love you all. Thanks for having me on. Ian : People, please check out indietennis.com as that is where can catch Koz's material and he's got some audio content there you can check out and Koz, I hope that I can have you back on the show in the future. Dave : It would be my pleasure and I look forward to it. [music] [music] Ian : Alright, that does it for this week's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast, episode #108. Thank you very much for joining me today and let's go ahead and get to the flip cam giveaway. In order to enter yourself into the draw for a free flip cam, and there is lots of other prizes to be given away as well. If you haven't checked that out yet, go to essentialtennis.com/contest and there is a list of all the prizes I'm going to be giving away including that flip cam. In order to enter, all you guys need to do is go to essentialtennis.com/flip. And you'll be taken to just a little form to fill out-- just three things, your name, your email address and whether or not you've heard the Podcast before-- that's it. And you'll be entered automatically into the drawing and a week from today, on episode #109, I will be announcing all of the winners in that contest. So good luck to you and thank you very much for listening today and for your entry. I'm looking forward to giving away all those prizes. And if this was your first time listening, I release this show every Monday-- every single Monday I put out a new episode all about improving your tennis game and tennis instruction. Check it out on iTunes, it's the number one rated tennis instruction Podcast on iTunes and you can subscribe to it there. That's definitely the easiest way to get the show every week. Alright that does it for this week. Take care everybody and good luck with your tennis. [music]

Podcast 109: Learn about the six different types of tennis footwork and how to use them during groundstrokes, volleys, and overheads.

ianw — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 11:39:06 +0000

Today's show is completely dedicated to one of the most important parts of your tennis game: footwork! Did you know that there are six different ways to move your feet on the tennis court? When they're all put together correctly a player can become as quick as efficient as possible. Listen to today's show to find out how! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this Podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann : Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert, tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by ProTranscript.com and also TennisTours.com -- more on that new sponsor later in today's show. I want to kick things off today by saying thank you to everybody who participated in the contest I ran last week. 158 entered into the drawing for a new flip Ultra-HD camera and I've got my winners all selected here and those of you who won, will get an email from me shortly. But thank you to everybody, especially those of you who listened to the Podcast for the first time-- great to have you guys on board. I also want to announce a new clinic, the next Essential Tennis Clinic will be held in Baltimore, Maryland and will be on May 28th, 29th and 30th. Features of this clinic will include 9 hours on the court with tennis instruction from myself and other tennis professionals. Also, a mental tennis workshop from David Grumping, a mental tennis expert whose been on the Podcast many times. And a video analysis session and everybody is going to get one of their strokes analyzed by myself with high speed video. So lots and lots of value in this clinic. If you're interested, send me an email or go to essentialtennis.com and click on clinics. There is only 4 spots left, so definitely let me know right away if you would like to attend. Alright, let's get down to business-- sit down, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] Alright let's get started with today's topic on the Essential Tennis Podcast, and it comes to us from Carl E on the forums on Essentialtennis.com and Carl wrote and said ' can we revisit footwork in the Podcast? One thing I'd like to hear about is using the cross-over step to recover into the court. And how about use of a cross-over step while moving around the baseline. When should it be used? What's the choreography like? How can we practice this so that is becomes second nature?' And in the forums, Gaskeys Backhand also commented as well 'could you please also pickup the footwork from the very beginning because I'm guessing there is a lot of people like me who've just begun to take tennis seriously and have never been taught anything about footwork-- Thanks, it would really help. ' Alright, we are going to go over footwork on today's show, and it's going to be the only topic we cover. And I'm really going to go into depth about the different types of footwork, the different types of steps that you guys can use on the tennis court. What they are good for, what they are not good for and I'm also going to go over the most common shots in tennis and how you should use those different steps during those common shots so you guys can move effectively. And Footwork is incredibly important in tennis and I'm really happy that I'm doing an all-footwork show because you can only hit as good of a shot as your footwork is. Now professional players, high level players, are able to hit incredible shots even when they are off balance and in an uncomfortable position but for the rest of us that aren't incredibly gifted athletically, it's very important that we learn how to move around the court as efficiently as possible so that when you do get to the correct spot on the court, you are able to hit as good a shot as you possibly can because your body is there in balance, you're in the correct position, the ball is in the right spot in relationship to you and you're able to hit the best shot possible. And then the second part of that, is after you've hit your shot, it's very important to get back to a good spot on the court immediately following whatever shot you just happened to him. So, the first thing we're going to do is talk about types of steps or different ways you guys can move your feet around the court. I'm going to give a quick definition for each of them so that you guys understand what I'm talking about when we start to talk about individual strokes and how you guys should move your feet during those different types of shots. So we're going to go over 6 different ways you can move your feet on the court. The first one is a side shuffle and Carl was pointing this out and wanted some explanation on the side-shuffle specifically. The side-shuffle is lateral to the baseline or it can also be perpendicular to the baseline and kind of anything in between. Basically the side-shuffle is a way to move your body laterally. And this is commonly referred to when talking about recovering from a ground stroke and wanting to move back to the middle of the baseline and we're going to get to that later. But the correct way to use the side-shuffle is to have your toes pointed forwards and making a balanced move from right or to the left. Your knees should be balanced, your feet should be shoulder-width apart and your feet should not cross. That's what differentiates this from different types of footwork. During a side shuffle, your feet do not cross-over. And so it's a balanced way to move around the court. It's not the fastest way you can move around the court but it keeps your body in very good balance. This is basically a way that you can move in a ready position and your body is kind of all set to go. As you shuffle from the right or to the the left, or up and back, we are going to talk about how to use both. So that's number one. Number two-- cross-over step. And again, you can use this lateral to the base-line or perpendicular to the baseline and we'll talk about how to use both of those later in the show. But the difference between a side-shuffle and a cross-over step is that your feet are crossing over-- they are crossing each other. And a variance of this is also the karaoke step or the grape vine which is sometimes referred to as a series of cross-over steps... We are just going to keep it at cross-over step just for simplicity sake. So that's number two. Number three, the back-peddle. And the back-peddle is basically moving heels first. So the back of your body is facing the direction you are trying to move. Believe it or not, but these steps should be used sometimes and we're going to talk later about when they should be used. That's number three. Number four is forward stride or sprint. Basically you guys are facing dead on forwards. Your toes are pointing forwards towards where you are trying to go. And you're either in a sprint or another kind of forward motion. Next up number five are adjustment steps. And these are different from a forward stride or a sprint in terms of their size. An adjustment step usually is a series of quick little steps to kind of fine tune your position on the court and to be able to really put yourself in just the right place. And number six, the last in our six different types of steps is the split-step. And the split-step is a way to get your body in balance and we're not going to spend a lot of time talking about the split-step today because I've talked about it in previous shows in a lot of detail and if you guys want to learn about when to use the split-step and literally how to do it physically and how to move your body to split-step correctly, check-out Podcast #101, #90 and Podcast #13. And all there of those previous Podcasts, I've talked about the split-step and it's a very important part of your footwork and we're not going to go over it in detail today but go into the Podcast archives if you would like to hear more about the split-step. So a quick review before we go to the next section-- six different types of steps: The side shuffle. The cross-over step. The back-peddle. The forward stride or sprint. Adjustment steps and the split-step. So, next up, we're going to be talking about how to put all of those together effectively within different strokes and how to move your feet correctly within different strokes. Before we do that, I'm really excited to tell you guys about the newest sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast and that is TennisTours.com. TennisTours.com is the place to go if you guys are planning on going to an ATP or WTA professional tennis event. They do tickets and they do travel packages to go to all your favorite tournaments including the Grand Slams. It can be really tough to get reliable tickets for the Grand Slam events, Australian & French Open, the US Open and Wimbledon and that's their specialty-- the Grand Slam events. And you guys can purchase individual tickets from them or even complete ticket packages including hotel and accommodations. You guys can purchase ground passes, luxury suites and everything in between. They offer wide ranges of different types of tickets for every event that they do have for professional events. So if you're going to go to a professional event which an incredible way to learn about tennis and to experience tennis by watching the best players in the world, go to TennisTours.com and definitely check and see if they do carry tickets for the professional event that you're going to be traveling to. And especially if it's out of town and you need accommodations and hotels-- these guys do everything together and do it all for you so you don't have to worry about it. Now, when you check out TennisTours.com, make sure to use the promotional code essential and you'll receive a discount off your purchase. That's 'essential' in the promotional code field as you're checking out. Show them that you appreciate their sponsorship of the Essential Tennis Podcast by supporting TennisTours.com. I appreciate them very much for their support of the Podcast. Thank you guys. OK, now let's get into some specific situations around the tennis court and how you guys should be moving your feet most effectively. Now, as you guys move to anywhere on the court and hit any type of shot, there should be a sequence of different moves or different things that you need to accomplish in order to move effectively. And that sequence is, preparation, movement to the ball, recovery and then preparation again-- there is kind of a cycle that you guys should be repeating in between and during and after every shot so that you guys can be in the best possible position with your body. Now, let's talk about some specific shots and how you guys should be using those specific types of steps within those different phases of your movement around the court. First of all, let's talk about ground-strokes and moving side to side, either to the right or the left for a forehand or backhand. Now preparation, the preparation phase, is basically your split-step. That's how you best prepare your body to be able to move towards any possible shot. It puts you in a nice ready position, in a balanced position. You're not moving anywhere-- you're just ready. Now if you want to use some stutter-steps and some shuffle-steps instead of an actual split-step, that's fine as long as your body is balanced. And again, check out those previous Podcasts for a detailed discussion on that. Now, after your split-step on a ground-stroke you want to transition the forward steps and if it's a forehand and you're right-handed, you would turn yourself to the side and make forward steps out to the right to get to that shot. And these steps should be quick and you want to get there fast so that you can be in balance once the ball gets to you and you're in a good, comfortable position. Now, the next phase is adjustments steps. You want to next use adjustment steps to kind of fine-tune your position between yourself and the ball. These should be different from your forward steps because we don't want to continue making long strides when the ball comes close to us because that's often times how players make mistakes and if you mis-judge just a little bit how the ball is going to bounce or where exactly it's going, and you're in the middle of a full stride towards the ball and it ends up bouncing a little funny or maybe the wind catches it or it has some spin on it you weren't expecting, you're done-- you're screwed. So you have to be in the habit of making small, little steps as the ball gets close to you to be able to really make last second adjustments and you might think you know exactly where it's going but don't make that mistake. So, again preparation, the split-step and movement to the ball starts off with forward steps, then adjustment steps, then you make your swing-- your forehand or your backhand swing. Now, after you've made your swing, it's time for recovery. And this can be done when you're moving to the right or the left in one of two ways-- you can use either shuffle-steps or cross-over steps or a combination of both which I recommend that you guys do. And it kind of depends on your position on the court. If you're not very far away from the middle of the baseline, you really only need to use side-shuffle shuffle-steps and you would do that by pointing your toes forward towards the net, not crossing your feet over, and just making two or three shuffles back to the center of the court. Now this is something that rec players and students of mine, for whatever reason, don't like to do. I guess they feel silly doing it. It's not something they've done before ever playing tennis because they've never done it correctly. If you guys watch tennis on TV and [inaudible] Wells is on right now as I'm speaking, you will see tennis pros using side-shuffle steps to move along the baseline after they've made contact. The reason why it's so important is because we need to be in a balanced position, in a ready position, while moving back to the middle of the baseline. That's important because we don't know where the next shot is going. After you've hit your forehand or backhand ground-stroke and the ball is traveling towards you opponent, you do not know where they are going to hit next, and so if you take the quicker route and let's say you move out to your right, hit a forehand ground-stroke and then you simply turn your body to face the middle of the court and run back, that would be a lot faster than using a side-shuffle or a cross-over step, however, if your opponent hits back to your forehand side again, and you have not yet returned back to the center of the court, you're moving in the exact opposite direction and your body is facing the exact opposite direction and it's going to be very difficult to gather yourself, stop your momentum and turn back to the right where the next shot is coming-- please don't do this. You need to get yourself lateral to the baseline and move back sideways while facing the net so that you can see what is going on and so that your balanced in case they cross you up and they hit to a direction that you're not anticipating. So using that side-shuffle step is very important. Now Carl, talked about using a combination of steps and having a good rhythm and I suggest that when you guys really get pulled off to the side, you use a combination of cross-over steps and side shuffle steps and you guys will very commonly see the pros doing this. They'll move out to the right or to their left, make their adjustment steps, make their swing and very typically make one cross-over step and then several shuffles to get back to the baseline. Or maybe if they're really far out, maybe they'll make two cross-over steps and several shuffles to get back to the middle of the baseline but very often you'll see them at least one cross-over step and then transition into a shuffle. Now both the cross over and the shuffle step keep you sideways facing forwards towards the net so they keep you in balance. The cross-over step is a little bit faster and it kind of gets you moving immediately after your swing and the shuffle step is kind of more fine-tuned and a little more unbalanced and it keeps your feet underneath you, they are not crossing over... It's more difficult for you to get caught off balance when you are shuffling. So, in review and I realize I may have repeated some things here but this stuff is really important and that you guys follow this specific pattern. Split-step, turn and make forward steps towards the ball. Make adjustment steps, quick little steps as you get close to where you're going to make contact. Then make a cross-over step then finish it up with side-shuffles back to the middle of the base-line. And at that point, you should repeat the preparation phase and use a split-step and a side-shuffle is very similar to a split-step but whenever your opponent makes contact, even if you're not back to the middle of the baseline yet, you should be making another split-step to repeat this pattern. The preparation, the movement of the ball, the recovery back to the middle of the baseline, and then prepare again. And when you guys do this correctly, there is definitely a rhythm to it and this is why the pros, especially the players with really good foot-work, look like it's so effortless because they use all of these steps together and they do it very seamlessly and it's all coordinated together and it is almost like a dance going back and forth, back and forth. And this is something you guys should practice, and I'm going to talk about how to practice it later. Now, let's talk about one of the tougher shots in singles and that is moving back for a ground-stroke and you guys should move back when your opponent has hit a high, deep shot to your half of the court and it's not going to be at waist height-- it's going to be bouncing up over your strike zone, you've got to back up and let the ball come back down again. In order to move back effectively, for a ground-stroke, you guys should be turning to the side and side shuffling back. Do not use a back-peddle movement or foot-work to move back for these shots. So if it's a forehand and you're right handed, your right foot should pivot back to put you in a square stance and then you should side-shuffle, or if you want to use a cross-over step and then side-shuffle back, that's perfectly fine. But get back there and turn to the side already so that you're in balance and also so that you are ready to swing. You've already turned your body to the side and you are ready to go. It doesn't mean that you have to hit in a closed or a square stance, you can still hit from an open stance but as you are moving back, make sure that you get yourself turned perpendicular to the baseline so that you can move back in balance. This is a common mistake for rec players to move back with a back-peddle type step and that kind of makes them off-balance and not only that, but when the ball gets there, they are not turned to the side yet and can make for some trouble, some complications. Now, after you make your swing, after moving back to that shot, simply turn forwards towards the net and use a forward step or a spring to get back to the middle of the baseline and then split step to make sure that you prepare again-- so that's for moving back. Now ground-stroke moving forwards-- on a low shot or a shot that is not traveling very far into your half of the court, you might have to move forwards. In order to do this, if it's straight forwards, you guys should simply be moving forwards with your body facing the net. As you get close to the ball, you should be turning your upper body to the side and or changing your stance, whichever type of stance you'd like to use to hit this shot. And this is the one time where you guys should be back-peddling is after you've hit a short ground-stroke or a ground-stroke you've had to move forwards into the court for, straight-forwards and after you've made contact, you want to get back to the middle of the baseline again. Don't stay up in no-man's land. This is where it's open to use a back-peddle type step, is when you've moved straight forwards from the middle of the baseline, you've made your swing, and you want to get back to the middle of the baseline again. The alternative would be to turn around and face your back to your opponent and hustle back to the middle of the baseline but don't do that. We need to be facing forwards and ready and watching and seeing what's going on-- so use a back-peddle step to get back to the middle of the baseline. Now, so we've talked about moving to the right or the left, moving back and moving forwards for a ground-stroke. There is combination's as well and this is where things get a little tricky but it all makes sense. If you are moving up into the right, you should turn and face towards the direction you want to move yourself-- make a forward step or a sprint. Make your swing and this is where you want to use a kind of diagonal shuffle. So if it's forwards and to the right, and you are moving up for a forehand, make your swing then pivot, get your back foot kind of back so your right and left foot, draw a line between where you are in the middle of the baseline and use a side shuffle in a diagonal direction back to the middle of the baseline. If you are moving back and to the left, if it's a deep back-hand, then you would want to again pivot your left foot back, use a kind of diagonal side shuffle to move yourself back behind the baseline. Make your swing, then go ahead and face towards the middle of the baseline and use a forward step and move back forwards towards the middle of the baseline. What's important here guys is your balance and we want to be prepared for every shot and each subsequent shot. You want to be prepared for the next one. So whenever you are moving back towards the middle of the baseline, we want to be facing forwards, whenever you're moving towards whatever shot you are trying to get to, usually you want to be facing that way. When that wouldn't be the case is when you are moving backwards and you are kind of moving with a side-shuffle type position. So those are all the different possibilities for ground strokes. Let's talk about overheads and I just wrote an article about this-- how to move back for overheads and it's something that rec players usually do very poorly. What you guys don't want to do is use a back-peddle type step to move back for overheads. After you're prepared and you are in your ready position, and your opponent lobs you, it's incredibly important that you use either a side-shuffle or a cross-over step to move back for your overheads. This is a very common mistake and something you guys should absolutely be working on. So if you are right-handed and that lob goes up, get your right foot pivoted back-- that's the first thing that should happen. Get yourself in a square stance and from there either cross over with your left foot going across over in front of your right, and continuing a cross-over like a quarterback going back for a three step drop which is what I wrote about in my article. Or you can just stay lateral-- you don't have to cross your feet over and you can just use a side-shuffle. Just make sure your feet get perpendicular to the net and you are shuffling back and not back-peddling. Back-peddling is pretty much the slowest way you can possibly move across the court and not only that, but I have personally witnessed several times, in fact many times, player's falling backwards over themselves because they are in poor balance as they try to make back for an overhead. Please do not do that. So it's really important that you get into a position where you can either side-shuffle or cross-over to hit that overhead. And lastly, let's talk about volleys and on a volley, you want to cross-over whenever possible which means for a forehand volley, you guys should be stepping across with your left foot to reach for a forehand volley and across with your right foot to reach for a backhand volley. If you have to move multiple steps, then make sure that you turn your body to the side towards the direction that you are trying to cut off that volley-- move there quickly, then just like on a ground stroke, use a combination of either a cross-over step and several shuffle steps, or you can just use shuffle steps if you don't have very far to travel. But make sure that you get back to the center where you are supposed to be for the next shot by moving laterally across the court. Lastly, let's talk about how to practice everything that I've talked about today. Now, some of this may have been review for some of you listening. If you are a 4 or 5 player listening to this Podcast, you probably already know about all the different types of steps I've been talking about and you probably already know about when to use them correctly as well. If you are 2.5 or a 3.0 player, a lot of what I just said is probably new to you and you've got a lot of work to do to catch up in the footwork department. Now I recommend a three step program or a way of practicing in order for you guys to make this a part of your game and if you have to work on all of this, you've got a lot of work to do. If only one or two things sounded new to you that I just talked about, then it should be pretty quick for you to make this part of your game. But the first thing I recommend is shadowing. Basically meaning practicing this without a ball and this can be on a tennis court of not. It doesn't even have to be out on a tennis court. You can do this in your back yard or on your drive way or in the middle of a park as long as you aren't too embarrassed to do it. But I recommend you guys do this and follow the patterns I was talking about on your own. And just kind of get a feel for what the rhythm is like moving between these different types of steps and moving in all these directions that I discussed. And I would take some time, especially from the base-line as this is really where it is important... It's important all over the court but I think where the most different types of steps get used is moving to the right to the left, forwards and backwards as you move along the baseline to hit your ground-strokes, especially in single's play. So I recommend that you practice moving in each of the four main directions-- forwards, backwards, right and left and using the different combination's of different types of steps that I described. Once you really feel like you've got it down and you're using all the different steps correctly without a ball, have a friend of yours feed some shots to you or just toss shots to you. And there is kind of a famous tennis drill called the Spanish Drill that I use when one of my students really needs to work on their footwork and basically I stand on their half of the court, just a couple of feet away from the middle of the baseline with a basket of balls, and I simply toss tennis balls-- I might toss straight out to their right, I might toss straight out to their left, I might toss short to the right, short to the left or I could toss deep behind the baseline to the right or deep behind the baseline to the left. Whichever direction I toss, my student has to use the correct footwork to move to that shot, make their swing, then use their correct footwork to get back to the middle of the baseline again. So this is a controlled environment, I am right in front of my student, I can see what they are doing right and what they are doing wrong. It's not terribly realistic because obviously I'm just tossing the balls underhand and the ball is not flying towards them from the other half of the court. So the way the ball is coming to them is not match-realistic-- it's just a way to really focus on the footwork and nothing else. So that's a great way for you guys to practice with a partner on a tennis court and you are going to need a basket of balls or at least 10 or 12 balls because the idea here is to get them moving and this can be a good way to work on your conditioning and your fitness as well. As well as using all the different types of steps correctly. And the last way to work on this is in a live rally, and I've followed these three steps myself when I teach. I have my students demonstrate to me without a ball at all how to do it correctly, then I'll feed them various types of shots to make sure that they can do it with the ball coming towards them. And then the final way to show me that you really understand what you're doing is to be able to do this in a live rally back and forth in a controlled rally where me and my student are maybe hitting forehands cross-court to each other. And I will mix up my shots-- give them high ones, low ones, and varying degrees of right and left and make them show me that they know how to move their feet correctly. So I would follow those three different ways of working on this footwork to make sure that it is really integrated into your game and that your body is starting to learn it and once you feel like you are doing it automatically, you can go ahead and start using it in match play. Not that you can't go out and play a match right now and hopefully use some of this and have it improve your game, but expect that you're going have to work at this if you aren't already using most of these different footwork already. So that brings the footwork Podcast to an end. Hopefully that wasn't too monotonous for all of you guys-- I went into some detail there and I'm sure I repeated myself a couple of times on some of these different techniques and ways to move your feet, but this stuff is really important and I'm a little surprised that I hadn't done a whole Podcast on footwork before. But this is a good primer for you guys who are just starting off in tennis and really need to know what to do with your feet. And those of you who are experienced already, hopefully there is just a couple of things in there, or different ways of moving your feet in different positions that you hadn't really considered before and you can go ahead and take those one, two, or three different footwork elements and go ahead and put them into your game. But no matter what, as always, I hope this helps you guys improve and that's always my goal with everything I put out on the Podcast. So Carl and [inaudible] backhand on the forums, thank you guys for a great topic and hopefully this helps you guys get better at your game. [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for episode #109 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for joining me on today's show and I hope that it was enjoyable and helpful to you in your game. As always, let me know if you have any questions that you'd like to be answered on the Podcast. My email address is ian@essentialtennis.com. Now in wrapping up today's show, I want to say thank you to several people who have made donations to the Podcast in the last two weeks and I really really appreciate the support of all of you who have made donations-- either one time donations or subscription donations to the website and to the Podcast. You guys are really helping me out a great deal both financially in helping to pay for what I do here at Essential Tennis and also emotionally. It really feels good to know that people out there are appreciating the show enough to make a financial donation. Even a $5 donation shows me that you appreciate it and in return I appreciate that very much. So, let's say thank you to a couple of people here-- First of all Guidare in Texas, I hope I'm pronouncing your name correctly, $20 donation thank you. Ian in Colorado, $60. Gary in Pennsylvania donated $25. Bruce in Florida is a new monthly subscription donor at $5 per month. Kelly in Alabama also a new monthly donor at $5 per month. And then we had three people make their regular monthly donation in the last two weeks-- Steve in North Carolina, $5, Bill in Missouri, $10, and Carlotta in New Jersey, $5. So thank you to all of you guys so much for your donations and if the Essential Tennis Podcast has helped you improve your game, please consider making a donation of any size to the Podcast and I would appreciate that very much. Just go to essentialtennis.com and on the front page in the lower right, there is a button that says 'donate'. Alright, that does it for this week. Thanks very much for joining me. Take care and good luck with your tennis. [music]

Podcast 110: Mental toughness expert David Groemping talks about what steps to take to get yourself out of a slump and start playing good tennis again!

ianw — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 11:44:28 +0000

David Groemping has been a popular guest on the podcast and today he's back to talk about two topics. The first has to do with getting yourself out of a slump in your tennis game, the second is about what to think about during change overs to keep you playing your best tennis. Believe it or not these two topics are very closely related, David explains how in today's show. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Announcer : Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this Podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game. Tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian. Ian : Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by ProTranscript.com which is a provider of Interactive Transcripts, and tennistours.com. Thank you very much for joining me today and I want to let you guys know about a free way that you guys can get some tactical and strategical instruction from myself and Royce, another certified tennis professional who posts at the forums at essentialtennis.com. Next Sat and--actually I'm sorry this coming Sat.-- March 27th at 09:30pm EST we're going to be doing a live video web conference and during that conference I'm going to be playing some singles video from a member of the forums at essentialtennis.com. And, Royce and myself will be going point by point and giving them strategic feedback and instruction. You can watch this for free and get all of the tactical information and advice and instruction that we give. Just send me an email at ian@esentialtennis. Com and I will tell you where you need to go in order to watch this and take part in the strategy session. Again, that's this coming Sat. The 27th. So, shoot me an email and I will tell you what to do to take part in that. Lastly before we get on with the show I want to tell you guys about the winner of the flip cam. That is Gabrielle in Venezuela. He's 8 years old and entered the contest to win that flip cam and his name came up on top of the list. So congratulations to him. I've been emailing back and forth with his father Carlos and I look forward to getting them that camera so they can start using it to improve both of their tennis games. So, congratulations guys. Alright. Let's get going with today's show. Sit back , relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] Ian : My guest today on the Essential Tennis Podcast is mental toughness expert David Grumping. David welcome back to the podcast. David : Thanks Ian. Thanks for having me. It's good to be back. Ian : Yes. I'm glad to have you. I can definitely say without a doubt that some of the most popular shows that I've done on the podcasts so far have had you as a guess. People really enjoy talking about mental toughness topics and how to be better out there on the court and be tougher , not choke, not be anxious, not be nervous, and maybe dealing with a partner, a double partner who is difficult to deal with. These types of topics. Why do you think mental topics are so popular amongst tennis players? Ian : I think one of the reasons is because there's not a lot of access to mental tennis information and training out there. It's really easy to go to the club and get a lesson on your backhand or your footwork. But, it's a little more of a scarcity a short supply of mental tennis stuff. So, and it's also so many people really struggle with it. So, I think it is something that is easily popular because there's not much out there. But, there is a lot of demand. David : Well, I'm really glad I have you back on it. And, those of you listening, David and I have done many shows previously. I think 5 , maybe even 5 or 6 with you guys sign up for the archives at the podcast page at essentialtennis.com. You can find all the previous shows that we've done together and lots of really good topics that we've talked about. And, today the first thing that I want to go over with David is I want to do a little overview of what David is going to be doing in terms of the next Essential Tennis Clinic which is going to be held in Baltimore Maryland on May 28th, 29th and 30th. David is going to be on the court with me helping me teach during that clinic and we're going to be doing an off courts training session as well that's going to feature David doing a mental toughness workshop. So, David why don't you tell us a little bit and give us kind of a little taste of what exactly your going to be talking about to those people who happen to attend the clinic in May? David : Sure. So, the first thing is , what we're going to cover is the foundation for mental toughness. Just like when they start to build the building they put the gurgles in first, and the structure of the building inside the bone. So, that's the first thing we're going to cover. And, just having that, Ive shown just that to people and they've gotten huge amounts of value for their tennis just in terms of even having an idea within a framework for mental toughness. That's the first rule I'm going to lay out for everybody. It's very simple, very easy to understand. I do it with 8 year olds with the framework and they get it easily. So, that's the first aspects. Then, in a lot of the podcasts previously I've talked about nasty benefits like eating a Twinky, junk food that gets us stuck in no mental toughness. Right? Ian : Yes. David : And, so the next piece that I'm going to cover is going over exactly what these nasty benefits are and how they relate to tennis. And, we're going to give a comprehensive outline of them. There are not many of them. And, having that and their tennis for having that in their tool belts to refer to is a huge asset in terms of looking back here and it's wrong, something's not working, looking at these makes a huge difference towards getting yourself unstuck. And, using the Twinkie example again, getting non fat. So from then with the framework and then the nasty benefits what we're going to do. We're actually going to do a not literally but quote unqoute on the court exercise for an area of your tennis where you want to improve an aspect of your mental game. And it, we're going to work with dealing with the nasty benefits and specifically people are going to get a chance to pick an area where they have a complaint in their tennis. And, this can be a complaint regarding a surface. I don't like cheaters. My forehands' bad. I'm in a slump. My second surf's no good. I get distracted when this happens. I don't like the sun. The wind annoys me. Any complaint a tennis player can have. So, we're going to do an exercise to cause a huge gain in this area. Because, when someone has a complaint in an area of their tennis it's next to impossible , it's not impossible to actually cause progress in that area with the complaint still there. So it's an exercise that takes the complaint apart. And, it's very useful and in the end I guarantee , I promise that you'll come out with a whole new game plan that's going to blow you away out of the exercise. Ian : Awesome. David : That's what we're going to cover in the workshop and that's my promise for the people who are there. It's going to be good. I promise , promise, promise. Ian : It better be good David. David : Yes. I know. Ian : Well I"m really excited about the format that I have set up in the morning that Sat the 29th we're going to be doing several hours of on court instruction and we'll going to have lunch together. We're going to get back on the court, do several more hours of on court instruction. Then you're going to do your mental toughness workshop and following that we're going to have a singles and doubles tournament which I did at my first clinic as well which is a lot of fun. Everybody gets to compete and David and I are going to be kind of walking around, doing kind of coaching on the courts. So, I think that having back to back your mental toughness workshop and then going right into some competition and point play is going to be really cool for people to get this focus and information and learn how to be tougher out there and then go right out and practice it with you and I on the courts, there to kind of help them out and guide them through it. So I think it's going to be a huge value for people. David : Yes that's perfect. It's a great opportunity for them to practice what we just went over in the mental toughness workshop. That's great. Ian : Yes. Well, let's get going with some questions from people on the forums. By the way I can't wait for that clinic David I think it's going to be great. By the way there are I think there's 5 spots left at this point. So if you guys are interested in signing up for that clinic and spending time on the courts and off the courts with David and myself, shoot me an email at ian@essentialtennis. Com. Or, just go to essentialtennis.com and click on clinics and there's information on how to sign up right there. Now, we've got 2 questions here from people on the forums for you David, and there are, David told me before the show started that they are closely related. So, I'm going to go ahead and read both of them. The first one is from BB in North Carolina and she wanted David to talk about how to keep intensity and focus up when you're in a slump, when you're in kind of a down section of time in your game. Also, Mark in San Diego said that he would like recommendations for what to do and what to think about during change overs. He said this is probably different for singles versus doubles but, he wants to know what to do during change overs. Now, I am not quite sure how those are related, but David I'm looking forward to seeing how they're connected. David : Sure. So with our mental tennis, It really depends a lot on what we're focused on. It's pretty much what the crux of when you get deep down to it, your mental game is good if you focus on something really useful and powerful. And, it's not going to be that great on something that's not. So, there's always a choice that you have to make minute by minute of what you're going to be focusing on. A lot of times we get on the court and we kind of go on to auto pilot with our minds and our focus and that's actually the opposite of what you want to do. It takes a huge amount of mental effort to really stay in this zone and stay mentally tough throughout a match. And, part of that is constantly choosing to be mentally tough or not be mentally tough. And, you deal with that choice every minute. It's very broad and general choosing to be mentally tough or not mentally tough and there are all kinds of new answers and specifics to go along with that. But, in the end you have, there's a choice to have an intention to win which is what I would call be mentally tough. Or, a choice to be in a trap. And, one of the traps could be complaining to yourself. A lot of times players will complain to themselves during a match, which is what we'll cover in the clinic. But, it also causes slumping and it's something that you may be, may be really useful during a changeover. That's the broader part this. So, getting down to the specifics to keep up the intensity and focus in a slump it first takes getting out of the slump. And, this relates over changeover. If you're in a slump or if your at a changeover and it's going badly there's a really useful tool that I recommend and it's really asking yourself what are the facts here. It's going over the facts , I'll get into what I mean by that in a second. It's a really useful way to get yourself up out of the muck of no mental toughness. You know what I'm talking about here, right? Ian : I'm very familiar with muck yes. David : Me too. So, it's asking a simple question, getting simple answers to yourself here. What are the facts here? It's a great way to get up out of the muck. The facts could be what the score is. I'm not hitting my forehand how I want to. My first serve is going in well. It's sunny out. I'm playing on clay. Those can all be examples of facts. In doing this you really want to be aware and promise me you're not keeping interpretation in here with asking what the facts are. So, an example of having an interpretation in there would be my forehand's really bad today. Or, my player's really, the other guy's really annoying. Those are not facts. Those are things mixed with interpretation. That actually will not have you, that will have you get deeper into the muck. Ian : Those are opinions basically. David : Right. Yes. You want to keep your opinion out of it with this. And, you want to get very black and white. What are the facts? It's something that a dog doesn't have opinions would be able to see. Right? If I had a dog and stuff. Anyway, Something to do over changeovers and to use when you're in a slump is to figure out what are the facts here. It's very sobering once you really get to it. That's the first step. Then what's really useful, and I talked about a second ago is you're always choosing. You always have a choice. An intention to win and mental toughness or complaining or being in a slump. Whatever your focus is that's keeping you in a slump. Once you really get to the facts, it's a choice of what's my game plan. I'm going to stuck back with my game plan. Or I'm really focused on being aggressive today. I'm going to go focus on that again. The chances are if you're in a slump or if you are at change or it's not going well your focus got derailed somewhere. This is a really useful and simple tool set to get you back on track and be mentally tough. You just have to use it. Ian : So it's kind of just a matter of taking a step back, I guess, and looking at the big picture, and saying this is true. This is true. This is true. And, then looking at those things as a whole and kind of picking the most worthwhile one ? David :I mean you don't even have to pick one of the worthwhile ones. One of the worthwhile facts, you could come up with I'm playing on clay. The score is 5 - 2. And, it's sunny today. And just really focusing on that will give you the opportunity to regain and then chose again what you're actually going to focus on. Like I remember today I was actually going to focus on breaking the person's back hand out. Ian : So the main thing here is to get our minds off of our own, I guess, opinions or subjective thoughts? David : Exactly. Or, pull yourself out of the muck of the complaint that you have or your opinion about your opponent or even your double's partner. It's a quick and simple and easy technique to have you do that. Ian : I've got a question about something that you said when you were kind of setting this up. You made the statement that good mental toughness, or I guess mental play, why you're playing tennis is not something you can do on autopilot. It takes mental effort. Now, is this something that we can practice kind of like a good forehand stroke technique? Is this something we can practice enough times that maybe eventually it could be on autopilot? Or, is this just something that's always going to take, I guess, conscious effort? David : Yes. So, that's a really good question. In a lot of podcasts that I referred to is the mental toughness muscle. Right? And, it's just like you have endurance for our fitness in a tennis match. Your body gets tired or your body stays energetic. It's the same thing with your mental toughness muscle. And, practicing it in matches and in competitions and competent settings is an opportunity to grow that muscle and grow your mental toughness endurance. So, the stronger you can get that muscle the easier it is to be mentally tough quicker , be mentally tough for longer periods of time. So it's something that takes building. But, once you're stronger at it, it gets easier and easier. But, it always will take focus and intention to be mentally tough. Unfortunately it doesn't ever get super easy. If it was super easy then everybody would do it. Ian : Yes. I think that's really important to point out. It's not going to, can we kind of look at this in the same way as good stroke technique where it's kind of a one in a million shot that you're just going to walk out on to the court and just do it right the first time? David : Absolutely. Ian : I don't mean to discourage anybody out there. I mean let's be honest--the technique part of it is tough and if you don't have somebody guiding you along the correct path then just figuring it out and just doing it the most efficient way is something that takes a lot of natural talent and ability. Do people have that chance of having natural ability of being mental tough as well? Is it kind of the same thing as physical talent? David : I mean, Yes everybody has their own natural and self developed aptitudes and skill and mental toughness as is. And, it's an area that can always be developed. You can look at it like I think a really good analogy would be really good athleticism. If you're naturally athletic, then you may be able to pick up tennis a little easier. Some people have a natural aptitude towards mental toughness. You may be able to pick it up a little easier. However, I don't want anybody to get discouraged. Maybe you don't think you have a natural aptitude for anything. With mental toughness you can, you just have to work at it and I guarantee, I've seen people who have turned around from awful in terms of a mental game. They just put in the effort and work that it took , and if we think about it, how much time do we spend working on our stroke production? How much guidance do we get on that? 100's right? Ian : Yes. David : And then mostly how much effort and attention do we put on our mental game? Not that much. Right? Ian : Yes. David : And the way I break down the areas and other people have different break downs, that's fine. But, the way I break it down is simple for developing your overall ability to win. It's a circle that's divided into 3 slices like a pizza. So in one sector there's your skills, your stroke production, how well you move your feet. Things like that, your skill. Then you've got your fitness in another. And, at last your mental toughness. A lot of people work on all of them a lot except the mental toughness aspect. So in working with the mental toughness and growing that muscle and practicing it and doing the exercises that we've laid out a lot, here in the podcast it's an opportunity to grow your overall ability to win and practice and area that very few people do grow . Ian : Good stuff. Let's get back to how that relates to keeping intensity when you're in a slump and you said first of all you have to have the intention to win. We want to find out what are the facts. Be objective in our thinking. Then, remind yourself of what you wanted to work on that day or I guess what your focus is tactically. Was there any other steps after that? David : Yes. So, there are no more really steps to take but I want to tie it all together a little bit more. And, the ability to which you can maintain your intensity and your ability to which you can get yourself out of a slump is directly proportional to how strong your mental toughness muscle is and how practiced it is. So, to keep up the intensity and something to do when you're at a changeover and it's going well, is it's a little bit different. So, when you're at a changeover and you want to keep up the intensity, or you're not even at a changeover, the first thing, a huge factor, is to pat yourself on the back. Look how good I"m doing. Give yourself a little bit of a break from exercising the muscle and really focusing on it and putting intention on your mental toughness. That's always a trap. It happens quite a bit. That is one thing to avoid first. Ian : Yes. It's tempting isn't it? I mean you may be at a break or at 3-0 in the first seven and you're like, 'Man, I'm doing awesome. ' David : Right. Yes. You're great. It's going to be like nothing. It's going to be easy. This all goes back, I remember we had a podcast a long time ago to how to avoid choking. It's all the same thing really. And, it's the same thing with thinking you're doing well on the court really. So, what you want to do is to occupy your mind and not give yourself a break when it's going well over a changeover and to keep up the intensity. You want to, one thing that's really useful is to talk with yourself about what's working in an objective manner. Well, what's working? I'm moving my feet well and I'm really focusing on tumbling the guys back hand and I'm focused on being aggressive with my serve. Great. That way you know what to keep up. I talk to a lot of players who their on a changeover and man I'm doing awesome this is great, I'm in the zone , and I'm like that's great what are you focusing on to have that happen? They're like I have no idea. Then they don't have as much access as they could to keeping in the zone. And, getting it back once their out. Because they don't know what to actually focus on. That gets back to you have to choose what to focus on. If you don't know what to choose, you can't choose. Your mind will choose for you and that's actually a very dangerous practice. Ian : I want to get more into that but, first I want to remind listeners of my sponsor of the podcast which is tennistours. Com . They sell ticket packages and along with accommodation to all of the grand slams and all of the other ATP Masters 1000 events. The next one coming up actually is in Miami, the Sony Ericson Open. If you guys go to tennistours.com you can check out all the different packages they have. Everything from, basically every possible price point they have from luxury boxes to just regular ground passes and when you guys use the promotional code Essential with a capital E, that's Essential with a capital E , you guys will get a $25 discount off of any purchase that you make at tennistours.com. So, definitely go check that out and thank them for their support of the Essential Tennis Podcast by purchasing your tickets through them whenever you guys go to professional events which are definitely awesome for you guys to go check out as you continue to improve your game. Now, let's keep talking about being in the zone. I find it really interesting because that was kind of a really big buzz word or phrase a couple of years ago. And, I am sure it still is, is how can I get in the zone? I find that interesting that so many times when players are interviewed after an obviously incredible match for them and they get asked about that, they don't really seem to have any meat to whatever they're talking about. It's just like you were saying, it's the player you were talking about that they were in the zone and then you say why and it's like,'I have no idea but it's awesome. It's fun'. Then before you know it they kind of come crashing down in the next couple of games or maybe the next match after being in the zone. How likely is it that we can actually find a certain thing or maybe a grouping of things that when we focus on it, it gets us more likely to be really focused like that? David : One of the cool things I should mental toughness is that it gives you an opportunity to choose if you're going to be in the zone or not and get better and better at getting yourself in the zone when you want to. In the likelihood on your own of doing that is slim. But, just like if you practice a really great inside out forehand. You practice and you practice and you practice and the more you do it, the more likely that it is that you're going to be able to nail it more consistently in a match. So, the more you practice your mental toughness and really practice the tools that we've been going over in podcasts and even Ian the more amount of training you can get, especially at getting deeper in the mental toughness training like we're going to, I don't mean to selfishly plug here but in the workshop. The more you can get tools like that and use those tools, the more you're going to be able to get yourself in the zone when you want to and need to. Does that answer the question there? Ian : Yes. Definitely. I think that should be really encouraging to people listening that you guys have a chance if you focus on the right things and in the right ways to be in the zone or be really focused and play in your best mode, more and more often. I think that should really make you guys excited out there that with the right information, how fun would that be to be able to go out there and figure out how to play to your peak? Even just a little bit more often than now and if you can double it that would be incredible. This is such good information. Now, I want you to tie this together and you've kind of made some small connections here and there about talking during changeovers. And, I'm starting to see how this fits in now. But, can you tie what you're talking into what Mark in San Diego asked about what to talk about during changeovers? David : Yes. So with singles, if you feel like it's not going well, with singles you want to do , you want to go over what the facts are and then remind yourself what the strategy is. I talked about it pretty extensively about a minute ago. Shall I elaborate on that? There's not a whole lot more to cover with that one. Ian : No. Yes. I think you got that. David : If it's going well, again, there's that trap of this is awesome. I'm doing really well. This is in the bag. This guy's got nothing. It's going to be easy. So, you want to avoid that trap over. The thing about changeover is it's good and it's bad. It's good because you can rest. You can regroup. You can talk to yourself. But, it's also bad because you can talk to yourself. And a lot of times when we're just sitting there on our own our thoughts starts to run rampant a little bit and it's actually very easy to get caught in the mental toughness trap. One thing to really, I think have the gain is to occupy your mind so it doesn't mess you over. So, we can all think of a time when all of a sudden a thought hit us and we get really nervous before a match. All of a sudden a though hit us and then the match goes to pack. So, part of it is occupying your mind so those don't happen. Right? You want to really go over it's going well. Thank yourself. What's working now? What am I doing well? What am I focused on? Then you really want to remind yourself and make sure that you're still focused on what it's been that's had you do so well up to now. Ian : So be specific it sounds like is a key thing here? David : Yes. So, if I'm in a changeover and it's going well I can think well I'm making the guy run around a lot and I'm playing really aggressively off the ground. So that's what's working. Great. What am I going to keep focusing on? I'm going to take it to the next level on being aggressive. So, that would be one thing you do over a changeover. This is something and it's really the only difference between singles and doubles here, is you can with doubles you can do it out loud. Ian : I suppose you could in singles there. [laughter] David : And you want to, this is something back from the doubles podcast that we did in December, that the good thing about having a doubles partner is that you have someone to work with and talk with about this stuff. And, someone to remind you that what are you focusing on right now. It's really useful. I mean there are also plenty of pit falls too. But, with doubles on a changeover talk with your partner. What's working right now. What are we doing poor? What am I doing poor? What are you doing? Alright we're going to keep focusing on it. You can talk each other up. Then there are all kinds of, I don't know how much I want to get into it if one player is playing well and one player is playing badly. I know that was one of the questions on the forums but, I think we covered a lot of that in the last [inaudible] podcast. So it's kind of redundant. Ian : Yes we did. Well, let's go ahead and just wrap everything up. We've just got a couple of minutes left. But yes, listeners please go check out our previous shows if you haven't already. We've gone over so many different topics. And, it's just really good information. So just check out the podcast archives at essentialtennis.com. Let's go ahead and just kind of put a bow around all of this and kind of bring it all together if you will David. David : Yes. Absolutely. So, in the workshop we're going to be doing a really powerful and useful exercise on handling complaints, which is one of the main aspects and things that have you get in a slump and playing badly. You're not only going to get to handle a complaint right there live and it cause your mental toughness to go to a new level, but you're going to get the tools to do it for future complaints. Alright? In terms of what we talked about today, something that causes slumps or being stuck in complaints or some other stuff too , complaints are a huge player in that. So, what we're going to be doing in the workshop is going to be huge for not only giving you tools to get out of a slump, but also I keep saying at the end think about what you're going to focus on. You're going to come up with a killer game plan that's going to really blow you away, in the workshop in Baltimore. And, that's something that you can use from then on to focus on that's really going to have you be in the zone and be mentally tough. And all of that supports having and focusing on an intention to win which really is what mental toughness is in the long run. Ian : Awesome. Alright. Well, David thank you very much for your time. Thank you for doing another episode with me. We put a lot of stuff out there and I think it's really cool how we continue to have new questions and we kind of rehash certain topics and things that we've gone over in other shows. But, it's kind of fun seeing how it pertains to different circumstances and singles and doubles and kind of our tennis games in general. So, thanks so much for coming back on the show. Before you leave please tell us where we can find you online. David : Yes, absolutely. It's www.Sports.Gemexecoach.com Ian : One more time. David : Yes. www.sports.Gemexecoach.com Ian : Great. Well, I look forward to doing the clinic with you in May. Those of you listening who are interested in spending a weekend with David and myself please shoot me an email or check out the clinic's page at essentialtennis.com. David thank you again. It's been great talking to you. I look forward to spending some more time with you on the show again in the near future. David : Yes it's going to be great. I really look forward to the clinic too. People who already signed up and people who are looking to sign up it will change your game I promise, I hope we see you people out there. In huge numbers. [music] [music] [music] Ian : Alright our message for this episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast episode 110. Thank you very much for joining me today and hopefully my conversation with David has been helpful to you. I want to do some shout outs now to a couple of really important people this past week that donated to Essential Tennis and to the podcast to help support everything that I do on the website. First of all, Cheng in Massachusetts $15. Chris in Texas $20. John in California $10 donation. Gary in Florida $50 donation. Calvin in California $5. And, Kimberley in Texas began a $5 per month subscription donation. So, thank you to all of you guys very much. And you know what? I really appreciate all of these people a lot. I've decided that every week I'm going to give a free Essential Tennis shirt to the person who donates the highest amount. The highest single amount. That means that this week my first week, Gary in Florida you're going to receive a free Essential Tennis shirt. I want to show my appreciation to you guys for your support. That goes for next week and every week here on out. If you donate the most that given week for the podcast then I will send you guys a free shirt. Thank you guys so much for your support. If you're listening and the podcast has helped improve your game please consider sending a donation to Essential Tennis. It does not have to be very much to help. Just go to essentialtennis.com and on the front page on the bottom right there's a box that says donate. So, thank you very much. Alright. That does it for this week. Thanks again for joining me. Take care. And, good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast 111: Is there an unwritten rule about hitting at the female in a mixed doubles match? Find out when Jason and Ian discuss.

ianw — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 13:15:04 +0000

In today's podcast my guest is tennis professional Jason Cole. Together we discuss three listener questions. The first has to do with choking up on your handle, should you be doing this on any of your tennis shots? Next we discuss strategies to use in a mixed doubles match including whether or not to hit towards the woman frequently. Lastly we talk about serve development, should you work on your spin serve or flat serve first? Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love Tennis and want to improve your game this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian. Ian : Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by the interactive transcript provider, ProTranscript.com and TennisTours.com. Today before we get started I want to tell you guys about something I'm doing with Will of fuzzyyellowballs.com. Which by the way, is an excellent source for tennis instruction all in video format. And, I just started putting out some amazing videos from Indian Wells. So, go check out his website if you haven't already. But he and I during the men's final of the Sony Ericson Open, which is in Miami, being played right now, he and I are going to be doing a live webcast. And, we're going to be doing commentary during the men's final of the Sony Ericson Open. We did this during the Australian Open Final. It was a lot of fun. And, we're looking forward to doing it again. So you can watch us do that live. It's going to be a video commentary. Watch us do that live during the , again the men's final. Just by going to fuzzyyellowballs. Com and the stream is going to be up on his website. I think it's going to be up on essentialtennis. Com as well. But, I'm not positive on that yet. So, definitely check those both out. Alright. Let's go ahead and get to today's show. Sit back. Relax and get ready for some tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] Ian : My Guest today on the Essential Tennis Podcast is past team mate and Jason and I went to college together as well. But, Jason Cole is our guest today who's been on the show before but it's been a little while. Jason welcome back to the show. Jason : Thanks buddy, good to be here. Ian : Yes it's nice to have you back. It's a shame that we kind of seem to go long periods of time before having you back on, but I know that you have a busy schedule with your golf game and all. Jason : Mondays are for golf. I tried to avoid that. I can't get away from it. Ian : No problem. I understand. It's always good to get away from Tennis. At least a little bit during the week. And, kind of think about other stuff. Jason : Yes no doubt. -- Ian : Well, we've got 3 listener questions that we're going to be talking about today. None of them really having to do a lot about technique, but it's just kind of topics that I thought Jason and I could have good conversations about. And, hopefully help you guys out and give you some ideas on how you can improve in these various parts of tennis. -- And, our first question today comes from Thomas in Germany and he puts himself down as a 4.0 player. Thomas wrote and said, '... I have a question. How far up should you actually hold your racket? Where is the budcap supposed to be on the hillpad between the hillpad and the index knuckle? Or even somewhere else? Thanks a lot. Thomas. ' Well, Jason I'll kind of throw that out to you first and then we'll see what kind of thoughts you have on that and I'll put in my two cents to. What do you think? Jason : I have 2 thoughts. The 1st one is whatever feels comfortable. But, the 2nd one is and probably more importantly your using the long adult racket for a reason. To give yourself extra lenght. Most players have a bit of their hand hitting the opposite direction when hitting with it. I'm not sure that I've seen too many people at all play with their entire hand up above the budcap of the racket. So, I would say that if things are going awry, you might decide to choke up just a bit. I would do that as a last resort. Try and use the advantage of the longer racket as much as you can. Ian : Yes. A lot of time choking up a little bit can kind of give players a feel that they're in better control of what the racket is doing. And, that's true because it's a shorter tool at that point. So it kind of allows you to move it around more easily. However, what Jason is saying is absolutely correct. When you use a shorter racket you've got less leverage essentially. You have less force over the ball when you accelerate the racket and swing towards it. And so, I agree. I think probably the lower the better. As long as it's comfortable as Jason also said. I think the exception to this may be a twohanded backhand. I think in general twohanded backhand players tend to be a little bit higher up with their as compared to a forehand. Where as you said Jason, essentially every good upper level player that I have seen hit a forehand, the heal of the hand is mostly off of the racket completely. What are your thoughts on that? I know that you have a twohanded backhand. Is your bottom hand, your right hand a little higher on your backhand than it is on your forehand? Jason : Maybe just a little but, not really. Because twohanded's are already giving up the extra reach because they're primarily hitting the righthanded forehand. So, the more you give up, I mean you don't want to handicap yourself. In my opinion twohanded backhands are far superior than one handed. But, as you start using a ping pong paddle you're really giving up a little bit too much. So I don't think that would be necessary. If anything, if you can have that left hand down well on this two handed backhand so that you're still getting the reach. Ian : I think that more or less wraps up that topic. Anything else to talk about as it pertains to that? Jason : Not really. I mean the leverage and the distance is there for a reason. That's why there was such a big deal made when long bodied rackets came out. Because it did give you an advantage. So, it would be kind of silly to steal that from you myself. Ian : Alright. Well, Thomas hopefully that's helpful to you. Basically what Jason and I are saying is, allow your hand to go down on the racket. Maybe even off a little bit at the bottom. As long as it's comfortable to you. I like what Jason said. Maybe if you're having a period of time where a certain stroke is really off. Maybe choke up a little bit to give yourself some more control and kind of get back into it again. But, the longer the racket that you have, the more leverage that you're going to get. So, I like how Jason is kind of saying don't cheat yourself and choke up too much. Alright. Let's move on to Jason in Illinois who's a 3.5 player. And this is going to be an interesting tactical discussion having to do with doubles. And mixed doubles specifically. It's got a little bit longer of a question. So, bare with me here for a second. He wrote in and said, '... My wife and I recently played in a mixed doubles tournament. I am a 3. 5 level and my wife is probably around a 3. 0. We did well, advancing to the semis before losing in 2 close sets. However I found mixed doubles to be both frustrating and maddening. As our opponents continually found ways to hit only to my wife. She did well and held her own hitting back 5 or 6 vows in a row on a few points. But, eventually got worn down. I found myself standing there as a spectator during most points looking for an opportunity to jump in and pouch. But, couldn't as my wife doesn't hit very hard. Leaving my side of the court exposed when I try to pouch. In one match we tried the I formation and forced them to hit returns down the wine against my wife's serve. Giving me a better chance to pouch. Out of frustration I also started blasting returns at the net player which made it harder for them to hit a good reply towards my wife. These 2 tactics helped us win a match. So I'm wondering if there are any other strategies we could employ. During the entire tournament I think my wife hit 4 times as many shots as I did and probably 5 times as many in the semi final that we lost. I believe we could have won if I could have found a way to contribute more during the match. ' I think that's a really good question, well thought out. And, it sounds like Jason and his wife did try a couple of different variations on their strategy and tactics to try to make things a little bit more even. But, this is a great question. Not only for mixed doubles, but for doubles in general when you are playing with somebody who's significantly weaker than you are. Or, when you're the person who's kind of the weakest on the courts and your opponents are trying to pick on you. So, Jason what are your initial thoughts here? What could they have done to maybe have a little more advantage out there on the court? Jason : Okay. Well I have a few first things. When you're playing regular doubles as apposed to mixed it's a lot harder to see one man and say he's probably weaker than the other. But, when you step on the court for mixed doubles everybody just assumes that the woman is weaker, whether that's true or not. So, it's definitely, I would say, good strategy by your opponents. They should be hitting to your wife who is weaker. Good job by your wife making 4 or 5 volleys. You definitely need to be pouching more. And, this is something that I really stress in all doubles. But, in mixed doubles you really just can't avoid it. And that they're hitting to your wife, assuming they know where she is standing. You can't have her standing there. She's got to be moving or you've got to be moving in front to make it a lot smaller of a target. If you camp out on your side and she's camping out on her side then any 3. 0 level player should be able to hit it to her repeatedly. That just shouldn't be the case. If you watch professional level mixed doubles the woman is always moving. The man's always standing in front of the woman. There's a reality where it's 4 or 5 shots by the woman in a row. That's something that's better for work and better strategy effort that you can really get away from. I've heard not only you said you did the I formation which is good but you don't always force them to hit it down the line. She can go down the line. She can go across court. They should have a 50-50 gap of where it's returning. Whether it's going to her or you. And, the same should be happening when she's serving , when you're serving. It really doesn't matter. Ian : Yes, and Jason said that he tried to pouch or at least thought about it however, he was really worried about leaving the court open behind him and Jason say advance as a doubles player. This is a fear that eventually you're going to have to get rid of, is being worried about being caught down the line. And, especially when you're trying to kind of make up for a partner who's weaker. Whether it's your wife who happens to be at a lower level than you or anybody else for that matter. When you're the net player and your partner is back, or starting back. You need to play a really strong supportive role out there as a net player. And, you really should be dictating play as the net player. And, Jason mentions making the returning essentially you have to guess and kind of figure out. Alright, where am I going to have to hit this return in order to avoid Jason up there at the net? Because, he's, I don't know where the heck he's going at this point. And, you want to disrupt that returner or that server as much as possible and just make things miserable for them. And, that means that you probably will get caught a hand full of times with them hitting down the line. But, that's a tougher shot to hit anyway. So you should really be disrupting and making their life miserable as much as you can. And, it kind of takes some trust in yourself and it takes confidence in yourself to kind of just go and leave your comfort zone and cut over to your wife's side of the courts or whomever else you're playing with. But, that's absolutely something you should get comfortable with. Jason : You should also be giving signals. So, if I stand at the net and I tell you I'm going to pouch if they hit the ball down the line you'd better be there. You knew I was pouching and I'm going to be a cross defender. So, if you're not getting to cover that line you're failing there. It shouldn't just be that they hit me down the line. I lose now. You can feel free to be a maverick and give it that shot every once in a while but, that there's no way you should just be getting beat repeatedly down the line just because your wife or whoever else should be there. They know it's coming. Ian : That's a great point. You guys should be talking between every single point and working these things out. Sometimes maybe you'll plan to stay and the return is going to be within your reach. In which case you should just go and kind of be , if I can use the word maverick there. Jason that's all. Sometimes you have the opportunity to just cross and it wasn't planned. But, you guys should also be planning those types of switches and movements all the time so that you really keep your opponents guessing. Something else I had thought of Jason, is maybe playing double back. What do you think about that? Jason : I mean, I inherently hate that idea. If you're playing somebody who's decent at the net, then you're really putting yourself at a disadvantage. Because if you play double back you cannot step in front of your wife. That's ridiculous. So it's really easy just to give the ball to her. That's assuming on a serve. On a return if you're playing double back versus somebody who's really crush and serves at your wife and she can't handle it, that's certainly more acceptable to try and get in the points. But again, I wouldn't just go to that. Most woman , as I said, obviously I don't know Jason's wife. Most woman are pretty capable returners. That's usually not where their weakness lies. So, it's not something I love. Ian : Fair enough. I mean don't get me wrong. It's not something that would be my first choice either. You know how much I love to come to the net. But, I guess if all else fails Jason you could try that and essentially just play defense and maybe play for, hopefully a good lab hit by one of you 2. Or, a well hit ground stroke that gets down low to your opponents and give you guys a chance to move back in together. But I think that should be the last ditch effort more of less to just give up the net and go back. Jason : Well you do have another excellent point in that it does depend on the level. Not a lot of 3.0, 3. 5 women can put overheads away. So if you start back and just start lobbing the women, it's really tough for a 3.0, 3. 5 women to put overheads away consistently. So that's not a terrible strategy. Usually though, you get a little better and the women get a little better-- can't rely on that quite as much. Ian : Sure. Jason : But you still can use it. Ian : Just one other thing I had for an idea of what they could do better-- what about picking out the weaker player on the other side of the court and having a plan between the both of them-- both Jason and his wife... Anytime that we have a choice with a shot, to hit to one player or another, assuming that they are kind of in an dual positions on the court in terms of being offensive or in a defensive position. Do you think they should direct as many shots as possible towards the weaker player on the other side to kind of give them a taste of their own medicine? Jason : Without question. In mixed doubles, there is women to women rallies until the man can step over and do something. Not meaning to sound condescending, but that is how it should go. There is no way that any woman should try to take on the man unless it's well determined that that man is weaker then his partner. So that's really not often the case. It should go man hits it to the woman, woman pops it to the woman and they rally it out until somebody can do something a little bit better. - But yeah absolutely. His wife should just pick out the female on their team and assuming she's not trying a really difficult shot, put it over to her every time. Ian : In all fairness to the ladies out there, I would like to point out that what you are describing definitely takes place more often in upper level high competitive tournaments -- 5. 0 and above type level. Where it is kind of a given that the two women are the weaker of the two players. I mean Jason's describing himself as a 3. 5, his wife is a 3. 0 and at the club level, having a man and a woman on the court-- I guess in general you could say that the man should be stronger but it doesn't always necessarily mean that when you are playing a club match. Jason : Yeah that's true. I guess I'm just making that inference if your situation is reversed, then [inaudible] I guess. Ian : Alright. Any other thoughts of ideas on that situation Jason? Jason : No. The only tough thing is if you are the guy picking on their women over and over it's really a morally tricky thing to do for sure. But your wife should have no problem doing that and she needs to if you want to be successful. Ian : That's an interesting topic. Let's talk about that briefly. Is there an unwritten rule or you said moral obligation for the man to not hit to the women a lot. What have you noticed across different levels? I guess ranging from club all the way up through professional mixed doubles? Are there unwritten rules or is it completely fair game to just go towards the weaker player if it happens to be the woman. Jason : I want to say there are unwritten rules, but they sure get broken a lot. I've played several [inaudible] tournaments and I had a really strong partner-- she was a national champion a couple years in a row. But she still just got picked off right and left by certain teams and it depends how bad the guy on the other team wants to win in a lot of cases. So I guess there is not really unwritten rules. Obviously if you have an absolute put away and she turns her back, you shouldn't try to hit her but unfortunately other than that, most people don't seem to care which is not how I feel but it is the case. Ian : Well my thoughts are personally is that at the club level if you are out playing at your local club or your local park or public courts, I don't think that's the time or the place to really make one person feel really singled out and abused on the court. I just don't think it's worth getting people angry over. And some people-- there are some women out there who don't care. And they are going to say you know what? If my partner is stronger than me, then absolutely, you should be hitting at me. But other times they are not going to appreciate that. I think unless you have a prior knowledge of your opponent and you know that the woman is OK with it, I think that in a recreational match, it's not something that is a good idea. Nothing good is going to come of it essentially. Maybe once in a while they aren't going to mind, but the times when they do mind, you are definitely not going to make any friends out there. However, in a prize money tournament, I'm a little surprised to hear you think that there still should be an unwritten rule there Jason and like you were talking about actually playing for money. Isn't that just kind of good tactics to go towards somebody who is a little weaker on the other team? I guess it is. And there was a couple times when there was several thousand dollars on the line, I just couldn't bring myself to do it. And I would say that probably 70% of the guys out there are in the same boat where they just-- you know you hit for the women and you go for the right shot, but you won't just abuse her like we are speaking of. And there is probably 25-30% of the guys who just don't care. And I can tell you that my partner , although she was a phenomenal tennis player, absolutely hated those guys who just went to her with ever single ball no matter what. That did not go over well. Ian : I think that's probably a really important distinction to make. There are times in most doubles points where a certain player who is a position of offense and has the opportunity to do something offensive with the ball, there is always going to be situations where tactically it just makes the most sense to go in X place on the court regardless of who is standing there. If you have an overhead or an easy volley and you have the choice between a player behind the baseline and a player who is on the service line, whether it's the man or the woman, it just makes sense to go to the direction of who is closest to you not to hit at them, to hit towards the person who has the least amount of time to react. So I think it's important to point out that there is a difference between going towards to woman in that situation and just going towards the woman on any single ball possible. And just overtly, I guess kind of being a dick about it. There is a big difference between those two things isn't there? Jason : A huge difference. I've definitely hit around with my fair share of women, but it's with balls that make sense. It's not every single return. It's not every single volley. It's not every single overhead. It's more towards points that make sense and obviously there is some strategy in trying to win so it's not like I'm picking on the guy, but yeah, there is a big difference between hitting 97% of your shots to one person no matter what and just being smart. Ian : Good discussion. This is the first time actually that a mixed doubles question has come up on the Podcast. I wanted to kind of get that out in the air a little bit and I'd be curious to see what listeners think about that. Send me an email this week guys and tell me what your opinions are on I guess what the protocol should be in those situations. Now before we get to our last question I want to tell you guys briefly about our sponsor at the Essential Tennis Podcast and that is TennisTours.com. Since 1987, they've been putting together ticket packages to professional tennis events including all of the grand slams and most of the ATP 1000 events. If you are going to watch professional players play, whether it's WTA or ATP which is an amazing experience, please check out TennisTours. Com to see what they offer and very often for most of these events, they offer lots of different options in terms of the quality of seats, you can get luxury suites, you can get individual tickets, grounds passes. All kinds of different options as far as exactly how close you want to get to the action. And they also offer packages along with hotels and accommodations. So you can get everything in one place. Now if you use the promotional code 'Essential' as you check out, you'll receive a $25 discount off your purchase. So please show them your appreciation for their sponsorship of the essential tennis podcast by purchasing your tickets through them the next time you go to a professional event. And they have tickets for the Sony Ericcson Open if you guys happen to be heading out there to see them play. Also the French Open and all kinds of other different events. So again, TennisTours. Com, use the promotional code 'Essential' when you checkout and I thank them very much for their support of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Now we've got one more question to get to. So let's shift gears a little bit and this comes from Adrian in the Philippines. He's a 3. 5 player. He wrote to me and said 'basically, I don't know what kind of serve I should be practicing. I already have reliable, moderately paced ground strokes and can place them but I'm struggling with my serve. I'm 5'7 tall and I can't do flat serves. I'm now trying to put more pace on my slice serve which is my best first serve now in terms of reliability although it doesn't go in as much as I'd like it to. All in all, I would very much appreciate your advice on how I should progress with my serve practice. For now, I am just looking for a decent first and second serve to get me through my matches. So what do you think about that Jason? Jason : Well a couple things pop into my head. For one, saying that you can't do flat serves, I have to wonder why. Ian : I agree. Jason : I just can't think of a good reason. If your arm hurts, that means that you are doing it wrong. I can't think of a good reason that you say you can't do flat serves other than you don't know how and you should probably check out the website a bit and learn to [inaudible] and do a flat serve because those are really quite important. Wouldn't you say? Ian : Yeah. Absolutely. Although on the other side of the coin, I would say that at his level, in my opinion, typically I'm trying to get students to learn how to have a good, reliable, I guess aggressive spin serve first that they can be really confident with and accelerate at. But eventually, having a flat serve is definitely something that you guys listening are going to want to develop at some point. And Adrian throws in their his height, and I think he's using that as his reason. He says he's 5'7 and can't do flat serves and that is an excuse for having a flat serve. I've known plenty of people shorter than you who have a good flat serve. So that's not a reason why. It has more to do with mechanics and technique like Jason was talking about. That being said, I think he should probably develop his spin serve first. What do you think about that Jason? Jason : I kind of tend to go a different way from most people when I try to teach people serves, I like them to try and figure out how they are manipulating the ball more so than [inaudible] making the ball. So if he already knows how to hit a slice serve, so he's hitting around the right side of the ball just fine. He should be able to [inaudible] wrists over and hit through the middle of the ball. And he should be able to drop the racket head down and hit up with the side of his racket over the ball for a kick. I traditionally will teach people all three serves at the same time so that when they hit something, they can feel what they did-- whether it's on purpose or an accident. And then progress from there and it's, in my opinion, it's way easier to learn that way than just trying to hit once serve and figuring it out from there. - My advice would be figure out how you are manipulating the ball, watch the way it bounces, listen to the sound that it makes. Check out how hard it is. All of those are clues to what just happened and then figure out ways to manipulate your racket differently to create all three serves. And for sure, your height means nothing as far as not being able to hit a flat serve. Ian : There was a player when Jason and I were at Ferris State, there was a player who played on the women's team and her nickname was 5'1 which was her height. And she had a pretty big serve as far as the women's team was concerned. She had one of the better serves on the team. So her height did not hold her back at all. And I'm able to hit a pretty decent flat serve on my knees as well. So the height definitely doesn't have a whole lot to do with it. Jason : If I was teaching somebody and he had a slice serve and wanted to learn others, the big thing that I would try to make points of is to just move your racket around the ball and hit it differently and figure out which spin you've just created and move on that way. There is no good reason why you can't teach himself how to do kick serves by watching videos and reading and just paying attention to what he has done for the ball. Ian : Alright, good stuff. And with that we're going to wrap it things up. And I want to thank the people who have submitted questions for today's show. Adrian in the Philippines, Jason in Illinois USA and Thomas in Germany-- a nice diverse group of people. It's always cool to hear questions from all different parts of the world. If you're listening and would like to have one of your questions featured on the show, you can always send me an email at ian@essentialtennis.com or on the Podcast page at essentialtennis.com there is a form that you guys can fill out to submit a question also. But Jason, I want to thank you very much for your time. Thank you for talking with me about these topics and me and my listeners both appreciate it very much. Jason : Thanks for having me Ian. Ian : You bet. I hope to see more of you around the forums. Jason : I hope to see you on the golf course. Ian : Touche. Sometime soon we definitely have to meet up and play. Jason : Alright. [music] [music] [music] [music] Ian : That's it for today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for joining Jason and myself. Hopefully you enjoyed today's show and in wrapping up, I'd like to do a couple of shout out's here to people who have donated over last week. First of all Tychi in Maryland donated $20 to Essential Tennis. Patrick in Nebraska donated $10. Shelly in New Mexico made her $10 monthly subscription donation and John in New Mexico made his $5 monthly subscription donation. So thank you to all four of you very much. I appreciate your support and Tyche in Maryland I'm going to be sending you an Essential Tennis shirt free of charge for being the top donator of last week. Thank you very much. Now if you are listening and the Essential Tennis Podcast has helped improve your game, please consider making a donation. Any amount is always helpful and each week, the top donator gets a free Essential Tennis t-shirt. Just go to EssentialTennis.com and on the front page on the lower right, there is a button that says donate. So check that out. Alright that does it for this week, thanks very much everybody. Take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast #112: Listen to Ian interview professional speaker and coach Raj Gavurla about mental tennis dynamics in a team setting.

ianw — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 13:20:44 +0000

Mental tennis topics are some of the most popular on the Essential Tennis Podcast, but did you know that mental toughness for a single player can be very different from mental toughness on a team? Listen to Raj talk about being tough as a team whether you play USTA tournaments, club matches, or on high school or college teams. Did you know that there is a difference between "self talk" and "self think"? Listen in! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it is technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here is Ian. [music] Ian: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by ProTranscript.com and tennistours.com, where you can receive a discount off of professional tennis events' tickets by using the promotional code "Essential" with a capital 'E.' Well, before we get started with today's show, I want to let you guys know that there are still a couple spots open for the Essential Tennis Clinic in Baltimore, Maryland, this coming May 28, 29, and 30. If you are interested in attending, please let me know. Just shoot me a quick email to ian@essentialtennis.com. Let us get to today's show. We are not going to waste any more time. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] My guest today on the Essential Tennis podcast is Raj Guverla, who is a professional speaker, author and coach, and he is going to be talking to us about a special topic today having to do with mental tennis, but a little bit different angle than what we have covered before on the Essential Tennis Podcast. But, Raj, I first want to introduce you and say hi. Welcome to the show. Raj : Thanks for having me, Ian. Ian : Yeah, you bet. I am happy to have you on. And you and I first talked several months ago, I remember we had a phone conversation, and we talked for quite a while I think about different tennis topics. Why do you please take a minute or two and tell my audience a little bit about yourself, your background, and how you are involved with tennis. Raj : Well, I played tennis all through high school, and I was not very good. However, I started getting better, and today I am a very good player. Of course, I am not on a pro level by any means. And I got into professional speaking, and mostly what I do is I help organizations increase their productivity and profitability by improving their mindset, and using motivation. And I work most exclusively with sports teams. Ian: OK Raj: So this podcast will focus more on the tennis team itself and going from what I call a fixed mindset to a grow mindset, and using mindset mood motivation tools. Ian : OK, great. Well, David Grauping, who has been the other kind of main mental tennis guest that I have had comes at it from a similar angle that you do. He also works with business people, and likes to work with athletes, as well. But, the difference is . . . Raj : Who? Ian : Go ahead. Sorry, Raj. Raj : Yes. Go ahead. Ian : Oh, I am sorry. I thought you were trying say something. It sounds like the difference between you and him is that you specialize with teams, and I find that really interesting because most tennis players at some point are going to participate in some kind of tennis team competition or activity, which is great. And I really recommend that my listeners go out and do that, whether it be a high school team or, if you are lucky enough, a college team, or a club team, USTA, league team, all are really great experiences, but it kind of brings a unique mental challenge to the table for a lot of us, and I know that you have a little outline here that we are going to follow, and four main points. Why do you not go ahead and give us a little introduction and get started on our main point, Raj. Raj : Sure. Yes, you really, really honed in on it. Being on a team really brings a lot of different dynamics. And tennis itself, although a lot of times it seems that it is an individual sport, in doubles, of course, there is a team there, or again, as you mentioned, USTA, even Vegas Cup, the team aspect. So, even if you are a singles player, you have a team in the sense that you are working with a coach, and the higher you get, you probably have a mental motivation expert, you will have other people there part of your team. In fact, Roger Federer a lot of times when he wins, he credits his team, because it is not just him doing it, although he is the star attraction. Ian : Right. Raj : But today what we are going to talk about is going from having a fixed mindset to a grow mindset, and the way that we are going to do it is through mindset, mood and motivation tools. Dr. Carol Dweck wrote a book called Mindset. She is a Stanford University researcher, professor and psychologist. And she talks about in her book going from a fixed mindset to a grow mindset. So I want to talk about how to go from a fixed mindset. I'll give some examples. To a grow mindset using what I call an 'adaptability link. And the first adaptability link that we will use will be to use logically emotion. Ian : OK. Raj : Shall we start from there? Ian : Yeah, sure. Sounds good. Raj : To use logical emotion, notice that I put logic before emotion, and I do that for a reason, because we know through research that emotion comes before logic. However, we know that one without the other is very short sighted. If we have just emotion, then we do not have any thinking. There is only a certain emotion, a certain ingredient, it has no purpose. But if we have logic and not emotion, well, we have a plan, but we do not have any action; we do not have the emotion part to get any type of will actionable purpose. But put both of them together, because you can probably well relate if you have ever talked with your spouse or your tennis partner, and there has been some kind of conflict, well, if you used just emotion, that conflict can really get you in trouble. Or if you use just logic, it is shortsighted. If we know that a thought has emotion into it. And that emotion creates that action, because logical emotion is very important. Ian : Is it not funny how similar those 2 relationships are? [laughter] The husband and wife and doubles team. I have definitely compared those 2 before, but I think it is funny that you come at it from that direction--from kind of a communication standpoint-- and having to put the 2--the logical and emotional-- side together. That is very interesting. Raj : Yeah, it really is, and to give you the first example, on a tennis team the bottom line is to win a championship. And so, since the bottom line-- now that might build too much pressure for some people-- but what is the top line. Well, the top line is to make a positive difference or to grow. And if you are doing that, then obviously the championships will come. But a lot of people use either logic or they use emotion and not logical emotion, because I go on talks with teams, and let us say that they are winning, well, I go in there and tell them here is what, you are going to win the championship. And they look almost dumbfounded, like who is this guy? We are winless. And there is a reason I do that. It is because you deserve just as much as anybody else to win a championship. Now, it is not just going to happen magically, because obviously, they are going to come up with excuses saying that, oh, we are not that talented, or we do not have the skills, or last year this team had just these awesome players, and they are going to be there again in the playoffs, and I do not know what we are going to do. And I understand that those are all challenges, but the way you remove obstacles is through logical emotion and by using the tools to get there. So, I am going to define first what mindset is. Mindset is simply what we think and the way we think. So, obviously, right there we know that we need to work on their mindset a little bit. Our mood is the bottom line. The bottom line in any kind of team sport is to win the championship. And then our top line is motivation and inspiration. Now, there is only 2 things I left out and that is attitude and subconscious. So, l et us start with David Grumping had talked about earlier in that self talk. And there is a lot to be said about self talk. It is just that with self talk, I think there is confusion between self talk and what I call self think. And self talk is what to me is verbalized, whether it is to yourself or to someone else, but it is verbalized. And usually it is verbalized to yourself. Sometimes people do talk to things, just trying to get them psyched up. Ian : [laughter] Yeah. Right. Raj: However, self think is actually what are we thinking during the match, because that is really ultimately what is the critical component to make us win. It is what we are thinking. And if we think our match through and our games through, you know what I find find is that people enjoy their sport so much more. Ian : Do you find a correlation between how positive or negative a player or a team self think is and how successful they are on the courts? Raj : Definitely. I think that what happens is that their self think is really their foundation. And if they are not continually adding to that foundation and growing through an adaptability link, and the adaptability link here is logical emotion, which is going to get us from a fixed mindset to saying that, OK, I am only so talented, I am only so skilled. Well, now we want to go to a growth mindset through this adaptability link called logical emotion. Ian : So can you give us I guess a tangible or a method that our listeners can go through to make that connection from saying I have got this much talent, I have got this much skill, I can only win this many matches this season. How do we actually work on making that connection from that fixed mindset to a more grow mindset? Raj : Well, one is through using the adaptability link. And in this case,one mindset tool is logical emotion. Let me give you some examples. Ian : Yes, please. Raj : For example, Bjorn Borg. He was a great self thinker. And, granted, self thinking is much more important and critical to the self talk. However, you never really saw him use much self talk. However, he is arguably one of the best players ever. However, now time has progressed, and during the Bjorg era there was Jimmy Connors. And obviously Jimmy Connors had great self think, but he was a better self talker, because you knew when he had Yvonne Lindahl in the US Open Finals year after year, that eventually he was going to get pumped up, fired up, starting pumping his fists, start talking to himself to the crowd, and once he did that, he got into a zone that hardly many players ever really get to. And Lindahl lost year after year. And then, of course, we have John McEnroe. John McEnroe again is a great self think and he is a great self talker, but he used more self talk than he did self think. However, you can see that he did have greatness in self thinking, because as a commentator he is excellent, and he really shows the subtleties of the game, and how he really did think the game through. However, he used self talk, put emotion aside and linked both of those together. Now, sometimes he got in trouble, because he abused the umpires and things of that nature. In fact, Dr. Carol Dwork uses an example of him as being someone who is extremely successful in that fixed mind set. And he could still be extremely successful but even John McEnroe today says that if he did not do some of the things that he did, he would have been even more successful, and that would have been really quite amazing to see. Ian : Yeah. Raj : And then I give you another example. Of course, we have Pete Sampras. Pete Sampras, again, great self thinker, but not one to do much self talk. But, did you notice that towards the latter part of his career he started to. And even the commentators they would start to see that maybe something is being done here. You see that consistently adding skills and talents and growing your skills and talents will let you to continue to go to another new best level, because they want to grow. They want to raise their game. And Pete Sampras definitely did that, because Arthur [inaudible] one of the greatest ever, he had the most grand slams until Roger Federer came along, and that did not happen until years later. And, of course, you know, Pete sometimes would throw up and win a match, and you knew he was going to win if he threw up, but I do not highly recommend that. Ian : [laughter] Raj : And then, lastly, of course, [empty] RX launched today Roger Federer. You can see that he is a great, great self thinker. However, you are starting to see slowly and slowly that he is using self talk to get himself to use this adaptability link logical emotion. And then on the women's side, there is Serena Williams. That was the biggest tip from Tony Robbins, who is one of the top motivation and spiritual speakers that she hired. He told her, use emotion. You have a great self-thinking concept, but your logic is there, your emotion is missing. And some players use one more than the other, but when you can find that nice congruent balance is when you get the best results. Ian : Alright, I have two questions for you, Raj. First of all, how exactly do you go about developing this with an individual or an entire team, just in general? And then, my second question is, for for those of us who may already have plenty of self think and self talk going on, but maybe it is not constructive. Maybe we have have negative mindsets and what we are doing in our heads is not helping out very much. How do you train somebody to be more constructive with their self think and talk? Raj : Well, one way is again through an adaptability link to let us say a another profession. For example, I am also a professional speaker. And if you notice that the words I use, especially when I am professionally speaking, versus doing a radio interview or a podcast interview, are a little bit different. And in professional speaking you want to have the most dynamic, most powerful meaningful, purposeful sentence, but you want to do it in the fewest amount of words. And the fewer words you can use, and the better the word choice, the better the speech. And the same thing applies to tennis. You want to unclutter all of that chatter that is going on in your mind. You want to quiet it down, [inaudible] or not, and then at the right moment, you want to be able to activate it, whether it is through self think, which is going to create the synopsis in your mind, that is going to cause an action, thought becomes an action, which becomes a result. And then self-talk is the same thing except for it is verbalized, and it is very important that with both of these areas, it is critical, to have self think and self talk put together, because again, one without the other can be very dangerous and can really hinder your progress. Ian : Can you give an example of why that is dangerous exactly, of why we do not want to use just one or the other? What if, like myself personally, I am a very--people find this surprising--introverted person. I am kind of quiet, by nature, so what is wrong with me going out and playing and using mostly or all self think? What is the danger in that? Raj : Well, what is the danger in that is you are not giving your body the ability to express itself. Ian : Huh? Raj : And as an engineer, because that is what I was before I became a professional speaker and sports team mindset motivation coach, and I was somewhat introverted. However, I was not as introverted as most engineers. And I wanted to grow, and I think that was one of the reasons I reached out to this profession is because I was not allowed to grow. And that is what I am saying is that it stymies your growth if you use one more than the other. Ian : Hm. Interesting. Well, before I ask my next question, I want to remind my listeners about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast and that is tennistours.com, Championship Tennis Tours. Since 1987, they have been offering tickets and travel packages to tennis fans all over the world to professional tennis events, whether it be WTA or ATP. They offer tickets and travel packages to the Grand Slams, and a lot of the Masters Series and Level 1,000 tournaments around the world. Definitely check them out if you are going to go watch professional events, and help support them, and kind of thank them for their support of me and the Essential Tennis Podcast, both myself and tennistours.com would both appreciate that very much. And when you go check out with them, use the promotional code use 'Essential,' with a capital 'E' for a $25 discount off your purchase. And they offer a wide variety of different types of tickets ranging from grounds passes and cheaper tickets all the way up through luxury suites and accommodations that they really for a wide range of options. So, go check them out and show them that you appreciate their supports of of the Essential Tennis Podcast as much as I do. So, I thank them very much for their support. Well, I have another question here that kind of goes back to when we first started. You were talking about walking in and first addressing a team that you were working with. It sounds like you are making it very clear that you want them, or you are kind of putting the expectation on them that the point of them playing is to win a championship. And then you are talking about how that is typically very surprising, especially to a team that is used to losing. Now, I am sure that you have probably heard from other coaches, maybe other speakers or maybe parents or players that well, you know, have you not heard, it is the 21st century, and sports and competition are all about having fun. And everybody is supposed to go out there and do their best, and as long as they try and they have fun, then great. And everybody should be happy. What is your response to that kind of mindset? Raj : Well, I do believe that sports is there and we are supposed to have fun, and I do know this that every time that I have won or I have won a championship, I have had a whole lot more fun than if I did not. That is #1. Ian : That is a good point. [laughter] Raj : And #2 is that I am not just putting someone on the island with these extremely high expectations. I am giving them the mindset, mood, mental motivation tools to make this happen, to help them to grow. And that is the thing that they are missing. You see, they focus totally on the emotion side of, oh gosh, this guy wants us to win championships, and we are not that good. Whereas, they do not have the logic side. Or you can be reversed. The team that has won, let us say, 2 years in a row, well, they can have a lot of the logic. Well, we have already won 2 years in a row. We should win again next year. And that is logic stuff, but then they are missing the emotion side, because they still have to go out there and perform. And so it is really important. So I give them a tool, and I have put together another adaptability link called the Winning Mental Pyramid. And I have worked on this leading edge research for 5 years now, and it shows the relationship between motivation and inspiration: attitude, mindset, mood and subconscious. And to quickly summarize it, motivation has a relationship with inspiration, and motivation controls your attitude. Your attitude controls your mindset. Your mindset controls your mood, and mood has a relationship with subconscious. And so in order to put yourself or use this self talk, self think appropriately, well, in a team dynamic, the way that I have come into teams and I explain what the Winning Mental Pyramid research is, and I apply it to their team, well at the beginning of the year it is applied differently, because we want to get the team to gel, to mesh together, to come together, to bond, and really, really focus in on a lot of the team aspects as far as communication, as far as how we are going to handle things, as far as what is going to happen if there is some obvious challenges or some conflicts, and really sets the tone so it is almost like as if this is the degree in your hand. When I was in college, all 4 years I just focused on having that degree. And my bind, because I had that in my mind, all I would think about whenever sometime something would come up [inaudible] is I want that degree in my hand. I want to hold that degree in my hand, and automatically that would create that logical emotion connection for me. And so where we figure out what that is for a team, because for every team it is going to be different. Let us say you have 10 people on the tennis team, you are going to have a lot of different personalities, a lot of different characteristics, and people. You are are going to have different talents, different skills, and so we want to be able to learn from that and to grow with that. What I found is that the best tennis players, the best teams in the world, when you really know you have a good player is when you really have a player that makes other players, other teammates better. Ian : Yeah. Raj : And so I use this Winning Mental Pyramid. Now, let us say I come in in the middle of the season. Well, it may be a little bit different, especially if the team is losing and I come in. Then I use it differently. But let us say the team is winning and I come in. Well I am not going to make a whole lot of adjustments. I mean, the day before, or halfway through the season, if you are winning and you are undefeated, I am not really making a lot of adjustments. What I am doing there is giving you more incentive and keeping you pumped up to stay on that leading edge so that you do not lose that momentum as you start going into the playoffs and into the championship realm. Now let us say you are in the playoffs. You are winning and you are about to go into a championship game. You are undefeated or if you are not undefeated, you are favored to win it all, well, again, I am not going to come in there and try to introduce something that is totally new. In fact, If this team has never heard of the Winning Mental Pyramid research, I probably will not even mention it to them, but I will apply it in doing pre-game motivation for them before their big match, and usually and hopefully they will win, and we will have a post-game victory celebration. So, it is a combination of the 2. And so I am using the Winning Mental Pyramid. However, in that case I am not really telling them what I am doing, but I am giving them the pre-game mindset, mental motivation, then the post-game victory celebration. Ian : When you come in and you first start talking to a team, whether it is a sports team or a business, I guess especially with a losing team, do you ever find that the players or participants have a hard time believe you or buying into what you are talking about? I mean you come in talking about winning and getting championships and all this stuff, and I guess especially on a losing team it seems to me that there might be a tendency for them to not really buy into it, and maybe even actively resist it. Do you ever come across that, and if so, how do you deal with that with a player who is kind of fighting against having a positive mental attitude? Raj : That is a great question. And the way that I combat that is through my analysis. I do a lot of upfront work with the coach, and then I learn about each of the players. So when I am walking in and I am on the platform in front of them, I am already telling them things (and they have never even met me) that I know about them. And see, that automatically gets them to a comfort level, because then they say, well, golly, this guy has really done his research, and he has really done his homework. He is really invested in us. Let me perk up here and listen to really what he really has to say. And then once they see that I am not here to basically try to bully them to do better, I am really there to give them the tools to help them grow, and it is like anything else in the sense that if you are a child, let us say, or even a boy or an adult and you have never had a computer, then all of a sudden somebody has given you this magnificent tool and they show you how to use it, well you become more productive, right? Ian : Sure. Raj : And you grow. So, that is what I am doing. I am giving them that computer. I am giving them those tools in order to make that happen. And then also, the biggest thing that I want them to benefit from, because they are going to be together a lot longer than my how much ever time I am going to be in front of them, so I want to give them the opportunity to work with one another, to know one another, the tools to do that, and by using this leading edge research, the Winning Mental Pyramid, I do that and I bring them up front and I will ask each one of them to tell me about a time that they were in the zone. And probably other players on the team have not even heard this story, because again, most teams, they do a great job of taking advantage of having their coach or coaches, but they do not do a very good job of taking advantage of having teammates, and that to me is what I see is the difference between a bad team that goes to a good team, a good team that goes to a very good team, and a very good team that goes to a championship team. Ian : Last question for you, Raj, and this is all really interesting stuff, and I am sitting here on the other side of the microphone just kind of trying to absorb as much of this as I can, and hopefully I am asking good questions or my listeners? Raj : Yes, you are. Ian : I know that I have many listeners who are actually coaches: high school coaches and team coaches. Obviously, I have a lot of listeners who are just players, and they might be on a team who needs this information, and obviously I am sure my coaches listening are very interested in actually being able to take this information and use it, and try to spread these methods throughout their own teams. So, in our last couple of minutes here, I would like you to please talk to the coaches and talk to the players out there, and how can they implement what you are talking about? Is this something that they can do for their own teams, and start to build up the success of their own teams as players and coaches, or do we need an expert like you to come in and try to help us out? Raj : They can definitely start to implement it, but they do need someone like me, or they do need me to come in and really show them how to apply the research. Now, once I have applied the research, the Winning Mental Pyramid research, I also have another new tool called Winning Leadership Teamwork Chairs that help really resolve conflict, and to gather strategy, and it is a really, really neat tool where 2 people, 2 players sit back to back, sometimes it can be 3, sometimes it can be 5, and sometimes it can even be all 10 players. We can even do it that way. But notice what I am doing is I am taking away the visual, because I want them to feel. And I think it is really important to think and feel. And when you do that then obviously you are in a very good zone, and that is the kind of leadership teamwork that I want, and everybody has a thought and opportunity to participate. However, once I leave, the coaches are very well versed in actually applying it. And what they will do a lot of times is apply it own their own, because now they have seen how it works, and then they will consult with me, give me a call, and I am going to talk with them about the match coming up and give them advice in that way. So, it really depends on the 2 dynamics. Then, of course, the third dynamic for a championship type of game or match is bringing me in and let us have a victory party so we can have like a nice celebration act where we really celebrate and have a good time and prepare again for next year. Ian : Alright. Good stuff. Raj : And also .. . Ian : Go ahead. Raj : Well, I appreciate that Ian. And also you can go to my website. Ian : Yes, please. Raj : It is www.rajgavurla.com (which is my first name and last name, R-A-J-G-A-V-U-R-L-A ), and there you can see the Winning Mental Pyramid, there are a couple of articles even that I have where I have written about some of content I have used in working with teens and working with developmentally [inaudible], and working with youth, and even in businesses, and even in facilitation, where people that have mental health challenges. And I would also like to finish off with logical emotion and give you a couple of examples. As a boy, there were 3 things that my tennis instructor told me. And at the time, I really did not think much about it, and they did not work for me. And they did not work, not because they were the wrong message, but it was because I did not understand it. I only used the logic or I only used the emotion. One was my tennis instructor would tell me to punch the volume, like I was punching. Ian : [laughter] Raj : OK? So I would grab my racket and I would punch, punch, and it would never really have that zip on it that I would see like a McEnroe get or somebody on TV on his volleys, and I just never knew why. And until later, when I was an adult, I know now why, because it is common sense, it is because I was not gripping the racket tight enough. So, when I would punch my volume, I had a naturally soft grip, so therefore I was never able to give that real good [silence] . And I was thinking that, OK, well my fist is clenched and I am punching in the sense that I am making that forward motion. However, I never gripped it tight enough. And now, today, that clearly explains why I have such great drop volley, just like McEnroe, although he could hit both volleys. I had a great drop volley, because I had such soft hands. And I could literally take almost all of the pace off the ball when it came, but later in my tennis development I realized that was the reason I was using that same grip, as far as the tightness of it in when I was trying to hit a regular, hard put- away volley. The other one was to put top spin on the ball the instructor would say, OK, go low to high. So I would go low to high. And then sometimes he would say brush on it, brush on it, brush on it. And again, being a boy, I would just a different mindset than an adult, I just did not really pick up on what 'brush' meant. I could pick up on low to high, but today, now that I know what brush means, I I literally when I see the ball coming I have my eye on the ball. And I literally brush as in the sense that I go from low to high and I literally with my wrist, lift up, brush upwards on the ball like I am painting upward, and I have tremendous, much, much more control now. And of course, because I am bigger and more balanced I have more power. And then the last thing is losing. And I think we have all been there where we have been in a match and we have been losing. We say, OK, what is going on? What is going on? Well, the first thing we need to do is recognize that losing in the Winning Mental Pyramid is under attitude, because you are supposed to be winning, right, in a tennis match? Well, losing is under attitude. So, we have got to recognize that attitude. OK, so now, once we recognize that, sense this attitude, then we know that, OK, motivation controls attitude, so, now we have got to create these synapses in our mind that says, OK, we are supposed to be winning. What is going on? Now, we start using logical emotion, self talk, self think. Then attitude does what? Attitude controls the mindset. Now we have got to understand, OK, what is the actual thinking process that we need here? What is the tool we need? And lastly, the way that teams really improve and players really improve and coaches really improve is really keep and mark down in a notebook what worked, what did not work, what surprised you that maybe was an excellent shot that you may not have hit ever or you may hit only every once in a while, but how could you add that as a permanent part of your weaponry. And if you add that to your foundation, then that is another option and tool that when the timing is right, you can really bring that up, and make it happen, and include that in your arsenal. And as you do, then tennis becomes a whole lot more fun. It is no fun to just go out there and keep doing the same thing over and over and expect a different result. We want to keep adding and growing, and go to that grow mindset, and that is what really keeps us ahead of the competition. Because you know that if you are not adding skills and talents that someone else is, and that is the reason that they are growing, and that is the reason that they may win the championship and not you. And I would much rather be in the other position. Ian : Well, Raj , you have gone a couple of minutes overtime, but I know that my listeners are really going to appreciate listening to your insights and your thoughts. So I want to thank you very much for your time today, and spending the time talking to myself and to the listeners of my podcast as well. Thank you very much. Raj : Thank you, Ian. Thanks for having me, and I really appreciate what you are doing for tennis and for your listeners. They are very fortunate to have you. Ian : Well thank you, and I look forward to having you back again in the future hopefully. I get the feeling that on a lot of these topics we have just kind of scratched the surface and introduced them. And to my listeners, definitely go and check out Raj's website at rajgavurla.com. See the materials that he has there, and Raj, hopefully I will be talking to you again soon in the future. Raj: Thanks Ian. [music] [music] [music] Ian : Alright. That does it for Episode #112 o f the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for joining me today and my guest. Hopefully you guys enjoyed the show, and before I wrap things up, I want to send a special thank you out to those of you who have donated to the Essential Tennis Podcast in the last week. Starting off with Jason in California, who sent a $20 donation. Thank you very much, Jason. David in Alabama did a $5 a month subscription donation. Thank you David. Steve in North Carolina, $5 subscription. And Charles in Maryland, also $5 subscription donation. So thank you very much, I appreciate it. And Jason in California, I am going to send you an Essential Tennis shirt since you donated the most this past week. Thank you very much. And if Essential Tennis Podcast has helped you improve your tennis game, I would really appreciate your support through a small donation, either monthly or one time. It is totally up to you. And you can do that by going to essentialtennis.com, and in the lower right there is a box that says 'donate.' Just click on that. I thank you guys very much for your support. Alright, that does it for this week. Thank you everybody very much for joining me. And I look forward to the next episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast next Monday. Take care everybody, and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music]

Podcast #113: Listen to Ian answer three listener questions having to do with high volleys, pronation on slice serves, and racket customization

ianw — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 13:23:42 +0000

Have you ever played a great point, setting yourself up for the easy put away only to miss your volley long? Today Ian talks about how to fix that mistake. Also discussed is the slice serve, should you be turning your hand to the right or to the left to get the most amount of spin? Lastly Ian talks about racket customization, specifically how to balance out a racket. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis, and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you! Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment, or the mental game, tennis professional, Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian. Ian: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com and protranscript.com. Thank you very much for enjoining me today's show, I appreciate it very much. Before we get started, I just want to tell you guys about a new tennis podcast that has just kind of come out in the last, I think in the last couple of months, they started their show, and it is the tennis.com podcast and it's hosted by several top editors and writers of Tennis Magazine, so you definitely know that these guys know what they're talking about. They've been around the tennis industry for a long time and, it's there job to report on tennis and, the show format is all ATP and WTA Tour commentary, tour news, analysis and, opinions, etc. So, these guys just get together and talk about both the men's and women's tours. It's a great show if you're a fan of professional tennis and, they do at least one show a week, during bigger tournaments they do more than one show a week. So, check it out. --I'd like to keep on top of podcasts. I love podcasts, myself, and I like to keep up with what's going on in the tennis world, as well. So, these guys are on itunes, or if you go to tennis.com, you can find the podcast there, as well. --All right, let's get down to business, and start todays show. Sit, back, relax and, get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Ian: All right, let's get going. I'm looking forward to doing today's show. It's going to be a Q&A show. I've got some questions to catch up on from listeners, and I'm looking forward to answering a couple of them. The first one comes to me from Ben, in Salt Lake City, Utah, and Ben was with me in Palm Springs for my most recent Essential Tennis Clinic. I enjoyed working with Ben very much, so Ben, I'm looking forward to this question. He wrote to me and said, 'This has happened to me in the last couple of tournaments I've played. I'll hit a good approach shot, make my opponent run, and hit back a relatively weak passing shot. It's not hit with a lot of pace, but, it's not really a lob either on my forehand side, high enough that I'll hit it like an overhead, and I hit them long. This tends to happen near the end of a match, and usually on big points. Any idea as what might cause this?' Well, Ben, I feel your pain, and this is something that can be very frustrating, both to do, and to watch. I can tell you that from a coach's perspective, it's always great to see a student set up a point really well, hit a nice, firm, aggressive approach shot, make their way into the net, get their opponent off-balance. Their opponent hits back a weak shot, and then, my student misses the volley or the overhead! That's definitely a frustrating thing to do, and as a player, obviously something that you don't want to have happen. And, I've got a couple of thoughts here. First of all, you say that this isn't really a lob, and I'm going to basically approach this from 2 different perspectives. I'm going to talk about hitting this as a high volley, rather than taking it as an overhead. But, if you do want to swing at it like an overhead, I'm going to tell you how to fix this, as well. So, you're going to have 2 options on how to hit this shot and, we're going to talk about the high volley, first. And, a high volley, or really volleys in general, are just so overdone by recreational players. They make it much more complicated than it has to be. Move their racket around a ton, try and make it fancy, and usually try and make it more aggressive than it should be and, it's very painful for me to see, because technique wise, volley's the simplest shot in tennis, and it's a big mistake to move the racket around a lot, more than necessary and, I think often times recreational players try to use the volley as a power shot, relatively speaking. Way more than they should be. Now, let's talk about high volley techniques, specifically you're talking about a high forehand shot, it's not really allowed. But, it's definitely, it sounds like, definitely, above shoulder height. Most players make the mistake of moving the racket back and forth, way too much. Meaning, they take their racket way back and then close the face, kind of like a mini overhead, but not really. And, often times looking from the side, see if I can explain this to you, the big mistake I usually see from recreational players is looking directly to the side, say a right handed player, and I'm standing on the right side of the court watching them play, and they come up to the net, and I'm directly to the right side of their body. I will see their racketactually get taken back, behind the plane of their body, behind the back edge of their body, with an open face. And so, they'll take their hand, and their racketface way back behind them to where their strings are facing up, toward the sky and, then the ball gets to them and, they'll swing the racket forwards, and close the racketface as they swing to try to get the racketsquare to the ball, so it that doesn't go to far, because you don't want to his these high aggressive shots hard, because they are definitely going to end up going to far. So, this player will start with an open face behind them, and then try to turn the racketover, using their forearm, and their hand to close the racketface. And so, the racketis swinging back and forth, back and forth. Now, this type of swing is way too unpredictable, and that's the problem with trying to hit a high volley this way, is when they take the racketback, the strings are facing up, when they finish the swing, the strings are facing down and, so all throughout this stroke, this volley stroke, the strings are facing in completely different directions the entire time. And, if your timing is just a little bit off, you're going to end up putting the ball all over the court. Which I very often see. Players very often know how to hit these types of shots hard but, they're very, very inaccurate and, so there is a lot of times, errors associated with this shot, even though it should be very easy. Your close to the net, the ball is high, and it's not moving very fast, as you said Ben, in your particular case. And so, it just sucks to miss this shot! And, it's usually due to people trying to do too much. Now, if you're missing long, on a regular basis, which Ben said that he is, then your racketbase is too open, it contact. Now, traditionally struck volleys in general, should be hit with an open racketface. But, on this particular shot, when you're close to the net, and the ball is high, and from where you're making contact, you can literally look down st your opponents side of the courts, we no longer need to have the racketface open. At least, not very much. If you're trying to place the ball deep, you still might want to have it open a little bit. But, if you're trying to put it away, especially with some force, and some firmness, we need to close the racketface up, and this is a good thing. You've kind of earned the right to do this. You've gotten yourself close, you've set the point up well, and the ball is high. And so, you can go ahead and start to close the racketface more. This is not going to happen a whole lot during a match. Those of you listening be aware of this. Don't think that you can get away with this very often. It's not very often that you're going to be close enough, and have the ball high enough that you can actually close the face. And, face it downwards towards your opponents side of the courts. But, you want to close the racketface enough, that it's bascially facing directly at your target. And, this is basically the set up, and this is the way I'm going to describe this is a very simplistic way to hit this shot, and it's very straightforwards, and this is the way that all of you listening should learn how to hit this shot first. Before you try to hit the shot with any power at all. So, what you want to do, is get yourself turned to the side, as you put your racketup behind the oncoming ball, and then angle your racketstrings, so that they're facing directly at your target. Let's say that you've approached down the line on your forehands side, straight ahead, and your opponents is over to the right side of the court, from your perspective, they have floated up a high forehand volley to you. And, you want to put it away cross-court, away from your opponent. So, you want to turn your body, at least 45 degrees or so, to your right, the ball is coming to your forehand side, you're on the deuce side, you want to put your racketup behind the ball, and angle it down, probably around service line, around the service line on your opponents side, as far as depth. And, I would suggest a target that's probably 4, maybe 5 feet from the singles sideline, cross-court from you, on your opponents deuce side. So that we can hit it firmly and right at that target, to put it away from them, cross-court, after you hit you're down the line approach shot. Now, once you've got your body to the side, and the racketis set up behind the ball, you're going to want to use the big parts of your body, your shoulder, and your core, to rotate and push the ball toward your target. Do not use your hand, or your forearm to swing the racketat the ball, and hit it down towards your target. Now, when I first start teaching people this kind of technique, it feels very under-powered to them, it feels weak, it feel like they're never, ever going to be able to put the ball away. But, to be honest, I don't care! Until they're able to show me that they can make 5,6,7 of these in a row. They're easy shots. Until they can show me that they can consistently place this shot pretty close to a target, someplace on the court, you know, a certain number of times, consistently, I don't let me students hit this ball with any pace. Being consistent, and being able to place this shot are the two most important things. Again, this is an easy shot, and missing it is terrible! You have to learn how to control this shot first. As your skill increases, you can use your hand, and your forearm, a little bit at a time to increase speed. I'm not against power on volleys, but, you have to learn how to control the shot first. Period. And, I will not waiver on that. And, I've spent lots of time, lots of repetition with players, learning this kind of technique and doing it again, and again, and again, until they're consistent, just blocking it. All right, well that pretty much wraps up the volley part of it, and that's my description of how to hit this as a volley, and Ben, I would say that most of the time, I would suggest, that you take this kind of in between shot as a volley. It's going to be by far the most consistent way to do it. If you continue to miss lawn, you've got to line your strings up correctly, towards your target, and not open them quite so much. Now, let's talk about hitting this as a low overhead, because that is an option, assuming you guys are close enough, and the ball is high enough, and I would say it's got to be at least a foot to 2 feet above shoulder height, probably closer to 2 feet above shoulder height to take an overhead, or a serve type swing at this shot. If it's any lower than that, just take it as a volley, and place it well, and hit it cleanly, and that's going to be your best bet. But, if it is high enough, and it's not really allowed, but it is high enough to take an overhead swing again, you're missing because your racketface at contact is too open. And, Ben said he's always missing these deep, and, this is really obvious, and you know, seems like a simple answer. But, when you're taking a swing at the ball and, it's going to far, we need to close the racketface. Now, in this situation, it's probably due to you tightening up and decelerating, due to nerves. It sounds like you're getting nervous, here. Ben said that this usually happens at the end of a match, and on big points. And, a lot of times when players get tight, they start to slow down a little bit. An overhand motion, whether it be the serve, or the overhead, and you're still trying to hit it with some force, but you kind of get, you get a little bit tentative, often times that causes the racketface to stay open. Because, you're not releasing, you're not allowing the racketto swing freely, because you're body is getting tight. And, that keeps the racket from closing properly, and facing towards your target. It kind of stays open. And that's what causing the ball to go to far, Ben. So, in order to fix that, we've got to loosen up, and we need to pronate and also rotate your shoulder, internally. The combination of those two things is going to get that racketface closed. --And, just briefly, I'm going to go over what that means. Pronating means that your palm is going to turn to face downwards, using your forearm. Pronation is referring specifically to the rotation of your forearm, to turn your palm down, and that in turn is going to turn the racketface down. We're also going to want to internally rotate your shoulder, which is going to bring your elbow up, and again bring that racketdown. If we do those two things, we'll be able to easily hit the ball down into the court, and not float it too long. A drill that I do in order to get my students to feel this, and be able to get the feel for this. And, by the way, one of the most fun shots in tennis, in doubles or singles, is the overhead that you bounce over the back fence. If you're listening, and haven't had the joy of doing this yet, I highly recommend that you work on this shot, because it's extremely fun! It's great to hit the shot, and just watch your opponent stand there, and watch the ball bounce over their head and over the back fence. Nothing that they can do there, at all! Very gratifying! [laughter] And, in order to do that, you have to really get good at pronating, and being relaxed, and allowing your racketto really close, and face down towards the court. You guys will see pros do this all the time, on TV, when they get a sitter overhead, is they'll just crush it straight down into their opponents side of the court and bounce it up into the stands. And, I oftentimes have students practice this, by coming up to the net, and I'll take the basket of balls up there, and I'll have them toss the ball to themselves, kind of like getting set up for a serve, and have them bounce the ball down across over to the other side of the net, with the goal of bouncing it over the back fence, or over the back curtain, if we're inside. Now, if they're a little bit older client, or if maybe they're not as very athletic, and have a hard time with the service motion, and pronating in general, maybe I'll alter the target a little bit and say we're trying to bounce the ball and hit the top half of the back fence, or the top half of the back curtain, whatever. But, kind of the ultimate, the ultimate goal here, should be to be able to bounce it over the back fence. And, I'll tell you guys right now it's not easy, and you really have to have the correct technique. You have to be good at pronating in order to achieve this. It sounds easy, especially tossing a ball up to yourself, but, it's not that simple. But, in order to get the idea of the feel, of how to really pronate, relax, and kind of, people use the term 'snap your wrist', that's not what's going on. But, that's very commonly what's referred here. In order to get the feel of that I really suggest you take a basket of balls, walk up to the net, and try to bounce it over the back fence, Ben, and that's going to really help you get the feel for closing your racketface, a lot. All right! So, those are my suggestions to you, Ben. Again, I would suggest that you take most of these as a high volley, but if you do want to take this as an overhead, you just to get that racketface closed, so that you can hit directly at your target, and not worry about hitting these shots lawn. Thanks very much for the question, Ben. If you have any follow-up, definitely let me know. And, good luck with your game out there in Utah. Before we get to our next question, I just want to briefly tell you guys about the sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast, and that is tennistours.com. I hope you guys have at least gone and checked them out, since they started advertising on the podcast. I really appreciate their support of the show, very much. And if you enjoy the Essential Tennis Podcast, I really urge you to go check them out, and if you're going to be going to a professional tennis event, whether it's men's or women's, definitely go to tennistours.com. They've been doing this since 1987. You can get individual tickets, ticket packages, also hotel and accommodations, along with your tickets, they do everything. And, whether you're looking for ground passes, all the way up to luxury suites, they can really hook you up with a wide variety of different tickets, and if you use the promotional code, 'essential', while you check out, you can also receive a $25 discount off your purchase. So, go there, check them out if you're going to a tournament anytime soon. They have all the grand slams. They've got tickets for all the grand slams, as well as most of the upper level ATP Masters Events. So, if there's one of those in your area, and you're going to check it out, go to tennistours,com. I thank them very much for their support of the Essential Tennis Podcast. All right, let's get to our next question. And, it comes to us from Samir, in Chicago, Illinois. And, Samir, I definitely can't read your name without thinking about the movie, 'Office Space', and if you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it. If you're into comedies, anyway. Funny movie, with a character named Samir. Anyway, let's go ahead and get to his question which is, 'My question has to do with a slice serve, and specifically the wrist action at contact and follow through. I have seen it taught a couple of ways. Both stress the fact that the racketchops at the ball at the 3 o'clock position, but I have seen one approach indicating at contact the racketcurves around the ball, and your wrist moves in a way where your palm moves toward the side you're serving to. The second suggests that at contact, you pronate, so that your wrist and palm move away from the side you're serving to. I have heard the former method produces more spin or skid, but in general, I thought pronation generates more rackethead speed? I'd love to get your take. Thanks again, Samir. ' Well, Samir, that's a good question and this is a technique topic that has a lot of misunderstanding around it, in tennis, in general. And, if you, well, I'll get to that later. Let's start off briefly with pronation, and supination. Supination is the opposite of pronation, and pronation would rotate, if you're a right-handed player, and you're on the deuce side of the court, and you want to hit a big slice serve, that curves from your right to your left xxx and, so it would curve out, away from your opponent, off the courts, off the deuce side, again, if you're right-handed. Pronation would turn your racketface, and palm, the palm of your hand, out, outwards, towards the right side of the courts, if you're on the deuce side. Well, on both sides, really. If you're a right-handed player, your palm would rotate out towards the right, along with your racketface. That's pronation. Supination would rotate the racketinwards towards the left side of the court. And, those are the two different ways that you can rotate your forearm. And, by the way, pronation and supination have nothing to do with your wrist. It's important that you guys understand that. Biomechanically, your wrist does not pronate, it does not supinate. Your wrist and your hand, does move, I'm not remembering the technical terms for the movement, right off the top of my head, but pronation and supination refer specifically to the rotation of your forearm. It's what's actually causing that rotation to the inside, or the outside. Now, it seems like, if you want the ball to spin to your left, as a right-handed player, then you would want your palm to turn to the left. It kind of seems logical that you would want to come and kind of scoop the racketaround the outside of the ball and kind of spin it to the left, by supinating your hand, and rotating it quickly again at 3 o'clock, kind of around the right side of the ball, and it kind of seems that would be the best way to get spin but, it's not true. To get the most amount of spin possible, you need the most amount of acceleration possible. The faster that your rackethead is moving, as you make contact with the right side of the ball, again at 3 o'clock or, whichever direction your racketis moving. The more spin you're going to get is going to be dependent on how fast you accelerate the racquet. And, to get the most acceleration possible out of your racquet, every high level athlete with an overhand motion, pronates to achieve the best possible results. It's very important to understand that. And, whether we're talking about American football, or baseball, or tennis; any sport with an overhand motion, a throwing motion, or obviously, with tennis, you've got a racquet, but it's still a throwing motion. Any professional athlete playing any of those sports, that throws, or does an overhand motion, they are pronating. And, just to really confirm this in my own mind, last night when I was taking notes for todays show, I went to UTube, and I looked at some slow motion, really slow motion footage of some football quarterbacks, again, American football, and also baseball pitchers, and you'll see that their palm, as they release the ball, pronates, and their hand turns out to the right, if they're a right-handed player. Left-handed player, your palm will turn out to the left. So, it's important to understand that to acclerate as much as possible, you need to pronate. And, I've seen, I've seen articles, recently, saying that pronation is actually not a very large part in the however much you're able to accelerate the rackuet. I don't agree with that, personally. I think that without pronation you're not going to be able to accelerate the racketnearly as much. I think there's definitely a reason why every top level athlete does pronate with an overhand motion. And so, quite simply, Samir, that's what you need to do. You need to learn how to pronate. It's a very important part of your serve. To be honest with you guys, I have seen recreational players be pretty successful without pronating. It's not a motion that comes naturally to everybody. But, whether you're hitting a flat serve, a slice serve, a kick serve, a twist serve, any kind of serve, when you're watching a professional player do it, they will pronate on all of those serves. And, this is a video I plan on doing soon. A video lesson. I want to do a comparison, side by side comparison of the actual technique differences between a flat serve, and a spin serve, and various spin serves. So, look for that in the video section of Essential Tennis, coming up pretty soon. But, for now, Samir, just definitely know that professional players in every sport with an overhand motion, do pronate, and you should be doing that on your serve. Regardless of what type of serve you're trying to hit, and the reason for that is that it will help you get the most amount of rackethead speed, as possible. So, Samir, thanks very much for your great question, and good luck developing your serve. Let me know if you have any further questions. [music] [music] [music] All right, we've got time for one more question here. And, we haven't done a gear question in a little while, so I'm going to answer one. This comes from Francisco, whose a 4. 0 player, he said, 'Hi Ian, I was wondering if you could talk about racketcustomization, specifically changing the main grip. I have been wanting to change my synthetic grip to a leather grip. I know that it will change the balance point, but will it change the swing weight?' Also wondering if I should add lead tape to the head to get it back to the same balance point. I tried that on one of my old rackets but it felt to heavy. Well Francisco, when it comes to weight and balance issues, we are really talking about a personal preference thing. And, when you're changing your grip from a synthetic one to a leather one, there is going to be a small weight difference, but it's not going to be very much. To be perfectly honest with you, if you felt a big difference, in terms of weight, in terms of swing weight, and balance between the two, between using a synthetic grip and a leather one, I'd be very surprised. Now, if you do feel a big difference, and that difference bothers you, then yes, you could use lead tape, but as you pointed out, it's going to change quite a bit the overall weight of your racket, and it's probably going to make it feel quite a bit heavier. Lead tape is something that I use on my current racquet. I'm using a Wilson K Pro Tour, and I wanted some more weight in the head to get a little bit more plow through, a little bit more weight into my shots, and so that felt good to me. I don't like the K Pro Tour without the extra weight in the head. But, it's just personal preference. And, I've got 2 of those rackets right now, and they're about, I think they're about 10 grams difference, which is quite a bit. But, I can play equally as well with each one. Really, if you get it close, it shouldn't be a big deal. And, once you're a professional player, really a small difference between rackets is not a huge deal. And, you should be able to play equally as well with either one. The really important thing is that you get them close. And so, you want both rackets to have that leather grip. And, whatever changes to make to one racquet, you're going to want to make to both of your rackets, or all of your rackets. However many rackets you have of the same frame. You do want to match them as closely as possible, and so using a little bit of lead weight between the two, and finding the same balance point, and the same total weight is definitely worth while. But, to be perfectly honest with you, changing from one type of grip to another and then worrying about the balance due to a couple grams of weight difference in the handle, honestly is not something I would worry about. If you do notice that difference, I would be very surprised. But, then again, it's all personal preference. So, it's up to you. So, there's not really a rule of thumb here, Francisco. Go out and do what feels best to you, and match those rackets as closely as you can. And, that's my advice. Thanks very much for the question. [music] [music] [empty] [music] All right, that does it for episode number 113 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for joining me today. And, just 2 quick things before we wrap up today's show. First of all, I'd like to announce the next Essential Tennis Clinic. It's going to be July 16th, 17th, and 18th in Galveston, Texas. Now, I know I've got quite a few listeners in Texas, and I really urge you guys to sign up for this clinic quickly. We're going to limit it to, somewhere between 6 or 8 participants. I think probably 8 participants. So, this is not going to open to very many people. It's going to be a smaller group. Myself, and mental tennis expert, David Grumping are going to be running this clinic. And, features are going to include, 8 to 10 hours of on-court instruction with myself and David. Also, a video analysis workshop, featuring instruction, and analysis from each of the participants in this clinic. A mental toughness workshop presented by David Grumping. And, a group dinner at the club house, at the club where we're going to be holding the clinic. So, lots of cool features in this clinic. I don't have exact price worked out yet, and I'm working on getting this clinic up on my website, so this is kind of a preliminary announcement and I want to let you guys in the podcast know first, so if you're interested in attending this clinic, in July, in Galveston, Texas, please shoot me an email, and let me know right away if you'd definitely like to participate, and my address is; ian@essentialtennis.com. Lastly, I just want to get to those of you who have sent donations. Just 2 people this past week. Both of them a monthly subscription donation. William, in Missouri, sent his monthly $10 subscription via paypal, and also, Bruce in Florida, his monthly $5 subscription donation. So, William and Bruce, thank you very much for your monthly support of the podcast. I appreciate you guys very much, and if you guys have found the podcast helpful, please consider making a donation. Either a one time donation or signing up for a monthly donation is also very helpful, as well. Just go to essentialtennis.com and on the lower right corner of the front page, there's a button that says, 'Donate'. All right, well that does it for this week. Thank you guys very much for spending your time with me. Take care and good luck with your tennis.

Podcast #114: Andy Zodin gives his thoughts on what it takes to build a game plan and anticipate your opponents moves in singles

ianw — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 13:29:18 +0000

Andy Zodin is back on the Essential Tennis Podcast to lend his expertise on the topic of anticipation during singles competition. He discusses with Ian things to look for on the court during your matches such as your opponents balance, court positioning, and stroke technique. Did you know that playing smart tennis is very much like a game of chess? Listen in to find out how. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here is Ian! Ian: Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Thank you very much for joining me on today's episode. I appreciate your support of the show by downloading the file and listening to it. I hope today's show is going to be helpful to you and your tennis game-- that is always my goal. Before we get started, I want to remind you guys about two upcoming clinics-- first of all Baltimore, Maryland on May 28, 29, 30. I'm going to be working with several listeners of the Podcast and there are still 5 spots left. I'm opening that clinic up to twelve people and there are still five spots available. If you are interested, go to essentialtennis.com and click on clinics in the menu on the left. Also, Galveston, Texas this July 16, 17 and 18th. I announced that last week-- there are only 8 spots open for that clinic total and after announcing it last week, seven spots are already filled. So there is only 1 spot left. So if you think you'd like to work with me in Galveston this coming July for a weekend, please go check that out right away as there is only one spot left. Alright, let's go ahead and get today's show. I'm looking forward to it a lot. Got a great guest lined up for today, so sit back relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] My guest today on the Essential Tennis Podcast is Andy Zodin who is the host of In the Tennis Zone and season three which is a radio show in Colorado and also a Podcast. Andy, I had you on the show back a couple months ago and had a lot of good feedback from that show. A lot of listeners really enjoyed it, so I am really happy to have you back on. Andy: It's always good to be with you Ian. I appreciate the opportunity and you do a great job with it. Ian: Thanks. Before we get started, tell us a little bit about the radio show that you do and tell people where they can find it online. Andy: Well, they can catch it live streaming on MileHighSports.com where on Sunday's we've been going from 10-12 mountain time which is 12-2 eastern. But we are getting ready to switch back over to an evening show. The station that I happen to be on is the flagship station of the Denver Nuggets and the Colorado Avalanche. So going in the morning up until the time those seasons ended make sense so I didn't have to move my start times around too much. I also archived all of the podcasts at tenniszone1510.com. That's www.tenniszone1510.com and they can go back and catch all the different interviews that we've had. It's been a really good season-- we've had John Isner and his coach Craig [inaudible] and we've had everyone from Rod [inaudible] to Billy Jean King. It's been a great season-- I had Cliff and Nancy Richey on a couple of weeks ago. Vincent Van Patton was on with me recently. Lee [inaudible] was on in the last few weeks. I could go on and on but it has been a thrilling season and it seems like the show just continues to gain momentum and we've just such great contributors that it's been really a joy for me to do. Ian: Yeah, the guests that you get are awesome. I mean it is tough to get a whole lot better than the lineup that you've had for the past couple seasons. So I'm sure you are really excited about it and I really encourage my listeners to go check it out because I'm not aware of anywhere else that players of that caliber both present and past, get their brains picked by tennis enthusiasts like yourself-- so it's a great show. Andy: Thank you very much. Now I think that is part of the reason we've been successful, because there are so few people out there doing sort of what you and I are doing that I don't think that they are being inundated with the request very often which is definitely in our favor. So they've been gracious enough, and I think people that are tennis enthusiasts and former tennis greats like to see people doing what we are doing to continue to help grow the game and to grow the knowledge that people are exposed to to be able to hear from them. So they seem ready and willing whenever we ask if their schedule's allow for it. Ian: That's awesome. Well, let's go ahead and get started with today's topic. And as you know the Podcast is primarily a Q&A show but once in a while I get a question that I just think is really interesting and when that happens, I like to have a little conversation and discussion with somebody else who really knows that they are talking about, having to do with the game of tennis. And today's topic is going to have to do with anticipation in singles and I'm going to go ahead and read the question here-- a couple of small paragraphs. And this comes from Charles in Santa Cruz, California. He wrote on the forums on essentialtennis.com and he said, 'I think I have decent situational awareness for my level, at least in doubles. The way I gauge that is when I play a player with a lower rating, like my girlfriend as an example who is a 3. 5, I feel like I often see where the ball is going to go before the opponent hits it, whereas she will often be surprised. It's hard to summarize how I know that, but I feel it's more like what player's tendencies are, where the ball is, where people are positioned on the court etc, rather than a cue in the way the opponent is setting up to hit the ball and or maybe I know where they should hit the ball given a certain scenario whereas she is still trying to figure it out. In single's, I'm not sure I am seeing that stuff very well. Yes I start to notice tendencies, and based on that guess where they are going to hit and after a while sometimes I'm successful. I don't know that I'm reading what their body, racket and swing is doing that well and I'm probably getting a late jump on a lot of shots which doesn't help my single's game given my slow foot speed. ' So Charles kind of wants a conversation here having to do with anticipation and specifically in singles. And I think it's very good that he pointed out the difference between the two and I very often get this from students and I'm sure you do as well Andy with your teaching that a lot of times player's play just one of the other exclusively for a long period of time-- either singles or doubles. And then they go to the other one kind of expecting that 'Oh well, we are still playing tennis, right? We are on a court and we have some tennis rackets and a tennis ball. How different can it be?' But the rythm of the points and the knowledge and anticipation is very different between the two games isn't it? Andy: There is no question about it Ian. And I think part of the developmental curve of a tennis player is that you go from being primarily reactive in nature to sort of ascending towards a level of being a little more anticipatory in nature which comes largely with the experience of being out there and doing it. I recently watched a nice interview that Pat Cash did with the [inaudible] brothers and one of the comments that they made was that doubles and singles at this point are really two different sports. Not just two different forms of tennis, but they literally use the term different sports. I think a lot of the kids we work with nowadays do play primarily singles. So I think when they get out on the doubles court, they have just the opposite problem in that they don't understand some of the innuendos of the sport of doubles in respect to movement and anticipation and what is coming next as opposed to the rhythm and sort of the point structure in a single's match. I think it's interesting to hear someone saying 'I get it in doubles, but not so much in singles because nowadays, that is kind of the opposite of the problem that I think people have. With that said, I think you in trying to go out there and play your own game first, then have to sort of subliminally supplant what you would be thinking into the mind of your opponent in saying, 'Based on what I would've done here, I've got to assume that this guy maybe seeing something similar.' And that is sort of how you ascend to that level of anticipation. It becomes very largely like a picture and a batter in terms of the pitcher saying 'Well, I've got a feeling this guy is going to be looking for the curve ball here, so therefore I'm going to go high and tight with the fastball. ' And you've got to wonder if the batter is going, 'This guy thinks I'm looking for the curve ball, I bet he comes in high and tight. ' And he ends up hitting a home run. Ian: Right. Andy: If he guesses right. So it does become a guessing game and I think you become better at that guessing game the more you are out there playing those points and then maybe a lot of times you'll work with a pro on the court that's coaching two players that are playing singles and saying 'Aha. ' And this is where you've got to recognize that your opponent is off-balance. They are on the run towards the fence, and yet you chose to stay on the base-line when that is absolutely the time to move forward and expect a ball that you should be able to attack. So some of the things like that that they may not recognize a pro can help with, but nothing helps more than just going out there and doing it and learning with trial and error. Ian: Absolutely. In getting going with this topic, I'd like to kind of give Charles a pat on the back that he's actually starting to become aware of these things. Because there is a lot of rec and club players out there who are very preoccupied with what's going on on their own half of the courts and really miss a lot of information that that is extremely vital to being able to build a good game plan. So I think it's great, first of all that Charles is getting out there and starting to play some singles. And secondly, he's starting to think about these types of things and this kind of awareness -- and I like that you use the word awareness to describe this is going to really bring Charles up to the next level. And it's going to take some conscious effort at first Charles to start picking these things out and Andy and I are going to go through and talk about several specific things that you should be looking for. And at first it's going to be mental work-- you are really going to have to pay attention consciously and really for these things on purpose, but eventually, you are going to start reacting to these things-- it will be second nature. And you are just going to start to move without even having to think about it. That's just going to take time and experience, isn't it Andy? Andy: Correct. There is no doubt about it. I think back when I was a kid and I was starting to play match after match after match, and not only was I learning from the matches I was playing, but I was learning a lot-- probably even more so in the [inaudible] in the matches I was watching. And I learned how for instance, something as simple as long-footing a person. Where maybe you see a guy hit a kick serve to the back hand in the ad court and then the return of service through the middle of the court and the person comes in and then volleys back into the corner that the ball came from because they expected that their opponent will be running to cover the open court. So as soon as you see then moving in that direction, and then you volley perhaps back behind them and long-foot them as they say. That's a very valuable tactic that most serve and volleyers employ pretty regularly and pretty successfully. If you look back at what John McEnroe used to do to people-- everything was done kind of two shots at a time. Very much the way I'm describing now. He would wide serve you and then just knock off a little volley to the other side. And compared to the shots that people are hitting today, none of the shots John McEnroe were hitting if you took them as an individual shot, were that incredible. They were great the way he put one together with the other to where it was a very effective game, but yet McEnroe's game didn't always incur a lot of risk, it just incurred some great patterns and some great point structure that made a lot of sense that made his game so high percentage and extremely effective and really tough to do anything about what he was doing to you. Ian: I think it's interesting how you are talking about-- it's funny-- kind of anticipating your opponent's anticipations and trying to be one step ahead of them and a lot of times chess is kind of..... A lot of times tennis is kind of off-handedly referred to as a physical chess game and having to have those tactics. Anybody who hasn't played chess, doesn't really understand the analogy because they don't understand how you have to think 2, 3, 4 moves ahead of your opponent and try to guess, 'What is my opponent going to be thinking? When I do this, what are they going to anticipate and do in return?' And I think that is a big part of tactics and strategy in tennis that recreation players kind of miss and I like the example you gave about going behind a player who is going to probably run towards the open court where it seems obvious, ' My opponent is obviously going to hit the court there because there is a ton of open court. ' And just start to run for that open court. And one of my favorite things to do is to fake in that situation and start just booking it towards that open court and then as soon as my opponent is about to make contact, stop, and go back to where I just came from to try to anticipate the fact that they are going to anticipate where I'm anticipating and it can kind of confusing. I think that is incredibly fun and something that obviously you're aware of out there on the court. But I think a lot of listeners might not be. Andy: Well, and you used the chess analogy which is really spot on Ian. And I'll tell you a story, a buddy of my named Phillip Farmer who was coaching the Bryan Brothers for a few years before David McPherson came along who they are with now. And he was down in Australia with the boys and it was the year that Phil Jackson had taken off from coaching the Lakers and he had gone down to Australia and he became a big fan of the Bryan's and he was watching a lot of tennis and Phillip Farmer got the opportunity to get to know Phil Jackson pretty well. And this was at a time when Roger Federer was really starting to move head and shoulders above Andy Roddick in the rankings. And you could just see the things that Federer was doing on the court were just brilliant in nature and his all-court game was just really starting to flourish and to ascend to the level that we are now used to. So after the tournament was over, Phillip got a phonecall and it was Phil Jackson. He said, 'I think that I can help Andy Rodick .' And he said, 'OK. ' And Phillip Farmer said, 'OK. I'm listening. ' And he goes, 'Here is the thing that I worked on with Michael Jordan and Kobe and with Shaq. ' And of course at that point, Philip Farmer was really listening. And he said, 'Let me ask you a question about Andy Rodick. Does Andy play much chess?' And he said, 'No. I don't think he plays any. ' 'What about video games?' 'Yeah, probably about 3 or 4 hours a day. ' And he says, 'What about Federer?' And he goes, 'Actually, Roger does play a lot of chess.' And he said, 'If Andy Roddick took the time that he was using on video games and became a chess player, his tennis game would improve 10 fold in my opinion because you just see the way Roger Federer approaches the sport very methodically. Very calculating. You don't see his eyes you kind of think of Andy Roddick, his eyes are pretty shifty. He is always kind of doing little things-- grabbing his shirt and little things like that. And Federer is just always in cruise control, whether he is walking from one side of the court to another or getting ready to return serve or even in the midst of play. He just seems like he is kind of floating out there. And most guys don't look like they are that in ease on the tennis court. And Phil Jackson attributes an athletes success to an ability to think ahead like you are saying and be a chess player and be calculating in nature and that the mindset that goes from the chess board to the field of play is one that an athlete can really use as another club in the bag, as another strength. And this is the kind of mindset that helps you sort of naturally create your own skill-set to be able to be anticipatory in nature as opposed to just reactive. Ian: Before we get to our next part of our conversation, I want to tell my listeners about tennistours.com where you guys can go to get individual tickets, ticket packages and ticket pages along with accommodations to travel to professional tennis events, whether it be WTA or ATP tour. And they carry tickets to all the grand-slams along with a lot of the Masters 1000 series tournaments. So definitely go check them out. They've been doing this since 1987 and they have just about any type of ticket you might want, whether it be ground passes or luxury suites. Plus when you use the promotional code Essential you guys can get a $25 discount off your purchase at tennistours.com. So if you are going to a professional tournament and going to watch the pros, which is always an awesome experience, please check them out and support them-- tell them thank you for being a sponsor of the essential tennis podcast. Well, let's go ahead and with that start talking about some specifics Andy. I've got a couple of things listed here that in my opinion are definitely important to be aware of and hopefully start to make automatic and start to notice without even spending a whole lot of mental energy to really watch your opponent. Although don't get me wrong, you should be paying close attention to your opponent but you just don't want to make it an active mental process. Hopefully, eventually it becomes second nature. And let's talk first about something that you mentioned earlier and that is the balance of the body and I guess body position on the court. But balance specifically-- let's talk a little bit about anticipating a response from our opponents when their body is off-balance and they are obviously not in a comfortable position physically. What should listeners be looking for in that particular situation? Andy: Depending on the style of play that the player employs, you either are going to see a ball that they sort of flail at when they are on the run because a lot of players don't have the ability to separate their foot speed from their racket head speed. An example being, when you see a guy on the run and then the faster they are running, the faster they are swinging. Whereas, some of the higher level players are able to operate two separate transmissions-- one for their upper body, one for their lower body. The smarter players who have that ability to control their body a little better maybe on the run if they are really in full gear to a tennis ball are able to maybe slow down their racket head because they know that a control component has to come somewhere in this equation and they are able to do that. I'm going to say that you're going to see one of two things-- either a ball that comes floating back because they realize that I'm on defense now. I just want to make sure I get this ball back in play and maybe that's the time to seize the opportunity and move forward and realize that you are going to get a shoulder high ball or higher to either hit a high volley or an over head off of when they are on the [inaudible] like that. Or move forward anyway and let them take that flailing swing at the ball because the percentage chance of they actually hurting you and hitting some laser passing shot if they are not a 5. 0 player or better, is probably pretty minimal and you give them an opportunity to just kind of hang themselves with a wild swing on the run. So I'd say moving forward on a shot where your opponent is off-balance-- whether they are playing defensively or offensively probably behooves you because as I say, you are either going to give yourself an opportunity to put away the next ball or they are probably going to go for something outside of their comfort zone. And that is going to be low percent by nature and you are going to get some free points that way. Ian: Really good observation and that's something that I definitely noticed in teaching rec players myself, is that players-- especially if they are not kind of gifted naturally as an athlete to begin with have a really hard time separating their lower body and upper body. And they get really really quick and frantic with their lower body and their swing just kind of follows suit. That's really interesting that you put that [inaudible] anticipating and I'd like to point out the flip side as well-- let's say that you've just hit a great shot Charles and you put your opponent off balance whether it be maybe retreating back away from the baseline because you hit a good deep shop or maybe running off the court to the right or to the left because you hit a nice wide shot. If you consistently do not follow that forwards as Andy is suggesting and you just stand back there at the baseline and watch them and do nothing about it, they are going to pick up on that and know that they basically have got a free shot back into the court and they are going to be able to hit up pretty much anything they want. And if they aren't very smart and they aren't very controlled, they might go ahead and try to crush a winner anyway like what Andy was describing. But if they are smart and they see that you aren't doing anything about the fact that they are off balance, it is really going to put them at ease much more. They aren't going to be under any pressure to hit anything good-- they'll just be able to play an easy defensive shot back to the middle of the court. Andy: Well I think that example holds true even more often on a more regular basis with respect to your ability to grain your own comfort zone in returning serves. If a person serves big and I'm playing a big server but they aren't coming in behind that serve, I feel a huge sigh of relief in just being able to lock a return back down the middle of the court and get it up high in the air and just let it carry deep in the court. Not have to flirt with disaster of having to get every return down low at their feet because they are just attacking like a madman and they are effective in doing so. It takes a lot of the pressure off to know, that if I can just block the return and put it back in play and kind of regain the center of the court and neutralize that big serve by just making a higher percentage of returns, I've got a better game than this guy. Outside of this big service that this guy is bringing, I can hit more balls back and to know that all I have to do-- using Federer as an example, you see him against a lot of these guys that don't come in behind their big service, and I hate to use the example but Andy Roddick is the guy who comes to mind who doesn't always take full advantage at least against Roger with that big serve which I think is largely why the record between the two is what it is. Obviously Andy almost got over on him at Wimbelton last year, but aside from that some of those matches have been pretty one sided. And I think Roger realizes that Andy has got possibly the most dangerous serve in the game but the fact is, that I have a pretty crisp return game, I don't have to be overly agressive with it because I know once we get into these points, I have the upper hand. You just don't see Roger sweating too much out there the way most guys are when they are playing Andy Rodick because he understands that dynamic so clearly and then realizes, I take away this guys serve and I kind of own him. And I think that is something that a lot of other players need to realize. If you have your serve as a weapon, it is only largely going to be an effective weapon if you back it up with a next shot. Which again, was what John McEnroe did so brilliantly. Ian: Sure. Let's switch gears a little bit and move to a different topic and talk a little bit about swing technique and mechanics having to do with watching your opponent and seeing what they are doing with the racket. And I'll give one quick example of that and then I'll toss it over to you Andy to see what you think. Let's go ahead and keep with that example-- let's say that you have a big serve Charles and you are looking at what your opponents reactions are. If they are going to start playing it safe, like what Andy is describing, and essentially just block it back in play, that's an opportunity for you. And what you should be looking for as you make your serve and you get prepared for their response, you should be looking where they are taking the racket back to and what the angle of the racket face is. If they take their racket back shoulder height and their face is open, they are getting ready to just block it back or play a slice. Or something that is not going to be terribly offensive. If on the other hand they take the racket back well behind them and the face is closed, they are going to be preparing to make a drive or some type of top spin shot. Myself personally, I'm always looking for these opportunities. I love the net and I love closing in. And when I see my opponent taking the racket back with an open racket face, I definitely love sneaking in there real quick and trying to catch them off guard. What do you think Andy? Andy: I agree. I think that you have to over a period of the first few games of the match, get a feel for what those tendencies are. And sometimes, as you say the preparation of the racket will really give you a very clear indication, sometimes that will belay what is coming. And I [inaudible] back to when I first started teaching tennis, and I was working for Cliff Drysdale and another South African tennis pro named Billy Frier who was a great player. But Cliff used to love to give Billy a hard time because he would say to him something like-- Cliff would come to the net and Billy would take a wild swing and hit a passing shot. And Cliff would say in that South African accent of his, 'Billy how can I possibly know what you are doing when you are no idea yourself. ' So I think sometimes, you have to be careful that you over analyze what it looks like somebody is trying to do because then all of a sudden something else can come and it wasn't even necessarily anything that they meant. So what I tell my players is, 'somehow or another, get to 2 all. And then at 2-2, then start to formulate a game plan that maybe has some definitive intentions to it. In the meantime, worry about your game. Worry about high percentages of first serves. And at 2-2, then start to say to yourself OK, where is the rubber going to meet the road here with respect to where I'm going to choose to either attack this guy because I think he might be a little steadier than I am, or just wait him out and give him enough rope to hang himself. The shots that he is hitting look way to low for [inaudible] . I can't believe that at 4-4, this guy is going to be able to do what he's done at 1-1. And understand that there is much different mind-points to different points in the set. When I was 14 years old, I had a coach that was getting me ready to play a match against a kid, and he said 'This kid is all forehand. He can't do anything close to what he does with his forehand on his back hand side. So play it to his backhand side and play it until you are blue in the face. ' Well on the first point of the match, I served and volleys. I hit a volley over to his backhand, he went running over and jumped out of his shoes, came off the ground with both feet and hit this monster backhand passing shot like it was somebody on the tour. And I didn't go back to the backhand anymore and I came off the court-- I think I got beat 3-2 or something. And my coach kind of slapped me upside the head and said 'What were you thinking? What happened to playing the backhand?' I said, 'Didn't you see that backhand that he hit on the first point?' And he just kind of hit himself in the forehand saying 'You've got to be kidding. Make him hit it 10 times. I bet you he would've made that shot 2 or 3 times. ' And I just didn't get that at 14. The guy hit such a brilliant shot that I was convinced that I shouldn't do that anymore and I completely abandoned my game plan. So know that at 2-2, you are going to say 'OK, this is where I'm going to be able to exploit a weakness. This person doesn't run very well. I'm going to move him from corner to corner a little bit. This person passes well out of the corner, so I'm going to approach up the middle and take away the angles. Give yourself at least half a set to make determinations based on what you think this person's tendencies are. And that still doesn't guarantee you that that is really the reality of what they are doing. I think it gives you at least a little bit of information to work with, probably something that you can make a half way educated guess. But you still need to leave yourself open to other possibilities because like I said, sometimes a person will hit a shot and they were going across court but somehow or another, nature took its course another way and it went down the line and the guy didn't even mean to do that. Ian: It seems like there is a really delicate balance here-- almost like there is an art to this. I'm hearing you say that on one hand we don't want to over analyze and get too caught up with their technique and what they are doing with the racket, but on the other hand, we definitely want to have some kind of game plan eventually and not just hit random shots either. It can be kind of tough to balance those two things out, can't it? Andy: It really can. And I think a lot of that comes from your own level of confidence in yourself. That's your number one priority-- making sure that you have your mindset in a place that allows you to play the kind of tennis that you are capable of playing and that you are confident in playing. Because one of the mistakes that I think players make at the 3.0-4. 0 levels is that they put expoitation of their opponents weaknesses above playing their own game. And what you'll find if you talk to the pros and you say, 'Describe your game to me Andy Rodick. ' He'd say 'Big serve, followed with a big forehand. ' 'Describe your game to me Rafa?' 'I'm just going to hit big hooking forehands and I'm just going to wear you down and I"m going to run every single ball down until you are just laying on the side of the court ready to be taken off on a stretcher. ' 'Describe your game to me Serena Williams. ' 'I'm just going to be a better athlete and I'm just going to come up with the goods on the big points and I'm going to hit the ball harder than you and when the points are the biggest, that's when I'm going to play my best.' Then you say 'Describe your game to me Mr. 3.5 player. ' And he takes out a phone book and he starts to turn the pages... 'Well if this happens, then I'm going to do that. But if that happens, I'm going to do that. [inaudible] big and overweight, I'm going to hit a drop shot-- even though I don't have a drop-shot.' Then all of a sudden it becomes this sort of convoluted-- I'm going to do this if this happens, and I'm going to do that if that happens. But they don't even take into consideration the fact that they are asking them to do things that they don't do. First things first as a tennis player is identify your game. Know what under pressure you are going to do. At 4-4 in the 5th set Pete Sampras is going to serve big and he is going to serve you off the court. Angre Agassi is going to grind you down off of the ground. He is going to stand on the baseline and he is going to hit too many balls in the court to too many corners for you to be able to do anything about it. Brilliant athletes, and the more brilliant the athlete is, the more a simplification of the game plan is then allowed. Because they know what they do under pressure. They know what their out-pitch is and that is part of that developmental curve in going from being a reactive player to an anticipatory player is that ability to first identify here is who I am, here is what I do. I'm going to do it to the best of my ability and then after that, I'm going to say, 'OK, within the framework of the game that I really own, this is where I'm going to now apply those things based on where I think this person is stronger or not as strong. ' Ian: Good stuff Andy. Tell you what, I always know I have a great guest on the Podcast when I only get to about half of the things in my outline. And that's the case today. Andy: We've determined that it's based on how long-winded I am is more of the problem then anything. Ian: Well, that's usually directly correlated to how much knowledge and passion one has for the game. So don't worry, that's not a negative buddy. Andy: I appreciate it. You always have a good lineup of questions ready and it's great to be able to reach out to your listeners and hopefully impart something that makes a little bit of sense to them. And we need to get you back on in the Tennis Zone again as I got some good feed-back when you came on my show as well. Ian: Oh yeah? That's good to hear. I'd love to. It was a lot of fun. It was the first time that I've done a live radio segment and I enjoyed it a lot. So I'd love to do that. Andy: Well we'll definitely keep going back and forth-- I think we've got a good thing going here. You've got a great deal and I think we are going pretty good too. So it's great to work with you. Ian: You to. One more time before we wrap things up-- please tell my listeners where to go to download the Podcast segments? Andy: You want to go to www.tenniszone1510.com and you will definitely, as Ian said, get to hear interviews with some of the top players, coaches, commentators and personalities in the sport. As a matter of fact, we've got a guy coming on this Sunday who is out in your part of the country who is Steve Flink-- the famed tennis journalist. He is coming on and I believe that he is actually being inducted into the Eastern Tennis Hall of Fame on Friday night and will be coming on with my wife and myself this Sunday. She is coming back on the show me as it is our 2nd anniversary, so we like to get together for those kinds of occasions and do the show together. Steve Flink will be joining us and another New Jersey boy, Tommy Fontana, who played with me at the University of Texas will be coming on and he'll be addressing the issue of tennis and sports parenting. He's got 4 kids now, and he was #1 at the University of Texas and he played a little bit on the tour and has some great sort of east coast insights into the sport of tennis. And now that he's got four kids, all of which are pretty athletic, a lot of what he has learned about being a sports parent and some of the things that he's seeing out there and what he thinks are effective parenting techniques and what he thinks are some of the ones that are maybe leading some kids and their parents and those relationships to stray a little bit. Ian: Well Andy, thank you very much for your time. It's been great to have you on the show again, and I look forward to being on your show and having you back again on the Essential Tennis Podcast as well. Andy: Always a pleasure Ian, I appreciate it. [music] [music] [music] Ian: Alright, that does it for episode 114 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for joining me and my guest today on the show. I appreciate you being a listener and downloading the podcast-- that means a lot to me. In closing up today's show, first of all I want to recognize a couple people who donated to the Podcast last week which I always appreciate very much. First of all, Gavin in London, England donated $10 to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Robert in British Columbia Canada started a [inaudible] $10 per month subscription donation and Alex in Houston, Texas donated $25 to Essential Tennis. So thank you for you three for your support last week, I appreciate it very much. And if the Podcast has been helpful for your game, please consider making a one time donation or a monthly-- just go to essentialtennis.com and on the front page on the lower right you will see a box that says donate-- go check that out. And one other way that you guys can help support me. I've just started getting some new advertisers on the website which is really exciting for me because it really helps finance my time here and what I'm doing on the website. It really helps me move forwards and hopefully move towards a future of doing this full time. And you guys can help support those advertisers just by clicking on the ads that are on my websites. And the two newest ones are found on the forums. If you guys go to essentialtennis.com then click on forums, you'll see two ad boxes on the top. One is for Babalot and one is for Tennis Metro. Just please go check those out-- you don't have to buy anything, in fact, neither of them require any kind of purchase to support. Tennis Metro, you can get a free account and Babalot has a contest that you can sign up for by just filling in your information. So if you appreciate what I'm doing here on the podcast and on the rest of the website, please go support my advertisers so that they continue to advertise with me. And by doing that, I can continue to move forwards and move hopefully towards doing this more and more during the week and producing more content and giving you guys more free instruction. Alright, that does it for this week. Again, thank you very much for joining me. Hopefully you enjoyed today's show and I will catch you guys again next week. Until then, take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music] [inaudible]

Podcast #115: Listen to a round table discussion between Ian and two forum members about how to improve your tennis game.

ianw — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 13:41:05 +0000

I often times have tennis experts on the show to talk about improving a specific part of your tennis game. Today my guests are two recreational players who have worked really hard to improve over the last several years. Find out what worked for them, what didn't, and what has been most important to them as they continue to get better. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Speaker: Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis, and want to improve your game, this Podcast is for you! Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian. Ian: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast: your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by TennisTours.com, where you guys can get $25 off your next purchase of ATP or WTA Professional Tennis Event tickets by using the promotional code Essential. Before we get started with today's show, I've got a couple of guests Tennis that are going to talk with me about tennis improvement on the show. I just want to remind you about the various social networks that you can find Essential Tennis on. Get connected with the website, and find more out about exactly what's going on during the week. First off is Facebook. You guys can connect with Essential Tennis@Facebook.com/ EssentialTennis. Also on Twitter at twitter.com/EssentialTennis. And on YouTube I put all my instructional videos up there. You guys can follow the videos there and become friends with me at Essential Tennis at YouTube. The URL for that is YouTube.com-Essential Tennis. So go check out the website on all those different places. For right now, let's go ahead and get started with the show. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] Today on the Essential Tennis Podcast I have 2 guests with me. Both of them are frequent visitors to the forums at Essential Tennis.com. They are very active there in the Essential Tennis community. Both really passionate players about improving their tennis games, which is exactly why they're on the show with me today. You guys may remember--those of you who have been listening to the show for awhile--I had Sally, definitely another big fan of the website and forums. I had her on the show awhile back. That was in Episode #53. I kind of interviewed Sally. I asked her, 'As a recreational tennis player, how are you improving? What's working? What's not working?' And I want to have another one of those conversations. I oftentimes have guests on the Podcast that are experts in tennis or in a certain aspect of tennis. Today I want to talk and have an open conversation some recreational players, and kind of come at things from another angle. And get the perspective from a couple of people who are out there on the battlefield trying to improve their own games. Because I think it's really important to get thoughts and words of wisdom from those of you out there who are just working hard on your game day in and day out. With that, I'm going to introduce my 2 guests. I have first of all John, who goes by John in real life on the forums. He's located in California. John, welcome to the show. John: Thanks, Ian. I'm glad to be here. Ian: Thanks very much for spending the time with me and being on the show. I really appreciate it. Secondly we have Steve, who goes by Steve-O on the forums. He is in North Carolina. Steve welcome to you as well. Steve : Hey Ian. Thanks for having me. Ian: You bet. So let's start things off with just a little bit of introduction from each of you. I'm curious--well I want my listeners to know exactly how long you guys have been playing; when did you start; those kind of things. So tell everybody listening a little about your game; how long you've been playing; and those kind of things. Let's start off with John. How about you? John: Well Ian, I came to tennis late. I actually got started or dragged into tennis kicking and screaming. I didn't really want to play, but all of my friends were doing it. So I started at the age of 42. I've been playing about 6 years now. Taking time out for break meals and potty breaks. Ian: [laughter] Yeah, in the last 6 years, how many hours a week would you say that you've been playing and working on your game on average? John: I'm not sure I want to answer that in case my wife is listening to this podcast! I'd say it's fluctuated over the years. I play more now than I used to. I get about 3-5 days a week for a couple of hours of sun. Ian: Great. And Steve, how about you? How long have you been playing, and how much time do you typically spend on your game during the week? Steve: I played in high school and in my early 20s. I'm 37 now. I took a long hiatus from the game, and started back about 6 years ago. Over the past 3 years, I'd say I've been playing at least 2-4 times a week. Maybe sometimes 5 on an avg. of maybe 8-12 hours a week. 12 on a good week when I can get it in. Ian: OK. Good stuff. Now my first question having to do with how you guys have improved. That's going to be our focus today, to pick your brains and see what has worked; what hasn't worked; what have been the big challenges for you as you start working hard at your games in trying to improve them. Because obviously the whole point of the podcast is to help get people better. I'm hoping that by hearing the stories from both of you, people are going to get some ideas and at least a good sense of what it's going to take for them to move up in level, because of both of you have. And that's the first question I want to ask is: Both of you started--or Steve, you re-started--6 years ago. John, you started for the first time 6 years ago. I'm curious how many--and we can go by NTRP, which here in the U.S. is a rating scale that goes from 1-7. About 3 or 3.5 is around avg. 4.5 or 5.0 would be an advanced player. And a very beginner would be a 2.0 or a 2.5. How would you rate yourselves when you first started? Over the last 6 years, how much exactly have you improved? John, I know that you play competitively. Steve, not as much. I don't think in NTRP or USTA type of league play or competitive play. But Steve, let's start with you. Exactly how much of those 6 years have you improved? Steve: The bulk of my improvement has been over the last year. When I started playing, I rated as a 3.0 player. I could get the ball over the net a couple of times. I'm very athletic, so that always helped out. I think now I'm playing at about a 4.0 level, I rate myself. Ian: OK. And John, how about you? John: When I started, I played the same 18 year-old kid that was in lessons with me for about a year and a half, and I didn't play anybody else, just because I didn't know anybody and I was a little too chicken to get involved! Then I got into USTA, and I guess I started at a 3.0 level. In about 4.5 years I've gone from there to 4.0. But even more important than the rating level is just the stuff you learn, how you mature in the game. I definitely became far smarter on the tennis court in the last 2 years, and I have improved technically. Ian: Yeah, well I agree. That's extremely important to be able to improve tennis IQ and not only be able to recreate physical skills and strokes, but actually have a broader knowledge of tactics, and maybe even history, and general tennis knowledge can definitely help your enjoyment. To help spark your improvement even more I think and increase your passion for the game. Steve, I'm curious about your thoughts on that. Would you agree that your general tennis IQ has increased a lot over the last couple of years? Steve: Absolutely. I've learned in matches for sure to be a smarter player. I think that's an important distinction to make for me. Because I played about an even number of--well probably a greater number of recreational play vs. actual match play when I count. And I can hit with guys that are a lot higher level than me for practicing and knocking balls around, but when it comes to playing matches and winning games, I'm still very much on the upward curve of learning how to win. I think when we're talking about NPRP level, we're talking about rating based performance. I would rate myself a weak 4.0 on that scale, but if we're just hitting around, I'm a lot better player. I may actually look like a lot better player than I am in the match play! So I think that's important to think, and that a lot of people don't make when they try to paint a number on you. Ian: Yeah. That's a very common thing. I'm sure a lot of people listening are definitely relating to what you're talking about. Don't feel badly about that! The vast majority of us are much better at practice than we are in competitive play. In fact, I would say that's very rare that it's the other way around, where somebody is poor in practice and really rises to the occasion on competitive courts. I'd say there are a couple of players out there like that, but they're definitely the exception. So let's talk about some specifics here. I'm going to ask a very general question of you. Feel free to talk about whatever part of your game that you'd like. Basically I'd like to know: What has been the most important thing for you to improve in your game over the last couple years? What's been--in your opinion--the most important aspect of your game that you have improved? [laughter] It's a very broad and general question! But I'm curious if you would maybe want to rank your 1, 2, and 3, or just give me your top 1. Whether it has to do with tactics, technique, or mental toughness. John, let's go to your first. What do you think has been the most important improvement for you? John: Taming my raging inner 5.0. Ian: [laughter] Wow. Sounds tough! John: [laughter] I know that sounds funny, but if I can look back over the past 6 years, the one curved corner that I turned that helped me the most was realizing who I was. That came after reading Inner Tennis. That's a book that came out in the '70s. It's a little bit zen for some people. But it taught me that... You know, like Steve, I played other sports. I was a baseball player and then a volley ball player. I did well at those things. Then I get introduced to tennis at a later age. I just had this expectation that 'I should be good at it!' Ian: Right. John: But that doesn't come for free! And I think that once I learned to stop putting pressure on myself and just enjoy the process of learning, it got so much easier. When you try too hard, everything's hard. Put in hard work, but you don't berate yourself on every stroke. It starts to click, I think. Ian: Yes, and there's several steps to what you're describing here. The first one I think is the acceptance that tennis is a lot tougher than people give it credit for. It's really hard to jump up the way that you guys have. 3.0-4.0 both of you kind of described your progression over the past couple of years is not a small jump. It's very large. So both of you have done a great job, and I hope you both continue to improve. Those of you that are listening to this show right now need to understand that that is a big jump, and I guess don't head out there. Even if you have played previous sports like John described, don't assume that you're just going to pick it up. Maybe listen to a podcast; watch videos on YouTube; watch some slow-motion video of pros; and just go: 'Oh, I'm just going to do that and be a great player!' It's a lot more difficult than that. So it's great that you pointed that out, John, that the first step for you was identifying that it's going to be a longer road, and not take it too far ahead of yourself. Steve, what would be 1 or 2 things that you would say has been probably the most important thing to understand or learn as far as your improvement has come over the last couple of years? Steve: I don't there's any particular stroke that you can...Obviously, increasing your technical attitude and learning the proper fundamentals on strokes is definitely important. Especially if you're going to get past the 4 level, you're going to have to have some technique behind it. But I think John touched on it. I was very athletic. I played lots of basketball, lots of baseball, lots of sports. Those kinds of sports--especially basketball--they're rewarding when you let all out and were very physical. When I try to take my athletic ability over to the tennis court, I found out that running around and smacking the ball as hard as you could was not the best things to do. I found that out quickly! I was stubborn--and I am stubborn--and it took me awhile to make myself back down. I think over the last year that's what I've learned to do, is just make myself apply the proper amount of exertion on a shot based on situations where I am on the court. If I'm stretched out wide and running for a ball, I know that I might be able to make a shot, but the spectacular 2 out of 10 times; 1 out of 10 times. I think just in learning to play the percentages and saying, 'Hey, at this point, just hit a defensive ball and stay in the point.' and definitely when you're talking about competitive tennis, I think that's what we all want to get better at, is winning more games and winning more sets and more matches. It starts with that kind of court wisdom and recognition of where you are, what the ball's doing, what my opponent's doing, and the dynamics of how all that fits together in leading you to play a particular shot at a particular time. I'm very much still at the beginning of the learning curve on that! But I think that it's finally starting to click. For me, that's been not a particular technique, change, or improvement, but it's just that mindset of: 'Hey, slow down! You know you can chase down a ball, but slow down and play the right shot at the right time.' That's been the thing that's helped me improve a lot. Ian: Good stuff. Let's actually bounce off that a bit, Steve what you're describing, and talk about how you guys have split up your time on the court. And I'm curious from each you what you find is the best combination of drilling or stroke practice, technique practice type work on the courts where maybe it's you and a partner doing some focus hitting, cooperative hitting back and forth. Or maybe with a ball machine. John, I know that you hit with a ball machine quite a bit. Or maybe hitting serves by yourself. How do you guys split up your time between that type of cooperative or structured practice and actual competitive play? Whether it be organized USTA matches or practice sets with a competitive partner, that type of thing. I'm curious for each of you, and I expect you guys to be at least a little different, how do you guys split that up so that it's optimal in your opinions? John, let's go to you first. John: Sure. I'd just like to make one comment on what Steve said before we go on. Ian: Yeah, sure. John: There's a subtle distinction between what Steve and I talked about. This should be important to your listeners. Steve was talking about playing smart. You know: don't swing hard when you don't have to, when the shot doesn't call for it. What I was talking about was playing content. You miss a shot--everybody's going to miss a shot--that's OK. You just tell yourself, 'I'm not looking forward to cleaning that shot up or making it better next time' as opposed to carousing about it. And I know you've talked about mental tennis a number of times on the Podcast, but just to be clear, that was what really helped me. Just getting in a better mental frame of mind. To answer your question about practicing, there's so many variables that go into that. I try to get a little bit of practice and a little bit of play each week. There's always people around on the weekends; the courts are full; so I know that's going to be competition. USTA matches are off an on weekends. I try to sneak out at lunch on the weekdays to get a little ball machine practice. If I can; if nobody's available. But I definitely in a little each week. One thing that I do that I don't see a lot of people doing and it mystifies me: if I have a lesson, I schedule practice time either immediately after that lesson or the following day, so that whatever the pro taught me I immediately put that into practice. Instead of just assuming that 30-60 min. with the pro has fixed the problem! You have to do your homework. Ian: I agree. Obviously, I've spent a lot of time on the court myself around recreational players. In my experience as well, it's very rare. And trust me, I consistently suggest to people to practice whatever we happened to be working on. We have several great ball machines at my club. We have a hidden wall. Obviously serves are easy to work on by yourself, but I rarely see people go out and actually put the sweat time on their own, and spend time working on whatever we happen to be practicing during lessons. So good stuff. All of those things you suggest are valuable. If you're hitting against the machine, the wall, a live person taking a lesson, you can learn from all that as long as you're deliberate. Actually that's something I learned from you and Jason. Going back to talk about hitting ground strokes. You just have to have something in mind, because if you're not practicing towards a goal, you're just exercising. Ian: [laughter] So John, give me a percentage. I know the club where you play is very active. There's a lot of players; a lot of courts. What percentage of the recreational time spent out there has some kind of focus? It doesn't even have to be a very specific cooperative drill where there's targets, objectives, and that sort of thing. John: Of the entire membership? Ian: [laughter] Yeah. John: I'd say maybe at the high end 5%. I mean everybody goes out to play mostly. Ian: Sure. John: And you know the 5% that practice, maybe outside of somebody like me who just practices a lot and is of moderate ability, the good guys get out and practice. You see them all the time doing cooperative drilling. Ian: Isn't that funny? [laughter] John: Yeah, it's amazing. Ian: I think rec players, lower level rec players a lot of time assume that it's kind of the opposite, where 'Oh man! I'm just starting to get going. I've got to hit as many balls as possible. Play a whole lot of sits.' And they don't really stop, slow down, and think about anything that's important to their game. Whereas you go watch 2 4.5 players drill. They're going to just hit balls for an hour without keeping track of score at all. Yeah, it's Just one quick example before you go to Steve. There's one guy that I see: he's the most diligent practicer I've seen. He'll go to practice his serve. He will throw up a toss, and if that toss is not worth hitting, he will not bother. He will sometimes throw that toss up 5 times until it's in just the right place to swing. Ian: It takes a lot of focus. John: Yes. Patience. Ian: Yeah. So Steve, going back to the original question, how do you split up your time on the court between cooperative hitting and maybe stroke work and competitive play? How's your ratio look? Steve: It's probably 60-70% drilling and hitting. 30% match play. I've been fortunate over the last 3 years to have a really good hitting partner. We'll go out and hit balls for 2 hours at a time without even playing a point. Over the past year, I've really been more disciplined about using that time constructively and trying to hone down my technique, especially on my forehand. 1. I have a powerful forehand, and 1. I have that as my go-to shot. My game-winner shot, so to speak. The couple years prior when I was really working on solidifying my game and getting better, I would go and practice my serve 3 times a week for 1-1.5 hours. That's really helped me out over the last couple of years in making that a better and a go-to shot, and I now have a good powerful serve that I can use. Then over the last 6-8 months or so, I've been playing a lot of doubles at the courts that I go to. There's the challenge court. I'll be consistent in going out there. It's hard to practice I think doubles play. There's obviously some things you can work on: volleys and maybe your approach game with yourself or somebody else. But actually practicing doubles. I've got to play doubles [laughter] to actually....That's really what's improved my level in doubles play a lot. Concurrently, I think that's helped to expand and help out my singles game as well. I play an all court game and what's the tax in that? The most important thing for me has been some things that I learned at the last [inaudible] was just being deliberate and disciplined about hitting the same shot 4 or 5 or 6 times in a row. Being able to hit the same spot on the court. Being able to work on my footwork, and get it to where I know exactly where my feet have to be and where my weight has to be to go into the shot to hit the kind of shot that I want to. To produce the kind of shot that I want to. Like I said, that's probably--I don't know how that ranks with the avg. but 60-70% practice time and the other small percentage of the remainder of that playing matches. [speaker] Before we get to our next topic, I want to tell everybody about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast. That is TennisTours.com. Since 1987, Tennis Tours has been putting together tennis ticket passages to professional men's and women's touring events. Whether you're into the WTA or the ATP, they have the Grand Slam tickets available for all 4 of the Grand Slams. Also, most of the ATP 1000 Master's events and some of the lower level tournaments as well. They carry a full range of tickets for a lot of events. Go check out what they have available at TennisTours.com. No matter what you're looking to spend, whether it's just a ground pass or a regular seat or a luxury suite, they have a little bit of everything available there. They can put together tennis tickets along with accommodations, hotel packages, etc. So no matter where you're looking to travel, no matter what tournament you want to go to, please check them out first and thank them for being supportive of the Essential Tennis Podcast by making your next purchase through them. If you fill in the promotional code Essential with a capital E, when you check out, you'll receive a $25 discount off your purchase. I thank them very much for their support of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Please go check them out at TennisTours.com. Let's switch gears a little bit. There's at least 2 other questions that I'd like to get to. The first one is a little different from what we talked about before. I asked you guys a few minutes ago to talk about what in your opinions, were the most important things that you have improved over the years. Now let's talk about the most difficult thing for each of you. For myself, I would choose either my one-handed back-hand top spin has always been a weakness for me myself on my backhand side. So that would be one example. Or you can pick something having to do with tactic or mental toughness, whatever. Steve, let's start with you. What has been the most difficult thing for you to improve over the last couple of years? Steve: Definitely not backhand. I hit a one-handed backhand, and up until about a year or 6-8 months ago, it was a hit or miss shot. It was a spectacular winner or it would go in the fence, over the net, or in the next court. [laughter] [inaudible] It was extremely inconsistent. It has improved over the last couple of months. It's gotten to where it's not such a liability. But that's definitely been the hardest thing for me. Everybody wants that--everybody that hits a one-handed backhand anyway--wants that pretty [inaudible] Feder-esque rolling top-spinner. It is a hard shot to master. Ian: Is there anything specifically recently that has helped it get a little better? Or has it just been repetition and practice time for you? Steve: Definitely repetition and practice, but I've played with a--I've worked with a guy who's a 5.0 player. We go out and hitting a couple of times a week. He moved away. He made me focus on my point of contact: moving my feet. I'm real good at moving my feet and getting in the position on my forehand side and knowing what to do, but I'm not as comfortable going on my backhand, recognizing that it is a backhand and going and getting my feet set. And also recognizing like I said, where the contact point needs to be and moving not laterally side to side, but backward and forward to adjust and make that contact point as optimal as possible. So that [inaudible] has been huge in helping me out. Ian: Good stuff. Those are types of things that I think a lot of rec players take for granted. It's like, 'Well, yeah. I'm supposed to move my feet. And I'm supposed to make contact around waist height.' And yet it's something that is done incorrectly so often. So it's great that you're focusing on that. John, how about you? Give us an example of one thing that has been particularly difficult for you over the last couple years. John: Searching for my inner singles player. [laughter] Ian: Ah. You're more of a doubles expert? John: Well you know, I think it was just a product of joining the club and you'll find in most places at my age almost everybody plays doubles. And there was a challenge court which was the social venue. I would show up there, and I kind of learned to play tennis on that court. The downside of that is I learned to play doubles. And I kind of geared my attitude around doubles. Which is 'Go get the ball!' I sometimes tell people, like if I'm playing with a lower player, in doubles my view is either the ball is coming to me or I am going to get it. You have to have that mentality. So when I get out on that big open singles court, there's too much hurry and panic, and that manifests itself in ways that I'm still dealing with now. I get too close to the ball. I'm just not comfortable letting that ball get far enough away from me. So I'm constantly fighting balls off from both the forehand and the backhand side, because I don't give myself room to breathe in singles. Steve: John, that's funny. I'm almost the exact opposite! [laughter] John: Yeah, we've talked about that, haven't we? Steve: Yeah. John: If we could find some way to clone the good half of Steve and the good half of me, you might have a decent all-around tennis player. [laughter] Ian: I'll try and work on that product. Alright, speaking of which, one question I really want to get to before we wrap things up is I'm curious how the internet and technology in general has aided you guys? And you can talk about specific websites; parts of specific websites. Maybe it's a piece of technological gear that you use to help yourselves out when it comes to improving your game. I'm curious. Obviously, technology keeps getting more and more prevalent in smaller parts of our lives. For me personally, teaching has definitely been affected. So I'm curious as students of the game, what are maybe 2 or 3 areas that technology has really helped you improve? John, let's start off with you. John: I can answer that a couple of ways. Technically it's obvious. There are sites like yours with the podcasts, and sites like FuzzyYellowBalls that have the video content. And even the talk tennis message boards that have an infinite array of people. I think you can get something out of all that. I've become a big video nut. I've learned that because of video, I can't stop lying to myself on the [inaudible] [laughter] When I think I'm doing something--and literally, when I go out on the ball machine and think: 'Hey, I'm doing this right. This is perfect. That's what the pro was talking about!' I'll go back and look on the video and say, 'No. I'm not even close to what I'm supposed to be doing. So that's immensely helpful. But from the more mental or psychological thing, I've just got to say that all of these resources on the internet and the 3 sites I have named, I've used all of them pretty regularly, but I really enjoyed the shared experience. So you know how tennis is. You can have good days and some days it's just going to spike you in the chest with a volley. [laughter] Because nothing's working! And in either case, if I have a good day, I can go on the message boards and chat about a great USTA win I had. Everybody comes back [laughter] with some hi-fives. Great going! Or I can have a really crappy day and go talk about my experiences, and somebody will come back with: 'You think that's bad, let me tell you about my experiences!' [laughter] So it's a nice motivating resource. If you feel good, it makes you want to go out and play again. If you feel bad, it makes you feel: Hey, you're just like everybody else! Tomorrow is another day. Ian: Alright. John: That's what I've gotten out of it. Ian: OK. The community feel that's available online, no matter what you happen to be into, is definitely a huge plus. Just to be able to interact with different people from all different backgrounds, and different specialties. They have different strengths and weaknesses. It's definitely an awesome part of the internet. Obviously, we're seeing stuff like Twitter and Facebook take off in little niche areas like tennis or...Well yeah, we're talking about tennis. It's a great way to use technology to be able to be like you were talking about, get picked up when you need it or hi-five when you need it. Good stuff. Steve, how about you? Technology and your improvement. What has been most helpful? Steve: Yeah, I spent a lot of time probably like John and like a lot of folks that frequent ET forums and XYB and all that stuff. Watching a lot of video and looking for the magic formula to what Roger Federer is doing and how I can look that. That has not helped me out as much as...I think just solid --I don't want to say mental instruction--but just the kind of thing that the podcasts do. Just exploring what's going through your brain when you're on the tennis court. Like I said, I'm a natural athlete and I don't have problems getting the ball or hitting a shot. Whether I can hit that beautiful down the line forehand winner once or twice, or how many out of 10 times, I know that I hit once I can do it. You know? It's possible. But not relying on that, but just the mental aspect, and learning about just taking information with the podcasts, and I guess the more mental aspect of the game. Making myself actually think on the tennis court is to react. Learning how to do that and the kind of thing that you teach, and that Will teaches, and things like that have been more helpful, I would say, than trying to look at top level players and emulate what they're doing. Ian: OK. Good stuff. Well we're a little bit overtime, so I'm going to wrap things up. But I want to thank you guys very much for giving me part of your time tonight to record the show. I know that everybody listening appreciates it very much as well. John, thank you for your time and Steve, you as well. I look forward to spending more time with both of you back on the forums and helping you guys improve. So John, thank you. John: Thank you, Ian. I really enjoyed the chance to share these experiences, because that's why we get involved anyway. And Steve, it was nice to finally be your doubles partner, even if for just 30 min. Steve: [laughter] I think maybe 2 on 1 we could take Ian. What do you think? John: As long as he's got the frying pan, we've got it! Ian: Ooh. We might have to do that some day. That'd be fun. [laughter] Alright. Steve, thank you for your time as well. Steve: Thanks for having me. Like I said, I say a lot if my mistakes can serve as a warning to others, then something's worked out. I appreciate the opportunity. Thank you very much. [music] [music] Ian: That does it for Episode #115 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you for your support of the show by downloading it and giving it a listen this week. I hope it was enjoyable and informational to you. For those of you who don't already listen to the Podcast and download it through iTunes, I really suggest Tennis that you do that. It's just the easiest way to listen to the show. You can subscribe to the show and automatically have it download each week instead of having to go to the website and manually download the file, and then drag it into whatever music player you happen to use. Definitely check it out on iTunes. Just download iTunes. It's a free application. Click on...It says Music Store on the left. Then just do the search for 'tennis' or 'tennis podcast' and the Essential Tennis Podcast will come up on top their hopefully. And you can subscribe there, so definitely check that out. I want to thank a couple of people who donated this past week. Just 3 donators, and all subscription donations, which help a lot. The first person here is Kim in Texas. A $5 monthly subscription. Thank you, Kim. Shelly in New Mexico with a $10 subscription donation. And John in Texas $5 subscription donations. Thank you to you 3 very much. I appreciate your support a great deal. If the Essential Tennis Podcast has helped you improve and you would like to show your appreciation, you can donate. Either a monthly subscription donation as Kim, Shelly, and John did this last week, or a 1 time amount as well. Just go to Essential Tennis.com and on the front page in the lower right, you'll see a box that says Donate. Alright. That does it for this week. Thanks again everybody. Take care. And good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast #116: So should you really be watching the ball during points? If so, what process should you follow? Also Ian talks about the journey of improving your game.

ianw — Mon, 03 May 2010 13:42:47 +0000

There are so many misunderstandings about watching the ball during your tennis play. Watching the ball is an incredibly simple concept, but so few recreational players do it well. Find out what steps you can take to start making better contact with the ball, stop losing your concentration! Ian also talks about the journey we all take as we try to improve our tennis games. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Speaker: Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast--your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by TennisTours.com, where you can use the promotional code Essential to receive a $25 discount off your next purchase of professional tennis event tickets and travel packages. Before we get to today's topics, I'm going to answer a cuople of listener questions on today's show. Before then, I just wanted to simply thank all of you who have been regular listeners of the podcast. I appreciate all of you very much. Without you, the show would not be possible. I want to thank you for downloading the show, esp those of you who download on a regular basic and listen to this show weekly. Those of you who have rated the show and commented on iTunes, thank you very much. And I want to esp thank those of you who have sent in questions for me to answer. That's really what makes this show tick. And really makes it unique, I think. That's what makes the internet and podcasting in general so much fun, I think, is the communication back and forth between a host or producer and his or her listeners. So thank you all very much. I appreciate it, and I hope to continue making the show even better fr all of you listening. Now let's go ahead and get started with today's questions. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Alright. Let's get started with our first question. It comes to us from Sandro in Italy. Pretty sure it's the first podcast question coming to us from Italy, so Sandro, thank you very much for your question. I appreciate it. And I'm sure that you've been enjoying watching the recent ATP events there in Italy: the Rome tournament. [inaudible] tournament just wrapped up yesterday. Good match between Rafael Nadal and Ferer. Anyway, let's go ahead and get to his question, which is: I have been playing tennis for 4 years at a local club. I've also played some tournaments. When I play, I have a lot of problems looking at the ball. My eyes go to where I want to send the ball, and of course I lose it and hit a poor shot. I can keep concentration on the ball for 4-5 minutes, but after that my eyes go to the point where I want to put the shot. As you can understand, I've lost many matches against players a lot lower than my level because of this. I hit a lot of unforced errors, giving away the match. Do you have some tips or exercises to keep my eyes on the ball, and not where I want to put the ball? Thank you, Sandro. Sandro, that's a really good question. I'm going to be spending some time on this today. I'm going to go into some detail, because I think this is a topic that is misunderstood very often. I think it falls into 2 categories. First of all, I think it's misunderstood. That's #1. Though there's people that know it's important, but have misunderstandings about how exactly it works. There's another group of people I think, who don't even feel like it's a very important or worthwhile thing to focus on. I disagree with it. I'm going to talk to you guys why. Just to give you a heads up, [laughter] I'm probably really going to be going into detail on this today. It's a topic that I feel strongly about. I think that it's smthg that is the difference between levels of play. In other words, it's smthg that higher level tennis players just do automatically. It's not smthg they have to think about. Whereas as more beginners or intermediate level recreational players are not even aware of it often. It could be a real different maker. So I'm going to spend a lot of time on it today, because I feel that it's very important. Let's begin first with: why is it important? Well, in my experience as a teacher, I've spent a lot of time on the court as a teacher teaching recreational players and avg. level club players. Those are the people that make up by far the biggest chunk of my audience here on the Essential Tennis Podcast. So I'm speaking to you guys: the weekend warriors, or just the recreational players who go out there on a regular undefined and 4.0 player. Now, if you're a 4.5 level player, this can pertain to you as well, but probably not quite as much.. Anyway, in my experience watching recreational players, there are errors due to making poor contact with the ball way more times than they think there are. Most recreational players in my experience are just not aware of how often the ball does not hit the middle of the racket. When I say 'poor contact,' I'm talking about the ball hitting somewhere on the racket other than where it's supposed to. Now of course we have some margin for error. The ball doesn't have to hit an area on the strings the size of a tennis ball in order to be a good shot. There's probably 1, 2, maybe 3 inches of margin for error, all around the actual center or the actual sweet spot of the racket. But once the ball starts making contact with the racket out towards the edge--even if it doesn't physically touch the frame of your racket--it really detracts from the quality of your shot a great deal. More than people think! The reason why it's so important for us to focus on watching the ball closely is because most players just aren't very aware of when this happens, and how often it happens. When I'm watching players play, I very often watch and see in front of me a player mishit a shot badly. An example of this might be, let's say in a doubles point somebody I'm watching on an instructional court that I'm teaching during, a lot of times I'll watch a player mis hit a volley. And see a low volley--a shot that they're trying to play with a little more touch of finesse; they can't really attack on it--and the ball will just purely hit off their frame. I'm not even talking about a shot that's a little off center. It completely hits off their frame, and hits the bottom of the net. It doesn't even get close to making it over. I'll very often ask the people on my court when I'm teaching: 'Alright, everybody stop. Hang on a second. I need to talk to the person who just missed the shot.' And I'll look them in the eyes and say: 'Why did you miss that shot?' And I am absolutely shocked by the wide range of answers that I get back to that question! Time after time when I ask that question, people give me answers other than: 'The ball hit my frame.' They'll say smthg like: 'I hit it too softly. I was trying to go for a tough shot; it was too soft.' Or maybe they'll say: 'I didn't get down low enough with my knees. Low volley. I stayed too upright.' Or they'll say: 'I didn't open up my racket face enough. My technique was poor.' Whatever. They'll say smthg besides: 'The ball hit my frame.' Then I'll tell them: 'No, you're incorrect. Your technique looked great. You were in the right spot. Everything looked good, except that the ball hit your frame.' And then everybody laughed and did, 'Oh, ha! Well obviously, yeah. I hit my frame. I knew that!' Well, think about it. What could be more important than the ball hitting your strings? You go through all this time and effort of working on your technique and trying to make it better and better. Then the ball comes your way and doesn't hit your strings. How can you possibly even think about anything else besides: 'Well crap! The ball did not hit the middle of my racket, so of course it wasn't a good shot!' [laughter] Now, out of people who I haven't asked that question of before, honestly I would say 10-20% answer correctly. Now, if I'm talking to a person who knows me well and has worked with me over several hours, they probably know what I'm getting at and immediately know what I'm asking. They'll give me the correct answer. But out of people who don't know how I teach and what I really emphasize on the court--which is mostly basic things and big chunks of important parts of tennis that need to be done well in order to improve your game--they very often miss this question, which is always baffling to me. So let's move on and talk about a debate that many people on the internet have when it comes to talking about actually watching the ball. There's 2 main arguments that I see. I've seen a lot of discussions about the merits or demerits of watching the ball. There's 2 main detractions that I've noticed the most. The first one is when somebody will say on a tennis message board or blog post: 'Hey, you guys really need to be watching the ball,' very often people will reply and say: 'Well, you can't even see the ball hit your strings! So why could it be important to watch it closely? I can't watch it, because I can't actually see it. So what's the point of that? It seems like this is a waste of time to try to watch the ball hit my racket or hit my strings, because I'm not going to see the ball anyway.' And that's true. That's important for you to understand, that the ball comes and leaves your racket much too quickly for you to actually see; meaning see, meaning have a snapshot in your head of the ball making contact with the racket. So that is true. But that's not the point! [laughter] When I ask people to watch the ball closely, I'm not asking them because I want them to tell me what number's on the ball or I want them to draw a picture for me of what it looked like. Because I know that they can't physically see the ball hit the strings. But that's not really the whole purpose of watching anyway. Now, in terms of the ball coming and leaving quickly, just to give you some information here. I heard this just recently in an instructional DVD that I watch. The amount of time that it takes for the ball to come and touch your strings, and then leave the strings again, is typically between 2-5 1000s of a second. Think about that. So if we're talking like 3 1000ths of a second is the amount of the time that the ball actually stays on the strings of your racket. So obviously, if you think you can see that occur, you're incorrect. [laughter] It happens much too quickly. But again, it's not the point to physically see it. The point of watching the ball is to focus on the most important part of the moment, and that is the ball. The whole purpose behind watching the ball closely is to ensure the best possible concentration on what's happening. That the most important point of time during a tennis really back and forth is when the ball is hitting your strings. Because if it doesn't hit your strings, it doesn't matter how good your technique is. If you're technique is perfect but the ball hits off your frame, the result will be a poor shot and your good technique was wasted. So we need the best possible contact and therefore we need the best possible concentration on the ball to make sure that happens. Otherwise, we're just really paying ourselves a disservice. Now the second main argument that I see online, when people argue against watching the ball closely, is they say: 'Well, the pros don't always watch the ball.' Then they'll paste in a link to an image of some professional player making contact with the ball. It will be a snapshot with the ball right on the strings and their eyes are not looking at the point of contact. Their eyes typically are just a little bit in front of the racket. The ball is on their strings, and their eyes are not looking at the strings. Well, it's also not the point of my talk here--it's not the point of watching the ball to actually have your eyes perfectly in the right place at perfectly the right time over and over again. Once again, it goes back to concentration and focus on what's important in general. It doesn't have to be perfect in order to benefit you. Your eyes don't have to literally be on the point of contact when yo make contact. You also don't literally need to watch the ball hit your strings. That's not the point. And anybody who argues either of those 2 arguments is missing the whole point of the exercise of focusing on the ball. Now, my second comment on that is that the pros very rarely hit their frame. [laughter] You will see a pro shank a ball every now and then, but for the most part, they're making very clean contact. They're amazing athletes. Most people don't understand how good of athletes they're watching when they watch professional tennis. And to be perfectly honest, they don't need to be perfect and have their eyes literally on the point of contact. That being said, some pros do most of the time. When you look at photos of Roger Federer making contact with the shot, usually his eyes are right in contact. Other pros their eyes are just a little off and not quite looking at the strings when they make contact, and that's fine. Bottom line here guys is the point is to hit the strings as often as possible. Period. So, let's move on and talk about exactly how to do that. I'm going to go through a pattern, or a sequence of events that you should be following in order to best focus on the ball, and give yourself the best concentration possible on what's important. This is smthg I'm probably going to write in a whole e-book about in the future. And really lay it out in great detail. I'm getting into detail here today for sure. But there's a lot of points that I could make that I'm not going to. I'm just going to lay out a simple sequence of events that you guys should be following when you're in the middle of a rally or a point back and forth. So this is the pattern you should follow. First of all, once the ball comes off your opponent's racket, you need to keep your focus on the ball all the way up until it gets to your racket. And your focus can't waver during this period of time. The period of time that it takes for the ball to leave your opponent's strings and get to your strings, your focus needs to be on the ball and nothing else. This is difficult. This is exactly what Sandro was talking about. There's so many other things that could take your concentration. You could be watching your opponent and trying to figure out what they're doing on the other side of the court. As Sandro pointed out, you could be looking at your target and anticipating where you want the the ball to go. Maybe you have a sharp angle volley you're trying to hit. It's a forehand volley and so contact is happening on the right hand side of your body. Your target is way over on the left of the court. It's very tempting to look away and want to check out your shot. Well, you know what? The ball is going to go where it's going to go regardless of if you watch or not. So whether or not you look at your target has nothing to do with if the ball goes there or not. However, you'd better believe that where the ball hits on your racket is going to make a big impact on where the ball goes. So you guys need to focus on the important part of what's happening here, and that is: where the ball's hitting on your racket. That's where your focus should be, and it all starts watching the ball come off your opponent's racket. From there you should be following it all the way into our own racket. An interesting peace of trivia as far as how the human eyes work, as humans we have just about 180 degrees of total field of vision, and it's split into 2 parts. You have your peripheral vision, which is the vision that's out to the side of your eyes. And this vision is blurry. We can see objects in our peripheral vision, but you can't focus on them. Meaning fine focused vision. In other words, when you have some text or an image off to your right or to your left, you can't actually read that text or focus clearly on that image unless you move your eyes and put the focus part of your vision on whatever you're trying to focus on. That part of your vision--the part that's actually sharply focused--is only 3-5 degrees out of the 180 degrees of your vision. A very small percentage. Most people don't realize how little of their vision is actually focused. The rest is blurry. Once the ball leaves your opponent's racket, you need to keep that 5 degrees of focused vision on the ball all the way until it gets to your racket. No exceptions. If those 5 degrees of vision leave the ball and look at your opponent or your target a split second before you make contact, you're decreasing the chances that you're going to make good contact. You're doing yourself a disservice there. Once you've made contact with the ball, you want to shift your eyes from the point of contact, hopefully just a little after you make contact, and you want to shift them to your opponent. You want to start looking at what your opponent is doing. This is going to tell you when the ball is coming next. And also, it's probably going to give you some really good information as far as what type of shot is coming from your opponent as well. These are topics I could do a whole show about individually. But by watching your opponent, you'll see when their swing begins. You'll see what type of swing they're going to make. That's going to tell you when you need to be ready for the next shot, and also what type of shot is coming to you next. That's going to help you prepare yourself and be ready for the next oncoming shot. When the ball gets to your opponent's racket in the middle of their next swing you want to shift your eyes from you opponent and then back to the ball again, and you'll repeat that sequence. So the sequence is this. Watch the ball come off your opponent's racket and follow it all the way into your racket. Once you've made contact, shift your focus back to your opponent's again. See what they do; see where they go on the court; see what type of swing they make. Once they make their swing and they make contact with the ball, shift their focus back to the ball again, and then repeat. So there should be this shifting from the ball to your opponent; to the ball to your opponent; and back and forth again. It's not that you want to watch the ball the entire time, because you'll miss out on a lot cues from your opponent in between shots. Once you've made contact with your shot, you want to watch your opponent's again until it's time for them to make contact, and then you shift your focus back to the ball again. So this sequence of events and the way that you control your eyes is very important. For many of you, this is going to be a conscious thing. You're going to have to really mentally focus on it in order to make this work. But trust me, it's worth it! I really encourage you guys to practice it. In the long run, your concentration will become better, and your contact will become better. You'll hit the middle of your racket more and more often. Before I wrap up this topic, I want to tell you guys about today's sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast. That is TennisTours.com. I've got a really awesome package to tell you about. The U.S. Open is going to be coming up at the end of the tennis season in Aug. Always an awesome event. And championship tennis tours at TennisTours.com has put together just an incredible package to be able to go check out the U.S. Open. As part of their packages, you can choose between either a 4 or a 5 star hotel in NYC. You can choose the type of seating level that you'd like for your tickets between court side, lodge, or promenade. You also choose between attending a Broadway performance of your choice; a ticket to the Mets or Yankees game; or a city tour. That's pretty awesome. And you get free limousine shuttle back and forth to the U.S. Open and your hotel. Talk about an awesome experience! I mean, you get to go check out NYC; go to a baseball game or Broadway performance; get the limousine shuttle. You get to choose what type of tickets you'd like when you go and watch the U.S. Open. Plus--and this is my persona favorite--they're going to be sending you an invitation to a championship tennis tours and Essential Tennis Podcast cocktail party at the W Hotel in Times Square. I'm going to try to make arrangements to be there personally. I'd really love to go there to see the Open this year and meet some of you guys who support both my show and championship tennis tours. Please do support them. Thank them for being a sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Go check out their U.S. Open ticket and accommodation packages. As you can tell, they put together a first class ticket package with so many different options and different types of amenities. I guarantee you will have an amazing time in NYC. So go check them out: TennisTours.com. Make sure to fill in the promotional code Essential with a capital E, and you'll get your invitation to the championship tennis tours and Essential Tennis Podcast cocktail party in Times Square during the U.S. Open. Just 2 other things that I wanted to point out before I wrap up this topic. First of all, I think it's good information to point out how you can tell when you do hit off center. When you don't hit the right place on your racket. When the ball makes contact with your racket. There's 3 main ways you can tell. First of all, the sound. It will sound different. After awhile, once you start paying attention to this, you'll be able to tell without seeing your opponent hit. Or let's say there's a point going on behind you; you're not even playing. You'll start to be able to pick out clean hits and shots that are off center. After awhile that becomes very helpful, because when you make a swing and it's a bit off center, it's good to get that audio feedback and be able to tell: Alright, I need to do a little bit better job watching the ball. I need to make better contact on my next shot. Secondly, feel. It's going to feel completely different. The racket will twist and turn in your hand. Or it will vibrate. It just doesn't feel like a clean, crisp shot. Very often I see people blame their grip slipping n a bad grip, when in fact they've just hit off their frame. And that kind of twirks the racket in your hand. It destabilizes the racket in your hand and makes it want to twist and turn to the side. When the racket twists in your hand, please don't tell yourself that you're gripping too lightly, or that your grip is wearing out and getting slippery. Maybe it is. But the grip will not slip in your hand unless you hit off center. And that's what's going to twist the racket around in your hand. And thirdly, the result. This is the one that should seem obvious, but I pointed out earlier in my explanation of this topic that very often players don't even think that it could have been possible that they hit their frame. When the ball just doesn't go anywhere close to where you were aiming or trying to hit it, try to think back and see if any other of those other 2 things were there. Did it feel right? Did it sound right? If it didn't go where it was supposed to either, it's a very high likelihood that you hit off center. And lastly, when you do hit an off center shot, and you do it on a regular basis on a certain shot. Let's say a backhand ground stroke. You tend to hit off center really regularly. Look and feel for a pattern. Very often in my experience teaching, when players have problems off center, it becomes a pattern where the ball hits the same place over and over again. So let's say you have a 2 handed back hand and the ball consistently hits the top edge of your racket. That's going to kind of twist the racket back and open the face up. It's not going to feel right or sound right. A lot of times when players have problems, they fall into hitting a pattern in the same place again and again. So pay attention to that. Once you recognize the pattern based on where you see it hit and also how it feels, you can start to make changes. If it continues to hit the top edge of your racket on your back hand, you know that you need to lift the racket a little higher so that you hit the middle of the racket instead of the top frame. So you can start making specific adjustments like that. So pay close attention. Lastly, I just want to say: Stick with it guys! This is smthg that seems like it's very simple, but it's not. When I start with students, very often they have no idea when they hit frame. And people that I've been working with for a long period of time; that I've give a lot of lessons to; after awhile they start to tell me first--I don't even have to point it out to them anymore! They'll hit a shot off center, and it's not a good shot as a result, and they'll immediately look at me and tell me it was off center. Or they can even tell me where it hit. They'll feel it. They'll see the result. They'll recognize the direction the racket twisted in their hand. And they'll tell me, 'That was off center. It hit right here.' Then the next time they get that same shot, they can make an adjustment with where they put the racket by using their hand and adjusting where the racket is in relationship to the oncoming ball. They can make the correct adjustment and the correct change. And that's the whole point, is to do a better job of making good contact. So, that brings that explanation to an end. Sandro, it might not have been exactly what you were looking for. You were asking for exercises or drills. I really just wanted to get through that and explain to you guys in detail why it's important and how you do it. I want you to go out there and practice doing it. Practice the steps that I explained. And I promise you you're going to get better at it as you become more aware of it, and as you start to narrow it down and focus better, and start to make changes where you see patterns of making a mistake and not making good contact. Again, this is a topic that seems very simple, but it's incredibly important. So I encourage you guys to focus on it and do a better job with it. This is one of those things that can really improve your tennis. I'd be curious to hear what you guys think about my explanation here. And also I'd be curious to hear feedback about you trying this for the first time. That'd be cool. So send me an e-mail: ian@essentialtennis.com. Hopefully this was helpful to you. [music] [music] [music] Alright. One more thing I'd like to talk about before we wrap up today's episode. It has to do with the learning process in tennis. I know that if you're listening to my voice right now you're really passionate about the sport of tennis. [laughter] Especially if you just listened to me go over the detailed outline of watching the ball. I know that you're really taking seriously your tennis improvement. That's great. You're exactly the type of person I've been looking for while doing the podcast. And I talked to somebody just like that yesterday. His name was Andrew. He called me. And by the way, for those of you who don't know, Essential Tennis has it's own website phone number. I use Google Voice with that. It actually comes through right to my cell phone. I can't always answer the phone, obviously. A lot of times I'm on court teaching. But if you'd like to leave me a message, I can get back to you. Or sometimes I may even be able to pick up and talk. But if you guys go to Essential Tennis and click on Contact, there's a phone number. So anyway, Andrew had called me and he wanted my opinion on a couple different things. First of all, he gave me a pretty long list of different websites, different products that he had purchased and tried online. I think Andrew's pretty typical as far as listeners of my show in that he's trying to find as much information as possible. Obviously, Essential Tennis is not the only place online to get tennis instruction. There's lots of different places and a lot of good information out there. He asked my opinion about a couple of specific websites and teachers and coaches online who put out instructional information. He just wanted to get my take on a couple of different places and what I thought about their content. What this came down to was eventually he was asking me for suggestions of other ways to get instruction that is going to help him improve his game. Basically he said, 'Listen. Please tell me a DVD or smthg I can buy that's going to take my game to the next level.' I asked him about his game. He's been playing for 3 years. He's just looking for that next way to improve. In talking to him I can tell he's really pumped up about this, and really is looking for that next change. The thing that's really going to push him over towards that next level of that play. I gave him a couple of misses of advice. I want to pass that along to you guys, because I think it was a good conversation and I hope that he came away from it with a little bit more understanding of what it takes to really continue to improve your game. You guys need to be patient and keep working hard. Tennis looks easy when you watch it on TV or when you watch high-level players in person. But it takes a long time to continue developing your game. It's not smthg where you get that 1 piece of information, or that 1 product, or that 1 DVD and you watch it and it just makes sense. And it's like, 'Oh, this is great!' And you go there and just play incredible. And all of a sudden, 'Wow, I'm a good player because I got that piece of information that I was missing before!' Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way. Now granted--don't get me wrong--you need as much good information as possible, and that's why I'm here, and that's why there's other instructional websites as well. But just understand that even after you've learned that information, it takes time. It takes practice. It takes repetition. It takes perseverance and character to be able to continue working on those things. Even once you have the information, it takes sometimes long periods of time before that information actually makes its way into your game, and you have to stick with it. Andrew had been playing for 3 years. I told him, 'Let me guess. When you first started playing, you were really into it. You improved really quickly for probably that 1st year. Then you probably hit a plateau.' Andrew was like, 'Yeah. Definitely.' Don't be surprised by that, guys. You're going to have seasons in your game as you continue down towards the path of improvement where all of a sudden some things might click. And especially at first; when you first start working really hard at your game, you're going to improve very quickly. Because you just started. You're going to see big changes really fast. Eventually, that's going to slow down, and those big changes will come with more and more work. It takes more effort, more concentration, more repetition, and the better you get at tennis, the more work it takes to make that next improvement. So to Andrew and everybody else out there, stick with it. It's worth it! Make sure that you appreciate the journey. That's such a cliche thing to say, but enjoy the process. Enjoy finding that next piece of information and then going through the process of learning it on the court, and making it part of your game. Just don't expect it to become automatic right away. It's going to take time. You've got to stick with it. So those of you out there listening to me, don't look for that magic solution. Don't look for the silver bullet, or the magic pill, or that magical DVD where you're going to watch it and sit there on the couch and go, 'Oh! That's it!' Then go out there and move from a 3.5 to a 4.0 like the next week. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way. But if we continue to work together, and I continue giving you guys pieces of information here and there and you can put them into your game one at a time; piece by piece; you can continue to improve. Just please have kind of a long-term outlook on it, and don't get impatient. Don't go buy everything [laughter] and subscribe to every single website thinking that the more information you throw at your head, and the more you try to memorize, the better you'll get. Because that's not the case. You've got to work on one thing at a time, and move on to the next thing. So Andrew, be patient. And everybody else, be patient. Hopefully what I've said here has made sense and is a little encouraging and inspiring to you guys. Keep up the good fight, and I'll always be here to help you continue to improve. [music] [music] [music] Alright. That does it for Episode #116 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you for joining me for today's show. Thank you for downloading the file and for taking the time to listen. Hopefully it's been helpful to you. If it has, do me a favor and spread the word. Please tell your friends, your teammates, your co-workers who play tennis, your family members who play tennis--whoever. If you know other people who are really crazy and passionate about tennis as you are, please do me a favor and tell them about this show. Tell them where to download it either on EssentialTennis.com or on iTunes. I want to continue to grow this show as much as possible, and I can't do that without the help of you. So thank you very much. Alright, that does it for this week. Take care everybody, and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast #117: Is your tennis playing style something that you were born with or part of your game that you can change and develop at will? What are the main types of playing styles?

ianw — Mon, 10 May 2010 13:43:50 +0000

Today I discuss some great questions from a listener having to do with different playing styles of tennis. I first go over the four main styles of play in detail, talk about which pros fit each, and how you can improve your game if you fit into those styles. Next I discuss how much of our style is chosen, and how much is simply natural. Lastly I talk about how to beat each style of player! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game strategy, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player, and now, here's Ian. Ian: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast, your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today’s episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by Tennis tours.com where you can receive a $25 gift discount off your next purchase of professional tennis events tickets and travel packages. Before we get started with today's show, I'm wondering if any of you out there are experienced in writing iPhone or iPad applications. I am I'd really like to get an Essentials Tennis iPhone application going and one for android [inaudible] the android platform as well, and if that’s something that you think would be fun to work on and you like to give me a hand on getting an application out there like that. Please shoot me an email, I'd appreciate it very much. My email address is ian@essentialtennis.com Thanks very much, now let’s go ahead and get started with today’s show. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Alright let’s get started with today’s topic, which I think is really interesting and one that you guys are going to enjoy. Our question today comes from [inaudible] in Brazil, he wrote to me and said, "As my technique improves more and more I realize, that to win in tennis, you need more than just sharp technique. So I start to study the strategy, tactics and mental parts of the game. I'm just a beginner in those topics, but so far one thing is clear to me, to know yourself is just as important as knowing your opponents weaknesses and weapons." [inaudible] that’s a really good observation. I'll continue with his question here, "Knowing that it would help me and probably a lot of people, if you analyze the most important types of players you have in tennis. Counter, puncher, all-court player, etc. How I identify my style of game and how I work to improve it. I'm reading quite a lot about it and one thing in particular is problematic for me the game style, is the game style something natural, or chosen? Do I start as a counter-puncher by only having ground strokes and a base-line game, work through the middle court to be an aggressive player, and then get a grip on net play to serve and volley and after mastering all the court, turn into an all-court player and only then make an informed decision about my game? Well I think that this would be, I think this is just the beginning of my doubts as i go deeper on this new ground. Any insights would be helpful." Well [inaudible] really good observations and good question as well. And to be honest with you this is something that I hadn't really considered before. Obviously, I'm very aware of different styles and generalities of tennis players and the different kind of ways that we enjoy being on the courts and maybe different parts of our game that are stronger than others. Every body has different parts and sections of their game that they prefer over others. There's not a whole lot of people that are just good at everything and we're going to get to that, in detail, a little bit later. But I had never really thought about the connection between making a conscience choice of wanting to be a certain style of player as apposed to just being a natural type of player. So, I had a good time thinking about this, I enjoyed thinking about it, and in creating the outline for today's show, and I'm going to go into some pretty good detail. Kind of like last week's show where I really focused on the topic of watching the ball. We're probably going to spend all of today's show on this topic and I'm going to be outlining four main types of tennis players styles, that i think there are. We're also going to talk about professional for each style that i think probably represents that style the best. And I'm going to tell you guys how to improve each of these styles and i want you guys while I'm talking about these different types of players, I want you guys to be thinking about your own game and trying to figure out which of these styles fit you best. So that when i get to the part about improving, you'll know, in general, what to work on next to continue advancing your game. So, lets go ahead and start talking about the different types of players. And I'd like to start off saying that these are definitely generalities, alright, I mean everybody's a little the difference. Everybody has a little bit different skill set, and has different strengths and weaknesses, and there can be some overlap between these 4 really main types of players. With that being said, more than likely, all of you guys listening are probably going to most cleanly fit into 1 of the 4 of these categories. So, listen closely, and see which one you are. The first one I want to talk about is the counterpuncher-pusher-defensive baseline-type player. And this is a type of player that we are all very familiar with. It is very common style of tennis, and it depends on who you are, but it is probably the easiest way to start off, by not hitting anything fancy, not being very aggressive, just keeping the ball in play. And probably the hallmarks of this type of player are being very comfortable on the baseline, usually does not like to dictate point play, simply meaning that this type of player does not really feel comfortable being assertive, is not very comfortable being aggressive, and is much more comfortable allowing his or her opponent to dictate play, and simply absorbing their pace and putting the ball back in play. Also, usually this player makes very few unforced errors and simply waits for his opponents to make mistakes. And it could be easily argued that this is a very kind of pure and fundamental style of tennis. After all, you can only win a point if you keep the ball in play, and so this type of player is really at the core of it really playing solid tennis. They are really focusing on not making mistakes, just keeping the ball in play, usually not a whole lot of power, or aggressiveness behind their shots, and this type of player is usually very frustrating for recreational-type tennis players to play. And often times, recreational players want to try to hit those big shots. They want to try to hit winners and be aggressive, and when they come up against a pusher or counter-puncher, or whatever you want to call it, it can be frustrating to make mistakes, and feel like the other person did not really beat you, but you beat yourself because of the errors you make. So, this can be a very frustrating type of player to play. Usually this player does not like the net very much. They will stay away from the net and just keep the ball in play. Now an example of a professional player--the first person that came to mind for me was Layton Huett. Layton Huett is definitely a counter-puncher type player. He does not have big weapons from behind the baseline. Do not get me wrong, he has got great groundstroke’s. He has some skills at the net, but definitely not terribly comfortable up there, he would rather stay away from the net and keep the ball in play back from the baseline. And he waits for the most part for errors from his opponents. Now if this is you, if you are this type of player who is kind of passive, does not mind running down a ton of shots, just keeping it in play, that is about it, to improve you want to work on hitting short and weak shots aggressively. You want to develop some weapons, and it is very possible that you are successful at your own level of play, but if you want to move up a whole other level, and start beating players who are a level above you right now, it is important that eventually you start to develop some weapons and some aggressive shots. So, work specifically on short, weak shots. Hit towards you. Work on hitting those aggressively. You are going to need to learn to hit some topspin to keep those safe. Also, work on your net game. Get a little bit more comfortable up there so that when you do get that weak shot, and you attack on it, you can following it forward, and work on putting the ball away at the net. Also, work on creating pace and topspin from back at the baseline. Work on being a little bit more pressuring from back behind the baseline where you are usually playing your points. So that is the counter-puncher, pusher, defensive-type players. By the way, I did a whole podcast on how to beat this type of player sometime ago. I want to say it was Episode 30 or maybe Episode 40. Go to the archives and download that show. It is only about how to beat this type of player. Now, the text style of player is the aggressive baseline player, and this type of person is again very comfortable on the baseline, just like the counterpuncher. However, this person loves hitting the ball hard and dictating play. This person is most comfortable and is having the most amount of fun when they are really unloading on the ball and going for big shots. This person typically has very little patience. They will take the very first opportunity that they get, and just go for a winner, and very often this person has either a really good day or a really bad day on the courts, and not a whole lot in between. And it kind of depends on whether this player is on or not. In other words, when this person is really comfortable, and really timing his or her swings well that day, and really hitting the ball well, this person is really tough to beat by somebody at their own level, because they are just hitting everything big, and making it. However, when this type of player is having a little bit of an off day, it can be a disaster, because he or she will just make a ton of on-course errors due to their aggressive game play. If you are a little bit off and play really aggressively, you are going to make a lot of mistakes. So that is kind of the downfall of the aggressive baseline player. An example of this player in the professional ranks would be James Blake. And [laughter] not that I am saying that James Blake is not a smart player, but I have seen him play in person. I have watched him play on TV many times. He loves to hit the ball hard. He definitely hits the ball a little bit flatter than most of his peers, and he just likes to go for big shots. And kind of like what I describe a second ago, he is either really on or he is making a lot of mistakes that day, and it kind of a big swing back and forth. And a lot of times there is not a whole lot of in between for James Blake. Now, to improve, if you are this type of player. If you are an aggressive baseline player, you want to work on developing rhythm from the baseline. Rather than developing pace and power you want to be able to keep a certain pace of shot in play over and over and over again. And that will probably mean that you take a little bit of pace off your shorts on average in general, but you want to find a pace, a speed, to hit the ball at that is consistent, but still confident without being overly aggressive, and making a lot of errors. This is something that I will give a shout out to Brian Mark of the Forums. He has been working on this. He would definitely be in this category of an aggressive baseline player. He loves to hit the ball hard. He likes the net too, so he is not 100% a baseline player. But recently he has really made some big strides in his game by working on his rhythm by being able to hit back and forth, back and forth, still at a confident pace, but at a consistent speed and at a speed that he can manage. Lastly, this type of player typically needs to work on their net game as well. Not always. Like I said a second ago, Brian is definitely an aggressive baseline player, but also likes to be at the net. He plays quite a bit of doubles. But in general, usually aggressive baseline players would much rather let the ball bounce and do not like the net a whole lot, so working on their net game is usually a good thing. Alright, style #3 is the net rusher. This person would much rather be at the net taking the ball out of the air than letting it bounce. Usually they do not like to rally from the baseline. They are not as comfortable hitting ground strokes, and this type of player usually moves in on just about everything. As soon as they get their first opportunity, even if it is not a good one, they immediately move into the net, because that is just where they are comfortable. They feel like a fish out of water when they are back behind the baseline, and having to hit a couple of ground strokes in a row. A professional example of this would be Taylor Dent. Taylor Dent will serve and volley on every serve the entire match, and on a fast court will also hit return of serves and move right in after return of serves. And he will come in off of just about everything. It is rare to see him play an entire point from the baseline. He will usually come in at some point, and by the way, I love watching Taylor Dent. It is an exciting style of tennis to watch, there is always a lot of action, and he had an awesome match last year at the U.S. Open. I am forgetting who he was playing. I think it was a Spanish player. But an amazing match at the U.S. Open. It was a night match. Now, if you are this type of player. If you are a net rusher, and by the way this style of player is, I do not want to say the way of the dinosaur, but definitely more and more rare these days to have somebody who is more comfortable at the net then at the baseline. If you are this type of player, you need to work on your technique, and confidence on the baseline kind of goes without saying. You need to work on identifying the correct times to move into the net as well. Oftentimes, these types of players will move in off of absolutely just everything, and an aggressive net rusher will really benefit themselves a lot by working on being patient and coming into the net when it makes the most amount of sense, and that means being able to hit a couple of groundstroke’s and and waiting for your opportunity before you do move in. Do not just move in off of everything. Be patient, rally some groundstroke’s, wait until you have the upper hand in a point, and then use that opportunity to attack. Otherwise, you kind of...I mean it can be very effective against some players to always pressure off of everything, and always move in, but against somebody with confident groundstroke’s, you will find yourself getting past a lot and player it is really good to be able to take your time and wait, and pick and choose your opportunities. So that is #3, the net rusher. And now we come to #4, the last kind of main style of play, and that is the all court player, the fabled all court player, somebody who is just as comfortable at the net as at the baseline. This person has no obvious big holes in their game, and they are just pretty solid at everything. And this is a tough player to play, obviously, and you guys will honesty rarely play somebody like this. Now you might play a half a level or level above you that seems like they do absolutely everything well and everything perfectly and they do not make any mistakes, but the reality is that most players (definitely, at least 90% of tennis players) have some stroke in their game that they are just not very comfortable with, and it is your job to figure out what that is, but an all court player is in general pretty good at everything...pretty solid. A professional example of this, and this is the really obvious one, Roger Federer does not really have a stroke that is a big weakness. Sometimes he will have days where his backhand is not that solid, but for the most part, he is comfortable from the baseline. He is also comfortable at the net. He is definitely competent up their. He has played some doubles, and he can hit an amazing shot from anywhere on the court and that is a really rare quality. There are not a whole lot of players like this. In my opinion, among recreational players, the 2 main styles that you guys are going to see are either the counterpuncher or pusher, defensive-type baseline player or an aggressive baseline player. Those are by far the 2 most common styles you are going to see. Or maybe something in between. Somebody who you really would not say is a counterpuncher, but does not just blast everything from the baseline, as well. Those are the 2 most common things. If you are an all court player, be honest with yourself, [laughter] if you are an all-court player, and every part of your game is pretty solid, you just want to continue to work on everything together. Make sure that you do not just focus on on one part of your game. Make sure that everything continues to improve, both your net game and your baseline game, your tactics, your serves, your return. Try to work on everything at once. And that can be tough. Most of us have some kind of weakness that we know that we should really spend some time on that. I guess [laughter] the downfall of an all court player is they have to really even everything out and spend equal time on everything. So, there are the 4 main types of tennis styles in my opinion. Those are the 4 most common ones that I see. Some of them are more common than others, but I think all you listening should be able to put yourselves into one of those 4 categories. Again, it was counterpuncher or pusher, aggressive baseline player, net rusher or all court player. Before we get to the next section of my outline on this topic, I want to remind you guys about the sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast, and that is Championship Tennis Tours. You can find them at tennistours.com. They have been putting together travel packages and tennis tickets to professional events since 1987, and I am going to tell you guys again about the incredible packages that they have available for the U.S. Open this year. It all starts with picking your choice of tickets and you can choose between court-side, lodge or promenade tickets. Next up you get to choose between 2 different hotels: a 4-star and 5-star hotel, the W Hotel in Times Square or the Essex House Hotel, both in New York City, obviously. Next up, you get to choose between either a Broadway performance of your choice, a ticket to a Mets game, a Yankee's game, or you get to have a city tour around New York City. While you go back and forth between these things, you get the use of a limousine shuttle to the U.S. Open and to your hotel, as well. Also, you get a ticket, and invitation, to a cocktail party at Times Square that is going to be exclusively for Championship Tennis Tours and the Essential Tennis Podcast. How awesome is that? So not only do you experience New York City, you get to experience the U.S. Open, you get to go watch top-level professional tennis, and you also get an exclusive cocktail party in Times Square, and I am going to do my best to be there myself. Hopefully I will be. I would love to see some of the Open this year, but Championship Tennis Tours is who is making this possible. Go check out the pricing on this package. I mean, how can you possibly beat that package and that combination of different events and ways to experience the Open and the City as well at the same time. So, go to tennistours.com and when you check out make sure to use the promotional code Essential with a capital E. You will receive a $25 discount off of your purchase, and that is how you will also receive your invitation to the cocktail party during the U.S. Open in Times Square. Please show them your support by making a purchase. If you are not interested in this package, you can go there just to purchase individual tickets, as well. You do not have to go for the big shebang, although definitely check that out. Show them your appreciate for their support of the Essential Tennis Podcast. I thank them very much for their support. Alright, let us keep moving ahead with today's topic, and the next section I would like to talk about is whether or not style is a natural thing or it is chosen by the player, and decides that this is going to be my style of play. In my experience, it is definitely a combination of both. And I would like to use myself as an example here. And we are going to talk about physical skills and abilities first, and what naturally makes somebody a certain style or type of player. Natural, physical things or abilities I have are, I have pretty good anticipation. I have good hands and touch, I am relatively quick, and I also have a lefty serve. I am a left-handed player. Most returners do not returning leftie's serves, so the combination of all those things together would make me either a counterpuncher back at the baseline or a good net player. And I love being at the net for all of those reasons that I just listed: Anticipation, quickness, leftie serve. On the flip-side, physically, I am not a very big person [laughter] . I am 6 feet tall and right around 160 pounds. Back when I was playing in college, I was only like 145, 150 on a good day, and also by backhand is a big weakness of mine. It is my biggest weakness. So when you put together my lack of size and relative strength, and my weak backhand back at the baseline, I would show you guys that it would probably not be smart for me to be a big baseline player. Either a counter- puncher or an aggressive baseline player. More than likely, my skill set would make me a better net player, and that is the case. I am better at doubles than I am at singles most of the time. I love to be at the net, and against somebody who is even with me or a level above me, I am usually not very good back at the baseline. I kind of get picked apart very often at the baseline because, again, the combination of not being very big and strong and have my backhand groundstroke being a definitely weakness. So, against somebody who is half a level better than me, I usually like to try to get to the net as often as possible to make the use of my skills. So there are some examples of kind of a natural skillset, and how it can steer you or should steer you towards a certain style of play. Also, personality is a natural thing that all of us are born with. I mean I not a psychology, but I think most of us are pretty born with certain personality traits. I am sure they are also developed as we grow up and become adults, but personality can also definitely be a factor in picking out a game style. Often times laid back people are counterpunchers or baseline players that just like to keep the ball in play. Outgoing and extraverted people very often are aggressive baseline players or net rushers. They like to make things happen. They like to really initiate. Now, this is certainly not always the case. Sometimes it is exactly the opposite, but it can also... I just wanted to throw that out there as another kind of natural way that game styles become developed for tennis players. I think it is a combination of personality traits and physical skills and abilities. Now, on the flipside of the coin, you can definitely choose a game style that you want to develop, as well. I mean, you guys can choose. You can go purely based off your physical skills and your personality and the way you like to play out there and the way your strokes kind of fall into place. You can also simply choose what you want to develop, and what you want to spend the most amount of time on when you practice. And that can shape you as a tennis player, no doubt. Figure out what appears to you most on the court, and the type of play that seems most attractive and fun to you when you do go out and play tennis, and work on that. Just because I have a weak backhand does not mean that I cannot go out there and just drill the heck out of my backhand for about 2 months, and just really work on and focus on that. Leave the rest of my game alone for a while. Continue to practice it, and certainly maintain it, but really spend the most amount of time on my backhand so that I can become more of a baseline player. I could definitely do that. Now, if at the end of those 2 months my backhand is the same [laughter], I am going to be very frustrated, first of all. But, second of all, that would be a strong indicated that being an aggressive baseline player is probably not for me, and I probably do not want to play all of my points from the baseline. I want to use what is kind of naturally given to me, and I want to continue coming up to the net because of my different skill sets. But this is a choice all of you guys can make, and there is no wrong answer to this. Just choose whatever you think is going to be most fun to you, what you really want to work on, what you admire the most in other players, and go after that. I think you might be overthinking this a little too much. You want to develop all different parts of your game, but as far as what style you want to play during competitive points, that is something that you can definitely pick and choose and try different stuff out and see what works best for you. Just 2 more things I want to hit on before we wrap up today's show. First of all, Remulo talked about a progression through different styles, and I think this was a really good observation by him. He talked about how very often beginning tennis players start off as essentially a counterpuncher. They work on their groundstrokes first, then once they become good at that, they will maybe start working on their net game, and then try to put everything together. And I think that is a really good observation, Remulo, and I think that is very often the way it goes, and it is actually very similar to how I teach people. When a fresh total beginner comes in and starts taking lessons with me, I always start off with groundstroke’s first, because I feel like [laughter], you know, how can you possibly be a tennis player without being able to maintain a groundstroke rally back and forth. You have to be able to hit a return serve and play, and I think it is probably most satisfying for a player beginning to play tennis when they can just hit a ball back and forth from the baseline, and that is just a good, fundamental place to start in my opinion. After my student has become pretty competent with both forehands and backhands, I typically add netplay to that. Now, there is no set formula. If you are just starting to play tennis and you love playing at the net, and you want to develop that first, I do not think there is anything wrong with that. Now I would encourage you to try to develop both parts of your game at the same time, if possible, but to be honest not everyone has the same amount of time and ability to do that. We are not all blessed with the same athletic ability, and very often people need to pick one thing at a time to develop, and then move on to the next thing. So, from that perspective, Remulo, yes, I think that is how it works. You want to move from one element of the game to the next. I do not think most people have the luxury of being able to take everything and say, alright, this weak I am going to work on my serve, my forehand, my backhand, my approach shot, my forehanded and backhanded volley, my overhead and my return of serve, and I am going to improve all of those things this weak. [laughter] That is not really practical. Most of us should be picking 1 or maybe 2 of those things, really focusing on those and trying to bring them up to level, and then once you are satisfied, go and pick out 1 or 2 other things. And that is how most of you guys should be working through the progression of your tennis games. And you can shape and mold your playing style as you go, depending on which of those elements you like the most, or which ones you pick up most quickly. Now, if you do have the ability to work on everything at once, then God bless you, but that is not going to be most of you guys, and there is going to be kind of a natural progression through different strokes. And you guys can pick how you would like that progression to go. I would encourage you guys to kind of map it out and decide what you want to work on first, and have fun with it. Enjoy going through and kind of checking off 1 thing at a time as you work your way toward being comfortable with all parts of the game. The last thing I want to talk about is tactics as it relates to all of these different styles, and hopefully you guys are paying close attention when I described the 4 different types of players. And I just want to throw out a really simple tactical thought to you guys before I wrap up today's show. Very simply, when you guys go out and play tennis, watch for the different styles, and you want to try to put your opponent, not into a box. We do not want to say that, OK, this person is always a counterpuncher and they do not have any weapons, and so I do not have to worry about that. Everybody is going to be a little bit different as I talked about earlier in the show, but try to notice their generalities. Notice what they really like to do. More importantly, notice what they really do not like, and then basically you want to take whatever they do not like to do and make them do it again, and again and again. If you are playing a net rusher, somebody who comes in after everything, you want to try to keep the ball deep, keep them defensive, and keep them away from the net. Or you want to work on your defensive shots and try to lob over them off the net. But one way or the other you want to keep them away from the net. If you are playing an aggressive baseline player, somebody who hits the ball hard, you want to be steady, consistent, do not try to out hit them if it is not your game, and if you can, try to draw them into the net. If you have a good touch, good hands, try to bring them forward without giving them too easy of a shot that they can just put away consistently. And make them volley, make them hit overheads. It is probably not something that they are comfortable with if they are an aggressive baseline player and they are comfortable at the net, as well, you are going to have a tough time that day. You are going to have to pick out something that you can attack and make them uncomfortable with. But my point is, pay close attention. Remulo pointed this out earlier when I read his question he talked about looking for these tendencies in his opponents, as well as himself, and being able to match up your strength hopefully versus their weakness, and that is really the fundamental truth and tactics. That is really what you guys want to look for first. And try to exploit whatever natural things that your opponent is not good at. Remulo, I want to thank you very much for your question. Thank you for writing me from Brazil, and I hope my discussion of your question has been helpful today. Please let me know if you have any follow-up questions, but I appreciate you being a listener. [music] [music] [music] Alright. That does it for Episode 117 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for downloading today's show and giving it a listen. I hope that it was helpful to you. And please tune in every Monday as I release a new podcast. Usually Monday afternoon here on the east coast of the U.S. Before we wrap things up I definitely want to thank a couple of people who have donated in the last couple of weeks. I appreciate you guys very very much, and those people are Sandro in Italy, Bill in Missouri, Ben in Utah, Max in New York, Charles in Maryland, Steve in North Carolina, Kelly in Alabama, and John in Texas. Thank you to all of you who have donated some funds to the Essential Tennis Podcast. They really help me to continue to do what I am doing at the website and at the podcast, and if the Essential Tennis Podcast has helped your game, and you appreciate the show, I would really appreciate a donation of any kind that you can set up a subscription donation or just make a one-time donation to the show, as well. Just go to essentialtennis.com, and in the bottom right-hand corner that says 'donate.' Thank you guys very much for your support. I appreciate it very much. [music] OK. Thank you guys very much. Take care, and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music]

Podcast #118: Stop blaming the lob for your doubles losses! Learn how to effectively move back and hit a solid overhead at the net.

ianw — Mon, 17 May 2010 13:45:44 +0000

I so often hear doubles teams complain about opponents that put up lob after lob in a winning effort against them. If this sounds familiar then you absolutely have to listen to today's show as I outline the four most important aspects of covering behind you correctly after closing into the net in either doubles or singles. Don't get caught off guard by the lob anymore! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it is technique, strategy or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here is Ian. Ian: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com, where you can receive a discount off your next purchase of professional tennis event tickets and travel packages by using the promotional code Essential. Before we get to today's topic on the podcast, I want to remind you guys about the video section of essentialtennis.com. Some of you guys may not know that I do instructional videos as well. And there are many of them up there for free on the website. Just go to essentialtennis.com and click on video in the menu on the upper left-hand corner. Alright, [music] let us go ahead and get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Alright, let us get started, and today's topic is going to be focused towards you doubles players, and specifically covering the lob, which is very often a difficult shot for recreational players to cover. And our question today comes to us from Michelle in Massachusettes who is a 3.5 level player. She wrote to me and said, 'how do I deal with ladies who lob in a double's match. I had a match the other day with 2 women who would constantly lob us. We tried different formations only for them to hit nicely down the line or lob back keeping us off the net. We did try to stay 2 back when they served or even a foot or 2 inside the service box to try to react to the lob. Eventually, it got to us, me in particular. I started to play their game instead of mine. I like to play aggressively and attack the net, but that was just not happening. They got almost everything back that we gave them with a lob. At times we would get a point or 2 when we hit at the net person, but it was just not enough . It was not enjoyable to play, and couldn't believe that we could play for another hour like this. I walked away from that match incredibly mad at myself for allowing those women to make me feel so inadequate in my abilities, and left me with little respect for them in their game of tennis.' Well Michelle, it sounds like a really frustrating match, and I definitely feel for you, and this is a pattern that I see repeated all the time at the club where I teach and other clubs where I have talked recreational doubles' players very often...well, there are 2 things here... First of all, recreational doubles' players very often struggle with covering the lob, and with overheads in general, and secondly, on the flipside of the coin, recreational double's players are very often frequent lobers, and you know, for good reason. If you are playing a team that is not great at covering it, then it is a good strategy. And I am getting a little bit ahead of myself, so let me go to my outline here, and we are going to be spending all of today's show on this, because I think it is a very important topic, and I have got a large outline here having to do with how to cover this and play more effectively at the net Michelle, for you and for everyone else listening. First of all, I want to congratulate you on your good doubles' tactics in general. It sounds like you are comfortable moving into the net, and that is awesome. Congratulations on that. I work extremely hard with my doubles' students to improve their transition game and their net game to get them comfortable moving up to the net. Very often, beginning players are not comfortable up there, and so at a 3.5 level, to have that be kind of your main game style in your doubles' play I think is great. So, nice job working on that. However, there needs to be a balance in your abilities. The more that you move in, the better you need to be able to back up. You cannot just have one or the other. You cannot be one-sided. It is kind of like a car. I am kind of a car person... The faster the car that you have, the better the brakes have to be. [laughter] When you are modifying a car, you cannot spend all of your time and money on the engine and not also upgrade the brakes, because the faster you get going, and the faster you are able to get going fast, the faster you also need to be able to slow down. Otherwise, it is just not safe. And I look at that the same way in doubles. The faster you move in towards the net, the faster you also need to be able to retreat to be able to cover behind you. If you are only good at one or the other, you are going to leave large spaces of court open. Now, I want to talk about one other thing here, Michelle. Before we actually get started talking on what to change and how to improve this part of your game, I am going to lecture you a little bit. [laughter] I was going to apologize for that, but you know what, I am not going to apologize for it. You said that...now, where is that section... 'it is not enjoyable to play. I couldn't believe that we had to play like that for another hour. I walked away from this match incredibly mad at myself for allowing those women to make me feel so inadequate.' You should have stopped that sentence there. I wished that you had not finished your email to me by saying that you left with little respect for them and their game of tennis. I think that is a mistake. I think that is a big mistake. Do not disrespect them and their tennis skills. The reality is that they beat you fair and square. They did not cheat you out of the match. You missed more shots than they did, so they deserve to win the match. That is how tennis is played. If you and your partner were not able to keep enough shots in play and if you were not able to use those shots to challenge your opponents very effectively, then quite honestly you did not deserve to win the match. So, to be frustrated with yourself for losing to that style of tennis, I completely understand. I am on the same page with you. I would have been incredibly frustrated as well to lose to that type of player, but to have little respect for their game, I understand where you are coming from. You feel like for them to stay back and lob everything maybe does not feel as legitimate as a strategy. It is not a high level-type strategy, and probably not a strategy that is going to be them very far in doubles in terms of long-term thinking. You know, they are not going to become 4 or 5 players sitting back there and just hitting lobs all day. However, you do need to give them some respect. You do need to shake their hand and say good match, and you need to in a way thank them. Thank them for pointing out an area of your game that you need to work on. [laughter] You should be happy about that. They have shown you a part of your game that does need to be improved. If it did not need to be improved, then you would not have lost this match. So, do not worry about it, and certainly do not diminish them, and I think that is something that a lot of players do. Pretty common after playing a pusher, as well. Somebody who plays a defensive baseline game. After losing to that style of player, very often recreational players badmouth them, and say well, you know, play the game, you have to hit strong shots, and anyway, in my opinion, it is just not a legitimate complaint. So, my lecture is over. [laughter] Let us move on to more of the instructional part of my outline here. I am going to be going over 4 main elements of effectively covering the lob and being a well-rounded player up at the net. The first section, the first out of the 4 areas is going to be about court positioning. And you talked about this a little bit in your message, saying that you guys tried to mix it up and play 2 back a little bit and also just come in just a little bit in front of the service line. It is good that you guys tried to make some changes, but I am going to talk about this and make sure that everybody is on the same page, and has a good understanding of how they should be positioning themselves during a doubles match. You do not want to oversell your position when you come forwards to the net. Coming to the net is an excellent tactic. It pressures your opponents. It forces them to have to try to hit a good shot, and it puts you in an offensive position to be able to try to put the ball away. So, coming in is excellent, but you do not want to overdo it. You want to pressure your opponents without leaving large spaces of court open, and that includes behind you. Now, where exactly on the court you shoujld position yourselves depends on your opponents, and this is the really really important part of this. How often your opponents lob, and how well they lob is going to determine exactly where on the court you put yourself from point to point. And you have to pay close attention to your opponents to be able to figure this out. And I wrote 'PAY ATTENTION' in all capitals on my outline. I wrote a couple of things in all capitals during this outline and this is one of them. You have to pay close attention to what your opponents like to do during your doubles' match, and And Michelle, obviously, I do not think this was a problem for you. You guys obviously figured out early that your opponents like to lob, and you guys did try changing up your positions on the court. So I do not think this is where your problem was. I just want to make sure that everybody understands that this is very very important. You do not want to position yourself the same way for every opponent. That would just be poor tactics. And some examples of that would be like what Michelle said. She and her partner figured out that their opponents liked to lob, and so they started playing different positions on the court, and the 2 examples she gave were playing 2 back and also being a little bit farther back than she typically would be. It sounds like when she normally plays the net she likes to get close and put the ball away, but during this particular match she and her partner were coming up to the net just inside the service line. So these are 2 good examples of ways that you guys can vary your positions on the court in order to more closely cover that lob against a team that likes to lob. You also want to try experimenting with a staggered position at the net with your partner, meaning that 1 of you is a little bit closer than the other. When you guys watch professional doubles on TV, you will usually see this. When you are watching a team that serves and volleys and returns and volleys, watch just one-half of the court. Watch 1 team and see how they position themselves. Rarely will you see both players even with each other when they are both at the net. One will be a little bit farther back and 1 will be a little bit closer. Now, again, this depends on your opponents' lobbing tendencies. As with everything tactically, when you guys are playing doubles, if they never lob at all, then you can stay pretty much together, and go ahead and close into the net and get really close and really pressure your opponents. If they lob a lot, then you want to leave several feet between you and your partner in terms of your depth. Meaning, 1 of you should be several feet closer to the net, and the other 1 several feet closer to the baseline. This puts 1 of you in a slightly more aggressive position, and the other person, your partner, in a slightly more defensive position. This is good because you guys can kind of have your cake and eat it too a little bit. And exactly how much space to leave between yourselves, and exactly how close both of you are again is going to depend on how much your opponents like to lob and how good they are at it. But, in case you have not tried that before, Michelle, try doing more of a staggered position. That will leave your partner close to the net to try to put the ball away, or you close to the net, and the other player a little bit farther away so that she is ready to go back and cover behind that close person in case a good lob goes over her head. So that wraps up my first section on court positioning. Just a couple of really important things to understand. Next up I want to talk about anticipation and preparedness when you are up at the net. You need to be read, and I am going to start off this section by saying again you need to notice your opponent's tendencies closely. Pay close attention to what your opponents like to do, and this is of the utmost importance. You need to know. You need to pay attention to this. And so many doubles' teams just do not. And they just continue playing the way they always play their doubles. They do not make any adjustments. And it is because they are not paying attention to what is going on. Once you have been inside the service line for several shots during a point, you need to start looking for the lob. You need to anticipate it. Do not close in inside the service line to try to put the ball away, and assume that everything is going to be just fine, and you have nothing to worry about and you are about to close out the point. Once you have made it in front of the service line, and you have hit 1 or 2 volleys and you have not finished the point yet, start looking for the lob on purpose, especially if the ball is traveling towards somebody who is on the baseline. If your opponents are still on a 1-up, 1-back position, and you and your partner are at the net, and especially if 1 or both of you are well inside the service line, just go ahead and expect that a lob is going to come. Assuming you are not putting the ball away. Now if both of your opponents are also at the net hitting a good lob volley or a half volley lob or any lob really from at the net over another net player is a really tough shot, but if they are playing 1-up, 1-back and you or your partner hit to the back person and you or your partner or both of you are both inside the service line, pretty much expect that they are going to lob. And Michelle and everybody else who plays at a 3.0 or 3.5-level, this is going to happen a lot and you guys know it. Those of you who are playing at a 5 level or below, you know that your opponents very often like to lob so do not be surprised by it. Look for it. You need to start anticipating it and paying closer attention. Next up under anticipation and preparedness, read your opponents. Read their position on the court. So, again, going back to being 1-up, 1-back. If the ball is going towards the back player, look for that lob. Swing technique and racket face. Look at how they are preparing their racket and look at the angle of the strings. If they turn themselves to the side, and they take their racket up at shoulder height, and the racket face is closed, look for a drive. They are about to hit a strong drive to try to pass you or your partner or both of you, obviously. If they are facing the net and the racket just gets taken back low and the racket face is open, it is facing up towards the sky, they are about to lob. And you need to watch these little details. The closer you start to watch your opponents, the more of these types of cues you will start to pick up on, and they are very important, because they will help you anticipate what is coming next so that you can be ready mentally and physically to be able to cover whatever shot they try to hit. Lastly, under anticipation and preparedness I would like to talk about the use of the split step and also your initial reaction to the lob when it does go up into the air. The split step is incredibly important in all aspects of tennis whether you are a single's player, a double's player, whether you are at the net or at the baseline, it is of the utmost importance that you guys do use the split step to support yourself, to balance yourself and to be ready to move for anything. I very often see doubles' players close into the net, and as their opponent hits the next shot, they are still in mid-stride and still moving forward. They are still actively moving forward and taking steps towards the net as the ball goes up into the air. And that is a huge mistake. Your balance is leaning forwards towards the net and your feet are actively moving in the wrong direction. That cannot happen if you want to be able to cover the entire court effectively. So, what you need to do is make your split step right as they are making contact with their shot no matter what it happens to be so that you are ready to move in any direction. If it is a lob, you are balanced, if it is a drive, you are balanced. If it is to your right or to you left, you are prepared. Please do not make the mistake of not split stepping, and just running into the net without being ready to move. So, that is the split step. Secondly, after you have made your split step, your opponent has made contact with the ball, and it is going up into the air as a lob, move immediately. This is another thing that I have in my ouline that is in all capitals, and, you know, this seems incredibly obvious. [laughter] I mean, yeah, sure, I need to move right away. But recreational players, there is kind of a disconnect [laughter] in reality in my experience between how hard club players think that they are playing and how quickly they are reacting and what is actually happening. I so often see a lob go up into the air when both players are at the net in a doubles' point and I watch the net players watch the ball go into the air, see the lob get to about, its apex--its highest point in its path, and then kind of go, oh crap! And then turn around and start to run. And it absolutely too late. The split step should prepare your feet to move, and as soon as you see that racket face open up and as soon as the ball comes off the strings and it goes up into the air, both players need to move immediately. It is extremely important. And once they start to move back towards the ball or wherever it happens to be going, both players need to start to communicate and talk. This is another very important part of covering the lob is communication, and I could definitely do a whole other section just on the communication part of it. But suffice it to say for right now that both players need to move and then start to talk and work out as early as possible who is going to cover which shot. It is extremely, extremely important. So that brings us halfway through. We have talked about court positioning, and we have talked about anticipation and preparedness. Two more points to go. Before I get to those last 2 points I want to tell you guys about my sponsor of the show today on the Essential Tennis Podcast, and that is Championship Tennis Tours. They can be found at tennistours.com. Since 1987 they have been putting together individual ticket sales to professional tennis events, as well as complete travel packages to go watch professional tennis players play, which is an amazing experience. If you appreciate the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you have learned from it, please go check them out, and show them that you appreciate their support of the podcast. They help finance my time here. They are a paid sponsor of the podcast, and if we can keep them happy [laughter] and keep them as an advertiser, that will absolutely help me to continue to do more of what I am doing here at Essential Tennis, and to continue moving me towards doing this full time. So go check them out. And what I have been talking about recently that they are offering is their U.S. Open packages, and you can choose between 2 different hotels: a 4 and 5-star hotel, you can choose what ticket you would like, courtside or promenade, and they also throw in a Broadway performance, tickets to a Mets or a Yankees game, which is pretty cool, or a city tour. And you get a limousine shuttle to the U.S. Open and back to your hotel, which is pretty sweet. So, go check them out. Check out their packages to the U.S. Open. If you are going to the U.S. Open anyway, you have no excuse. Go check them out right now. You can buy either individual tickets or 1 of these incredible packages, and as an extra bonus, if you use the promotional bonus Essential, they will give you a special invitation to an Essential Tennis Podcast, and Championship Tennis cocktail party in Times Square during the U.S. Open. I will have more information on that in the near future, but I thank them very much for their support of the podcast. Please go check them out and thank them by making your next purchase through tennistours.com. Alright, let us finish up by talking about the last 2 elements of moving back and covering a lob effectively in doubles. We have already talked about court positioning and anticipation. Next up we are going to talk about foot work. And the way that you actually physically move back to cover a lob when you are at the net. And this is going to apply for you single's players, as well. It is extremely important. You need to move back sideways to the net, meaning that, let us say that you have made a split step, and that means that you are facing forward, and your shoulders are parallel to the net. You are facing forward towards your opponent. Once they put that lob up and you realize you are going to have to move back, or even (actually, I take that back), no matter where you need to move you need to turn yourself 90 degrees to the side and get yourself sideways to the net. Now, if you are a right-handed player, you are going to do that by taking your right foot and pivoting it around, sliding your right foot around back behind you and getting your stance closed so that your body is sideways. So if you are a right-handed player, your right foot will go back so that your left shoulder is pointing forward towards your opponents. If you are a left-handed player, it is the opposite. Your left foot will slide around and pivot around your right foot and go back behind you to get yourself turned to the side. This is extremely important for a few reasons, and this is a huge recreational player mistake when trying to move back. A lot of recreational players move back towards the baseline to recover a lob with their heals first meaning they will stay facing towards the net and they will back peddle with their heals first back towards the baseline, and try to move back to try to cover a lob that way to try to hit an overhead, assuming that they are not actually turning around and running back towards the baseline. This is a big mistake. First of all, it is slow. It is not an athletic position to move in. There are times when back peddling is an appropriate way to move around a tennis court, but not in this circumstance. It is much slower than the alternative, which I will talk about in a second. Secondly, it is dangerous. I have seen multiple people move back in this way with their heels first and get tripped up, because it is very difficult to balance when you are back peddling quickly. We are just not designed to move that way guys. I mean, we do not have toes back there to keep our balance. When you are on your heels and moving quickly backwards, it is very easy to trip up and fall back, and I have seen people whack the back of their head behind them after tripping and falling. I have also seen people break their hand that way, tripping and trying to brace themselves with their hand. So, honestly it is dangerous trying to move back that way. Nevermind that it is slow. And thirdly, when you move back that way, it does not turn your body to the side and that is a problem, because it does not allow you to hit as strong an overhead. Think about your serve. Hopefully, you do not face forwards and hit your serve while facing towards the net. You turn sideways first, so that you can rotate your body forwards toward your target and create power by using the rotation of your core. We want to do that on every overhead possible. So by taking your dominant foot. Well, the foot of your dominant side. A right-handed player, your right hand. Left- handed player, your left foot, and by moving it back and getting sideways, you avoid all of those things, and obviously that is a good thing. Now, the way that you should move back is with either a side shuffle or by crossing over. And actually usually a cross-over step. Either 1 if fine. They are both faster, and they are both safer. They both get you turned to the side. Cross-over step take a little bit more athleticism, but it is faster. I see some players use a combination. Maybe they will cross-over their first 2 or 3 steps and then go to a shuffle to kind of fine-tune their positioning on the court. But no matter what, make sure you get to the side and then use whatever footwork is comfortable for you there. But if you can work out a side shuffle, or a side-step, a cross-over step, you are going to be in much better shape than moving back heels first. Alright, so that is footwork. And the last element here of being able to cover that lob effectively is your actual overhead, and Michelle, I want you to work on your overhead so that it becomes more of a weapon. If you want to continue advancing as a doubles' player, and if the rest of you listening want to continue to improve your doubles' game or just your net game in general, you need to make your overhead a priority during your practice time. Spend time practicing your overhead. And all too often when I am running team practices during the week where I teach, when it comes time to work on the overhead, everybody is like oh, no, not the overhead. I do not want to work on this, because players are not comfortable or confident with their overhead. Well, how do you think you are going to get comfortable and confident with it. You have got to start hitting it a lot. You have got to practice it. Take a few lessons. If you have got time and money go to your local club and get a couple of lessons from a professional about your overhead technique. You can improve your overhand throwing motion to get more power and to get better placement, and have a more effective overhead. So, take some lessons if you can. Also, I want to point out that the goal of the overhead should be to finish a point. When you get an overhead in the middle of a doubles' point, you should be looking to close the point out. It should be aggressive shot whenever possible. It is not always the case. When a lob is hit really well and you are having a hard time just to get to it, sometimes it is not practical or even possible to try to hit an aggressive overhead, but you guys should be working towards a goal of having your overhead be a weapon so that you enjoy getting lobbed. [laughter] I tell students this all the time when they complain, when they come back and have a story much like Michelle's, when I introduce this topic and my students tell me, wow, I had a doubles' match, it did not go very well. I was coming up to the net just like you always tell me to, Ian, and they lobbed every time. And all of their lobs hit right on the back of the line on the baseline, and it was incredible, and I do not buy it. First of all, average level players are not great lobbers. It is a tough shot to hit a really good lob deep in the court. Now, it will happen. Do not get me wrong. But most of the time when we are talking about recreational players and a team that lobs a lot, a team that gets beat by a lobbing team, usually it is due more to poor foot work, poor communication skills with partner, poor positioning and just the missing of overheads in general that is the ultimate reason for losing the match, not a slew of perfectly hit lobs. It can happen, but very rarely. And so you guys need to continue working on your overhead. Develop it so that eventually in the future you enjoy getting lobbed, you know, not if it is on the baseline--that will happen sometimes--but you should enjoy getting a lob over you that you can hit an overhead on, because it should become a weapon to be able to put the ball away. So, Michelle, hopefully I have answered your question, and Michelle, by the the way is coming to the Baltimore Essential Tennis Clinic, coming up in just a couple of weeks. And Michelle I look forward to working with you in person on this. We will be covering these types of topics at the clinic in Baltimore, so I will get to see you in person and work with you on all of these different aspects. Again, we had 4 main aspects of covering the lob well, and those were court positioning, anticipation, and being prepared, correct footwork, and improving your overhead and having a more solid overhead. If you guys can work on all 4 of those areas, you will get beat by the lob much less, I promise you. So, Michelle, that is it. Hopefully, it was helpful to you. Feel free to send me an email with any followup questions, and thanks very much for being a listener. Thank you for your excellent questions that I could talk about today. [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright. That does it for Episode 118 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for joining me today for downloading the file and for giving it a listen. Hopefully, it was helpful to you. If you ever have any questions of your own, you can feel free to send me an email at Ian@essentialtennis.com, or if you go to essentialtennis.com and click on contact there is a form that you can fill out that also goes directly to me, and I have a running list of podcast topics that I am going to be getting to in the future. And I answer those in the order that they were received. So sometimes it takes a little while for me to get to people's questions, but I do always talk about whatever topics people send me messages about which I enjoy doing. If you enjoyed today's show do me a favor and go to Itunes and rate and submit a comment about the Essential Tennis Podcast. That helps my ratings over there at Apple, the Itunes music store, which is the biggest source of downloads for the podcast, so if the show has been helpful to you, do me a favor and spend a couple of minutes an rate the show, and also leave a comment, and I would appreciate that. Alright, that does it for this week. Take care everybody, and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast #119: Learn how to take your ground strokes early and pressure your opponent! Also listen in on how to aim your serve correctly.

ianw — Mon, 24 May 2010 13:53:05 +0000

Hitting on the rise can be a great way to improve your position on the court and take time away from your opponent at the same time. Learn how to do it correctly in todays show. Ian also discusses the right and wrong way to aim your serve to different parts of the box through good technique. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether is technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian. [music] Ian: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com. Before we get into today's questions that I'm going to be answering I want to talk to you guys briefly about a feature at essentialtennis.com that truthfully, I don't think you guys are taking advantage of nearly enough. Now the forums at essentialtennis.com have grown and I'm really happy about that. I'm really proud of the community that has been growing over there, but I think more of you guys need to go experience for yourselves and start taking advantage of it. Its not just a place to go and burn time and you waste time on the internet. Its really a place where you guys can continue to help improve your tennis game. And one way that happens is through professional feedback. I spend a lot of time there posting, answering questions and giving my two cents. There are other professional, certified USPTA tennis pros as well, that are friends of mine. Royce is one, he's been on the podcast a couple of times, he's spends a lot of time there as well giving feedback. So its another way that you can get value out of Essential Tennis, by getting feedback from myself and other pros. Also as I mentioned a second ago, the community and support aspects of the forum are incredible. People post their experiences during league matches and tournaments. They post their problems that they're having with their mental game or their technique or their strokes and other members give feedback, or just give support, they say "Hey, you know stick with it don't worry about it," or "Hey, I've got that same problem, this works for me." and it's just a wonderful place to go to stay passionate about tennis and continue getting ideas and just kind of give yourself a kick in the pants when you need it, to continue working hard at your game. To give you guys some extra incentive to go check it out, if you are one of the first seven people this week to sign up for a free account and introduce yourself in the top forum there, at the forums, which is the introduction forum. All you have to do is sign up for free, introduce yourself to the community there and I will send you a free copy of Mental Tennis by Vick Braden. Which is an amazing book about mental tennis, totally free of charge I'll send that to you. All you have to do is go to the forums, sign up, introduce yourself and I will send you a free book. So please do go check it out, again its completely free, I'm not trying to trick you guys here, or anything. As with all of the different parts of the website, I want it to continue to grow, I want more people there and that will continue to make it a better and better place for everybody to continue working at their tennis games so go check it out. Alright lets gets down to business! Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [silence] [music] [silence] [music] Ian: Alright, so lets get started with today's show. And the first question that I'm going to discuss comes to us from Tony in Georgia. Now, this is not Georgia in the United States of America, but rather Georgia, the country in far eastern Europe. Which is pretty cool, Tony I'm pretty sure you're the first Georgian listener that I've heard from. It's really nice to hear from you. He wrote to me and says he plays three times a week and he groups himself within the top five Georgian tennis players under the age of 18. Tony, keep up the good work and I hope that you continue to work at your tennis and hopefully in the near future you can maybe do some international competition etcetera. His question was "How exactly should I hit a strong attacking shot on the rise? I don't get a lot of these types of shots because I usually just let the ball come back down again and I want to make a slight change in my playing style this way." Well Tony, that's a good question, and Andre Agassi kind of made this type of shot popular. Back in the early and mid '90s he really stayed close to the base line and took the ball earlier than most professional players had up until that time. There's no doubt in my mind that players before Andre Agassi did take the ball early and did hit the ball on the rise. There's no doubt about that. But he kind of used it more exclusively as a playing style and really stayed close to the baseline. Unlike a lot of players back in the '90s that were starting to get farther and farther away from the baseline and hit with more top spin and more power. So, anyway I am going to be talking today Tony about, not only how to hit this shot more aggressively but I want to take this opportunity to tell you and the rest of my listeners about how this shot works in general as well. I want to make sure everybody on the same page about this shot, about taking the ball on the rise and how to do it correctly, before I start talking about hitting it aggressively. So my first couple of topics here are going to have to do with the shot in general. So lets just give a little bit of background information about the shot. First of all, it's an excellent tactic to learn. It takes time away from your opponent when you hit the ball right after its bounced, you take away time, you're closer to the ball, to where its bouncing than you normally would be when you would've let the ball come up to the top, to the top of its bounce and then come down again before you hit it like you described Tony. By taking it earlier you give your opponent less time to react to your shot. It also keeps you in a better position on the courts, as I mentioned a second ago, to take the- to hit the ball with a ground stroke on its way back down from the bounce, you need to be farther away from where it landed on the court in the first place. So by taking the ball on the rise, you have the advantage of staying closer to your opponent and you get to keep yourself in a more offensive position, a little bit closer to your opponents. And closer to the net. Now, on the rise basics as I mentioned a second ago, it is hitting while the ball is coming back up from making contact with the court so its exactly what its title says, its hitting on the rise as its rising up off the court after its bounced. The easiest way to hit a ground stroke is on its way back down again, it gives you the most time to react to the bounce after its hit the courts and its just the easiest way to do it period. However, hitting on the rise is useful in several situations and I've outlined three of them here. First of all, its useful when your opponent has hit a very deep and high bouncing shot. An example of this would be a shot thats crossed the net by a wide margin, maybe four or five feet over the top of the net, with a lot of top spin and the ball is about to land within a couple of feet from the baseline. Now this type of shot from your opponent if you were to let it get all the way to the peak of its bounce then let it come back down again to your strike zone, which is somewhere about waist height, that's where you typically want to make contact with a ground stroke. In order to allow that to happen, and hit it in kind of this more traditional way, letting it come back down again, you're going to back way up behind the baseline. Sometimes, there's not even enough room behind the baseline to let it come down to your strike zone again and which means that you're going to end up backing up way behind the baseline and hitting it in an awkward position, at shoulder height, or even above shoulder height to try to get it back. This is not a situation that you want to be in especially if you want to hit an aggressive shot. Which is what Tony is asking about. Second situation where hitting on the rise is very useful, is when your opponent has hit a high, floating and weak shot that you want to attack on. This is a ball that has also maybe crossed the net by five or six feet, but is not traveling very far into the court and its landing somewhere around the service line. Maybe even a little shorter than that, or deeper, but definitely not close to the baseline. This is a shot that you're going to move forward into the baseline to be able to hit early on purpose. And very often you'll follow up that shot with a volley, by coming up to the net. The third situation where you're going to want to consider hitting the ball on the rise is when you've been caught off guard and in the middle of the courts by your opponent. Maybe you had a hard time recovering back to the baseline after a tough shot from your opponent that landed short, or something, maybe you're serving in volley and the balls been hit right at your feet. But some way or another you've been caught in the center of the courts, not necessarily literally the center but inside the baseline, and the ball is coming right towards your feet. That's another situation where you might want to consider hitting the ball on the rise. Instead of backing way up to allow the ball to come up to the peak of its bounce and then come back down again. So, those are kind of the three main situations that you're going to want to try hitting the ball on the rise. When your opponent's hit a really good deep shot, when your opponent has hit a high and weak shot, or when you've been caught off guard inside the baseline and the ball is coming towards your feet. Now lets talk about the technique of actually hitting a ball on the rise. And we're going to get into some technical details about how this actually works. And there's three main elements here that need to be done correctly if you guys want to be successful in hitting the ball on the rise. The first one is foot work, positioning when you're trying to hit the ball on the rise is incredibly, incredibly important. The reason for that is the ball is coming up right off the court. And you have a very small window that the ball is actually in your strike zone. Its not going to be at waist height for very long, also you must read the bounce perfectly. You have zero time to change your position after the ball has landed. When you hit a ball in a kind of more of a traditional way, a ground stroke, and you allow it to bounce, come back up to the peak of its bounce and then come back down again. You have time to make adjustments with your position after the ball has landed. Often time recreational players and sometimes even professional players misread a bounce maybe there's some more spin or some different kind of spin than they thought was going to be on the shot in the first place. Maybe it even hits something on the courts, this happens all the time in clay court tennis. When the ball bounces a little bit differently than you expect. And when you're allowing the ball to come up off the bounce then come back down again, you have extra time to be able to reposition yourself and make an adjustment. When you're hitting the ball on the rise you can't do that, you don't have the time to make an adjustment. And so putting yourself in just the right position is incredibly important to be able to actually hit an effective shot. Most recreational players are still trying to get in the right place after the ball has bounces and so trying to hit the ball immediately after it's bounced usually presents, you know, some problems for recreational players. A lot of you guys listening are not going to want to use this tactic a lot, however, it's something that I do recommend you work on. And see if it comes quickly to you, see if you're able to develop it pretty fast. And you can add it into your repertoire. So, thats foot work. You've got to position yourself in the right spot. Secondly, out of three here, for technique elements, is timing. As I mentioned a second ago, the ball moves through your strike zone very quickly and you have very little time to make adjustments. That means that, not only does your positioning have to be great, but the timing of your swing also has to be perfect, in order to make contact where it's comfortable. If you start your swing a little bit too late, the ball's going to be really high. If you begin your swing too early, its going to be really low, and just barely coming off of the court. And there's not a whole lot of time, like actual, physical amounts of time, in between those two timings being early or being late, or being just bout right, where you're making contact around waist height. There's not a lot of margin for error there because the ball is coming up off the court so quickly immediately after it bounces. Now, this means since the ball comes up off the bounce so quickly and goes through your strike zone so quickly, usually your swing should actually begin before your ball even hits the court. And so, you want to have your racket prepared obviously before the ball gets to the bounce and you want to kind of drop your racket and begin your forward swing before the ball even hits the court a lot of times. Not always, it depends on the speed that the ball is traveling at and where you are on the court; how aggressively you're trying to hit it, how big your back swing is, all kinds of things, but usually you're going to want to begin your ground stoke swing before it actually hits the courts. And when recreational players mis-time an on-the-rise shot, like 99 percent of the time, they're too late and they've begun their swing past the window where it would've been appropriate so that they're making contact in a comfortable spot. They begin a little bit later than they should which means that the ball comes up out of their strike zone and it ends up being too high. If you guys are going to go out and try this for the first time more than likely, at first, you're going to position yourself too far away from the ball. And more than likely, you're going to be late and the ball is going to be up too high. And this is just from experience. Teaching this to people, teaching this to kids, this is a really valuable thing to teach to kids because a lot of times childrens strokes are kind of beyond their physical attributes. So you might have an 11 or 12 year-old kid with great top-spin ground strokes but their only four feet tall, or maybe even less. And so they've got to really position themselves in the right spot. And a shot thats been hit high and close to their baseline, sometimes is just un-returnable when they try to let it come back down again from the bounce because they're just not tall enough to get a racket on it. So I very often taught kids how to hit on-the-rise to be able to combat a high deep shot from their opponents. And in my experience when they're first starting off trying to learn it they don't get themselves close enough, they don't position themselves close enough to the bounce. Or they position themselves in the right spot but they wait too long to start their swing and the ball gets up way too high outside of their strike zone. So, for those of you going out and you're going to try this for the first time, swing early. Probably earlier than you think you're going to have to. Now lets talk about actual technique and changes and adjustments you're going to have to make to your technique in order to make this shot. Hitting on the rise is different than a more traditional or standard ground stroke because the ball is actually coming upwards, its accelerating upwards off the court, as opposed to accelerating downwards back towards the courts again and falling back down after its bounced. This means that closing your racket face a little bit more is usually necessary. I'm talking about a top-spin ground stroke here or a drive ground stroke, a low to high type swing. When you combine your low to high swing with a ball that's coming up off the court and accelerating upwards towards your racket it means that the ball is going to combine with the upwards traveling ball, with your upward traveling racket very often causes the ball to travel farther than what you were expecting and rather than shorten your swing up and get tentative and start just pushing the ball in play, and Tony this is for you, since you want to hit this shot aggressively. You're going to want to close your racket face more, so we want the strings facing down towards the courts a little bit more than normal. And when I say a little bit I'm talking like a couple of degrees. When you guys hit a standard, top-spinner drive, type ground stroke you want your racket face to be just about perpendicular right about flat, 90 degrees to the court surface. When you're hitting on the rise your going to want to close it just a little bit more than that as you continue to make a full swing, to be able to keep that in the courts. And I want you guys to, and Tony you especially, since you want to hit this aggressively, continue to excelerate upwards as you normally would. You want to create top spin, this is going to help keep the shot in play more consistently. Don't decelerate and push it in play, unless it's a really tough shot and you just want to block it back into the court. I want you guys to try making a full follow through at the ball. And again, if you miss long, close that racket face a little bit more. If you're having trouble this guys, if you're going on trying it for the first time, you can try just shortening up the swing. And you guys will see pros do this from time to time, especially in in the third example of a situation where you guys are going to want to use this. When you guys are caught off guard and you're in the middle of the courts you can just simply block the ball back in play and use this as more as a defensive type shot. That's not what Tony asked about, but you can use this as a way to stay in better position just keep the ball back in play, nothing fancy and hope to get back into the points and regain control of whats going on in the points. Now lets talk about actually hitting it aggressively which is what Tony asked about. Let me tell you what you better practice it. And Tony, this goes for you and everybody else listening. Again, your timing, your positioning and your swing technique, all have to be just right. And there's very little margin for error here. I talked earlier about how the positioning and the timing are so delicate and you've got to be just right. If you're a little bit off on any of these things it becomes a very awkward shot, very quickly. And so if you guys want to be able to use this in match play, start practicing and practice it a lot. Have a friend or practice partner hit you high, deep shots and practice taking it right off the bounce, making contact at waist height and making a full follow thru. Tony it sounds like you want to use this as an attacking shot. So I would recommend that you practice moving forwards and hitting the more aggressive type shot where you're moving into the court and taking a shot thats landing a little bit shorter on the rise. That would be a great shot for you to practice. Start off at a moderate pace. Tony, you and everybody else as well. And once you start getting consistent and you get comfortable with the positioning and the timing, go ahead and start to speed up the swing a little bit, but I would really caution you guys from doing that right away. Make sure that you're getting comfortable with the important technical elements [inaudible] of the shot first, before you start to really speed up the swing and try to hit it aggressively. Well Tony thank you very much for your question, I appreciate it. Great question and it was really nice to hear from you in Georgia. It's always great to kind of put a pin in a new country on the map. So thanks for being a listener. And hopefully my description here was helpful to you. [music] [music] [music] [music] Ian: Before we get to our next question, I want to quickly tell you guys about this sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast. And that is Championship Tennis Tours and they're located at tennistours.com. These guys put together ticket travel packages and hotel and accommodation packages for professional tennis events. Both the ATP and WTA. They provide tickets and accommodations to all of the four grand slams along with many, many other professional tennis events all over the world. So if you're planning on going to a professional tennis event in the near future, please definitely check them out. And you can get a discount just for being a listener of the Essential Tennis Podcast. They have coming up a couple of great packages for the US Open where you guys can choose between hotels, types of tickets. Also tickets to a Broadway performance, to a baseball game, to a city tour, limousine shuttle, all kinds of excellent choices. Ways to really make your trip memorable and an exciting experience. So definitely go check them out at tennistours.com. If you use the promotional code, Essential, with a capital 'E' when you check out, you'll receive a discount off your travel package. And if you do that in conjunction with purchasing a package to the US Open you'll also receive an invitation to a Championship Tennis Tours and Essential Tennis Podcast cocktail party at the W Hotel in Times Square. Which is pretty awesome, and I'm trying to make plans to be there myself and meet some of you guys, the listeners, who help support the advertisers of the Essentials Tennis podcast. So please show them your support by making a purchase. Doesn't have to be a package, you can purchase individual tickets as well. So go check them out at tennistours.com. I thank them very much for their support of the Essential Tennis podcast. Alright next up we got a great question from Noam in California. He came out to the Essential Tennis clinic in Palm Springs earlier this year. Good to hear from you again. He wrote us, and said, "You always here and read about placement of the serve, but can that really be done? I'm sure some players are able to do that, like professional tennis players but if this is something that can be developed by them then why do the key elements to change when you're goal is to change the placement of the serve from one serve to another. Would it be positioning of yourself on a different spot of the baseline? And keeping the same service motion, or is it more of controlling the shot by changing the grip, arm, back, wrist movement, etcetera? Hopefully this question makes sense, and if it does I am sure you can supply a practical answer. Thanks again, Noam." Yes, it is possible, and no, you don't have to be a professional player to be able to place your serve. Absolutely not, I teach players how to do this every single week while I'm at work. I've actually been working with one student, just on her serve a couple of times a week. And we've been working really hard on , we've totally broken down her technique and rebuilt it to be better. And more solid, technically, and we've worked a lot on exactly on what you're describing, Noam, being able to place the serve and vary its placement on purpose in different places in the box. Now, to answer your question directly. In order to place a serve in different places, no, don't change the grip, don't change your technique, the type of serve, your positioning on the courts, on the baseline, or anything else if you want your serve to be aimed in different places. You don't have to change any of that stuff in order to control where the ball is going. So what is it? It's all about your racket face at contact, where the strings are actually facing when you make contact is what is going to determine where the ball goes, period. Now that probably seems, that sounds incredibly obvious, incredibly simple and it is. But that's exactly what it comes down to. Where the racket is facing is determined by the timing of your pronation during the swing. There's going to be a big disclaimer here, this is assuming that your service swing is a traditional type swing and technically sound. Meaning that you follow all the main elements and fundamentals of a good, solid service swing. When you guys break down the service technique of high level players, whether they be professional or college players. Basically a four or five player and above you'll see several key similarities between these types of players and how they swing a tennis racket. And one of those similarities is pronation. You will see all top level tennis players pronate. Pronating I've talked about on the podcast before, I'm not going to get really into it. But basically its the rotation of your forearm and your shoulder from inside to outside. If you face your palms together, if you put both your hands in front of you, face them together so that they're parallel and your palms are facing each other and then you rotate your hands so that they face down toward the ground you've just pronated both of your arms. And again that rotation occurs, really pronation refers to rotation of your forearm. Rotation of your shoulder also aids in getting that rotation, that acceleration of the racket towards the outside of your body. So what does that have to do with actually aiming your serve? Well if you look at slow motion video, lets talk about a right handed player here. When they were, after the racket has dropped back, behind the player, after they've taken the racket up and prepared their body after their arm has bent and the racket has dropped, this is called the racket drop position. Usually when you guys watch instructional videos online the players palm and the racket strings that are going to be used to hit the ball are facing to the left, your palm is facing to the left. And so are the strings, the side of the racket that's about to get used to hit the ball. As the racket starts moving upwards on edge towards the contact point, up towards the ball, they will begin to pronate and their hands, their palm and the racket will rotate towards the right and meet the ball facing towards the target. And this is kind of the magical point in time that's going to determine where the ball goes. Depending on where the strings are facing in this point in time will determine what target area is about to get hit by the serve. Or maybe what target area is about to get missed if they're aiming some where different than where the strings are actually facing. As contact is made the racket continues to rotate and will finish with the palm of a righty-players hand facing to the right. So there's a 180 degree rotation of the forearm from left to right. Facing to the players left if they are facing forward towards the net and then finishing facing towards the right shortly after contact. And this is the pronation element of the serve. And so depending on the timing of this pronation and exactly when during this 180 degree rotation contact is made, is whats going to determine the direction where the ball goes. For a righty-player the longer that they hold the racket on edge as it moves up toward the ball, the more to the left the ball will go. Because their hand will, if they wait a long time, if they wait longer to unwind their hand to the right the strings will be angled more to the left. If they begin that pronation process a little bit earlier contact is made with their palms and with their strings facing more to the right. And late and early here are relative terms. We're talking about a couple of degrees in rotation between hitting the left corner of a service box and the right corner of a service box. I don't know what the measurement is exactly but I would wager it, its probably ten degrees or less between those two targets, the extremes, the left side and the right side of the box. We're talking about very small changes in the racket face that make a big difference in where the ball goes. And so, Noam, where exactly your racket faces, facing at contact, as you pronate, the split second that the ball meets the strings and where the strings are facing determines where the ball is aimed and you should be able to stand anywhere on the baseline. Literally anywhere, and use the same grip, use the same technique and be able to hit any corner of either box. Just by varying the timing of your pronation and where exactly the strings are facing when you make contact. Now for those of you who are still listening to me, because I know that listening to audio instruction of details that are really detailed like this is not everybodies cup of tea. So thank you guys for baring with me through that. For those of you who are more visual learners when it comes to this I just did a video explaining this fully. I mean I went through the entire process on how exactly this works. And with visual examples, I used myself as the example and I hit two serves from the ad sights since I'm left handed. I used the same grip, I stood in exactly the same place. I used the same service motion, I used the same type of serve, it was a spin serve. And I compared two swings. One where I hit right down the T and I hit the centeral line, as left as i could've possibly gone in that service box and another serve, all the same mechanics. And I hit the other corner, I hit the right corner of the box. And I compared my techniques between those two service placements and I show you guys how in that video, how all of my technique was exactly the same except for right at contact where my strings, you can see on the video, slow motion video, where I captured right at contact and you can see the difference in angles between my serve down the middle and my serve out wide. Go check that video out. Its really good, if I can say so myself. Its really good comparison and should explain to you guys fully about what I'm talking about in a more visual way. It's a ten minute long video. And it really explains it. So Noam and everybody else listening who has an interest in this go check that out, just go to essentialtennis.com click on video and as I'm recording this, it's the one all the way at the top. And its called "Pronation and Aiming your Serve." So go check that out. [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for episode 119 of the Essential Tennis podcast. Thank you very much for joining me today and I hope that todays show has been helpful to you. If you would ever like me to answer your question on the podcast, feel free to send me an email to ian@essentialtennis.com Ian is spelled, I A N. I'd love to hear from you. And before I wrap up today's show I want to let you guys know that somebody recently dropped their spot for the upcoming essential tennis clinic in Galveston , Texas, in July. So if you're interested in working with me over a whole weekend and mental tennis expert David Grumpin for an incredible instructional experience please shoot me an email to ian@essentialtennis.com. This event was sold out and unfortunately one of my listeners had to pull out, something came up and she's no longer able to make the event. So if you would like to join me and seven other Essential Tennis listeners and working on your game over a weekend, please shoot me an email. Also at ian@essentialtennis.com. Alright, that does it for this week. Thanks again everybody for listening. Take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [silence]

Podcast #120: Battling out a match in the summer heat can be dangerous! Find out how to protect yourself from the elements and stay safe.

ianw — Mon, 31 May 2010 14:08:54 +0000

Today I'm joined by Fitness Blog writer Steve Beck to talk about how to battle the heat during your summer tennis play. I also talk about changing your grip from one forehand or backhand to another, should you use the same grip on every topspin ground stroke or is switching a good idea? Is the continental grip the best to use for a forehand and backhand slice? Find out! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Narrator: Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com where you can receive a discount off your next purchase of professional tennis event tickets by using the promotional code Essential. Thank you very much for joining me on today's episode. I appreciate you taking the time to download the file and to listen to the show. Before we get started with today's topics, I'd like to do a quick shout-out to some very special people that spent a weekend with me this past weekend in Baltimore, MD. This was for the third Essential Tennis clinic and we spent a full two days working on different parts of their game. Their stroke technique, their tactics in both singles and doubles, their mental toughness-- everything. So real quickly to Steve, Brian and Dana, Michelle, Sonya and Psalm in Florida. Amadeu, Debbie, Charles -- I had a really great time working with all of you. Only one person from MD, everyone else flew or drove in from other states here in the US and that shows great dedication and all of your guys were great. If you are interested in working with me over a weekend, the next clinic is going to be in Galveston Texas this coming July, I believe it is the 18-20th and there is only one spot open for that. So if you'd like to work with me this July in Texas, shoot me an email at ian@essentialtennis.com and maybe you can grab that last spot for the Texas clinic. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] This segment of the podcast, I have a special guest named Steve from NC. He posts as steveo in the forums at essentialtennis.com and he just completed the 3rd essential tennis clinic in Baltimore Maryland with me over the weekend. Steve, welcome to the show and good to have you here. You are the first person to ever record a segment with me live on the podcast, so good to have you here. [speaker] Thanks, good to be here. [speaker] The reason why we are doing a segment together is he is the writer of the fitness blog at essentialtennis.com. He knows what he is doing when it comes to working out and keeping your body in peak condition. And we have a good question coming from Romy in the Phillipines. Romy writes and said, "Since last week, I was watching my son playing in an age group tournament. He is playing in 14 and under and 16 and under, playing conditions are harsh this summer in the Phillipines. It gets to be 38-40 degree celcius which is 103 degrees-- temperatures above our normal body temperature. Would you be able to discuss the tips in handling this situation? Many thanks." So yeah, obviously, above average temperatures. For most of us here in the States and I would guess for most people in general, so that gives us a unique challenge. Especially for kids I think. It seems like you have to be pretty careful. So Steve, what are some tips for you on how to handle this kind of heat and be safe out there while competing on the tennis court? Steve: You bring up an important point. It is really difficult to play in those conditions. The first and main thing that you want to be aware of is the hydration factor. You can get really dehydrated quickly as I know it's very humid in the Philippines. So you want to be aware of a couple things. The first is to have proper pre-hydration. This begins, not the day of, but the day before and a couple days leading up to it. You want to make sure that you are drinking as water as you are comfortable. And have the kids drink as much as it is comfortable for them to drink. An 8 ounce glass of water every hour is probably adequate. The body is able to eliminate up to 32 ounces of water per hour and so this may seem like a lot of liquid to be intaking, but it's really not. You want to make sure that they are getting a good diet in. Some lighter foods as well. You want to have them avoid caffeine, any kind of sodas or coffee because caffeine can act as a dieratic. It causes the kidneys to increase urine production which is going to eliminate a lot of water from the body. The day of, you want to make sure they get up and drink plenty of water. And make sure that they are drinking water continuously throughout the day. And especially as they begin to work out and exert themselves. At least every 10-15 minutes, give them a break and let them get as much as they want but not too much, but definitely more than 8-10 ounces of water at a shot. But give them frequent breaks and for any play lasting over an hour, you would want to add in an electrolyte beverage because at this point, your body is really going to start getting depleted of sodium. A proper sodium balance in your body is crucial for ensuring proper hydration. A large amount of sodium is lost through sweat and you want to make sure that you are putting back in some of those elements such as potassium, sodium, and a small amount of carbohydrates in order to keep the body going. What a lot of people don't realize is that when it is really humid, that acts against the body's natural cooling mechanism. Your body cools off by producing water in the form of sweat. And when that water evaporates it cools the body. It's kind of like a car's radiator-- you get cool air running through the water and it cools off the body. But when you are playing in humid conditions, the sweat tends to not evaporate and it will negate the body's natural cooling effects. So there are a couple things you want to be aware of. You want to stay covered up, as this will create a barrier between you and the heat and the sun. And you want to be aware of factors such as cramping and heat exhaustion. This is a really -- symptoms that can be exasperated by extreme heat and high temperatures to obviously ensure that they are taking in the proper amount of fluid but cramping and heat exhaustion can become serious issues even if they are maintaining proper hydration. Some symptoms of heat exhaustion are going to be paleness, nausea, fatigue, dizzyness, light-headedness, vomiting, fainting, clammy skin. If you get those kind of conditions, you definitely want to stop activity immediately. Get them into cool air, drink moderate amounts of fluids and just let them cool down. Ian: So, extreme climates or situations like this with the temperatures so high, is it possible to still get those kind of symptoms even when properly hydrated or is the dizzyness, fainting, is that possible even with proper hydration? Steve: It can be just depending on the athlete's conditioning, body type, background, depending on how much work they have been doing. Depending on what they may or may not have eaten. You know, if they are properly fueled with nutrition and food. Sometimes, you are more susceptible to those things -- if you didn't get enough sleep, many factors can contribute to it. So yes Ian, even if you are having proper hydration, you can have some of those things happen. Ian: Alright. So what else, beside the hydration and you mentioned the electrolyte beverages, trying to get some sodium.. by the way, I know that Gatorade and popular sports drinks, I know that sodium, part of those beverages is key. How come sodium is so important to our bodies? Steve: The sodium is what enables the muscles and it really acts as a stabilizing agent. It stabilizes your blood Ph level and it makes the water in your body and your blood able to transport the nutrients properly. It's just a good balance to have in your body, once you start losing sodium, your body will start breaking down tissues and it just enables your body to have a proper water balance. Ian: OK, besides the hydration in general and the sodium intake, what else is important for these kids playing out there in these hot conditions? Steve: Well it's important to take breaks and cool off. The best athletes in the world, I know Roger Federer often trains in Dubai in temperatures that are in the mid-40s which is about 110 degrees. Still it's important to take breaks. You can go and go for a while, and even if you are taking in a proper amount of fluids and staying cool, trying to stay cool covered up etc. It's important to take breaks. 30-45 minutes of hard activity, you need to take a break and have time to cool down. And that is really going to cool down the machine. You can't just run at the red-line for an hour straight and expect the body to keep going, you've got have some proper recovery time. Also, just going out and training in those conditions continually is going to help you create more endurance. The more that you place yourself and your body in those tough hard conditions, the more your body is going to get used to it. You are going to start to adapt to it after a while if you are being challenging in there. Some of things that could help are some off-court trainings. Some good cardio training that is going to get the heart pumping, whether it's riding a bike or running or things like that. Just some general cardio training to increase the heart's capacity to work when it is hot is going to be also very important and often an under rated or under used thing as a tennis player. Most people think of getting most of their exercise in on the tennis court and that is adequate when really, the top atheletes in the world are doing lots and lots of off-court training. So the combination of hydration, the conditioning and the frequent breaks I think are going to be some things that will help your guys out. Ian: I'm curious, even at age 14, is that still recommended I guess to do a lot of off-court training? I guess my question is, at what age should kids start to actually workout or do physical training off the court. Steve: Sure, by the age of 14-16, most boys have probably reached their peak height, their bones have stopped growing. They've reached for the most point the size they are going to be as adults. So strength training is OK in moderation. Of course we aren't going to put them out there and have them do 800lb squats and try to develop full loads of muscle. Those things aren't necessary to playing optimal tennis. You want to do some degree of strength training. A medium program of moderate weight and higher reps because that is going to condition the muscles. And it's very appropriate that they begin doing a lot of cardio work as well. Tennis is mainly running and if you don't have the foot speed but the cardio endurance to get out there and stay out there and stay running, then you are going to wear out sooner and you aren't going to be as effective as you go into a match later. Ian: Alright Steve, I want to thank you very much for your time. Do you have anything else to add before we wrap up this topic? Steve: No, that's it. I think proper hydration is the main key. And that is just for anything that you do outside when it is hot and humid. You want to make sure that you are drinking plenty of water, plenty of fluids in your body and just keep an eye on the heat level. Ian: Alright, it's been great having you here this weekend. Thanks very much for your time and hopefully I'll see you again in the near future at another clinic. Steve: Thanks, I enjoyed it and we had a great time in Baltimore and I appreciate you hosting it. [music] [music] [music] Ian: Our next question on this episode, I want to remind you guys briefly about my sponsor of the Essential Tennis podcast, and that is Championship Tennis Tours, and you can find them at championtennistours.com. They've been putting together individual tickets to professional tennis events, both WTA and ATP tours and ticket packages including accommodations and hotel to a wide variety of professional events all over the world. And that includes all four of the grand slams and a lot of the Master's 1000 series tournaments. So if you are going to be traveling or going to a tournament in your hometown in the near future, definitely check them out. And if you use the promotional code Essential, you'll receive a discount off your purchase of professional tennis event tickets or travel packages for the next event that you go to. Please show them your support for having them be the official sponsor of the podcast and I really appreciate their support. Definitely make sure that you check out the US Open packages as well and when you purchase a US Open package and use the promotional code Essential, you'll also get an invitation to a cocktail party in Time Square which I'm going to be a part of live. So check it out, it should be a good time and I'm looking forward to heading up to New York this year and possibly hooking up with a couple of you guys and having a cool event in Times Square during the tournament. So, tennistours.com and again the promotional code is Essential when you checkout. I thank them very much for their support of the Essential Tennis podcast. Let's get going with our next topics and they are coming to us from Mark in the Netherlands. He has a couple questions having to do with changing your grip that I'd like to discuss-- His first question is all about the adjustment of grip and he has a few questions related to it. The first one is that somebody gave me a pointer that instead of changing my grip, I could also rotate my wrist a little. You would call it pronating, I think because the rotation is not done by the risk itself but I think you know what I mean. Both adjusting the grip slightly and turning the wrist a little are done to prevent the ball from going long. My question is, what are the advantages of changing your grip as compared to rotating your wrist? By the way, I normally hit a forehand and backhand with an Eastern grip, for these slow short balls I now change towards a semi-Western grip, maybe somewhere in between both grips. Alright, what he is saying is that for a short shot in the court, he is moving forwards and using a different grip then what he would for a shot a little bit farther back and closer to the baseline. First of all Mark, I want to say that it's smart to want to change your racket face for a shorter ball-- you are on the right track there as far as your technique is concerned. The closer you get to the net, the less room you have to hit the ball into. The closer to the inside of your court you get, the less amount of room you have to land your shot back in on the other half of the court. And very often, when players miss a short ball deep when they are trying to attack ,they make a technique change and their swing length. Meaning, that typically, they get tentative on the next shot, they shorten their swing because they remember they missed the last one by hitting it too far and the result is an increasingly short and tentative scared ground-stroke swing and I don't like that. When you guys watch the pros on TV, you will not see them let up on a shorter shot. If anything, they will actually accelerate more at the ball. I'm talking about one that is relatively easy, they are moving inside the baseline, it's a shorter shot sitting up in their strike zone or maybe a little bit higher around shoulder height, but not even necessarily shoulder height. Something that you can get to and hit comfortably is what I'm talking about. And when you watch the players on TV, they don't swing shorter at those shots and yet they are still able to hit them in play. And a big mistake the recreational players make is they miss that short shot, they are trying to pressure their opponent with it which they should be doing because it is easy, you're close to your opponent, it's an easy shot, it's in your strike zone so you should be trying to pressure them with that shot. And very often, rec players miss this shot long and they say to themselves, I hit it too hard, I was too aggressive and that's not the way that I want you guys to think about it. Because when you think that way, you become more and more scared of hitting the ball and you are not going to advance in your tennis game that way. Instead, you should make a full follow through at these types of shots and the change you should make to keep the ball in play is to close your racket face more. Meaning, that your strings are now facing a little bit more towards the court then they were from back behind the baseline. But you should make the same follow-through, the same swing that you would from a shot at the base-line as you do on a shorter shot, that you are moving well inside the baseline on. Make sure to continue swinging upwards also so you create topspin to curve the ball back into play. I've talked about this before, as you are making an upward swing to make that spin which is going to curve the ball back into the court and that is not going to happen if you shorten up your swing. So the result here is a full confident swing on any shot that many recreational players are nervous about. So, before I really answer your question, I just want to congratulate you on having the right idea there. I'm glad that you are thinking about simply closing the racket face a little more to keep the ball from going too far and you are not being scared and nervous about missing it long. It sounds like you are continuing to follow through and I just wanted to put that out there because some listeners might not have heard me talk about this before and it's a really important concept to understand. So you are correct, closing the racket face is important. Now, let's talk specifically about changing the grip versus just turning your hand or your palm downwards to close the face. Closing the racket face does not involve turning your wrist. You were correct in pointing that out, it's pronation. And pronation is specifically the rotation of your forearm, meaning your arm, your forearm is what actually pronates and that turns your palm down towards the court surface. It's not your wrist. Go ahead and grip a tennis racket right in front of you, put it out in front of you like you are making contact with a ball and then move your wrist back and forth. And the racket will move back and forth. It won't twist up and down. That motion is accomplished with your forearm, so yes you are correct. And that is what closes the racket face. Now, to get to answering your question, no I don't recommend changing your grip for a short ball and then changing it back again for a deep ball. This is much more complicated then simply closing the racket face with your forearm by pronating. When you change your grip, many more things change then just the angle of your strings and Mark points this out in a question that is going to come up in a second here. But when you change your grip, it is more than just the racket face that changes. You now need to use a different swing because you are going to have a little bit different contact points, it's going to be a different feeling swing because the mechanics all change when you change your grip. It becomes essentially a different stroke. The main elements of hitting a good ground-stroke are still the same but changing your grip is a big change. And it causes you to have to change many other things at the same time. It's not just the racket face. So what you should do instead is learn how to feel, learn how to have an awareness of where your strings are and you need to learn how to make adjustments accordingly based on the type of the shot that you are trying to hit during a point. In other words, a deep rally shot in a really short put-away ground-stroke. We are looking for a very different result on that deep ground-stroke, we are trying to really get the ball up into the air, keep the ball deep back to your opponents again and so you have a really long distance to make the ball travel. On that short ground-stroke where you are trying to pressure your opponent, you are trying to do something very different. You are trying to attack and we are not trying to get the ball up into the air and get it to travel nearly as far and you need to learn how to change your racket face between those two different types of shots and everything in between while using the same grip. You need to learn how to achieve those different range of shots using one grip and you are going to accomplish that by making small adjustments to the racket face. The angle of the strings when you make contact. And a small change makes a big difference, so in my opinion, changing the grip is not necessary, it's just going to over-complicate things. I would recommend that you find the grip that is most comfortable for you in general, whether it be Eastern, forehand, semi-Western, forehand grip or an Eastern backhand grip. Whatever feels most comfortable for you in general, stick with that and practice creating different types of results using that same grip. Now let's go ahead and move to Mark's second question. "My second question is about attacking these short, slow balls with your backhand. I found that hitting a backhand with a semi-Western grip is much more difficult. Would that be a reason to stick to an Eastern backhand grip and pronate instead? I discovered the same semi-Western grip also helps me for deep, high, topspin shots. So very different shots from the short slow ones. You don't hear a lot about players that change their forehand grips during the game, would you recommend that in general or would it be confusing because swing and contact spot would also change. I'm looking forward to your answer, especially because advice on the swing between different forehand grips seems quite rare. OK, we've got a couple different questions in here. You are talking about a backhand grip with a semi-western grip which I assume you are meaning is another turn past an Eastern grip where your knuckles are up on top of the grip. That's really far over, we are getting into almost a grip that [inaudible] uses on her one-handed backhand and that is a really extreme grip. I wouldn't recommend that you go over that far. And you say that it's an awkward grip to you, I agree. You shouldn't have to turn it that far in order to keep your racket face closed. And you say should I stick to an Eastern backhand grip and pronate instead... Yes. Although on a backhand, it's [inaudible] and not pronating. You are going to want to turn the racket the opposite direction that you do on a forehand. On a forehand you pronate, and on a backhand your dominate hand will supenate to keep that racket face closed. Now you talk also about the forehand here, talking about it becoming confusing because the swing and contact point would change. Yes and I'm on the same page with you and I completely agree and that was what I was talking about before. I don't recommend that you try to learn several different forehand and backhand swings for different types of grips. Instead, find a grip that feels most comfortable to you in general on both sides and then learn how to use it to achieve different results as I described before. Alright, the third question here having to do with changing grips and this has to do with the backhand slice. So we are kind of going through every type of shot here from the baseline. He wrote to me, 'I have a follow up question about switching between different grips for different kinds of shots. Normally, I use an Eastern grip with both my forehand and backhand which is one-handed. One shot where it is often recommended to change your grip is when you play a slice. You often hear that you should use the continental grip for the backhand and forehand slice. However, personally, I wonder if it's really a good idea to use the continental grip when you play the slice. I find that when I use that grip, the racket face is facing too much upward with the consequence being that I only brush the bottom of the ball and it goes up very high. This makes it an easier target for my opponent, the ball goes way up too high and spends too long a time in the air. But is it possible that there is something else that I'm doing wrong? Would you say that the Eastern backhand and forehand grips are also fine for slice shots? Maybe slightly better?' Alright, let's talk about the forehand and backhand slice and which grip to use. If your slice is popping up too much, it means that your face is too open. And exactly as you said, your strings are facing upwards too much as you are making contact. It could also mean that you are chopping down at the ball too much, but ultimately it means that your face is too open and so the ball is popping up into the air. Now, this doesn't mean necessarily that the grip that you are using is wrong, but rather it just means that you aren't controlling your racket face correctly. Traditionally most players do use a continental grip to hit their slice on both the forehand and backhand side as you pointed out. This includes myself, this is how I was taught when I was younger and for volleys and drop shots, and slice shots, anything with back spin, on both my forehand and backhand side, I use a continental grip for both sides. And it's definitely very natural for me and as I said a second ago, traditionally, it's what most top level players including professionals use. Recently, I've started noticing that pros are using other grips to hit their backhand slice. Specifically, I've noticed that Nadal and Murray both use a different grip from a continental grip. Now you talked about on your backhand slice, using an eastern backhand grip to try to close the face a little more. But guess what, both Nadal and Murray use an eastern forehand grip to hit their backhand slice. This means that it opens the racket face up even more then what would naturally occur with a continental grip. And neither of them have any problem keeping the racket face closed enough to keep the ball from popping up on their backhand slice. And you are talking about going two grips farther over than that to keep it closed and using an eastern backhand grip on your backhand side. So, this tells me that you are obviously doing something undefined undefined eastern backhand grip just to keep the racket face closed enough to keep the ball from popping way up in the air. So in my opinion, you should really be keeping at least a continental grip for that backhand slice and you need to get some more feel for where your racket strings are and start to close the racket face by hand, no pun intended, by supenating a little bit on that backhand side to close the racket face. More than what you are doing now. I'm not aware of any players who use an eastern backhand grip for their backhand slice or an eastern forehand grip for their forehand slice. Those are definitely grips that are naturally setup to hit with top spin because they close the racket face so much and I highly recommend that you stick with that continental grip and start learning how to close the racket face a little bit more to keep that ball from popping up so much and floating and making an easy shot for your opponents. So stick with it Mark and thank you very much for the great questions. In review here, going over your questions, I don't recommend that for top spin shots, on your forehand and backhand, that you use different grips. I would highly recommend you stick with one grip and learn how to get different results. However, when you do want to hit a slice, I do recommend that you change your grip on both sides and go to a continental grip. It doesn't have to be continental, use what is comfortable for you. But I don't think that you should have to go to an Eastern backhand grip for a backhand slice or an Eastern forehand grip for a forehand slice. Continental should be more than closed enough for you to be able to hit a nice deep penetrating slice that stays relatively low to the net and doesn't pop up too much. So thank very much for your questions. I really appreciate you being a listener over in the Netherlands. Hopefully my descriptions here were helpful to you. [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] That does it for episode 120 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thanks for joining me here today, I appreciate it. Make sure to check out the podcast on iTunes in the music store where you guys can subscribe for free and get the new show every week automatically downloaded to your computer and you can transfer it right to your iPod or iPhone or iTouch or iPad which is pretty cool, to automatically get those downloaded. I'm going to be signing off here and then going to watch the French Open which I've enjoyed watching so far. I'm really looking foward to the second week and by the way, myself and Will Hamilton over at fuzzyyellowballs.com are going to be doing another live webcast during the French Open final which is coming Sunday. Hopefully it's going to be a Federer and Nadal final which would be awesome. That's going to be this coming Sunday and I think we are going to start at 8:30am eastern time here on the east coast of the United States which makes it very early for my friends over on the west coast. But hopefully you guys get up to watch it live and you can check out the live video stream of myself and Will doing match commentary and chatroom at the front page of essentialtennis.com or at fuzzyyellowballs.com also. Alright, that does it for this weeks show, thank you very much for tuning in. Take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [inaudible]

Podcast #121: Learn 7 new drills to improve your net game in either singles or doubles. Start working on them today!

ianw — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 14:14:08 +0000

Being comfortable at the net can introduce a whole new world of options and opportunities to you in singles. Having more solid volleys can obviously improve your doubles game as well! Listen to this episode of the podcast to learn what drills Ian uses to help his students improve at the net, 4 cooperative drills and 3 competitive ones. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here is Ian. Ian: Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode is brought to you by tennistours.com where you can receive a discount off your next purchase of professional tennis event tickets by using the promotional code Essential. Thanks very much for joining me today for today's episode of the podcast. We are going to be talking all about volleys today and how to practice your volleys, specifically to improve them and make them a better and stronger part of your game. Before we get to that, I want to remind you about the best way that you can access to Essential Tennis podcast and that is through iTunes which is a free download for the Mac or PC. And through iTunes, you can subscribe to the Essential Tennis podcast and automatically get the episode every week as soon as it gets released as long as you have iTunes open. So you don't even have to go to the website to download the file. So check it out and subscribe to the show that way and also, as long as you are there, do me a favour and go to the music store, search for tennis, go to the podcast and rate and leave a review for the podcast. I would really appreciate that, that helps with the ratings for the show and will help more people find it on iTunes. So give me a hand and leave a review for the show. Alright, let's get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, let's talk about volleys and the idea for today's show came to us from Eddie who is a 3.5 player who lives in Salt Lake City, Utah. He wrote to me a little while ago and said 'I'm primarily a singles player and I know that I can significantly improve my game if I come to the net more often. I know that I'm missing great opportunities to finish out points. I'm not comfortable at the net and have been playing more doubles to work on my net play. Besides playing more doubles, how do you suggest that a single's player feel more comfortable coming to the net, thanks.' That's an awesome question and I'm really happy that you are asking it. You are absolutely right, coming to the net more in your single's play is going to improve your tennis game. Especially if you are not comfortable with it now and you just haven't been using it. So, I really congratulate you on taking this step in your game and I hope you stick with it and you continue to work at your net game. Because as you pointed out, it will give you so many more opportunities to be able to put the ball away. And this was the case yesterday-- Will Hamilton of fuzzyyellowballs and myself did a live webcast and we were doing commentary during the French Open final between [inaudible] and Nadal. And [inaudible] was hitting some big groundstrokes. Nadal of course as he is known for was playing really good defence and getting to just about everything that was been thrown at him. And [inaudible] had so many chances to move forwards after a big groundstroke where Nadal was on the run in a tough spot, barely getting to the ball, hitting with an open racket face and was obviously just going to push the ball back into play. Now push is a relative term of course, push by a professional standards is just putting it back in play essentially. And [inaudible] was just standing on the baseline or even a couple of steps inside of hte baseline and just standing there watching Nadal run back and forth. And Will and myself were really pretty hard on [inaudible] about not taking those types of opportunities to move forwards and put the ball away with a simple volley instead of giving Nadal the time that it took for the ball to get all the way back to [inaudible] and then for [inaudible] to setup and launch himself into another big groundstroke. That's just an example at the professional level of where you guys will have chances but if you are not comfortable at the net and you don't like to volley, you are not going to look for those opportunities and you are throwing away points. You've got chances and you've got to taking advantage of them. Now playing doubles, one more thing before we get into the actual ways that you can improve your volleys, playing doubles is a great way to practice your net game. And a great way to round out your game. If you've only played singles up to now, it's going to be awkward. It's going to be uncomfortable. You are going to feel like a fish out of water. You are going to think you are a bad player because you won't be able to understand how it can possibly feel so different from singles. And you are going to say to yourself 'well this is just another way to play tennis, right? We are still playing tennis out here. There are just four of us instead of two. How hard could it possibly be?' Well if you've only played singles, and you go and play some doubles for the first time, you are going to feel really strange on the court. I remember first starting to play doubles when I was still a junior player. I definitely played almost all singles until college but my coach definitely brought me to doubles early on-- or at least go me some experience before I went off to college. And I hated it at first. I was not comfortable with it. Now when you go to college to play tennis, you have to play both singles and doubles. Very rarely does a player play only one or another. So I really had no choice but to improve to net game. And once I got into it and I really started getting comfortable with the tactics and the strategy and the tempo of play and communicating with my partner and all those type of things, I really started to love it. There are times now where I definitely enjoy doubles more than singles. So continue to play doubles and that will round out your singles game. Now let's get down to different ways that you can continue working on your volleys as a singles player. We are not going to talk much about technique today. I will definitely be throwing in some tips and suggestions on how you guys can do better with your volleys or half-volleys or shots at the net. But I'm going to be focusing mostly on drills that you guys can do and we're going to be talking about seven different volley drills. I've got an outline for each of them, so we are going to get right into it and hopefully get to all seven. There is going to be four cooperative drills, meaning drills that you do with a partner, just one other person and they're drills that you are trying to work with somebody else as a partner on the other side of the net to be able to keep a ball going back and forth for a certain purpose. And I'm going to be talking about three competitive drills. Drills where you can actually play out points and make it count and practice your volleys within an actual point situation. Now we are going to talk about the cooperative drills first. And I'm going to be talking about these in progression from the simplest to the most difficult. We are going to talk about the easiest volley drill to do first and as I go through all four, I'm going to progress in difficulty. It's important for you guys to understand this and in my lessons, with my students that I work with, on a weekly basis we very typically go through this whole progression of all four of these cooperative drills. Moving from the easiest down through the most difficult in order to really drill their net game and to get them more and more comfortable hitting volleys at the net. So, let's go on and start with number one. Cooperative drill number one is a simple volley to volley rally with you and your partner across from each other, half way between the net and the service line. So you guys are probably about 15 feet apart or so which is close. You guys are going to be close to each other. Again, half way between the net and the service line, no closer, no farther away. Both of you guys should be in that same position. And from here your goal is to keep the ball in the air back and forth. And to have each of you continue to hit volleys, both forehands and backhands. Now in order to do this effectively, a couple of things have to happen. You both have to hit with an open racket face. Meaning your strings are angled upwards towards the sky or towards the ceiling. Why is this important? Because we are not trying to hit these shots at each other, meaning have the ball come off your racket and go directly at your partner. Why? Because that means that the ralleys are only going to last about two shots each and our goal here is to keep the ball going as long as possible. We want long rallies. Secondly, you want to have relaxed hands. Don't hit these firmly. Your hands should be [inaudible] and we're honestly barely holding on to the racket. You should be very relaxed as you hit with that open racket face. And you're really just trying to bump the ball up into the air, we're litterally angling the strings up to hit the ball up, and then have the ball come back down again to your partner. So the ball should be falling down to your partner, you're not trying to hit at your partner. A couple other things to focus on here: Make sure that you start to split step every time your partner hits the ball. And in general, stay on your toes and continue to move your feet. Please do not stand there and rally back and forth. That will be a detriment to your game. You have to practice good footwork. And those of you listening who were at the latest clinic in Baltimore, know exactly what I'm talking about. We started out that clinic with some short courts, rallies back and forth, nice and swell, and I got on everybody's case immediately about moving their feet. Even when the ball was not coming to them, when the ball was coming to another player that was next to them, I was yelling at people from across 2 courts, "Your feet are not moving anymore." And when you guys get into the habit of this, you'll get in better shape, and you'll have a better habit of continuing to move your feet. So, even though this might be easy for some of you guys, to rally close and soft and relaxed back and forth, keep your feet moving, get in the habit of split stepping, It's going to make your volleys better. Now, this volley to volley rally, softly, I want you guys to do it with your partner until you've made 20 volleys in a row without any bounces. The ball lands in front of either of you, or if it hits the net, or if one of you guys can't reach one of the volleys, that's it. You go back down to zero again, start again, and keep going until you get 20 in a row back and forth without any bounces. If you can't do that, then this is all you do that day. Alright? With your partner. And you keep working at it until you get 20. And if you can not get 20, do not progress to the next drill. Because this is where you need to work on. This should be the easiest out of the 4 drills that we're talking about. And if you can't do it, don't move on. Alright? Focus on improving this part of your game. Alright, cooperative drill number 2. Volley to volley from the service line. This is going to be obviously very similar to the first drill that I talked about, but this time you and your partner are going to back up a little further, and both of you will be in the middle of the service line. And you're goal again is to keep the ball in the air back and forth. In order to do this, you still want an open racket face as you make contact with each volley. Don't close your racket and drive to drive the ball, or hit it with top spin to get it to go farther. Keep your racket face open, and hit a simple, traditional volley. [noise] A little bit of back spin should be on each shot. The difference between these volleys and the short ones, is that we do want to hit the ball a little bit firmer to get it to go farther, because we're quite a bit deeper. If you guys are just like in your car, or you know, in your back yard listening to me now, it probably doesn't sound like a big difference between the first drill where you're half way between the net and the service line, and this one, where you and your partner are both at the service line. But trust me, it's a big difference. It's a lot tougher. Keep a simple technique. Keep an open racket face. We're just trying to hit through the ball a little more with that open face, a little bit firmer shot, to direct the ball towards your partner, and keep it deep, back and forth. You really should be aiming for about your partner's chest, anything lower than that, and you want to either lower your racket face a bit more, or hit it a little bit firmer to try to keep it in the air back and forth. Just like the first drill, if the ball bounces, then fine. Practice your [inaudible] I'm going to give you guys a goal in a second, but what I don't want to see you guys doing is running in for short shots and then trying to back up again. Just stay on the service line for now. Keep it simple. Do keep your feet moving. And continue to split step. You can take a step forward to take the ball out of the air if you can reach it on one step, but for the most part you should just be staying on the service line, and taking the ball as it comes to you. [music] If your partner continues to hit it at your feet, or bouncing it in front of you, they need to work on their control and their depth of their volleys. Remind them that they should be aiming for your chest and your goal is to keep the ball in the air back and forth. I want you and your partner to get 10 in a row in the air. So again, if the ball bounces, fine. Just hit a half volley, keep the rally going, but start your count again back at zero, and try to get 10 in a row. If you get 10 in a row no problem, shoot for 15 or 20. If you can get 20 in a row without a bounce, with both of you on the service line, without cheating inside the service line, you're really doing an excellent job, and you and your partner are pretty advanced volleyers. That's much easy... I'm sorry, much more difficult to do than what it sounds like just listening to me describe it. So, that's cooperative volley drill number 2, both of you on the service line. Let's move on to the third one. Another progression here, and this is going to be ground strokes to volleys. One of you is now gonna be on the baseline, the other one in the middle of the service line. The ground stroke player is going to be either on the deuce side, or the ad side. They are going to take one half of the court back behind the baseline. The volleyer is going to be aiming past the service line now. Their target is going to be between the service line and the base line. So they're trying to hit a deep volley and on one half of the singles' court. So, either the deuce half or the ad half, so essentially we're taking that rectangle called no-man's land, deep in the court between the service line and the baseline and we're going to cut that in half. We're not using the alleys, we're just using half of no-man's land, and that's going to be the target for the volleyer. Put something there, by the way. In the middle of that half of no-man's land put a ball pyramid, or a cone, or a hat, or something. Put it right in the middle of that box that you're aiming for as the volleyer and literally try to hit it. It's good for your concentration, and it's a good reminder of what your objective is. You're trying to hit your target over and over again. Now, the ground stroke player should be making a full round stroke swing at a steady pace. This player is not trying to hit all out and hit aggressive shots, but make sure as the ground stroke player, that you're not just pushing the ball towards the volleyer as well. You want to be making a full swing at whatever rally speed that you normally hit at, that you and your partner normally hit at. You should be trying to hit the volleyer in the air. Trying to give them as many volleys as possible. If it lands in front of them, that's okey. They can practice their half volleys as well. And volleyers, you should be remaining on the service line. Don't cheat in. Don't cheat in. You're gonna want to. Especially if you don't volley a lot. You're gonna want to get closer where it's easier to volley. Stay on the service line and practice your volleys from there. Stay on one half on no-man's land until the volleyer makes 20 volleys total. Not in row, but a total of 20 that go past the service line and are on the correct half of the court, either the deuce side or the ad side, then switch over to the other side. Volleyer will stay in the middle of the service line, ground stroke player will shift over to the other half of the court, and the volleyer will make another set of 20. Alright? So that's cooperative drill number 3. Before we get to our fourth and final cooperative drill, I want to remind you guys about the sponsor of the Essential Tennis podcast, who I appreciate very much for their support of myself and for Essential Tennis, for the podcast, and that is Championship Tennis Tours. You can find them at tennistours.com, and since 1987 they've been selling individual tickets to professional tennis events, both the WTA and ATP events all over the world. And they not only sell individual tickets, but also complete ticket packages, including hotel and accommodations, even limousine service from your hotel to the tournament site, all kinds of different things, all kinds of different packages. And if you haven't been to a grand slam--and the US Open is gonna be coming up pretty quickly, Wimbledon is next, and then finally the US Open--if you haven't been there before, you should really check out their packages for the US Open this year. You get a choice of all kind of different options, including choice of hotel between the W in Times Square, and Essex Hotel as well. Also in New York City. Both--obviously Times Square is in New York City--but both hotels you get to choose between those two. You get to choose the kind of ticket, how close you are to the action during the matches that you go to watch. You get shuttle service back and forth. Also, a choice between tickets to a Mets or Yankees game, a city tour, or a broadway performance, all kind of awesome stuff. Plus, you'll get an invitation to an exclusive Essential Tennis podcast cocktail party at the W Hotel in Times Square. And I'm gonna be making plans to be there myself, so you can meet me, and other listeners of the Essential Tennis podcast who are checking out the action at the US Open. So go check them out. Again, tennistours.com, and when you check out, if you'd like the invitation to that cocktail party, make sure to use the promotional code Essential with a capital E as you check out, for your purchase. Alright, now let's get to that final cooperative drill to work on your volleys. And this is gonna put together ground strokes and volleys. And as I told you guys when I kicked things off, this is been a progression from easiest to most difficult. This is gonna be the toughest drill here, cooperative drill that you can do with your partner to work on your net game. Now we're going to have both players starting from the middle of the baseline. One player is going to be hitting an approach shot and moving forwards, the other player is going to be staying on the baseline and going to be hitting all ground strokes. The person that's going to be staying on the baseline is going to feed a short shot-- meaning really anything that's soft and lands in front of the service line on the other side, but the baseline player should feed it short in front of the service line--player across from them is gonna move forwards, hit an approach shot down the middle of the court and then continue on into the net. Now, as with all the other drills, there's going to be a target area. The target area for the approaching player is between the service line and the baseline and also between two other targets. And normally when I do this with my students, I place two cones or two ball pyramids in no-man's land about 10 or 15 feet apart. And so my student will have basically a box or a square right in the middle of no-man's land, and their target is between the service line and the baseline, in between the two cones that I put out. And so they've got a square right in the center of no-man's land, and that's their target area. Anything that lands outside of those parameters, we start the drill over again and start back from square one. Now, the approaching player, their objective here is to make that approach shot off of the short feed, and then 2 volleys after that in a row. So we're trying to make 3 shots: an approach, and 2 volleys. And as you hit those 3 shots, as the approaching player, you should be getting closer and closer to the net. By the time you hit your third shot, that second volley, you should be pretty close to the net as you continue moving forwards. If you're the baseline player, again, you should be making full ground stroke swings at a steady pace, nothing aggressive, but you should be trying to hit a good solid shot that makes it all the way back to your partner. Continue doing this until that approaching player has 5 times made all 3 shots in a row--the approach and 2 volleys. If either player misses--either the approaching player or the baseline player--start back again, reset with both players in the middle of the baseline, and start over again. This is really important guys, and now, before we move on to the competitive drills, a couple of things that you guys want to keep in mind as you do these cooperative drills: First of all, stay on task. And I've given you guys specific targets, specific objectives, and by following those instructions, you will get the most out of this practice time. Don't miss, you know, don't do the first volley drill, go for 20 in a row, miss at 15. You know, it bounces, say, "Oh, that was close enough, keep going". And then get 20, and say, "Alright, great. We got it. Let's move on." Be honest. Don't cheat youselves, please. Make it as tough as it's suppposed to be. Don't make it easier on yourself by cheating or getting closer in the volley to volley rallies, whatever. If you miss a ground stroke, on that fouth and final drill, you put it into the net and your partner just needed one more volley, don't feed in another ball. That kind of defeats the purpose of the drill which is have the approaching player work on moving forwards and hitting volleys at the same time. So don't cheat yourselves, number one. Secondly, as the volleyer especially, be very aware of your quality of contact. Meaning, pay close attention to where the ball is hitting on your racket, because it will make a big difference, a huge difference, in where the ball goes. Most of these shots that you'll be hitting as the volleyer, you'll be relaxed, and you're not going to be gripping the racket very tightly. And when the ball hits off your frame, or not even off your frame, but just not the middle of the racket and out close to the frame, it's gonna kill your shot. You will not get the same results. I strongly suggest that if you haven't heard it already, go download the Watch the Ball podcast which was just a couple shows ago, and listen to it. It's gonna be really important as you do these drills to pay close attention to where the ball is hitting on your racket. Thirdly, pay close attention to your consistency of shot, and be picky about this. During the drills where you have a specific target, between the service line and the baseline, etc., really be picky. In other words, if you're only making one in your target area, and then missing 3 or 4, or 5 by a couple feet, and then making 1, then missing 4 again, you're not doing very well. Alright? And pay close attention to this. Honestly, you should be making 3, 4, 5, in a row, in your target area, before you make a mistake. And then making another 3, or 4, or 5 in a row again. If you're not doing that, focus on the contact and simplify your technique. We're not going to talk about technique right now, but just make it simple, and just make sure you're hitting your target. Lastly, your target and the ball are the most two important things here. Nothing is more important. Make sure you make good contact, make sure you focus on your target, and do that during all 4 of those cooperative drills, and you'll get much more out of it. Alright, now, 3 competitive drills before we wrap up today's show. First of all--and this is one of my favorite drills, competitive games, of all time, volley to volley game--both players start in no-man's land, half way between the service line and the baseline. And you're gonna use half of the double's court, or the single's court. You're gonna use either the ad or the deuce side, and you're gonna play straight ahead. So if I'm on the deuce side on my half of the court, straight across from me is my opponent. He or she is on the ad side. I'm on the deuce side, they're on the ad side, and we're gonna play this game straight ahead. You're gonna feed a volley to the person across from you, who's in no-man's land, give them a volley--a courtesy shot, right to them--so that they can play a volley, and then after that anything goes. It's your choice whether or not you want to make the alleys in or not, you can play alleys in or you can play alleys out, for... they kind of work on different stuff. When the alleys are out, it really keeps you in a very close-quartered part of the court. Really works a lot on hands, there's not really any room for angles, and it's all about, kind of braking the other person down, making more shots than they do. Also good to emphasize closing in to the net. When alleys are in, you have a little more space to use, and you can start to use angles a little bit more than when alleys are out. So, your choice. Whichever one you want to do. Try it both ways. But both players start in no-man's land, straight ahead from each other. Courtesy feed, feed of volley to the person across from you, and then play it out. This really kind of you can say, is more of a double's drill than a single's drill since it's volley to volley, but it's outstanding practice; to work on your hands your touch, your reaction time, and your footwork, as you move in to the net from no-man's land after that first shot. Don't stay in no-man's land. Close in. And if you miss your volleys on your way in, we've found something that you need to work on and get more consistent at. Again, this is one of my favorite games. There's a lot of fast action. I would also suggest that you guys switch who feeds every point back and forth, or every 5 points, or something like that. Make sure the same person doesn't feed every time. So, that's competitive drill number 1, to work on volleys. Number 2: Ground strokes to volleys. In this game, the volleyer starts on the service line, and we're gonna use the entire single's court for this one. Volleyer is going to start right in the middle of the service line, the other player is gonna start in the middle of the baseline. The volleyer is gonna feed a courtesy shot right down the middle to the ground stroke player, and then the ground stroke player must hit a shot in return that the volleyer can touch. Now, notice I didn't say it's a courtesy shot. That ground stroke player can hit it hard, he or she can hit it low at the volleyer's feet, he or she can stretch the volleyer out a little bit to one side or the other, but the ground stroke player just can't hit a winner. He can't hit an outright winner, in fairness for the volleyer, since the volleyer is just feeding in a courtesy shot to the baseline player. So, that's how it starts. A courtesy shot from the volleyer, a competitive shot from the baseline player, but it has to be touched by the volleyer, and then play it out. Full court singles. Anything goes. And this is putting that volleyer right up there in the middle of the action, and then playing out the points. Now, you can play a game up to 10, then trade sides, have the other person be the volleyer. Or you can play up to 20, and then trade sides when one person gets up to 10. You can format it however you like, but another great competitive game to work on your net play as a single's player. Lastly, ground stroke to approacher. And this is very, very similar to the cooperative drill that we talked about a little bit earlier. Both players will start in the middle of the baseline, and one player is gonna feed a short ball. Short ball meaning it has to be in front of the service line. The other player is going to hit an approach shot, and then has to move in to the net. And so, now you're going to work on your approach and your volleys together as the approaching player, the other person's gonna work on their passing shots, their ground strokes, and their lobs. Lobs are good as well. Lobs are also good in the first two competitive games I talked about as well. By the way, anything goes in all 3 of these games once the point has begun. So, you can format this a couple different ways as well. You can play a game up to 10 and then trade, the other person hits the short ball and the first player approaches, or you can trade half way through a game, as well. It doesn't really matter. Just make sure you guys keep track of score, and if you can kind of put something on it, and make it even more competitive, I would recommend that. Lastly, I'd simply like to point out that it was not a mistake that I spent so much more time today talking about cooperative drills, as opposed to competitive drills. I think that recreational players in general, are poor at using and utilizing cooperative drills. Whether it be because of lack of focus, lack of concentration, or maybe they just think competitive games are a lot more fun and a lot more interesting --and I agree, they are-- but if you really want to get the most out of your time on the practice court, find somebody who shares your desire to get better, talk with them beforehand, work out these drills, go over them together so that you both have a good understanding of what's going to be expected, and then stick with it, and keep your focus, and don't deviate until you finish these drills. Give yourselves objectives, and complete them. And that's what good, high level tennis players do, that's what, you know... When I played college tennis, that's what we did, in practices for hours and hours, were drills like this. And that's how you get better. So, Eddie, hopefully you've enjoyed today's show. And the rest of you listening, hopefully you've enjoyed today's show as well. Continue working at your net game. It's going to improve your single's game and your double's game, whichever you happen to play. And Eddie, keep up the good fight, and I hope that your net game continues to get better so that it can become a stronger part of your single's game. Thanks very much for your great question, and thank you for being a listener. [music] [music] Alright. That does it for episode number 121 of the Essential Tennis podcast. Thank you very much for joining me today, and for listening to the show. I appreciate having you as a listener, and other people I appreciate a great deal, are those who donate to Essential Tennis. And I'd like to thank a couple people specifically, who have donated over the last couple weeks here. And they are Bill in Missouri, Charles in California, Charles in Maryland, Steve in North Carolina, Max in New York, Bruce in Massachusetts, David in Alabama, Devin in Pennsylvania, Carlotta in New Jersey, and Gary in Florida. Thank you to all of you who donated over, about the last 2 or 3 weeks or so, and if this podcast and the rest of Essential Tennis have helped improve your tennis game, I would appreciate your support by a donation, either a small, one-time donation, a big, one-time donation, or you can do a monthly subscription donation as well, in 5, 10, or 20 dollars per month. Just go to essentialtennis.com and in the bottom, right-hand corner, you'll see a box that says "Donate". And I would appreciate your support very much. Alright, that does it for this week's show. Thank you again for downloading the show and for listening to it. I hope it's been helpful to you. Take care this week, and good luck with your tennis. [music]

Podcast #122: Listen in as Ian talks to Dave “The Koz” Kozlowski about adding more offense to your tennis game by using slice and backspin.

ianw — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 14:20:10 +0000

Whenever tennis players think of offense hitting the ball with power and pace definitely comes to mind first. Did you know that you can also create offense by using slice? On today's show Ian talks to Koz about how this is obtained and where recreational players can start using backspin to keep their opponents off guard. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian: Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today on the Podcast I have a really exciting guest who is back for his second time being a guest on the show. And we are going to be talking about adding offense to your singles' game in tennis. It's going to be a really good discussion and let's go ahead and get right to it. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] My guest today on the podcast is Dave, the Koz, Kozlowski. Koz, welcome back to the show I'm really happy to have you back on the Podcast. Koz: Ian, always a pleasure. Great to be here with you this evening and I know you have a great topic so I'm eager to get going with it. Ian: Awesome. Well, I want to welcome you back to the program. The Koz was a guest on the Essential Tennis Podcast for episode 108. And for those of you that haven't heard that episode, definitely go to the archives and download it. We talked about power versus control for the recreational player in that episode. And we discussed why control is so important for those of you listening. We discussed things like rhythm and being able to maintain a steady rally back and forth. Not only was the topic excellent for us to talk about, what really shown through for myself and I've heard this over and over from my listeners-- your enthusiasm and passion for the game was electric and was really fun to listen to. So I'm really happy to have you back on the program. Koz: You are so kind, my friend, but let me tell you. I'm only as good as the audience allows me to be and only as good as a host brings out of me. So you brought it out and the audience was very attentive. But indeed we did, we talked about control first and then some power and some offense coming second. But it's so important to get that repeatable and dependable shot that you can hit the same swing, the same type of tempo time after time so you get the shot groove. Now you've got this audience very excited about adding some offense and what I think is very important is that they realize that offense doesn't only have to come with power. It can certainly come from change of spin and change of speed-- adding a slice to your game. And let's not forget the impact that dropshots have on the tennis game. Especially at the 3.5 level where it's difficult to change direction and get to a dropshot. We saw a lot of drop shots coming from Paris the last couple of weeks. We are going to see a lot of drop shots coming from the Wimbeldon championships because they will be dropshotting just as much on grass as they did on clay because the bounce stays low. But what does the dropshot do for the average player at a club level? Well, it throws off the rhythm of the opponent. First of all, you make the opponent come in. Sometimes that opponent may not like to be in the four-court or may not like to be at the net. And all of a sudden you are testing their volleys. Plus by bringing someone in on a dropshot, it adds to your confidence. When you have a target at the net, your passing shots are supplemented and all of a sudden you feel that you've got confidence and have more trust in your shots. You can then pass the player at the net. So let's not overlook the importance of a dropshot. Along with the dropshot, once you get a player in there, let's throw in a lob. So you hit a dropshot and then you hit a lob and then all of a sudden, you are getting offense to your game. You are getting scoring opportunities without relying on slug power only. And it's so important to add these shots to your game. You know that there are a lot of opponents that you can beat in singles. Especially on the female gender-- and I'm not distinguishing men from women. In match play, it's even but a lot of women don't like to run forward and then have to back peddle. So if you have a drop shot and follow it up with a lob, that is offense personafied. You have offense glorified there and you can get a lot of mileage out of two little simple shots-- a drop shot followed up by a lob. Ian: It's really interesting that you bring up the point that offense and aggression doesn't necessarily have to equal power. And you hitting the ball hard and I think that's definitely a misconception among today's recreational players who watch modern professional tennis on TV and no doubt you have to have weapons at that level and you need to have a certain level of paste to your to your shots and we talked in episode 108 about so often recreational players these days try to copy that to their own detriment. And we're definitely going to get into a variety and how that can help the question asked for today's show and let's go ahead and get into his question. His name is A. J. Glenn A.J. How are you? Let's hear this question-- So A. J. wrote to me and said I'm about a 3.5 player and play two to three times per week. I'm really trying to up my consistency with my strokes and get away from the all or bust type of game where I really go for too many winners I have been doing a lot of work on the wall and have gotten my consistency up quite a bit over the past few months however in my matches my consistency doesn't really put me on the offensive side of the ball and i find myself playing a lot more defense then I would like I end up running a lot throughout the match and by the end i have nothing left what can i do to find that blend of consistency that doesn't always put me on the defense? When should I go for the aggressive play? Koz: Well excuse me I'm sorry that you finished that statement you had me all excited about this wall i wanted to mention that as soon as your finished and i did not mean to interrupt i was encroaching in on your territory there pardon me. Ian: I just wanted to say that basically id like to split this conversation up into two main categories number one when is it appropriate for a recreational level player to start working on offense and the number two how does a recreational player start to achieve this? We've already thrown out a couple of ideas there lets um, tell you what go ahead and run with that cause because i agree i was excited myself when i read that a recreational player would actually take the time and concentration necessary to hit against a wall. Why don't you talk a little bit about how good a practice that is? Koz: Well i will tell you this this is kinda sounding corny but anything coming from the cause at times can sound corny but where there is a wall ladies and gentlemen tennis fans there is a way because theres instrumental practice and skills that you can gain from hitting against the wall Monica Sellis is seven times slam-- nine time slam champion would spend a minimum of two hours a day hitting against the wall. Now this was an addition to playing several sets a day doing a number of conditioning and drills on the court but she would supplemented with hitting against the wall. Theres no better practice area to work on getting confidence to hit passing shots so this guy is on the right track keep on the wall. Make that part of your weekly supplements to your game now lets talk about this offense. Many players are equipped to give there opponents chances to lose very few players that were actually talking even at the high level, high college even the respectable pro level there is not always equipped to beat there opponent but they are equipped to get give there opponent a chance to lose. So were only in a point you gotta take the perspective i want to play investment tennis. I'm willing to hit three, four shots. I want to work the point I'm going to give this guy a chance to lose before i try to go for one strike tennis meaning get that ball and try to hit a winner that's overly aggressive for most players you still have to get the opponent some opportunity to lose now on the other hand i heard this guy Aj saying that hes not able to have the offense because the guy is running him around and you want to take the point you want to take the perception that is that your trying to orchestrate this point your trying to set it up your trying to build the point so your hitting slightly wide shots to the other side making the opponent run and hoping that he coughs up a short ball then the option starts to arrive arise when you have a chance to hit an approach winner perhaps a short ball to set it up that your going in to terminate it with a volley or that drop shot that we talked about so those options are available if you move the opponent early in the point but your not necessarily trying to win the point your not trying to conclude the point or terminate it on the first shot Ian: Going out to play first strike winners so that you're willing mentally and physically. You have the patience. You have the prudence to try to set it up. And perhaps it will contribute to your funds. He may cough up some outright unforced winners. Unforced errors rather. Before you have the chance to try to terminate it yourself. So, my advice always is try and keep the ball in play. Give him a chance to make some errors. Then when the opportunity occurs you try to strike. And you may not even go after an outright winner. What your trying to do is to put him more in an awkward spot. Maybe run him wider to the side with some short angle crosscuts. Trying to hit the ball deep. So that he coughs up that short ball that you can eventually attack. So the key is to have a combination of some patience. Along with some prudence. And that prudence, need'nt be in many times, just includes knowing the right shot to hit at that time. Going with the shot selection. Now there are times where the ball actually puts you on defense. And the trick is to be as smart as Federer is. And as talented as Federer is. When he's on defense he's at one he's one of the best coming up with a shot that is going to next put his opponent in an awkward position. That doesn't mean hitting a winner. It means having the ability to perhaps dump the ball at the opponents feet as he's coming in. Whereas that in the middle of the court. So you find a way to make it awkward for the opponent. Is that getting offense out of your game? You better believe it is. So it's a combination of knowing when you're in that ability to go for something big. And when you're in the location that you, matter, may be better going for so something at a more moderate type of offensive shots. Ian: Good stuff guys and lets take that one step further and get really specific. And your talking about being patient on the court. I like how you how you use the work orchestrate. It kinda to to conduct the points. And be able to work your opponent back and forth. Which does take patience. To be able to do that without going for the out outright winner too quickly. And your talking about waiting from errors from your opponent. And lastly you, you were discussing waiting for an opportunity to be able to make your opponent uncomfortable or catch them off balance. Not necessarily through power. Now let's talk a little bit. Or I'd like to hear your thoughts on and keeping in mind that AJ is a 3'5 player. Koz: Oh that's, that's respectable and he can play with 85 percent of the people that are playing tennis Ian: absolutely. Koz: out there. So that's, that's applaudable right there. Ian: Yeah, yeah no doubt. And yeah that puts him above average for recreational tennis players. Which definitely is outstanding. Keep keeping in mind his his ability level. What should he be looking for in terms of opportunities? When he he goes out to play a match and when the rest of my listeners go out to play a match and they're around a 3 5 level. What do does opportunity look like at that level? What should they be looking for? Koz: Well I think a lot of times the all court games separates levels of players. And often times that they let's say 3 0 level they're able to volley very well close to the net. But their volley's go down. Their confidence goes down. They're not as comfortable as they start to volley from the midcourt. And it's imperative that players who want to go to that 4 0 and above level that they learned how to hit volley's from all over the court. And that means tempered volley's from defense at the service line. Or with high volley's at the base line instead of letting the ball drop in and bounce in over their head. But they are able to come in and pop it deep. Maybe if it's floating and they're able to move forward. They take a more offensive stroke volley swing at it. But you know Ian I think that one of the keys is that often times players don't really supplement enough underspins of their game. Everybody is so caught up on hitting heavy top spin. And top spin I in fact I try to avoid the word top spin. And just try to refer to it as adding more gravity to the shot. Because basically the club player is going to obtain sufficient top spin by starting low and finishing higher than where he started. Of course the higher he comes up the more quickly he comes up the more added gravity he puts on the ball. As we refer to it in the industry as top spin. But instead of trying to generate top spin by trying to turn the wrist and flip the racket and trying to make the top spin. Then just get into a confident mode of starting undefined undefined the ball up higher so you get it in an unfavorable strike zone for the opponent, but it's also time to spend some time on your tennis career, adding a underspin. And what happens often times, those who start hitting only flats or hitting only top spin, or let's just say hitting top spin initially, that's about the extent of their game. They can only hit top spin and they can't [inaudible] on the short ball or on the low short ball, they have trouble because they haven't learned how to slice. The best advice you can give yourself is to try to explore all these shots. Look at how this underslice is hit, the value of coming under the ball, getting that rub wipe across the ball and the action that the ball picks up. And it's important that you add these early, because I know for a fact there is some very accomplished players at even a higher level, at 4.0, 4.5 that can't hit the underspin. And they used to talk about Ivan Lendl when he played on grass. He looked like someone where a black tie outfit, wearing a tux but wearing brown shoes, and it's almost the same. [laughter] They can hit excessive top spin at the baseline but when it comes in to hitting something else, some dropshots, some change of pace, some chips going in, they're not as comfortable. Part of the reason is that they may have hit top spin only for too long of a time. Can you add the shot later in life? You bet you can. Is it tougher for some? Yes it is, because you become so secure with what feels comfortable, what feels secure, that you have some challenge adding those under spins. So the advice you should give yourself--I'm going to give it to you right now along with you giving it to yourself, is do not be afraid to start to come under the ball. Open the face of the racket. Explore with some grips. Turn the hand halfway between a forehand and a backhand. Maybe even start to hit some backhands. Now this is not radical. This is good, solid training stuff to hit a backhand grip on a forehand side and you're going to force yourself to open the face and to come under the ball. And all of a sudden you're starting to supplement your game with some underspin shots. Ian: So Koz, let's talk a little bit more about the actual application of that slice as it pertains to being offensive and being able to throw our opponents off balance and relieve some pressure, I guess is what we're looking for. AJ was talking about being able to run down shots and building his consistency so he's doing a lot of great work on the courts and improving his game. And now your advice to him is to work on more variety of shot by using that slice or the underspin. So I've heard you throw out the idea of dropshotting. I've also heard you, during our discussion, talk about just throwing the slice in there as a change of pace. Let's talk a little bit more about specific application and how he can make his opponents uncomfortable, maybe even while he's playing a touch opponent that's maybe pushing him around the court a little bit. Koz: Well I think anytime that you see a ball that bounces around the service line, that has a bit of topspin on, there are options that occur. You can flatten out, you can topspin it back, or you also can go in and hit the opposite spin that's been delivered to you. And many, many times the best time to hit a dropshot, or a shot as a chip, or a chop or a change of pace is when someone's hit a soft topspin into the middle of the court. That ball is most favorable to hit as a drop shot or as a slice coming back, and this drop shot--the key on the dropshot is to be able to think in terms of a miniature lob. When you ask yourself, what is the characteristic of a lob, most people will say, 'It's a ball that goes up and it's a ball that comes down.' Well believe it or not, that's what a dropshot is. It's a miniature form of a lob, and people are going to have better shots with the dropshot, better results with the dropshots if they get the mentality that they're not trying to hit straight ahead as a line drive, because they may spin that ball. They may underslice it but if it's going straight ahead with a low line drive trajectory, that ball is going to carry much more deeply than a ball that is arced, that once it hits, it kind of sits down. It doesn't undefined Koz: So what you're trying to achieve, is a ball that has some arc. So it's going up, going down. Characteristics of good drop shots are soft hands, strong legs. So that you're actually, in your mind, attempting to hit a ball so softly, that you want to see it drop on your side of the net. Now you really don't want to do that, because you're going to lose the points. But when you're practicing, you want to feel that you're trying to hit the ball so softly--out of the hands--that the ball goes up. But it comes down, hitting your side of the net. Well how do you get that ball to go over? Keep the hands just as soft as they are, but widen your stance. As you go to hit that drop shot, take an extra 8, 10 inches wider stance as you hit. So that the wider stance allows you to lean forward more, to push the ball forward with your body. But you have the soft hands, and the strong legs. The drop shots are very effective. The trick is, as you know as being a quality coach, once you learn one of these underspin shots on your forehand, you have the ball. You have a drop ball or you have a dropshot. You have a lob volley, you have a chip return serve. You have somebody that smashes the ball at you. Instead of trying to drive swing, you just chip it as a lob, or you chip it as an underspin. So I can't tell you the value that one gains by learning this drop shot. A key trick on learning underspin; I've had players go to the net--and I'll try to speak this as we're listening and not seeing it--but actually stand on the opposite side of the net than I am. Place his or her racket flush against the net on the forehand, taking the arm out as far to the right as it it'll go. And the racket cannot go forward. Once it goes forward, you drive. But the racket can go from right to left. It can go across the ball, so that you get that rub, wipe effect. So as the player is stretched out far on the side, on his side of the net, I'm standing on the other side. I deliver a ball--an underhand toss--that bounces, perhaps 4 or 5 feet in front of the net. As soon as that ball hits the net, he gets the sensation that he's rubbing and wiping across the net. All of the sudden, the player starts to get the identity, that it's not a hit, it's a rub. It's a wipe, you're starting to sweep across the ball. You get that shot, you'll learn all types of chips. You'll learn how to hit inside the ball, and veer the ball out to the side. You'll learn how to hit behind the ball, and throw it up for a drop shot. You'll learn how to chip and charge behind a second serve, or a short ball that's hit as your starting to approach the net. Here's the beauty--you add these drop shots, these shots are going to get better all your life. I know I'm on record tonight, but I'll go on record, and I'll say this: There is no way in Heaven or Hell, that I can hit the ground strokes, or the serve as hard as Federer, or Roddick, or any of them. No way. You know that, maybe you can't either. But I will tell you this. Can I hit the drop shots as well as they do? Can I hit the spins as well as they can on the approaches? I would say I can. Because, these shots don't acquire power, they acquire finesse. These are shots that are going to stay with you for life. Many times, as you age--and we all do playing tennis--all of the sudden, you're out of the 35's. You're approaching the 50's, and you want the specialty shots to be able to terminate the point,. And that's where some offense comes without having the power. Ian: Great stuff guys. Koz: You're so kind, thank you. Ian: I've got to admit to you, I would have come at this from a different direction. I definitely would have-- I'm more of a student of the more modern style of play than styles past. Koz: Nothing wrong with that at all. Ian: However, I do appreciate these touch shots that you're talking about. They're a big part of my game, so I definitely enjoy hearing you talk about-- I agree with you. Once you learn one type of this type of soft, finesse type shot, so many options become available. That's absolutely true. Koz: Well, let's touch a bit on the power. The key is to be able to generate power when someone has not given power to you. We'll go into a bit of stroke production. There must be some reason why 95 plus percent--maybe closer to 99%, take a circular back on their back swing on the forehand and many on the back hand, because they can generate pace off of a slower ball. Most times the most difficult for everybody is to generate pace when the pace isn't given to you. But I think if a lot of players start to try to try (1) keep the foot work continuous and it may mean three, four steps going nowhere. The foot work is continuous, and the back swing is continuous. And the mentality that you want to have when trying to generate power is to feel that you have a slow start maybe at 10 miles an hour, it's increasing to 20 miles an hour, and all of a sudden as your racket goes to hit the ball, your racket is moving at a 30 mile plus speed. So it's a slow start. Let it build up, and then a fast finish. When one tries to hit power and generates it from the initial part of the swing, one has a tendency--and there's a strong propensity to get a bit more muscular than you can afford to be and still hit a powerful shot. Most of the power from the top players comes from racket head acceleration. A much better chance of getting that racket head acceleration by starting slowly in the beginning allowing the racket head to speed up. But I think that all our players at a 3, 5--all our players even at a start off 20--are going to be better with a more conventional--and we call it conventional because it's been around longer than your age and my age, and that's close to 100 combined-- over 100 years of a circular back swing, but it's very vogue today, because they know the advantage of keeping the back swing continuous. So the folks and the tennis fans that want to add power explore with the circular back swing. One of the tricks in the circular back swing, instead of going straight back initially take it slightly up so it's slightly up, back, and around so there is a flow, a loop. Almost feel that you're trying to trace a backward letter of a C on a blackboard that it's up, back and around, and slow start, fast finish. I think the other to get power, there's nothing wrong with getting the confidence on a short ball to move into side shuffle, and to skip, and to karaoke step in. But you're moving in and actually get the legs low and as you hit it, come off the ground. I can't tell you tell you what kind of confidence that builds. That is a confidence maker right there, is to actually jump up as you hit that ball so that you have the confidence and the trust that you're not holding back. Are you working hard? Not so hard on the arm. You're starting to use racket head speed, but you're also getting tremendous leg lift into the shots. But I've got to comment. You talked about today's game, and [inaudible] figured out the male dog around the fire hydrant on the back hand. Now, some players lift the back foot and jump, and I know that's for power. Perhaps you can touch on that, Ian. You see a lot of that where the back foot actually comes up to add some power, and jumping along with it. Ian: Are you talking about more a forehand, or a backhand stroke or both? Koz: I'm seeing it more on the backhand. I don't know if it's more suited on the two handed side versus the one handed side, but it reminds me of a male dog hanging around a fire hydrant and a bit of a leg lift coming up with it. Ian: Yeah, I can definitely picture what you're talking about and I kind of associate that with what you were describing a second ago having to do with kind of a hop, skip, or a jump moving into a shorter shot where players are trying to hit more aggressively. And I think the lifting up of that back leg is something that just kind of happens naturally for a lot of players who are trying to transfer their body weight around and into a shot kind of leaning forward into the court as they make contact. I think that's probably--the back leg lifting is probably a good transfer forward a lot of times. Koz: You know what I used to do in the past is to have a 12 inch high platform out there wide enough that you could have both feet stand on it. So you this in your mind. You're standing on this 12 inch high platform, I give you the ball to your back hand where it's out in front and tell you to jump higher than where you're standing off of that platform so you're a good 24, 26 inches into the air as you're hitting that, and that really gives you the sensation of not being afraid to come off the ground and really attack the ball. Plus for a lot of players that builds another dimension of coordination in their game. Coordination ...was brought out multiple ways the way you can jump in any sport. The more you can jump and leap in tennis you're supplement that coordination. You're bringing coordination out of some players that might not have had that athletic coordinated movement. Ian: I've just got more more question for you Koz before we wrap things up. Koz: Absolutely. Ian: Of course the time is flown by during our conversation here. In fact we are already over time but I am really curious to hear your comments on one more questions I have. We started off our discussion with AJ's question and he wanted to figure out how to keep away from being so defensive during match play. You started the conversation discussing the use of slice. Being able to throw his opponent off balance, put in a change of pace and regain control of the points. You also just talked about the addition of some more power by using more of a circular back swing, also using the legs more to propel the body forward, especially on short balls. What I am curious about, let's try to bring this all together a little bit, how can AJ and the rest of my listeners tell which one is more important for them right now? In other words, are there symptoms during their match play, when they lose matches that more touch and finesse and variety would be a bigger benefit for them to develop? Or are there also symptoms where adding more power is probably what they need to be able to make it to the next level? Koz: That is absolutely a superb and a great question and I'm going to spin it this way. You ready. Accomplished teaching professional, when you go to play some three five players, you can actually beat them by ball placement by some chips, by some change of place, some change of spins, some drop shots, some lobs. Are you over powering them with your offense? No. You're just using an all court game. Along with adding power, I'm not against that at all, but I think that it's just as important. I holding fast on steadfast [laughter] on the fact that you supplement all the shots. Because you can become one dimensional and only have access of topspin and losing out in a myriad of other areas. Flattening out. Changing speed. Coming under it. Lobing as an under spin ball. Drop shotting. Drop volley. I think that it's important that they supplement the power game with some change of pace. The question was not so much how they were getting power but how they could add more offense. What I saw that question without adding more power how can I add more offense, I was very excited to take it first, or take it in an area that we hadn't talked power. We talked about finesse and using all court tennis. I would still open that same talk the same way, Andy. Ian: Alright Coz, Thank you very much for your thoughts today. It's been great to have you back on the podcast and before we send you off can you please tell my listeners where they can find you online. I know you are doing some projects with a website, correct? Koz: We are. The website is the website is indietennis.com, and indie is spelled indie tennis is tennis.com. We just a did a great resort review in your area [inaudible] down in Bethany Beach. We did an extensive program 7 days of day after post at the National Spring Championships down in Mobile. We will certainly be in New York doing a number of things at the US Open. It's indietennis.com. I doing some things with tennis balls.com and that tennis is tennis is 10sballs.com. Those are some interviews that were pickup that are not always being video taped but they are audio mp3s that are on 10sballs .com. Ian: OK. Alright There you go guys. Go check it out, indietennis.com and 10sballs.com. Go check out the Coz's other materials. Coz thank you very much for spending time with me and for answering AJ's question. I really appreciate it. I know my listeners are going to enjoy today's show so thank you your time. Koz: The pleasure is mine. Tennis fans remember in tennis scoring, love means nothing, but love of the game means everything. You keep alive your love of the game Love you tennis fans. Love you too Andy. Koz: Thanks for having me on. [music] [music] [music] Ian: Alright. That does it for episode #122 of the Essential Tennis podcast. Thank you very much for joining me on today's show and I hope it was interesting, entertaining and instructional for you. It hopefully gave you a couple new ideas about how you can develop some offense in your tennis game. If today's show was helpful, check out the archives. Go to www.EssentialTennis.com, go to Podcasts and then Archives. You can access all 122 episodes of the podcast, which I need to sit down and edit up, but it's something like 60 or 70 hours of instruction now. We are actually working on reworking that section of the website in the near future. You, guys, will be able to browse by category and topic, and it'll be more convenient in the near future. It's free to access. All you have to do is sign up for the free Essential Tennis newsletter and that's it. So go check it out. Alright. That does it for this week. Thanks very much for tuning in. Take care, and good luck with your tennis! [music] [music] [music] [music]

Podcast #123: Find out if you should be picking a target for every shot that you hit and also what factors should play into selecting one.

ianw — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 14:37:35 +0000

Would picking a target for a tennis shot ever lead to actually missing it? Today Ian answers that question and also talks about what factors should go into picking your targets as you play your matches. Also discusses is hitting the ball on the rise more aggressively while still maintaining control. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Announcer : Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! [music] Ian : Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast, your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you to by tennistours.com where you can receive a discount off your next purchase of professional tennis tournament tickets by using the promotional code "ESSENTIAL" [silence] Well thank you very much for downloading today's show and for giving it a listen. I am going to be answering some listener questions today, but before I do, I just want to tell you guys I am really excited for Wimbledon, the kick-off tomorrow. I am recording today's show on Sunday, tomorrow Wimbledon kicks off and I am looking forward to that tournament a lot. And for those of you who are going to be following along during the tournament, feel free to interact with me as I use both Twitter and Facebook. I am starting to use Twitter more. It's a lot of fun and if you guys would like to follow me and chat with me about the matches and about the tournament, you can follow me at t witter.com/essentialtennis and also at facebook.com/ essentialtennis. I look forward to chatting and interacting with you guys there. Alright, let's get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Alright, let's get started. And today I am going to be answering some questions for Toby who is a 4.0 player in Atlanta, Georgia. Toby wrote to me and said 'I practiced for a couple of hours today with a friend and came up with a few questions for you.' He's got two questions here, I am going to talk about His first one is: 'I love to hit the ball on the rise, especially with my two-handed backhand where I don't swing as fast as my forehand, but can generate more power with less swing. And hitting on the rise can give me a little extra power. But it is also somewhat of a riskier shot because the ball is coming at you faster at the contact point so it is easier to miss hits. What is your stance on this? Is this something you recommend for your students to work on? What are some ways to improve [empty] [empty] Well, Toby, in case you didn't hear Podcast 119, I talked about hitting on the rise the entire show. It was more talking about technique, and how to hit that shot well. Wasn't so much about tactics, etc., which is what kind of more of what Toby is asking for here It's my opinion on how often the shot should be used. Well, as you said Toby, taking the ball on the rise is a lower percentage shot. It's definitely trickier than hitting the ball after it has bounced, come up to the top of its bounce, and then is coming back down again toward the court. As I talked about in Podcast 119, the positioning-- the way that you position yourself on the court and also the timing of your swing have to be darn near perfect. If you are not in just the right place you have almost no time to react to the ball after it has landed on the courts because you are hitting it immediately after comes up off the courts. So positioning is very important and, again, so is the timing of your swing. So if you are a little early or a little late, it's a very unforgiving shot. And also the swing dynamics change as well, due to As I mentioned a second ago, the more traditional and the easiest way to hit a ground stroke, either forehand or backhand is to allow the ball to come up and then let it come down again and make contact with it at a comfortable spot on its way down again from the bounce; after it has started to fall back towards the court again. So this is the basically the opposite, the ball is not accelerating downwards, as in falling towards the court. It's instead accelerating upwards, so that changes some things. You have to adjust your swing a little bit because of that. So take into account the positioning the swing timing, and the change in technique. And by the way, I talk about all those in detail. This is definitely not an easy shot. It takes a lot of skill to hit this shot and even more skill to be able to hit And to be able to try to attack with it, so I think, to answer your question Toby, I think this is a shot that players really shouldn't start to work on til around a 3.5 level or so. And for those of you outside the US who are not familiar with the NTRP rating system, basically a 3.0 player is around average. The scale goes from 1 to 7; 6.0, 7.0 are basically professional players. 3.0 is around average, 3.5 is a little bit above average. I want you guys to have a solid foundation of technique hitting the ball at its easiest point before you really start to get fancier than that, and try to hit the ball on the rise very often. So not until you are 3.5 do I really recommend people working on this on purpose. Now Toby is a 4.0 player, which is a good bit above average. And at that point, Toby, I think you are probably in the clear to go ahead and start working on this shot as even more of a weapon to be able to hit short shots on the rise and be able to attack, and even shots that your opponents hit close to the base line that are really nice and deep in your court. I think this is a shot that you can probably go ahead and start experimenting with making a nice full swing at a shot on the rise and be able to hit it back towards your opponent with some pace on it, and kind of send it right back at them and try to hurt them right back, right off of a good shot that they have hit to you. Now as far as how to improve on this shot, just practice it a lot. It's very similar to a regular ground stroke, there is some small changes, I'm not going to go into those here because, again, I just talked about them in a lot of detail in Podcast 119, so go check that out and just practice it a ton, it takes a lot of practice to get good at positioning yourself and timing your swing correctly to be able to hit an effective shot back. So Toby, keep working at it. Good job with your game so far. It's great that you have made it up to 4.0 level. To make it up to a 4.5, it would definitely help you a lot to be comfortable hitting this shot back in general, and also hitting it back with some decent pace and some topspin as well, and sending it right back to your opponents. Alright, let's go ahead and move on Toby's second question, which I think is really interesting one and I hope you guys find as interesting as I do. He wrote and said in his second question, 'Sometimes I feel that I get distracted by my vision of how I would like to hit the shot, and can as a result miss it. For example, I just hit a great backhand the previous shot and I want to hit with the same pace again, but I am not as ready for it this time. Or I just hit a ball out wide and want to finish the point off into the opposite direction, but didn't quite get into position. I feel like that if I didn't have this perceived notion of how to hit the shot and just focused on hitting it back, I wouldn't have missed the shot. Should I resist this urge and decide on how to hit a shot later in this stage when I actually reach the ball, or just plan better?' So basically what Toby is saying here is he is wondering if the whole reason why he is missing the point-finishing shot. He has got the point set up in his favor and he is trying to finish the point now and end it by aiming for a spot that makes sense. He is wondering if the very act of thinking about it and trying to set up the point in his head is causing him to And this is definitely a topic I definitely haven't talked about on the podcast before, and I look forward to it. Basically, Toby, I have got a question for you. So let's say that you have gone through that whole sequence of shots. You have set up the point well, you have got that opening after hitting your opponent out wide. If you adjust and you ask the question should I have just focused on getting back in play rather than the trying to aim. Should I just hit it back? Well, I want to ask you do you think that if you just focused on hitting it back would it magically end up in the right spots? In other words, how successful do you think you would be in the long run if every time you had a point set up in your favor you just focused on just hitting the ball back in play. I mean, that just seems really short sided to me. I'm surprised that you are thinking that that would be a good way to go. by just trying to get it back in play. On one side of the coin, I see what you are saying I would rather you would just hit it right down the middle of the court and make it and miss the shot and lose the point. From that perspective, I see where you are coming from but certainly you must realize that to be able to advance your game and improve as a player eventually you are going to have to be able to Pick out targets on the court and hit them at will, over and over again. Regardless of the point situation or whether your opponent is in trouble or not in trouble. If you ever want to become a 4.5 player, certainly a 5.0 player, you have to be able to pick out a target on the court in any circumstance and be able to hit it with a pretty high success rate. And you have to be pretty reliable in hitting your targets. So having a target is never a reason for distraction or it shouldn't be anyway. I understand what you are saying Toby but I think it's a poor excuse for missing these shots. And I would encourage you, Toby and everybody else listening, to have a specific target as often as possible for every shot that you hit. Never play competitive tennis and just hit the ball just to get it in and just kind of hope for the best. And say I am going to run to this forehand and I am just gonna hit it. I am gonna run to this back hand, I am just gonna hit it. [laughter] I am gonna get that ball and I am gonna hit it and well see what happens. That is not good enough. Just plain not good enough. I want better tennis for you guys than just running to the ball and just hitting in play anywhere. I want all of you listening to know the successful feeling and the pride in running down a ball, a tough shot having a specific target in mind, you know if you hit it it's gonna turn out well for you and then actually making the shot and winning the point. Because you are smart enough to aim for a good target and you made it and you executed it and you ended being successful. I want all of you listening to know that feeling of success when you watch that shot go past your opponent for a winner. So you should have a specific target. Please don't just hit the ball to just hit it anywhere. And you must have a plan to be successful. That's what this really comes down to. You should be planning your points and you should have a reason for where you are trying to hit the ball. Your plan should include aiming some place specific and again for a purpose. Now we are going to talk a little about that. And to answer your question specifically waiting until you reach the ball is too late. Toby, you said maybe I should just wait longer, wait til I get to the ball and just decide then. You should really have a good sense where your next target will be immediately after the ball comes off your opponent’s racket. That's really important too. You don't want to wait until the last second to choose your target because you'll become rushed and you'll make kind of rash decision You are gonna make decisions that always don't make a lot of sense. Because you aren't thinking them through very well. Not that have you have a lot of time to sit there and think about it literally. And kind of conversation in your head, well if I go here what will happen? If I go there, what will happen? Basically you want to get better at making snap decisions early as quickly as possible. Knowing what makes the most amount of sense and being able to stick with it. Now to make these decisions. There is several considerations you need to think about or be aware of. I have got four here. Four things you need to be aware of to make good decisions as far as your target is concerned on the court. Number 1, your opponent’s position and balance on the court. Meaning, are they in the middle of the court and already in a ready position? As you are getting ready to hit your shot. Or are they way off in the corner somewhere, still stumbling around and trying to recover from the shot they just finished hitting? So that is one consideration, you have got to realize and take into account their position and their balance. Number 2, the quality and difficulty of the shot they just hit to you. How good of a shot did they just finish hitting to you? Is it really tough or over in the corner away from you? Or is it right towards and bouncing at the service line and it is going to be easy to hit back? You need to take that in to consideration as well. Number 3, you have to know and realize your strengths and weaknesses on the court. What are the shots that you hit best? What are the shots that you aren't that great at? Number 4, you have to be aware of your opponent’s strengths and weaknesses and this will vary for every person you play against. Some people are going like their backhand and not have a great forehand. Some players are going to hate overheads. Other players are going to love overheads and they are going to put the ball away consistently. These are things that you have to pay attention to A lot of you guys are probably saying to yourselves well, Ian that is a lot to keep track of I am not sure that I can have all that in mind and be able to make a decision based on that information all on the fly. Well, that's what you have to kind of start being aware of are those four things. And you have to start making decisions based on them. If you think that four things is too many to pay attention to at once, then just pick one or two. And if you are going to just pick one or two, I would say that strengths and weaknesses are probably the most important one. Yes, balance and core positioning are very important as well and hopefully that is kind of thing you notice without thinking about it. And eventually it is our goal to notice all four of these things and keep them in mind without literally thinking about it. We want to make this something that happens automatically. But it takes awareness of it first. But you have to first know what is going before it ever starts becoming automatic. Now let's give two examples, specific examples of this and we are going to talk about all four of those criteria and how this might look during an actual point. Example number 1, of a specific decision, let's say that your opponent just hit a forehand from off the court. You hit a good shot previously and there are literally off the singles court trying to recover the shot they make it and they managed to get it cross court but not very deep and not very hard. So they have hit it cross court from their forehand side let's say that you and your opponents are both right handed and it's not very deep or hard. Let's say it's landing a foot or two that is short of the service line and without a lot of pace. Now you're waiting for the ball to come to you and you're in good balance and in good position. So you are not in trouble here at all. They have hit a relatively easy shot and you're going to be in good balance for this shot and you are going to be in good position. Now let's say that your strength is your forehand and their weakness is their backhand. So everybody kind of kind of picture this in their mind as I say this it is probably real obvious but these are the types of decisions you have to be able to make. In this situation even though it goes against the directionals this is a good time to change to direction and go down the line with your forehand. It's your best shot you forehand, and your hitting to your opponent's weakness. You are in good balance and they are off balance. So all four of the criteria that I was talking about before points towards going down the line. Let me say that again, they're off balance and they're off the court in the deuce corner so hitting down the line means that you are going to hit the furthest away form them possible right now. Also it's their back hand, so even if you don't hit a great shot, they're having to run clear across the court to get to it. It's your strength so if you are ever going to change direction this is the probably the time to do it. And it is an easy shot. They haven't hit it very deep. So everything here point toward going down the line. So I would suggest going down the line here, hit it confidently don't push it, make a full swing, doesn't mean hit it aggressively and crush it but definitely hit a good solid confident swing. And you should be aiming five feet inside each of those two lines. That might sound like a lot to some of you but trust me, that's plenty close to the lines to be able to win the point with that shot. There is no need to risk missing it. And we are going to talk a little bit more about that a little bit later. But in this circumstance, aiming five feet inside either line is more than good enough if you're hitting a confident swing to be able to win the point right there. And if not you can probably close into the net and put away a volley on the next shot. So that's example number one. Example number 2, deciding where to aim. Example number two is they have just hit an aggressive back hand cross court from the middle of the baseline so your opponent is in balance in the middle of the baseline and they just hit a good back hand cross court it's going to land deep into your back hand corner. Your strength is your forehand so your back hand is not your strength and their strength is their forehand as well. So what do you do in this situation? They're in balance, you are about to be out of balance and you are not going to hit your strength here it's going to be your backhand. And we know that if you were going to hit them anything on their forehand side they would probably appreciate that in this situation. So the best target should be a cross court rally ball, 8 feet inside either line should be your target and you should also be aiming four to six feet over the top of the net. And the reason why I give those specific measurements is that we want to make this a safe shot. The smartest play here is to follow the directionals, go cross court where you have the lowest net the longest court, you have the most amount of court to work with and you should be trying to aim well inside both lines. If we can hit this target it's safe because are clearing the net by a lot. We are staying inside the lines by quite as bit as well. A nice comfortable margin of eight feet. But keeping it eight feet inside the base line still means that it is ten feet past the service line. So we are not hitting a weak shot here. When you guys here, I know this, when you guys heard me say to aim about 8 feet inside the base line I know a lot of you are saying wow that is a crappy shot! That's weak! It's not! There's 18 feet of space between the service line and the base line. If you can hit 8 feet inside the base line just picture a shot that is landing ten feet past the service line on your half of the court. That is not an easy ball, it's not a sitter that is landing in front of the service line that your opponent is gonna be able to try to put away. If you can put it 8 feet inside either line. A nice high margin over the top of then net and keep it cross court you are in great shape here. You are hitting to your opponent's weakness. You'll probably be able to back into that point here. Maybe they'll attack again but at least you put back into play and it was a smart target for you hit. So being able to hit these targets for the reasons and hopefully these two examples can get you guys thinking. This is the time of critical thinking that you guys should be going through on the court. And at first this might take mental energy. You might actually have to be conscious of this decision making process at first. To be able to make good decisions and pick targets that make sense. It is our goal to be able to do this on the fly eventually without thinking about it. And being able to make these decisions and be smart about it. It's a learned skill. It's not something that you are just born with or not. It's something you can teach yourself or train yourself today. To be a smart tennis player, so pay close attention to your points and always hit and aim for a specific target with a purpose. Please don't just hit the ball and hope for the best. I want you guys to be better players than that. Alright, in a second we are going to talk about reasons why I think Toby is missing these shots, but first I want to tell you guys about the sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast and that is TennisTours.com. Since 1987, they have been selling ticket packages and individual tickets to tennis tournaments all over the world, both ATP and WTA events. Both men's and women's professional events and they specialize in the grand slams. So if you guys would like to go to the U.S. Open this year they're offering some awesome ticket packages along with a lot of other options to be able to customize your experience in New York City and I'm making plans to be there this U.S. Open in August-September so I'm looking forward to it a lot. And if you make an order with TennisTours.com and use the promotional code Essential when you check out you'll not only get a discount off your purchase but you'll be given an invitation to a cocktail party where I will be I believe Will Hampton of Fuzzy Old Balls is going to be there as well. It'll be a great time kind of mingling together in New York City. It's going to be at Times Square, so you'll get a chance to hang out with me and Will as well and talk about tennis. [laughter] And the U.S. Open. So go check them out I thank them very much for the support of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Alright, so let's wrap up this question from Toby and I just spent several minutes talking about why picking a target is not the reason why Toby is missing these shots. Or, at least in my opinion, it is not an excuse. It should not be the reason why him taking maybe his concentration and thinking about the wrong thing. A target is exactly what you should be thinking about Toby. So, why is he missing? And why do you guys miss when you have the point all set up and it's going just the way you want it and you get that put away shot or that opportunity to be able to finish the point and you screw it up. Why? I've got four reasons here why I believe players miss these types of shots and I'm sure that you guys will be able to relate to exactly what I'm talking about. At least in one or two of these areas, if not all four. So, why would you be missing? Well, number one general lack of focus and concentration. That's the first thing that came to mind Toby when I was reading your, your question as I was preparing for today's show, is you talked about hitting a good wide shot and then wanting to be able to put the ball way on the other side and you just missed it. Or, you said how you're just not getting into position even though it's not a very difficult shot. But it seems to me that you're probably watching something else and thinking about other things such as maybe how great of a shot you just hit to get your opponent off balance and off the court. You're admiring your shot, watching your opponent scramble and barely get to it. They made it but just barely and you're just enjoying every second [laughter] every split second of this process as you see them stumbling around the court trying to recover that great shot that you just hit. And I find that recreational players very often lose sight of the whole purpose here is to win the points, and they just enjoy thoroughly hitting that good ball that set them up so well and before they know it they are not in position for the next sheet even though it is a relatively easy one and they make a mistake. They make an unforced error. Don't let that happen to you. Number Two reason why you might be missing these shots is poor target choice. This happens so much so often when I watch recreational tennis players play. They get an easy ball their opponent is out of position and they aim a foot from the line. And miss it by couple of inches and they think ah I just missed it, that's too bad but you know what it was your mistake for aiming so close to the line. I don't remember which show it was but I had a conversation with my good friend Jason Coal on a previous show and we were talking about picking targets. Guys professional players don't aim for the lines. They don't even aim a foot from the lines. They're aiming three four, five feet inside the lines. You know on average shot but don't get me wrong there is a time when they don't have a choice and they have to aim and hit incredible shot. But on average they are giving themselves many feet of margin for error and you should be too. Don't get suckered into aiming close to the lines after you have just gone through all the work of setting up a point well. Have your opportunity and your opening and then you hit a perfect shot. Please don't do that. Pick a smart target. Reason number three while you might be missing these shots is lack of confidence in your ability to finish the point. I see this a lot too where players will hurt one good shot. And just not think they have the ability to or maybe they get nervous or a little bit tight. They don't have the confidence for a good full swing at the next shot if it is a ground stroke. or hit the next volley firmly to be able to put it away. Whatever it might be, you need to practice combinations kind of 1, 2 punch combination on the practice court when you are practicing your game. Practice a good wide back hand cross court and then hitting a put away forehand down the line. Practice combinations like that, maybe a down the line approach shot. With your forehand and then a cross court volley to be able to finish the point. Practice those types of combinations as often and build your confidence in those kinds of you can set up points and you can put the ball away. Don't just practice one shot at a time. I mean that is good to do too. But you should practice on purpose putting balls away and doing it over and over again. So that when you get into a match and you have a put away opportunity you take it. And you are able to do it with confidence. Reason number 4, last one, why you might be missing these types of shots just general poor techniques and stroke production. All of us who play tennis are able to hit great shots at least once. We have all hit that amazing forehand or backhand or serve or whatever. Where it just came off the racket just right and landed just inside the lines for a winner and everybody kind of stopped what they were doing and said wow that's amazing. Well I don't want to somebody who is able to do that and just be able to dot it once I want to play with a partner who is able too hit three of four feet inside the lines several times in a row. That's who I want my partner to be. And so that's not possible without good technique. And if you struggle with being consistent and you are only able to hit across court forehand two or three times in a row. Nice and deep in the court, before you make an error somewhere you need to work on your steadiness with your technique. And you need to work on your steadiness with your targets and you need a lot of repetition to be able to put the ball in play over and over again. Toby, you are 4.0 player so this is probably not the area you need to work on the most. Wherever you are making a mistake it's probably in one of those three categories. It's probably not this one. But I am going to throw this one out there for anybody else listening who might be as not as experienced as Toby and not playing at his level of his play. You need to be able to be reliable with your ground strokes and every other shot you hit as well. Alright Toby that wraps it up Hopefully that makes sense to you. and hopefully that is useful information get out their practice picking targets for a reason for a purpose. Targets that make sense Make sure that you pick them wisely and that they are smart. You aren't going for too much and you practice it. You'll get better at this but please don't think that picking a target is causing you to screw up It's definitely not that I would subscribe to. But Toby, thanks very much for being a listener. I was happy to answer your questions today on the show. Please let me know if you need any further help. [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for episode 123 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for spending your time with me today or tonight or whenever you happen to listen to this show. I really appreciate it and in wrapping up today's show I want to send a special thank you out to those of you who have donated to Essential Tennis and to the podcast in the last two weeks or so. And those people are Kim in Texas, Robert in Canada, Jannen in California, Bruce in Florida, Joe in North Carolina. Thank you to you guys for your support. I really appreciate it and if the Essential Tennis Podcast has been a help to you in your tennis game and you would like to reciprocate, please think about donating to the show. And really help support what I am doing here and can make me get closer and closer to my goal of doing this full time. Which I do plan on doing in the future. Hopefully, sooner than later. So to donate just go to Essential Tennis.com and in the bottom right hand corner of the front page you will see a box that says donate. [music] Alright. That does it for this week. Have fun watching Wimbledon everybody. I hope to talk to you guys on Twitter and Facebook and take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music]

Podcast #124: Ian and Jeremy talk about several important gear topics such as pros and cons of different strings, frame fads, and using lead tape to change balance.

ianw — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 14:39:04 +0000

Being able to chose the right gear and customize it exactly the way you want can make a huge difference on the court! On today's show Master Racket Technician Jeremy Plumley talks about three important topics: different types of strings along with their pros and cons, different fads in rackets such as extended lengths and heavy frames, and also using lead tape to change the balance of your racket. Part 1 of 2. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] [Narrator] Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian. [Ian Westermann] Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast, your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com, where you can receive a discount off your next purchase of professional tennis event tickets by using the promotional code "ESSENTIAL". Well thank you very much for joining me on today's show and I've got a special treat. On today's episode we have master racquet technician Jeremy Plumley back in the house. It's been a while since he's been on the show and so I've had some gear questions kind of stacking up. So we're going to be talking all about different gear-related questions today, having to do with lead tape and racquet balance and creating more spin and more power by altering your frame and all kinds of stuff like that. So if you're interested in improving your tennis by knowing more about the gear and equipment that you play with, today's show is definitely going to be for you. So sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] My guest today on the podcast is master racquet technician Jeremy Plumley. Jeremy, it's really good to have you back on the show again. Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. [Jeremy Plumley] Thanks, Ian, it's good to be back. [Ian Westerman] Well, it's been too long since I had you on the show last, and I've had some gear questions kind of get piled up over the last couple of weeks, and probably months, since I had you on the show last. I'm sorry it's been so long, to both you and my listeners who've been waiting for gear topics and I definitely wait to have you on the show because, while I might know some of the answers to these questions, I'm not able to explain it in the same depth as you are, so I'm really happy to have you back on the show. [Jeremy Plumley] That's me, Mr. Depth. [Ian Westerman] Mr. Depth, yes. Well, as I said, Jeremy is a master racquet technician, he is also a certified tennis professional, so he really knows his stuff and so let's go ahead and get started. And Jeremy and I are going to talk about, actually, 7 different questions today, and this is going to get broken up into two podcast episodes, I'm not sure exactly where we're going to draw the line, but we'll be talking about half of them, or so, on today's show, and at some point I'm going to cut the show off and continue it at a later podcast, so we'll get to about half of them today. So Jeremy, are you set to go? [Jeremy Plumley] I'm ready to go. [Ian Westerman] So #1, this comes to us from Gavin, and he wants to know--several of these questions are going to come to us from Gavin, by the way-- but one of them had to do with racquet fads. He wrote and said, 'What about racquet lengths? A few years ago, 28-inch XL racquets seemed to be all the rage, as an example the Michael Chang racquets and others. Nowadays XL racquets seem to be much more rare, why the change? Will you recommend an XL racquet to somebody that isn't for example the height of John Isner?' And he also says, 'Again, a few years ago, heavy racquets seemed to be popular, for example, the Wilson Hammer range. I found an old 95 square inch 260-gram racquet in my garage recently, and as an experiment added 30 grams to the hoop. It turned into a beast on ground strokes, much more powerful than my normal racquet. Nowadays, all racquets seem to be head-light, why do you think there has been a change in the market? What are your preferences regarding head-light or head-heavy balance? Or are you not even that bothered?' So let's talk about what kind of trends as far as frames are concerned, Jeremy, and he points out the extra length racquets that were popular a few years ago and also shifts in different weights. I'm curious to hear if you think that there's even been trends in weights or if that's just kind of marketing certain ranges of weights within racquet lines from major companies. So what do you think, Jeremy? [Jeremy Plumley] Well, I think we've gotten away from any real fads when it comes to weights recently. There have been times when, you know, they were looking for ultra-light racquets. I remember back in the early '90s, Yamaha came out with a racquet, and it was the first racquet that was ever 9 ounces, or maybe it was 10 ounces. But whatever it was, it was really light at the time and everybody was like, 'Wow! This is amazing, it's a very light racquet.' Now almost every major manufacturer has something, at least one frame lower than that, and some of them have several, so I don't know if we've ever really been in a trend where heavy racquets were popular. There was a time when racquets were only heavy, before they got really good with using high-modulus graphite, and then they moved into titanium, and carbon, and all that. I think when Gavin was talking about finding that Hammer in the garage and digging it out of the moth balls and lead taping it up to all get out. That was, you know, the Hammer craze was a head-heavy craze. It wasn't an all-around weight, as far as the racquet went, it wasn't exceptionally heavy, it's just where the weight was put. And that was popular for a while because that really helps people create more power and, if they swung the right way, more spin on their ground strokes. [Ian Westerman] OK. That was kind of what I had in my own head as well, was it seemed to me that all the major manufacturers really come out with at least one racquet at each major weight class, as it were; 9 ounces, 10 ounces, 11, and maybe at least one at 12 ounces. Is that something that's just come about recently, where the manufacturers have that wide a range of weights, or has that been around for a while? [Jeremy Plumley] I think more so now than it used to be. The big manufacturers, you know, Wilson, Babolat, Head, Prince, the ones that really have a lot of racquets in their line, just because they have so many options, they're going to have stuff that falls into each category. Some of the smaller racquet companies, say for example, Yonex, they don't really have anything ultra-lightweight. They kind of have more 'tweeners, and then they have a couple racquets that are like their tour models, that Hewitt uses or Ivanovic. But they don't really cover the whole spectrum the way that Wilson does. You know, Wilson has their Cirrus One racquet which is, you know, really light, extra length added, which was one of the fads he was talking about that we've kind of gotten away from. And then they have that at one end, and then all the way at the other end, they have the KPro Staff, 88 square inches, 14 ounces. [Ian Westerman] Yeah let's talk about the length. I remember back in the '90s when, I remember, I had a Prince Thunderstick that was longer than a standard length, and it was really popular back then. I remember the ads in Tennis magazine for it. How come they seem to have just about gone away altogether? You just mentioned one specific frame that's longer than a standard length, but how come we don't see much of that any more when it was so popular before? [Jeremy Plumley] I think it's a couple of reasons. Right now, on the market, about the longest extended length that you can find is about 28 inches, which is 1 inch extended from a standard frame. Much more than that, I can't think of any racquets currently on the market that go longer than 28 inches. I think a big part of that was, when a racquet gets lengthened, it actually increases the swing weight, which takes it a little bit longer to get through, and it can be a little bit more difficult to get that racquet through on your ground strokes. That's one thing, I think the other part of it is a lot of people were seeing those racquets as an ultimate game improvement. Give me a 2 inch longer racquet, I just went from 5'8" to 5'10". But they didn't take into consideration that added weight, also, you know, it doesn't seem like a lot, but that extra 2 inches also changes your footwork a little bit. You can really talk to that as a tennis professional, but 2 inches can be the difference between a good shot and getting jammed. [Ian Westerman] Sure. [Jeremy Plumley] And I think a lot of lower, intermediate and even beginner players picked up these racquets and they found it a little harder to play with than their standard length racquets. And maybe the benefit of that extra length, more reach at the net, more leverage on the serve, maybe didn't outweigh the negatives. [Ian Westerman] OK. All right, let's move on to question #2 in our line of 7 questions here, and this one also comes from Gavin. In this question he said 'There are lots of different types of strings out there, polys, synthetic guts, multifilament strings. Ivan Lendl recently commented that he thought the biggest change in the game since he was a pro were the strings. What do you personally play with during coaching and matches and what do you think are pros and cons of each type of string? What type of strings would you recommend for an intermediate, say, 3.5 level player?' So lots of stuff we could talk about in there. First of all, I'm curious what your opinion is on this statement that he quoted Lendl on, in saying that he thought that the biggest difference between when Lendl was a pro and the modern game--and I don't know when that quote was taken from exactly-- but apparently Lendl thought that the strings were the biggest difference between when he was a pro and whenever this quote was taken. What are your thoughts on that, Jeremy? [Jeremy Plumley] I tend to agree with Lendl-- [Ian Westerman] Really. [Jeremy Plumley] If you had known me growing up, I despised Ivan Lendl. But he's not the only person that thinks that, there's a lot of former players out there that have really said that the string technology has been the biggest jump. And not just string technology in general, they're talking about the polyester. They're talking about the Luxelon, the new hot string that everybody's talking about that Nadal is using, RPM Blast. That is, you know, the biggest thing in string technology for as long as I can remember. And those who aren't familiar with polyester, you've probably heard it if you've been watching Wimbledon or the French Open before that. Polyester is a very stiff dead string that allows the players to swing through it pretty much as hard as they can and, because they're not getting a lot of launch off of the racquet string bed, they're able to control the ball and keep it in the court. And what it's basically led to is people like Nadal running 6, 7 feet outside of the court behind the baseline. They're able to produce these massive shots with tons of spin that allow them to stay in the point, or even win the point with just one massive swing. [Ian Westerman] So if we took Nadal and the athleticism and the stroke technique that he brings to the table currently and we gave him, let's say, T-2000 with whatever string Jimmy Connors would have put in that racquet, back when he was playing with it in the '70s and '80s, are you saying that you don't think Nadal would be able to produce the same amount of topspin and the same basic resulting shots with his ground strokes? [Ian Westerman] I don't think he would right off the bat. The T-2000, you know, that's kind of a different animal all in itself. If you want to go back-- [Jeremy Plumley] Let's say a stick that--not wooden racquets, let's not go back quite that far, but let's say an early aluminum or metal frame, an early metal frame. [Ian Westerman] Possibly. [Jeremy Plumley] ...which is Lendl's era, correct? Am I right on that? [Ian Westerman] Yeah, Lendl, I mean, he had a long career. He started off with a woody, went into the metal stage, and then when he finished, he was pretty much in that kind of high-modulus graphite with some fiberglass. He used a Mizuno racquet that I think had a good amount of fiberglass in it, which allowed them to keep the weight down, but it was still pretty stiff; but nothing like the Aeropro Drive that Nadal is using now. I think, you know, the racquet that Nadal's using isn't extraordinarily heavy. It's a pretty powerful racquet. It's probably much stiffer than any of the rackets that Wendell used even late in his career. That would definitely help Nadal with his power. I think Nadal gets so much then from his racket head acceleration and you know he just swings at such a vertical angle that he imparts so much spin on the ball. He could do that with any racket. I don't think the materials, the frame would make that big of a difference. I think it would be more of the weight that he would be able to generate that type of racket head acceleration like you said with the T2000. Probably not right off the bat but you know the guy is pretty strong [laughter] . He can put it through there at a decent speed. [Ian Westerman] Well before we continue our conversation on strings, I just want to remind my listeners about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast and that is Championship Tennis Tours. You guys can find them at tennistours.com and there specialty is selling professional tennis event tickets. Whether it be WTA or ATP tour events and also they put together great travel packages including accommodations and transportation to and from hotels and your event, put together some awesome packages and some upcoming ones are having to do with the US Open and I really encourage you guys to check that out. In fact, if you purchase a travel package with them to go to the US Open and you can't check out with the promotional code, Essential with a capital E, you will not only receive a discount off your purchase but you will also be invited to attend a cocktail party in Times Square that will have both myself and Will Hamilton of Fuzzy Old Balls there. So definitely really cool stuff that they're doing and I really appreciate their support. of the Essential Tennis Podcast by being a sponsor. So go check them out-- tennistours.com [Ian Westerman] Well, let's talk about a bit more about strings. Gavin asked us to--or asked you--to kind of go over the pros and cons of each general type string and you just talked about the polys and you talked about the pros essentially of it being dead and stiff for big hitters to help them control the ball a little better. What would be the cons of a polyester string and then let's go into synthetic gut. What would be the general pros and cons? [Jeremy Plumley] Okay, well first off, the cons of polyester are what is possibly a pro for a high level player would be a con for your everyday recreational or club level player. A very stiff string bed is pretty uncomfortable. You're not getting a lot of help from the string so you are going to be using more of your arm. So arm fatigue is going to be a little bit higher with a stiff string like that that you aren't getting a lot of bounce off of. The other part of it is the polyesters, because they are basically just one thick string, they loose tension very quickly. They " "go dead" and I said it was a dead string before but they become just terribly loose a a lot quicker than a standard synthetic string. So basically it just comforts and actual life of playability for those strings that are on the low side. Another pro of them is if you're a pretty high level player and you can handle it, they are very durable. They don't break quickly, they just lose their resilience. [Ian Westerman] Okay now how about your basic, generic synthetic gut, what would be the basic pros and cons of synthetic guts string? [Jeremy Plumley] Just the basic synthetic gut would be like a Prince [ph] or a Wilson synthetic string. They are good because they don't really shine in any particular area. They are not the most durable string on the market. But they don't break real easily. T [empty] hey kind of fall some where in the middle. They tend to be a little bit crisper feel b ecause they tend to use little bit different material for it. They are also pretty cheap. Normally they are like, 4, 5, or 6 bucks for an entire set so you are not breaking the bank. They don't really have a lot pluses or minuses. You know it can go in either direction there. They place decent but not great. They just kind of fall in the middle. [Ian Westerman] Okay, and lastly, how about multi-filament strings. [Jeremy Plumley] Multi-filament strings basically are at the opposite end of the polyester. A multi-filament string is several different fillaments [laughter] wrapped together to make a softer string. Normally they also have more grab on the ball. So you might get a little bit more dwell time in the string bed with your swing. [Ian Westerman] Okay. [Jeremy Plumley] Like I said they tend to be softer which means they are easier on the arm. They do not tend to be as durable because they are you know several strands rather than, you know, one thick strand. So with each shot they break down a little bit each time. But they hold tension very well because it is not just one giant string. They are woven together and they slowly unravel throughout time. They hold tension better than some thing that would be solid. [Ian Westerman] Okay and then lastly he asked for a recommendation for an intermediate level player. What I am curious about is, as you answer this Jeremy, is in your opinion from your perspective how much, when you recommed a string to someone how much of it has to do with their ability level and how much is personal preference? I mean can a lower level player prefer polyester? And is that okay? And can an upper level player prefer a softer multi-filament string as an example? [Jeremy Plumley] Absolutely, I don't like to think of recommending strings in terms of somebody's playing level. I like to think of it as more of their style of play. [Ian Westerman] Okay. [Jeremy Plumley] If you go out to a park and you see ten different 3.5 players, you might see ten different styles of play. And, you know, each string while it has the you know has it good points and its bad points, it takes the right type of player to bring those out. Some top level players do prefer that softer feel. Probably not the guys on the pro tour. But you'll find a lot of players that prefer that softer feel of a Wilson NXT or a Gama Professional string because maybe that's just what they have been used to. Maybe they have an arm injury. So they can't use something stiff. On the other end of the spectrum, if you are a lower level player but you use a lot of top spin, then maybe a polyester at least in a hybrid, you know, it might suit you. And it is a personal preference for some people. Some people prefer a very stiff string bed, I think you are one of them. [Ian Westerman] Yep! [Jeremy Plumley] So it doesn't necessarily break down to, ah well, you are a 5.0 player this is the string you should be using. It really is the style of play and your personal preference. [Ian Westerman] Okay. He also asks what we play with and I play with whatever Jeremy puts in my racket. I think over my last five string jobs I have had five different types of string in my racket. And I teach and play with the same string by the way. Currently, I have got full polyester [laughter] in my rackets that I teach with, you know, 30-40 hours per week and that is what I play with as well. I don't, which string did you put in there Jeremy, one is all white and one is all black? [Jeremy Plumley] That was a head sonic pro.. [Ian Westerman] Okay, yea! [Jeremy Plumley] It is a polyester, it's a softer polyester because had wanted to make a string that could give you the benefits of a luxilon [ph] But make it a little bit more user friendly, It is still not recommended for every body. But it is I would almost call it an entry level polyester. Not because it doesn't perform well but because it is a little bit more comfortable. You have been my guinea pig for trying new strings all the time and letting me do funky tensions and stuff like that [laughter] So I have appreciated that. [Ian Westerman] I am not picky. W ell I'll take that back I don't like soft strings and you have always known that and you never put you know, I remember you putting natural gut in my racket at times but you strung it at a pretty high tension. You have always stayed within basic parameters that I enjoy. But beyond that I am not picky at all. How about you what do you have in your rackets right now? [Jeremy Plumley] Well right now I actually have that very popular RPM black string. [Ian Westerman] The black stuff, right? [Jeremy Plumley] I had gotten a sample string from our [inaudible] rep a few months ago and I put it in and honestly I was out hitting yesterday with my wife and I was noticing it's pretty dead. It's been awhile [laughter] . It is time to get some new strings in there. But like you I don't, when I teach, I don't use anything different than I normally play with. [Ian Westerman] Okay, let's move on. Looks like we have got enough time for one more question in this show segment and then the next question that you and I answer will be put over on another episode. Let's answer from a question from Chris in Wisconsin. Chris good to hear from you from the mother land. I am from Wisconsin. [laughter] Jeremy appreciates it as well since he is from Ohio, right. [Ian Westerman] So Chris put himself down as a 4, 5 player and he said what does the balance of the racket influence? I am currently using the aero pro light and it is a very light racket so it is slightly head-heavy. I am searching for more top spin but also more power butt I cannot buy a different racket. Where should I put lead tape in order to produce more top spin and a little more pace. Jeremy what do you think? [Jeremy Plumley] Um, 4, 5 player aero pro light There's been a lot of discussion about the aero pro light and also the pure drive light online. Some people find them to just kind of be a blank canvas. [laughter] Where you don't have a lot of weight on the racket as it is. So you can, you know, really customize it without going past a comfortable weight. I f you are looking for more pace on your ground strokes you want to add weight in the head of the racket. The higher up on the racket you put the lead tape, the more it's going to increase your swing weights. [Ian Westerman] Okay. [Jeremy Plumley] The important thing to remember is you don't want to go t crazy. I know Gavin added 30grams of lead tape to [laughter] his head-heavy hammer racket [laughter] . And I don't think he is still playing with that. It's fun to experiment with that kind of stuff but what you will find is you know want to go to much in one direction because it is really going to throw off the balance of the frame. Now you can add more at the top but then bring a little bit down. Also put some down maybe underneath the grip or in the throat of the racket to maybe balance it out. But you don't want to go crazy in one direction. 4.5 player, if he is staying back on the baseline, you know the whole time. If he only comes up to the net to shake hands then you know bump up in the head, add a little bit down in the grip but you'll see you'll get more racket head acceleration at it's going to swing a little bit heavier. It's gonna sacrifice some maneuverability up at the neck. And also might take a little bit of adjustment when you are swinging up to the ball on your serve. [Ian Westerman] Now what about the subject of top spin? I am curious to get your thoughts on this, and I know how I would answer this question but I am wondering what you are going to say as far as adding lead tape to one part of the racket or another to increase top spin? Is that something that's possible? [Jeremy Plumley] Well ultimately it comes down to how you are swinging at the ball. If you add weight at the top at the top and you swing through it, you're going to get more mass going through the ball so the chances of getting more top speed by adding weight there are better. But you are not going to get more top spin just by adding weight. [Ian Westerman] Okay. [Jeremy Plumley] You are still going to have to swing through it. All things being equal if you have got more mass going through the ball at the same angle as you do with the racket with less mass, you are going to be able to impart more spin. Is it going to be a lot? Maybe not. I don't have the type of equipment to measure that but you are going to give yourself the possibility of adding more spin to it by adding weight to the head of the racket. [Ian Westerman] Since Chris is a 4.5 player I am assuming that he is already hitting with top spin on the baseline. But just for clarification for the rest of you listening, and Jeremy correct me if I am wrong in how I am stating this, but what it sounds like you are saying is if you are not already swinging at your ground strokes in such a racket path that is creating top spin already adding lead tape to one place or another is not going to create top spin or make it more top spin where there wasn't some already. Is that correct? [Jeremy Plumley] Absolutely, yeah and the same thing will go with those textured and hexagon shaped strings. If you aren't already putting spin on the ball, that alone is not going to add spin to it. [Ian Westerman] Okay, anything else to add on those three topics that we just talked about? We talked about the fads, the racket fads, the different types of string, just talked about lead tape to create more power, more spin anything else to add on these three, Jeremy? [Jeremy Plumley] Maybe just a little something on balance. We spent a lot of time talking about head heavy. But head light rackets, while you are not getting as much of an addition, a possible addition of top spin and power on your ground strokes. You are going to have a more traditional feel where the weight is going to be in your hand. It is going to be a more maneuverable frame. So if you're a volley player or your playing a lot of doubles you might want to look at something that's you know more head light rather than head heavy. If your net game is important part of your game then you should probably be looking at head light rackets so that is kind of the opposite end of the spectrum we are talking about. But I thought we should probably throw that in. [Ian Westerman] Okay, alright. Well Jeremy and I are going to wrap up this segment and this is going to be Podcast Number 124 but we will continue our conversation right now. You will just be able to hear us on a future episode. So definitely stay tuned if you want to hear the rest of our conversation and if you're listening to Podcast 124 and you want to hear the rest of our talk other topics are going to have to do lead tape. We have another question different application having to do with lead tape not having so much to do with balance. We are going to talk about let's see, racket weights in general; lighter rackets vs heavy rackets. Also racket head sizes and talking about strings and what gauges make different changes in results coming off the rackets. So those are going to be the next topics we are going to talk about. But for now we are going to wrap it up episode number 124. Jeremy thanks a lot for your time. And my listeners and myself always appreciate you dropping by. [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [Ian Westerman] Alright that does it for episode number 124 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for joining me today and for listening to my conversation with Jeremy and our conversation will continue in a near future episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Not sure which show exactly but we did continue our conversation and it's going to be coming up soon. Not sure which show exactly but we will continue it and finish with a couple of questions that we had. That does it for this week and, before I wrap things up, I want to tell you guys that I have got something new coming your way soon or at least an offer. I am going to be starting to do some more audio content each week. it looks like I will probably be adding an extra hour of audio, tennis instruction. It's going to be really focused on a couple of special listeners who decided to join me and if that is something that it sounds like you would be interested in, send me an e-mail and I'll give you some advanced notice on that. Shoot me an e-mail to ian@essentialtennis.com [music] and I'll let you know when I have more details. Alright that does it for this week. Thanks again everybody. Take care. Good luck with the tennis. [music] [music] [music]

Podcast #125: Mental toughness expert Dr. Cohn gives advice on staying relaxed, confidence vs arrogance, and what to think about during changeovers.

ianw — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 14:40:28 +0000

Dr. Patrick Cohn is back on the podcast to talk about all things mental toughness! Along the way he and Ian discuss three different listener questions. The first one has to do with staying relaxed during tense moments in a match. The second deals with the difference between confidence and arrogance as well as how much of each is a good thing. Lastly they discuss what to think about during changeovers. Check out his own show: The Tennis Psychology Podcast on iTunes by clicking here! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Welcome to Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! [music] Ian Westerman: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast, your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com, where you can receive a discount off your next purchase of professional tennis event tickets and travel packages by using the promotional code Essential, with a capital E. Thanks very much for joining me today. I really appreciate you taking the time to download this podcast file and to listen to the show. I've got a special guest with me on the podcast today. We're going to be talking all about different mental tennis topics, which is always a favorite topic of mine. So, let's go ahead and get right to it. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] My guest today on the Essential Tennis Podcast is Dr. Patrick Cohn. He is the host of the Tennis Psychology Podcast. You guys can find that on iTunes. It's one of the top tennis podcasts in iTunes, and he's a mental toughness expert in all kind of different fields of sports, which is interesting. Dr. Cohn, welcome back to the podcast. It's great to have you here. Cohn: Thanks for having me again, Ian. Ian: Yeah. You bet. Actually, let's talk about that briefly. In googling your name to get a little bit of background information about you to do an introduction, I couldn't help but notice but you specialize in a lot of different sports. I noticed race-car driving, and tennis, and there were a couple other ones in there as well. How many different areas of sport do you specialize in? Cohn: Well, the whole gamut. I mean, tennis is one of my specialties. Golf and tennis are a couple specialty areas that I have. Also racing is another specialty. But I work with equestrians, skaters, dancers, basketball players, baseball players, I work with the entire gamut, you know. So, I've opened up my business for working with all performers and athletes. And tennis and golf are the ones where I've focused in terms of the products that I've developed, and also some of the online material like the podcast, etc. Ian: OK. That's interesting that you bring so much different experience to the table. And I'm actually curious, one question for myself before we get to listener questions. What unique challenges or circumstances do tennis players--in your opinion-- get faced with, compared to all those other sports that you've worked with? Ian: Well, both tennis and golf. I mean, we can chunk those together. But, it's the start and stop nature of tennis, I think, that has one of the unique mental demands. Because you know, between points, obviously there has to be a ritual and you have to be able to let go of the last point, but then you have to kick up the focus again and restart it. You have change-overs, obviously, and it's like coming out at half-time again, you know. Even though a change-over, you know, it's shorter than a half-time. But I think the continual starting and stopping it would be one. I think another one that I find in particular, at least working with young juniors right now, is they pay too much attention at ranking, I guess. And I don't know, they get psyched out, or they get over confident. And really the ranking, the rankings and the seedings really don't mean a lot, I don't think, at the junior level. So I think they get too worried about where their seeding is, or who they're playing, and don't focus enough of their own game and their own strengths. Ian: OK. Interesting. Well, let's go ahead and get to some questions from listeners of the Podcast. And these were actually taken from the forums at essentialtennis.com. People were really excited to hear that you were coming back on the show, by the way. You're definitely one of the favorite guests that I've had on the show. So I'm happy to have you back. Cohn: Great. Great. Ian: So let's go ahead and get started with the questions. The first one is from David in Dallas. And he wrote nice short and sweet one, and said: Are there stress-relieving routines one can do in a match to promote fluid strokes during tense moments? What do you think? Cohn: Um, this is in a match. This is during a match, or before a match? This looks like in a match, during a match. Ian: Yeah. Cohn: OK. Well, David, I think you have to understand that there's no really quick fixes in my work. In other words, there's no Band-Aid out there. Ian: [laughter] [inaudible] Cohn: Breathing obviously, tightening and releasing, stretching, you know, those are all the physical things that you can do, obviously, to relieve stress. The whole area of relaxation training and being able to use relaxation training. But there's one premises, and that is, it's body to mind. So what that means is you're trying to reduce the tension in the body, and hopefully that will reduce some of the tension in the mind, you know. But my philosophy is often that's a Band-Aid. The whole breathing, certainly that can help settle yourself between points, tightening and releasing, relaxing, but what you really have to understand is where that mental stress is coming from. Because the mental stress, the mental anxiety, ultimately leads to the physical tension, and then the strokes don't feel as smooth. So typically what I see, if I was to give a kind of the chain of command here, it would be, there's an underlying fear of failure--let's just say that there's a fear of embarrassment, for example--that creates some anxiety, which creates some of the physical tension, but it also creates a lack of trust. And now, it's hard to hit out on the ball, it's hard to hit your normal fluid strokes, because you've got both of those going, the tension and the lack of trust, and they may be related to each other. Lack of trust is usually when you're trying to guide it and steer the ball around, rather than just hit your normal strokes, because you're afraid of missing shots, or you're trying to be too perfect with it. But so, that's what I mean, David and Ian, is about there's no quick fixes and Band-Aids like simple relaxation techniques. Now you can do that to reduce your physiological activation. In other words, the breathing--what we call the abdominal breathing-- between points, can help get oxygenate your system and reduce your heart-rate quickly, but it really doesn't address where the mental stress is coming from. And that to me, is the key. My philosophy is: What is the fear? What is the stress? And a lot of times what I find is the fear and the stress, is it relates to some type of fear of failure, which is often related to other people. I don't want to disappoint a parent. I don't want to disappoint a team-mate. I don't want to disappoint a coach. Um, I've worked too hard on my game to, you know, to perform this way. I don't want to lose. You know, so, it's... Those are often what I call the mental triggers that are going to lead to some of this perceived stress and anxiety that the player has, which is more of a core issue. And you have to address these core issues in order to completely relieve... So, I guess what I'm saying is there are no quick routines that you can do, other than like I said, there's certainly, you know, you could do some relaxation training and stuff like that. But, from a mind game perspective, I would say how to keep your mind focused in the present. Don't get ahead of yourself, because when you get ahead of yourself and focus on results, that's when you can easily start getting tense and anxious. Try to just play the next point to the best of your ability. Obviously easier said than done. But, for some players that's helpful too. Is to remind yourself, let's just play the next point. Let's just play the next game, you know, one point at a time, one shot at a time, and not get too far ahead on myself. Cause the fear, the anxiety, is often future thinking about results and consequences, and what if I lose? Ian: Sure. Sure, yeah. Well, I think that a lot of my listeners will really be able to identify with one thing that you said. You said that a lot of times this physical tension is due to mental anxiety over fear of failure, or embarrassment, or letting a person down. So let's say that my listeners out there are having this realization that wow, yeah, I'm feeling so much pressure because I don't want to let my parents down, or my coach down, or my team-mates down. Even though it's easier said than done, but we all should realize that it's not that important that we win each match. But I guess my follow-up question for you Dr. Cohn, is once we identify where that anxiety is coming from, how do we deal with it? In other words, if my pressure is coming from thinking that I don't want to let my coach down, how can I work past that mentally? Cohn: OK. So, that's good that you gave me a specific example. So ultimately, then you have to find out the roots of, you know, why does the player worry about letting the coach down? What is it that they... Are they playing for the coach? So #1: the player probably cares too much about what other people think. And we call that social approval, um, in my work. They're looking for some type of approval, some type of respect. They're very much oriented and geared towards, you know, what the coach has to say to them, too much. You know, they hang on every word maybe, the coach says, for example. And it's not, in general it's not healthy, for example. Ian: OK. Cohn: So, step one is the athlete has to realize that they're playing for themselves and not their coach. Or they're playing for themselves, and they're not playing for a parent. Because a lot of young kids I know, that I work with, they worry about disappointing a parent, or they want to make their parents happy, or you know, whatever. So they have to start playing for themselves, and not playing to get respect or get admiration from the coach. Ian: OK. Cohn: The second part of that is they have to learn to be able to catch themselves when they start worrying about what a coach is gonna saying, or worrying if they're going to disappoint a coach. They have to be able to recognize that mental turmoil that's going on, and be able to refocus themselves in a way that they're not burdened or hindered by that. So, it's you know, I'm making it sound easy, and simplistic. It's not that easy, and it's not that simplistic certainly. Ian: Sure. Cohn: But that's the direction that I take it with my students. And it usually goes to [inaudible] some type of ego involvement, to put it simply. Ego involvement means players that don't have self-respect often look for respect from other people. That's a premises of social approval. They haven't given themselves unconditional self-respect, and they feel like they need to get it from other people. And that can be really dangerous for athletes. Ian: Well, before we get to our next question, I want to remind my listeners about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast, and that is Championship Tennis Tours. You guys can find them at tennistours.com. Since 1987 they've been providing tickets and travel packages to professional tennis events. You guys should definitely go check them out. And especially check out their US Open travel packages. If you guys purchase one of those using my promotional code, which is Essential, with a capital E, you'll not only get a discount, but you'll get an invitation to a cocktail party in Times Square, where myself and Will Hamilton from Fuzzy Yellow Balls are going to be doing a little cocktail reception during the tournament. And it's gonna be a lot of fun. So please go check them out. Look at their prices, and make a purchase through them if you're going to be going to a professional tennis event anytime soon. And please use the promotional code to show that you're supporting the Essential Tennis Podcast, and thank my sponsor for their support of me as well. Alright, let's go ahead and move on to our next question, which comes to us from Gary. And his question was: Should I consciously think that I'm a better player than the opponent or opponents? Or should I just be confident in my game and my strokes? At what point is confidence just simple arrogance? Also, can arrogance actually help you sometimes in a game or match? What is the precise relationship between confidence and being able to stay relaxed in tennis? [inaudible] There is a bunch of questions that aren't in there, but let's go ahead and start with the, I guess... Cohn: There's several issues there. Ian: Yeah. Cohn: There's several issues, yeah. Ian: Go ahead and take the lead on that. Cohn: OK . So, let's start off with the first segment about should I consciously think that I'm a better player than the opponent. Well, I don't know about the "consciously" part about that. I mean, either you do or you don't. You can't fake that, right? You can't fake that. So, it sounds like he's asking should I fake it and just automatically think that I'm better than my opponent, or should I just be confident in my game and my strokes? There may be some expectation imbeded in there, that I think that I'm better than the other player, which I'm not a fan of, of having expectations like I should win, for example. Ian: OK. Cohn: So, I guess my answer is I like the sound of the second part of that. I want him to be confident in his game and strokes, go out there and play one shot at a time, and continue to believe in his game and his strokes no matter if he's up big, he's down big, or if it's a really tight match. That to me, it just has a better ring to it than having to consciously think that you're a better player. Ian: Yeah, it's kind of an unreasonable thought, isn't it? I mean, there's always gonna be players that are better than us, and it's not just tennis, but every sport. And from day to day you're going to play people that are much better, much worse, and right in between. And it's probably not healthy psychologically to walk out onto a court and just automatically assume that you are better. Is it? Cohn: No. Because I think, once again, tied in with the expectations, if you just think you're better and you expect to win, and then it doesn't go your way early in the match, then there could be some real frustration time with that. Ian: Yeah. Absolutely. So, what about this comparison between confidence and arrogance? I guess, would arrogance be that first thought? That kind of the assumption that of course I'm better than my opponent? Cohn: I look at that a little bit differently. I mean, I have this discussion with my students a lot. So confidence as we define it, is a believe in your ability, is a believe in your skill, it's how strongly you believe you can execute your shots, if you want to get more specific with it. So it's a strength if you believe. Arrogance, I don't use that term in sports psychology, but it's defined by people, I think, outside of sports that look at vary confident athletes and say that's arrogant. In other words, they look at supreme levels of confidence as being more too cocky or too arrogant. Ian: Right. Cohn: I think it's usually people that are outside of sports. But some athletes do worry about how their confidence comes off. They don't want it to come off as an arrogant type, you know, confidence. Like I guess some people would say, you know, Nadal obviously is a very confident guy. Some people that might not like some of his action would say that's arrogant, he's being arrogant or cocky. So, what we really want, is we want cockiness and confidence on the inside. You've got to be internally confident and humble on the outside. Arrogance I think can be construed as you're just doing it for the showboat-y. You know, I think of Deon Sanders. Ian: [laughter] Right. Cohn: If people... if your listeners are old enough to remember, you know, Deion Sanders' heyday was very much a showboater. However, he had the skills to back it up, you know. Even though he was a showboater he was very respected by his teammates and he was a very, very talented athlete. So, often I look at arrogance as just trying to put it in other people's face, rub it in their face, on purpose. Right? But I really want my students to have that internal confidence and cockiness yet be humble on the outside, but not go out of your way to be humble on the outside. Okay? Ian: What do you mean by that? Cohn: Well, sometimes if you try so hard to be humble with your actions and your statements, that can often stifle your internal level of confidence and cockiness. Ian: Hmm. Cohn: OK? Because you're so concerned about how it looks to other people. Boy, I'd better not say that. Or, I'd better not think that way. You know, that might be construed as being too arrogant and cocky on my part. So, ultimately then that'll feed internally to them where there's trying to put a cap on some of those thoughts. Ian: That's interesting. Do you watch professional tennis very often, Dr. Cohn? Cohn: Yes. I do. I mean, obviously the bigger ones, Wimbledon now, and the Open, and Australian... So I'm glued to the TV when the big ones are around. I don't watch every week in and week out. No. Ian: So I'm curious what your opinion is, because I've had conversations with actually many people, tennis fans, tennis players, who do think that Nadal is arrogance and cocky. And I'm curious what personally you feel about that statement, coming from a psychologist's standpoint. Cohn: Well, I would say that it's a reflection of what he feels like on the inside. Ian: OK. Cohn: That it is a true confidence. It's a true confidence that he lets out. In other words, he's not protecting or he's not filtering what he does or what he says. It's you know, and he's not afraid of the repercussions of it. So often it can be a reflection of somebody that has a superior level of confidence. Because I think even a confident athlete, or a confident tennis player, can look at Nadal and say that's arrogance, because maybe they can't relate to that level on confidence that you have to have. So... Oh yeah... Ian: And maybe it makes them a little uneasy to see another player that confident on the court? Cohn: Yeah. Yeah. It could make them uneasy, or they just can't relate to that level of confidence, and then they call it arrogance, or they call... he's too cocky. But you know what, the best athletes in the world and the best tennis players in the world, they have that internal level of cockiness. You have to have that in order to perform your best. Ian: Interesting stuff. And let's talk about the final question that Gary wrote here, which was: What is the precise relationship between confidence and being able to stay relaxed in tennis? Cohn: Um, I don't know. Ian: Or is there one? Cohn: Well, it's an interesting question, because he's asking for a precise relationship between confidence and relaxation. How I would answer that, is I would say if you have a lot of confidence, I call it a cure-all. Meaning: you don't get anxious, you don't get fearful, you don't get scared, because you have this level of confidence that everything is gonna be alright, everything is gonna turn out alright. And if it doesn't, then the next day will. So I guess, I really don't know where he's going with that. But to me, the relationship is when you have a high level of confidence you're going to be relaxed. When you don't have confidence it's much more likely that you're gonna have tension in your game. Ian: Sure. Cohn: Does that make sense to you? Ian: Yeah. Yeah. That makes sense. OK. Cohn: He says relaxed confidence, in the next statement he asks about what is relaxed confidence in tennis as opposed to other types of confidence. I've never heard of relaxed confidence. I would make the assumption once again, he's looking at it from a perspective like, someone like Federer. Federer kind of looks laid back and relaxed, but he has a nice confident demeanor about him; as opposed to Nadal who looks very, you know, jumpy, cocky, you know, type of confidence when you look at him. Ian: Sure. Yeah, is that just kind of different personality styles? Or why do they come off so differently? Cohn: Yeah. I think that's different personality styles and how they display their confidence. Certainly. Yeah. Ian: OK. OK. Alright. Let's move on to our third question. This comes to us from [inaudible] in New York. He wrote and said: What should you be thinking about on change-overs? Is this the time to pump yourself up, take a mental breather, or put yourself in a relaxed state? Should you be mulling over tactics? And if so, should it be general things like stay aggressive, or more detailed thoughts like serve wide to their backhand, or hit down the middle to take away angles, etc.? Cohn: Very interesting question. I think very astute question. I like my students to start off with a game plan, that they have a game plan that's going to work for a particular opponent or their style of play. In addition to that, I like my students to focus on what are called processed goals. Processed goals are little things that you're going to do to execute, you know, each and every point that you can. So it's a good example of kind of a strategy and a process goal tied into one. Stay aggressive could be a more general process goal, whereas serve wide to the backhand, hit down the middle to take away the angles, that's more of a strategy once again, but it can also be a process goal. Process goals can be really small like make sure you pick a target before you get up to the service line. In your service routine, make sure you pick a target and commit to the target and commit to the type of server you're going to hit. Right? Ian: OK. Cohn: Those are more specific examples of process goals. But in terms of change-overs, he says, pump yourself up, take a breather, relax yourself. I do believe, it's kind of where you are in the match and what your mental state is. If, you know, you just missed an easy volley to lose the game, and you're just beside yourself, you know, I don't think pumping yourself up is going to work. [laughter] Ian: [laughter] Cohn: Right? Ian: Yeah. Cohn: That's the time where you want to take some deep breaths, say it's okay, let's let it go, let's get to the next game, for example. If things are going really well, for example, in the match, and you're up 4-1, for example, that's where you want to remind yourself to stay aggressive. Okay, let's finish this off. Let's stay aggressive. Let's not go into protect mode, you know, and give my opponent any momentum. Let's keep the momentum going and stay aggressive with my shots. So that's a couple examples of it . Depends on really what's going on for you in that match, and what type of adjustments that you have to make on the change-overs. Because sports psychology, Ian, is all about the real value in sports psychology isn't when you're in the zone and you're playing great. The real value of sports psychology is when you need to make adjustments. Ian: Sure. Cohn: You just lost your confidence because you, you know, whacked two balls long, for example. Or the example I said before, you missed an easy volley and you're really upset with yourself, and you're frustrated and you need to make an adjustment. Or you find that your mind is wandering and you just don't have the focus you need, and you need to, you know, get your mind re-focused on the match. You know, on and on and on. Obviously I could keep going on some of the adjustments that you need to make. Maybe you're too anxious and tense, and you need to calm down, take some breaths and try and let go of the last game, for example, or the last couple of games. So it's really about what's going on with your mental state at that time. Generally, I can say, what you're trying to do each and every point, and each and every change-over, is you're trying to be in a confident, a focused state, and in a state of what I call trust, meaning you have trust in your skills and what you practiced, and you trust your strokes. Those are the biggies that I teach my students. So if any of those are askew, during change-overs you obviously want to talk to yourself and set up a plan. For example, if you feel like you're tightening up and you're pushing the ball, or you're steering, you're guiding it with your racket rather than swinging out with your racket, then that might be a situation where you decide, you know what, that's not working. So, let's just throw that away, and let's just start hitting out on the ball and accept the results. Ian: I like how you're tying the decision making process there to the momentum in the match, and how well things are going. I actually learned that lesson when I was playing in college, and it's not anything that I had thought about before. But I was playing up with somebody much higher in the line-up than me, that normally I wouldn't have been playing doubles with, and we were beating a team that was better than us. And we were both playing a real well . And we going over to a change-over, and my partner, who's a much stronger player than me, much more experienced, you know, we went over to our bags and we're grabbing our water, I started to sit down, and he's like no [inaudible] stand up. Stand up. And we put our water down, walked right over to the other side of the net and got into our positions to play the next point, and just stood there and watched the other guys. And like, you know, kind of to pressure them, to keep them going. And he kept us rolling. You know, he didn't let us take a breather, he let us stay on our role. And the flip side of the coin, we were having trouble in a different match, and I think we were down a break, and he took a ball and kicked it [laughter] over like two courts down, and he was like, come here. And we like walked and talked while we went and grabbed the ball to give ourselves a little bit of time. Do those sound like good, you know, maybe kicking a ball on purpose to waste time isn't ethical, but do those sound like good examples of being able to play with the momentum of the match? Cohn: Yes. Absolutely. You know, another good example that I see is a player that's down and that's frustrated, I see with the younger kids a lot, what they'll do is they won't stop for a drink. They'll just go right to the service line. You know, to return a serve. Ian: Yeah. Cohn: And that's exactly the wrong thing that you need to do in that situation. That's the wrong adjustment. They want to get up there, they either want the match over with quickly, or they want to get to the next game so that they can win a game quickly and settle themselves down. And it's exactly the wrong thing you need to do, where you need to actually take more time on the change-over to sit down, do some breathing, try to let go of some of the frustration that you have. And then when you're ready, then get up and walk slowly and calmly to the serve or return of serve. So yeah, those are good examples of trying to make adjustments on change-overs based upon what's going on in the match. Certainly. Yup. I remember one time, I mean, just quickly, my daughter was up, was playing a pretty good opponent. This was a while ago. But she was up 3-love in the second set, and she needed to win the second set to pull even. And she took a bathroom break. Ian: [laughter] Cohn: What do you think happened after she came back from the bathroom break? Ian: I'm guessing she had a let down. Cohn: She lost all the momentum. Ian: Oh man. Cohn: She lost all the momentum. She had her opponent's back against the fence. You know, she was reeling, she was upset, she had lost 3 games in a row, and it's just exactly the wrong time to go for a bathroom break. But I mean, you got, you know, nature calls. You've gotta go, but you've gotta go. But I said, "Why did you take the bathroom break? You're up 3-0 and you got all the momentum?" "I had to go, dad." [laughter] Ian: Good answer. Cohn: [laughter] So, that's another example of when you've got the momentum and you got your player against the, you know, you know, get out there and get after it. Ian: Sure. Cohn: You know, don't call an official, or you know, don't break the flow. Don't break the momentum. Ian: But Dr. Cohn, with that we're gonna wrap things up. We're out of time. But, I want to thank you very much for spending time with me, and especially for answering questions from my listeners. I know that they're going to appreciate it very much, not only that you took the time to be here, but for all the great information you've given as well. So, thank you very much for doing the show with me. It was great to have you. Cohn: Hey, thanks for having me on again, Ian. I appreciate it. Ian: Sure. And before we sign off, I want to remind my listeners as well, definitely check out the tennis psychology podcast on iTunes. And you can go to Dr. Cohn's tennis site as well, which is sportspsychologytennis.com Thanks again, Dr. Cohn. It was great to have you. [music] Cohn: Thank you. [music] [music] [music] Ian: Alright. That brings episode number 125 of the Essential Tennis Podcast to a close. And before I wrap things up, I want to thank a couple really special people who have donated to Essential Tennis in the last couple weeks. Just 3 people this time: Shelley in New Mexico, Kimberly in Texas, and I want to send a special thank you to John in Oregon, who sends an unusually high donation, unusually large donation to Essential Tennis. And John, I want to send a special thank you out to you on the podcast. Really appreciate your donation. So if the podcast has helped you improve, and if you really appreciate the show and you'd like to give back, feel free to do that through a donation. It does not have to be a large amount. And you can also sign up for a subscription donation and make a small monthly donation of 5, 10, or 20 dollars. And you can do that by going to essentialtennis.com and on the front page, on the lower right, there's a box that says donate. So go check that out. And I would appreciate your support very, very much. Alright, that does it for this week. Thanks again everybody, for listening. I appreciate it. Take care. And good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast #126: Gear Talk with Master Racket Technician Jeremy Plumley. Lead tape for more spin, racket selection, string gauge differences.

ianw — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 14:42:18 +0000

Listen in on part 2 of 2 in a discussion with gear expert Jeremy Plumley. Ian and Jeremy talk about using lead tape to create more spin, selecting the correct racket for certain types of players, and the differences that string gauges make. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [silence] [music] Welcome to the essential tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game. This podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game. Tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player and now, here's Ian. Ian: Hi, and welcome to the essential tennis podcast, your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the essential tennis podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com, where you can receive a discount off your next purchase of professional tennis tournament tickets by using the promotional code essential with a capital "E". But thank you very much for downloading today's show and for listening to us, I appreciate it very much, I am going to be playing the second half of the conversation that I had with master racquet technician Jeremy Plumley. And the first half of our conversation was released as podcast number 124. So Jeremy and I today are continue our talk about gear and how to select racquets and strings and how to use lead tape and all kinds of stuff. So, it's gonna be a good conversation. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] Ian: Back on the podcast with me is Jeremy Plumley. Who's a master racquet techician and we just wrapped up episode number 124. When you hear this conversation it will probably be a couple of weeks later, cause I have some other guests lined up for next week's show. Which will be 125. So, I don't know [laughter] what episode this will be Jeremy, probably 126 or 127, but I am looking forward to continuing our conversation that we've recorded for episode 124. So, um it hasn't been as long this time. Welcome back to the show. Jeremy: Thanks, let's hope the technology hasn't changed a lot from the time we recorded this until people actually get to hear it. Ian: Yeah, good point. Yeah, I know, I hopefully, yeah, I just quit and saved everything to make sure we didn't lose episode 124 conversation file either, so yeah hopefully everything works out here. But we just got done talking about racquet fad, different types of strings and also using lead tape to change the balance of the racquet. So, if you haven't listened to podcast 124, definitely go back and check that out. But we've got a couple of more questions to get to in today's show. Jeremy I appreciate you sticking around and continuing to answer questions from my listeners. We all appreciate it very much. Jeremy: Happy to do it, love it! Ian: Alright, so let's move on here and this question comes to us from John, he wrote to me and said, "I have been experimenting with lead tape, I tried putting a lot on the throat of the racquet to make it more head light and I put some on the end of the head to put more spin on my shots. Those are the two places on the racquet that I know will make a specific difference in my game. Could you explain where one should place weight on his or her racquet to make a certain change to his or her game?" So, John here's referencing, putting more weight in the tip of the racquet, at the top of the head of the racquet to create more spin. I n episode 124, Jeremy also talked about putting weight up there towards the tip to create more power. Essentially, more racquet head speed. Um, why don't you tell us the other different places we can put lead and what kind of differences our listeners can expect as far as results? Jeremy: Oh, well like I've said, you know, putting the racquet up at the tip of the racquet, up at the tip of the head. You're going to get your most bang for your buck! You're going to feel it's the most there because adding the lead tape up at the tip increases your swing weight the most. So, even if you put a little bit up there, you're going to feel a difference. Um, and then as you take it further down, you get less change in swing weight, but there are other benefits. A lot of times, what you see people do is they'll add lead tape around 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock in the racquet head cause that will stabilize the racquet head a little bit on off center hits. You know you get that racquet twisting in your hand. By adding weight at 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock, you're putting just a little bit of extra mass on the further, the furthest points from the sweet spot and it will sure that up a little bit. Maybe give you a little bit more stability on what might be a little off that are shot. As you bring the racquet as you bring the lead tape further down the racquet you're adding weight to the frame overall but you're not adding as much swing weight, so you are probably going to get a little bit more stability, a little bit more plough through but you are not really raising the weight that it feels while you're swinging through the shot. You're not going to get as much extra pop on your ground shot that way but you are going to you know, bring that balance point just a little bit more towards the bottom of the frame. Ian: OK, I remember on my racquets personally Jeremy you added, where did add the weight? I remember when I got my first my k pro tour, I liked the racquet overall but I just wanted a little bit more kind of pop behind my volley, I want to be able to hit just a little deeper without trying so hard to be able to have to hit through it to create depth in my volley. Now, I remember you put some at 9 and 3 o'clock, did you add weight in any other places on my frame to give me that specific result that I was looking for? Jeremy: Ah yeah, I don't remember specifically how much we put on there. But we basically put lead tape from 12 o'clock all the way down on both sides down to 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock. We put some down underneath the bumper guard, um and then the kind of, so it didn't completely get out of whack. I also put a little bit um, I think we put some towards the top of the [inaudible], I don't think we put any on the throat. Um, but most of the lead was up in the hoop of the frame. OK. Just to give you a little bit more solid surface to hit off for those vollies. Because the racquet was pretty significantly head light not as much as like the KS1. Ah, but it was head light racquet, so just putting a little bit more mass up in the hoop there, just to give you a little bit of extra thump on that volley. Ian: Yeah, I thought I remembered you putting some in the handle as well, so I mean essentially if you take a racquet and add a little bit of weight in all of those places. A little bit in the handle, a little bit in 9 and 3 and a little bit at the tip. I mean does that essentially kind of accentuate all of the qualities that the frame had originally or is it going to turn it into a completely different feeling racquet by increasing the weight everywhere? Jeremy: Ah, if you spread that out evenly it's should keep its general playing characteristic but add, but increase in the total weight of the racquet, if you crazy in one direction, it's going to throw things out of whack. We added more weight to the tip of your racquet then we did to the grip. So, we actually brought the balance weight closer to head heavy. Ah, it was still a head light racquet, um but we didn't completely polarize it. Which is when you add the same amount to the top and the bottom, so you are keeping that balance the same. OK. Ian: Now cool stuff, it's interesting how it's possible to change the playing characteristics of a frame or kind of keep them the same, but kind of get more so of what you are feeling before by balancing it out in different areas. I think that's pretty cool. Is that something you recommend recreational players experiment with or should that be left to trained professionals like yourself? Jeremy: Um, I think that is something that you can play around with. I think that tennis players are a little bit behind the curve on this one. Golfers for years have been customizing their clubs to fit their specific playing styles. Tennis players however, tend to just take a racquet off the wall and they might do the research to find out how it fits with their game or not and they just go out and play with it. Um, and you know they find a lot success in that, but there are things that you can do, you know to make that racquet play a little bit better for you. I think if you are looking a little bit more for stability and you want to add some weight at 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock that you're probably OK to do that. I think if you are looking to really change the characteristics of the racquet, you should at least kind of consult with your teaching professional or You know you can email into a specific podcast that you and I know of, um But if it's just a little thing here and there um yeah you should go ahead and try it out. But you know, if you are going to do a crazy and try to match a couple or try to make your new racquet feel more like your old one. You are probably want to talk to somebody who has a pretty good idea of what they are doing. Ian: OK. Let's head to our next question here and we are going to answer a couple of more from Gavin here. Next question from Gavin. How do you think racquet weight affects play? For example, "I love the weights and heft of a dunlop 4D200 racquet on ground strokes." And he says that's about 330 grams of static weight. I feel it allows me to hit a heavier ball and my opponents notice this as well. However, I feel I struggle to get enough racquet head speed on my serve. On the flip side, if I play with say a 300 gram racquet, I can get the head speed on the serve, but I feel that my ground strokes lack penetration and all I seem to get is [inaudible]. Is all of this simply down to ability or is equipment a factor as well? What do you think Jeremy? Jeremy: Ah, well equipment doesn't change everything, as much as the manufacturers like to tell you that buying [inaudible] is to change your game, but what it comes down to is your technique and how are swinging the racquet. To what's going to happen with the ball. Now that being said You know, you want to use the right equipment. If you have the heavier racquet and you can get through the ball. You are going, you should be able to hit the heavier ball with more top spin because you got more mass imparting its force on the ball. You know, that's the plus size to a heavier racquet, the down size like you said, he's having trouble getting top on his serve because he can't swing the racquet as fast as he could with the lighter one. The down size to the lighter racquet, you know you don't have as much mass parting force on the ball so... Kind of a catch 22 huh? Yeah, I mean it really is. The trick is you know finding somewhere in the middle there where you know you can find a racquet that is thousand [inaudible] pluses and minuses inside and out. I like to tell people that they should probably be using you know, the heaviest racquet that they could comfortably swing for a good amount of time because they are going to get more out of that than they will a super light weight racquet. You know you might get a lot of power from that 9 ounce racquet that is as wide as a baseball bat but you are giving up control there. I also like to have people use a heavier because it keeps their strokes from getting short and punchy. Ian: Yeah, that's the main reason why I push people towards a heavier frame and I basically tell people the same, I like to put racquets into the hands of my students that are basically, that heaviest and smallest racquet that they are still comfortable with and exactly for reason that you pointed out. When recreational players, especially beginners get a really light racquet put in their hands that creates a lot of power on it's own without good technique. Usually, beginners will kind of fully take advantage of that and use crappy technique and just let the racquet do all the work. And that's great at first, and it feels you know good at first. But that can really limit you guys technique in the long run as you tried to continue to advance, so that can be a little dangerous can it Jeremy to go for the kind of lighter more powerful racquets. Jeremy: Yeah, absolutely I really don't like to have beginners use those light weight racquets for the same reasons you were saying. When you're learning the game, particularly if you are working with a professional. You want to really develop your mechanics. Develop the strokes and then you know find that right racquet that goes in there. You don't want to start off, you know with those short punchy strokes because its just going to be harder in the long run to start putting top spin on the balls to start getting depth with it as you start using out your racquets. Ian: OK. Just one more question, just having to do with this with the weights. What do you suggest Gavin does I mean the two racquets he's talking about they're not a huge, well not a huge difference in weight. A 300 gram racquet and a 330 gram weight racquet. What do you suggest he does to try to bridge the gap Between these two racquets, maybe put some lead tape on the 300 gram racquet or should he try to find a racquet that is manufactured inbetween these two weights to try ro get the best of both worlds. What do you think? Jeremy: Um, I would tend to probably start off with the wider one and then maybe try experimenting with some lead tape. It wouldn't hurt because he obviously knows of about what weight he's looking for, he's got, you know pretty much an ounce difference in those two racquets but it's all in where the weights distributed. OK, So um, if he goes with the lighter one, he has a little bit more freedom to you know kind of change the playing characteristic of the racquet to something that might suit him better. Um, but he could also [inaudible] some racquets you know that kind of fall in between there and there's no shortage of racquets in that zone. I know he was talking about the dunlop 4D200. Um, you know he could try the 4D 300 Tour. Which is a little bit you know lighter than that 4D200. Um, but there's no shortage of racquets in that general, with those general characteristics. I'm sure he could find something that he likes there. Ian: Alright, before we get to our next question, I want remind my listeners about the official sponsor of the essential tennis podcast and that is Championship Tennis Tours. You can find them at tennistours.com and I've been talking a lot about the US Open ticket packages where you guys can customize your trip as far as how close to the action you get and what hotel you stay at. They have a couple of different hotel choices that you can make. Between five stars hotels, you get shuttle back and forth and get to choose between the tour of New York City, tickets to a Yankees game, to a Broadway show. What I don't think I've been talking a lot about though is that you guys could also purchase individual tickets. You don't have to go for a huge US Open Ticket package. So no matter what your budget is, or no matter how long your planning on going to the US Open this year, go to tennistours.com, check them out and even if you just make your purchase for the cheapest ticket and one day, one session and use the promotional code, "essential" with a capital 'E', you will still get the discounts and you still get the invitation to a cocktail party in Times Square, where myself and Will of fuzzy yellow balls will be as well. So go check them out and I thank them very much for their support of the essential tennis podcast. Next up, Gavin wants to know, "What are your views about racquet head sizes? I've played with racquets with head sizes of 95 square inches, 98's and 100's square inches. I find that the sweet spot is bigger on the 100 square inch racquet, but I don't seem to have as much directional accuracy as I do with the 95 square inch racquet. What do you suggest? I'm sorry, would you suggest going with the smaller head size so that I'm challenged to improve?" -- What do you think? Jeremy: Um, as far as the head size goes there, it's a not a big difference from a 95 to a 100. If you put a 95 square inch racquet up with a 100 square inch racquet, you are not going to see a big difference in hitting area. That being said, the larger the head, more powerful the racquet. Which basically breaks down to a larger sweet spot but with the smaller headed racquets, with the smaller sweet spot. That sweet spot is actually more poten. So, something to think of there. Now, is that just because the smaller headed racquet typically have more weight to them? Or is it actually directly because the hitting surface is smaller, that it's more of a potence result? It's just kind of, you just got that smaller area but you've got more energy in that little area because it's not spread out as much. Um, it's kind of like, you know if you take in Taekwondo, or some sort of martial arts class or you know even boxing, you know they tell you that you want to get as much energy into your punch as you can, so its a very small, you know, hitting zone. But it's very strong and powerful, and it's kind of that same idea with the smaller sweetspot. It's tougher to find a sweetspot, but you're going to get more payoff when you do hit it. The difference between a 95 square on track and 100 square on track it isn't that big, but there will be a difference in the potency of that sweetspot. Ian: So how come the lighter rackets are always considered to be the power rackets if it's actually the case that you get more out of a well hit shot with a smaller racket face. Jeremy: Um, normally when the talk about the power level [inaudible] those rackets they're looking at the overall hitting area and you know, they might give a B+ power rating to something that hits an inch outside of the sweetspot in those big banger rackets, and it might be like a C on the smaller ones. The big difference between those large headed powerful rackets and the smaller headed rackets is stability. If you hit an off-center shot on 115 square inch racket out near, you know, the shoulders around 3 o'clock or 9 o'clock, you're gonna get a lot of twisting just because there's so much space in between the frames from point A to point B. On the smaller ones, say a 90 square inch racket or a 95 square inch racket, there's not as much space. So you've got a better chance of actually getting that ball back over and in the court if it's off center with the smaller headed racket. Ian: So hold on a second. So you're telling me that when the manufacturers say that you'll get more power with that huge, you know, 9 ounce racket, you're telling me that by power they don't actually mean more miles per hour that the ball is travelling as it leaves the racket? Jeremy: Well, you are... Okay. Um... well, let's talk about this in terms of, you know, all things being equal. Ian: Okay. Jeremy: Okay? Because normally what happens is with those wider rackets you have a much wider beam which is going to give you more power. So it's not really necessarily a result of the sweetspot that you're gaining more power, it's the fact that the racket is lighter, you can swing it faster, and you've got a wider, stiffer frame that's going to give you that power. But if you take two rackets that, you know, are the same width and same beam width and different head sizes, you're going to get you know, more power from the larger one just because you get more trampoline effect off the string. Ian: And by power, you're meaning like, literally like speed of the shot? Jeremy: Right. Ian: Okay. Jeremy: Right. Because you're going to get more of a catapult effect. Ian: Got ya. Jeremy: If you're swinging at the same speed, everything else is equal, a smaller head is going to be less powerful than a larger head. Ian: Okay. Jeremy: But it's going to be more stable. Ian: Hm. Okay. Interesting. Jeremy: Yeah. They might have to post something on the boards to get a better clarification on that one. That one was a pretty complex sort of answer. Ian: Okay. No, I think it's good to talk through that stuff. And I think there's a lot of misconceptions when it comes to the, you know, the terminology that racket manufacturers use, and I think there's a lot of, I don't want to say misleading, on the... Well, maybe I should use that word... on the side of the manufacturers. I mean, there's a lot of marketing that goes on that leads people to believe that you'll actually hit a better shot because of X or Y technology or because of the size of the racket or whatever. I mean, how much of that is actually the case, and how much of it is just trying to get you to buy the newest, you know, latest, greatest frame? Jeremy: Well, you know, a lot of it is marketing. But you know what? I don't think that the manufacturers are just going to bold face lie to you. I'm sure that there's a way that they can measure that 20% increase in power from technology A to technology B. Whether you can replicate those findings in a non-laboratory situation, that's up for debate. Ian: [laughter] Alright, let's move on to our final question here. And this has to do with the gauge of different strengths. And last question here comes to us from Gavin as well. And Gavin, by the way, thanks for all of your well thought-out questions. He wrote me several weeks ago and said that, Ian, you should talk more about gear on the Podcast. And I said, well, go ahead and submit some questions and next time I have Jeremy on, I'll be happy to answer them. And he really did his homework. He sent in quite a few. So, here's the last one from Gavin. He said, "On the same subject of strings, what difference do you think the gauge makes to the playability of the strings?" And this is something I've always been a little confused about. I know that certain gauges are supposed to create more or less spin, assuming you're hitting a spin shot correctly. I've heard in some places that you're supposed to get more or less power based on the gauge. What are the actual facts on that? Jeremy: Um, basically, going back to the all things being equal, a thinner gauge string is going to give you more bite on the ball, which is going to lead to more spin, which should lead to more control. You're also going to have better feel with that. A thicker string, on the other side, it should give you more power. Again, all things being equal. The obvious distinction between a thin gauge and a thick gauge is durability. The thinner gauge is obviously going to break quicker than a thicker gauge. Ian: Okay. Now, it's interesting, because it seems, it would seem like, I think, to a lot of people at first blush, that a thicker gauge would actually create more spin, because there's more you know, string actually touching the ball as contact is made. Why is it that a thinner gauge is actually creating more spin? Jeremy: Just because it's, you know, it's kind of the same theory as a knife. You can cut through something better with a sharp instrument, like a knife, than you could with, you know, a thicker one like a 2x4. Ian: Ah. They must have taught you that at master racket technician training camp, huh? Jeremy: That's right. Yes. It was boot camp. And what they do is they had us [inaudible] hit with piano wire and 2x4s. Ian: Nice. Jeremy: [laughter] But it's, I mean, that's kind of you know, too extreme. You know, the difference between an 18 gauge string and you know, a 15 gauge string isn't that dynamic. But just think about, you know, that thinner string is actually biting into the ball and grabbing it and kind of imparting its force on the ball, while that thicker one is just kind of [inaudible] it [inaudible] through it. Ian: Okay. Alright. Well, that makes sense to me, and hopefully to everybody else listening as well. Anything else to add, Jeremy? We talked about... In this show, we talked about different gauges just now, different head sizes, different weights of racket, and first question had to do with lead tape, putting lead tape in different positions on the racket. Anything else to add on any of those topics before we wrap things up? Jeremy: Um, yeah, just a couple things. Ian: Yeah. Jeremy: Because there is some confusion, I think, with some people about the gauge, what is thicker and what is thicker. Um, actually, you know, an 18 gauge string is thinner than a 17 gauge string. And... Ian: That's important to get straightened out, huh? Jeremy: Yeah. Because, you know, people think well, it's a lower number, it might be a thinner diameter. An average gauge string is normally 16 gauge. And you can normally find up to 18 gauge is the thinnest, 15 gauge normally tends to be about the thickest you can find. So that's just something to think about when you start looking online for strings. The other thing is, in terms of the lead tape. And we always kind of joke about this. You know, you are working with lead. So if you are putting lead tape on your racket, after you do that, make sure to wash your hands. Because, while it is safe to use, you still want to take general precautions. Ian: Don't let your children chew on the lead tape. Jeremy: No. No. Keep it away from the kids. Ian: Yes. Jeremy: In particular if you have a son like mine who likes to put everything in his mouth. Ian: [laughter] Leave the lead tape up on the top shelf. Jeremy: That's right. Ian: Alright. Well, Jeremy, thank you very much for your time, and for your expertise. It's been good to have you back on the show again. And I know that the listeners of my show all appreciate your inputs and your time, and answering their questions as well. So, thank you very much. [music] Jeremy: Ah, well, thank you very much for having me. It's always [inaudible] [music] [music] [music] Ian: Alright. That does it for episode number 126 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for listening to today's show. I appreciate it very much. And if you're not already downloading the show using iTunes, I really suggest that you do that. You can subscribe to the show and make it download automatically every Monday when I release the podcast. And if you already do use iTunes, please do me a favor, go to the iTunes music store and rate and leave a review for the Essential Tennis Podcast. It helps with the ratings for the show on the iTunes music store. And I would appreciate your time very much, if you wouldn't mind heading over there and doing that, it would be great. Okay. That does it for this week. Thanks again everybody. Take care. And good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [silence]

Podcast #127: Avoiding Momentum Swings in Three Easy Steps

ianw — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 14:43:32 +0000

Ever get way ahead in either a singles or doubles match only to see your lead quickly slip away? Today Ian talks about the causes of these big momentum shifts as well as a three step process for avoiding them. By the end of today's show you'll know what to look for and how to prevent big swings in score from one side to the other Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Welcome to the essential tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game. Tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player and now here's Ian! Ian: Hi and welcome to the essential tennis podcast, your place for free experts tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the essential tennis podcast, is brought to you by tennistours.com. Where you can receive a discount off your next purchase of professional tennis tournament tickets by using the promotional code essential. Well welcome to today's show, thank you very much for joining me. Before we get to today's topic that I am going to be answering for a listener I'd like to send out a special thank you to eight really awesome people, really passionate listeners of the tennis podcast. And they are the eight players who joined me on Galveston Island in Texas this past weekend and I'd just like to do a quick shoutout. Those eight people were John D, Mike, Eddie, Alex, Chris, Jean-Paul, Dennis and last but not least John M. Who is the member at Galveston Country Club. He arranged and set up everything for us.d And got the courts and just basically helped me with all the administration type stuff that needed to be done. So thank you very much John. And to the eight of you, as a group you guys did awesome. It was a lot of fun working with you guys. I am really proud of the hard work you guys put in, these guys drilled and played outside for over nine hours this past weekend, in the Texas heat. In the middle of July, and you know that's impressive right there. And on top of that, we did a mental tennis clinic with David Grubin, mental expert and we did a video analysis session as well and went over one stroke of the eight participants and I gave them my feedback, frame by frame video in a group setting as well which is always a great learning experience. So, I just want to thank you guys again. Very much for your participation. That was the forth essential tennis clinic that I've put on. The fifth one is coming up in November. And it's already sold out. I didn't even announce it here on the podcast. It's sold out, just with the members of the forums at essentialtennis.com, so unfortunately the rest of you sort of missed out on that one. Everybody on the forum has jumped on that, but I think I am going to be scheduling another one for either January or February again in Palm Springs California. It's a great venue to hold our events, so if you think you might want to attend that one, the 6th and upcoming essential tennis clinic and work with me for a weekend on your tennis game. Shoot me an email to ian@essentialtennis.com and I can give you guys early notification when I start to put the details together for that next clinic after the one in November. Alright, let's get down to business. Sit back and relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, let's get started on today's topic and it comes to us from Rich. Rich wrote to me and said, Tonight I played in my first USCA match for the summer season. I would say my partner and I are both strong 3.5 players and have played together for a couple of years. We try to communicate together during the match and inter-match we got to a strong start in one pretty easily 6-0 and we are feeling pretty confident. The second set was somewhat shaky and we started out losing the first three games and then came back to tie it up with 3 all. We went down to 3-4 and came back to 4-4 and then lost the next two games to lose the second set 6-4. We did a third set tie breaker rather than a complete third set because of time constraints and we lost that 10-7. My question is, how can we maintain our mental focus after winning the first set so easily and avoid a wipedown? This seems to happen quite often, it would have been better if the first set was closer, [laughter] . Thanks Rich. Ian: Yeah, funny how that happens isn't it Rich? It actually turns out you probably would have preferred mentally anyway, that that first set was competitive so you guys wouldn't have let your guard down so much. Now I got a long outline here to talk about this and by the way this is going to be the only topic I talk about today To be honest with you guys I'm just really short on time today recording this on Monday the 19th. And it's late afternoon here in the east coast. Usually I am done with my podcast by early morning and I just had, had to much going on and so this is going to be the only topic we talk about today so I really wrote a detailed outline. And I look forward to talking about this Rich. And I am going to give you and everybody else listening some really concrete things for you guys to concentrate next time you guys you get put into this position so that you don't give away another set. And even the match, after winning so easily in the first set. So, first of all you are right. This is extremely, extremely common. That a team or a player will go out and win a first very easily and then turn around to lose the second set and even the match. When it was obvious that they were in control of the match to begin with and it's important to understand that this is not just for recreational players. I mean, so I want you to know that you shouldn't feel badly about this and for the rest of you listening. If this has ever happened to you, don't be embarrassed by it, it definitely happens to everybody to some extent or another. You know some of us are more mentally tough than others and it's really good that you identified Rich that this is a mental let down. You said, your specific question was how to maintain your mental focus. And that's exactly the right question because obviously you and your partner had the upper hand here to begin the match. But it's important to understand that this happens even at the professional level. You guys will see this, I am not going to say commonly. But it's definitely not unheard of to have one professional player win the first set easily and then turn around and lose the second set even by quite a bit. Usually, it's not as big as a swing as what your example is, to win the first set 6-0 and then end up losing the entire the match. But trust me there's definitely large momentum swings going on back and forth even between professional matches. Now, there's two main reasons for your momentum swing, and this particular circumstance, in this example you gave us. There's two main reasons why this occurs, and not just in your specific example but pretty much anytime that there is a large momentum swing, it's happening for two main reasons. Number one, emotional relaxation on the part of you and your partner. And this is probably the obvious one. And yet I think that a lot of recreational players don't guard against it. Basically, you and your partner won that first set in you're probably sitting on the change over and saying, Sweet, we going to totally crush these guys. This is no problem were having an easy match. And you know what, to be honest with you, I don't blame you for saying that and thinking that. I mean 6-0, you know the dreaded bagel, that's just a crushing, I mean you guys just thrashed them in that first set. They really didn't make it close at all. Even 6-1 or 6-2 a pretty sound beating of another team, but 6-0. Is like you guys embarrassed them. So, I don't blame you for letting your guard down here. You and your partner, were probably already celebrating after that first set during the change over. You guys were probably sitting there during the change over and laughing and joking around with each other before that second set started. In fact, I think you said here... Here we go. Rich says we got off to a strong start and won easily 6-0 and we were feeling pretty confident. [laughter] And again I don't blame you for feeling confident. Confidence is good, that's great. However, I can just read between the lines there. When you say that you guys were feeling pretty confident. And I just know that you guys probably crossed the line between confident and a little bit over confident and that's when your guard get, I'm sorry that's when your guard got let down by both of you. Now, you most likely headed out for that second set. Again, feeling over confident and probably a little bit nonchalant to saying, ah well even if we screw around in this set, we should still be able to win. Because that first set was so easy. And your basically thinking that the match was in the bag. So that's the number one main reason why this happened. You let your guard down emotionally, mentally and in terms of focus. You guys just definitely let your guard down. Now, the number two reason why this momentum swing occurred, and this is I don't think a lot of recreational players think about. Is that, you have to realize that your opponents are going to come out fighting twice as hard as they did at the end of the [inaudible]... I'm sorry, they are going to come out fighting twice early in the second set as they were late in the first set. So you guys probably sat down on your bench or in your chairs at the end of that first set kind of with a picture in your mind of how that first set went. And you were thinking about how those opponents were playing at the end of the first set. More than likely, they were pretty dejected. I mean they just gotten completely beat down in that first set. And they probably at that point after going down 4-0, after going down 5-0, they probably weren't giving you their full effort at that point. And I wouldn't blame them for not giving a hundred percent when they are down four or five games to none in a set. We'll see this happen all the time at a professional level as well. It's not just amateur players. However, after that first set is done they get a fresh start in the second set. Now, obviously they are down a set so, now were going to talk about that individually. They lost the first set and so maybe they are maybe they are down on themselves for that reason. However, they come out after that first set change over and the score is 0-0, they get to start all over again. The first set is completely done. And they get a totally new shot at you and your partner. In terms of the set. So, after getting crushed in that first set. Basically they have two choices. Emotionally or tactically. They can change nothing and just basically accept that they're going to lose because they just got killed in that first set. It was even close. So, I mean I could see it would be possible that they could walk back out for the second set and be saying to themselves, well it looks like this match is going to be over quickly, you want grab a beer after this. Where do you want to go for dinner? You know, whatever. It's possible that could happen and you and your partner and still let your guard down and still win without a whole lot of trouble. However, the second way that they could react after losing that first set is to change their tactics and fight twice as hard to even the match in that second set. And in my opinion, that second reaction is much more likely. I mean, these guys came out to play a USTA match. So, really what do you think they are going to do, given those two choices. Seeing as these guys have taken the time to work on their game. To feel pretty confident and competent about their tennis in the first place to go sign up for a USTA league team. They must be at least a little bit competitive and you and your partner should assume that they are probably going to fight twice as hard in the second set as they did in the first. Both in terms of tactics, and also in terms of just kind of basic energy level and effort. So, when you look at these two elements Rich, you'll see that we kind of have a perfect storm for momentum change. First of all, you and your partner are relaxed. You're enjoying yourself, you're kind of blasting in the glory of that easy first set. And then secondly, your opponents are both about to fight harder than at any other point in the match. They want to kind of vindicate themselves here in the second set. And if they are going to have any chance of winning this match. They know they have to pick up their games. And both tactically and physically and emotionally really come out strong and fighting hard for this second set. So when you combine those two things together, it's a reallt dangerous environment for you and your partner. Next we are going to be talking about how to avoid these kind of momentum swings but before we do that, I just want to remind you guys about the official sponsor of the tennis podcast. And that is tennistours.com championship tennis tours. They've been putting together individually tickets and ticket packages to professional tennis tournaments since 1987 and they do tickets for events all over the world and all over the United States. So, you guys should definitely check them out if you're planning on going to a tennis tournament or if you know if one is coming to your area. Now, the big one coming up here in the U.S. Is the U.S. Open and obviously everybody here in the U.S. is excited about that and especially if you live close to New York City. And I'm planning on hopefully being there. I think the second weekend we're going to be doing a cocktail party, myself and Will Hamilton from Fuzzy Yellow Balls and championship tennis tours are kind of going to team together for this and if you purchase tickets it's for the U.S.Open and use my promotional code which is, "essential" as you check out, not only will you get a discount, but you'll also receive an exclusive invitation to that cocktail party which is going to be in Times Square. Which is pretty cool. So go check them out at tennistours.com. The discounts, I think it applies to purchases of $175 or more but you guys can mix and match tickets when you check out for the U.S. Open they have tickets available for every session of everyday and different seating choices for each of those days and sessions as well. So go check them out. Again, that's at tennistours.com and don't forget to use the promotional code, "essential" that shows them that you appreciate their support of the essential tennis podcast. Alright, let's go ahead and move on to our final topic for today's show and that is how to actually avoid these kind of momentum swings. And, I am going to give you guys three step process to trying to not do what happened Rich and his partner here after winning their first set 6-0 and then losing the match. First of all, you have to have an awareness of this situation. Both setting up and occurring kind of being in the middle of this kind of situation and this is just one of those many things in tennis that sound easy but actually putting it into practice and remembering it on the court in the middle of the match, can be something that is pretty tricky. You know, it's easier said than done kind of thing. But after you and your partner or you when you are playing the singles match, win the first set, especially by a lot, you have to keep in mind this dynamic and this kind of set up for a possible fall or possible change in momentum. So that this is step number one, now that you guys have heard me talk about it and describe why it happens. Next time you go out onto a tennis court t play a competitive match. Step number one, is being aware of this situation. Step number two, you need to redouble your efforts and awarness tactically. So, as far as what you are doing strategically on the court you need to kind of redouble what you're doing. Definitely, redouble your awareness of what's going on. It's very likely your opponents will try something new after losing that first set. At least if they are smart. [laughter] If they lose the first set, 6-0 and come out for the second set and do exactly the same thing that they did in the first set. Then they're just dumb [laughter]. I mean, I'm just going to go ahead and say it like it is. These guys are not very intelligent. Expect that they are going to do something different. And if you are playing doubles like Rich was. Some examples of that might be, maybe they'll start playing double back or in an "I" formation, maybe a change of their formation and how they approach their points to give you and your partner a different look and try something tactically. Maybe they'll switch sides and instead of returning on the deuce side, the stronger player will return from the add side. That's something that they have the option of doing after the first set. Maybe, instead of staying in a one up, one back position kind of the a traditionally formation for recreational players. Maybe they'll start to serve and volley and return in volley. And they'll get really aggressive and both of them will come up to the net to try to finish up points quickly instead of staying back. These are examples of changes that you have to be ready for and not only do you have to be ready for them to mix things up and try something different. But then you have to make adjustments accordingly right away and Rich didn't talk about this, he didn't mention exactly what changed in this set. He didn't say if his opponents mixed up anything tactically. But I would be willing to bet that at least something changed. I'd be very very surprised if Rich and his partner won the first set 6-0 and then their opponents continued to play the exactly same way and then ended up winning the match. To be honest with you, the chances of that happening even if Rich and his partner got too relaxed and let they guard down. The chances of that happening is not very good. I would bet that they did something different tactically. So, don't wait, change your tactics and counter whatever they do immediately. Don't wait until you are suddenly behind three games in the second set to say, Aw crap we won the first set easily and they in second set they change things up on us. We weren't really paying attention and now we're way behind in the second set. Don't let that happen to you. And you are going to avoid that by being aware of what's going on. And this goes back to step number one-- be aware of the situation in general and then step number two was be aware of what's happening tactically on the court. So those are the first two steps. Step number three is you have to re-redouble your efforts mentally and emotionally. And this is one that kind of goes without saying as well-- but listen guys, this might be the most important part of my whole outline on this topic. Do not let your guard down after winning the first set easily-- especially if it is easily. Even if you win the first set 7-6 or 6-4-- just one break of serve or in a tie-breaker. Don't let your guard down. But especially if you win by a lot... And you guys might think it's opposite and it might be. Listen, I'm going to admit-- it might be the case that after you win 6-1 in the set , your opponent might just have a little temper tantrum and feel sorry for themselves and might just go home emotionally speaking and not even try for the second set. That's possible however, if you are going to play a match and somebody is really going to hustle and try, it's probably going to be after they get crushed in the first set. And they want to have some kind of chance of making it respectable in the second set. That's when you really want to guard against a big come-back from your opponent. Not only is it probably most likely that they are going to pick up their game and change things up, but these are the most disappointing losses as tennis players. When we are up by a lot and give away that lead and lose the match-- it's terrible. Now, I'm going to leave you guys with a really good quote that I remember. Mental toughness expert David Grumping saying on a previous episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast... This isn't a direct quote but I'm pretty sure I've got the jist of it-- he said that, 'you should never have the thoughts in your head that you are just maintaining a lead. You are either building on it or you are losing it. Let me say that again. Never think that you are going to maintain your lead in a tennis match, you are either building your lead-- you should be either trying to build your lead and if you aren't doing that, you're probably losing your lead. And this is kind of a mental thing. If you go out there with the attitude, 'Alright, we won the first set easily and we're just going to keep doin what we're doing and no big deal. This match is going to be over soon.' That's exactly when your lead starts slipping away. When you walk out there on the second set, after winning the first set easily, you need to have the mental tenacity and the mental focus to say, 'Alright, not only are we going to play just as well in the second set, we are going to play better. We are going to focus even harder because more than likely, our opponents are really going to try and fight back here and we need to keep them pushed down and we need to keep them behind in this match. So we are going to play even better tennis in this second set than we did in the first. And this is something that very few recreational players have the mental toughness and the focus to be able to do. But now that you guys have this outline, hopefully you guys will start to implement this and use it in your matches and go out and win the first set easily and then win the second set 6-0 as well. Have the focus to be able to do that. So just as a review here of the 3 steps to avoid the situation-- number one, be aware of it. Number two, re-double your efforts and your awareness tactically and number three, re-double your efforts mentally and emotionally. So stay strong. So Rich, hopefully that answers your question. I really enjoyed talking about this topic. I probably spent a little bit longer than I normally would on it just because I knew I was going to answer just one question today. But it's a fun topic to talk about and this is something that really commonly happens and I hope it's going to be a great help to all of you guys listening about it. Go out there and implement this and I'd be curious to hear feedback from you Rich and everybody else listening as well. Let me know if this makes sense and I'd love to hear some stories of you guys actually using this successfully. So Rich, thanks a lot for your great question and good luck with your tennis as you continue to work hard. [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for episode 127 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for joining me today. Thank you for downloading the show and for listening to it. I appreciate your support of the show. Just by doing that, it honestly means a lot to me just to know that there are people out there that appreciate the time and effort that I put into this show-- doing it free every week and I look forward to continuing to do it. If you ever have any questions for me that you'd like me to answer, on the show, you can always send me an email to Ian@essentialtennis.com or you can go to essentialtennis.com and click contact and there is a little form there and you can select podcasts-- you can fill out the form there to submit a question for the podcast-- just select podcast. Alright, that does it for this week. Again thanks very much everybody, take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast #128: Learn what to improve so you can beat pushers. Also find out what tactics are best to use on low, short shots.

ianw — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 14:45:35 +0000

So many tennis players absolutely hate playing pushers: tennis players who put no pace on their shots and simply put everything back in play safely. Today Ian talks about what parts of your game need to be improved to start winning against these types of opponents. Ian also talks about dealing with low, short shots. Where should you aim these? Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the essential tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it’s technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional, Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here’s Ian. IAN: Welcome to the essential tennis podcast. Your place for free experts’ tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today’s episode of the essential tennis podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com, where you can get a discount off your next purchase of professional tennis tournament tickets by using the promotional code: ESSENTIAL. Thank you very much for joining me today on the podcast. I really appreciate the fact that you downloaded this show and you’re taking the time to listen to it. I’ve always dedicated this show to passionate tennis players, and if that describes you, then you’ve come to the right place. Every week I put out a half an hour show released on Mondays that answers questions from really enthusiastic recreational players just like yourself and my goal is always to put out the best possible solid fundamental instruction so that you guys can take that advice, go and apply it to your own game and improve your tennis. And every week that happens all around the world as people listen to this show and then go and apply the simple suggestions that I give you guys. Never anything fancy or complicated here. Its things that all of us can get better at. And as a result improve our games, myself included. Real quickly before we get to today’s topics from my listeners. I want to let you guys know about another great tennis podcast that you guys can get on iTunes. It’s one of the most popular tennis podcasts on iTunes and it is created and produced by the people over at tennis.com, the same people that do Tennis Magazine, and it’s basically a round table discussion. The discussion is led by the editors and writers over at Tennis Magazine and tennis.com. It’s all about tour news so if you really like following professional men’s and women’s tennis, definitely head over to iTunes, just type in tennis and you’ll see the tennis.com podcast. Definitely suggest that you check it out. Alright, let’s get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. IAN: Alright, let’s go ahead and get to our first question on today’s show and it comes to us from Zack in Cincinnati who has listed himself as a 4.0 player. His question is a little bit lengthy here, but bare with me guys as I read through it. It’s a really good question and a question having to do with competing against a game style that most recreational player really struggle against. You guys will start to recognize this right away. I think the advice I give today is going to be definitely helpful for most of you guys out there who compete on a regular level anywhere between a 2.5 and a 3.5 level and probably most of you 4.0 players out there as well. So, Zack wrote to me and said: “I play weekly with an older player, about 65, in his prime he won many local tournaments in the 3.5 level. Because I am not a member at a club or part of a league I am subjected to playing a lot of different players who are scattered along the lines of ranking. He is among the lowest level players I play yet I seem to play worst against him. Most of it is due to the fact that he hits junk balls mostly with little to no pace and very little spin or angles. I have to rely on myself to generate my own pace on each and every shot. He has never "beaten me" but rather I beat myself. I do not want to resort to just hitting his balls back with nothing on them because that would be no fun for me and also set my game back. This experience is very frustrating because I seem to play like a 3.0 player when facing him yet, if I face a 5.5 or a 6.0 player I seem to play much, much better, almost feeling like a 4.5 player because they use pace and spin. And spin, it kicks the ball up into my strike zone and I can use their pace and add a little of my own for my own shots. What are some ways to generate my own pace and spin on a ball with absolutely nothing to work with? This problem is extremely exaggerated on my forehand side.” I wrote an email to Zack to get some clarification and just one follow up coming from him, he said: "My problem with this particular player or at least on most days is that my game doesn't seem to click at all. It's really not a question of keeping my shots in consistently but keeping them in at all. It's really hard to describe this problem because, for instance today, I didn't get mad or upset, I was just simply lost out there. Nothing is more demoralizing than just seeing any shot you try to hit with pace goes straight into the net or out lawn. Maybe he just has my number and I have to accept that but I refuse to quit." Zack. Well Zack, there's so many people all over the place, all over the world listening to this right now that are not in their heads in agreement with you and they totally understand where you're coming from. Now, I've done a podcast on dealing with pushers already and that's kind of the, you know, the phrase or the word we use to classify these types of players. Players that don't really do anything with their shots besides just get them in play without a whole lot on them. Nothing really special. But, they don't really miss a lot and that's something that most recreational players really struggle with, so, first of all I want you to realize you're not alone here so don't get too frustrated with this. I understand it definitely sucks. Alright? I totally understand that this is hard to deal with but this is the most difficult type of opponent for 99% of players out there that are 4.0 and under. And the reason for that, I wrote down four reasons here why this is so difficult for recreational players to deal with. First of all, the type of person that you're talking about playing here is usually somebody who's very experienced. As a player who's been around for a long time they're very smart. They know how to figure out what really bugs you and they've just been around the block a couple of times. They're usually more experienced than the types of players that struggle playing against them. Secondly, they're usually very crafty. They're very aware of your weakness when you play them. They have a way of kind of picking out exactly what annoys you and this type of player typically will kind of mix things up and not give you any pace to work with but will give you a lot of different looks usually. Now this player that you're describing Zack, you said that this person doesn't put a lot of spin on the ball, doesn't use many angles. You made it sound like this guy basically just hits right down the middle of the court soft and easy. And I'm going to get to that a little bit later. But, typically this type of player is somebody who will put junk on the ball and you used the term "junk baller", I think here, yea you said "he hits junk balls with little or no pace". I might reconsider your use of that term. Junk baller typically refers to a player who puts a lot of spin on the ball and lots of different types of spin to kind of throw their opponents off. I wouldn't call this player you're describing a junk baller. I would call them a counter puncher or a pusher. I would not call this person junk baller if he puts no, you said "he puts very little spin on the ball". It's just somebody who's just a smart player and very consistent. That brings me to number three, consistency. Number one, this person's experienced, number two, he's crafty, number three these types of players are always consistent and very often it's not pretty. They don't have nice looking strokes, these types of players. But, they can typically make just about everything that you hit in their vicinity and the person that you're describing Zack is no spring chicken anymore not that he still can't play the game well. Obviously he's still competing and I hope that when I'm his age I'm still able to run around and play. I think it's awesome that he's still playing. However, his number one weapon is his consistency. He probably doesn't move around the court as well as he used to. But anything that he does get to he probably misses very, very rarely. Doesn't make very many unforced errors. And that's what really makes this person difficult. You have to force him to make a mistake and that's very difficult for most players around your level to do consistently without making a lot of errors. So that's number three, this person's consistent. And number four I think this is what really bugs recreational players the most about this type of player. Number four I have written down that this type of player is usually shameless. You know what, they could care less if you respect them or not. They don't care if you walk off the court and complain about them and say, "Aw man he's just a pusher." "He doesn't really have any real shots" "He just you know he hits weak balls down the middle every time." You know what, this type of player doesn't care otherwise he wouldn't be playing. This guy's just out there to compete, he's out there to win and that's it. He's out there to enjoy himself and probably loves driving people crazy. And he doesn't care what people say about him. He just loves to be out there and he loves to play and he loves to win. And so that combination, somebody's who's experienced, crafty, consistent and shameless. He doesn't care how he does it but he keeps the ball in play one way or another. This is the type of player that everybody struggles with. Again, I wrote down 4.0 and under is definitely the main level of player that has a hard time with this type of style. But lots of different players do. Even above a 4.0 level. Now, I've got two main ways that you can deal with this Zack. The things I'm going to tell you that hopefully are going to help you out. Number one, and I talked about this in the pusher podcast which is in the archives by the way. I definitely suggest that you and everybody else listening who hate playing this type of player not only listen to this show but go to the archives at essentialtennis.com and download the pusher podcast also. But, number one, you must respect this player is not an option. Respect this player for what's he's good at, for what he's accomplished over his career as a tennis player. Don't put them down in your head or him in your head about his age, about his tactics, about his style of play, whatever. If you start to let that get in your head it will throw you off. It will put you in a negative mood and your outlook on the match will just get worse and worse. And you just don't want to be there anymore. And you'll make more mistakes and your attitude just goes right down the toilet. Now you said in your second email, Zack, that you weren't having a bad day, you weren't getting upset the particular day you were talking about and that's good. Hopefully you continue to keep that. Keep a positive attitude about it. So I guess this is more for everybody else listening. Don't disrespect this player and walk off the court and say, "Aw you know he didn't really beat me." Well, yea he did. He hit more balls in the court than you did. You missed and you don't deserve to win. A lot of you guys out there need to hear me say that and you need to accept it, seriously. Don't walk off the court after playing a pusher and say “Well he didn't beat me, I beat myself." Well guess what? That means that you didn't deserve to beat that player. You didn’t have the game. You didn't have the skills to be able to consistently attack. And so, you lost. You got beat. Whether you're the one that made the mistakes, or whether your opponent maybe made the mistake is irrelevant. At the end of the day your score was less than your opponent. So stop disrespecting this type of player. Again, this is not necessarily directed towards you Zack, but my listeners in general, you guys need to start respecting these types of players a little more. Even though they might not have a pretty game to watch, they get the job done. So, give them some respect please. Now, let's talk about actually improving your game Zack. This is what you need to do to actually start beating these types of players. First of all, and you know this goes without saying, but I'm going to talk about how to do it specifically. You need to learn how to create pace on your ground strokes reliably. And you're going to do that in three main ways. Number one, you need a solid rotation of your core of your body. Your chest and your torso need to rotate back and then around again as you make contact with the ball at least 90 degrees. On your forehanded ground stroke you need to turn to face to the right perpendicular to the baseline and then at least turn forwards as you make contact to be facing forwards towards the net so that your shoulders are parallel to the baseline. At the very least turning a little bit past that would even be better. And same thing on your backhand side, if you have a two handed backhand. If you have a one handed backhand you don't want to make quite as much of a turn. Well, I take that back, you will still rotate your core but it's a little bit different. You'll turn a little bit farther than 90 degrees initially so that your back is facing towards the net a little bit, but more work is done by your dominate shoulder. You should still rotate forwards. But anyway, in general you need a good rotation of your core on both your forehand and backhand side. That's number one, technique wise. Number two, you need a long and confident racquet pass. Most players who struggle against a pusher can't generate pace reliably because they have a relatively short swing. And there accelerating the racquet quickly, but they have a harder time controlling where it's going because they accelerate the racquet really fast over a relatively short racquet pass. You should be making a long and relaxed swing at the ball and generating pace more with the rotation of your body than the actual acceleration of your arm and shoulder and forearm and hand and wrist. You should be letting everything from your shoulder down be pretty relaxed. Obviously we want to accelerate the racquet with that part of your body, but really we should be using your core more than from your shoulder down so we can be a little bit more reliable in how the racquet is accelerated forwards. And lastly number three, I strongly suggest that you learn how to create at least a little bit of top spin to create some margin for error. You should be able to clear the net by 2, 3 feet, hit a solid shot, not necessarily super aggressive but definitely a challenging shot and be able to do it over and over again at that same height at that same pace and be able to hit a good solid shot without over doing and getting all crazy. And you need to repeat this a million times. Both forehands and backhands and learn how to create, again, repeat a strong rotation with your body, a long and relaxed swing with your arm and with your racquet and good margin for error over the top of the net and be able to do it over and over and over again. And you have to practice until you can do this. There is no substitute for solid fundamental technique. And if you're unable to do this now; I'm going to rephrase that Zack, you're unable to do this now, am I right? You described it in your question to me. And especially in the second email you that you wrote to me you were describing how every time you tried to put pace on the ball you either hit the net or it goes long. And that tells me that you have no curve to your shot. There is no arch in the path of the ball. You're hitting it dead straight. You don't have the margin for error that you need built into your shot so you need to start adding a little bit of top spin making a little bit more of a vertical swing towards the ball instead of just hitting straight through it and trying to power the ball through the court. You need some more margin for error and that's only going to happen by improving your swing technique. There's no magical fix here. You need to improve your technique so that you can create more reliable results and still be able to hit a solid shot. Without doing that you really only have two options to try to beat this player. Number one, you can try to out push or out jump ball this guy, but I don't want you to do that. I want you to move past this level where you're struggling against this type of player. I want you to improve your technique so that when you see a pusher you and look forward to it because he's sitting up on a silver platter, easy ball after easy ball. And you should be able to dominate this type of player eventually. I'm not saying next week just because you listened to this podcast you're going to be able to go and crush this guy. It's going to take some practice. But, I do want you to be able to beat him without resorting to just playing his style of tennis. Which quite honestly is probably exactly what he'd like to see. He'd love to see you step out onto the court and try to beat him at his own game. Because that's exactly what he's probably comfortable with. He'd love to push the ball all day long. So, without improving your technique that's option number one. Or, you can just keep trying to attack with inferior technique hitting the ball the way you are right now and essentially just hope that you have a good day and everything kind of clicks for your that day and everything goes into the court even though you're hitting the ball the exact same way with low margin for error. And you're going to have some good days out there and that's great, but I don't want you to be satisfied with using a low percentage ground stroke on both sides. You said especially your forehand and just waiting until everything clicks ones day, and you do awesome that day, and that's great, but, I want you to be able to be more reliable in how you attack. Just one more thing Zack. I also want you to work on your positioning. You need to work on moving yourself to the right place so that you can hit a confident shot. And the reason why I say this is because you described playing a 5.5 or a 6.0 player and being more comfortable. Now, I've got to be honest with you Zack, if that's the case, well you're probably not actually playing a 5.5 or 6.0 level guy not legitimately. If you feel more comfortable against them than hitting against a 3.5, 65 year old guy then I've just got to be real with you here; it's probably not actually a 5.5 level player. But, regardless, let's just say it's a strong 4.5 player and that he with more pace and more top spin. If you're more comfortable against that type of ball because it's got more pace so you don’t have to create your own and you said the ball is kicking up more so that's is going more into your strike zone. Well, to be honest with you it should be much easier for you to put yourself in a comfortable place against this weak, spinless ball down the middle. You said he doesn't hit angles. It sounds like he just hits a weak ball right down the middle of the court with no spin on it. And because it's not traveling very fast and it's got no spin, the ball's going to bounce up and sit in your strike zone where it's easy for you to hit. Much longer than against somebody who hits the ball hard and with a lot of top spin and so the fact that you tell me that you're having a harder time against this guy than against somebody who hits a strong solid top spin type ground stroke, tells me that your forward is definitely lacking. And you need to be able to identify and read that weak shot coming down the middle of the court. You need to react quickly and get there so that you can hit the ball in a comfortable place and so that you can hit it confidently with that good solid technique that you've been practicing. So, Zack this is pretty much it man. First of all again, respect this type player, secondly, you've got to improve your technique and that includes rotation of your body, length of your swing, adding some top spin so that you have some margin for error. That all has to happen. And then working your positioning as well so you can get yourself to a comfortable place where you can recreate those solid swings over and over again. But Zack, best of luck to you. I hope you start doing better against this guy and if I can help you any further definitely let me know. Before we get to our next question. I want to remind you guys about the official sponsor of the essential tennis podcast and that is Championship Tennis Tours. You guys can find them at tennistours.com. And they put together travel packages and ticket packages and even just individual tickets to all kinds of different professional tennis tournaments. An example of that would be a couple of upcoming events and the US Open series leading up to the US Open. And an example of that would be the Leg Mason tournament in Washington, DC. I live in Maryland. I work near DC and I plan on attending that tournament probably a couple of days or nights. So, go check out their ticket packages for the Leg Mason and if you use the promotional code, ESSENTIAL, you'll get a discount off a purchase of any ticket or package valued at $175 or more. So you guys will get a discount off your purchase plus it just shows them that you appreciate their support of the Essential Tennis Podcast. That helps them stay on as a sponsor which definitely helps me out, so, help them and they'll keep helping me. And I would appreciate that very much if you guys just check them out and see what they have to offer. And that's tennistours.com, and you're going to want to use the promotional code: ESSENTIAL. Alright, next up we've got a question from James. He wrote to me and said: "Hi Ian, I wondered whether you would consider doing a podcast specifically about how to deal with short balls correctly? By short balls I don't mean the easy type that bounce high, but the difficult low ones that are played deliberately to draw an opponent into the net. Yesterday I played against somebody who plays a lot of squash and who basically tried to slice almost everything short, draw me into the net and then lob me. This player simply did not have any top spin ground strokes that had very good placement and consistency especially using a slice backhand. Any of these short low balls were very effective. I was completely unable to play my normal game. But, fortunately came through 6.3. However, I am still very uncertain about where to hit these short balls. Assuming my opponent is staying on the baseline, is it best to play them deep, short, or angle them? Also, is there a way of deciding whether it is best to continue to the net or sprint back to the baseline after hitting these balls? This type of shot also seems to occur quite often against more regular opponents. So I feel it would be a really good area in which to improve my tactical play. Thanks as always for any help you can offer. James." Sure James! I'm going to try to get through this quickly here since we're running out of time. I'm probably going to go over time today. Hopefully that will make up for having a little bit shorter of a show last week. Now, you basically have three choices when dealing with a short low ball like what you're describing James. I'm definitely keeping in mind here that this is a shot that's kind of difficult to get to, it's definitely dropping. We're not meeting this ball at waist height or shoulder height and really able to attack on it. But rather it's definitely dropping kind of towards the bottom end of our strike zone. So, you've got three choices. Number one, you can play a slice deep down the line. I'm going to list the pros and cons of each of our three main options here. Most of my options are going to have to do with hitting the ball down the line. If you guys don't know why it's smarter to hit down the line in an approach situation, definitely go to the video section of essentialtennis.com and I have a video showing you guys why it's smarter to go down the line on an approach shot. But I'm just going to mention right now, it's usually smarter to go down the line. It's not always. There's some situations where cross court is a good play. But in general down the line is a little bit better shot to play. So, option number one, play a slice down the line. The pros of doing this, the benefits are if hit well it can stay nice and low making a passing shot are a lot difficult. If you guys are able to hit a nice kind of biting slice that stays low over the net and low to the ground, this can be a really good play to use that slice and taking that low shot and putting back spin on it kind of makes it easier to guide deep into the court and place it easily down the line. I'm kind of getting ahead of myself here. That's pro number one. Pro number two it's easy to aim and direct. In general, that slice shot is just really direct technique wise. You're lining your strings up and hitting straight through the ball towards your target. It's a much simpler shot than trying to hit a drive or top spin. And number three it's relatively high percentage for most people. Most people have a pretty easy time playing the slice. Now if that's not you, if you're not good at putting backspin on the ball and directing accurately, then I suggest that you work on this James. Because it can really help out on a low shot where you're being pulled into the net. Now the cons of playing a deep slice down the line or number one; if you don't hit it well that backspin can cause the ball to kind of check up and sit there and become a kind of sitting easy shot for your opponent back on the baseline. So this is a shot that you need to practice. If you can't keep it low already; if your slice shots tend to kind of float up into the air and kind of slow and just kind of sit there then you're going to want to work on it. I'm not going to go to the technique now but you want to try to play a kind of a biting lower slice. And so that's con number one. If you don't hit it well it's just going to kind of sit there. Number two. A slice in general travels more slowly than a drive/top spin shot. Again I said generally. It is not necessarily true all the time but it's definitely easier to hit the ball harder and more aggressively when putting top spin on it. And I realize that this a low ball so most people don't have that shot. We're going to get to that a little bit later. So, slice is a great option for this shot but, one of the cons is that it's not going to travel through the court as fast. It's not going to be as aggressive of a shot as if you were able to drive it or hit a top spin shot. Alright, option number two. Hit a drive/top spin shot deep down the line. And the pro here and the benefit is that you can hit it with more pace and more aggressiveness than a slice and still be able to keep it in play. Slice backspin causes the ball to float and travel farther through the court. A top spin shot pushes the ball back downwards into the court. And so if you’re able to get below it even though it’s a low shot; if you're able to get your racquet below it and hit up on the ball aggressively enough to spin it you can curve the ball back down into the court again and that's going to allow you to hit with more pace and be able to kind of hit right through the court and pressure your opponent a little bit more than with a slice. However, there are several cons to hitting with a drive/top spin type shot. Number one, if you don't really play it well the ball doesn't get hit through the court. The top spin; if you spin it quite a bit and hit kind of a heavier ball; if you don't hit it solidly that top spin can also cause the ball to kind of bounce up right into the strike zone of your opponent, which can give them an easy to ball to hit a passing shot or a lob on. Secondly, and I mentioned this before, it's definitely technically more complicated and more difficult to make and in my opinion it definitely takes more skill to take that low ball, hit it with top spin and make it than it does to use the slice. The slice is definitely a simpler shot to make. And thirdly, it definitely takes more confidence to hit, because it's a more complicated swing and because it's a more aggressive swing you have to really feel confident about going for it. Otherwise, you're going to dump it into the net or not put a lot of spin on it and make it float long. So, it definitely takes more confidence than just hitting that slice and directing it deep into the court. Alright, and option number three. Option number one was slice deep down the line, option number two was hit a drive/top spin shot deep down the line, option number three is hit a short ball right back. Just drop shot them as you're running into the net. And this definitely takes some touch. And I'll go over the pros and cons. Pros; it can be thrown in as a change of pace/surprise play. You can mix this in along with some deeper approach shots and catch this guy off guard and give him a taste of his own medicine. Number two, if you do hit it well, it makes passing shots and lobs more difficult as he runs forwards into the court. He's got less room to hit around you because he's getting closer to you and there's less room, there's less visibility around you because you're taking up more of the court from his vantage point as he gets closer and closer to the net to recover your drop shot. So those are the two main pros. Con is that if you don't hit it well you're just a sitting duck. If you try to hit it short and you just kind of pop it up and it's not very short and it just sits up there in the air, obviously, once you just has no ability to hit the ball aggressively and hit it past you you're just going to be sitting there an easy target. So that's definitely the con of trying to hit short right back. So, which one of these three options is best? Well, when trying to select which one is the best play you have to know two things. You have to know your opponent and you have to know what they're good at. Whether their forehand or backhand side is stronger. Whether they're better at passing shots or better at lobs. Whether they prefer to hit lower in their strike zone or higher in their strike zone. How mobile they are. If they can run and hustle and get to a short drop shot. You need to know all these things and you have to take them into account. And really very often you want to mix these options up to keep your opponent off balance and make them have to hit a lot of different types of shots in order to beat you. Number two, you have to know your strengths and weaknesses. So, walking onto the court that day you've got to know, do you prefer to hit a slice? Or prefer to hit a drive or top spin shot? Do you have good hands where you can take that short ball and hit it really short right back and make him have to run into the net himself? You've got to know your own game. And you have to know his game. And then you got to kind of mix those together and come up with a game plan. Come up with a good, solid, tactical plan for that day. And again, lastly I'm going to mention one more time that you should be practicing all three of these options, James. So that based on what opponent you come up against, whether it be this squash player guy or somebody else who gives you a lot of short shots, practice all three of these options so that when you figure out what play is going to be the best suited for that day against that opponent you can do it confidently and use whichever of these three main options makes the most sense. So, James hopefully that's helpful to you. Thanks very much for your great question. Good luck with this. Let me know how you do. Alright. That does it for episode #128 of the essential tennis podcast. Once again, thank you very much for spending some time with me. Thank you for listening to the show. I really truly hope that it's been a help to you. I hope that it's been informative and instructional and I hope you're able to take these suggestions, go and use them on the court and improve your own game. And if it does help you, I'd always love to hear back from you. Let me know what's been helpful to you. Maybe wasn't hasn't been helpful. Any suggestions that you might have for the show. You guys can always feel free to contact me at Ian, I-a-n, @essentialtennis.com. Alright, that does it for this week. I will talk to you guys again next Monday. Until then, take care and good luck with your tennis.

Podcast #129: Stop positioning yourself too close to the ball on your ground strokes! Learn how.

ianw — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 14:47:23 +0000

So many recreational players position themselves too close to the ball over and over again. Stop doing that! In today's show you'll learn two drills that you can do with a partner that will improve your judgement of where the ball is and your relationship to it after it bounces. Also learn how positioning yourself better for easy, short shots. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the essential tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it’s technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional, Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here’s Ian. IAN: Hi, and welcome to the essential tennis podcast. Your place for free experts’ tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today’s episode of the essential tennis podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com, where you can receive a discount off your next purchase of professional tennis events tickets by using the promotional code: ESSENTIAL. Well, thank you very much for joining me today and especially if you’re a new listener. Last week we got a whole bunch of new listeners; a lot more downloads than normal. I think it was probably due to the topic. Last week we talked about pushers and being more successful against pushers, always a very popular topic. So, if you are in fact new to the show I want to welcome you and I hope that you came back to listen to this week’s episode. If you are new to the show make sure to check it out on iTunes. That’s the fastest and easiest way to get the podcast every week you can click, “subscribe”, in the iTunes music store and automatically get the show every week when I come out with it on Mondays. So definitely check that out. Alright, let’s go ahead and get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. Alright let’s go ahead and get started with our first game improving topic and that always is my goal here on the podcast is to bring you guys information that can help you become a better tennis player. That’s what this show is all about. And today is definitely no exception. Let’s go ahead and start with our first question, which is from Christian in Ecuador. Christian wrote to me and said: “I have been practicing tennis since about a year ago. I took some tennis lessons with a couple of instructors and all of them have told me that I have to improve my footwork. Sometimes I do not bend my knees enough and I also let the ball get too close to me. Could you please describe some drills to improve my footwork and place my body at the right distance from the ball?” Best regards, Christian. Christian, good question. This is a great question because first of all, footwork is so important to tennis and it’s definitely one of the most important parts of the game. Yet I think it’s underrated among recreational players and I think probably especially modern day recreational players who really get caught up I think especially those of you who spend a lot of time online looking around for instruction and for video. I think a lot of you guys get too caught up in technique. Not that technique is not important; obviously it’s crucial for you guys to have solid technique to be a good tennis player. But, one of the easiest ways to tell the difference between an average level recreation player and a higher level one, let’s say one that’s 4.5 or 5.0, is footwork. Without even looking at stroke technique it’s very easy to pick out players who aren’t as high in level because they just don’t do as much with their feet. And by the way, if you’re listening to this podcast you’re probably aware of the great video that Will, over a Fuzzy Yellow Balls came out with. Will and Adam; I should make sure to mention Adam’s name in their as well. But, they both came out with a really good footwork video just about a week ago and it’s been getting a lot of attention over there, so check that out. There are some things in the video that I don’t agree with but I think that most of it is really solid and it’s something that you guys listening, really could stand to spend some more time focusing on to make your games better. You can only be as good as the position that you give yourself to be able to hit the ball solidly. Now Christian, let’s talk about your problem specifically, which is getting too close to the ball. And in my experience teaching, this is something that’s very common. A lot of recreational players misjudge the bounce and they misjudge their distance from the ball after it’s bounced and they end up kind of overrunning and overplaying their position and they put themselves too close to the ball and end up getting jammed up at contact. The result is usually poor swing mechanics because your core, because your body, your stance, and all of you because all of you is so close to the ball. It makes it impossible to extend your arm out towards the ball as you make contact and when you get jammed up like that and your arm remains too close to your body it’s really difficult to make a fluid, loose and long athletic swing towards the ball and most players end up just kind of pushing the ball back in the play. To be honest with you guys that’s really kind of all that’s possible. It’s really tough to still hit a solid shot once you get too close to the ball. Again, this is something that is not uncommon at all. So, Christian don’t feel badly about it. I’m going to give you two drills that you can do to help you get better at judging where the ball is and also where you’re body is in relationship to the ball and where the ball is landing and coming back down to. The fist drill I’m going to describe to you guys I have titled simply, “the catch the ball at the hip drill”. Very uncreative, I know, sorry. It does just what the title says. You and your partner; you’re going to need a partner to do this and not just Christian should be doing this. I want all of you guys to go out and try this drill. It’s a really good one to find out exactly how good you are at judging, again, the bounce and where you are in relationship to the ball. But you guys should go out with a partner and both of you guys should start right in the middle of the service line and neither of you guys need a racquet, so leave your racquet over on the side of the court. Both of you should go to the middle of the service line, one of you will start with a tennis ball in your hands, and the other person will not. So you just need one ball between the two of you. The person who starts off without the tennis ball is going to put his or her hands on each hip, so at your side, not in front of you, but at your side right at hip height with your palms facing out. So, your hands should be facing forwards towards the net and you want your wrists to be touching your hips. Kind of right at your side with your hands facing forwards. Now, from that position with each of you on either side of the net, one person with their hand at their hips, the other person with the ball, the person with the ball is going to toss it up into the air so that it lands inside either service box on the other side of the court. The person who just had the ball tossed towards them; their goal is to catch this ball after one bounce without taking their hand off their hips. So that means that this player must move their feet quickly and efficiently and very accurately, I might add, to be able to reposition their entire body without, again, their hands cannot leave their hips. So that means that in order to catch the ball after one bounce this person must position their body perfectly so that after the ball bounces and comes up into the air it comes back down again into either the right or the left hand of the person trying to catch the ball. So, again, this person cannot move their hands at all. They have to stay essentially connected to their hips; their right and their left hip one on each side and must catch the ball after one bounce. Not two bounces, not on a fly, but after one bounce. And a couple of notes on this: In order to do this correctly and to do this successfully, you need to be able to move effectively right and left and up and back. You have to be able to move anywhere and judge where the ball is going to end up within a very small margin for error. Your hands don’t take up a large amount of space and so you have to be very accurate with how you’re moving your body up and back and right and left. And that’s the whole point here is to build some greater awareness of where your body is in relationship to the ball. One more thing, kind of a little rule here, you must catch the ball with the hand that is on the side that the ball bounced on. So, in other words, if you’re receiving the ball and the ball lands on the deuce half of the court, on the deuce side service box, so the service box to your right you must catch with your right hand. If it lands on the left service box you must catch with your left hand. And you guys can make a little competitive game out of this as well, which can actually be pretty fun. I’ve played this with students and it’s a good workout and really, really good to develop your guys eye hand coordination and your awareness of where your body is in relationship to the ball. And the way that you play is you both start off in the middle of the service line and one person tosses the ball to the other side; it must bounce inside either service box, the other person must catch on one bounce and without taking their hand off their hips and then after you’ve caught the ball, you toss it again back to your opponent and you can take one step. So you can take, kind of like in basketball after you catch the ball, you can take one pivot step in any direction you want and toss the ball to your opponent’s side of the court. And so, you can kind of work each other back and forth trying to win the point by causing your opponent to drop the ball or to not be able to get to the ball. Now, you want to be fair with this. You can’t use an overhand you know throw and just kind of whip it over right at the court; it’s on the other side. So, create rules that are fair for both players. Rules such as, the ball must travel upwards, out of the hand you can’t throw it down, it must be an underhand throw, etc. Or maybe you could create a height requirement; the ball must travel over the net 2 feet or 3 feet over the top of the net, whatever, but, you guys get the idea. And this ends up being a good workout and a great way to develop your judgment. So Christian, I suggest that you try this. Everybody else listening try this as well. It’s a great competitive drill or cooperative drill, whichever way you want to do it. And one variation on this; once you get good at doing this from the service line, have one player go back to the baseline and the second player remain around the service line and actually feed shots. So, take their racquet using open racquet face, a continental grip; just feed kind of high deep shots, but vary the depth, vary the width and have the person receiving the ball still keep their hands on their hips and move their feet to be able to catch it right at hip height, right where they’re leaving their hands, right on their hips. Now, this is a lot harder than you guys think. If you’re just listening to me describe this and you’ve never tried it before, either on the service line or on the baseline, it’s a lot harder than you think. Alright. Even if you consider yourself to already have really good footwork. This is like a whole, this is like next level type stuff. You really have to be extremely accurate with your footwork and with your judgment. When you first start doing this, you will screw it up. And you’re going to like run at the ball, and it’ll bounce way higher than you thought and it’s not even going to be close and it’s going to like hit you in the forehead and you thought you were in the right place to catch it at your waist. You’ll be surprised most likely, I mean if you’re not, write me, please. If you go and do this for the very first time and you never screw up and you catch it without moving your hands every time, good job. You’re a really good athlete and you’ve got great eye hand coordination. You guys will be surprised at how difficult this is, and especially when you go back to the baseline. And so, it’ll help you realize how much you should be moving your feet because recreational players all too often stand in one place on the baseline as far as depth. And they’ll move right and left because they have to get the ball before it goes past them. But, too many recreational players don’t move up and back with the ball very well and once you start having to catch the ball at waist height without using your racquet and without using your hands off of your hips you’ll start to realize exactly how little you’ve been moving your feet up until now unless you’re already a 5.0 player. But, if you’re a 5.0 player you’re probably not listening to my voice right now anyway. So, I really suggest that all of guys try this and if it’s easy first try let me know, seriously, and I’ll respond and tell you “good job”. Alright, let’s go on to the second drill here. I’ve got another one to help you guys work on your positioning and to work on your footwork. And this one has to do with varying your contact point. And this is something that I do specifically with players who have a hard time giving themselves enough space between themselves and the ball. I use this specifically for players who jam themselves on either of their forehand or backhand side over and over again. And it’s a definite pattern. And that’s something that I definitely see quite a bit of. I really haven’t ever seen a recreational player who consistently stops early, either men or women, you know regardless of level; I don’t think I’ve ever seen a player who has plenty of time, but stops, misjudges where the ball is going and ends up being way too far away from the ball and you know, kind of like hesto(15:06) fall over and swing at the same time because they didn’t put themselves close enough. However, I very commonly see players that overrun where they’re supposed to be and end up trying to hit with the ball way to close to them. So, this is a drill that I’ve kind of developed to help players break away from that pattern and break away from that habit. So in order to complete this, we need one person who is hitting, and one person who is feeding. And the person who is feeding, ideally, you guys really want somebody who can hit you a consistent shot over and over again. And we’re looking for a ball on either of the forehand or backhand side, whichever side that you want to work on. That’s about three or four steps away from the center of the baseline. And the feeder, again, this is important, if you guys have a ball machine that would really be ideal. If not, we want somebody who can give you a consistent height, a consistent speed, a consistent depth and a consistent width. And to be a consistent feeder you have to control all of those things. That’s why it’s not easy to be a good feeder. That’s probably something I should talk about at some point on the podcast, or maybe I should do a video about that; about how to feed correctly. But, you guys want somebody who can give you a consistent ball. And once you have that you want this person to feed to the exact same place over and over again. And I find that most players have problems being too close to the ball on the forehand side. So let’s say that the feeder is hitting you shots out to your right if you’re a right handed player, again about three or four steps away from the middle of the baseline. And I want you guys who have problems being too close to the ball to go through this sequence of shots. First of all, I want you to hit five shots in a row on your forehand side off of these consistent feeds that are way too close to your body. Alright? Now, maybe you already do this and so this probably will be very easy for you but, I want you, and even if you don’t have problems being too close to the ball but you just want to improve your footwork and your judgments I want you guys to try this. So, hit five shots in a row that are clearly too close to your body and too jammed up. I don't care if you make this shot or not or where the ball goes. Just make an attempt to hit a ball after you place yourself too close to it. Next, hit five shots in a row that have a contact point that are definitely too far away from your body. Too far away; and I'm talking clearly too far away where you plant yourself, you get ready to swing and you can't even hit the ball unless you just totally lose your balance and have to kind of fall forward towards the ball in order to reach it. Because it’s just way too far away. Now, if you do have a habit of putting yourself too close to the ball, this is probably going to be hard for you. And in my experience, after I have my students hit five shots in a row that are too close, and then I say, "Okay, I'm going to give you that same feed. I want you to hit five in a row where you purposefully position yourself too far away from the ball." And usually the very first time they try it or maybe even the first five or ten times they try it they actually position themselves just right. And they're thinking to themselves in their own head, "Alright, I’m going to stop myself too far away." And they stop themselves to what seems like too far away to them but it actually ends up being just right. And then I say, "No, that wasn't too far away. In fact that was just about perfect." You need to double that distance away from you and just make it obvious that you're too far away from the ball. Again, the whole point here is not to practice being in the wrong place and making your swing. The point here is to break you guys away from the habit of being too close. Christian, specifically here in Ecuador, but anybody else who's listening who is consistently too close on either side. The point here it to break your habit and to kind of get away from that muscle memory of putting yourself too close and feel what it feels like to actually make the opposite mistake. After you've done that five times in a row, meaning if you do four in a row that are, "Alright that was way too far away." And then the fifth one, it's comfortable or too close, start over again. Do five in a row that are too far away. And then finish it up with five in a row that are just right that are in a comfortable place. And I suggest that you guys go through this sequence a couple of times. If this is an area that you struggle with, keep going through that sequence. Five shots in a row that are too close. Five shots in a row that are too far away. Five shots in a row that are just in the right place. The point here is to judge where the ball is going and purposefully mix up how you position yourself in relationship to the ball. So that you guys can get away from whatever habit you have, that's assumedly incorrect here, and learn how to judge and put yourself in the right place. So we want to break away from your habits, feel something different and then learn what it feels like when it is in fact correct. So, Christian that pretty much wraps it up. Those are my two suggestions for drills to improve your positioning and to improve your judgment of the ball and to improve your footwork. All three of those things will get better if you practice these two drills and find a partner to do them with and hopefully this is helpful to you. I'd love to hear back from you. Let me know how it goes when you attempt these drills for the first time and the rest of you listening, if these drills are helpful as well, definitely let me know. I'd love to hear how it was helpful or even not helpful. If it doesn't make sense feel free to shoot me an email and let me know. Before we get to our second question on today's episode of the essential tennis podcast, I just want to remind you all about the official sponsor of the podcast, and that is tennistours.com. They are kind enough to support me in what I'm doing here on the podcast financially by being an advertiser and so I ask that you guys return the favor since they are helping me continue to do this by at least checking them out. At least go see what they have available. You'll probably be surprised at the wide range of different tournaments that they have tickets for and also the different kind of wide array of packages that they also have available. Ranging from hotel to limousine or shuttle service. Other tickets in the example of the US Open. A lot of times they package together kind of a freebie for like a Yankees game or a show on Broadway, etc. So, they have all kinds of different packages available or if you just want to purchase individual day tickets as well for a lot of the bigger tournaments, they have that too. So, go check them out and see what they have. If you’re going to a tournament soon, please give them a shot and use the promotional code: ESSENTIAL, with a capital E, and you'll get a discount off of any purchase over $175. I thank them very much for their support of the essential tennis podcast. Alright, let's go ahead and get to our second question on today's episode on the podcast and it comes to us from Nicole, in San Francisco, California who's a 3.0 player. She wrote to me and said: "My question is about shots you do as your running to the net. I tend to get a lot of these because as a 3.0 player with fairly good baseline hitting, my opponents sometimes just barely return the ball back over the net. You'd think this would be great because the short approach shot allows you to go for a winner but normally these are short wobbly shots that make it over the net and I need to run and hit it back. Sounds easy enough, but sometimes my racquet isn't turned right, my balance is off and I can't decide if I should hit the forehand or backhand side. Setting up for these lame shots that come over the net is hard and I end up losing the point because the ball flies out of the court or into the net. Can you give some tips on how to hit these shots?" IAN: And then she says, " P.S., I don't have problem getting to them, I'm very fast on the court. It's just the movement that flusters me." Well, Nicole I definitely feel your pain and I think just about everybody listening does as well. It really really hurts to get a short, weak, easy shot. And to get there quickly you say that you move around the court really well. It sucks to get that short easy shot. To get there quickly and then to just miss it for not good reason. And I'm going to talk about both main elements here. The movement and the technique of actually hitting this shot. I'm going to try to get both in quickly. First of all, movement wise, I've got two main things here that you need to work on. First of all you must make a choice immediately about which shot to use. Either forehand or backhand. And if you get a lot of shots that land right around the center of the court that are slow and weak. Or if you're really fast, even if it's not right in the middle of the court, it's very possible you could easily hit either shot. Even if it is a little bit to the right or to the left of the center of the court. I suggest that; this is probably the most obvious statement of the podcast; I suggest that you use whichever you're most confident with and use that shot as often as possible. Either your forehand or your backhand. Even if it means running around your weaker side. So, if your forehand is more confident in general and you on average hit it better than your backhand, I want you to get better at making kind of a snap decision to hit a forehand as often as you can. Even if it means running around to the left, three, six, or maybe even ten feet to get a really easy forehand and to move around it. I'd rather that you have a shot that you prefer and you make a quick decision on which shot to hit than to be really wishy washy about it and kind of wait to the last second and not really commit to the shot and you'll end up making a lot of mistakes that way. Now practice on this is going to build your confidence and skill. And as I said a second ago, we want to start making this an immediate decision during your match play. And so that means you have to practice this during your practice time on the court. Now, if you happen to be one of those people that likes both shots equally as well, and I don't think I know more than one or two people who can honestly say that they like both their forehand and their backhand just as well. They hit them both with pretty much equal results. They feel just as coordinated, and just as confident on both sides. If that happens to be you or anybody else listening; since your having trouble with this, honestly I would spend a bunch of time maybe the next couple of weeks really drilling one or the other exclusively on the short shot so that you can kind of a more go to shot on this short ball. It's not that I want you to have a weaker side and to lose confidence in one side, but it sounds like you're really making a lot of mistakes due to indecisiveness and just not really sure which one to go for and as a result, your movement and your positioning is suffering. So I want you to get more confident in either your forehand or backhand side and start making that kind of your go to shots so that anytime you get kind of a floater, short, easy shot, you know, alright, I'm going to hit a forehand on this for sure no matter what and it's going to be solid. I've hit a ton of these and you can go for it with confidence rather than being unsure of yourself. So, that's the first part. The first part having to do with movement. I want you to start making a choice immediately about which shot to use. Secondly, your balance and your positioning, etc.; both things that you mentioned. This will start to come as well with repetition during practice. You have to practice this shot on purpose. Get somebody to feed you short easy shots or get a ball machine to feed you short easy shots. And you have to learn how to be an athlete and hit an effective shot while moving dynamically at the same time. And that might be just moving forwards quickly to get to a shot that's really low and short, but still a relatively easy shot. It might mean moving around a backhand to hit a forehand while you're moving forwards, whatever. But a lot of times these short balls, we don't give them enough respect because they're supposed to be easy and yet, we don't practice them enough to be really good at moving and hitting the ball at the same time as we move into kind of try to put the ball away or finish the point. It sounds like you've got plenty of quickness which you've said in your question, you've got plenty of quickness. Now you need to learn to hit these shots with balance and that takes practice. So, another reason to practice this shot a lot. Not only do you have to learn how to take one shot or the other probably more or often and make that decision more quickly. But you have to develop some more balance as you do so. And everything will get better when that happens. And that's going to come through repetition and practice. Now real quickly here let's talk about the technique of this shot because this is a really really common shot for recreational players to screw up. The short easy shot. And it's crappy because, again, it’s an easy ball, it’s a shot that everybody thinks, "Oh I should be able to put this away just like on TV and finish the point." And when you miss that shot it's really kind of deflating. And it's terrible to miss it. Now, the biggest reason in my experience why this shot is missed by recreational players is because they hit the ball too straight and too flat with a very little margin for error. Believe it or not, even when the pros hit this type of shot, they're still hitting the ball with top spin. Now, it might not be as much top spin as a ball that's struck from behind the baseline and hit with a big loop in it up over the net to make it safe and come back down again. But they are still hitting the ball with top spin most of the time. Once in a while they get one so easy that they literally just hit flat right at their target over the top of the net. But most of these types of short balls are still hit with top spin by the pros. Assuming that they're driving it and it's not dropping so low that they're playing some kind of slice or backspin shot which can be effective as well. But I can tell from your question here, Nicole, that you're talking about a ball that's easy and you're trying to hit with some aggressiveness. So, you want to start adding some more top spin to this shot so that there's more curve in the path of the ball. And that's going to give you more margin for error and make it safer for you to attack without making so many mistakes. Both into the net and lawn. And there's two main technique elements that are going to make this possible. Number one, we need an upward swing pass. That's what's going to lift to the ball to get it over the top of the net safely. Number two, we need a flat racquet face relatively speaking. We don't want the racquet face tilted upwards towards the sky because if we combine that with an upward swing pass you know what's going to happen, the ball is going to go too far. And that's what happens when players miss lawn. So, basically, anytime you miss a lawn, during your practice when go to practice this shot, anytime you miss a lawn I want you to close your racquet face more. Don't change your grip just take your hand and turn the racquet face, turn the string bed so that it's more closed and make the same swing that you just made a second ago when you missed lawn. Don't take anything off of it; hit it with the same amount of confidence. Every time that you hit the net I want you to accelerate upwards more, not forwards, but vertically upwards. So we need to balance these two things out. The upward swing and the closed racquet face. Anytime you hit the net do your best to leave the racquet face the same but hit upwards more aggressively. Every time that you miss lawn, do your best to keep the swing path the same but close the racquet face a little bit more. And so we need to find a good balance between how fast you're accelerating upwards with exactly how closed the racquet face is. And practice this again and again so that you can clear the net by a good foot or two feet and still keep the ball inside the baseline by four or five or six feet with a confident swing. Once you can do that and you put in enough repetitions that you can also get better balance and get better at moving quickly and making a more decisive choice right away about which shot to hit, you're going to start crushing these Nicole, and you're not going to be a 3.0 player for long. Once you're able to hit these consistently and start to put them away with confidence. So, best of luck with this. Thank you very much for being a listener. Nicole had some kinds words about being a listener of my show as well early on in her question so thank you for that Nicole. Thank you for being a listener and good luck with this. Let me know how you do. Alright. That does it for episode #129 of the essential tennis podcast. Thank you very much for taking the time to download and listen to this show today. I really appreciate it. Make sure that you tune in next week. I'm going to have a special guest with me on the show. He is a professional tennis player. Not anybody who's like a big name, you know, house hold name or anything, but somebody who makes their living playing tennis professionally in the ATP Tour. He's going to be answering some questions about doubles and I'm also going to have an announcement about something that I'm going to be releasing next week that I'm really excited about. So make sure to listen to next week's show to catch that. Until then, take care and good luck with your tennis.

Podcast #130: Improve your doubles game now! Learn now to strategize like the pros in today’s interview with professional player Ashley Fisher.

ianw — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 14:49:32 +0000

So what do the pros do that set them apart from the rest of the world? Today Ashley Fisher spends some time with Ian telling him about the ins and outs of professional level doubles. Many listener questions are answered and they also discuss the newest product from Essential Tennis: Doubles Domination. Check out what free instructional downloads are available right now! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Ian: Thank you very much for joining me today for episode number 130 of the podcast. I have a very special guest today on the podcast and we are going to be discussing all Doubles topics. and I have a very special announcement to make on the show today as well. You'll have to wait and see what that is. But lets go ahead and get to the interview. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. My guest today on the podcast is ATP touring professional Ashley Fisher. He is actually currently coaching and is up in Canada getting ready for a tournament there with his Doubles team. Ashley, just to give you guys a little background, has had a career high ranking in the ATP Doubles tour of number 19. He's played in the main draw of all four grand-slam tournaments, and he's got a best result in the Grand Slams of making it to the semi-finals and the U.S. Open. Ashley, thank you very much for sending some time with me and to answer some questions from my listeners. Ashley: Your welcome, Ian. Good evening. Ian: Well, let's start things off by telling myself, my listeners a little bit more about yourself. I just gave a kind of a really brief overview of what you've done so far, but you're a Doubles specialist, you're from Australia, tell us a little bit more about your background as a player. Ashley: Well I grew up playing Junior tennis in Australia until I was eighteen years of age at which point I moved over to the U.S. On a tennis scholarship. I played four years of Collegiate tennis at Texas (inaudible) University which was a great experience for me in all honesty if my game wasn't great in the tour I would have been eaten up and spit out very quickly, so it was an excellent opportunity to stay and hone my skills. Turned pro about 1998 after I graduated, and it was pretty evident to me early on that Doubles was going to be my forte and I progressed through the rankings a lot faster than Doubles and Singles. And in 2000 sort of broke into the top 100 and was able to do an ATP World event and I've been doing it ever since. Unfortunately I've had some injury issues the last two years, had four (inaudible), two in each knee which has been frustrating, its set me back, I haven't been able to play at all this year. But the flip-side is it's given me an opportunity to get into other aspects of tennis. I've done some coaching, which I thoroughly enjoy, as well as some commentary for Tennis channel, so it's opened my eyes up to what will eventually have to happen. I can't play tennis forever, so in that it seems its been an excellent opportunity to get some experience. Ian: All right, great. Well it's an, we're going to talk a little bit about your website as well, it's great that you're starting to get involved in different avenues of the sport. You're my favorite kind of tennis player. You've gone through all the hard work to develop yourself as a Junior, as a College player, you know, you've developed yourself enough to where you've been able to be successful on the professional tour, and you're starting to get to the point where you're thinking about what's next, and you're still being involved in tennis. And you're reaching out to the fans and coaches like myself, and it's just really good to see, so I really enjoy my time talking with you. So let's talk a little bit about your website, which is tennis-update.com. Tell us a little bit about the site and what you are doing there. Ashley: Well thanks for saying that, Ian. I love tennis and whatever it is, if its playing, coaching, (inaudible), I want to stay involved in the sport that's given me so much. It's nice to try and give something back, it's a passion of mine, I'm a huge tennis fan. Ian: Awesome. Ashley: I'd love to stay involved. So this year I've had a lot of spare time on my hands with my injury. So one of my little ventures is to create a website. As you said its tennis-update.com, and it's got a few different purposes, but the main concept is just kind of an inside look at the ATP world tour. I travel a lot to these tournaments, whether its coaching, commentary and these flip-cams that have now come out are incredible so I'm just getting a lot of video blogging, interviews, just inside stuff that fans don't have access to. Whether it's locker rooms, player lounges, player parties and just things of that nature that I see on a daily basis that I want to share with fans. And give you guys some insight into what our lives are like, not just on the tennis courts. Yeah, I'm having some fun with it, it's great experience for me to practice doing some interviews and most of the players are very accessible which helps. Check it out, I think you can have some fun with it. I've got a great interview from the Bryan brothers right after they broke the record in L.A., and like I said the players are very open, they love reaching out to the fans. So have a look. Ian: Yeah I actually just went through and checked out a bunch of your most recent videos that you've put up there. And for people like myself who just love the sport, and love to watch professional players, I hope you keep doing it and I hope it's successful because it is so much fun to get a behind the scenes look at what the players are like when they're not on the court. How they spend they're time. Another example of a video that Ashley just put up was one in the training room at the (inaudible) in Washington D.C. They had a rain-out day earlier this week, so Ashley is just chatting with some of the players in the hotel workout room room as they are staying active and trying to find something to do. I think videos like that the fans are really going to respond to well, and they are going to love to see the personal side of the tour like that. We don't get to see much of that, so I hope it continues to be successful and I hope all my listeners go check it out. Ashley: Well thanks Ian, you hit the hammer on the head. A lot of the guys have excellent personality's that often doesn't come across on the tennis court, so its an opportunity for the fans to see that. Ian: yeah, I hope it keeps going well. So let's move on to our main topic today, and that is Doubles. That's why I have you on, and I actually am announcing today for the first time on the podcast a Doubles product, a course that I have coming out. I'm going to be releasing information about this week and my listeners can go check that out at doublesdomination.com. It;s all instructional having to do with tactics and strategy, having to do with Doubles for the recreational player. And the reason why I have Ashley on today is because he is one of the professional players that I interviewed. He and I talked for a full hour discussing Doubles tactics, and partner relationships, and things of that nature specifically for the recreational player. That interview is going to be a part of the full download of Doubles Domination. I'm not going to go into a ton of detail today about the product. Instead, Ashley and I are going to have another discussion today about Doubles tactics. We are going to be answering some questions today of members of the forums of essentialtennis.com. So, Ashley, if you're ready, we'll go ahead and get going with our first question here. Ashley: Sure! I like the sound of Doubles Domination. I'm looking forward to doing some domination myself on tour. Ian: All right lets get going with our first question, and it comes from Steve in North Carolina. He wrote to us and said, 'When do I move up or back when I'm around the service line? I know that I should close in when my partner hits and back-up when the other team hits past me. How does this work?'. And this is actually a whole section of my product and I refer to this as shading, moving up and back and also right and left with the ball. And Ashley, can you talk about that a little bit and tell my listeners how they should be moving on the courts? Ashley: Yeah, sure. You always want to move as a team – the Bryan brothers are an excellent example. If your partner shifts left than you shift with him or her, so in that instance you'd be cutting off the middle and you'd be having the sideline. You always want to take away the high percentage shots and give your partner the angle. You can't cover the whole court, you have to give up certain parts of it. As for moving backwards, as a volley, you always want to try to have an aggressive stance and looking to move forward and get closer to the net. The closer you are the more options you have with angles and so forth. So in most instances look to be aggressive and look to be volleying on your toes, not your heels. Ian: Okay. As a coach of recreational players I'm definitely always trying to get players more comfortable getting closer to the net. It's something that a lot of club players don't like to do definitely first. And that's definitely, it can be a big negative as a Doubles player. Let's move forward. Let's talk a little bit about backing up. When is it smart to back up? Because I think a lot of coaches and pros really preach, 'get close to the net and close in really hard', but a lot of times I think they leave out when its smart to back up. So can you talk to us a little bit about when it is a good idea not to be super close to the net? Ashley: Well are you talking about retreating to the baseline when you've already made a move to the net? Ian: Not necessarily moving all the way back to the baseline, but not as close. So let's say that you and I are playing a point, Ashley, you serve and I close forwards to try and cut-off the return, but the return makes it past me and the returner has made a great shot. Do you think I should be staying close to the net at that point? Ashley: Well, the problem with backing up is you open up the court for your opponent. You give them more angles. It's a lot easier for them to put a ball away if you retreat and give up court. Having said that, it depends how fast you are with your reflexes, how comfortable you are. Do I want to be on top of the net if Fernando Gonzalez is on the other (inaudible)? Probably not, but having said that, that might be my best chance to win the point. To reflex the ball, or if I'm running backwards, then I'm just giving Gonzalez, or whoever it is, that many more options in that big of a court to hit into. So a lot of this stuff just comes down to personal comfort levels and how quick your reflexes are. If they're not quick, then get out there and work on them. There are some drills, that I'm sure Ian you go into in your Doubles Domination product to assist that. But you don't see the pros back up too often in Doubles. You don't want to see the (inaudible) brothers jumping back, they're always taking the most aggressive option. Ian: Well before we move on to our next question, I just want to mention that if you guys go to doublesdomination.com right now, you'll see an instructional video from myself outlining how you guys should be moving with your partner and with the ball, again which is called shading, and actually give away that whole chapter of Doubles Domination for free. So definitely check that out. Let's go and move on. Ashley: Just a bit on that point. You almost want to imagine that your partner and you are connected with some rope. So when he moves, you're moving. You're always kind of moving as a tandem. Because if you don't do that, if your partner moves and you maintain your position then there's a gaping hole in the middle of the court, the easiest part of the court to hit into. Ian: Yeah, that's a good visual for my listeners to think about. Good stuff! All right, let's move on to our next topic and this question comes to us from THM on the forums. He wrote in and said, 'What are things you consider when selecting a partner, what are some things you do to maintain a good partnership?'. And Ashley, this is a topic that we talked about in our interview for the product. Why don't you give us a quick overview on what you think recreational players should look for in a partner when they are trying to select somebody to play with. Ashley: Well you want to look and find a partner that compliments your game and your skill set. Not necessarily replicate it. And by that I'll give you some examples. Perhaps your serve isn't the strongest part of your game. So if you can find a partner that is very comfortable around the net and is good at (inaudible) and cutting off balls, then that's going to help you hold serve. So your looking for someone to really aid your weaknesses and assist your strengths. If you're a good returner, then a partner who is very good at being at the net and intercepting volleys off your low return. All will help. So look for a partner who is going to help you with your game and complement and assist the areas that you're not as comfortable. And then as far as - what was the second part? What do you want to do once you have a partner? Ian: Yeah basically, he said, 'What are some things you should do to maintain a good partnership?'. Ashley: Well, practice hard. Ideally, winning matches. Ian: (laughs) That always helps. Ashley: That can go a long way to building team unity. Just practice together. Even just put pen to paper every week or to. Sit down and say, 'Joe, what's been working well for you? What do you think I need to improve on?', because sometimes there's a play you don't see it quite as objectively when it's coming off your racket. And don't be sensitive about it. Look, I've been (inaudible) in the world, and I still have plenty of areas in my game that need work daily, so I want someone to tell me what I have to do to get better. So have that attitude, just be honest with each other and go out there and work on it together as a team. Ian: Yeah I think that's really key and something that a lot of players can work on. Kind of having more of a humble attitude about it and not taking it personally, and also having the openness to have the sit-down and have that open conversation with the partner and be able to outline things to work on. I think those are huge keys. Ashley: Raphael(inaudible), has a new coach this week, Paul (inaudible), so (inaudible), he's got every shot in the book but he still feels that some outside resources can help him. Look we've all got things to work on so have some thick skin and the idea is to constantly get better and address areas that need improvement. Ian: Before we get to our next Doubles related topic, I want to tell my listeners about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis podcast, and that is tennistours.com. You guys can go there to check out professional tennis events, tickets and travel packages. Pretty much no matter where you want to go to watch an ATP or WTA event, they're going to have something available for you. Whether it's individual tickets for just individual days or sessions, or full packages that include travel and accommodation, they've got really the whole wide range of products available. So go check them out, especially since the U.S. Open is coming up. And I thank them very much for their support of the Essential Tennis podcast. Remember to use the promotional code “ESSENTIAL” when you checkout and you'll receive a discount off your purchase of over $175. All right, let's move on to our next question. Coming to us from John in Texas, he wrote and said, 'When returning serve in Doubles, what are the considerations when returning serve cross courts versus down the line. What about the lob return?'. So, John lays down three main options for returning serve. What kind of different things are you looking at Ashley, when you're playing or when you're coaching the Doubles team that you're working with now. When should players be looking to use each of those three options? Ashley: Well you need to pay attention to what your opponents doing. More specifically the net man. If he's moving a lot and cutting off balls in the middle and poaching, you're going to need to go down his line. Also, if he's not a comfortable volleyer and his partner is, than you want to go at him, you want to test him out and make him hit volleys. As far as the lob, it's a very good shot. Again, if you're playing an aggressive opponent who likes to move in the middle or get very close to the net, the lob is extremely effective. It can take your opponent off the net. And always follow it through. If you get the ball over your opponent, than you run in and take control of the net. As far as also going down the line, if your partner is getting you with a volley serve that's hard to generate an angle cross court, then that's often not a bad ball to take straight down the line. Again, just be aware of what's happening with your opponent, the net, and what sort of serve you're getting as well. If you're taken out very wide on the forehand court, than the line is often an excellent option because there's not much court for you to hit back into. Ian: I think that the best thing that you said there Ashley was the first thing that you said. It depends on what your opponents are doing and you have to pay close attention to that. I think that's so important and something that a lot of times recreational players pass up and it almost seems like its too obvious of a thing to be able to watch them and then base your tactics according to what they're doing to try and beat you. But I know that's something that you and I talked about in detail in our conversation for Doubles Domination. Do you have anything else to add to that, as far as being able to adjust to your opponents and making sound tactical decisions? Ashley: Well that's exactly right. You want to have a game plan, but you also want the ability to assess whether it's working, and if it's not, make an adjustment. Every sport in the world has pro sport coaches. They'll go out there telling the team what to do, but they're constantly making adjustments. Whether it's defensive, offensive, you just have to be your own coach out there in tennis because we don't have access to on-court coaching. Especially in Doubles, you have the opportunity to ask your partner during a change-over, take 90 seconds, say hey, what's going on out here? Is this strategy of serving to Jones' forehand working or is he maybe getting a little grooved on it – I can see he's moving that way, now we need to serve to his backhand. Ian: All right. Great Stuff. Next question up here I think is going to be fun to ask you. And actually I haven't asked you this before. Have you ever played the Bryan brothers personally? Ashley: I have. I beat them last year in the semi-finals of the Sony-Ericson Open in Miami. Ian: Thataboy. Ashley: But the Bryan's have got me on a few occasions prior to that. Ian: Alright, so this will be a great question for you. Gary in Pennsylvania wrote and said, the Bryan brother twins just won sixty-two overall Doubles titles, a history-setting record, of course which you mentioned already Ashley. His question is, 'What makes them so good in your opinion? Are there two or three things that stand out in their play, for example, that your typical club or recreational player, or even weekend warrior can learn from and benefit from?' What do you think? Ashley: Yeah, there are. Firstly, the Bryan brothers play with a lot of energy and enthusiasm. They love the game. They are constantly bouncing around. And that helps. Being flat in tennis is something that will work to your detriment. You always want to be bouncing around trying to improve your footwork. So that's one thing they do better than anybody on a daily basis. They bring so much energy to the court which is why crowds, amongst other reasons, enjoy watching them. They complement each others game incredibly well. For two guys that are identical twins, they don't play identical, its actually the contrary. Bob has a huge (inaudible) serve, Mike has a good serve, not nearly as big. And then Mike is one of the best returners in the world, just takes the ball so early, and Bob again not as comfortable especially with the backhand. Bob's very good around the net, that lefty, forehand poach, Bob plays (inaudible) courts, and when Mike Bryan gets the balls down, which he does all day, Bob has that forehand volley in the middle of the court. So that's building on the point we mentioned earlier, is finding a Doubles partner that complements your strengths, and the Bryan brothers do that. Then they move together as well as any team I've ever seen. I don't know if its because they were united in the womb thirty-two years ago, they have like that twin telepathy going where they say they don't even need to talk to each other to know what the other guys going to do. And it shows, they're just always moving together, they never seem like they're caught out of position. They're a very aggressive team. You can do this at home regardless of your level of play. You can put yourself in aggressive positions, take the middle of the court and don't be afraid to poach, and the Bryans do that better than anyone. Ian: Man, that's like a whole Doubles product right there, that two minute explanation you just gave. And this is my favorite part of interviewing you and the other professional players I talk to in preparing for the Doubles Domination course is that all of your guys were able to so well articulate specific things like that, that obviously professional players do better than anybody else in the world. But recreational players can absolutely take those things and apply them to their own game, and you gave four examples there. Positive energy on the court. Absolutely everybody listening to this show can do that right now. They complement each others games. You guys can find partners that do that, that move together well, you guys can learn how to do that. And they're very aggressive. So it's really cool to hear, and especially from somebody again like you, a professional player who has experienced this on the world stage. It's great to hear that we can apply those same elements to our own games, that no matter what level we are. I just think that's really cool. Ashley: Thanks Ian. And also have a short memory. Don't be concerned with being beaten up a line, or missing a return. Just put it behind you and move on to the next point. The Bryans, they don't give anything away. You walk by and watch a match and you're just assume they're winning just based on they're body language. Ian: Yeah, that's absolutely true. I actually saw them play at the (inaudible), I saw the match that they lost. That was on Friday. Yeah you're absolutely right. It made absolutely no difference whether they won or lost each point. They reacted exactly the same way. And that's something that most recreational players are terrible at. They'll physically look dejected and it's very easy to tell who is winning or losing a match very often based on body language. Ashley: Yeah, they win and lose as a team. If your going to get upset about a match that's fine, but do it when the match is finished. Go into the locker room and then smash your racket or swear. You don't want to let your partner's see that they are getting to you. Ian: let's go to another question. We have time for maybe one or two more here. Here's an interesting one from JR Striker on the forums. He wrote and says, 'what's the best way to decide who plays on which side, especially if both you and your partner usually prefer the same side?'. What do you think? Ashley: Well one way to do it is, if you play two back, which some people do, I like to do that often as well when I'm returning, most of the balls are going to go to the middle of the court. If I have a better backhand, I might be confusing myself here, yeah I want to be playing a (inaudible) backhand because the majority of the volleys are going to come to my backhand and hopefully my partner has a better forehand. Again he's on the outside, so the middle ball, the middle of the court, we're both hitting our favorite shot. It's the same with a volley. If I have a better backhand volley, poaching, then I want to be on the deuce court. Ian: And this is assuming right, that both players are right-handed obviously. Ashley: Yeah, right. If you're a lefty righty, then its a good idea to do it the way the Bryans do because they both have they're forehands in the middle of the court, from the back, and when they're poaching. You typically are going to have a lot more better reach than a forehand volley, you can stretch out to that better than a backhand. Ian: Okay. And his second questions was if I'm a recreational player and I'm just being put with somebody randomly for today's match what if we both happen to like the same side typically. Is there some quick and easy way to figure out who should go where, or is it not that easy? Ashley: Well, and that happens on tour as well. Sometimes you kind of get a last minute team together just because that's the only person you can get into an event with and you both play the same side. Someone has to suck it up. Typically the better returner should be on the outside. They're the bigger points love fifteen, fifteen-thirty, thirty-forty. So if you both prefer that side, go with the better returner. And you can change during match. Play one set and if its not working out, have that versatility where you can switch sides, even top teams on the AT World Tour will do that. Ian: Okay. Last question we are going to go to comes from Charles in California. He wrote in and said, and I'm actually what your answer will be on this Ashley, he wrote and said, 'What is the best way to position yourselves when you're both at the nets particularly regards to covering lobs?'. So maybe you're up against a team that lobs a lot. And he says, ' Should one player be a little further back than the other to cover the potential lob. I'm under the impression that the cross-court player from the person getting ready to lob, should be a little further back.' So should players be staggered against a team that lobs a lot? Ashley: Yeah you have it right, that's the way we're taught. Typically the vast majority of the time the lobs will go cross-court, yeah you're going to have a staggered formation just like you mentioned. With the cross-court player looking for that lob and his opponent closer to the net in a much more aggressive position looking to close off the net. Ian: Ashley, do you play on tour teams that are kind of known for lobbing more than others? In recreational Doubles, the lob is unfortunately one of the most feared shots because a lot of the players dont like they're overhead a whole lot. At the ATP level, are there players or teams that are kind of known for having good lobs or is it just not a shot that is ever effective? Ashley: It certainly is effective, it's under-utilized. Particularly off your return there's not many (inaudible) has an excellent (inaudible) lob. But Doubles has moved more towards a kind of blasting power strategy technique rather than the old traditional Doubles skills of thinking and using feel and touch aren't quite as predominant. Now players serve huge, return big, but there's still plenty of room for the lob, particularly against aggressive teams (inaudible). It would work well against the Bryan brothers because they are so aggressive it's just the problem is when Bob Bryan serves at 140 mile an hour, its not quite as easy to chip one over head, but if you can hit it, it will be successful. Typically, if you force a player back, if you hit a deep volley forcing back, that's when a lot of your opponents will go to a (inaudible) lob, kind of fading off in the back foot. So that's something to look for. It's a great shot. You want to hold your opponent accountable to all angles and everything on the court. And even if the lob is unsuccessful, it still sends a message to the opponent that you have that shot in the bag and that maybe he can't crash the net quite as much. Ian: Sure. I find it really interesting that you would make that comment, that the lob really isn't used enough at the professional level these days. Do you think that maybe there will be eventually a swing back towards maybe more of a finesse touch, you know, angle, volley, and lob kind of game at the professional level? Ashley: I don't. It's moving the other way, technology, and just the game has become so much more physical. I'm constantly amazed seeing a seventeen year old kid just serving hug and ripping forehands, and its gone to big serving, big returning. I mean the volleys are still very good volleys, but if you look at the Woodys and compare them to the Byrans, they had completely different styles of play. The Woodys did not have big serves at all, but they so much variety and so much feel and touch, whereas the Bryans have a lot of skills, but different skills. They serve huge, return big, get close to the net, yeah, they still volley real well, but you can't compare the volleys of Mike and Bob to (inaudible). Ian: Hmm. All right, interesting stuff. Well Ashley, we are going to go ahead and start to wrap things up, and as we do I want to encourage my listeners to go check out doublesdomination.com. Again, I'm giving away a whole chapter of that product this week, on shading. I'll be giving away other parts of it as well. Just to give you guys a sample of whats in there and how useful and helpful the information is. And again, featured in that package is going to be a full, hour-long conversation with Ashley, all about tactics and strategy, and the whole time keeping in mind the recreational player. So its a great conversation. And Ashley, I want to thank you very much for your time, not only for our conversation in Doubles Domination, but today on the podcast as well. It's been great speaking with you, and I know that my listeners are really going to enjoy this conversation. Ashley: Thanks, Ian. I'm excited to see the Doubles Domination product. Ian: yeah, absolutely. And lastly, everybody make sure you go check out tennis-update.com, it's Ashley's website and he's always updating it with new videos from the tour. Any plans on – I see that you have a member forum there Ashley, obviously the videos are in my opinion the coolest part of the site so far – any other plans for the site coming up? Ashley: Well there's an instructional blog section which I need to add to, but I'll be getting some fellow players and friends of mine just to give little one minute kind of videos on how they think to (inaudible) has some tips on forehand volley. Yeah, that's a big part of it and there's a forum where you can chat with other tennis players in your area or anywhere in the world. Ian: Awesome. All right. So go check it out guys, and Ashley, thank you very much for your time I really appreciate it. Ashley: Thanks, Ian. Ian: All right. Well that does it for episode number 130 of the Essential Tennis podcast. Thank you very much for joining me today and I hope that you enjoyed my conversation with Ashley. Go check out doublesdomination.com, it's up right now and I'm giving away a full section of the product today, I'm actually recording this Sunday night, it's going to be opened up on Monday. I'm going to be giving away another section of the product on Wednesday, and by the end of the week, you guys will get really a full picture of what Doubles Domination is really all about, and then you guys will have a short opportunity to be able to get in and purchase it and improve your Doubles game. I really believe in this product, honestly, I've put a lot of time and effort into it, I really stand behind my instruction, and the content that I put out there, and this is no exception. So I really urge you guys to go check it out. Again thats doublesdomination.com. All right that does it for this week. Thanks very much for listening everybody, take care and good luck with your tennis.

Podcast #131: Not everybody has the same potential for improvement, but are there players out there that will never get to a 4.0 level? Ian also discusses volleys while poaching.

ianw — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 14:53:17 +0000

Is it possible that you could work super hard at your tennis game but never get beyond a certain level? What level would that be? In today's show Ian talks about different ability levels for different people, and how much natural athleticism plays a role in your improvement. He also answers a question about missing volleys while poaching in doubles, start making more! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian. [music] Ian: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast, your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com and tennisexpress.com. Thank you very much for joining me today. I appreciate it. Before we get to today's listener questions, I want to remind you guys about the doubles tactics and strategy product that I was talking about in last week's show, episode number 130. I am releasing doubles domination today. Today is Monday, August 16th, and it's only gonna be up for sale until August 20th, this coming Friday. So if you're listening to this right now, and you're a doubles player, and it's not yet past Friday, August 20th, go to doubles domination right now, and at least check it out. I know obviously not all of you guys are gonna purchase it, but I really strongly believe in the content in this product. You will receive over 5 and half hours of instructional doubles content having to do with tactics and strategy, a 45 page e-book, and also an hour long strategical video webinar. That only purchasers of doubles domination will be able to participate in. So go check it out. It's all only 47 dollars, less than the price of one lesson. Pretty much any place you guys are gonna go to take tennis instruction. So go check it out: doublesdomination.com. Alright, let's go ahead and get down to business with today's show. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] Alright, let's go ahead and get started with today's show. And we have 2 really good listener questions to talk about. The first one comes to us from Darren in Toronto, Ontario. And Darren, I wonder if you got to go see any of the Rogers Cup this past week. Hopefully you did. That just wrapped up yesterday, good match between Federer and Murray. He wrote to me, and he's got a question about his volleys. He said, "I have been having a lot of trouble with my volleys lately, and think I have found the problem. I think the problem is that I try to change the direction of the ball too much. For example, when I am at the net on the deuce court, and my opponent at the baseline returns one of my partner's serve, sometimes I try and poach the ball and hit it towards the opposite net player. When I do this, however, my racket face opens up, and the ball goes [inaudible] or I simply mis-hit it. What can I do to improve my change of direction volleys. Darren." Well, Darren, that's a good question. And this is a doubles question, as you guys could tell based on how he's speaking about the returner and hitting toward the opposite net player. Let's first discuss the merits of this specific target in your doubles play, having to do with tactics, specifically, in your doubles points. And when you're poaching in dobles, the direction that you're talking about trying is actually the easiest and most natural target to aim for. And he's talking about being on the deuce side, so his partner is serving from the ad side. The returner is also on the ad side, directly in front of him. And the returner's partner is diagonal from him on the deuce side, up at the net, over on the other side of the court. So, if you guys can all kind of picture yourselves in Darren's position here in this situation, playing a doubles point, when you poach from this position, you're moving to your left to poach that cross court return of serve from the returner on the ad side of the court over on the other side. Now, as you move towards that return of serve that was struck cross court, and as you poach--and by the way, I'm really happy that you're poaching and going for the ball. And that's something that I should've added into my outline, but it just came to me just now. I'm happy you're going for it. And a lot of times, Darren, players will poach and they'll go for this type of shot where they're making an aggressive play with their feet to cut off a return of serve, and miss it, and then they'll just give up. And they'll say, "Well, I guess I'm trying too much. I don't want to get my partner mad at me by missing too many of these." I'm happy that you're asking this question, because it tells me that you're wanting to continue doing this. And that's great! Keep it up. You're gonna get better at this. I'm gonna give you some drills later to be able to continue improving at it. But when you move in this direction, when your partner is serving on the ad side and you're on the deuce side service box and you poach to your left, hitting towards the net player on the other side of the court is actually the most natural place to hit. And the reason is, that's the direction that your body's momentum is heading. You're already moving to your left, your whole body is, so is your racket, and your heading in that direction to cut off the return of serve. And so it's most natural to just hit in that direction. Plus, it's really a great tactical target as long as you keep it low. If you do hit toward that net player--and by the way, this is probably what I recommend the most--when players are poaching, making a move over towards their partner's side of the court--the opposite side of the court--to cut off a return of server, this is the target that I recommend most. Right in the direction you're moving, towards that opposing net player, and then aim it right down at his or her feet to make them have to hit a tough low volley or half volley. I mean really, tactically speaking, you only really have two other main options. Option number one is to cut it back to your right, cross court, and hit a sharp angle back to your right in the direction you came from. And this is hitting in the opposite direction that you're body is moving. And you're taking a ball that's angling to your left, and then trying to cut it off to the right; moving to your left, and then you're trying to angle it to your right. That's a really difficult shot. And it takes a lot of touch and a lot of concentration to hit it at just the right firmness so that it doesn't go too wide. And it's tough to also not mis-hit this shot and shank it, because you're running to your left, you're aiming over to your right, it's tough to really keep your eyes on the ball and not look over to your right to check out your target. So, that's a tough shot. But definitly, you know, it's a good target if you can make it. Your second main option would be to try to take this volley that you poached on, and try to place it between the net player and the returner on the other side of the court. And usually, when players pick this target, the volley just ends up going back to the baseline player that hit the return of serve. And the point gets reset. Meaning that the baseliner now has another chance to either hit past you or lob you. And now we're back into a kind of baseline to baseline player rally, and we're right back where we started: with two players on the baseline, and two players at the net. And so you kind of blow your opportunity to try to put the ball away. So, my point is here, that it's not your tactics that are the problem. It's your technique. We need to improve your technique so that we can start making this shot. Because as I've just layed out, I think it's a really good place for you to be aiming. When it comes to technique on volleys, in general, they're very much over- complicated by recreational players. Usually rec players, when the ball comes towards them and they're at the net, just simply do too much with the racket. And there's just not as much control as there should be with the racket head and with the strings to be able to consistently aim and place the ball where it should be. A volley, first and foremost, should be a control shot. And in doubles, it's very often that we do want to add some extra pace to the shot. And this situation that Darren is talking about is definitely one of those. You don't want to cross cut off a return of serve, and then hit a weak volley to the opposite net player, cause they're just gonna, you know, if they do their job they're gonna crush it right back at you, and you're gonna put yourself in a tough spot. So I'm not saying that all volleys should be hit weakly, but just in general, volley technique is over complicated by recreational players. Now, I'm gonna address the two main mistakes that you're struggling with, Darren. And one at a time I'll tell you what's probably happening and what's causing those two errors to occur. The first error that you identified was hitting off center, miss-hitting the ball, and not hitting the middle of your racket. And this all has to do with focus and concentration. And I did a whole podcast episode about this quite a while ago. It's in the archives. And by the way, those of you who don't know about the podcast archives, I'm sure you've noticed that only two episodes are available on iTunes, and only two on essentialtennis.com. If you sign up for the podcast archives on the podcast page at essentialtennis, you'll be able to access all 130 back episodes of the Essential Tennis Podcast completely free. You'll be asked to sign up for my newsletter, but don't worry, it's not spam. I just send one newsletter per week, and let you guys know what happening at essentialtennis. Once in a while I'll send more than once a week, but very rarely. So anyway, go to the podcast archives, and check out the episode about watching the ball. Just do a page seach for "watch" or "eye", keeping your eye on the ball. And I'd really talk about it in detail, but in general, hitting off-center is always linked back to not watching the ball carefully enough. You have to really make quality of contact a conscious thing during practice. And I'm not gonna get into a lot of detail on it today, but just know, Darren, that you need to do a better job of making good contact. And usually there's a pattern involved here. When you cross over to your left, and you go for that poach, next time you hit off-center and you don't hit the ball cleanly, make a mental note of where the ball hit on your racket exactly. And if you don't know, you've gotta start paying attention. And this goes for all of you guys out there. When it does hit off-center, realize it, and then try to figure out where it did hit off-center. Because very often there's a pattern, in my experience. And a lot of times, recreational players consistently hit the same place on the racket that is not the middle. It's not the strings. And once you figure out where that pattern is and where you're consistently hitting off-center, you can help train yourself to get away from that mistake. I'm pretty sure I talked about that in my episode about hitting off-center and watching the ball. But, start working on that and focusing on that during your practice, your time on the practice court, Darren. Now, number two: The racket face opening up too much. And you talk about hitting the ball too far due to this. And again, very common mistake. And a lot of times, doubles players say that, "Aw, I hit the ball too hard." when they hit a volley out. When in fact, the actual problem was that the racket face was just way too open to keep the ball in play. As I said a minute ago, there are a lot of circumstances where you do want to hit a firm volley in doubles. You don't want to hit a weak shot back. And when you do hit firmly and relatively aggressively, it's important that you get the racket face angled correctly to be able to keep the ball in play without it travelling too far. So, this is a simple matter of controlling what the racket is doing. And just because the concept of controlling your racket is simple, doesn't mean that it's easy to do consistently. And this is --as I mentioned a couple minutes ago--this is essentially where most doubles players and most tennis players run into problems, is they do too much with the racket face. It's moving around too much. They're trying to swing the racket at the ball too much, and they lose control of where the racket is facing. And aiming your volleys and being consistent and being acurate is all about controlling where the racket is facing. Period. So you want to keep the technique simple, face the racket towards your target--meaning where the strings are facing--and move your racket firmly towards your target without swinging your racket back and forth suppenating and pronating to open and close your face to add pace. It's really tempting to do that to be able to hit a harder shot, but that's where you're gonna run into problems with your racket facing the wrong way at contact. And it's also gonna add a lot of mis-hits to the equation as well, as your racket starts moving around a lot. So, do your best to try to take everything extra out of it, and just keep the technique very simple. Now, I'm gonna talk about practice drills and how you can improve on this. But first I want to tell everybody listening about tennistours.com. They're the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast. And their specialty is tickets and travel packages to professional tennis tournaments. And the US Open is coming up very quickly. I want you guys to check them out for that. Go to tennistours.com. Check out the individual tickets, ticket packages, and also accommodation and ticket packages for the US Open. If you guys make a purchase through them that is over 175 dollars, you'll receive not only a discount off your purchase when you use the promotional code "essential", at checkout you'll not only receive a discount but you'll get a free ticket--an invitation to a cocktail party in Times Square during the U.S. Open, and I'm going to be doing my best to be there for that. I know Will Hamilton of Fuzzy Yellow Balls is going to be there, as well. So it should be a good time. So go check them out, tennistours.com. I thank them very much for their support of the podcast. And remember, make sure to use the promotional code, ESSENTIAL. Alright, so back to the practice drills, Darin. I want you to do this with a partner. You can do this with your doubles' partner or with any other tennis player that's right around your level. I want you to be at the net on the deuce side, just like what you described in your question. And your hitting partner should be across from you--directly across from you at the baseline on the add side of their side of the court. So they're going to be down the line from you. Again, exactly like the situation that you described in your question. I want your hitting partner on the baseline to start with the ball. And I want them to feed a volley to you down the line. You're going to take that volley and hit it back down the line again, back to your partner, and then from there, your partner is going to aim cross- court. So they're going to feed down the line to you, you're going to volley, back down the line to them, and then that next shot they're going to hit cross-court. Darin, you're going to pouch on all of them. [laughter] On all the cross-court ground strokes that your partner hits, and I want you to set up a target so that this only takes two of you guys. And you're going to set up a target. You can use a plastic cone, you can use a pyramid of balls. Just take four balls, put three on the bottom and one on the top to make a little pyramid, and I want you to place that target right around the service line and right in the middle of the deuce side of the court in the direction that you're pouching towards to your left. So it's going to be cross-court from where you're starting on the add side. So I want you to repeat that like 100 times, focusing on your accuracy. So feed to you, volley down the line, ground stroke cross-court, pouch, and then put that ball right at that target. And I want you to start off at like a medium speed with that volley, and work your way up from there. And get a little bit firmer as you go, but only as you can show yourself that you can be steady and consistent with that volley. And this is going to help you practice your footwork for the pouch, it's going to practice your accuracy for that volley and your consistency for that volley. Nothing fancy here, just repetition, practicing that shot over and over again. And you can do this over on the other side, as well, starting from the deuce side and pouching over to your right. So Darin, hopefully that answers your question. We talked about the off-center shots, the mishits. We talked about the shots that you're missing long by losing control of the racket face. I gave you a drill there to work on it, and that's the end of my outline. So hopefully that's helpful to you. Send me an email back and let me know how your practice goes. I hope that this answer helps you out and you're able to improve this part of your doubles' game. Next up we've got a really interesting question from Roger in London, England. He's a 2.5 player. A bit of a long question here, but I think you guys are really going to find it interesting. I know I definitely do. And I'm looking forward to answering it. He wrote and said, "I've been playing tennis seriously for several years now, have had about 10 group lessons, about 15 individual lessons, and playing around 60 matches. I'm not a natural athlete. Sports have never come natural or easy to me, although I really enjoy watching them. Right now I attend two small group lessons each week, and I try to play a match about once per week on top of that. Despite this, my progress has been agonizingly slow. This was really brought home to me a few weeks ago when I played a friend from work who had just come back from a tennis holiday. He had never played much tennis before, and beat me in a close match. This guy's a natural athlete, plays for the company soccer team, and generally has pretty good eye-hand coordination. My question is this, in your experience, do some students never really get tennis, because their bodies just aren't wired that way for the game. Can everybody get to a reasonable level--say 3.5 to 4.0 if they spend enough time and effort on learning the game, or is it just beyond some of us? I love the game and love the way that playing it, even at my level, helps me appreciate some of the finer points when watching the pros, but I'm not sure I'll ever be any good at tennis and possibly need to accept that. If I'm not going to be disappointed with my progress, I if I'm not going to be disappointed with my progress in the coming years. Thanks very much. Roger, thank you very much for your brave question. I mean, honestly, it takes a lot of security in yourself and a lot of bravery to ask this. And I assume that you've listened to many podcasts before, and you know that I kind of tell it how it is. I'm a pretty straight shooter, and I'm not going to pull any punches here. I'm going to not take this question lightly, and I'm going to be as honest as I can with you and with everybody else listening. And I'm going to answer this question based on what I see everyday from recreational players. I see, you know, the average Joe playing tennis hours and hours a day, everyday, and I try to help the average person improve their tennis for hours and hours a day. So I feel as though I definitely have some insights into this, and I'm going to tell you exactly what I think. Now, let's talk about athleticism and coordination in general. They play a huge, huge role in anybody's ultimate potential as a tennis player. There's no doubt about that. Now I've heard some tennis players argue that with enough practice anybody can be a great tennis player. In fact, I [laughter] won't name names, but somebody on the forums at essentialtennis.com not too long ago made the statement that in his opinion he thought that anybody could become a 6.0 player if they put enough time and enough money into it--to take lessons and to train. I mean, don't get me wrong, he meant a lot of time and a lot of money. He didn't mean like two years and a private lesson every week or any thing like that. But it was his stand from his viewpoint he felt as if anybody could reach that high of a level if they really took it seriously enough and put enough time and effort into it. Well, don't get me wrong, practice and work ethic are extremely, extremely important, but everybody does have a limit to how good they can be based on how athletic and how coordinated they are. Some people as you found out just pick it up more easily than others, and that can be really frustration sometimes. And that can be frustrating no matter what level of player you are. I, in my college career, played with players who were a lot more talented than me, and were able to beat me easily without a whole lot of effort, and they didn't practice nearly as hard as me, they didn't put in as much effort, they didn't hit the weight room after practices or between practices, but they would still beat me without any trouble [laughter]. And, you know, while that was definitely annoying, that's just how it is guys. I mean, everybody has different genes, everybody has different natural gifts. Some of us just pick up sports easily. Others of us can take an awesome photograph and just see things differently than most other people, and are kind of natural artists. Other people are good at communicating, interpersonal relationships, whatever. Everybody's got different gifts and when it comes to tennis and being an athlete and being able to pick it up easily, it's no different. It's just like any other skill in life. Not all of us can be blessed the same [laughter]. It would be boring if we were [laughter]. We all have different gifts. Now, I'm going to answer your question can everybody get to a reasonable level next, but first I want to tell you guys really quickly about my new sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast and that is tennisexpress.com. You guys should all be familiar with them. They've been advertising on theTennis Channel for a while now, and all over the place--on the Internet. They have everything you could possibly want: strings, rackets, apparel, footwear, stringing machines, anything you could possibly want related to tennis. Ball machines, whatever, they have it over there. And they're going to be my sponsor for the next four weeks, kind of just on a test basis. And because it's just a test, they're not going to be offering any free shipping, they're not going to be offering any discounts. Basically we're just going to see how it goes [laughter]. And to be honest with you guys, they don't think they don't think that there's going to be a whole lot of response. The download numbers for my podcast are not nearly as big as the audience that they're used to dealing with when they buy time on TV or in Tennis Magazine or whatever. So I'm just laying this out there. So they're a little skeptical. So we're just doing a trial period here. And what I'm asking from you guys is just make your regular tennis purchases over the next four weeks through Tennis Express. I'm not asking you guys to go out of your way and buy a $4,000 string machine, unless you were going to already, then by all means. But use the promotional code ESSENTIAL when you check out at Tennis Express. That will show them that you're appreciative of their thinking about being a full-time sponsor of the podcast. This is a just a test period. So the next pack of grips that you buy or reel of string, or if you need some shoes, or a frame, go check out tennisexpress.com. They have amazing prices anyway. You guys are going to get a good deal. They have free shipping for orders over $75. And use the promotional code ESSENTIAL to help me out. And hopefully they sign on as a full-time sponsor. Alright, so moving on with Roger's question here, and he was asking can everybody get to a reasonable level at tennis, and by reasonable he used the levels 3.5 to 4.0. Well, based on my experience in watching average athletes try to get better everyday, and again is this what I do everyday. This is my job--working with people that are not professional athletes. They're business people and moms and kids every single day. I can honestly say that I've given lessons to a number of people who will never be a 4.0 player, and I feel kind of bad saying that, but it's just the truth. And if you ask them they would say of course I'm not. I'm more positive than they are. I'm a very positive person on the court. I want to be clear that I'm not saying this because I'm a pessimist or because I like to make fun of people or put people down that don't get tennis right away, because I'm a professional and I make fun of them or anything like that. Listen, I'm a strong believer that anybody can improve their tennis game no matter how athletic they are, but not everybody can improve up to the same point. That's kind of my whole point here. Not everybody has the same potential. And so I can honestly say that I have taught people that, you know what, even with the best instruction and a lot of hard work on the court, they'll never be able to compete on a level playing field at a 4.0 level. And that's just how it is. I'm sorry [laughter]. Some of you guys are probably going to be offended by that. And you know what, if you are, send me an email. I'd be happy to discuss it with you back and forth. I'd be curious to hear what your guy's reaction to that is. But I'm just shooting straight with you guys--that's how it is. Now, that's not most people. I would say that the majority of people definitely can be 3.5 to 4.0 players, but there's people out there that tennis just doesn't fit them well. And that doesn't mean that they can't still enjoy it. It doesn't mean that they still can't get better. But it's just everybody does not have the same potential as far as ultimate level of play. So be honest with yourself. Be realistic with yourself about your abilities. It sounds like you are already, Roger. You've already picked out a couple specific examples where friends of yours have gone and gotten better really quickly, where it's taken you a long time to get to that point, and so you're already starting to realize these things. And I want to say good job for not getting down on yourself, and I'm glad that you're not discouraged by that. Don't be disappointed by this. As I said before, everybody's got different gifts. I'm not sure what yours is, but I'm sure something comes very easily to you that doesn't for other people. And this doesn't mean that you can't still improve and really enjoy the process of getting better at tennis. And I like that you were talking about (let's see, where is that sentence)--you said that "You love the way that playing tennis even at your level helps you appreciate some of the finer points when watching the pros." I totally agree with that. [laughter] Because I've worked so hard at my own game, even though at my level I'm not anywhere close as good as the pros are, the guys that we see on TV. When I go and watch professional tennis it's awesome, because I know how hard I've worked, and I can't come anywhere near to the same results as what these guys do on a regular basis. So, yeah, it's inspirational and it does help you enjoy the game as a whole more. So keep working hard, Roger. Keep studying the game and keep your head up. Keep a good attitude. And thank you so much for your question. I hope I haven't been discouraging to you or anybody else today. That was definitely not my goal. Just trying to be honest with you guys. And again, I'm not saying that most people will never be 3.0, 5.0 or 4.0, And I'm not going to give a percentage. But I would say that the majority of players, yeah, can definitely reach 3.5. Probably a little less than most people are going to be able to reach 4.0. But it's definitely not out of reach for a lot of people to get up to that level. It's different for everybody. So Roger, thanks very much for your question. I appreciate it. Keep working hard at your game, and thank you for being a listener. [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright. That does it for Episode #131 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for downloading today's show and for giving it a listen. I appreciate your support. And I will talk to you guys next week, where I'm going to answer several more listener questions. I always appreciate hearing from you guys. If you have a question that you'd like for me to answer on the show, you can go to essentialtennis.com. [music] Go to the podcast page, and then click the button that says, "Submit A Question." [music] Alright, that does it for this week. Take care everybody, and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music]

Podcast #132: What 5 things should you do to be a respectable member of the tennis community? Find out now!

ianw — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 14:54:54 +0000

There are just some things that you should or shouldn't do when you're on a tennis court. Some are tradition, some are just good manners, but not all of these things are commonly known to all recreational tennis players. Ian also talks about what to develop next after achieving a great spin serve! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Narrator: Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian. Ian: Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com and tennisexpress.com. Thank you very much for joining me. I appreciate you downloading this episode of the podcast and for listening to it. I don't know about you guys, but I am really looking forward to the U.S. Open. I'm always excited about the Grand Slams coming around, and it's always just an exciting time in tennis in general, but I'm hoping to make a trip up to New York City this year and I'm tentatively planning to be there September 9th, 10th and 11th. That's the second week of the Open, that Thursday, Friday and Saturday. If you guys are going to be around, if you're going to watch, or if you'll be in New York City in general, let me know. It would be cool to meet up with some of you guys and you can let me know by sending me an email to ian@essentialtennis.com. I'm probably going to try to hand out some stickers and some bracelets at the Open if [laughter] they let me. If I don't get kicked out. Not actually inside, but just on the entrance, coming into the tournament, and I'm probably going to go watch on that Saturday the 11th. I'm going to spend a couple of days in New York City. So shoot me an email, and maybe a couple of us can get together. Alright, let's go ahead and get back to business. Sit back, relax [music] and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, let's get to our first listener question, and it comes to us from Adielo in New York City. And Adielo and I are planning on getting together during the Open so I'm definitely looking forward to that. He wrote to me and said, "Right now I'm using a kick serve on both first and second serves. The difference in my technique between the two is a much faster racket acceleration and more aggressive leg drive from the trophy pose on my first serve. The ball travels faster through the air and jumps forward much faster after the bounce compared to my second serve. My second serve travels slower through the air, but bounces higher with similar speed before and after the bounce. Both of these can reach the back fence, but at different trajectory and speed. What differences should I be seeing between my first and second kick serves? Should I be adding pace to the second serve while landing it further from the service line for safety? Should I be trying to add more height to the bounce of my first serve? Should I add the right to left movement of an American twist serve, or is it just time to move on and add slice and kick serves to the mix?" Adielo. That's a really good question there, Adielo, and I want to say that first of all, excellent job developing this type of serve--this kick serve. I'm really happy that you've been using this and you've learned how to do this first. Spin is the best way to develop both consistency and confidence in your serve. Just in general, I think all too often recreational players go out and they try to figure out how to fit that big, booming, flat serve first, and that's not the best way to go in my opinion. I think Adielo has done a great job of doing this first. And spin is so important first of all because it gives you better margin for error. It gives you more margin for error, because you're able to curve the ball. Just like top spin can make your ground strokes more consistent, even when you attack and try to hit the ball aggressively, hitting with more top spin or even just spin in general on your serve can make your serve more consistent even when you're being aggressive by putting that curve into the path of the ball. And specifically in this instance, Adielo is talking about curving the ball with top spin, with a kick serve, and that's the best kind that you can hit as far as making the ball consistent, as far as making your serve consistent, because it causes the ball to curve back down into the box after you've hit it up over the top of the net. So that's the first reason why this is really good. The second reason is it allows you to sustain racket head speed. You don't have to slow your swing down to still have a really high margin for error. And again, that curve is what makes it consistent, and by spinning the ball, you can still maintain a very high rate of acceleration with the racket, and that spin is going to help you stay consistent. And the way that most players typically start off is they try to hit the ball really hard and really fast on their first serve. You guys all know where I'm going with this [laughter]. And then on the second serve the racket slows way down. The acceleration slows way down, the pace of their shot slows down, and they do that so they can be consistent. When you learn how to spin the ball on your serve you're able to make a high percentage of your second serves without having to decelerate your swing and lower the aggressiveness of your shot. Now just because you're hitting aggressive doesn't mean it has to be flat. It doesn't even mean it has to be really hard as far as the speed of the shot is concerned. Aggressive--when I say that you can still hit it aggressively, I am talking about the speed that you're actually accelerating the racket towards the ball. So I'm really happy that you've started off with the spin serve, and that's usually what I recommend for players to learn first as they just start off with their tennis game. And if you're listening to me right now and you don't already have a confident second serve that's a spin serve, a serve that you don't really have to cut the acceleration of your racket down on, start working on that now. It's very, very important. Now, Adielo is already hitting a spin serve on both his first and his second serves and that's great. That's usually what I recommend for players to do who haven't learned how to hit a spin serve first. Even if they already have a good flat serve is to hit a good aggressive spin serve on both their first and second serves so that they can really develop it as quickly as possible. And develop confidence and consistency in hitting it. So I'm glad that you're doing that already, Adielo. And now he's asking kind of about the next step--he wants to know specific answers to questions having to do with trajectory and bounce and depth and type of spin. He's starting to think about mixing things up. Well, once you're able to start controlling these types of elements, and again the depth of your shot, the type of spin, the type of curve, all these types of things I want you guys to start making your choices based on your opponents. And things that you can consider are first of all, how well does your opponent read differences in the type of spin and-or bounce that you are starting to hit towards them. If the person you're playing just has a hard time reading the differences between when you hit a kick serve or a twist serve or a slice serve, and they just don't even know that it's coming until it's already bouncing, and it knocks them off balance and they have to try awkward shots, then mixing things up between your first and second serve and mixing things up just on your first serve or just on your second serve is a great idea. And altering the depth and the type of spin and all those types of things is going to be a great thing to do Adielo and everyone else listening. If they're able to read your spin easily and the difference between a slice serve and a kick serve doesn't really phase them very much, and they're able to hit either one just as comfortably, then you're going to want to move on down the list and try to find other things that make them uncomfortable rather than mixing up the depth and the spin and all that kind of thing. Some people are--you're going to find that it's not very effective to try different types of things as you were describing, Adielo. The second thing to consider--does your opponent have a much weaker side? If so, which of your serves is going to be most effective to that spot. In other words, if they have a backhand that's much weaker than their forehand, are you able to hit your kick serve or your twist serve or your slice serve most effectively to that spot. And which one of those three serves puts them in the most defense position or makes it most uncomfortable for them to hit their weaker side back. And that's how you're going to choose what type of serve to hit to them and exactly how to aim it and with how much pace and how much spin, etc. In general, you should be trying different looks and you should be mixing up your serve to give them different types of serve to see what works best, and then stick with whatever is most effective. So basically what I'm saying, Adielo, is it's great that you're already starting to control these types of elements. Which one is going to work the best, in other words, more spin or more pace or a higher bounce or more curve right to left-- all of those types of factors--it's going to vary based on who you're playing. So continue to practice mixing those things up, but as far as which one is best to use is really going to be specific based on who your opponent is and what they're strengths and their weaknesses are. Just two last thoughts for you here. First of all, make sure that you always use your most confident and highest percentage serve for your second serve. So whichever one of those types of serve that you're describing is your most confident, that's what you should be using for your second serve most of the time. Now, as I mentioned a second ago, if you find a particular serve or placement combination that really is effective, if you're able to do that relatively confidentally on your second serve, definitely try that and see if you can do it consistently. But in general you should not need to slow your swing down. And you described in your question that currently your second serve travels slower through the air. You said that you have much faster racket acceleration and a more aggressive leg drive on your first serve. What I think you should be working on is maintaining the drive of your legs and how aggressive your trophy pose is, and the acceleration of your racket. You should be trying to match those elements on your second serve to what you do on your first serve. Now you change up the direction of your swing to make it be more of a spin serve based on the direction that you're racket is traveling and how much spin you're imparting on the ball. But I want you to use your body just as confidentally and just as aggressively on your second serve in terms of acceleration and confidence and how you're moving your racket up towards the ball and moving your body towards the ball. I want you to try to match as closely as possible those elements between your first and your second serve. We want to have a confidence second serve. That's very, very important. Last thought here, since you already have good control over your spin serves, I do want you to start developing a flat serve. In fact, I would take a pretty good chunk of your practice time right now that you're spending on serves and start developing that flat serve, rather than spend more time on mixing up different types of spins and different depths and different speeds on your spin serve. Not that that's not important. I do want you to spend some time on that. But at this point, if you could add into that mix a flat serve as well, a shot with very little spin that you hit at a much faster pace. It's going to be a lower percentage serve, but one that you should start to work on to throw into your mix. Another tool in the tool belt, so to speak. Another pitch for the pitcher. We want to mix up your delivery, and by having that wildly different--I mean after hitting all of these types of spin serves, throwing in a hard flat serve is a huge difference. And so if you could start to throw that into the mix as well during your competitive flight, that would be a huge benefit for you, and it would be a big, big weapon. So Adielo, keep up the great work on the spin serves. Nice job starting with that. I'm glad that you've been using your spin serve on both your second serve and your first serve. Now that you've developed it, really pay close attention to your opponents. See what they dislike the most. Use the spin serve that makes them most uncomfortable. That's what you should be trying to do in every match. And during your practice time start to develop that flat serve as well. And also make sure that you start developing more confidence in your second serve so that you can use your body more confidently and use the same aggressive swing you use on your first serve for your second. Just make sure that it's a spin serve so that you maintain your consistency. So that's my advice. Let me know if you have anything further on that, Adielo. Thanks very much for being a listener, and I look forward to spending some time with you in New York City. Before we get to our next question, I want to remind you guys about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast, that is Championship Tennis Tours. You can find them at tennistours.com, and you can receive a discount off your next purchase of tickets to professional tennis tournaments by using the promotional code ESSENTIAL, and you can get a discount off any purchase of $175 or more. And if you make a purchase of US Open tickets before the Open starts, you will also receive an invitation to an exclusive cocktail party in Times Square. It looks like that's going to be Thursday, September 9th. Thursday, September 9th, is when that party is going to be. I'm going to be there. I'm making plans to be there. Hopefully [laughter] , I follow through on that. Will of Fuzzy Yellow Balls is going to be there, and a bunch of fans of FYB and fans of Essential Tennis are going to be there. So it's going to be a great time. You guys can hang out and watch the matches on TV there and just talk tennis. So make your purchase at tennistours.com. Again, use the promotional code ESSENTIAL and you'll get your discount and invitation to that cocktail party in Times Square. I thank them very much for their support of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Alright, our next question comes to us from Chris in Wisconsin who's a 4.0 player. Chris, good to hear from you from the motherland. [laughter] I'm from Milwaukie originally so great to have a listener there in Wisconsin. He wrote to me and said, "I normally always play with my brother who is about the same level as me, but when we play we normally never play matches; it's just feed and rally. He tends to not feed very courteously and is always high and low and out of my strike zone so I always have to play a defensive shot just to get it in. When I feed it right to his strike zone so he can take a big whack at it, and puts the ball in play with a lot of pace. The problem is that either whether I'm feeding or he is feeding, I'm always put on the defense and he is always right on offense. He is always pulling off great shots because of this, and I'm just trying to keep it in, because I am in a defensive mode. I don't feel like this is helping me at all. What should I do to change this? Is this benefitting me at all?" Well Chris, good question, and I can definitely tell [laughter] that this is frustrating you. And I don't blame you for feeling frustrated. There's two main ways to look at this: And the first way--we're basically going to look at this from two different points of view. And the first point of view we're going to take a look at is the honorable tennis player's point of view. We're going to take the standpoint of an honest, honorable tennis player and there's kind of an unwritten code among tennis players, and especially tennis players of a certain level--I'm just going to say upper- level players--there's kind of a code of ethics when you're out on the tennis courts, and I've got five different things here that in general, if you're a decent person and [laughter] you're a nice guy or a nice girl, and you're a competitive tennis player, and again especially over a certain level, I'm not going to assign a certain level to that. But it has to do with experience level-- amount of experience for sure. There's kind of an unwritten kind of code, and I've put down five examples that are in that code. #1, when warming up before a match you are expected to rally nicely [laughter]. And I once heard a comment about a certain player in college. Somebody on my team exclaimed that somebody on the other team was undefeated in warmups [laughter], meaning that they went out with kind of a competitive mentality and just beat the heck out of everything, hit really aggressively, would hit winners during warmup, you know this is the time where players on both sides are trying to get into a rhythm and have nice rallies back and forth. Some people just don't get that. But there's kind of an unwritten rule or there's an expectation that during warmups you're supposed to be courteous, you're supposed to be consistent, and you're not supposed to be aggressive. So there's code-law #1. #2, when you hit a net cord or shank winner, you put up your hand, even if you don't mean it [laughter]. And listen, I've put my hand up and apologized for net cord winners even when I don't mean it. I'm going to be honest there. Not everybody means it, but it's the courteous thing to do. Unwritten law #3 is that when you hit somebody with a tennis ball you also put your hand up. And you may or may not actually verbally apologize and say I'm sorry. Same thing with the net cord or with the shank winner. But you at least just put up your hand. It's a gesture of say, you know what, my bad. And again, you may or may not mean it, but that's not really the point--it's just kind of a traditional part of the game. I think as tennis players we should all treat each other with respect and that doesn't always happen out there, but again, I'm just giving you guys examples of things that in general, traditionally, tennis players will typically do, just as a courtesy. So that's #3. #4, when there's a call that is super close or a player is unsure about a call, usually the benefit of the doubt is given, and the call is made good. And hopefully you guys do that. When you're unsure of a call, I hope you guys give the benefit of the doubt to your opponent, and you don't just call it out. And [laughter] everybody complains about that player who's a cheater or maybe we don't use the word cheater but they always make bad calls. And yet nobody ever says [laughter] wow, I had a close call the other day, and I called it out. And I don't care what the other person thought. I'm just going to call it out. I wanted the point. You've never heard anyone admit to that, and yet everybody talks about the cheater that they played. So listen, my point here is if give somebody the benefit of the doubt. When you guys plan and you're just not sure, or it was very, very close, practice giving them the benefit of the doubt. It's just the honorable thing to do. And #5, when playing a baseline game, you should hit a courtesy feed and Chris used that expression in his question. Courtesy feed means a shot that you hit to your opponent that's easy on purpose. And this goes for cooperative rallies or competitive points, when you guys are making a feed, just to get into the points and to begin the point and you're not playing with serves and returns you should be starting the points off with an easy shot to your opponent. And that doesn't mean you give them a sitter, and it's high and short and weak. But you should hit something to their strike zone so that you can get the point started. Now this is unless you have--you're working specifically on hitting difficult shots and then playing the point out, this should be the case. And on the other side of the coin, when you receive a courtesy feed, it's good manners and its good etiquette to hit the ball back down the middle again. You don't take the courtesy feed and take advantage of it and hit winners off of it, because that's just a [laughter] crappy thing to do. It's just taking advantage of the courtesy that your opponent showed to you. So you should hit that first ball down the middle. If there's a bad feed, it should be redone, and a winner off the feed should be redone. I've done both of those--I've extended both of those courtesies to my opponents during baseline games. I've made bad feeds and said, you know, listen, my bad, I wasn't trying to hit that good of a shot off the feed. And I've also hit winners inadvertently off of a feed and said, you know, here, let's replay that--that really wasn't fair. You gave me an easy shot and I just put it away. That's just not really a fair thing to do. Now, not everybody is aware of things like this, and you should cut them a break, alright [laughter]. Chris, this goes for you and everybody else listening. Not everybody knows about these courtesies-- these unwritten rules of tennis, and some people are just going to be ignorant of them. And they're going to break all of these rules within an hour of play. And just give them a break. Don't worry about it. Many people just don't play very often, they're not very experienced in tennis, they haven't played for very long, or they're just completely unaware of these courtesies. Now, other players are completely aware of all of the five examples I gave, but they choose to completely ignore it. They choose to ignore the code, and they break these unwritten rules, and they even do it on purpose. Now, this is your chance to work on your mental toughness and kind of make your skin a little thicker on the court. Just let it go. Focus on what you can control. And don't let it affect your temperament on the court. Don't let it get you down. Don't let it annoy you. This is just a good chance to practice, and Chris this goes for you playing against your brother. Just do your best, work on your own game, and that's my next point. That was standpoint #1, just purely from a kind of unwritten tennis code point of view, all of these things can be annoyances, but not everybody is aware of them, and not everybody chooses to follow them. And that's fine. You're going to play different people with different codes of ethics and that's just kind of life in general. You guys are going to come across people all the time that just don't agree with you about what is nice, what is acceptable conduct. You're going to get cut off by that person in traffic, or that person in front of you is not going to hold the door for you, even though they know that you're there. And that's just how it goes. Don't let it bother you--that's just life. And you guys are going to be better for it if you can just ignore it and not worry about it. Now from another perspective, I want you to think about this as well, Chris, and that is from a game improvement standpoint. Not only do you get to improve your focus and your concentration during this time with your brother, but you get to work on your positioning and defensive skills. So rather than sit back there on the baseline and sulk and have a negative attitude about it, and say this is just crap, this is totally unfair. I'm giving him easy shots on the feed. He's taking advantage of it. When he feeds to me he's giving me difficult feeds. I'm barely able to get into the points. Well, guess what, why don't you play at a higher level. Learn how to move your feet a little bit better so you can take those shots and still beat him. Wouldn't that really ultimately be the most satisfying thing is taking his crappy feeds and figuring out a way to get them back consistently and still win? That's ultimately the attitude that I want you to come at this from, because this is good practice for you. Now, since you guys are going out with the purpose of practicing, this isn't--while on the one hand this isn't the best practice, because you're not getting into a rhythm, you're not maintaining a rally back and forth, but on the other hand, you need to practice difficult shots too. And so if you're really serious about improving your game, you shouldn't spend all of your practice time with your brother; find somebody that you can rally with that is going to give you a consistent shot, that's not going to take advantage of the feed, and somebody that you can really get the most out of your time on the court with. And then go practice with your brother too. And practice against somebody who's purposely giving you difficult shots. Because you know what, that's real life. Real life is that your opponents are not going to care whether or not you like it. They're going to do whatever they can to try to win. And so this is a good thing for you to practice. When I am running junior clinics at the club where I teach, myself and the other pros don't let kids complain about the feed unless it's just super blatant. I mean, we outline before baseline games start, you guys needs to hit a courtesy feed to start each point. The second shot should be down the middle. It's understood that those first two shots should be down the middle of the court to get the rally going, and so that nobody is taking advantage of the other person as they're trying to get a rally going. However, we don't like to hear a lot of whining about bad feeds. And what we'll watch kids stand there and watch the feed bounce up out of their strike zone without even moving for it and then go, "Oh, that was a bad feed. Refeed it," and they didn't even try to back up to let it come back down into their strike zone. Don't be that person, because you're not bettering yourself at all by practicing that way. We do let kids redo feeds, but only if they make an honest effort to get to the ball and hit the best shot that they can. And if at that point the shot in the ball is still way out of their strike zone and they can't even barely get a racket on it, then we allow them to refeed it. We say fine, that obviously wasn't courteous. You gave it your best chance, your best shot. You know, you gave it an honest effort. Still weren't even close to getting it in play. So go ahead and refeed it. But in general, Chris, I want you to come at this from a game improvement standpoint. Bust your butt, try your hardest, let your partner-opponent offer to redo it if they see fit. And if they don't, you know what, even if you complain to them and say, listen, that's just really not nice, [laughter] they're probably not very likely to change their mind anyway. In fact, they're probably just going to respect you less for whining about a feed that was a little out of your strike zone, and you weren't able to feed comfortable hitting it back. So bottom line here, control what's in your own hands, control what you're able to control-- that is your effort level, your hustle, your footwork, and concentrate on improving your effort level and your mental concentration and your focus. And if you go out with your brother everytime with that kind of mindset, you're going to keep getting better and you'll benefit from your time together. But if you let it bother you, chances are you're not going to get a whole lot out of your time together. So work harder and keep mentally tough, and you'll get the most out of your practice time. So I tried to come at that from two different angles, two different perspectives. Hopefully that's helpful to you, Chris. So, I mean, while on one hand I don't agree with your brother for hitting tough feeds, especially if it's on purpose--on one hand I don't really agree with that, and that's not something I would do if I was practicing with you, but on the other hand, not everybody is aware of courtesies like that. Not everybody knows about them, and even if he did, he might not even care, even if you talk to him about it. So just do what you can do to continue bettering yourself, and let him do whatever he's going to do. And if at the end of the day you feel like it's just not worth it to you, and he's just taking advantage of your time, then find somebody else. I'm sure there's other people you can find to practice with. So Chris, hopefully that's helpful to you. Send me an email. Let me know what you think. And I really appreciate you being a listener. Before I wrap up today's show, I just want to remind you guys about tennisexpress.com, a huge online retailer where you guys can buy any of your tennis purchases that you might need: strings, grips, rackets, bags, shoes, clothing, accessories, string machines. Anything you might want, they've got. And I'm working really hard to get them to be a sponsor of the podcast. They're skeptical, and we're just kind of doing a trial period. So any purchases that you guys have to make this month, do me a favor, go to tennisexpress.com. They've got awesome prices. They have free shipping for orders over $75, and when you check out use the promotional code ESSENTIAL. You're not going to get a discount or free shipping off of orders less than $75 or any bonus items or anything like that, not yet anyway, but you'll help me hopefully secure them as an advertiser here on the podcast. And then I can start working out deals for you guys. So do me a favor, go check them out. At least check them out and make whatever purchases you have this month using the promotional code ESSENTIAL. If you could do that I'd really appreciate it, and hopefully next month they'll be back on as a sponsor. [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for Episode #132 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. I want to thank you guys very much for listening to today's show. The show is completely dedicated to you guys, the listeners, the recreational players, the weekend warriors, you guys out there fighting every week to improve your game as much as you can. This show is recorded all for you guys. And if you have a specific question that you'd like me to answer, go to essentialtennis.com, [music] click on "podcast," click on "submit a question," [music] and I'll use your question here on the show. [music] Alright. That does it for this week. Thanks again everybody. Take care [music] and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music]

Podcast #133: Learn 3 things to help you return more shots in play that your club pro hasn’t taught you! Also learn how the pros create tons of power on groundstrokes and serves.

ianw — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 14:56:24 +0000

There are 3 simple yet incredibly important factors that completely decide whether or not you'll get to a ball comfortably, or even get to it at all around the court. On today's show learn what those things are and how you can improve them right away! Ian also talks about how the pros make so much power on their groundstrokes and serves, and why many recreational players do not even though they try super hard. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Narrator: Welcome to the essential tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you! Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here is Ian! Ian: Hi and welcome to the essential tennis podcast. Your place for free, expert's tennis instruction that can truely help you improver your game. Today's episode of the essential podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com and tennisexpress.com. Well as always, thank your very much for joining me on today's episode of the podcast I appreciate the fact that you downloaded today's show and you're giving it a listen. I really believe that the content in today's episode is going to be helpful to you. It's going to help you improve your game and make you a better player. Before we--ah--get started, I'm really excited about the US Open starting today. Today is Mon., the 30th, and things are kicking off in just a couple of hours up there in New York City. Make sure that you guys check out both, the WTA blog and the ATP Tour news blog at essentialtennis.com. Charles does a great job with the ATP blog and he does daily updates during the Grand Slams. Dana is our writer at the WTA blog. He doesn't have as much time to do updates, but he does an excellent job over there as well, letting you guys know what's going on, and who's winning and who's not at the Open. So make sure to check that out all during this week and next week during the US Open. Alright, let's go ahead and get down to business. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Alright, let's go ahead and get started with our first topic on today's show, and it's a really good one, an interesting one, something that we haven't talked about on the podcast before, and something that's probably a little bit more detailed and a little bit more in depth than what you guys will guess, and today's question, our first question comes to us from [inaudible] in Southern California. He wrote and said, "What are better ways to counter tennis wild balls and bounces during a match? What I mean by wild balls are different slices, miss hits, windy shots, wild bounces on clay, on lines, and on grass etc. It takes me 10 plus shots to get used to different slices and other wild balls. These 10 plus errors are the difference between a win or a loss. Please address the following: #1 backspin shots, #2 side spin, miss hits, line shots on clay--ah--grass, hard etc. #5 uneven bounces on clay, grass, hard courts etc. and then lastly, windy shots that move side to side." So, [inaudible] is wondering how exactly to deal with shots that don't bounce normal.-- ha, I guess, ah--when you, when you hit it or when a ball bounces on your side of the court and it doesn't bounce, you know, straightforward,-- ah--it doesn't, it doesn't maintain its current trajectory and it makes a goofy bounce in some way or another, based on those many different criteria that [inaudible] mentioned, it can sometimes be really tricky and difficult to to be consistent. It's not an easy thing to deal with. Now, I'm going to talk about 3 tennis skills that nobody teaches. I don't see a lot of instruction about this online. I definitely don't hear tennis professionals teaching it very much--um--I definitely have seen it in some places, but it's not a common theme, it's not your typical topic that you guys are usually going to see talked about in tennis videos or, definitely not in a clinic, if you guys go to a tennis club and you're looking for instruction. These are not topics that you're going to hear covered, and this is kind of, this is one of the reasons why I really enjoy the podcast, because while the podcast, you know the audio format might not lend itself perfectly towards technique all the time or strategy, - you know, a lot of you guys are more visual learners and I appreciate that - but what the audio format is great for is things like this, that you guys can learn more about and maybe learn about it for the first time, and go and implement these things into your game. Now these 3 things, it doesn't mean that some of you don't need to really work on these things just because they're simple They're not complicated, but you guys will definitely need to work on some of these areas, in order to improve your game. So, these 3 skills that aren't taught very often: #1 is judgment, and judgment quite simply is the ability to tell where the ball is going after it's bounced. Or I guess in general, we could really expand that to be talking about volleys or overheads, you know, other shots that you take out of the air. You know, we could definitely expand the definition to include that as well. So it's the general ability to tell where exactly the ball is going. And the resulting thing that you guys should be doing once you can tell where it's going is placing your body in the correct spot on the court so that you're able to make an effective swing at the ball, so that you're able to hit the best shot possible. And everybody has different amounts of natural judgment. And you guys, some of you guys I'm sure, are probably thinking to yourselves, "Well yeah, doh, I mean obviously we need to be able to tell where the ball is going, otherwise we're going to have a hard time getting it back," but let me tell you: many of you guys need to work on this. And you don't have large amounts of natural talent, most of us don't have huge amounts of talent to draw from, where you know, we just kind of pick things up automatically without thinking about it first or being aware of it. Most of us are not like that. Some of you guys are and God bless you. You probably don't have to think about this. Others of you, are going to have to actually make this a conscious effort at first to get better at judging exactly where the ball is going and it's something that can be worked on. Now, I have 2 examples here of judgment gone wrong. So, specific examples of what happens when players aren't the best at judging exactly where the ball is going. And many of you guys will be able to identify with both of these examples right away. Example #1 would be repeatedly jamming yourself or positioning yourself too close to the ball on either you forehand or your backhand ground stroke. This is something that I see very commonly, both in my instruction in person where I work, and when I watch recreational players in general, when people send me videos to look at of their stokes. I very often see players position themselves too close to the ball. And it's not something that happens once in a while, it's a repeatable pattern over and over again. And so their judgment is off. They're just not seeing correctly where the ball is going and they're not judging correctly where the ball is in relationship - I'm sorry, where their body is - in relationship to the ball. A second example of judgment gone wrong would be repeatedly hitting the ball up higher than what your strike zone is, over and over again. And I also see this very commonly, and you guys know what I'm talking about: you're on the base line in the middle of a single's or a double's point, the ball comes over to your side, bounces, you prepare yourself, you get ready to swing, you start to make that swing - that forehand or backhand stroke - and before you know it, the ball is up shoulder height or maybe even higher and you're making contact well above where your comfort zone is. Maybe you even identified that it was going to bounce high and you backed up a little bit, but it was still way too high and it became a very difficult shot. Those of you, especially who have one-handed backhands, know what I'm talking about. When the ball is just a little high outside of your strike zone, it becomes much more difficult to hit an effective shot back. So, any time this happens, it's the result of not judging the ball correctly. Any time you position yourself too close to the ball, it's a matter of not judging the ball correctly, and so you have to improve your judgment. That's skill #1, that nobody really talks about or teaches. Skill #2: anticipation, having a strong sense of what's coming next before it happens. And this is something, again, natural athletes just kind of get. And they're always trying to think one or two steps ahead, one or two plays or shots ahead in a point or in a match. They're trying to anticipate what their opponent is going to do next to try to beat them. And this is something that you guys can develop, it's not an easy thing. It's not something like a stroke where you can say, "Alright, this is how you do it," and you know--shadow swing and practice it first and then go out and try it with a ball. And there's not quite the clean progression that you would normally have for a lot of tennis skills, but it's something that you guys can develop. And examples of anticipation would be: having a strong sense or a good guess of what shot placement or shot direction that your opponent is going to hit next. Where are they going to aim their next shot? If you're good at anticipation, you've got a pretty good idea based on their tendencies, and their strengths, and the patterns that they've shown you thus far in the match. From shot to shot you're going to have a pretty good sense of what's happening next. It doesn't mean you're always going to be right. Obviously, your opponent could always throw something in there that is a little bit different and catch you off guard, but people who are good at anticipation very often have a high success rate of telling what's coming next. And there's even certain professional players that are known for this. Andy Murray is kind of known as having good anticipation and when you guys watch him on TV, you'll very often see him start to run before the ball is hit by his opponent, which is part of what makes him cover the court so well. Example #2 of good anticipation would be-- um, I lost my spot. Oh, here we go-- shot selection of your opponent. And what I mean by shot selection is not where they're aiming, but the type of shot. As an example, a drive, a lob, a slice shot, or a top spin-- you know, shot--all examples of different types of shots, that your opponent could hit. Taking out the accuracy, or the aim, or the placement of the shot, they could also choose to hit different types of shots. And that's another type of anticipation. And then thirdly, lastly, realizing that the ball is about to hit a line on your side of the court, or it's about to hit the net court, or there's a strong possibility that's it's about to bounce off the net, or it's some other spot on the court that you frequently get a bad bounce off of. When you have good anticipation you can start to pick up on things like that before it even happens. And again, you might not always be 100% correct. And you might say, "wow, it looks like it's about to hit the line," and it might not. Maybe it'll land inside the line and not touch it at all, or maybe it'll land outside the line and you're off by a couple of inches. But my point is that players that are good at anticipating, they have these kinds of awarenesses and thoughts on their mind and they start trying to pick up on these types of things before they happen, so that they can make a good adjustment to be more successful getting the ball back. So that's skill #2 out of 3: anticipation. And skill #3 that's very infrequently taught is, skills at reading what your opponent is doing. And this is similar to judgment and also it's similar to anticipation, but it's a little bit different. Let me explain what I mean: Basically by reading, I'm talking about understanding what's coming next based on outside influences to the ball. And an example of what I mean by this is the direction of your opponent's racquet swing, would be one example. So, if they're starting with their racquet high, and as they make contact the racquet is coming down, it means they're going to be putting back spin on the ball. It's also pretty likely that it's going to be short. It's probably going to be a drop shot. Not necessarily; they could also knife through it and hit a slice deep in the court as well, but it's something that you would be looking for. And again, this is very akin to anticipation, but I'm going to put this in a separate classification of reading what your opponent is doing and what your opponent is doing to the ball. Again, close to anticipation, but I don't think quite the same thing. Another example of reading would be the angle of your opponent's strings. When you guys play doubles or if you're playing singles and you come to the net a lot and you're worried about the lob, very often you can see the lob coming, based on what your opponent is doing with their strings. Very often, players telegraph what they're doing next by what they do with their racquet face. And so if you see your opponent running towards the ball with their racquet open already, the ball's going to be going up in the air, and unless they chop down at it aggressively - it is possible they could hit some kind of power slice, but look for the ball to pop up. That would be an example of reading what your opponent is doing. #3, the sound that contact makes coming off of your opponent's racquet. This is a big one that I almost never hear anybody talking about, and this is why it's so important at a professional tennis event. The chair umpire and event staff is so being quiet is so important. It's such a big deal, because professional players get a lot of information based on what it sounds like when their opponent hits the ball. And this is something that fans often times don't understand, and outsiders to tennis definitely don't understand, and they think it's kind of a silly thing that everybody has to be quiet. But truthfully, you can tell a lot about what's coming your way by the sound that the ball makes coming off the racquet. A cleanly hit shot makes a very different sound from a shot that hits a little bit off center on the racquet, and definitely a lot off center. If it hits, you know, they just purely shank it, that's good information. You need to know that, because the bounce is going to be very different and the flight of the ball is going to be very different than a cleanly hit shot. And you can also hear different types of spin. I guarantee you guys, that blindfolded I could tell you guys if a ball is hit with drive, heavy top spin, or a slice, or hit softly, or hit off center. All of those things I can tell you guys, what's happening coming off the racquet without even looking. I can tell you what type of swing it was, how aggressive it was, all those types of pieces of information, you can tell just by listening carefully and picking out what different sounds mean as far as what's happening with the ball. And #4, a last example of reading skills: and that would be the wind. Being able to read what the ball is going to do based on the wind. Both, the direction of the wind and the strength of the wind; both really important factors when trying to tell exactly what's coming your way. So, there you have it: judgment, anticipation, and reading. Again, these are really closely related, but slightly different skills, and when you put all of these things together, you'll have the ability to deal with any possible shot to the best of your ability. That doesn't mean that it's always going to be easy. It doesn't mean that you're always going to be in a comfortable place and it's going to be no problem of getting the ball back. But you're going to give yourself the best chance to be successful - even when the ball is hit awkwardly to you - by doing all of these different things. Now, it's so important, because you can't even use whatever athletic gifts you have, unless you read and anticipate and judge the ball well. You could have the world's greatest forehand, but if you consistently misjudge where the ball is going, and you don't react to the ball until after it's been hit every time and you're not anticipating, and if you're poor at reading what your opponent is doing and what the wind is doing and how clean a contact they made etc., if you're not doing any of those three things well, you're rarely going to be in the right spot to hit your best shot. And so you kind of waste that kind of ability to hit great tennis shots. So, unless you can do those things and know what's coming, you're really kind of doing yourself a disservice. And so, it's really improve at all three of these areas. Before I move on and finish this topic up, I want to remind you guys about the official sponsor of the essential tennis podcast, and that is Championship Tennis Tours. You can find them at tennistours.com, they specialize in tennis tickets and travel packages to professional tennis events. Definitely go check them out! They've got great prices, and you can get a discount by using the promotional code essential when you check out. You get a discount off of any purchase over 175 dollars. They've got tickets to most of the big tournaments around the world including the Grand Slams. It's not too late to get tickets for the US Open. You can buy individual tickets or packages as well. So go check them out. And hopefully, I'll get to meet up with some of you guys next week. I plan on being in New York the 2nd week of the tournament, so go check out tennistours.com and use the promotional code essential. I thank them very much for their support of the essential tennis podcast. Alright, let's go ahead and move on and [inaudible] asked me to address several specific instances of what he called wild bounces or wild tennis shots. And now that I've gone over the three main ways that you guys are going to best position yourselves and be in the best possible place to hit a good tennis shot, let's go ahead and go back and talk about each of his [speaker] specific circumstances and real briefly I'm going to take what I talked about already and apply it to those specific occurrences around the tennis court, so that you guys can tell exactly which part of what I talked about are going to apply to these different circumstances. So #1: backspin shots. He asked me to address backspin shots. Well, this is all about reading the swing, first of all. If you can read that he is coming down at the ball and that the racquet is open, you know that he is going to be hitting with backspin. And so you should be able to anticipate that a backspin shot is coming based on reading the swing. So based on those two things, you should be able to judge exactly how much spin is on the ball, and then move forwards accordingly, because a backspin shot is going to cause the ball to kind of check up, to bounce, and maybe even go backwards a little bit. And based on exactly how aggressive the swing is, you should be able to read and anticipate exactly how much the bounce is going to be altered. And that's how you change your game. Based on that you judge where to go and you position yourself accordingly. So that's kind of working down all three steps there, when your opponent hits you a backspin shot. Sidespin, same thing: read the swing, anticipate what's coming, and judge how much spin is on the ball and move accordingly. And depending on what direction your opponent's racquet moves, you know that the ball is going to curve the other direction in one way or another. Or it's going to not necessarily curve, but bounce and skip to the right or to the left. You'll be able to tell based on what direction your racquet, I'm sorry, your opponent's racquet is moving. #3, miss hit shots. This is all about listening. And I put that under reading. You'll be able to tell when it's miss hit based on the sound and also watching closely. The ball won't come off the racquet the way it was supposed to when your opponent hits it when they miss hit the shot. Now as far as what's going to happen specifically with the ball, they are all different. This is tough. This is a really tough shot, when your opponent shanks the ball, you're going to get a variety of different bounces and resulting shots from the other side of the court and so this is tough to judge and know exactly where to go. The best thing I can tell you is, try to visually see the spin on the ball. Very often you can actually see what direction the ball is spinning and you can see it already starting the curve as it travels through the air, and so you can get a read on which direction it's going to bounce when it hits the court. This is a tough one, but if you pay close attention both, by listening and watching, you should be able to get a decent jump and position yourself correctly. Fourth one: line shots. This is tough, too. And you're going to be able to best deal with these by anticipating when it's about to hit the line, or when it's most likely to hit the line. And you can adjust the timing of your swing accordingly. Usually when the ball hits a line, it kind of skips, it comes off the court a little faster than it normally does and usually a little bit lower, and so you have to start your swing a little bit sooner than you normally would to adjust for that. And this is just a tough one, because you might have a good feel for when it's going to hit the line, but you're not always going to be right. The line's a small piece of court, guys. It's not easy to tell for sure when it's going to hit the line. So if you misjudge that and you're off by a little bit, don't worry about it. It's a really tough one, but it really comes down to watching the ball carefully and anticipating when it's about to hit the line. Second to last one: uneven bounces on hard courts, clay courts, grass courts etc. This really comes down more than anything to quick adjustments, because you're not always going to know when you're going to get a bad bounce. In fact, usually, you're not going to know. It's going to catch you off guard. Sometimes, it's something you can anticipate, but not usually. So this is really more a matter of just simply your reaction time. How quickly can you react to the bad bounce? How quickly can you make an adjustment both, with your feet and with your swing? It really doesn't go back to anticipation and reading and judgment a whole lot, because you just have very small amounts of time to make a change, and it's almost impossible to tell for sure when you're going to get a bad bounce. Sometimes you'll have a good idea of when it's going to happen, but this is another really tough situation. And then lastly, windy shots that move side to side. This is something that you should be able to read and anticipate simply by feeling and listening, and watching the ball, and seeing exactly what's taking place from shot to shot. Now of course, sudden gusts of wind could come about and make it difficult, and you might have to make a last second adjustment, and that can always be tough, but in general, you should be able, I mean, you know it's a windy day, alright? The fact that it's a windy day shouldn't catch you off guard. That's something that you should have felt already moving into the match. Of course, each individual shot might be a little bit different, but there's not going to be huge changes in direction and strength of wind, most likely. And so you should have a pretty good feel based on what side of the court you're on, what direction the ball is probably going to move, when the wind does catch it. So, this is something that you should anticipate based on what's already happened that day as you've been outside, but again can be a tricky situation. Alright, so [inaudible] , that's it. I could have gone a lot longer on this. I'm trying to actually get through my outline quickly, because I want to get to another question today, but really good questions and hopefully I've given you guys some things to think about and some things to work on, some things to be more aware of when you're out on the courts and to watch more carefully for. If you guys can get better at judging, anticipating, and reading what's going on around you, you will become a better tennis player. Period. And these are things that recreational players very often either are just not aware of, or they're aware of it and they just take it kind of for granted and they say, "well, yeah, obviously I'm supposed to try to figure out what's coming next," but it's not something that they really work on and take seriously, because they feel like it's too obvious of a thing. So if you guys do take it seriously and you really pay close attention and you work on it, you can improve your game. [inaudible] thank you for the great question, I appreciate you being a listener and hopefully, this was helpful to you. Alright. One more question I want to get to before I wrap up today's show - and this comes to us from Megan in New Zealand - Megan, great to have you as a listener in New Zealand, I really appreciate you listening and writing in with your question. She simply wrote, "What are the best ways to get heaps of power on your ground strokes and serve?" That's it. Simple, straight to the point, I like it. Well, Megan, efficient and coordinated transfer of energy from the ground through your core and out through your arm and racquet head is how you're going to make a lot of power on both, your ground strokes and on your serve. And this is called the kinetic chain, the kinetic chain. And this is something I've referenced a couple of different times on the podcast. I actually did a whole podcast on it, and that was episode #41. I had a medical doctor on the show with me as my guest and we talked all about the kinetic chain and the creation of power using the body. And the kinetic chain is basically a biological theory of how you use your body to best accelerate and create power in general. And this goes for any sports. Any sport where you're accelerating something that you're holding on to. So, golf, baseball, hockey, tennis, anything where power is wanted or needed, the kinetic chain is in use. And it all starts with the legs, as they push up and pivot off of the ground and into your hips, and into your core. Now that's where it should starts. From there, the core should rotate and turn your upper body and your shoulders and your arm. And as that happens, from there, that energy should transfer through your shoulder and arm as they rotate and accelerate the racquet towards the ball. And so there's this push and this rotation, starting form the ground and traveling up your body and out your arm and into the ball and, I'm sorry: into the racquet, and finally transferred it into the ball. All of that must happen in the right order, and it all must be coordinated together smoothly, in order to really get as much out of a tennis swing as possible. Otherwise, your efforts and your energy will be lost, and it will wasted. And recreational players who lack power, who try really, really hard, and - there's a lot of you guys listening out there who are going to relate to what I'm about to say - a lot of you guys put lots of effort into swings, a forehand or a backhand or a serve. You try really hard, but the results, the resulting shot isn't very powerful. And then you look over to the court next to you and there's some 4 or 5 or 5.0 level players hitting and it doesn't look like they're even trying hard. And they're hitting twice as hard as you, and it's not fair. And it doesn't seem like it should be right, because you feel like, "Whoa, I don't understand! I'm putting all of this effort and energy into it. Why am I not getting the same results?" And it's because recreational players very often don't use this method. Instead of transferring energy up through, up from the ground through their body and out their body to the racquet smoothly and coordinated, they swing as hard as they can, using only parts of their body. And usually it's the arm and the shoulder all by itself, and they're just using that part of their body to try to accelerate the racquet super fast. Or, they'll use multiple parts of their body, but it's just not smoothly coordinated or it's in the wrong order. And very often you guys will see players that do use their whole body pretty well. And they do try really hard, but it's just all kind of herky-jerky and not smooth. And they just don't look like a good athlete, when they try to hit the ball hard, everything gets really tight and abrupt. That's one way to really kill your power, is by not being relaxed and one with your swing. Or, it could be in the wrong order. And this is a really common thing as well, that I see when I do video analysis, is a player will accelerate their arm and their shoulder first to try to move the racquet towards the ball in a powerful way. They'll hit the ball and then after contact is made, then their core rotates forwards. It's like, well, what was the point of that? Your core rotated forwards, but the ball was already off the racquet, and so so they feel like, "Wow, I'm really turning my body," but it's a wasted motion, and their energy is not actually going into the shot. The big parts of the body, the legs and the hips and the core all need to start their rotation before the ball is even hit, and then only after the rotation has begun, should contact be made and that's when you're going to really transfer all of that energy into the ball. Now, I've talked about... This is all talk about how your body should work together and how it should be coordinated. I haven't talked at all about correct technique. And that's a big part of it as well. And usually good athletes, who kind of just get the kinetic chain - and they walk out onto the court and they're already doing it well - usually they kind of pick up on technique pretty quickly as well, and it's something that comes kind of naturally. Many of you listening will have to consciously and purposefully work on coordinating your body together correctly, and using the kinetic chain correctly. Some of you listening have attended some of my clinics, and you and I have worked specifically on this, to try to create a more powerful shot. You guys you know who you are, who are listening to me talk. For those of you who haven't worked with me personally: this can be a really tough thing to learn for the first time, especially if you've already been playing tennis for many years, you played when you were younger and you're just starting to pick it up again, and also especially, if you haven't already played a lot of different sports, where you're trying to create power. It can be a really tough thing to learn. So don't be frustrated, if you're putting a lot of energy in and not getting much out. I really encourage you guys to get a video camera and check out your technique on video, on the computer, and go frame by frame and see how your body is being used. Many of you are scared of that, but it is the best way for you guys to see exactly what you need to work on and where things are not working the way that they should. So Megan, that's the answer. Use the kinetic chain, coordinate your body and your efforts together smoothly and in the correct order, and that's how you're going to get the most out of your technique. Both, your ground strokes and your serve, that's how you're going to get the most power and the most spin, the best results out of your technique. So Megan, thanks very much for your great question. Hopefully, this was helpful to you and check out podcast #41 in the archives at essentialtennis.com. Just click on podcast and then on archives and you can listen to that whole show where myself and Dr. [inaudible] talked about the kinetic chain. [music] [music] Alright, that does it for Episode # 133 of the essential tennis podcast. By the way, I'd like to point out that the podcast archives are completely free. I do ask you guys to sign up for my newsletter, but I only send that out once a week. I don't spam you guys and all I do is tell you guys about what's new at essentialtennis.com and then you can access every episode of the essential tennis podcast for free. It's up to something like 70 or 80 hours of instructional audio. So, if you liked the show, go start downloading those extra shows and listen to them during the week. One more thing I want to talk to you guys about before I wrap up today's show, and that is Tennis Express. Now, I've done 2 shows where I talked about their possible sponsorship of the podcast already. I checked in with them over the weekend and I think I heard back from them on Sat. or maybe Sun., and at that point, 4 orders had been placed with the code essential. And I was disappointed by that. At this point, there's hundreds and even thousands of you guys out there listening. And I know a lot of you guys are new to this show, so I don't expect you guys to go and support the show by purchasing anything at Tennis Express or anywhere else, so don't worry about it, but I do want to just give one more pluck for this, because I was really hoping that they could become a sponsor of the show, but if more than 4 purchases don't get made, they're definitely not going to see the value in becoming an advertiser on the podcast. Now, maybe the show is just not ready for that yet, and maybe my audience isn't big enough. Trust me, I'm going to continue working on it, I'm going to keep growing the audience for this show. And so maybe it's just a little bit too early, maybe you guys don't appreciate me asking you guys to do that. And if that's the case, then that's fine, it just wasn't meant to be. But if you do appreciate the show and you would like to see it continue to be successful and all those good things, then I'd really appreciate you guys checking out tennisexpress.com and make any size purchase, doesn't matter how big or how small. And when you check out, use the code essential. You won't get a discount, but you will help me hopefully secure them as an advertiser. And we can continue to work together to get you guys some discounts in the future. Alright, that does it for this week's show. Thanks everybody for downloading it and for giving it a listen, I appreciate it. Take care and good luck with your tennis! [music] [music]

Podcast #134: Today Ian covers three great topics that include target strategy for your second serve, having a good mental balance in trying to please your coach, and best judging whether or not passing shots are going out at the net!

ianw — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 14:58:22 +0000

After missing a first serve should you go right back to the same spot with your second serve or mix it up? Ian talks about three things to keep in mind when making this decision. The second question is all about seeking for approval from a coach, what is a good balance so that you're not distracted on the court? Lastly Ian discusses judging passing shots when you're at the net. Should you play ones that are close? Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Announcer: Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment--or the mental game-- tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! [music] Ian: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast: your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com and tennisexpress .com. Thank you very much for joining me on today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast. Hopefully you guys notice a big difference in the audio quality. As I'm speaking to you, I've upgraded my recording equipment again. It's just another effort to try and make this show sound as professional as possible. And I'd like to thank Cliff Ravenscraft. He helped me figure out what was the best equipment for me to purchase. I'm really happy with how it's sounding. He is the host of the podcast Answer Man podcast, all about being a successful podcaster So those of you listening who might be interested in being a podcaster yourself, or maybe you already are and you'd like some better equipment or tips on how to make your show sound better, definitely check out Cliff's show. That's at podcastanswerman.com. Thanks a lot for your help, Cliff. Alright, we've got 3 great questions to talk about today on the show. So sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Alright. Let's go ahead and get started with our first questions. Our first 2 questions today are going to come to us from Megan in New Zealand. Her first question is as follows: "Hi, I was listening to the confidence vs. arrogance/expectation podcast and it raised a question for me. Dr. Cohn talked about those tennis players that don't have a lot of self-respect that tend to look for respect from others; for example, their coach. This would have to be one of my biggest problems! I was wondering, what if you build up your self-respect and learn to have confidence in your playing ability, but that still doesn't get rid of the need to not disappoint your coach?" Megan, that's a great question. This is definitely an important thing to work on. It's something that I have very often struggled with in college. I had a hard time mentally in college. Looking back, that was due to several different reasons that I won't get into right now. But my eyes would very often travel up to the viewing area during points, during matches. Very often in between every point. I can remember having stretches of time where I was just constantly looking up there. Basically, I wanted to see who my audience was. I was curious who had shown up to watch that day's watch. Were my teammates watching? Was my coach watching? And if I'm honest with myself, I know that I wanted to check out and see, alright. Who can I impress? Who's watching that I can really work hard for, and hustle hard for? If I hit a really awesome shot on this point, who's going to see that? Basically like what you're talking about, you don't want to disappoint your coach. And this is a recipe for a disaster. It takes your focus off of what is really important during your match. Your #1 task at hand in any match is to win. That's what you're trying to accomplish every time you go out there and compete. When your focus and your attention is constantly being drawn to others, you are constantly thinking about other people and what they're going to think about you. Whether or not you're going to win this match, or even how much you win it by. You put that pressure on yourself to try to make other people happy. You stop thinking about tactics. You stop paying attention to patterns that are happening right in front of you in the match that you're playing. You stop focusing on your game plan, and you're not very emotionally controlled either. It takes your focus off of controlling all of those things. Your emotions, your tactics, your game plan. [laughter] And obviously that's not a good thing! When your focus gets taken off all of those things and you start thinking about somebody else instead, and you start worrying about what they're going to think about you, that's just not going to be very helpful to you. You're not going to be as successful that way. As if you keep your focus on the task at hand, and on exactly what's happening right in front of you. And don't badly about this, Megan. Like I said, this is something I had a really hard time with in college. You'll see professional players that struggle with this as well. It's not uncommon at all to see professional players on TV constantly looking up to their box for emotional support during touch matches. Not that it's a bad thing to want support and encouragement from those around you. But when you're literally in the middle of your match and have just finished a tough point, and you're looking up towards your coach, your teammates, your friends with that whiny look on your face. It's like, "Oh, come on! What's going on here?" You're basically looking to other people to help try to get you out of the situation. That's not a good sign of mental toughness. The players who are most mentally tough that you see on TV, they are constantly focused, and they're not allowing other people around them to break their concentration. So I have 2 suggestions for you moving forward. To try and improve this. One is a suggestion on how to improve it, and the other one is just kind of a thought. Something I want you to think about as you continue working at this. First of all, I do want you to continue trying to develop your on court focus skills. Keep working hard at competing for yourself, and maintaining your concentration as you do compete. I want you to realize that this isn't an all or nothing type skill. You will have to continue working on it. It's not one of those things where either you get it or you don't, [laughter] and it's like a red light, green light kind of thing. And you're either succeeding or you're not. It's a sliding scale. So even though you may feel like you've gotten better at this since you've listened to that podcast with Dr. Cohn. And those of you who haven't heard that episode, sorry I don't have the episode number right in front of me, but Dr. Cohn. That's C O H N. He's been on the show 3-4 times. He's a mental toughness expert. Really good guest. For those of you who have troubles with your mental game, I highly recommend you go to the podcast archives and download his shows. But the one that Megan's talking about, I think that's only--I want to say a month or maybe 2 months old at the most. However much time since you've heard that show that you've been working on this, you can still get better, Megan. Don't think that this subject is something that you've conquered and there's no way that you can make this any better. I've got 3 tips for you to continue improving your on court focus, and keeping your attention off of other stuff. First of all, develop a solid routine to repeat between points. This is something that professional players reference all the time in their post-match interviews. They talk about their pre-points routine, or their routine in between points. This is typically things like--I think one of the best examples of this is Maria Sherapova. She has a very distinct routine between points. She'll walk back towards the back wall of the court while looking down at her strings. She'll think to herself what she wants to do in the next point. She kind of has this little hop up and down that signifies: OK, I'm ready. Let's go! Then she'll walk up to the baseline, and either prepare for the routine of serve, or do her service routine, which is also very distinct. [laughter] Ever since Novak [inaudible] copied it and kind of made fun of it a little bit, I think everybody's aware of it. But anyway, she's a good example of anybody who has a really solid pre-point routine, and she sticks to it perfectly ever single time. That's a great way to always calm yourself down. Do the same thing between every point, something familiar, and that can help you maintain your concentration. You can use that time to refocus your concentration on exactly what's happening right in front of you, and continue to push out whatever thoughts you might have during the match. About your coach, or about whoever might be watching, etc. #2. Learn to ignore everything going on outside of your court. This can be really hard. There's a lot of distractions that could potentially tear our concentration away from the match. It could be other matches going on around us. Could be family or friends that are just outside the court watching us. Could be teammates or coach watching us. It could be something stupid, like a kid running around and screaming who's being distracting. Could be lots of stuff. Somebody listening to a radio. Maybe not even close to the courts, but maybe you're hearing music. Or maybe people playing a different sport outside the courts. Could be anything. Any of you who have competed at tennis for any length of time know that some days are easier than others to maintain your focus. Sometimes it just seems like whatever's going on outside the court, for whatever reason that day, your attention is getting sucked away from the match, and that's a terrible thing as far as being successful competitively. So continue to work on that, Megan. And #3 make all of this a habit through repetition. Again, these are things that you need to practice. It's not an all or nothing kind of skill. So keep working at it and you'll keep developing the skill, and keep getting better and better at it. Lastly, I just want to say: it's OK to want to make your coach happy. Don't think that you should be indifferent about how your coach feels about you. [laughter] I want you to work hard for your coach and do whatever he/she tells you to do as far as during practice time, whatever. Exercises or drills. I mean, always work 100%. From that standpoint, I do want you to work hard at making your coach happy, and gaining his or her approval. Where it crosses the line is when you actually go out and compete for your coach, and that's your main motivation is you really want to make your coach happy with you during competition. So don't think that wanting to make your coach happy is bad in general. I just want you to be clear about why you're competing, and I want you to play for yourself out there, and like you were saying, have that self-respect and [laughter] I guess love yourself enough to be playing for yourself. Know that ultimately, you're doing this for your enjoyment, and it's exciting to you, and you love the sport. Those are all reasons why you should be competing--not just to make your coach happy. But wanting to make your coach happy in general is fine. Just be careful about using it as your primary motivation. Using your coach or other people as a crutch during matches. You need to stay mentally tough out there. Fight for yourself and play to win! For yourself. That's how I want you to think about it. So Megan, great question. Hopefully this is helpful to you. I'm not sports psychologist like Dr. Cohn is [laughter] but those are my thoughts, so I hope that's helpful to you. Thanks very much for being a listener. We'll be getting to your next question in just a second. First I want to remind you guys about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis podcast. That is tennistours.com. That is the URL for championship tennis tours. I'm going to be with them in NY this coming week. I'm going to be there Thurs. and Fri. I'm going to be at the matches on Fri. That party that Will Hamilton of Fuzzy Yellow Balls is going to be at it. I'm going to be there. And championship tennis tours is putting it on. It's going to be Thurs. evening. This coming Thurs. is the 9th. That's going to be at the W Hotel in Times Square. If you guys want to go that, you can either purchase a ticket through Championship Tennis Tours and you'll receive a free invitation. Or send me an e-mail and maybe I can hook you up. [laughter] So shoot me an e-mail: ian@essentialtennis.com. If you're going to be at the Open, or you're just in NYC, send me an e-mail, and maybe I can get you into that party with myself and Will, and Championship Tennis Tours. But definitely check them out for any tournaments you might be traveling to, whether here in the U.S. or even abroad in other parts of the world. They've got great prices, great customer service. Please show them some thanks for being a supporter of the Essential Tennis podcast. I appreciate their sponsorship very much. Alright. Our second question again comes from Megan in New Zealand. She wrote, and has a question about serving tactics. She said: "Hi, Ian. I have a question of tactics in the serve. When you serve and you've picked out your target and you're aiming for it, what do you if your serve goes wide, or the ball hits the net, and you have to hit your second serve? Do you stick with your previous target? Or do you change it for the element of surprise? Or does it depend on how far into the match you are? Or the the type of opponent you're playing? Etc. Thanks, Megan." Well Megan, this totally depends on the opponents, and your strengths and weaknesses as well. As do all tactical decisions. They're all subjective. They all depend on exactly what's going on in each individual match that you're playing. As with all parts of tennis, strategy, there's lots of general rules that you should usually follow. But there will always be circumstances from match to match where you might have to break some of those rules to give yourself a certain advantage based on what your strengths are, and what your opponent's weaknesses are. This is one of those kind of situations. There a few things that you should be taking into consideration. I'm going to list 3 different tactical things that you need to keep in mind as you decide where you should be aiming that second serve specifically. This is probably a pretty common thought for most people, because you pick out. Let's say you're serving down the T for your first serve. Maybe you just miss it by a couple of inches, and so your opponent obviously know where you were trying to aim that first serve. It's possible, maybe they're going to try to get a jump on that second serve, and maybe assume that you're going to serve there again. Or maybe they're going to assume you will serve some place else and try to mix it up. It depends on who you're playing. So there's 3 different criteria, Megan, that I want you to look at as you try to decide where you should aim that second serve. #1 Does your opponent have an obvious weakness? As an example: maybe their backhand is much weaker than their forehand. If that's the case, do not be bashful about going to that spot over and over again. I really can't stress this enough. I think too often, recreational players think that good tactics, to be a good person at strategy, they have to be sneaky and trick, and always mixing things up, and never doing the same thing twice in a row. That is definitely not true. I can tell you guys honestly that I have definitely gone whole matches, either singles or doubles--probably at least 1 of each instance--where I've only served to 1 place to my opponent. Because their backhand was that much weaker. I'm left handed and so my spin serve naturally curves out to the right handed player's backhand. I know for sure in double matches, I've gone whole matches to certain returners. Either on the [inaudible] side or the ad side, only serving to one place. Because I found out early that it worked. I found out that they were uncomfortable with their back hand. So just exploit it! [laughter] Just go there over and over again. [laughter] Don't feel like that's mean. That's just good tactics. And don't feel like you have to change it up necessarily. If they really have a weaker side, then just keep going to the well. And make them have to make a big adjustment, either in the technique that they're using, or make them have to run around it. Or make them have to try a different type of shot to be successful, or something. But that's one example of choosing the same target, and that can be really good tactics. If you really have a good reason for going to that same place over and over again. An example of that would be a big weakness. So that's #1. Criteria or thing to think about to consider #2: Do you have a pattern of play that works well for you over and over again? Even if it's not a major weakness of your opponent, a lot of times a certain direction of serve for you followed by another shot can be really successful. I'll give you another personal example of that. Serving and volleying out wide on the ad side in singles has been kind of a go to play for me on hard courts I have a harder time [laughter] Serving and volleying is a lot tougher on clay! But where I played tennis in college, our courts were really fast hard courts. As I mentioned a second ago, I'm left handed. Usually my opponent's back hand was their weaker side. So serving and volleying to my opponent's back hand, I used to have a really good spin serve outside, as most lefties do, on the ad sign. I would come in behind that pretty often. And you know what? Even if it was my opponent's strength, their back hand, I would still throw it back there pretty often, even on a second serve. Megan was talking about second serves. I always had a confident second serve. I would very often throw it in there as a change of pace and to keep my opponent guessing and off guard, even on a second serve. So don't be bashful about using patterns like that over and over again. If you know it's a big strength of yours and you're confident in it, even if it's the same serve that you tried the first serve. In this example, I served out wide aggressively, and made those 2-3 aggressive first steps into the baseline, making it really obvious I was serving and volleying. I would very often just go right back to it for my second serve. Hit a confident spin serve out wide, and come right in behind it. That just shows your opponent that you're not afraid. You know what you're good at, and you're going for it. And you're playing confidently. That's a message that, if you can send that to your opponent on a regular basis, you know what? Even if they hit a back hand return winner on me, I don't feel badly about throwing that in there once in awhile. Because it's really forcing my opponent to stay on their toes tactically. I force them to have to go for that big return serve. Whereas if I just kind of spun it into the middle of the box and sat back at the baseline, they're feeling no pressure to even have to hit a great shot. So think about that, Megan. What patterns or specific placements and combinations of shots do you usually use to the best effect? That's something to keep in mind when you think about where to aim that second serve. Thirdly, have you spent a lot of time developing your aim and your accuracy and your confidence of your second serve. You need to ask yourself this. All of you listening need to ask yourself this, because many of you who are listening to me right now don't have the confidence to actually aim your second serve, and go for a target, and hit to a specific place. Many of you don't feel like your second serve is good enough to try to aim it, and as a result, you're happy to just hit the box in general. You're aiming for very general targets. If that's the case, then I suggest that you stick with whatever your most confident placement is on that second serve to avoid double faults. In which case, your decision is kind of made for you on that second serve. So if you go for a big first serve and you miss it, then your choice is pretty easy [laughter] on the second serve. If you don't have a very confident second serve, you're going to find yourself going ahead and going with whatever the highest percentage placement is, and highest percentage type of serve is for you on that second serve. Even if it's not the best tactical decision. In other words, if your most confident second serve is just kind of a slow spin serve right in the middle of the box, and your opponent is running around hitting all 4 hands and crushing them, maybe you want to try for a little more on your second serve. But if you haven't spent a lot of time working on it, and you end up just double faulting as a result when you try to hit to their back hand on purpose, then unfortunately you're going to have to go ahead and go with whatever generic target is most comfortable for you on that second serve. So let me encourage you to work hard at developing a confident second serve. It's really important. You should be able to aim it and place it. If you can't do that confidently already, start working on it, because it can be a really big tactical advantage for you during a match. Alright. So Megan, that's it. Hopefully that was helpful to you. I want to thank you very much for both of your questions that I used in today's show. I appreciate you being a listener of the podcast. It's always great to hear from listeners in other parts of the world outside of the U.S. So it was exciting to hear from you. Hopefully today's show is helpful to you. Keep working hard on your game. Before we get to our last question today, I just want to remind you about the second supporter of the Essential Tennis podcast. That is Tennis Express. You can get free shipping for any order over $75 from Tennis Express. When you use the promotional code 'essential' when you check out, you will support the Essential Tennis podcast by showing Tennis Express your appreciate for helping me out. This is the last week in their trial period. We're going to be reviewing how many purchases got made in the last 4 wks. Sometime this week. Hopefully, we're able to work something out for the future, and I'm going to fight really hard to get you some discounts and special offers, and things like that. So thank you for your help as I continue to try to secure them as an advertiser on the show. So tennisexpress.com and again, promotional code: essential. I really hope that I work things out with them moving forwards, both for the podcast, and for you as well. With that, let's go ahead and move on to our last question. This comes to us from Tim in Dayton, Ohio. He's a 3.0 player. He wrote and said: "My question relates to judging if a ball is going out or not when I'm playing at the net. It happens so fast that I don't much time and I often hit that balls that may have gone out." So he's got two main questions here. #1. Does the chance of making good contact affect your decision on close calls? What he means by that I assume, is if you can reach a volley easily, does that have any bearing on whether or not you let it go if you think it's going to be a close call. Then the second question is: "What cues should I be watching to help make this decision? Top spin, etc. Do you have any drills to help with this? I know this is basic stuff, but I think it's a good topic." I agree, Tim. It is a good topic. I like basic stuff! [laughter] At the core of a lot of my teaching is just fundamental things. This is one of those topics that probably hasn't been discussed a whole lot around the internet. It's how to get better at judging whether or not passing shots, lobs, are going in or not once you do approach the net. I think that's probably one of the biggest areas that tennis players are worried about or apprehensive that can a lot of times keep recreational players from going to the net as much as they should be. So to answer you questions Tim #1, he was asking about if it's an easier shot to make a play at if I can reach it and it's a relatively easy volley, does that have any effect on my decision to let it go or not? Yes. Absolutely. An easy volley, if I'm receiving volley from my opponent, or if they're way out of position--or even if it's a medium to tougher skill level volley and my opponent is way out of position of the shot I hit I previously, I'll definitely play a volley that I know might be going out if I'm not 100% sure. If I'm 80% sure that the ball is going out, or maybe if I'm only 30-40% sure that the ball is going out. And it's not like I'm running these calculations in my head while I'm playing. I'm just using the numbers as an example here. Even if I'm a little bit suspicious that the ball is going out, or I'm pretty sure, either way. If I have an easy volley, or my opponent is out of position, I'll just go ahead and play it and play a really high percentage easy volley to the middle of the court if they're out of position. Or if it's a really easy shot, that I'm in good position for, and it may or may not be going out--I'm not positive--I'll just go ahead and crush it and put it away. If it is that easy. Because it's just terrible to set up a point well. You hit all those shots that it took to get up to the net. Maybe you even have your opponent really on the run and they're in a tough spot. [laughter] And it's really deflating to go through all of that work and then watch their shot go right by your nose, and turn it out to watch it land out, and it lands inside the lane. [laughter] That's really frustrating. So if it is an easy shot, I will definitely play it. Even if I'm pretty sure it's going out. Second question, he was asking about cues to be watching for to make this decision of letting the ball go or not. Spin is definitely a big one. You need to watch the shape of the shot and the direction of swing. If your opponent makes a very aggressive upward swing, and you see that the ball is curving in the air, that's a shot that you're going to want to play more often than a shot that's traveling straight, and that they've either sliced or hit flat. Straight towards you. A slice, or a flat type shot, is going to travel farther given that it's the same speed as a top spin shot. So you definitely want to watch for heavy top spin. It can be easy to be fooled by that, so watch for a top spin swing, and watch for a top spin ball path, which is going to be one that's curving back down towards the court. #2. Cleanness of contact from opponent. Especially at a top spin type spin. When they shank or hit off center a little bit, you should be able to hear that and on a top spin swing, very often when your opponent hits it a bit off center, even if it's really aggressive and they've hit it super hard, that will add more spin and cause a really aggressive curve back down into the court. So listen for that. Lastly, speed and height. Really obvious things, but those are probably the 2 most important factors that you should be looking at. If the ball is traveling really fast and it's 4 ft. on top of the net, unless there's a lot of spin on it, it's probably going to be going too far. Again, really fast is a relative statement. A lot of spin is also a relative term. When it comes down to it, you're going to have to use your own judgment for this. There's no set rule about which balls you let go and which you let play. This is something that you're going just going to have to build your judgment up on. It takes a lot of repetition and a lot of experience. Drills to help you improve your judgment, Tim, definitely play as many competitive volley games as possible. I've got 2 main suggestions for that. 1.) You can just start at the service line and feed straight ahead to a base line partner who's across from you back on the base line on the other side. And just play it out. I would set a rule that there's no winners on either of your first 2 shots. So you make that feed. Your opponent can't hit a clean winner off of their first ground stroke, and you can't hit a winner off of your first volley either. Otherwise you just restart the point again. That way you at least get into the points and you at least 2-3 shots exchanged back and forth every single point. It just makes for a little bit better, more productive practice. So you can play points out that way. Play a game up to 10 and then trade sides, or just stay at the net if you want to keep working on it. Or you can both start on the baseline, and have one of you feed a short shot, a shot that lands in front of the service line on purpose. The other person comes forward, hits an approach shot, and then you guys play it out. That's a way you can work on your approach shot and your volleys in your judgment up at the net. There's 2 ideas for you for competitive gives. Do it in a competitive environment. Cooperative hitting can be helpful as well. But in cooperative hitting, you're just trying to get everything back and be as consistent and keep the rally going as long as possible. In competitive games, you're actually trying to win the point, so it puts that pressure on you to make the right decision. I think that's where you're really going to develop your skills at judging where the ball's going exactly the fastest, and the best. So in wrapping up, as I said earlier, there's no real secret to this, Tim. It takes a lot of experience, and a lot of repetition. It's something that can both be developed and lost. It's a learned skill. I can tell you that [laughter] my judgment is not even close to what it used to be! I definitely used to be able to tell within several inches where the ball was going to land across a wide variety of speeds, heights, and amounts of spin. [laughter] My judgment's way off now. When I go and play a full-speed point and I'm at the net, and I have my opponent hit a 5.0 level heavy top spin passing shot, I definitely let shots go now that land well inside the line. My eyes just aren't adjusted anymore to the same speed of shot that they used to be when I was playing competitively on a regular bases. It's something you can lose, and it's also something that you can develop. So don't be frustrated about it. The more you work on it, the better you're going to get at it. Keep working hard at it, and I know that you can improve. Tim, thanks very much for being a listener. Thanks for your great question. Hopefully this was helpful to you. And good luck with your game! Keep working hard. [music] [music] Alright. That's brings Episode #134 of the Essential Tennis podcast to a close. Thank you very much for taking the time to download today's show and to listen to it. I really appreciate your support just by being a listener and listening to the show. I hope it's been helpful to you. It's always my goal when I record this show. And I hope you guys are enjoying the new audio. Maybe it's not a big difference for some of you, but for others it probably will be. I'm kind of a techie. I used to be a sound technician way back in high school in college, so it's something I enjoy tinkering with, audio quality in general. So I finally made the plunge and purchased some serious equipment. [laughter] And I'm really with the results so far. I hope you --I hope it makes the show more enjoyable for you! It should definitely sound of much higher quality. I'm really excited about that. Alright. That does it for this week. Shoot me an e-mail if you are going to be NY this coming week, Thurs. or Fri. I'd love to meet up some of you guys. I'll be going to [inaudible] on that Fri. Again, Ian@essentialtennis.com. I'm really looking forward to that trip. I'll tell you about it next week. Until then, take care. Thanks everybody, and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast #135: Should you be using a straight or bent arm forehand? Ian also talks about increasing your focus on the court to be more successful in match play!

ianw — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 15:00:05 +0000

There is a lot of debate online about which forehand technique is the best: straight or bent arm. Today Ian talks about which he likes to teach and why. Other topics include staying positive in the face of losses on the tennis court as well as keeping your concentration when distractions are all around you. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast! If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether its technique, strategy, equipment, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. Your place for free, expert, tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the essential tennis podcast is brought to you by Tennis Tours dot com. Thank you very much for joining me today, I appreciate that you took the time to download today's show and give it a listen; I really hope that its gonna be helpful to you and give you some ideas and thoughts on how you can improve your tennis. That's always my #1 goal here on the show. Before I get started with today's questions and answers, I want to thank a couple people in New York City. I was there this past Thurs. and Fri. I was there at the matches on Fri. I got to see the Brian Brothers win their 3rd US Open Grand Slam title. So I saw the men's final and I also both women's semifinals, it was a great time. I want to send a special thank you out to [inaudible] on the forums at essential tennis.com. H e was nice enough to show me around the city on Thurs., and he went to the matches with me on Fri., and gave me a place to sleep! [laughter] So that I really appreciate that [inaudible] , I'm in your debt for helping me out and showing me around. Also a shout out to Erin and Ben, two other listeners that I met up with while I was there. It was great to meet both of you guys and speak with both of you, and I really appreciate having both of you as a listener in New York City, it was a great time. And today the final sets of play, after the rain, today is Mon., and unfortunately was put on hold due to weather yesterday. So I'm looking forward to seeing that match I know the rest of you guys are as well. Alright let's go ahead and get to the show. Sit back; relax; and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] Alright. let's get to our 1st question, and it comes to us from Masa in Bloomington, Indiana, Masa's a 4.0 level player, and he wrote and said: "Federer and Nadal are no doubt two of the best players in tennis history. Both of them have a straight arm forehand. What are the advantages and disadvantages of having a straight arm forehand or a bent arm forehand? Which one do you prefer teaching? Do you recommend this technique to average club players?" Alright. Masa, great question, and this is actually something that I have gone over in the blog that I write--at essential tennis dot com-- you guys can go check that out. I don't update it as frequently as I would like. The podcast definitely takes precedence for me every week, but I do have an article in there about the straight arm versus bent arm forehand, and basically gonna give the exact same thoughts and opinions right here on the show. So which one do I prefer or which one do I recommend? The answer to that is neither. I don't care which one you use, and the reason for that is, this isn't an essential part of becoming a good tennis player, and that's for the title for my website comes from is, the way that I teach and the things that I teach to my students and to you guys every week when I do the show are things that, in my opinion, are essential. They're necessary, they're things that you better be pretty good at or you're not going to improve your game, and I like to focus on just the basics, essentially. And how do I know that this isn't an essential: straight arm versus bent arm, how do I know that if you pick the wrong one, you're gonna limit yourself, as far as your ability and your potential as a tennis player? Well, because, players in the top fraction of 1% in the world--and that's what we're talking about here: you're talking about Nadal, Federer, I'm gonna use another player as an example as well--we're talking about guys that aren't in the top 1%, they're probably in the top 1% of the top 1% of tennis players in the entire world. When you look at the USTA --which I think has something like 30,000,000 members, I might be totally off on that, but I believe that's just what I heard recently-- millions and millions of members that are a part of the USTA, the United States Tennis Association, and you look at the spread of players From...I think its from 4.5 and above, we're into your top 10% of tennis players in the United States, 4.5 and above. 5.0 and above, we're talking about the top couple percentage points--I think its around 4%, 3 or 4%-- is 5.0 and above. Now, myself as a 5.0 player am not even close, not anywhere close to a professional player. And I'm talking, when I say professional player, I mean somebody who's 500 in the world. A player at that level is gonna crush me. I'd be happy to get a couple of games off of a player that's 500 in the world. And that player is no where near a Federer- or Nadal-type player who's in the top 5 or--I guess for those two--top 3 consistently over the last 4 or 5 years. So we're talking about a ridiculous level of player, and the way that I know that what we're talking about here--straight arm versus bent arm--is not essential is because when you look at the top 5 players in the world, you see different players using different styles. As you pointed out, Masa, Nadal and Federer both use a straight arm style forehand. Djokovic --who's playing in the US Open final today, just beat Federer--uses a bent arm forehand. Now, some of you out there might be saying, 'Whoa, yeah. But Djokovic... He's only got'...what does he have, one grand slam? Well, I probably should have looked that up before the show started. I'm terrible at stats,but clearly, he doesn't have nearly the success that Federer and Nadal have had. So I'm sure that some of you guys out there are saying, 'Well, obviously straight arm forehand must better then right? Nadal and Federer both use it; they both routinely crush Djokovic, or maybe not crush him but at the very least they certainly have a winning record. So maybe straight arm forehand is better.' No. That doesn't mean that its any better or any worse, it just means that its his style of swing. Its what has come naturally to him, and so that's what he uses. He has a double bend in his forehand. So because these top level players use different strokes, and are still...not different strokes but different styles, and are still able to get to the top 5 in the world should tell you that its not essential which one you use. These players are able to become extremely good using either one, and so its not going to make you or break you either way. So basically, when it comes to my teaching, I allow my students to feel for themselves, something like this, and then use what comes naturally to them. I have actually... Thinking back... I'm pretty sure I've never actually talked about a straight arm versus a bent arm while teaching a lesson. Never. Not once. And its not because I don't know about it, and its not because I don't understand it, trust me, I know plenty about what is being taught online and not online. I keep up to date with these things; the article I wrote on straight arm versus bent arm was at least a year ago--its been a while now-- but its not something that's going to bump up the level of your game dramatically as opposed to other things, and we're going to talk about what other things I have in mind in just a minute. But the only time that I will instruct a player to do something that doesn't come naturally is when its something that is just wrong; and its clearly technique that's not going to serve them very well in the future, its gonna hold them back in the long run. There are times that all of us have natural tendencies that aren't good technique, and it just won't make sense to continue using that type of swing, or that type of footwork, or whatever. So I'm not saying that you guys should go out there and do whatever comes natural to you, and that's gonna be the best thing for you, because that's not true. You guys need to make sure that you understand the fundamentals and that you're performing them correctly, but straight arm versus bent arm is not a fundamental, and its something that you guys can become very good players with either way, and I think your time is better off spent focusing on things that have a much bigger bearing in how good of a player you become. So some things that I think are essential to your forehand, Masa, I've got 5 different things here that you should focus on, because they're extremely important. #1: the rotation of your body This is something that many recreational players are very poor at, and these are things that are going to sound really obvious to you guys, especially to those of you that spend a lot of time researching on the internet, watching a lot of slow motion video, and filling your heads with instruction from a dozen different online tennis instructors. You're gonna get a lot of stuff thrown at you, and everybody always says, 'This is super important; this is going to give you a world class forehand. Make sure that you do this...' and you'll hear 10 different pros online say that, and tell you 10 different things, and it can be kind of confusing. Well, let me submit to you guys that these five things I'm going to list here are most important and you need to focus on these things. Anything outside of that until you become a 4 or 5 player really is not that important, because when it comes down to it, the mistakes that recreational players make that truly hold them back are the basic things. So, again, #1: rotation of the body. Turning yourself to the side, or at least your core and your upper body and then rotating yourself back forward again past through the point of contact. #2: correct racket path for whatever type of your shot you're trying to hit. Whether you're trying to drive the ball relatively flat, or hit slice, or hit with topspin, it takes a different path of the racket, and you need to know--and when I say, 'path of the racket' that includes the drop of the racket (if you're hitting top spin or drive), the lifting of the racket, the follow through position, the direction that the racket moves is extremely important, and you have to be good at performing that consistently, correctly, over and over again. #3: correct angle of the racket face at contact. When you guys miss a shot long or into the net, very often its due to the racket face being a little bit too open or a little bit too closed, and that's simply means facing too upwards or too downwards, extremely important. Correct use of the kinetic chain--for those of you that are looking for more power or more spin on your ground strokes, using the kinetic chain correctly is huge, and that simply means how you coordinate the use of your body, and I've talked about that on several podcasts. I'm not going to go in depth on that right now. And #5: consistently swinging at a speed that's confident, but not out of your control. Some of you guys listening consistently swing at a tentative pace, and you swing scared, and you don't make a very confident swing at the ball. That's not good. Others of you hit very aggressively over and over again, and make a lot of unforced errors. You make some really sweet shots too, but you make a lot of mistakes, and so being able to swing at a consistent and confident tempo or speed is extremely important. If you put all 5 of those things together: rotation of the body, path of the racket, angle of the racket face, kinetic chain, and the speed of your swing, you put all 5 of those things together, and do them all correctly consistently, and you're gonna be and awesome tennis player. And along the way, whether or not you use a bent arm or a straight arm on your forehand, I don't care [laughter], and its not going to make a huge difference one way or the other. You guys need to focus on what's most important to your game, and that's how you're gonna make the biggest changes and the biggest improvements. And last thing I'm going to say on this topic before we move on, those 5 things that I mentioned, every pro does those things. Not every pro uses a straight arm forehand; not every pro uses a bent arm forehand; that's a style decision or a natural choice or path that each player has decided to take. But those 5 things that I just mentioned, every pro does great and every pro does consistently, over and over again. So its these things that are essential that you guys need to spend the most amount of time trying to copy and improve. Leave the stylistic things alone, and if you guys aren't sure which is which, send me an email, and I'll be happy to help you guys out. So Masa, hopefully that makes sense to you, and hopefully that's a helpful answer to your question. Great question, and good luck continuing to improve that forehand. [music] [music] Alright. Before we get going with our next question from a listener, I want to remind you guys about the official sponsor of the essential tennis podcast, and that is Championship Tennis Tours. You guys can find them at TennisTours.com. And they supply tickets and travel packages and accommodations to professional tennis tournaments all over the world. Whether you're into the WTA or the ATP, either way, these guys have tickets and packages to a lot of different tournaments all over the world. Again, just about any place that you want to go. All the grand slams, they have travel packages for, so thinking ahead to next season, if you guys are planning any trips out of the country or in your own country--I know I've got listeners all over the place. So if you guys want to go to any of the grand slams or a lot of the ATP 1000 series tournaments, definitely check their website out and when you checkout, make sure to use the promotional code essential, and you'll receive a discount off your purchase, and show Championship Tennis Tours that you appreciate their support of the essential tennis podcast. So, thank you Championship Tennis Tours. I appreciate your sponsorship, and all of you guys listening, please go. At least check them out and see what they have to offer. Alright next up we got some questions from Chris in Minnesota. He's a 2.5 player; two different questions here, his 1st one is: 'In my matches I have a tendency to start a set focused, but then start to lose focus when the score gets to around 2 to 2 in the set, which allows my opponent to take the set easily from there. Any suggestions on how to keep my mind in the match and not be distracted by things like planes flying overhead, the people playing on other courts, and the pretty girls playing softball in the nearby field?' [laughter] Well Chris here, a very honest guy, I appreciate that. And, trust me I'm right there with you man. It can be really tough to keep your concentration, and this is a very very common mistake and its a very costly mistake. As you've pointed out, you kind of get into a set, you--I don't know if its just sometimes we get bored, we lose interest, or maybe we just get tired of keeping our mental focus up. It's very common to kind of let your guard down, but you absolutely must keep your focus on the task at hand if you want to be successful, and the task at hand very simply is winning. We're there to win the match; that's why you're competing, is to see if you're gonna win or lose against whatever opponent that you happen to be playing that day. And the things that you have to be focused on to make sure that you are most successful and that you do win the most amount of matches are things like what tactics that your opponent is using, your opponent's strengths, their weaknesses, what they're good at what they're bad at, and you need to be conscious of your own game that day as well. What are you doing well? What are you not doing well? And basically what I just outlined is tactics or strategy in a nutshell. You got to be aware of your own strengths and weaknesses, your opponent's strengths and weaknesses, you have to realize what tactics that your opponent is using and then build your own game plan around all of that information, and if you're thinking about the girls playing softball next to the tennis courts, trust me. You're not going to be aware of any of those things, and the chances of you winning that match decrease a ton, because you're no longer focusing on what's most important, and what's ultimately going to decide the outcome of the match. So how can you improve your match focus? I've got 3 different suggestions for you, and this is a really good topic, Chris and I'm looking forward to talking about it all 3 of these different suggestions. #1: have a set routine. Have a set pre-point group of actions that get you into a rhythm and keep your concentration. I think a good player to watch as an example of this is Maria Sharapova, she has a very distinct, and very set routine between points. She'll walk back towards the back wall of the court, or back curtain, or whatever you want to call it, back fence, of the court after every single point. As she does that her head is down, she's looking at her strings, and at this point she gathering her concentration and her focus, she also thinking about what tactics she wants to use during the next point. After she's done thinking and gathering her concentration, she typically does a couple little hops to get herself moving physically, and get herself pumped up and set. She'll turn around and then go and get either into her ready position to return serve, or she'll go into her serve routine, which is a completely different set of actions. You guys all know what her serve routine looks like --I've seen Djokovic make fun of it [laughter] a couple years ago. Maybe not necessarily make fun of it, but copy it at least. So she has two different routines depending on whether she's serving or returning and she repeats this before every point. Whether she won or lost the previous point, she will always repeat this routine, and this can help you keep your focus. It does not have to be complicated. In fact , the simpler the better, and I want you to come up with something like this Chris and stick to it and make it a habit. I think my favorite part--well, my 2 favorite parts of what Sharapova does--are #1: she turns her back to the court, kind of shuts everything out behind her, and then she puts her eyes down, and she looks her strings, and she'll kind of mess with her strings. Its not because her strings have to be straight on the next point. I n fact, if you look at them they're usually straight to begin with, so it has nothing to do with straightening her strings. I t's just a habit that she does to keep her eyes down so that they don't wonder and she doesn't get distracted by anything else happening around the court. So come up with a couple of things like that and start to use them between every single point, and a big part of that is developing something that you can keep your eyes on inside the court at all times. So that's suggestion #1 Chris. Have a set routine, and I really suggest that you come up with one. Again, don't make it complicated make it simple, and make a part of that keeping your eyes inside the court. #2: suggestion #2 for you, make it a personal challenge, and this is my favorite one. [laughter] Personally, I'm extremely highly competitive, and so I love competing--not only against other people--but myself as well. I love giving myself challenges and then trying to achieve them and I love seeing how well I can do something. And so, make a commitment to yourself that you will not be distracted. Period. Make that decision before your matches start and tell yourself, ' You know what. No matter what happens today, I'm going to keep my mind on what's important; I'm going keep my focus on the match, and kind of make it a game out of it..." And times in which there's something super obvious that's happening and would be easy to pay attention to beside your match, whenever things like that happen when I'm playing--and like you were talking about you give the 3 examples: have a plane flying overhead, I've definitely fallen for that one. People playing on other courts, I think everybody listening has definitely taken their focus off of their own match and watched their teammates or other random people playing. Pretty girls [laughter] that's not one that I'm faced with very often but it can definitely be a distraction. Other random things like yelling, kids maybe running around playing something else, maybe a crying baby, maybe somebody talking on a cell phone loudly right next to your court. Whenever there's something super obvious like that, maybe even teammates of my opponent actually heckling me and actually cheering against me loudly at times that are maybe not even appropriate. The more obvious and the more potentially distracting something can be, I just kind of smile at those things, and I think about--it can be really easy for me to pay attention to that instead, and to take my focus off of the match, and I kind of almost make a game out of it and I'll smile and say 'wow. That can be a really easy thing for me to pay attention to and to break my focus, but you know what? I'm not gonna do it, and I'm gonna be that tough of a player today, and I enjoy trying to be as tough as possible.' So take this approach to every mental challenge that you're faced with on the court and great athletes have an attitude always that they will overcome their obstacles, no matter what they happen to be. Whether its a physical challenge, or a mental challenge, a focus or concentration challenge--a quote we're talking about, 'no matter what, get in the habit of making it a personal challenge for yourself to overcome things like this, and do it. Start doing it consistently.' Thirdly, on how to focus better and keep your concentration, keep practicing; and this is just like any other skill in your tennis game. Great mental toughness does not happen overnight nor does it happen the very first time that you try to do your best at it; its a learned skill, and you have to keep working at it. So the first time you go and try my suggestions, let's say you make it until 3 to 3 in the set, and then you lose your focus and lose the set. That's better. Keep practicing. Keep working on it. Keep putting yourself in competitive situations like this as often as possible, so that you can practice your mental toughness, and practice putting into play these suggestions that I'm giving you. Using the routine, making it a personal challenge to do a better job of staying focused, go continue practicing, doing these things, and you will keep getting better at it. So Chris, great question. Hopefully this is helpful to you. Alright last question for today's show, and this one also comes to us from Chris in Minnesota. He wrote and said: 'I'm a 2.5 player, maybe a little better, playing in a 3.0 singles league. I have a pretty limited match experience and I'm stilling working on a more consistent game. So I'm losing a lot of matches. In the long run, I know that getting a lot of match experience will help me, but in the short term, how do I avoid falling into a losing mindset?" That's a good question Chris, and it can be really tough to lose over and over again and not get dejected and not get frustrated and not start thinking, 'wow, is this really worth it? I'm working really hard at this, but I'm still not winning my matches...' and it seems like the main focus should be on your win and loss record, right? After all, isn't that really the top measure of your improvement is whether or not you're winning or losing your matches? And it seems like that can be logical, but please don't do that. Please don't make it your top priority, and a big reason for that is--you know what, it doesn't matter how good you are, you can always lose a tennis match, and it doesn't matter how good you play, there's always going to be somebody out there who's better than you, and so you can't put all of your eggs in that basket of, 'wow. If I lose today's match, then I'm a failure.' Because the reality really could be that you could play at 100% of your potential wherever you're at right now, and whoever you played that day was just plain better. For whatever reason; and so you can't always use that as the ultimate judge of your success. So what you should focus on instead--I've got 5 different things here that I want you to focus on instead of your win and loss record. #1: the level of your strokes and the shots that you hit in general. If you see improvement consistently, and I'm not talking about huge improvements, but little things here and there, if your technique is getting better, and the resulting shots that you're hitting are getting better, even if you lose, be happy about that. Be satisfied that you are seeing marked improvement in your strokes and in the shots that you hit. #2: the level of your concentration and mental toughness, which we just talked about. A specific area of that in your last question, if you're able to start being more focused and compete better due to your concentration, be happy about that. Even if you lose your matches, you can be satisfied with the fact that you did a better job with your focus and concentration. #3: your general comfort level competing when it counts. This is a big one; and this is something that a lot of recreational tennis players start off really poor at because they didn't grow up playing other sports, and they didn't grow up in competitive environments and it takes time to get comfortable competing in general. If you start feeling more at ease and more confident and in your competitive matches you're just able to do things more naturally without worrying about it so much, then be happy about that. #4: your ability to use tactics and strategy effectively. This is something that again if you didn't grow up in a competitive environment and playing other sports doesn't come naturally to a lot of people. If you're starting to be able to put together game plans more effectively, even just simple things--picking out your opponents weaknesses and making them hit more of shots that they don't like. If you can do that more consistently then be happy about that. #5: lastly, if your speed, quickness around the court, and your general fitness level becomes better as you continue to compete more and practice longer or harder, be happy about that. So every time you notice small improvements in any of these areas, be happy, and be satisfied, and celebrate a little bit. Give yourself a little bit of a pat on the back and say, 'You know what? Nice job.' Even if you lose those matches, tennis is complicated and all of the things that I just listed, all five of those areas, they all have to be improved to reach your full potential. Don't expect to get a little better at any one of those areas, and immediately just win all of your matches [laughter], or even win a lot more matches that you're playing. So take an incremental approach to it, don't take an all-or-nothing attitude or mindset and say to yourself, 'Wow. If I don't win today's match, I'm really just not getting any better.' You have to look at it at kind of a macro level and look at all the small individual pieces that you're trying to improve and remember back, 'Wow, remember three months ago when I wasn't even able to play 3 sets without getting really tired, or 3 months ago, that would have totally passed me by. I wouldn't have even noticed that my opponent's backhand was weaker. I wouldn't have been able to put together that strategy...' Take little successes like that and be content with that for now. Now several years from now, I do want you to be winning more matches for sure. I want you to be playing at a higher level and so all of these little things they should start adding up, and they should start resulting in better overall results, but until that starts happening, be patient, and don't be too hard on yourself. If your win-loss record is not very impressive, appreciate those baby steps, one small step at a time, and make that your #1 focus, and be happy that you're making those improvements. So Chris, thanks a lot for both of your questions. Hopefully these were helpful to you, that's always my goal of course, is to put information out there that's going to help you guys get better. So go implement these things and report back. I'd be curious to hear how its able to work out for you, and hopefully these suggestions are able to help you improve the level of your play. So Chris thanks again, and good luck with everything that you're trying to improve. [music] Alright. That does it for episode #135 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for listening to today's show. I really appreciate having you as a listener, and as I wrap things up here I'm going to try to reward those of you who have listened through to the end of the show here a little bit. I'm gonna be launching a whole new section of Essential Tennis.com very soon. Within the next couple weeks, probably two or three weeks. And its going to feature a new show. I'm going to be doing a whole other hour of instructional podcast audio every single week. Its going to also include video, and its also going to include a live chat room, and you guys are going to be able to ask me questions or follow up questions on whatever I'm talking about live as I record the show. And I'm giving away more than I wanted to already, but this section's gonna be available within the next couple weeks. If you would like a sneak peak at this new service, I've actually been doing it kind of secretly for the last--I've already done 10 episodes of this new show, just for members of the forum at Essential Tennis.com. So there's something that you guys missed out on if you're not a member of the forums already, definitely check out the forums at Essential Tennis.com. Well, if you would like to join them and get a sneak peak and get a discounted rate-- for those of you who contact me this week, send me an email at ian@essentialtennis.com, tell me you're interested in my secret new show, and I will tell you guys how you can sign up and get a discounted rate before I make it available across the entire site and start really promoting it to everybody, and start making a big deal about it here on the regular podcast, and across Essential Tennis.com as well. So send me an email: ian@essentialtennis.com, I'll tell you guys how you can get more information about that and how you can sign up and this is really going to be geared mostly toward you guys who have really been helped by the show and would like even more. I'm going to start off at a full hour extra of instructional audio per week, and I'm probably going to increase it from there and start doing a couple hours a week and so you guys can really start getting even more out of the website and getting even more instructional feedback and more personalized feedback as well, since this going to be a membership type deal. Only members are going to be able to ask me questions to talk about on this show. Alright so that does it for this week. Thanks again everybody very much for your time. Thank you for listening, and I'll be talking to you guys again next week. Until then, take care, and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music]

Podcast #136: Please make sure that you’re avoiding these three huge technique mistakes! Ian talks about the most common problems on the court.

ianw — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 15:01:34 +0000

Through out the countless hours that I've spent teaching recreational level tennis players how to improve I've definitely seen patterns in the mistakes that they make. Today I talk about the three biggest, most common mistakes that rec players make in their technique. Find out what they are and make sure that you're on the right track! Ian also answers a question about using two different tosses for the first and second serves. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Announcer: Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. If you love tennis, and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment--or the mental game-- tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast: your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by TennisTours.com. Thank you very much for joining me today, this episode of the Essential Tennis podcast. I really appreciate the fact that you took the time to download today's show, and give it a listen. I hope that it's going to helpful to you, and give you some ideas about how you can improve your tennis game, and move up to a higher level of play. It's always my goal when I create each and every one of these shows. Before we get to today's topics, I want to send a message out there to all of you gearheads, all you guys who are infatuated [laughter] by rackets, strings, grips, and footwear and clothing, and all of that stuff. If you're a huge gearhead, and you'd love to have an outlet for that, I'm looking for a writer to write for my Gear Review blog at EssentialTennis.com. I've had a really hard time keeping a writer for that blog for some reason. I've gone through tons of them. If you feel like you could be reliable, and you would enjoy writing content for that blog, I'd prefer that if you had some kind of certification or experience actually working with equipment. If you're a master racket technician, etc. that would be best, but I'm not going to make that a requirement. Either way, just send me an e-mail at Ian@essentialtennis.com. I'd love to hear from you if that's something you'd be interested in. This is something that would essentially make you published. You could put it on your resume as being a writer on a tennis website. So send me an e-mail, and hopefully I can find a new person to start getting some great reviews of rackets and strings, and all other types of tennis gear on the blog. Alright, let's get down to business. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] Alright, let's get started on the first question in today's show. It's a simple one, but one that's excellent, and something that's going to create a lot of discussion here on the podcast. Ben G. in Lexington, Kentucky wrote in and said, "What do you think about a podcast of the worst habits of the worst habits you see in teaching? As in: what are the things the player should go out of the way to NOT do?" Well Ben, that's an awesome question. I thought about having a guest on to talk about that's another teaching pro, but kind of ran out of time in doing that. So I'll just go through it myself. What I've outlined here are--in my opinion or in my experience--the top 3 technical mistakes that recreational players make. And this is just based on what I've seen teaching full-time over that last... I guess it's been about 6-8 years now, spending 30-40 hrs. a week on a tennis court trying to help recreational players just like you guys listening improve. In my opinion, these are in my opinion, the 3 biggest mistakes that will lead you guys down the wrong path as you try to make yourselves better tennis players. These are extremely common things. So Top 3. #1: a short and tight swing on ground strokes, both forehand and on backhand side. This is definitely the #1 technique issue that I battle with every single day as I'm on the court, trying to get my students to improve. Most often when recreational players try to hit the ball harder on either their forehand or backhand side, their technique gets shorter. This is what I see most commonly. Not all the time. In my experience, it definitely depends on what kind of background players have playing other sports. If you've already played a lot of golf, or if you've played baseball, or maybe lacrosse or hockey--or some other type of sport or game where a long swing was needed to create really good results--maybe you're lucky enough to go ahead and do it naturally, correctly, which is to make a racket path that goes through the ball with good length so that you can really create the most amount of power and racket speed as possible. But from what I've seen with kind of average level athletes and just your typical person off the street who has decided that they really enjoy tennis and they want to get better at it, when I see that type of person try to create more power, usually their stroke actually gets shorter instead of longer. This is due to their muscles tightening and tensing up as they make their swing. The result of that is a shorter racket path and less racket speed. Now even thought the racket moves faster because they're trying to accelerate it more, so they to move it real quickly through the point of contact, even though everything might tighten up and tense up, and their overall length of swing might get shorter, it might be that they actually do speed the racket up ultimately. In other words, compared to an average paced swing or a rally ball where they're just trying to get it in play. It's very possible that, even though they get tighter, the racket might move faster, but in the long-term, that technique is not going to serve you very well. It's going to choke off your potential to continue making your ground strokes better and better down the road as you keep on working on your game. This reminds me of--I tell this story a lot. I think I've only talked about this one other time on the podcast, and it was quite awhile ago. I was listening to a golf podcast. This is probably 1 yr. ago, back when I was really into golf and trying to improve my technique. I heard an excellent quote from one of the top instructors in the U.S. The person who's interviewing him asked him, "What was the #1 mistake that amateur golfers made as they tried to hit a good golf shot?" He said, "Amateur golfers too often try to hit the ball." [laughter] That should strike you as odd right off the bat! He said, "Amateur golfers try to hit the ball." That's a huge mistake! This 100% applies to tennis as well, and in my experiences, really transfers over for amateur tennis players as well. What he means by that is: rather than making a high-quality swing and using high-quality technique, and simply letting the ball be in the middle of that swing. And kind of just letting the ball get in the way of that good technique, and just focusing on the technique, both golfers and tennis players tend to consider the contact point as being all important. Don't get me wrong. The contact point is hugely important. And what happens just before and just after contact is a massive part of what make a shot successful. But what this instructor was talking about was having the contact point be the #1 focus for a golfer, or in this case, a tennis player. So these players can just focus on that part of the wring, and the result is kind of a bracing for packet. The racket is being accelerated towards the ball just to make contact with it. And very tennis players have this brace: Here comes the ball and I'm going to hit it! And there's just this quick, jerky acceleration towards the ball. Everything just comes to a halt as soon as contact gets made. There's a lot of tension there. Everything gets shortened up. That is no good! Both on the golf course, and on the tennis court. I'm going to ahead and stop using golf references now. [laughter] Because I know a lot of you aren't big fans of golf. But there's a lot of technique similarities between golf and tennis. Which I found really fascinating as I was trying to improve my swing about 1 year ago. So that's #1. Worst Habit, Biggest Mistake #1, is a short and tight ground stroke. Do yourself a favor by focusing on having a long swing. A relaxed swing. Being nice and loose, and don't even really think about the contact point. Make sure the racket moves through that area smoothly, like you're just not even really thinking about it. Just focus on the finishing position, your finishing spot of your swing, and accelerate to that point. Don't accelerate to the contact point. Don't accelerate up to the ball and then have that be your goal, and then everything stops as soon as you make contact. Accelerate all the way through to wherever you're finishing your swing, and make that #1 goal on your forehand and your backhand. Alright, Worst Habit #2 is that recreational players move their racket a lot on volleys. [laughter] If I could cure 1 technique in tennis across the entire world, it would be this. It just agitates me so much! Volleys should be very simple. They should be very straightforward. There should be no extra stuff in terms of technique. They should be a calm and relaxed redirecting of the ball. That just doesn't happen for so many players. This is definitely in my Top 3. In fact, this may be #1. I don't know. It's close between this and the short, tight ground strokes on both the forehand and backhand side. It's a close call for me. But this is a huge one. Two things that you should not do on your volleys. #1: I hate the word "punch" for volleys. Don't punch at your volleys. I mean, just think about a punch. If you're watching boxing or missed martial arts, or whatever, and you see somebody punch somebody else. Or you see somebody punch a heavy bag in training for boxing, or martial arts, or whatever. You'll see a short, abrupt, intense contact between the fist or the glove of whoever is doing the punching and the bag or the body of whoever they're trying to punch. This is not good technique for volleys. You should also not swing your racket, meaning: your racket head and your racket face is moving back and forth across your body like it would for a ground stroke. That's not something you want to do either. What we want is something in between. Again, I dislike "punch" a lot. You also should not swing at a volley. That's not a good idea either, because that's where things start to get sloppy. What you want is a smooth and relaxed guide of the ball. You're trying to guide the ball towards your target. Your racket face should be facing towards your target during most of this technique. Ultimately, what this means is that you want to use bigger muscle grips instead of smaller ones. Here's what I mean by this. When you move the racket head around a lot, and you move the racket face around a lot, and you're trying to accelerate through the ball and swing your racket towards the ball, ultimately that's from using your hand, your wrist and your forearm a lot. To kind of maneuver the racket, swinging it back and forth like you would on a ground stroke from the right side of your body to the left side or vice versa. That's from using a lots of smaller parts of your body. If you use the bigger parts of your body: your legs, your core, your shoulder to move the racket smoothly through the ball, you can guide it towards your target very accurately, and still with reasonably good pace. It doesn't have to be a weak shot if you use the bigger parts of your body to tell the ball where to go. You want to take the momentum that's already on the ball. Typically when you're hitting volleys, your opponent or partner has driven the ball towards you. They've hit a forehand or a back hand ground stroke. Or maybe you're in a quick net exchange back and forth, and there's already pace on the ball. It hasn't bounced yet. You've taken it right out of the air, and you've got some momentum to work with already. You want to take that energy that's already on the ball, put your strings behind the ball, and send it back towards your target. Again, I like the word "guide" for this. To send the ball towards the direction that you want it to go. This is as opposed to the two biggest mistakes. The #1 biggest mistake on volleys is too much moving of the racket, and swinging it back and forth. A second mistake that I feel--listen. I'd rather that you guys punch at your volleys rather than move your racket around a lot. Alright? That's definitely the case. So if you guys are going to make one mistake or the other, I'd rather that you're abrupt and short, and you punch at your volleys. I'd rather that by far, than you guys move the racket around a lot, and actually swing the racket towards the ball. So you know, please punch it [laughter] if you're going to do one or the other! But I don't like punch either, because it's abrupt and short, intense, and I don't like that for any shot in tennis. So make it a guide. Hopefully that makes sense. Hopefully my terminology there is not too vague, and I've explained that well. But that's definitely in my top 2 mistakes that recreational players make on the court. So let's go ahead and go to #3. This is in my #3 out of my Top 3 Worst Habits that recreational players make. #3 has to do with the serve. And I've done this on purpose. I've done my best to spread this out. I've done one on ground strokes. A worst habit for volleys or net play. Now worst habit for serves. In my opinion, the worst habit overall that recreational players have on their serve is serving too straight, or even downwards, towards their target. A good serve is an upward swing. Even on a flat serve, your technique and your motion should be accelerating the racket upwards towards the ball. Upwards. Not straight. Definitely not downwards. A serve is not like a jump serve in volleyball, or a spike. We're not trying to hit the ball down at the net. I don't care how tall you are, you should not be trying to hit the ball down at your target. Many recreational players hit their serves in that direction. Either accelerating their racket path, the direction the racket is moving, either horizontal, straight out to their target. Or they actually accelerate the racket down towards the target. The only way to make a serve doing 1 of those 2 things consistently is to have a slightly open racket face. So a forward motion and a slightly open racket face. The results, the resulting path of the ball, is a ball flight that travels straight or slightly down. It has kind of a straight trajectory right towards its target. Or as I head, even a little downwards. It is possible to make a serve this way. So all of you guys thinking about sending me an e-mail right now saying: "Well, the force of gravity and the drag of air, and if you're a 6 ft. player with this reach, making contact from this height..." Yeah, I've seen all the physics reports, and the different [laughter] equations. At what speed, at what height over the nets, and all this stuff. I've seen all that stuff, and I'm totally aware that at a certain contact height, it is possible to actually hit the ball straight, or hit it down and make the serve. I see players do it every single day, especially when they hit with a little slower pace. I'm not saying that it's impossible to make a serve that way. What I am saying is that when you hit in that direction, the trajectory that the resulting shot travels across, is extremely low percentage. You don't want to hit a shot from behind the base line that has to stay inside the service box, which is 18 ft. inside the base line, and try to hit it straight. That's a problem, because a straight trajectory carries with it a very low margin for error. If you hit just a little bit too high, and you hit the ball across a relatively straight line, it's going to go out very easily. If you're hitting across a very straight line or trajectory towards your target and a little too low, you're going to hit the net. This is the same thing as with ground strokes, and this is why I always teach players first to make an upwards swing towards the ball so that they can curve the ball back into the court. High level tennis players make contact all the way at the very peak of their technique of their serve. It's an upward swing. In preparation for their service swing, they bend their knees; they drop their entire body downwards; the racket drops. Those of you who have studied service technique at all on line with slow motion video know that there's a position called the "racket drop." That's to get the racket dropped. [laughter] To get it down below the ball as far as possible. When you watch professional players in slow motion, you will see that the tip of the racket drops well below their waist. They're dropping it way down below where the ball is. #3: They tilt their shoulders upwards towards the ball. Big servers have almost a vertical angle from their dominant elbow. If they're right-handed, their right elbow. Up through their left hand, their non-dominant hand, as they tilt back and create an angle upwards towards the ball. So all of those things: the knee band, the racket drop, the shoulder tilt to tilt upwards towards the ball--all of that is preparing to launch the racket, and launch their body upwards towards the ball. All of that accelerates upwards towards the ball, and contact is made at the very peak, at the very top of this technique. A lot of times I've had players say to me, "Yeah, but they finish low. They make contact, then they come down." Yes, but that's only after contact has been made. Contact is made at the very top of all that accelerating up towards the ball, and then the racket comes down. Then the body comes down. Contact is not made with the racket and with the body coming downwards, it's made at the very top of all of that momentum, carrying up towards the ball. So the serve is an upward hit. Put that into your heads! [laughter] It's true. So high-level players make that upward acceleration and at contact, the racket face is flat. At least very close to flat. It might be close a tiny bit, maybe a couple of degrees, but it's definitely not open is my point. It's either flat or close to little bit. The resulting shot has curve to it. Whether it's a flat serve, quote unquote "flat serve," which any tennis shot is always going to have some rotation on it. Whether it's a flat serve, or a kick serve, or any other kind of spin serve, a high level player after hitting a good serve creates a trajectory that has some curve in it. Again, just like a top spin ground stroke does. So that curve adds margin for error. It makes it safer, because you can hit the ball up over the top of that net, and that curve will bring the ball back down into the service box again. That's a huge benefit when you're trying to hit a ball aggressively, and still keep it in play. Alright. That's a topic I feel strongly about. A topic that recreational topic that recreational players probably fight me on the most. When I have students who just aren't buying into something that I'm trying to teach them, this is probably the #1 thing. A lot of players resist change in their technique to a more upwards swing. It's just not something they're comfortable with or used to. But it's a really big difference between your average recreational player and a high-level player or a professional player. OK. In review, Top 3 Worst Habits that I see in teaching: short, tight ground strokes; a swing on a volley or a punch on a valley. Again, I don't mind a punch that much. It's definitely a lot better than a swing, that's for sure. And #3: Hitting forwards or downwards on a serve technique. So Ben, those are my Top 3 mistakes, and Top 3 things all of you guys listening should avoid at all costs. If you're not sure if you're doing these things, get a video camera. You know what? All of you should have a digital video camera. You can get a regular flip cam for $80-$90 now. You can get a HD flip cam for $130- $140 on Amazon.com. You can plug that right into your computer, and see high resolution video. It's not super fast frames per second or anything, but it's more than good enough so that you can see what you're doing wrong and go from there. Alright. So Ben, great question. Enjoyed talking about it. Hopefully this has been helpful to you. If you'd like any more feedback, please let me know. Good luck as you continue working on your game. [music] [music] Alright. Before we get to our second question on today's show, I want to remind you all about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis podcast. That is Championship Tennis Tours. You can find them online at tennistours.com. They're a supporter of the Essential Tennis podcast, which I really appreciate. To show your appreciation for their support of myself and the show, go check them out. And if you're going to be going to a professional tennis event anytime in the future and you want tickets, travel arrangements, hotel accommodations, etc. definitely check them out first. See if they have tickets for the event that you're going to. If they do, when you make your purchase, use the promotional code "essential" and you'll get a discount off your purchase. Plus, it will show them that you're a listener of the show, and you really appreciate their support. Which will help keep them on as a sponsor of the Essential Tennis podcast! Alright. Our last question on today's show comes to us from Vidron in Croatia. Vidron, [laughter] I'm really sorry. I'm probably killing your name, so I'll go ahead and just apologize up front. I'm not sure what the correct pronunciation is, so please forgive me. Vidron is a 3.5 player. Again, in Crotia. He wrote and said: "The thing that I want to get advice about is an experiment that I tried on my serve. In trying to develop an aggressive and more powerful first serve while maintaining my second serve at its current level, I decided to change my toss, and throw the ball a bit lower and significantly more in front of my body to create more pace and more spin. But more pace mainly. Unfortunately, this experiment led to losing my consistency on my second serve, and producing a whole lot more double faults than before. So my question is this: Is it recommendable to have 2 different types of service toss? Is it even possible considering the problems I've developed? And keeping in mind all those problems that pro-players often have with only 1 type of ball toss in various parts of their careers." Alright. So Vidron, do I recommend 2 totally different ball tosses and techniques? Because that's what that would mean. Basically, when you put your toss in a totally different spot, it changes the whole rest of your serve as well. You can't just make a big change to your toss and use the same technique. Everything else has to change to accommodate that new location. So we're really talking about a completely different swing. Short answer is no. I definitely don't recommend that you do that. Mostly for the sake of consistency and unity in your game. And it would mean twice as much work for you to continually try to improve 2 totally different serves than if you used basically the same toss, and small changes in your technique between your first and second serve. If you tossed in essentially the same place between your first and second serve, you could keep things like your rhythm; the rotation of your body; your contact point. Again, relatively speaking, all of those things could remain the same, whereas this big change that you're talking about much lower and much farther in front, all of those big technique elements have to be different. So we're talking about trying to develop 2 completely different service techniques. It doubles your work as a player as you try to continue to become better and better on the court. I give this same answer when players ask me about something like maybe developing both the one handed and two handed back hand. Something else that I don't recommend for the same reason: it's 2 totally different swings, and it's just that much more to work on and try to improve as you try to get yourself to be a better player. The benefit almost never outweighs all that extra work. This is especially since most of you listening I assume--probably over 90% of you listening--are just recreational players, people that have a regular job during the day. Or maybe you guys are students, and you have school during the day. You might have a couple of hours a week to practice and play. Maybe 2-4 hours at the most. You guys want to be smart about how you use your time. When you start really spreading out your asset of time, especially on the practice court as you try to improve your technique, doing things like this is just not something that I recommend. Now this is unless your previous toss Vidron, if your previous toss was really high and it as far behind you, where you were constantly leaning backwards to get to the toss and it was super high so it kind of busted up your rhythm, and you had to wait for a long time to wait for the ball to get down. Unless that was the case, your change isn't going to lead towards better technique anyway. It sounds to me like you're trying to toss it low and kind of right in front of you, into the court a couple of feet, and probably making contact lower. [laughter] Basically, exactly what I was describing in my first topic today when I talked about bad habits on service technique. It sounds to me like you were trying to put it low right in front of you so you could make a low contact point and hit the ball just straight out in front of you into the box with a slightly open face to make sure that it makes it over the net. This is really common technique, but it's definitely not a very athletic motion. It's not going to give you a lot of potential as far as developing a higher level serve in the future. Now a lot of players are very consistent hitting the ball this way. But it's not a technique that I like. Again, because it's just not very good as far as fundamental use of your body goes for creating pace and spin, etc. It's not going to leave you a lot of room for growth. Now there's one exception to all of this. I've told you that I don't like your idea. I don't like you having 2 totally different motions and tosses in general. I also don't like the idea of the specific technique you're talking about. However, there's one exception to both of those things. Previously, you were really struggling with your first serve, and weren't making it very often. This big toss change made an immediate improvement. Vidron has told us already that this hasn't worked out very well for him, but this is more for the rest of you listening. If that big toss change makes an immediate improvement and ultimately you're happy with the result, and in the long run, you're going to continue being happy with it, then fine. Go ahead and do it! Go ahead and make the change, and have fun playing. I don't think it's the best idea, and I also don't think it's the best technique. But if you see an immediate improvement in confidence and consistency, and you're happy with where it's at and you don't mind sacrificing some long-term potential for short-term success, then go ahead and do it. I want to make sure that I don't get too rigid and too strict about my views with technique. I know I have the tendency to do that: both on the podcast and in person. Ultimately, all of you listening, it should be your goal to enjoy the game. To have fun. If you can make a quick, immediate improvement--even if it's not the best technique and you're going to be OK with the fact that it's not the best technique and it might limit you as far as potential a little down the road--go ahead and do it. But just keep in mind, it's not going to be my #1 suggestion! My #1 suggestion is always to be to learn the best possible technique, and work hard at it, and give yourself the best ceiling, your best change, to continue making yourself a better tennis player. I'm always going to be upfront with you guys about what changes will lead to the most long-term benefits, basically. It's always going to be the direction that I come at with my answers to your questions on this show. Those of you who comes out and work with me in person at a clinic, etc. That's always going to be my perspective, because that's just the way I think. I don't like shortcuts in general. [laughter] And tennis is no exception! I want you guys to learn the best possible technique. I just want you guys to know where I'm coming at in regards to that. So Vidron, thank you very much for your question. Hopefully you've got a good idea of what I recommend here. I'm sorry that your change didn't work out very well for you in general. Yes, I do recommend that you have some kind of unity between your first and second serve. They should be slightly different techniques, but I don't recommend that you use totally different serves for those 2. If you have a video camera, feel free to send me an e-mail with a video clip showing me your serve, and I'd be happy to give you some input. Some further input as far as specific technique is concerned. But thank you very much for being a listener in Croatia. I appreciate it. Hopefully this episode has been a help to you! [music] [music] Alright. That bring Episode #136 of the Essential Tennis podcast to a close. Thank you very much for joining me on today's show. I hope that you enjoyed it, and that it's been informative and helpful to you. And in wrapping up today, I wanted to remind you all about the different social networks that Essential Tennis is on. You can get updates on Twitter at Twitter.com slash Essential Tennis. You can also check out the Facebook fan page at Facebook.com slash Essential Tennis. And you can look at the instructional videos that I have posted at YouTube.com slash Essential Tennis. So go check all 3 of those pages out. Lots of good stuff in all 3. And if you'd like to be friends with me on Facebook, you can check out my personal account as well, which is Facebook.com slash Ian Westermann. Westermann is with 2 n's at the end, and Ian I A N. I'd love to be friends with you guys! [laughter] As long as you don't mind seeing my personal thoughts instead of just my tennis. I don't really post anything about tennis in that. Just personal updates. Alright. That brings today's show to a close. Again, thank you guys so much for listening, for downloading the show. I really appreciate it. I'll be talking to you guys next week in the next installment in the Essential Tennis podcast. Until then, take care, and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast #137: Lifting weights can add a lot of strength and power to your tennis game! Listen to a special guest talk about how important weight lifting can be and how to do it.

ianw — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 15:03:18 +0000

Do you head into your local gym only to be intimidated by the wide range of machines and weights available? Do you feel out of place next to the huge body builder-types? Fear not! Listen to Steve Beck of the Power of Fitness Podcast in iTunes as we talk about the best ways to increase your strength and power around the tennis court. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian: Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free expert tennis instruction, that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the essential tennis podcast is brought to you by TennisTours.com and TennisExpress.com. Thank you very much for joining me on today's show. I appreciate having you as a listener no matter how you might have picked up today's podcast, I recommend by the way that you guys use iTunes-- it's definitely the easiest way. ITunes is a free download from Apple and you can subscribe to the podcast in the iTunes store for free. And each week you will automatically download each new show. So it's nice and convenient and in my opinion, the best way to get the show every week. This week I've got a special guest on and I'm going to be talking about lifting weights and fitness for tennis. Which I think is a great topic for all of you guys to help improve your game and take yourselves to the next level. So let's go ahead and get right to it-- sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] My guest today on the Essential Tennis podcast is Steve Beck. He is the owner of PowerOfFit.com which is a great website all about motivation and working out and getting in better shape. He also has a podcast, an audio podcast, which is on iTunes and it is called PowerOfFitness. The PowerOfFitness podcast. Steve, thank you very much for spending some time with me and welcome to the show. Steve: Thanks Ian. My pleasure to be here. Ian: So you've been really active on the forums on EssentialTennis.com and you write some great fitness blog articles that we post on the fitness blog on essentialtennis.com. And you've come to a couple of clinics so you are super involved and I really appreciate that Steve and I'm really happy to have you here on the show to talk about tennis specific fitness topics. First of all, tell us a little bit about your background as a fitness person and tell us a little bit about your website and your podcast too. Steve: Sure Ian. Thanks for the opportunity. I started getting into weight training about 17 years ago. And I've been through a lot of phases and a lot of changes in my programme and I've seen a lot of fads and a lot of things come and go. And really in the past couple of years, I've really just come to enjoy it a whole lot and want to share that knowledge and share things that I've accumulated. And obviously I'm still learning-- I'm currently studying for my personal training certification through the American College of Spots Medicine. So I'm excited about getting certified and being able to really do some of the things that I love to do recreationally-- be able to help people do that in a professional basis as well. Ian: Cool. Steve: And over the past year or so, in getting involved with getting more active with my tennis and staying active with my fitness. You've obviously given me a great outlet to share some things and to help people get into a better tennis shape and a better shape in general. And at the start of the podcast, the beginning or a couple months ago towards the beginning of the year, and I'm still working on that and really the website is in its infant stages-- it's just an informational blog at this point. A plan on the future incorporating more fitness based routines and nutrition into it. And again, just being able to help people, to give people information and help them see the need to get into better shape. Ian: Great stuff. What prompted me to get Steve as a guest today was a question from a listener and you might remember this listener from last week's show-- his name is Vedron in Croatia and he has got a question about fitness specifically-- actually three individual questions that are all very closely related. Steve and I are going to talk about those questions and if we have time, we are going to get to a couple from the forums as well. So let's go ahead and read Vedron's question. And it goes like this, "My question is about physical training, which I find pretty important even for a recreational player as myself. The thing that confuses me, is how I should approach weight lifting training. Most of the training coaching tips that I Google'd say a tennis player should lift smaller weights and more repetitions during the tennis season and probably bigger weights with less reps in the off season. Is that true?" He has two other questions which I'll read, but we'll answer these individually. Secondly he says, "How many days in a week should I lift during my tennis season?" And lastly, "What muscle groups should I focus on and with what exercises?" So Vedron, thanks very much for your great questions. First of all, I've had a couple different guests on and I've definitely talked about fitness before but I don't think that I've ever focused on weight lifting specifically on the podcast before. So I'm looking forward to talking about this. I know that it's a topic-- something that I've used in the past to really help my game. Certainly when I was still playing full time-- it's not as important for me now, but hopefully we'll talk about injury prevention a little bit later as well. That's how it effects me now as a teacher. So Steve, let's get to his first question. And he was talking about lifting during season versus off season and he read that it was suggested that he should be using smaller weights and more reps during season and bigger weights and less reps in the off season. So his first question is, is that true for the tennis player? Steve: Absolutely not. But I'll say that with an asterisk on the end. The first thing before you approach any kind of weight lifting or training program, is you want to involve a professional. And obviously I know a lot but I'm not there with Vedron and I don't know his physiology. I don't know of any health risks that he has. And the same when I give information to anybody online and removed from it, then personally, is you want to seek out a professional and make sure that you don't have any underlying symptoms and that just doesn't mean any kind of disease or anything obvious. It could be some physiological symptoms. If you have shoulder strain or a tear or an underlying injury. Those things are going to definitely come into play. And so just to kind of get that exclaimer out of the way first. And I think that's smart for anyone when they are looking to improve their fitness level by going into the gym and lifting weights and doing some serious training-- or any kind of training. Any time you go in and lift weights, it's going to be a serious strain on the body so you need to be aware of some factors before you enter into any kind of program-- and get some professional guidance. So I hope that makes sense. Ian: Let me interject here for a second Steve. What about-- I know that a lot of my listeners don't want to pay what it costs in where ever they happen to live for professional tennis instruction and of course professional training or meeting with a trainer to work out can be very expensive as well. What are you suggesting here? Do you think my listeners need to be with a trainer every time they work out? Or maybe just once to see where they are? What are your thoughts on that? Steve: And that's a great question Ian. A lot of times if you are a member of a gym or if you just joined some place, they'll give you a couple of sessions with a personal trainer who will give you an assessment and kind of see where you're at and find out your baseline so they can measure some results. So that's a lower cost way to get an assessment. Also, if you have any obvious concerns, pain or if you are maybe having a weight issue... Obviously you want to consult your physician too and they can give you a green light. Ian: Great. Steve: As so far as working with a trainer, every time you go to the gym, fortunately we live in the information era and obviously you're on the cutting edge of providing great tennis instruction-- great virtual tennis instruction. And there is equally some great resources out there on the internet and in print and other media where you can get great exercise and fitness instruction too. Hopefully I'm able to provide some of that and there is definitely a ton of resources out there-- both online and in print where you can go and get your workout plan together before you every set foot in a gym-- which I think is also hugely important. You want to, you know beginning with the end in mind, so look at what kind of fitness [inaudible] you have. So no, you don't need someone standing over and barking at you that you need to give them 10 more push ups. Every time you go into the gym. But you just want to arm yourself with information and I think that's good advice for pretty much anything you are going to take seriously. Ian: Before we keep going, I want to remind my listeners about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast-- and that is tennistours.com. You guys can go there to find tickets, travel packages, and accommodations to professional tennis events, both WTA and ATP-- all over the world. So if you guys are making plans for next year for the grand slams, definitely check them out. They carry tickets for all four of the grand slams along with really cool packages while you are there at whatever city you might be visiting. So go check them out and when you check them out, use the promotional code essential which will not only give you a discount, but also show them that you are listener of the pocast and you appreciate their support of the show. Alright now let's go ahead to exactly why you disagree with his premise of less weight and more reps during the on season and more weights and less reps during the off season. Steve: Absolutely. The think is, you're not going to find any serious strength coach today, working for any professional team or any professional athlete. And especially with tennis players, it now seems to be the trend in the last couple of years with tennis players to start pumping iron and lifting weights and working out in the weight room. I don't think that you could find a strength coach or a conditioning coach anywhere that is going to say a weaker athlete is a better performer. And it's just common sense. You see guys-- professional football players-- they are in the weight room pretty much year round. Athletes -- Olympic athletes -- whether they are runners or whether they are gymnasts or you know, shot putters or whatever the case may be. They are always trying to do things to help them to get stronger. By lifting lighter weights, for more reps, you are not going to develop more strength. It's just a physiological fact. Maybe you're going to develop more muscle endurance, but you're not going to develop more strength and more power and thereby increase your performance on the tennis court or on the basketball court or whatever sport it is that you are going out to do. Ian: Let me ask you about that-- you mentioned that more weight would be for actual strength whereas weight and more reps would be for more endurance. So in your opinion speaking to tennis players specifically, are you saying then that in general as tennis players, even recreational players, we need more strength versus muscle endurance? Steve: Well, you've got to look at it this way. If you are looking at fitness holistically, as a total package, you've got as aspect of tennis which is cardio vascular endurance which takes a different set of exercises to excel and train your body at-- running, sprinting and things like that. And then you've got on the other side, the enrobic portion which is the lifting of weights and the increasing of muscle mass and the stimulation of different types of different types of muscle fibers. The idea being that if you want to improve your performance, you want to be working at both of those things and the strength and weight training is going to benefit you in areas that the cardio vascular can't. Most of the time, in tennis and I think you'll agree with me on this, what is the average rally in pro tennis or recreational tennis? I know it's under 10 shots, right? Ian: Recreationally, I don't know.. I'm totally making up numbers here, but professionally I would guess in singles on the men's side, we're probably talking 3 shots per point I would guess is probably average. And recreational players are probably around the same-- 2, 3 or maybe 4 at the high point for a high quality match. Steve: And I'm sure that you see a lot more rec tennis. And even higher level rec tennis, 4.0 or 5.0 level, you aren't playing long protracted points. Ian: No. Steve: So the need for muscle endurance in that performance arena, is not going to be as great as the need for long term endurance performance. [inaudible] hour or two at a time. Or if you maybe have a tournament or something like that-- those are different considerations to train like a long distance runner or like you are going to train for a marathon and be successful playing tennis doesn't make any sense. Does that help out? Ian: Absolutely. I think people a lot of times are surprised when I tell them that tennis is not an aerobic sport-- that it's an anerobic sport. It's quick bursts. Where you want to be powerful and you want to be as strong as possible and then you rest. And the resting period is a lot longer than the actual performance period. I guess that would make sense as far as what you're talking about where tennis players need to focus more on the higher weights and less reps. In general, should tennis players be doing both Steve? Should we be doing both workouts that have less weight and higher reps and workouts with more weight and lower reps? Is there some kind of balance there we should be doing? Or is it one or another? Steve: Well I think one is going to depend on your physical condition and starting out-- and obviously we are talking about people that are going to be all over the board here. We are talking about people who are going to be on the weaker or stronger end of the scale. We're talking about different body types. Guys that are [inaudible] and thinner and guys that are on the other side-- the [inaudible] that we've talked about in the past on the fitness blog. That being said, think about it this way, the stronger your body denotes the more or less, the more muscle fibers that you have and the more you are able to perform and apply kind of denotes how you are able to actively recruit the muscle fibers that you have. And lifting lighter weights recruits less muscle fibers than lifting heavier weights. And also you've got the idea of a term called hyperprothy-- opposite of atrophy-- which is getting smaller. If you've ever had a broken arm or a body parts that has been immobilized for a while, you've seen atrophy. I had a broken arm, and it looked like my grand mother after 13 weeks and I had to build it back up. And on the other end of the scale is hypertrophy where you are building muscle and you are adding on muscle fibers and I think one of the myths today is well I don't want to get big and bulky because that is going to slow me down. But if you look like a guy like Michael Vick or an NFL linebacker who is huge and muscular, those guys are sick fast. And they are fast and are able to perform like that because they've done weight training in the gym. They've added muscle and they've worked on recruiting fast and slow twitch muscle fibers to increase their performance. Ian: So let's go ahead and wrap up his first question. In review then, so it's definitely a misnomer that you should be splitting up his workout between off season and on season. Just to wrap things up, and I know that you said before, clearly we all have different body types and different strengths and weaknesses when it comes to our physicality and how our body is made up and how it's been trained. Is it possible to have a rule of thumb when it comes to working out as a tennis player? Or is it always just going to depend on a case by case basis? Steve: I think the rule of thumb is, and not just related to tennis but any other sport, you want to get stronger and faster. And we do that by lifting more weight and challenging our body. Now that's not to say that their aren't training cycles that we are going to go through that will have us lifting some lighter weights, and that maybe some higher repetitions. But I think as a rule over all, in order to build strength and build performance, you're going to have to keep continually challenging yourself. And you do that by lifting heavy weights. Ian: Let's go ahead and move on to his second question now and that is, how many days a week should he be lifting during his tennis season-- while he is actually in season as a tennis player. Steve: Again, this is going to depend on how often he's playing tennis. I don't know if he's playing 3-4 hours per day or is at 5 days a week. In that case, you're going to want to scale the lifting back some in order to not wear yourself out and totally be dead on the tennis court. So it's going to depend on how much his tennis demands are going to be incorporated into his total training program. But I think as a general thumb, you can easily do 3-4 days a week and some moderate heavy strength training. And as long as you are rotating body parts and allowing 24-48 hours between exercising the same body part and allowing that muscle tissue to heal from the training-- you are going to be OK. Let's give a specific example. I'm going to hopefully try to nail right in the middle of my demographic here-- so let's say for your recreational player who is really taking their game seriously, but maybe they are a mom or a dad and they've got a full time job and they don't have time to be a full time tennis player. So let's say a rec player who is doing 2-3 times a week on the court playing one or two hours at a time-- how often should that type of player be looking to lift weights, to challenge their body, and get stronger and faster? Steve: As much as possible. And I know that's going to sound like a broken record, but most people aren't going to put themselves in such duress and stress with their training that they are going to, I think, take away from any other kind of recreation or sport that they are doing. Again, you've got to keep in mind physical limitations and certain personal factors like that. 3-4 times out of the week, if you're in the gym from anywhere from 45 minutes to 1.5 hours, I think that's going to be perfectly fine. Ian: Before we get to his last question, just a quick note about the second sponsor of the podcast-- that is tennisexpress.com where you guys can go to get all of your gear and equipment needs fulfilled. They have everything at great prices. Free shipping over $75 and they are also a sponsor of the podcast which I really appreciate. So go check them out and when you do make a purchase from them, please use the promotional code essential which will tell them that I sent you. It's a great way to kind of give back and thank them for being a sponsor of the essential tennis podcast. Alright, now let's go ahead and move on to Vedron's last question. This could be a big one, so feel free to spend as much time as you feel is necessary here Steve to educate my listeners about what they should be doing as tennis players specifically. And his final question was, "What muscle groups should I focus on and with what exercises?" Steve: That's an easy one-- all of them. When I say that, let me just kind of focus in on that for a minute, you want to be doing multi joint exercises and you don't want to be focusing on things like "I just want to get big huge biceps and do heavy bicep curls." Obviously, that's not going to help your tennis performance. But what is going to help your tennis performance -- and I think we've talked about this in the past in some blog articles -- is developing the kinetic chain. And that's kind of exonerated in the service motion, right? You start with the legs, the energy travels from the lower part of the legs up through to the upper body and shoulders and to the arm and out through the hand and it ultimately ends up in the tennis racket and ends up hitting the ball, right? So in order to be more effective in that, you have to do exercises that in my opinion focus on working on the kinetic chain. Now exercises like [inaudible] and dead lifts and even things like kettle bell swings and exercises like that, are going to be great at developing that. Now the advantage you get is you are working multiple muscle groups. And I think as tennis players, I don't think you'll see any tennis player out there that you'll mistake for a body builder-- I can't think of any off the top of my head. Definitely not [inaudible] or I remember Peter [inaudible] how skinny he was. Ian: What about Rafa? For a tennis player, he's pretty built. He doesn't literally look like a body builder but he's pretty cut, right? Steve: Rafa is a tremendous athlete. But look where he's placed the emphasis-- he's placed the emphasis on developing his body. I guarantee you that Rafa doesn't go in and do a bench press with 40 lbs for 50 reps. I can guarantee you the guy is pumping some serious iron. You can look at him and tell. And how does that affect his tennis? He's bigger, he's stronger, he's faster. He's able to heal faster. He's able to stay out there on the court longer. He's able to blister the crap out of the ball when he hits it which is what we all want to do, face it. So, I guarantee you he hasn't spent time just working on his biceps or just working on his quads doing heavy squats. Ian: I dunno.. he's got some pretty nice guns. Steve: He does, but that can come as a result of working and doing those [inaudible] . Take a bench press as an example, you think that just targets the chest. Well, that targets muscles in the chest. It targets the shoulder muscles. It targets the tricep muscles on the back of the arm. It targets the trapezious muscles on the back to some degree. And so you are getting a ton of bang for the buck sort to speak. When you go to do a dead lift, you are getting the calves, the quadraceps, the lower back, the [inaudible] . It's almost a total body workout. And you go in and do three sets of [inaudible] with some serious weight, and you are going to be decked. You are not going to want to do a whole bunch else for the rest of your work out period because it's incorporating some cardio into the exercise, it's hitting a bunch of muscle groups, it's forcing those muscle groups to work together to produce the desired effect-- to lift the weight from point A to point B. So it's getting, it's taking a kind of holistic approach. I don't advocate doing bicep curls or tricep extensions and smaller things. You can do that as a supplement to your main lifting which is are going to be the [inaudible] exercises. The dead lift, squats, some sort of variance of those olympic lifting exercises. Ian: Let's try to get to one question here from the forums. And then to wrap things up, I have got a follow up question for myself that I think a lot of my listeners are probably thinking to themselves. People will have to write back and tell me but I think it's a pretty high likelihood. Let's answer a question from Toshi in Maryland. He wrote and said, "I would love to hear a good preventative exercise routine and I think this is definitely something people want to hear about. Especially, knees, elbow, wrist and legs. Of course as tennis players and recreational tennis players, you don't always have the time to work out a lot to keep our bodies really fit and really strong to be able to avoid those kind of typical tennis injuries-- tennis elbow and shoulder problems. Maybe your knee or joint problems in the legs. Can you give us some general pointers for trying to prevent those types of pretty typical tennis injuries? Steve: Sure thing Ian. It's a pretty simple answer. I don't know what specific injuries that Toshi is talking about, so obviously I want to be giving some very general advise here because I don't want to give him anything that is going to exasperate an existing condition that he may have. As a general rule, having a stronger more fit-- and again, stronger and more muscular body, you don't have to be Mr. Olmpiad. But again, going out and training-- again, going back to those multi-joint exercises -- if you look at it this way, what are muscles attached too? They are attached to tendons right? So the tendons have their basis in and around the joints. So most of the weaknesses you see are going to come from those weaker areas of the joints, taking over and compensating for weakness in muscles. And so strengthening the muscles that are wrapping around and insulating your bones and joints so to speak, is going to be a great way to prevent injury. And I know that sounds kind of juvenile and kind of simple at the base of it, but if you look at it, look at guys like Roger Federer. He has a ton of off court training-- he's not hugely muscular, but I bet if you stood beside him, he's going to have wider shoulders than you or me put together. And he's going to be stronger than a large percentage-- I'd say 99% of your listener base. And why is he like that? Well he's like that because he's spent a ton of time in the gym. He's as strong as an ox. And look at his injury history-- relatively slim or none. And you look at a guy like Rafa and obviously he is probably one of the strongest guys on the tennis court. And he's had some knee injuries-- some tendentious injuries. But again, one of the reasons he's been able to overcome that and come back and win three major tournaments this year, is because he probably spends a ton of time in the gym. He spends a ton of time strength training, flexibility training and he just puts in the work off the court that enables him to do what he does on the court. Ian: OK. I've got one more question for you and I'm really confident that this is something that a lot of people have been thinking and that is, that the types of exercises that you've really hit the hardest and it sounds like you are really more excited about and think are the best for people to do as tennis players kind of involve-- I believe you use the phrase multi-joint exercises? Dead lifts, bench presses are some of the exercises that you've been advocating. I know that a lot of my listeners are hearing you suggest that and are already getting intimidated about going to their local gym or wherever that they like to work out. You know, your average tennis player is not like you were saying before, is not a body builder looking type person. Speaking from experience, I'm 6'0 and in college I weighed like 140 or 145. And I remember going into the University athlete weight room and having the hockey team and the football team there and I'm walking around and I'm doing stuff like what you're talking about. I was doing free squats and bench press and all kind of stuff like that. You are using the bigger weights and I definitely felt out of place. What do you have to tell my audience who is probably not built like a football player or a hockey player and is a little intimidated by going to the gym to do these multi joint type exercises. Steve: Sure. There are two main things-- knowledge is power and knowledge is key. There are some great resources online that will show you the right way to do these things and for one, injury prevention, and two just so you are using proper form so you get the most out of the exercise. Guys like Eric Cressing is a great resource -- [inaudible] is a certified strength and conditioning specialist and he has tons of articles and tons of videos out there that show you the right way to do stuff. And he's linked up with a lot of sites-- there are guys like [inaudible] and [inaudible] who are some leading strength coaches in the industry today. So there is no excuse for you to not know how to do something. Everbody probably has an internet connection. It's not go to the library and read a book on strength training and Olympic lifting and learn how to do it right. That will allay a lot of the fears and a lot of intimidation that you may have by just doing the exercise. Because you are going to be worrying about people looking at you [inaudible] And the second thing is, who really cares? You are not there to please anybody else. You are not there to go up against the 300lb guy in the corner of the room who has been lifting weights since he was in diapers. So who really cares? You are there for you, right? Think about it this way. When you go out on the tennis court, you get intimidated by guys three courts over who are 5.0 players and are hitting at a great level. And you are worrying about what your strokes look like? Maybe sometimes, but you aren't there for that. You are there for you and you are there to improve your performance so who cares what looks you get or whatever. You are there for you. Go into the gym, do your thing and don't worry about what people look like and what you think people are thinking. I think we intimidate ourselves out of fitness a lot of times, and especially in commercial gyms, because we worry about impressing somebody. Well I don't have to impress anybody but me. And I'm not there for anybody else but to improve my performance. I think those are my two keys and hopefully that has been helpful to our listeners. Ian: Good stuff Steve. Of course, anybody who has listened to the podcast for any length of time, knows that I love mental topics and confidence topics-- so I love what you are saying there. That brings us to the end of our time together. And with that, and really kind of brings me back to the fact that I do listen to your podcast Steve and you talk about a lot of those motivational type topics. Because that's such a huge part of about why people don't work out when they do get out of shape. and so if you guys want to hear more information and more feedback like that about working out in general, definitely check out Steve's podcast. It's PowerOfFitness podcast and you can find that on iTunes or-- do you have the podcast up on your website yet Steve? Steve: I don't have it up there. I'm looking at changing hosts for the website pretty soon so that I can make the audio downloadable to the folks who don't have iTunes or just folks that want to go to the website and listen. So look for that hopefully in the coming month or so. Ian: OK, so if you guys have iTunes, go search for PowerOfFitness on iTunes and check it out. Again, Steve Beck has been my guest. He is an author, and check out his website as well which is poweroffit.com. Steve, any last words or thoughts for the audience before we wrap things up? Steve: Just realizing what strength and conditioning can do for your tennis game-- I think it can do a lot of things. It can make you faster, it can make you a better all around athlete. It can help you with health issues and living a longer more healthy life in addition to make you a better tennis player which I'm assuming what everybody is tuning into the essential tennis podcast for. Ian: Absolutely. Alright Steve, thank you very much for your time. I appreciate it. It's been great talking to you and hopefully we can have you back on in the future to talk about more ditness related topics-- thanks very much. We appreciate it. Steve: Thank you Ian. I appreciate it and I look forward to talking to you again soon. Ian: Alright. That does it for episode #137 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for listening. I hope you enjoyed it. I hope that it's given you some ideas on how you can increase your strength and your fitness for being a better tennis player. It's a great way to, as I said earlier, take your game to the next level and improve yourself which is always what this show is about. Before I sign off, let me again say to make sure to check out iTunes if you are just going to the website and downloading the file right from essentialtennis.com, it's definitely a lot easier to subscribe to the show. You don't have to keep going back to the website and right clicking and saving the file etc. So check out iTunes. Subscribe to the show on the iTunes music store and you'll get the podcast every single week automatically. Alright, that does it for this week. Thanks again everybody and take care. And good luck with your tennis. [music]

Podcast #138: Ian interviews Master Racket Technician Dustin Tankersley about improving your game through different strings and frames. Also hear what the pros are using!

ianw — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 15:05:15 +0000

So exactly how much effect does the type of racket and strings that you're using have on your game? In today's show Ian interviews a Master Racket Technician to ask questions about switching frames, how well those new fangled strings really work, and what the pros are using on tour that can benefit us as well. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! [speaker] Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast, your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the essential tennis podcast is brought to you by tennistours.com and tennisexpress.com. A big thank you to all of you who are joining me on today's show-- I really appreciate that you took the time to download this episode and give it a listen, no matter where in the world you might be or what time you are listening to my voice. I always really appreciate your support by being a listener. Today I've got a tennis gear expert on the show. He knows everything having to do with strings and rackets. Even the pros equipment which we talk about for a while which is interesting. So let's go ahead and get to our interview. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] My guest today is Dustin Tankersly, he's a USTPA certified teaching pro. A master racket technition and he's been a stringer at the US Open among other professional tennis tournaments and he's going to be a guest today on the show talking about tennis gear, strings, rackets and all that stuff. So Dustin thank you for being with me on the show. [speaker] Thank you. [speaker] First of all, those who have been listening for at least a couple shows here, I was looking for a gear expert to start doing some articles in the gear review blog at essentialtennis.com. And I got in touch with Dustin and he's actually already written his first article. Why don't you tell us a little about yourself and we'll talk about that first article briefly and then we're going to talk about a few questions from listeners of the show having to do with tennis gear. So tell us about your background as a tennis player, teacher and a little bit about your background as a gear expert as well. [speaker] I've been playing for 20 years. Teaching tennis for the last 13 years or so. And I've been stringing rackets for 18 years. I've been a tour stringer for the last four years. And I've always been into gear and what the pros are using and what kind of string and what kind of racket. I've always been into that kind of stuff. As a MRT I have to be up to date on all the new technologies with the rackets etc. I guess that's how I've become a gear expert I guess. [speaker] So how exactly do you get into becoming a stringer at professional events and especially the US Open. Is it tough to land that job? [speaker] It's not easy. The US Open team has 13 guys. 4 of us from the States and the rest of the guys all over the world. My roommate was from Hong Kong. We had guys from Australia, two guys from Japan. A guy from Argentina.. So guys from all over. I actually got started tour stringing because I called a guy up, Craig Brotman who has a company called Pro Circuit Stream which was about 4.5 years ago and I told him that I was interesting in stringing at pro tournaments and he invited me to string at a national junior tournament and later that year, I strung the Legg Mason with him and then I did a few tournaments with him and there was a racket stringer synposium in Texas from GrandSlamStringers which is a website. I went to that symposium and I knew the guy that runs the Wilson team that was there. He let me string a racket in front of them. They said I wasn't quite ready yet..... And then the next weekend I was going to a pro tournament. I thought I was ready because I was stringing at pro events but looking back, I'm a much better stringer now then I was back then. Anyway, the following year, I went to Florida for the same conference and he watched me string [inaudible] close I think with the training you'll be good. I went to [inaudible] last year and did the training and then I got invited to the US Open last year. I did the Sony Ericsson this year and then the US Open again this year. [speaker] Awesome. Who are some of the players whose rackets you've worked on? [speaker] At the US Open I haven't done a lot of the bigger players because I'm one of the short stay guys. I have four kids so it's tough for me to get away for more than a week. The big time players aren't going to give them to me because I'm only there for a week. They give them to the guys who are there all two weeks. I've strung for [inaudible] at the Legg Mason, the weekend before, I do that one too and I was able to string for Layton Hewitt, James Blake, Fernando Gonzalez-- quite a few of the upper end guys there. [speaker] If you do Legg Mason again next year, let me know. I teach in the DC area so let me know if you are going to be back in town. Let's get to some questions now that everybody is familiar with your backgrounds and how much expertise you have in this area of rackets and strings and all that kind of stuff. First question is from Ernie from LA, California. He's a 3.5 level player and his question is a few sentences long-- 'I was in the first set of a league match and I snapped a string on my first serve. Rather than use my girlfriend's hot pink Wilson from Target my opponent lent me his Babalot aeropro drive GT which was strung and gripped exactly as Nadal uses it. I had been using an old Head IS1 mid plus for 6 years. Unfortunately for my opponent, after he lent me that racket, I won the next two sets and I played one of my best matches of the year. Under normal circumstances, I would have never considered such a high end racket at that price. Should I invest in this racket or am I just getting over excited? I didn't think a piece of equipment could effect my game so much but this racket enhanced every shot I hit. Maybe you've had similar experiences and could let me know what happened with you." So Ernie is wondering if this racket is actually legitimately helping out his game or maybe he just had a good day. Is it possible that upgrading his equipment could actually make that big of a difference in his game play? And I'm interested to hear your thoughts on this because not only do you know what you are talking about when it comes to gear but you're also a teaching pro who has been teaching for a long time. So you are very familiar with recreational tennis players. So I'm curious what your thoughts are? [speaker] It could definately make a difference. I would suggest demo'ing the racket again and trying it again to make sure that it wasn't just one of those days where you are playing unbelivable no matter what you are playing with. I know the swing rate on that racket-- I play with that racket and it feels really good. The swing weight, the weight and the balance of that racket. So I could see him picking up that racket and definately playing better with it. I think the racket he used before was a much lighter racket if I'm not mistaken. I've always tried to get people to use rackets with little mass because you do get more power with a heavier racket. Your swings are definately more controlled so I think he could definitely pick up that racket and play better and it could be the racket helping his game. [speaker] I tend to steer students and clients towards a little bit heavier frame as well. Please tell my listeners why in your opinion that's typically better as opposed to a lighter frame. [speaker] For everyone that plays tennis that I do a racket for them is the heaviest racket that they can swing comfortably. If it's a little too heavy, then it can cause elbow problems if you are catching the ball late. But most of the time, most people don't realize that mass absorbs shock and vibration. So if you have a heavier racket, it's going to be less shock and vibration on your arm. It won't hurt your arm as much as long as you can meet the ball up on front and you don't get fatigued playing with it. That's something I always tried [inaudible] and your swings are also more controllable because you aren't having to swing really fast to get the power. You can just have a nice controlled swing and you can still hit the ball hard. [speaker] I tend to find.. and tell me if you agree with this Dustin.. feel free to disagree with me by the way. I tend to find that usually students with heavier rackets, in my experience it tends to promote a bit better technique as well because I think that a lot of times lower level players when they are given a really light racket, it's a lot easier for them to kind of use shorter, quicker, choppier swings as opposed to a little bit longer racket path, little bit longer follow through. Is that something that you've found as well? [speaker] Yeah, if you have a powerful racket, you don't have to swing very hard or you don't have to hit through the ball, you can kind of poke it back and it still goes in. But if you have a racket with some mass, then you have to hit through the ball but when you do and once you get the racket moving, it kind of finishes the stroke for you. [speaker] While you were talking, I looked up the specs on that racket-- the Head i.s1 it's 102 square inches, 27.5" and 9.7oz. So definitely on the light side. For him being a 3.5 player and looking to move up hopefully in the near future, now that we know the specs for sure, is that definitely a racket that you think might be too light for him? [speaker] I would think so. Look at either adding weight to his racket of investing in a new racket. It sounds like you really liked the Babylot racket so I would try that again. If he likes it after a demo of a or so, then definitely I would invest the money. [speaker] Before we get to our next questions, I want to remind everybody about the official sponsor of the essential tennis podcast and that is tennistours.com. They specialize in travel packages and ticket packages to both WTA and ATP professional tennis events all over the world. Definitelycheck them out if you are making plans for next year to go to any of the grand slams, they have wide ranges of different tickets and packages available for all four grand slams and a lot of the ATP 1000 and 500 events too. So definitely go check them out and when you make a purchase, use the promotional code essential. You'll get a discount and you'll show them that you appreciate their support of the essential tennis podcast. Let's go ahead and move on to a few other questions here from my listeners who go to the forums at essentialtennis.com. And by the way to all of you all on the forums, thank you very much for posting your questions. It was a little bit short notice so I appreciate you guys coming up with some questions here. First one here from Charles in Maryland-- 'How much do the pros vary their string jobs from day to day or from tournament to tournament? [speaker] Most of the guys in my experience are pretty stubborn as far as changing very much-- they don't like change. They are comfortable with something and they kind of stick with it. I think the times that they do vary a little bit is when it comes to altitude wise or temperature wise. If the temp are way hotter one day they are going to go up in tension a little bit. If it's cooler the next day, they may go down a couple of pounds. Usually it's a couple pounds up or a couple pounds down but it's generally kind of in that range from my experience. There are some guys that have personal stringers that when they are in the hotel stringing, it's not like if the temperature goes up they can send their racket to the stringer room and have them string it. They pretty much have those guys in a hotel so they are not going to be able to get them any rackets so they probably do, I would guess, a couple tighter and a couple looser just in case. But I think that's about it unless they are experimenting with some stuff. For the most part, they like a racket, they like a string, they like a tension and they kind of stick with it for most of their career. [speaker] Interesting. You've mentioned that on a substantially colder day, a player might have his racket strung a little looser-- is that because things kind of tend to be dead on a colder day and they are looking for a little bit more pop or power off of the racket then? [speaker] Yeah. I think so and the same as when it gets much hotter the balls fly more, the strings lose a little bit more tension [inaudible] want to go up a little bit [inaudible] cold day it feels like sometimes your strings will feel really stiff. So I think it helps the drop tension a little bit to kind of balance that out a little. [speaker] OK, second question from Charles-- suppose I had money to pay you to optimize my string job, how would you go about doing this? [speaker] First thing I'd want to know is what level you are, what playing style you are. What you are looking to get out of the strings... Do you want more control or power? And then I would gauge what you want out of the strings and then maybe even make a couple suggestions and if you had multiple rackets strung one way and another the other way and just kind of tweak them a little bit and see what you like better. I've always recommended [inaudible] my favorite string and I recommend that for a lot of people who wouldn't normally use polyester but I dropped tension way down. So this [inaudible] 56 NXT I would say let's try 46 with [inaudible] and then try that. And then maybe another combination [inaudible] and soft [inaudible] So it would basically take some trial and error I think to optimize something. There are so many options out there, there are so many different strings I think you really have to test a little bit and kind of see what feels good to you and what helps you get the most out of your strings. [speaker] OK. I think it's interesting that you mentioned possibly having a lower level recreational program try a full luxalon string pattern. He even had a lower tension... Is that a string that you've had good success with, with 3.0 or 3.5 players with lower tension? [speaker] Definitely. I've tried it with a few people and it really... there is not a lot of shock and vibration with that string. It's kind of a dead feel but I love the feel of that string. It's something that if you string it well enough, you are going to have plenty of power but you still have control because it's polyester and it's not going to hurt your arm like most people would think because it's much softer. I don't know how they make it that soft but it's something that I know even other manufacturers have tried to take that strain melt it down and use the same inexpedience and still not be able to make it as soft as the [inaudible] . [speaker] You know, that's one string that I really haven't tried yet. I'm a fan of dead feeling strings so the racket I teach with even has full polyester in it. I haven't tried any [inaudible] once or twice. I'll have to give that a shot and put [inaudible] and see how I like that. [speaker] And if you are going from a poly, then you probably won't have to drop off too much because you are already using a polyester string. I'd definitely recommend when you are going from a synthetic to a poly that you drop at least 8-10 lbs because it's better to go on the safe side. If it's something that is going to bother your arm a little bit if drop off enough tension then you shouldn't have any problems. [speaker] Alright next question comes from Zach in Washington State. I'm really looking forward to your answer-- 'there is a major belief that most pros are using old rackets that are repainted every year with a new paint job in order for companies to make money. Are there any pros to your knowledge that actually use their signature racket? I've heard that Roddick has used his racket from right off the retailers rack. What are your thoughts on that Dustin? [speaker] There are definitely guy using the newer models. It's kind of hard to tell on some of them because of the paint jobs that they do, they are so good that it's kind of hard to tell some times. The manufacturers aren't going to tell us anything. Even at the US Open, we'll see some rackets that are made by Wilson and they don't look like [inaudible] but the guys that work for Wilson will tell us. They are pretty secretive about what they do. I know some of them may have different [inaudible] where the graphite is stiffer in certain areas that you may not get off the one on the rack. I know there are a lot of guys that are using some of the older rackets but it's not a old racket. It's a new racket, it's just the same mold that they've used for a long time. A lot of guys, James Blake for instance, he's using old rackets that he's played with for a long time. When he went to Prince, he used his old Dunlop because he never found a Prince racket that he liked. But this rackets were so old, that the [inaudible] had broken down so the frame became softer. He likes that soft or dead feel of the frame and now every time he picks a new racket up, it doesn't feel as good as an old one. So he's gotten used to an old dead frame and now it doesn't matter who tries to make the racket, he's not going to like it. So they actually go through frames pretty quick.. They probably get six... depending how high they are, they get 6 to 12 frames ever 4 or 5 months and they'll go through them so that they don't go dead and then they'll discard them and go to new rackets. But in fact, there is no question there are some guys using the rackets but almost all of them are customized. I've seen Roddick's rackets and it looks like the racket that you get off the shelf, but I couldn't tell you whether it is or not. [speaker] You'd have to put it on a RDC and measure all the specs. [speaker] Yeah and I know that his rackets are customized so even if you took one off the wall and then his racket, it wouldn't be the same swing weight and balance. [speaker] It could be the actual mold is what you are saying? [speaker] Yeah. Same racket you get off the shelf, but his rackets are sent to [inaudible] so his rackets are sent there, [inaudible] customizes them to his specs and then strings them up for him too. They actually travel with him pretty much all over the world, wherever he goes. [speaker] Are there any pros that you are aware of that literally use the frame from off the wall without having them customized at all? [speaker] I'm sure there are, but I don't see many of them. Most of them you can look at and see that there is some white on the sides or if not it's under the head guard-- you can kind of tell because it's a little bit heavier then the one off the rack. I'm sure there are a few out there. Most of them, if you buy rackets off the rack, let's say you buy three radicals just to name a racket. And you buy three of them off the rack, they are not all going to be identical. So you go out and you play with one and you string them all up the same and you play with them, you might be able to tell the difference between one or two of them. But if you are a pro and you are playing that much, you can probably tell a little bit better than we can. And you don't want to go out there and break a string in a match and go to another racket and even if you don't feel the change, it takes you a little while to adjust to the different swing of the racket. If there is money on the line, they are going to want their rackets all identical so that they don't have to worry about it. [speaker] It's really nice to hear you be open and honest about it Dustin. I've talked to a lot of-- obviously the manufacturers they are not going to talk about it but I've talked to even a lot of other pros who know a lot about gear who still don't talk much about it and aren't very open and honest about the fact that the pros do very often use different frames because they are trying to protect their sales at their pro shop. So it's nice to hear you actually be open about it, that's great. [speaker] I don't think it's any secret out there. If you see the rackets that they are using, they are not all the same. And even if they are, I think they could have a different layout so it could be a little bit different but I understand why they are going to say that Nadal is definitely using the Aeropro drive or the.. He is using that racket though it's maybe a little different than the one off the rack though. [speaker] Before we get to our last few questions, I want to remind our listeners about the 2nd sponsor of the podcast which is tennisexpress.com. You can go there for all of your gear rackets, strings, shoes, apparel or whatever you need, they got it. And they've got excellent prices and free shipping for orders over $75. Use the promotional code essential when you check out and you'll show them that you really appreciate their sponsorship of the essential tennis podcast. Alright a few more questions here before we wrap things up-- our next one comes to us from Shelley in New Mexico. She wrote and said, what is the benefit of the cross string? I love guts and could play well just with full gut. But I've noticed that when I hybrid with a cheap synthetic gut or nylon, I don't really feel much difference and it becomes a lot cheaper to use gut only in the mains rather than a full set. So what exactly does the cross string do for you? [speaker] That's a good combination-- I've always had a lot of people using gut and then a [inaudible] synthetic because it lowers the price of the string but it still plays really well. I think the mains are more responsible for the feel and the play of the string than the crosses aren't as much. So you can still get the great feel of the gut and as long as it's a softer string, it's not [inaudible] it'll still play really well. I think the only downside to that is you're going to get about 45 hours of playing time before that string goes dead. If you use [inaudible] you get about 60 hours of playing time before the string goes dead. Playability is going to be a little bit longer if you go all gut versus the hybrid. [speaker] Alright good stuff. Lastly two quick questions from John M in Texas. Number one, what strings were the pros using most often at the US Open? [speaker] The [inaudible] is probably the most popular string. Definitely a lot of polyesters [inaudible] is a popular string. Nadal and [inaudible] were using that and then there is a lot of other players using that too. Most of it is all poly or poly and gut. There are a few that are still using all natural gut but it's not near as many as it used to be. [speaker] You know what? Before we get to Jon's last question, I'm curious, you mentioned the RPM Blast, the new string that Nadal has been using and has made popular. What are your thoughts on that string? Is it really making much of a difference as far as spin creation? Or is it just another polyester string? [speaker] I don't know. I've tried it myself and it feels a little firmer then what I've normally used [inaudible] . It's a little bit firmer and I think it's about the same spin potential. Most of the poly, if you string it a little looser, you are going to get more spin because the ball stays on the string a little longer and you'll be able to generate more spin that way. I don't know if the RMP Blast would generate more spin. I think for Nadal he could use anything and he's going to generate spin. [speaker] I've used it as well. I have it in my teaching racket right now. I use the same racket for teaching and the rare times that I do hit, I use the same racket. I've definitely not noticed any big difference and in general I'm a really big skeptic when it comes to technologies, both in strings and in rackets. So I wasn't surprised. I wasn't expecting any big chance but it was getting so much hype-- which tournament was it? They announced it right before one of the grand slams... Do you remember which one it was? [speaker] I think it might've been the French. I know [inaudible] switched to it for the French and ended up winning the French. So I think that helped a little bit too. And then Nadal is using it so everyone wants to try it. [speaker] Seems like it's been successful. OK let's go to our last question from Jon and it simply, 'how heavy a racket should a recreational player use?' What are your thoughts on weight? I know that we briefly earlier talked about usually pushing our students towards heavier rackets in general. Let's talk specific weights-- what weight range are you normally putting into the hands of your average recreational player when they are demo'ing a racket and looking for something new. [speaker] For most recreational players, I generally try to start off low and then [inaudible] but I think probably around the 11oz range is not too heavy but I think it's something that has a little mass to it so they can get some power behind the ball and the mass absorbs the shock. And then from there, I think it kind of depends on the player because I like to do a lot of on-court stuff as far as adding weight to the rackets and letting them hit with it a little bit here and a little bit there so they can feel the difference. Just adding a little bit of tape to the handle can make a huge difference but it doesn't affect swing rate of the racket so they don't feel it as much when they are swinging the racket around or the maneuverability. When you are at the net, you can still move the racket back [inaudible] quick volleys when the weight is in the handle. I think the 11oz range and then maybe a little bit more than that depending on the player. [speaker] We are going to start to wrap things up with that and I want to make sure everybody goes to checkout Dustin's first post at the Gear Review blog at essentialtennis.com. Just go to essentialtennis.com and in the main heading there is a menu option that says blogs-- go down to gear review and he wrote his first blog on [inaudible] ALU power which is a string that it sounds like he's enjoyed using the most now. Give us a quick preview on that write up? What were your thoughts? [speaker] I've used that string for a while and every time I try other strings, I end up going back to that string because it has a soft feel but I still can hit out on the ball with control. I think it's one of the best strings on the market and there is a reason why most pros are using that string? Then I talked about how what different types they have. They have a spin and rough version, they have a [inaudible] that is a little bit softer and thinner string. And then the regular [inaudible] 1.25 which is one of the most popular ones on the tour. So I just kind of talked about those a little bit. [speaker] Good stuff. I want to thank you very much for your time, both in writing that article and also in being here with me right now to talk about rackets and strings and thank you for answering the questions from my listeners. I hope to continue having you on the show because I can tell that you are definitely a huge resource as far as knowledge goes for here. Thanks very much for being here. [music] That does it for episode 139 or the essential tennis podcast. Again thank you very much for joining me on today's show. I hope it was helpful for you and informative and before I sign off I just want to remind you guys of the forums at ET.com which is where most of our questions came for today's show. Very often when I have guests on the show and I'm looking for a couple extra questions to ask to maybe fill in a bit of time, I always go to the forums. So if you want to get a jump on getting advice from myself and from the guest's that I have on the show, definitely go sign up and it's a great place to spend some time anyways to just interact with other people that are passionate about the sport and trying hard to improve their games. That does it for this week. Thanks again everybody. Take care and good luck with your tennis.

Podcast #139: Learn how to play an attacking style successfully even against today's big hitters from the baseline. Four keys to attacking the net in singles!

ianw — Mon, 11 Oct 2010 15:41:12 +0000

Players are hitting the ball harder and more aggressively then they used to. This means that coming to the net can be a losing proposition unless you're smart about it! In today's show you will learn four main keys to attacking the net successfully even against a big baseline hitter. Also learn about handling high forehand ground strokes. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann : Hi and welcome to the essential tennis podcast-- your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the ET podcast is brought to you by tennisexpress.com. Though we've got a lot of good questions, two good questions to get too on today's show, I'm really looking forward to talking about them. Before we get to that, I want to remind you guys about the different social networks that ET is on and you guys can keep in touch with myself and ET in that way and kind of see what is going on with the website. First of all, we are on facebook at facebook.com slash essential tennis. If you are on twitter, it is twitter.com slash essentialtennis and lastly YouTube-- you can check out our youtube videos at youtube.com slash essential tennis. Alright, let's go ahead and get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] Let's go ahead and start talking about our first question today on episode 139 of the essential tennis podcast. And it comes to us from JT in British Columbia, Canada. He's a 4.5 player and he wrote and said this, 'I'm a 45 year old former teaching pro. In my late teens and through my 20s I taught and he's just getting back into the game and looking to start competing again. My question is about game styles-- I'm a former serve and volley and attacking player-- more touch than power. Given changes in the game and reduced explosiveness as we age, do you have any ideas on how to model an attacking game style in today's hard hitting game as an older player? Thanks. Well JT, that's a great question and this is something that a lot of pros are starting to have to ask themselves-- not starting, it's been a while now that obviously the more modern power game has been taking over especially from the baseline and so playing a more attacking style of play which was extremely common, in fact the way most players played back in the day is becoming more and more difficult and even at the recreational level it's gotten easier to hit the ball harder because of new rackets and strings and also players are finding out ways to use better technique and use more powerful technique. So it becomes tougher to move into the net. I've got 4 different ways for you to improve this and continue using your attacking style of play because I want you to stay true to yourself. I think that's how you are going to have the most amount of fun as you continue to play and as you start to compete again and it's probably how you are going to be most successful if you do it wisely and you are smart about it and you practice it and you develop the things that are necessary to be successful at it. I think it's how you are going to do the best because you've identified your strengths and your weaknesses. So I think we should stick with that. So I have 4 subtopics here-- some things for you to work on so you can continue using your favorite style of play. #1-- You have to continue working on and developing your serve. Against today's returners, you cannot serve and volley after just hitting an average serve. It's just not good enough. It used to be way back in the 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s that you could come in off just about anything and coming to the net was seen as the ultimate attack. And it was very difficult to hit powerful shots from the baseline because of the equipment that they used and because of that coming to the net was the way to go because you put a lot of pressure on your opponent who had a very difficult time hitting the ball around you or over you consistently. Well it's not that way anymore, so we have to be really smart about when we do come to the net. So you have to develop your serve in order to serve and volley consistently and be successful at it. Now three different ways that you can work on your serve or improve your serve-- Number 1- develop more power and you can do this through technique improvement and also through practice. You can do it through strengthening your body. We just talked about weight lifting and tennis. So in 137, we talked about weight lifting. You can get your body stronger, improve your technique and just general practice can help you develop more power on your serve. I'm going to assume that you definitely know what the big factors are as far as technique is concerned. If you'd like some feedback on your serve, feel free to send me an email with a link to a video of yourself serving. Or you can post it on the forums at essential tennis.com and I can give you some feedback that way. But technique is definitely big. So that's the first way to improve your serve to be more successful serving and volleying is to develop more power on your serve. Number two, develop more spin and different types of spin on your serve. And again, this is largely technique. You can improve your technique and racket head speed to create more spin. You can also use different techniques to create different types of spin. So that's another way that you can improve your serve. Mix this up with your power serves to keep your opponent off guard and that will make it easier for you to sneak into the net and serve and volley and be successful up there. Thirdly, develop more accuracy and variety of targets-- meaning different places that you can aim in the box in both the deuce side and the ad side with every type of serve that you hit. It's not good enough to have all your flat serves go down the T and have all your spin serves go out wide. You should be able to hit both types of serves-- maybe you have a flat serve and a slice serve and a kick serve. You should be able to hit all three of those types of serves to all three main target areas-- out wide and down the T and at the body. If you can't do that currently, working on it and developing that is going to make a huge difference in your ability to be successful coming in right behind your serves because as you mix your targets up and you mix up your different types of serve with those different targets, you are going to really keep your opponent off-balance. You are going to keep them guessing and it's going to be much more difficult for them to get into a groove and hit tough returns of serve where it's difficult for you to serve and volley. So that's #1, working on your serve. I gave you a bunch of ideas there to develop your serve so that you can be more successful. This was a great question by the way. We are going to be using most of today's show to talk about this so we a quarter of the way through now. That was way #1 to be more successful with your style-- work on your serve. #2, work on your approach shots. So once the point has gotten started and you see an opportunity to move into the net and to attack and pressure your opponent, you need to work on developing your approach-- the actual shot that you hit before you hit your first volley. And just like the serve, you cannot come up to the net after hitting any old shot. At least not against 4.5 players which it sounds like you'll be playing against or maybe even 5.0 players. You can't just hit a medium paced shot down the middle of the court and just waltz in behind it. It just won't be good enough. You are going to get passed all day long unless you are playing against somebody that you make nervous and they just don't have good passing shots but you really can't count on that so I want you to work on your approach shots as well. And I've got three different ways for you to do that-- number 1, work on creating more depth and more pace to your top spin or drive approach shots. So your low to hi type swing-- whether you hit with top spin or heavy top spin or maybe more of a drive and you like to hit through it a little bit more. I don't care which one you use, but you need to work on creating depth and pace while keeping your approach shots in play as you do that. The more pace that you hit your approach shots at, the less time that your opponent will have to get to the shot and prepare for their passing shot. So definitely work on the pace of the shot that you hit. The more depth that you hit on your approach shot, the less amount of time your opponent will have to react to your approach shot after it bounces. And so both depth and pace play a huge role in how successful you are going to be when you do come up to the net after hitting that approach shot. Now obviously you want to work on the width as well. You want to be able to place your approach shots reliably and accurately somewhat close to the sideline. You shouldn't be aiming a foot from the line-- you should probably be aiming 2 or 3 feet inside the sideline and probably 3 or 4 feet inside the baseline. That's a pretty close target... 4 feet inside either line will probably be safe for you. You are giving yourself some margin for error. But basically working the placement of your approach shot-- that's #1. #2 is having to do with hitting that approach shot. Develop a slice approach shot for lower shots that you hit, meaning your opponent hits low and short and you are not getting up to the ball until it's below your strike zone. Having a reliable slice approach shot can be really useful in that type of situation and it's also a shot that you are going to want to use to mix into your regular approach shots when the ball is in your strike zone and you have your choice between a drive and a slice. It can be really useful to mix in a slice during that situation as well. It's a shot, that if you hit well, can bite and stay low until it can be really effective as a approach shot. Keep in mind also that depth is also really key on the slice. If you hit a short slice approach shot, very often those type of shots tend to sit up and sit in your opponents strike zone and make an easy passing shot attempt for them. So as you do work on developing a slice approach, if you don't have one already, definitely emphasize creating depth as you really hit through that slice nice and confidently and you put a good amount of back spin on the ball so that it stays low both over the top of the net and once it bounces. Work on that and keep it deep as you do that and you will make it really tough for your opponent. And you are going to find different opponents like to hit passing shots off of different shots. Sometimes an opponent will like it when you approach with a top spin approach shot. The big detractor to top spin as an approach is that the ball bounces up when it meets the court and so a lot of times opponents will like that. It will come up to their strike zone if they get to it quickly enough and they are going to have an easier time hitting a pass. Other opponents will have a much harder time with a slice approach shot even though it's a slower shot and it doesn't travel through the court as quickly, they are going to have a harder time with the slice shot because it stays lower and it forces them to have to hit upwards a little bit more to try to pass you which in a lot of times, will result in an easier volley for you. Lastly on working on your approach shots, number 1 was creating more pace and depth with your top spin shots. Number 2 was developing a slice approach shot. Number 3 and lastly, make sure that you follow the general rules and guidelines for approaching the net in general. Namely one thing that I want to hit on quickly, is make sure that you're approaching down the line most of the time unless your opponent really gives you an obvious reason to not go in that direction. In other words, let's say that you get a short kind of low back hand and you are right handed so you are moving forwards and a little bit to your left to hit a backhand and you hit that down the line like you are supposed to and you hit it well. Let's say that you hit either a slice or a top spin or drive shot, you hit it real solid, 3 or 4 feet inside either line. You get it right where you want it to and you really hit it well which goes to your opponents forehand if he or she is right handed and it just crushes a passing shot. Once that happens two or three times, now you've got a legitimate reason to start thinking about approaching cross court. Now if you do approach cross court, you better make it good because it's going to leave a lot of room, a lot of open court for your opponent to try to pass you down the line. And it's just a lot of court for you to cover in a very short amount of time from when you hit that approach shot and when that first volley is going to get on top of you. And that's why approaching down the line is in general the way to go. So you want to follow that rule for the most part. But there will be circumstances where you want to break away from that rule as well. It all depends on your opponent, but most of the time, you should be hitting down the line. And make sure that you follow that rule most of the time. OK, so that was #2, working your approach shots. Number 3, work on your reaction time at the net in general. Even when you hit a great approach shot, it might still come back at Mach 5-- you never know and again this is the whole reason behind JTs topic here is that he's playing against players now compared to when he taught tennis before. He's playing players now that have a lot more potential for power. So even when you do everything correctly that I've described so far, you hit a great serve or approach, you place it well, it still might get on top of you really quickly. Even if your opponent is off balance and is falling off of the court-- it's still possible that they are going to hit a really hard, fast, maybe even well placed passing shot. So you need to spend a lot of time practicing your first volley against somebody who hits big shots off the ground. Now, I've got three different things for you to focus on as you do that. Number 1, work on being calm and relaxed. Even when the ball comes at you faster, and this is very much easier said then done, but very often net players panic especially when the ball is coming to them fast and they have little time to react to it. Try to remain calm, stay relaxed, so that you can hit an effective volley. Number 2, work on hitting angles off of fast shots. And you have to be relaxed in order to do this, in order to hit an effective angle off of a shot that is traveling at you with a lot of pace. You've got to relax, soften up your grip because you don't have a lot of court to work with when you do angle the ball. But JT, this is something that you should work on specifically against somebody who hits a hard passing shot or hard ground stroke in general. This would be a great thing for you to work on and focus on. Thirdly, work on controlling the depth of your volleys off of fast shots. You should be able to hit a volley off of a hard passing shot and place it reliably, deep in the court or relax more, soften things up and also hit it short in the court. You should be able to do either one and I recommend that you really spend a lot of time drilling your volleys, working on your volleys so that you have the ability to do that even when the ball is coming fast at you. Number 4, work on your general variety. And the reason for that is big hitting players love a consistent ball over and over again. Players who hit big ground strokes love getting a similar shot again and again because it allows them to groove their timing and get into a rthym on either their forehand or backhand or both. Since you are a touch player and you know that you are better at feel shots as opposed to power shots, this works out great for you anyway. You should be able to develop good variety around the court because of your skills. Please don't take this to mean that you should be trying to hit every single shot differently and be super tricky and hit with 4 different types of spin off your forehand side and get all crazy and fancy-- that's not what I mean. In fact, please don't do that. But against many opponents, you don't have to be creative at all. You can hit your typical rally ball and still be successful against a player who does hit with a lot of power and is pressuring you-- you may want to simply throw in a change up or a change of pace here and there. Every three or four shots you might want to throw in a slice or throw in a high deep looping shot typically known as a moon ball just to change things up and don't allow them to get into that rhythm where after 3 or 4 games really feeling comfortable, really timing their shots well and they are just starting to crush the ball. You don't want to give them that same look over and over again. But I just wanted to throw in there as well, please don't over due it either because then you yourself will have no rhythm and you'll just be handing these random crazy shots from shot to shot. Totally different each time so I do want you to get into a rhythm as well but you should be mixing things up, using different spins, different placements, different depths to keep them a little bit off balance and to keep them guessing a little as far as what is coming. Don't let them get too comfortable. So JT, that's my answer to you and that was a really good question. To review quickly, the four different ways that are going to allow you to continue using your net rushing and attacking style of play-- number 1, work on your serve. Number 2, work on your approach shots. Number 3, work on your reaction time at the net and your general volley skills as well. And number 4, work on your general variety around the court. If you improve all 4 of those areas, you can absolutely be successful at a 4.5 level-- even against these modern players who are hitting the ball hard then what you were used to when you were playing and teaching. So good luck to you and I hope that this was helpful to you. Let me know if I can be of any further help to you. [music] [music] Alright, before we get to our 2nd question in today's show, I want to remind all of you listening about the official sponsor of the ET podcast and that is tennisexpress.com. They are an online tennis retailer where you guys can go to pick up gear and equipment of any kind. I mean really, anything you guys want-- shoes, clothing, strings, stringing machines, rackets, grips... They've got everything at great prices. Free shipping on any order over $75 and when you check out, please make sure to use the promotional code essential. I haven't setup any kind of discount with them yet, however it does show them that you listened to the podcast and you appreciate their support and their sponsorship of the show. So thank you guys very much, all of you that have made purchases already with the promotional code essential. I appreciate it and so does tennisexpress so hopefully our relationship continues to be good. Thank you all for your support and to tennisexpress as well. Let's get to our last question on today's show, and it comes to us from Dustin in California. He's a 3.5 player and he wrote and said, 'Your podcasts on how to beat pushers are great. However, I found myself facing another type of player that is close to a pusher and I can't figure out how to win. I guess you would call him a junk baller. Most shots he gives me are either too low or way above my strike zone. What is the art of hitting a decent shot back to the other side of the court when the ball is above your strike zone. I know I can back up and play the ball so it is decent and I know I can take the ball early as well. However, being only a 3.5 player, I find that most of the time I just have to take a swing at the ball above shoulder level. What is the best way to do this? Should my grip change to a more western grip? Do I need to be further away from the ball etc? OK, time for a little bit of tough love having to do with the foot work. We're going to split my answer up into two different sections. One section having to do with foot work and the other having to do with technique. Let's talk about the footwork first and I'm going to quote you here and talk about part of your question. You said, 'being only a 3.5 player, I just have to take a swing with the the ball at shoulder level. So my answer to that, stop playing like a 3.5 player. Stop being a 3.5 player. If you don't want to hit the ball like a 3.5 player, then stop doing what 3.5 players do. If you want to move up in level from where you are now then start doing things that higher level players do. Obviously I make that sound easy and we all know that it's not easy to just move up a level otherwise everybody would be above a 5.0 level. It's going to take a lot of work but you'll do it if you are serious about improving-- you'll put in the work and you'll put in the time necessary and you'll start moving your feet the way that you are supposed to in order to be a better player. So what do higher level players do exactly? They move with the ball. And when I say that, I don't mean just right and left but also up and back. They move up and back very effectively as well as right and left. And that up and back movement happens much much more then most people think it happens or realize that it happens. When I watch rec players play, just walking through my park or watching players at my club play, it's really easy to pick out what level a player is just by watching their movements around the court. And lower level players just don't move with the ball very well. They are constantly hitting the ball outside of their strike zone because their footwork is poor. And so they hit the ball low or high. They hit the ball close to them and far away. They hit the ball in lots of places that aren't comfortable and when you watch a 4.5 player play, you see them in a comfortable balanced position between themselves and the ball most of the time. Now obviously some of you out there are saying, great, but those are 4.5 players. So of course they move well. Of course they are going to be in balance most of the time. Well let me ask you a question, what do you think came first? Did they magically just become a 4.5 player and then their footwork starting being great and they started moving well? Or do you think that they worked on their footwork and as a result, started moving well. Started positioning themselves better and so as a result, they became 4.5 players. Obviously they worked on their footwork and they got their footwork the way it was supposed to be first, and as a result, they became better players. It's just like any other part of your game. You need to decide that you are going to improve something, get the information that you need so that you know what you are supposed to change and how you are supposed to change it specifically and that's my job-- that's why I'm here is to give you guys that information. And then you work your butt off and you make the change. Stop saying well I'm a 3.5 player so it's going to be high. Guess what? As long as you are making that excuse, you are always going to be a 3.5 player because you aren't going to position yourself any better and so you won't be able to hit a better shot. Alright my rant is over. I just hate when people use that excuse and I don't want you guys to think that way. All of you guys listening to my voice right now, I want you guys to be above that. I want you guys to think in terms of the future and in terms of always being able to make that next step to the next level. So don't get trapped in a mind-set where you are just going to accept the fact that part of your game is a certain way and it's not any better then that-- that's not good enough. I want you guys to continue getting better. Now, as far as specific footwork stuff and how you can move your feet specifically to position yourself better. Justin, I want you to listen to podcast 109 which is completely dedicated to footwork and I talk about 6 different types of footwork in that episode and you can go download that for free in the archives at ET.com Go listen to that show and then work on the different types of footwork that I talk about. Work on implementing them into your game and you can stop moving like a 3.5 player-- wouldn't that be great if you could start positioning yourself better, more consistently? That would make your life a lot easier on the tennis court. Now, let's talk about technique because remember, I said those 4.5 players, I said that most of the time, they are in a balanced spot but it's not always. No matter how hard you work on your footwork, or how good you are at it, there will always be some shots that will be out of your strike zone because your opponent just hit that good of a shot. When you watch tennis on TV, clearly those players have incredible footwork. They have incredible anticipation and so they know where the ball is going, but sometimes they just can't get in a comfortable place because their opponent hit a great shot. And so you just have to do the best you can. So I'd definitely agree that sometimes you just have to be able to hit a high ground stroke. I'm going to absolutely admit that-- I have to do it myself and so does every player. So let's talk about the technique of that real quickly. First of all, no I don't want you to change your grip. You don't want to have a different grip for every different contact height that you have on your forehand or your backhand side. You should be able to hit an effective shot from all different heights using the same grip. Most often, shots hit high and out of your strike zone land short or into the net. Usually they don't make it because it's a difficult height to make contact at-- your body is a lot weaker when you try to hit the ball up at that height so very often the mistake is made hitting the net or just hitting a short weak shot in general when trying to hit a high shot back. So make sure that even though these shots are high and above your strike zone, you are still lifting the ball up and you are still making an upward swing towards the ball on your forehand and backhand side. Now there is not as much room to lift the ball because the ball was already pretty high to begin with, so it's difficult, it's not an easy shot. We're going to put that out in the open that this is not easy. But you still want to try and lift the ball as best you can so that you can not only get the ball over the net, but hopefully hit it back deep to your opponents side and give them the exact same shot back even though you are in a difficult position. Easier said then done but you should be trying to do that. If you don't have any issue clearing the net but instead you miss these shots long consistently, then you are going to want to close your racket face a little bit more-- meaning angle your strings down towards the court a little more as you make that lifting swing and you make sure that the ball is going to clear the net. And again, I don't want you to do that by changing your grip but rather by simply turning your hand and either closing your hand on your forehand side or opening your hand on your backhand side to close those strings just a little bit more to be able to keep the ball in play. So like any other ground stroke, it's a combination of lifting the ball to make sure it clears the net and controlling the racket face to make sure it's not too open to where the ball goes too far. So basically that's it. I'm sorry I had to yell at you a little bit in the first part of my answer. But I really wanted to get that out there and I wanted to make sure you guys knew how serious I was about that and I don't want you or anybody else listening to get stuck in a mind-set like that. And maybe you weren't, maybe you just worded your question like that accidentally. That's just how it came out, so don't take it personally. It's something I really wanted to communicate to all of my listeners was that you guys can improve. Stop thinking that I'm a 3.5 player and that's how it's going to be. That was really the main part that I wanted to respond to. Hopefully my technique talk was helpful as well and if you need any further advice or if you have any further questions about this or other topics, definitely let me know. Justin thanks for being a listener in California and good luck as you continue trying to improve your footwork and those high contact shots. [music] [music] That does it for episode 139 of the ET podcast. If you listened to today's show, thank you very much. I really appreciate your support simply by downloading the show and listening to it. I really appreciate having you as a listener. I hope that today's show was helpful and it gave you guys some good feedback, instruction and ideas on how to improve your game. Each and every week, that's always my goal and I hope I accomplished that this week. That does it for today's show, I'll be talking to you guys next week when I release episode #140 next Monday. Until then, take care and good luck with your tennis.

Podcast #140: It’s impossible to compete at tennis over a long period of time and not eventually get angry at yourself. Is this always a bad thing? How can we deal with it?

ianw — Mon, 18 Oct 2010 15:41:52 +0000

We've all seen tennis players get upset at themselves and just completely melt down on the court. Alright, lets be honest, we've all BEEN that player as well, right? Is it always a bad thing to get out some negative emotion? Should we always be calm and even? Today Ian talks to a guest who helps answer those questions. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann: Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by tennisexpress.com. Before we get to today's topic which is a great one having to do with mental toughness and emotions and getting angry on the court. Make sure to go to essentialtennis.com sometime this week and check out the new section of the website that I'm making available for just the next 2 weeks. If you would like an extra hour long of instructional audio every week or if you would like me to analyze your technique videos every week, definetly go check it out-- it's called Essential Tennis Platinum and it's a new section of the site where you can get personalized instruction from myself on a weekly basis to really turbo charge your tennis improvement-- so go check it out at essentialtennis.com slash platinum. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] My guest today is certified teaching professional Jason Coal. Jason and I were doubles partners together briefly in college. He graduated from the professional tennis management program at Ferris State University and he was an assistant coach at the University of Virginia and now teaches fullt-ime in Charlottesville, Virginia. Did I get that right Jason? Jason: Sounds good to me. Ian: It's good to have you back, it's been quite a while. I apologize that it's been such a long time since you were a guest last. Jason: No worries. I've been working on my golf game. Ian: Sorry to hear that, I know the feeling. So let's go ahead and get to our question and I asked Jason to be on the show today to talk about this question on purpose. It's a topic that Jason and I both have a lot of experience with personally and we have different standpoints on it as far as how this topic affects both of us on the court when we compete. So I think it's going to be an interesting conversation and something that a lot of recreational players need to know more about and need more information about to hopefully play a little better when they compete. So let's go ahead and get to it. And our question comes to us from Sam from Portugal and he has himself as a 3.5 player and he wrote and said, 'I've been playing this guy who is a bit better than me who has gotten a few sets from me and vice versa, but the way he plays is like this-- every time he misses a shot, he punishes himself either by telling at himself or using off colour language. Now on the other side of the court is me, all calm and composed playing my game, loving my opponents misfortunes and I've won a few sets like this. This was OK up until the day he started beating me several times in a row, set after set. I reached the point I could no longer swallow my mistakes, especially after losing a set that I was most determined to win. So this is what I did, I acted just like him and believe it or not, I got the next set 6-4 right after losing the previous several. Acting like this makes me concentrate more and I don't know why, but I have more guts to hit the ball harder and go for my shots. My question is, is it good to show outwardly my bad moments and the good ones? Or should I just keep it to myself on the court in my mind? It seems like my opponent just weakens me mentally or psychologically throughout the match when after cussing himself or celebrates after a good passing shot winner. I remember one of your guests talking about something similar and likening it to Twinkies-- it tastes good but it will deteriorate you in the long run. Is that the case? So Jason, was I incorrect in characterizing that both of us, by saying we can definitely relate to this question? Jason: Yeah. You are not incorrect. I think anybody who's played tennis for a long period of time has run into more than their share of this. And we qualify! Ian: [laughter] Definitely. Well, would Jason and I kind of come from different viewpoints on this? Let's go ahead and talk about that first, Jason, so that people get a sense of where we're coming from as far as our own tennis background and how we personally can relate to negativity on the courts. I'll start with myself. I can definitely say with confidence that negativity on the court does me no good at all. [laughter] And Jason has definitely witnessed this. I would definitely be embarrassed to show on video the attitude that I have sometimes had on the tennis court. And when I'm angry at myself or when I allow my emotions to get out of control on the negative side of things, my game definitely goes downhill and I deteriorate. Anything to add to that Jason? Would you say that's accurate in your experience playing with me? Jason: Yes, you're dead on. Ian: [laughter] Jason: Certainly when you get angry, you are not better at tennis. Ian: No. That's for sure. So that's where I come from on this topic. Now you on the other hand are different. Again, I am vouching for Jason here. He and I have played together with a lot of time on the practice courts, and sometime on competitive doubles court as well. And Jason and my experience is very unique in that I have witnessed him playing much better, and probably at his highest level, when he actually does get angry angry at himself. I'll let you describe what I'm talking about, Jason. Jason: [laughter] Well, like you said, I certainly wouldn't be proud to show on video how I've acted sometimes. Ian: [laughter] Jason: But usually when I get angry at... Usually it's the other person. Some calls they made or the way they're acting, or something like that. It tends to make me really dislike them and want to focus harder to beat them. I think the entire key there is that I focus on wanting to beat them and not the way that they're acting. So yes, I definitely think that if somebody cheats me, or if somebody is being a real jerk on the court, although I do believe it's rare, I tend to play my best tennis. [laughter] Because it makes me concentrate on beating this jerk on the other side of the net. Ian: [laughter] Jason: So then every once in awhile that may lead to me being a jerk on my side of the net as well! [laughter] Certainly I'm not behaving like Pete Sampras out there while doing that. But I can definitely focus in while doing some things that I'm not proud of. Ian: Now I described your ability to do that as being unique. Do you agree with you on that? How many other people have you seen that are able to take negative emotion, like being angry at your opponent as an example, and actually be able to channel that constructively into more focus or more intensity, etc. Jason: We're out there! But I would say it's probably in the 5-10% of people. John McEnroe is a good example of that. Whenever he thought he had a bad call or started yelling at a ref, he always went back to the line and played great! You never saw him chuck it away or lose any points really, based on all of his massive arguing. And there's been a couple other people, like [inaudible], a couple other people who had some serious tempers that didn't drop their level at all. But I would say the vast majority of people that I've played, when they get upset with really anything, their level goes down. Ian: How about some examples of pros that get angry and what happens to me occurs? You know, they lose their focus and they play poorly. [inaudible] comes to mind. He's the guy who would definitely tank at the drop of a hat. Which way do you see Jokavich going? He's a big whiner. I'm not a big fan of his as a result. What do you think? Do you think it hurts him or helps him? Jason: I think it hurts him. I think it really hurts him. The best tennis I've seen him play is when he just shuts up and play ball. You see it at the Australian Open a couple of times when he gets real whiny about the heat and everything. Maybe the heat's affecting him, but he certainly doesn't start to play better after you start to notice he's having a problem. Whereas guys like McEnroe, I don't even know if anything was really bothering him, but he fired himself up that way to really get his focus up. That was kind of how I went. A lot of times I'm not sure the person was cheating me or not, but it really helped me a lot to think that they were, because then I would focus harder. So as far as pros who went the opposite way, I would say a lot of the Frenchmen are that way. When things start to go bad, you notice them tanking. [inaudible] obviously tanked tons of matches. Ian: [laughter] Jason: You've seen Andy Murray tank. [laughter] With 4 matches in Grand Slams. I mean, that's... Most guys when the certainly start to have a little bit of an injury, or a little bit of an issue, or whatever it is, they're done. Ian: Simone, I saw him play at the Leg Mason this past year. You said Frenchmen, so he came to mind. I can't remember who he was playing. I think it might have been Al [inaudible]. And just got real whiny! Earlier in the match. It was on serve early in the first set. And just had a terrible attitude out there and ended up losing that match. He's somebody that comes to mind. Jason: [laughter] Yeah. Absolutely. You see that a fair amount, even with the pros. They're certainly better than most club players about keeping their cool if it's somebody like that. If you're somebody who's disposed to get angry and lose focus. But you see it all the time. It's not rare by any means. Ian: So Jay, let's talk about the opposite end of the spectrum. Because we can all definitely think of examples of pros who seem to compete at their best when they're just totally even keel. Federer is an example. That Sampras is probably the extreme example of that, just showing no emotion at all one way or the other. So if we're in agreement that most of the time being really outward and allowing emotions to affect us is usually bad, is the opposite always good to just always be even keel? What do you think about that? Jason: That works for some people. I definitely like the guys you mentioned: Pete is a perfect example! You never saw him go up or down. You had no idea. I think a lot, I would say the majority of players, play best when they can fake positive emotion. So you're not really playing that will in your results. Your score potentially is showing that you're not playing that well. But somehow you can get out there and be pumped up and excited about the things that are going on rather than sitting there and dwelling on the fact that you just [inaudible]. Ian: [laughter] Jason: I think at the professional level, you see that all the time. They guys aren't playing that well, but all of a sudden they win a point at 30-0. And they're going crazy. It's not the biggest point in the match, but they're just trying to be positive, and trying to not let themselves go down the drain like we're talked about. Ian: I think a really good example of that would be Nadal. He could be down 2 sets to love in a 3 out of 5 match, and down like 4-0, and win a point down 0-40 on his serve. And all of a sudden get all fired up and pumped up. You know what I'm talking about? Jason: That's a perfect example. That guy could have not won a point all match long and be down 5 0 0-40, and all of a sudden has the biggest celebration you've ever seen. Ian: [laughter] Jason: He is a perfect example. I've seen a lot of Nadal playing tennis and I've never seen him negative. I'm guessing that if he does get negative, he probably plays a lot worse. Which is why he's one of the few people who is able to stay on the very positive side of the spectrum the whole way. All the time. That's amazing. Ian: Yeah. It's hard. I think a lot of people misunderstand that, and kind of speak about Nadal as if he's really cocky, and I think a lot of people misread that as arrogance where I don't at all. Personally, I love his fight and his competitive spirit. I personally just see that as confidence and just the desire to win in general. I think there's a difference between wanting to win more than anything in the world and being cocky or being arrogant on the court. Do you agree with that? Jason: I totally agree. I think that a lot of players--Nadal not being one of them, but Jokavich and Marry being great examples--are a little too caught up in how they look on the court and playing well every day. And just everything that's going on around them. So if a couple of things go bad, they start to get negative. It's easy to see them throw it in the tank. I imagine every listener has seen one of those 2 guys throw it in the tank! Whereas Nadal really seems like he is 100% focused on how he can possibly win the match. And how he can win the match is by being really positive even if it's going poorly. And then he does it every time. Ian: Before we continue with today's topic, I'd like to remind all my listeners about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis podcast. That is TennisExpress.com. Go check them out. They've got great deals on all of your equipment needs. They also have free shipping for any order over $75. When you enter the promotional code "essential" when you check out, it shows them that you're a listener, and you appreciate their support. So definitely go do that. Check them out. And use the promotional code "essential" for any purchase that you make. Thank you very much, and I thank them for their support. So let's talk a little bit more about ourselves, and how we can apply this to our own games. And obviously the point is [laughter] to apply this to the games of everybody listening. So how do we--and this is something that I personally have been really searching for for the last couple of years. Because I look back at my college career, and I had some really good times.. I loved it. But I went through phases where I was really unhappy on the tennis court. And Jason knows this. [laughter] Since then, I look back and realize it wasn't worth it to get so down on myself, and to be so negative on the court. It made it so that it wasn't enjoyable for me anymore. Since then, I've been working hard to try to find a balance for myself. In that process, I've tried to [laughter] just be even, you know? And not show any emotion. But I think I found that doesn't work for me. If I try to just show no emotion, either negative or positive, or maybe just positive. Honestly, I feel like eventually if I just hold all that inside, I'm just going to explode! What are your thoughts Jay on finding the right balance? Is there a different combination or ratio for everybody, is it always bad to have a negative outburst as long as we control it? What are your thoughts on the random ramblings I'm talking about? [laughter] Jason: Well for one, it's definitely not always bad to show a negative outburst. There is... You see Seph and when he finally decides to break a record, which isn't all that rare, he plays better afterwards. For me and a lot of people I believe, showing a negative outburst is just a way to let go of that last point and then you move on. Although for some people, keeping it cool and steady the whole way is their way. It is not for everybody. I don't believe that showing a negative outburst here and there as long as you're not being a total jerk or swearing or that sort of thing, I don't think that's that bad. Ian: Good. [laughter] It's good to hear you say that. This is an area that I've been searching and kind of experimenting with myself personally, as far as a player and teacher is concerned. What I've been telling my students recently, mostly kids, is when I see them really get down on themselves, I'll walk out there and say, "Listen. I understand you lost the last point. I know that I know that it's not fun to lose, and I don't blame you for that. I know what that feels like. It's OK to be disappointed with yourself for losing a point, but you have to do your best to not let it affect your overall emotional state. In other words, go ahead and be angry about, but then forget about it. Move on to the next point, and just kind of start over again." Is that basically what you're describing? Jason: Yeah. I guess to simplify it I would say: Everybody reaches the point to where they focus the most differently. Like we've talked about the whole time so far. For me, I focus the most when I'm the maddest. I've never been so angry or upset that I didn't pay attention well. And that's not just tennis. In most things if I'm angry and upset I'm really focused. So I would imagine for everybody who steps onto a tennis court, if playing on even keel and keeping cool is how you focus the most, then that's where you're going to be the best. If you get a little angry and that makes you pay attention better, then maybe that's it for you. If you get really mad and potentially start acting ilke a jerk--although I don't condone that--then maybe that's how you're going to play the best. If that's where your focus lies. I can't imagine a time when someone focused at the optimal performance and doesn't play the best tennis. It usually doesn't happen. Ian: That's interesting. So everybody needs to find out. And I guess this can only happen through experience, right? Playing as many matches as possible, and trying to control emotions. How do we find this out? Should listeners experiment with going out to play a whole match and being as even as possible and make that their mental or emotional goal for the day, and maybe another match just let it all loose and wear everything on their sleeves? You think players should experiment with this? Or how should they figure it out? Jason: I think you just have to really be thinking on the court and check yourself here and there. You know? I would say, at least for myself but I think for most people, when you play a point here and there, you can tell if you are really dialed in or not. Why are you not dialed in? What's going on and is not making you pay as much attention? I think for most people when they get angry, they're sitting there thinking about what a jerk, or what a cheater a guy is on the either side of the court! As opposed to: How do I win this next point so that I beat that guy? Which are two very different mental standpoints. If you're sitting there going, "God, I just hate this person!" You're probably not going to play the best tennis on the next point. If you're sitting there going, "I am so going to win this point! I'm going to hit the best ball I possibly can. I'm really dialed into his serve. I am ready." That's where your good tennis comes in. Ian: That's interesting. Yeah, sure. And this is not easy, because as we've both pointed out several times, it's going to be at least a little bit different for everybody, if not completely different. So those of you listening, you've got to be really focused in on your performance, what your output is like, what your emotional state is like, what your mental state is like, and you've got to mix and combine those things and be aware of when your performance output is the best. And then try to get yourself to that emotional and mental state as often as possible. It's obviously probably a lot easier said than done! Something interesting that I've noticed Jason, when you're talking about getting angry, it sounds like most of the time, you're projecting that, or focusing on your opponent. I think a big difference on yourself and me is that when I get angry, and I'm negative emotionally on the court, I reflect that back in on myself. I think my emotional state real quickly goes to how bad of a player I am, how bad of a day I'm having, how bad my backhand it, and really quickly I have a pity party, and that's when things really go downhill for me. Would you say that when you get negative it's usually on your opponent's side? Or do you ever have days where you find that you're negative on your side as well? Jason: You know, I'm almost always negative about my opponent. [laughter] I know that when I go out there I'm not the greatest player around. I'm not going to bring the best stuff to the table. So I'm just trying to find the way to win the best I can, so usually I'm trying to look for any reason to get fired up. Not necessarily yelling at or angry at my opponent, but a way to fake it. A lot of people fake positive energy. I'm trying to fake any way to get mad that I can! Ian: [laughter] Jason: A lot of things that I notice that happen to me, I slice a ton of backhands. Especially if I notice that you don't like that. It happens all the time where I'll slice, slice, slice. People miss of course. Then they're sitting there going, "All you do is slice. You're a terrible player! You're the worst guy I've ever played against." They just get so mad at the fact that I'm slicing, that they're too stupid to realize that they should try to get away from that slice. Then they just tank it on downhill, and I win easily with nothing that good, because they didn't put their energy into avoiding my slice. They put their energy into telling me how bad I am for doing it. Ian: [laughter] Well it sounds like there's 2 main ways that our emotional state can go downhill. Either by really focusing in on the opponent and forgetting about what you need to do, or changes you need to make technically, etc. To be more successful. And the other side of the spectrum, what I'm describing. Don't get me wrong! I can remember matches where I was really unhappy with my opponent. But I think that was probably rare for me. I can only think of 1 or 2 examples where I just... I was just really upset with my opponent the time the match was over. However I can remember dozens, and probably--well I won't say hundreds. That would be bad. I can definitely remember dozens of examples of walking of the court and being incredibly upset with myself. It sounds like that's probably the biggest difference between you and I as far as this topic goes. Jason: Absolutely. That's something that is not a proud thing in my life, even with the other sports teams that I watch. I think the Lions get screwed in every football game. [laughter] But I try not to get down on myself for what's going on. And it's not necessarily looking for excuses and saying, "Oh well, we got bad calls [inaudible]. " It's just trying to I guess subconsciously positively reinforce what's happening. Positively keep myself focused and in the game. Because it's really tough if you're sitting there going, "I'm the worst player ever! I can't win." You can't think like that. You can't be successful if you're sitting there going, "Well my backhand's atrocious; there's no way I can win a match." Ian: Right. That's definitely been my biggest downfall mentally, I think in the past. Recently for myself, personally. Since college, I've played competitive paddle tennis or platform tennis. I've played--well you know me, Jason. I'm always competing in something. So I've been trying my best to find that optimal mental state for myself. It seems like for me, the best combination for myself is first of all, I can't let everything just fly off the handle. I can't just be completely open and let everything just come out. Because I definitely will slide towards the negative side of things. On the other side of the coin, I definitely not successful just being completely even. That's not me either! [laughter] Because sooner or later, I can't hold it in anymore, and I blow up and I go right back to being negative again. So for myself, I think I've found that it's a combination. I allow myself to have an outburst after making a bad error, but then more often than out, recently I've just been laughing it off to myself. I'll make that mistake and then say, "Alright, well that was dumb." I'm doing my best now to let it out, and get right back to being positive again. I think that's probably the best combination for me. Jason: I would say that for almost everybody listening, either doing your best to just be positive about whatever situation is going on, or doing your best just to fake being positive. A lot of times if you tell yourself, "It's OK. I can still win this." Even if you're way back, that's a better result than sitting there going, "God, I'm down 3-0? I'm screwed." Most people can't make it from there. Ian: Right. And that's a word that you've used several times, is to fake it. And I've seen that by using the word "fake" you mean literally? In other words, you feel negative but you show something positive instead? Jason: Well, Nadal's an example. I don't believe that anybody in the world can play in like an ATP 500 event after being the best guy in the world for several years, or one of the best, play somebody who's #160 in the world, be up 61-51, hit a decent show, and pump his fists and yell, "Come on. [inaudible] " There's no way you can be that excited. I just don't believe it. So he's just sitting there thinking: I play my best tennis when I am fired up and positive. It's 61 - 51. But I got to keep doing it. That's how I play my best tennis, and I'm going to do it. I believe Nadal has trained himself to be outwardly positive even though there's no way he can feel that at some junctures. No way! Ian: And on the other side of the coin, you will actually go fishing for things to be annoyed about, even if maybe you have to make it up so you get your focus up during a match? Jason: Absolutely. If I love the guy I'm playing against and we're just out there screwing around, having a good time, I'm never going to play my best tennis. No way. I've got to find something. I don't need to be yelling at the guy or anything like that. Although I've done that sometimes. But I just need to not be happy. Being happy out there makes me laugh and not pay attention. Ian: And then on the other side of the coin, which makes for a 3 sided coin now for those of you keeping track at home. For me, it seems like my optimal emotional state is to let out negative feelings and then immediately go back to being I almost have to make a joke about it. To keep myself from just continuing to slide downhill. I've started to let it out, and then smile to myself and, "Well, it was a bad mistake, but I've got another point to play here, so I've got to let it go." So there's 3 completely different ways of "faking it." Overly excited; finding something to be negative about; and then me, finding something to be positive about. Sounds like this is pretty complicated. [laughter] It's got a lot of different elements to this. Jason: Yeah, I would find out how you focus the best, whatever that is, and that's your route. It may not be the prettiest route. I wish that I could go the Pete Sampras route and not say anything, not show any emotion, but that is not my way. I would guess that not many people are the Pete Sampras route where you just don't show anything. It's got to be somewhere. Ian: I guess in wrapping things up I would say that everybody listening I think needs to put themselves in competitive situations as often as possible. Because there's not really any other way to learn this about yourself, is there Jason? Jason: Not that I know of. In any competitive situation: ping-pong, sting-pong, pool, basketball, baseball, darts, billiards. Whatever you can come up with, it all works the same. I'm not very good at any of those if I'm nice and happy. Ian: [laughter] And I can attest to that as well. In all those examples actually! [laughter] Jason: [laughter] Ian: Alright, we're going to go ahead and wrap things up. Jason, thank you very much for spending time with me and for having this conversation about this topic. I knew you were the man for the job when I read through this question from Sam. So thank you for your thoughts. Do you have anything final or any closing words of wisdom before we sign off? Jason: I will say and although I've fallen into the trap a few times, but there's definitely a line that you can cross. Being angry at somebody could be having a scowl on your face and pumping yourself up internally. It's not swearing at them or accusing them of cheating. All the time. [laughter] Most of the time when I would try to really pump myself up, I might think the guy's cheating, but I would not say it. It's just to myself so I could go that route. I don't need to be standing at the net going, "Dude, that was in!" Even though I know it was out but it's not. That's not the way. A lot of people go that way for some reason. I'm not saying that by being angry you need to be a jerk. There's a difference. Ian: I think we should probably repeat for emphasis as well that the method that you're describing is something that very few people actually play better tennis while doing. I think we should probably repeat that as well. [laughter] Jason: Sure! Yes, I would say it's a small percentage, but there's people out there. You probably know it for the rest of your life. I do better with everything if it's in the last minute and I'm under pressure. If there's trouble, of something like that. I'm always better that way. So it makes sense on the tennis court that if I'm angry or under pressure or something's going on, that's when I pay attention the best. You might be able to get a clue from your daily life on how you like to react. Ian: Alright. Good stuff! Jason, thank you very much again for your time. I know that listeners of the show are going to enjoy this conversation and it's a topic that's not I don't think it's discussed very much. Definitely not online as far as tennis improvement goes. So I'm looking forward to hearing feedback from listeners, and Sam in Portugal I hope this was helpful to you, and gives you some thoughts and ideas on how you can keep getting better with your mental focus. So Jason, thank you very much. Hopefully I can have you back on the show in a sooner amount of time than it's been since the last time you were on! [laughter] So thanks very much for being with us. Jason: Thanks. I hope to see you on the forum some more too. Ian: That would be outstanding. We'd love to see you there. [music] [noise] Alright, that's it for Episode #140 of the Essential Tennis podcast. Thank you very much for listening to today's show. I hope that it was helpful to you, and gives you a good idea of what you need to do to find your ideal emotional state out on the tennis court. In wrapping up today's show, I want to remind you guys to go check out Essential Tennis Platinum. Hours of content every single week and it focuses on you the member. It's my goal to help all of you guys get as good as possible. It has always been my goal with the podcast and that's my goal with essential tennis platinum as well. So go check it out and give it a look and hopefully I will see you on the inside of Platinum. Alright, that does it for this week. Take care everybody and good luck with your tennis.

Podcast #141: Learn how to stop missing so many easy, how volleys! Also find out what the best footwork pattern is for deep overheads. Net play special!

ianw — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 19:00:29 +0000

It's always the worst playing a long point, getting to the net, being rewarded with a high volley or overhead and then making an unforced error! On today's podcast you'll learn what the best technique is to hit high volleys firmly and consistently and also how exactly to move back for a tough overhead. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Announcer: Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. If you love tennis, and want to improve your game, this podcast if for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, technique, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast, your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by TennisExpress.com. Thank you very much for joining me on today's show. As always, I appreciate it. It's going to be my goal today to give you information that can help you take your game to the next level. That's what the Essential Tennis podcast is all about, and that's what EssentialTennis.com is all about. Hopefully today's show does that for you. Before we get to today's topics, we've got a couple of really good ones to talk about. I want to remind you guys about iTunes. It's the best way, the easiest way by far to get the podcast each and every week. You can subscribe to the Essential Tennis podcast. Every single week when I put a new show out, it will automatically download if for you. I highly recommened that you download iTunes. It's a free download from Apple. It doesn't matter whether or not you're using a Mac or a PC. So check that out, subscribe to the show, and then you'll be sure to not miss any episodes moving forwards. Alright, let's go ahead and get down to business. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] Alright. Before we get to our first topic on today's show, I want to spend a couple minutes telling you guys about Essential Tennis Platinum. I'm sure many of you guys went and checked out the video that I had up last week at EssentialTennis.com slash Platinum, so you have a good idea of what I'm offering there as far as tennis instruction, and giving you guys personalized feedback. I want to work with you guys personally to help you improve your games. I'm putting up a new video this week and it's going to feature instruction. It's going to be a video that's focused around creating more power and creating more top spin on your forehand or backhand ground stroke. It's a video on which I'm going to be breaking down the stroke technique of a recreational tennis player, comparing it to a high level tennis player, and I'm going to show you how the kinetic chain works. How you guys are supposed to use your body correctly and in the right order using different parts of your body to hit a high level shot. So go check that video out. It's free. You can watch it anytime you like this week. It will come down this coming Sun. the 31st at midnight EST. So you want to go check it out before then so that you can at least get that free instruction. Now as far as Platinum is concerned, basically what I'm offering here is the abillity for you guys to be coached by me personally. What the Platinum show, what the Platinum membership offers, is access to a weekly hoour long video show in which I analyze and break down the tennis strokes of members. So you guys can submit videos to me and live, I will break them down, compare your strokes to high level players, and archive it. Every single show is recorded and archived so you can go back and see exactly what you need to work on. There's also a 1 hr. long weekly audio show, just like the Essential Tennis podcast where I answer your questions about mental toughness, or tactics, or anything else that you've having trouble with. I'll be there to help you. So as you make changes in your game-- and that's what you need to do get better by the way. You can't improve your game without making changes. As you make those adjustments, whether it be to your tactics or to your technique, you want to know that you're making the right choices as far as what to change. You can search around the internet and try to find good, free information. There is a lot of it out there. But the question is always: "Which piece of information do I listen to?" Because you guys know there's a lot of stuff out there. I don't want you guys to have to sit through hours and hours of stuff, and at the end of it not even be sure if what you're hearing or seeing is even correct or the best thing for you. So Essential Tennis Platinum remedies that. By giving you access to me directly so that I can help you guys and cut right to the chase, and tell you what you need to change that's going to help you the most. Now of course you could always go out and take personal lessons from a pro in your area. But to be honest with you, your local pros are probably not even using the technology that I am to help give you guys the information as clearly and as well. This especially pertains to the video instruction. There are some pros out there doing analysis on court. They'll show you your stroke and then compare it to another stroke. But very few tennis professionals do that. In my experience, it's the way that players can make the biggest changes in the shortest amount of time. You will see that when you go to EssentialTennis .com/Platinum this week and check out that free video that I have up. Last thing that I want to say before we get to today's questions is that everybody who signs up for Essential Tennis Platinum this week before the 31st will receive doubles domination for free. If you guys aren't familiar with doubles domination, it's a doubles tactics. Like a complete overview of doubles tactics. It's a product that I released a couple of months ago. I'm re-working the product. It's going to include a lot of video the next time I release it. But you'll get my first release, my 1.0 product of doubles domination for free by signing up for Platinum. Platinum comes with a 30 day money back guarantee. So you can try Platinum out. If you don't like it for any reason, ask for a refund. I will completely give it to you, no questions asked. And you can keep doubles domination. It's a $47 product. So I'm basically offering to give you guys $47 just to try Essential Tennis Platinum. So you have really 0 risk here. In fact, you're going to come out ahead no matter what! If it turns out Platinum's just not for you, no problem. I'll give you your money back for that first month. No questions asked. Keep doubles domination. You'll leave happy either way. [laughter] But I truly believe that Platinum is an excellent product, and when you start working with me, you start giving me your videos to analyze, you start giving me your questions to answer that week so you don't have to wait 8-12 weeks the way it is right now on the podcast. So check it out Remember this offer only stands until this Sunday the 31st, at midnight. EST. Go check it out. Sign up, and I look forward to working with you personally on improving your tennis game. Alright. Let's go ahead and get to our first topic now; our first instructional topic on today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast. It comes to us from Jacob in England. He wrote and said: "My regular tennis partner moves exceptionally quickly around the court. He tends to hit a lot of slow, sliced shots on both forehand and backhand sides. I generally have a lot of success rushing the net; however, I often have to hit slow, awkward shots that are just below comfortable smashing height, but above a comfortable volleying height. Maybe at about head height and just a little over that. If I try to hit an overhead, I will often end up clearing the baseline or hitting the net, but I also find it difficult to properly connect with a firm volley. What shots should I try to be hitting at this awkward height?" Jacob, good question. This is a shot that recreational players very often struggle with. It's frustrating, because it seems like it should be a gimme. You know? It seems like this should be an easy shot. It's traveling slowly. It's high. As Jacob said, not quite high enough to hit an overhead, but definitely high enough that it's not a defensive shot. He's saying right about head height or so. So it's a shot that you should be able to attack on but if you don't do the technique correctly or if you're not in the right spot on the court, it can turn into unforced errors very quickly. That's the first thing I want to talk about, is positioning. How aggressively you can actually hit this shot totally depends on how close you are to the net, Jacob. A head high volley taken 2 steps from the net can be crushed if done correctly. We're going to talk about how to do it correctly. So if you're close to the net and you get that shot around head height, feel free to go ahead and be really aggressive with it, and essentially smash it. However, a head high volley taken from 2 steps behind the line really needs to be treated with respect. You can't just do whatever you want with that shot, because you're far enough away from the net that you have a much lower margin for error. You have a lot less court to work with on the other side, because the net is now blocking a large portion of it. When you're standing close to the net, it's easy to see the other side of the court and hit directly to it. And let's talk about that one first So I've got 2 different shots we're going to talk about. Crushing that shot and the respectful high volley. As I've titled it. [laughter] You want to be respectful on the ones where you're farther away. But let's talk about the ones that you have the opportunity to crush the ball on first. I very rarely condone this shot [laughter] when it's not high enough to be an overhead, which is exactly what Jacob is talking about. So it a volley. It's a high volley. And I very rarely am OK with students and members where I teach taking a big swing at that shot and being really aggressive. But when you're really close to the net, and it is head high, I do want you to take care of business. I do want you to be able to put it away. So you're allowed to make an aggressive swing at the ball when you are that close. Making the shot is all about closing your racket face and having it at the correct angle. Jacob said when he tries to hit them aggressively, he will very often hit it way long or hit into the net so he makes both errors. Missing these types of shots is definitely common. The key is making contact with your racket facing towards, directly towards, your opponent's side of the court. When you're a few feet away from the net and the ball is head high, you want to close your racket face so that it is facing your opponent's side. It should not be facing forwards, or definitely upwards, but on the other hand, you don't want to close it so much that it's angled straight down into the net either. That's why making a swing is typically something that I don't ever recommend. That's because the racket face is moving around. The string face of the racket. When you make a swing with your racket and you try to hit the ball hard at that height, the strings are facing all different directions while you make that swing. So if you don't time that swing so that it's just right so that it's facing the correct spot on your opponent's side of the court, it could go in a very wide variety of directions. Which is obviously something that we don't want. So keep in mind that making that swing is going to make it more difficult to accurately know where the ball is going. So you better be sure you time it correctly at least a large percentage of the time. And you better be sure that you're close enough to the net to warrant that swing. That's probably the biggest thing that I want you to take away from this, Jacob. And everybody else listening. You're only allowed to make that swing if you're close enough to justify it. If you are 2 or 3 steps inside the service line with a head high volley, you cannot swing at that shot. OK? You're not close enough. Next time you guys are on a tennis court, or maybe you're next to a tennis court right now, walk out onto the court right now. Stand on the service line. Take 2 steps forwards, and just stand there for a moment. I want you to look across to the other side of the court, and make a mental note of how much of the other side of the court you can see while looking over the net. Obviously if you look through the net, you can see the entire side of the other side of the court. But if you look over the top of the net, I want you to make a mental note. Walk out there and do this guys. Look at how much of the court you can see over the top of the net, and that's how much of the court you have to aim for when hitting an agressive shot. And if you guys are of average height 2 steps inside the service line, you can probably see from around the service line back on your opponent's side side of the court. I'm estimating there a little bit. I'm guessing that's probably about what it is. It's probably right around the service back. So you have half of the court to work with when hitting an aggressive shot from 2 steps inside the service line. Now take 3 more steps forwards, and you'll probably be a little bit past the service box. Maybe even within arm's length of the net. Maybe a little farther away. And now look over the net and see how much of the other side of the court you can see. That 3 step difference is going to make probably like a 10-12 foot difference in how much court you have to work with on your opponent's side. That is significant! That's way more court to work with. So when you guys are playing your doubles points, you have to be very aware of where you're standing on the court, and that's going to dictate how aggressively you're able to hit your shots. Don't try to make this big swinging volley unless you're close enough that you can see most of the court over the top of the net. If you can't, you're going to make a lot of mistakes either 1.) by trying to avoid the net and overcompensating, or into the net by trying to hit avoid hitting it long and overcompensating. So you want to be close enough that you have a large area of court to aim for so that it's a consistent shot. Alright? So that's the first part of my answer Jacob, is having to do with crushing the ball. I don't mind it if you're close enough. Now let's about the second type of volley. This is the one that you really have to work on more. That is the respectful high volley. I title it "respectful" because you have to respect the shot! [laughter] Let's say you're on the service line or maybe even a step or so behind and you get that high volley around head height, you have to respect the shot. Even though it's high, and maybe it's slow, you can't just haul off and beat the heck out of it, because you don't have a lot of court to work with on your opponent's side. At least not when hitting the ball aggressively. This is a shot that every doubles player needs to be competent at, is this head high or should high easy volley. It will cut out a lot of dumb, unforced errors if you can do this correctly while still pressuring your opponent. You should be able to take this shot and at least hit it firmly, and be able to pressure your opponent. But if you don't do it correctly, you're going to make a lot of mistakes. So the key to controlling where the ball is going to go is in controlling the racket face, which we talked about earlier. The way that you physically do that while you hit a shoulder high or head high easy volley from the service line is by using your core and your shoulder to hit through the ball instead of using your hand and your forearm. Accelerating your forearm and your hand quickly and aggressively is how you make big changes in the racket face. And that's what's going to make you inconsistent as you try to hit your easy high volleys. So you want to use the big parts of your body instead. They will help you keep the racket face steady and making more consistent shots. So how do you do that? I want you to do this with me. If you're listening in a car right now, obviously that's not going to work. [laughter] Well, I suppose with bumper to bumper traffic go ahead and follow along, but if you're at home or on a walk right now, or doing chores around the house, go ahead and do this along with me here. I want you to picture you've got a net in front of you. Or maybe if you're on a tennis court, that would be ideal. Stand on the service line. If you're not on a tennis court, picture that you're standing on the service line facing towards the other side of the court. Alright? You've got your racket, you're in a ready position. Now I want you to turn to the side.. Turn your shoulders. You don't have to turn your stance, but you can if you want, and turn sideways 90 deg. to the net so that your shoulders are now perpendicular to the net. You're at a 90 deg. angel. I want you to put your hand up. Put your palm right in front of you so that your palm is right about eye height and it's facing towards the net. So that imaginary net, which if you're right-handed is now to your left after having turned to the right 90 deg. Put your palm up in front of you so that it's right about eye height and about even with the front edge of your body, the left edge of your body if you're right-handed. Now starting from this turned position with your palm flat out in front of you at eye height, I want you to rotate your chest forwards to face towards the net, and as you do that extend your palm out towards the imaginary or realistic net at the same time. Turn back again 90 deg. and rotate forwards again. I want you to repeat that a couple of times. So your palm remains facing the same direction, which is towards the net. As you extend your shoulder and your hand out towards the net, and as you rotate your body forwards towards the net, your palm remains steady and facing the same direction. This is how you should be hitting your high forehand volley. It's just like this when you're not super close to the net. If you're close to the service line or within 2-3 steps of the service line in either direction. This is how you hit a high volley steadily and consistently and confidently. You can still use this technique to hit through the ball firmly and relatively aggressively, but it's not nearly as aggressive as using your forearm and your hand to whip the racket back and forth and really create a lot of racket head speed. That's going to make the racket travel faster, but when you do that, your strings are facing all different directions as I mentioned earlier. So use the technique that I'm describing here. And hopefully you actually did that along with me so that you get a feel for it. Next time you go out and practice on a tennis court, remember that and use that for your high volley technique. At least when you're farther away from the net. Using this technique, you can still hit the ball firmly. But the racket face is under control. And that's the key. If you hit the net when using that technique that I suggested, open your racket face just a little bit more. If you miss it long, then close your racket face a little bit more. Angle your strings a little flatter, a little more towards the court if you're missing the shot long consistently. And that's pretty much it! So that answers your question Jacob, about those head high volleys. Practice. Go out. If possible, get a ball machine, have it feed you those shots over and over again, or get a friend to toss you some of those high volleys. Practice that technique when you're a little bit farther away and you want to make that high volley. Before I get to the next question in today's episode of the podcast, I want to remind you guys quickly about the official sponsor of today's show. That is TennisExpress.com, your online gear emporium. Go check them out! They've got rackets, strings, clothing, shoes, bags--whatever you guys need. Tennis balls, tennis ball machines, string machines. Whatever you guys want, they've got it. They have free shipping for orders of $75 or more. And when you check out, please use the promotional code "essential." It will show them that you're a listener and you appreciate their support of the show. So go check them not! Not EssentialTennis.com. It is TennisExpress.com, and promotional code "essential." I thank them very much for their support of the podcast. Alright, one more question to get to on today's show. It also comes to us from Jacob in England. He wrote and said that: "A second question is that due to net rushing, I am often back to get the shots that are over my head. I often end up taking the ball over my head while I am still moving backwards and not particularly well-balanced. Is it still advisable to try to take the ball in the air even while moving backwards? Or should I do everything to get into a better position to hit the ball after it has bounced" Jacob, good question. Let's talk about that. First of all, let's talk about going back for overheads in general. You use the term that makes me wince when I hear it. [laughter] And it makes me cringe, and that is "back pedaling." Back pedaling means that you're moving backwards with your chest facing towards the net, and your heels facing back towards the base line. Your toes are pointing forwards towards the net. That's a terrible way to move back! I want to describe real quickly how you should be moving back. What footwork patterns you should be using to be in the best balance, and to move back in the quickest way possible. The way that you should be doing this--and by the way, this is a huge recreational player mistake on overheads. Definitely the #1 mistake rec players make on overheads is not moving their feet correctly. It's slow and it's dangerous to back pedal. Seriously. To remedy that, you must get your stance sideways for balance and for quickness of moment. If you're a right-y, that means that your first move when you see that the lob goes up into the air is to drop your right foot back behind your left. So if you're in a ready position and you're right-handed; you're facing forwards; you want to take your right foot, pivot it around back behind your left so that you're now in a closed stance basically and you are perpendicular to the net. Then from that position, you should either shuffle, which is both feet pointing to the right. Facing towards to the net is forwards. To the right obviously would be to the right of that. So after pivoting that right foot back and getting yourself turned to the side, the toes of both feet will be pointing to the right. Shuffling would be keeping both feet staying pointed to the right and using a shuffle step without crossing your feet over. That's option #1 is using the shuffle step. Or you can use a crossover step. After getting your right foot back behind your left, you can then cross over your right foot with your left, and continue to take a step out with your right, crossover with your left. Take a step out with your right, cross over with your left. So you can use a crossover step as well to move back. Crossing over is a little bit more athletic. It will get you back a little faster than using a shuffle step. Using a shuffle step is easier and it takes a little bit less coordination and a little bit less skill. But both types of footwork are much better than back pedaling. Much better! I use a combination of both. When you watch players on TV go back for an overhead, you'll very often see them use a combination. What I typically do is when a lob goes up in the air, I'll use several quick crossover steps to get myself moving as quickly as possible so that I'm sure I can get underneath the ball. That will be my first price. 3 or maybe 4 steps, depending on how far back the overhead is. Then I'll use a couple of shuffle steps to balance myself, and kind of fine tune my position underneath the ball as it's coming down towards me. So use a combination of those steps, or just 1 or the other is fine as well. Usually I start players off just using a shuffle step. If they're more athletic than average, or if they pick up the shuffle step real quickly, I'll show them a crossover step as well. But you should be using at least 1 or the other, if not a combination. Stop back pedaling now! [laughter] Don't do it anymore, please! It's slow and believe it or not, it is. It's dangerous. I know that sounds silly, but I've seen many people fall backwards because your body is just not made to move in that direction with the heels leading. So don't do it. Just don't do it! [laughter] Now your second question having to do with taking the ball out of the air, take the ball out of the air at all costs, Jacob. In doubles you don't want to let the ball bounce if you have the choice to take it out of the air. There's nothing wrong with hitting an overhead while still moving backwards. That doesn't mean that you did anything wrong. I would prefer that you were in balance, of course. I would rather that you wree able to move back quickly enough that you got yourself set and you're good to go. And you can go ahead and make your overhead swing in perfect balance and maybe even transfer your body weight forwards into the shot and go right into the net again. But that's not always reality. If your opponent's hit a good lob, then you might have to move back quite a ways, and you might not even get completely underneath the ball. You might have to reach up and take it with your balance leaning backwards a little bit. That's OK. As long as you realize that you're in a tougher spot and you don't go for a winner, play it smart, then I'm perfectly fine with that. But when you realize it's going to be a tough shot and you can reach it but it's not going to be easy, just don't go for a winner off that overhead. Put it in a safe spot. Give yourself plenty of margin for error. Then continue playing the point. The reason for this is Jacob, when you let it bounce 2 bad things happen. 1.) When you let it bounce, it gives your opponent much more time to improve their position. When you let it bounce and the ball comes back up again, then it comes back down again, and then you hit your shot, you effectively double the amount of time that your opponents have to do whatever they want. They can move in whatever position they want! Once they realize that you're going to let the ball drop and bounce, they have a lot of time to either move into the net or maybe the close player will have time to poach and pressure you. To cross over to try to cut off your next shot that you're going to take off the bounce. Whatever. Bottom line is we don't want to give them that time unless it's a total emergency and you just can't reach it, and you have no other choice. When you have the choice, I want you to take it out of the air, and reason #1 is we want to take that time away from our opponent. Reason #2 why I want you to take it out of the air as much as possible is that when you do let it bounce, it puts you into a significantly more defensive position than taking it out of the air. When you let it bounce and it continues to travel farther away from the net, so do you. [laughter] In order to catch up with it. So it's a bad idea to let it bounce on purpose, because it will end up making you much farther away from where the action is, much farther away from the net. It puts you in a much more defensive position, and the combination of that along with giving your opponent more time means if they're smart at all, they're using that time to get into the net and now you're far away from the net, and the tables have completely turned. So I don't want you to do that unless it's a total emergency. If you can tell that you'll be lucky to just scrape it off the tip of your frame and you're just not going to get there, fine. Turn around. Get back there as fast as you can. Let it bounce. Do the best you can with that next shot. But if there's any way at all that you can get the ball on your strings and you can do it before it bounces, that's what you should be trying to do. Plus, when you do let it bounce, chances are it's going to get behind you and you're going to have to hit some crazy over the shoulder miracle lob shot. If you're super fast, maybe you can get back around it. And some of you guys are, and that's great. But it's a much more difficult shot. Again, it puts you in a much weaker position. So Jacob, thank you very much for your questions. I enjoyed answering them today. Hopefully they're helpful to you. Best of luck to you as you continue working on developing your doubles game. [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for Episode #141 of the Essential Tennis podcast. Thank you very much for joining me today. If you're listening to this show before the 31st of October, go to EssentialTennis.com/ Platinum A.S.A.P. and check it out. You'll get the free instructional video about creating power, using the kinetic chain on your forehand or backhand, and you'll have the opportunity to sign up totally risk free. I know that's kind of a cliche, but it's totally true here. You can ask for your money back after signing up if you're not completely satisfied with Platinum in that first month, and you can keep Doubles Domination, which is again a $47 value. That's going to help your game a ton! If you're a doubles player, that is going to help you a great deal win more matches. Because it's a great tactical overview of the game of doubles and how to play. There's interviews with professional players. There's an e-book and audio book. It's just a great package. So check that out: EssentialTennis.com/ Platinum. Alright. That does it for this week. Until next week, take care everybody and good luck with your tennis! [music] [music]

Podcast #142: Learn what is most important to putting together a winning strategy both in singles and doubles play!

ianw — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 15:56:45 +0000

Stroke technique is only part of winning a tennis match. Being mentally tough and putting together a winning game plan are completely separate and even more important than technique a large percentage of the time. Today Ian talks about what is most important tactically to winning both singles and doubles matches. Start winning more matches with better tactics!

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[music] Announcer: Welcome to the essential tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it is technique, strategy, equipment, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here is Ian. Ian Westermann: Hi! And welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by Tennis Express.com. Well before we get to today's topic, which is going to be a great one, we are going to talk about tennis strategy and tactics both in general and as they relate to the singles and doubles game. I have been talking about iTunes and how it is the best way for you to get the podcast and it really is, by the way, a free download for either Mac or PC. I am going to give away--I've got some string laying around the office here that I would like to give away to anybody who leaves a review of the Essential Tennis podcast on iTunes this week. I've got here 15 packs of Wilson Super Spin 16-gauge tennis string that I will send completely free to anybody who leaves a review on the iTunes music store for the Essential Tennis podcast. To get your string, all you have to do is leave the review, copy it, and then paste it into an e-mail. Send me the review that you left on the iTunes music store. Send me your name and address in that e-mail and I will send you a free set of string. That's it. So send those e-mails to Ian@essentialtennis.com and I look forward to seeing you guys' reviews up there and sending out some string that you guys can use. Alright, let's get down to business. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] Alright, let's go ahead and get started with today's topic. And today's episode of the podcast is going to be completely about strategy and tactics as it relates to both singles and doubles and combined general tactical and strategical elements that you need to be good at in order to be as successful as possible out on the tennis court. And I know that a lot of you spend a lot of time with technique and trying to improve your strokes, and that's great. And you guys should be spending time doing that. But make sure that you balance that out as well With learning about tactics and practicing your tactics. Make sure that you guys are getting in enough competitive play on the courts that you learn how to use the strokes and the techniques that you have taught yourself or that you have learned from the podcast or videos online or your local tennis pro or whatever. You guys should make sure you are balancing out your time on the court between the practicing of your technique, the practicing of your strokes, and also the practicing of implementing those strokes into a strategy that you have developed against an opponent. It is really important. And I want to give a shout out to the person who was the impetus for today's show topic. And that was John M, who's in Texas. John wrote me today's question and suggested the topic. And also included his own outline for both singles and doubles tactics. John, your outline was great. You're just right on queue there with your thoughts and your suggestions. And I wrote my own outline, because I didn't want to steal all your stuff basically. So I've got my own outline, basically, talking about all the same basic topics and fundamental things that we should be focused on as far as strategy is concerned. I am going to go ahead and get into that now. But I definitely borrowed quite a bit from your outline. You are on queue with most of your thoughts. So, cheers on that. You are right on track there. And strategy and mental toughness is definitely a big strength of John's in Texas. So, let's go ahead and get to my outline and I'm going to break this up into 3 different main areas today. I'm gonna first talk about general strategy musts. Things that you guys need to do and I've got 1, 2, 3, 4 different strategical things that, whether you're a singles player or a doubles player, these are things that you guys should be doing. You should be paying attention to on the court as far as strategy is concerned. Otherwise, you are absolutely leaving points in matches on the table. [noise] Excuse me. Secondly, we are going to talk about singles strategy specifics. I am going to give you guys 3 different things that are probably most important as far as understanding what to do during a singles match. And we are also going to talk about doubles strategy specifics. I've got 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Doubles--there's more parts to doubles tactics. It is definitely more complicated and if for no other reason, because there is twice as many people on the court. And so there is just a lot more stuff going on and there is more that you have to pay attention to in doubles. Not that singles can't be complicated sometimes, but doubles there's a lot more to it for sure. As far as tactics is concerned. Alright, so that's today's outline. Let's go ahead and get started with the first section. And that is General Strategy Musts. And #1, under that heading, is you must know your game. You have to know heading in to every match what you are good at and also what your weaknesses are. You should know this before the match starts. And I know that sounds obvious and it sounds like, "Well, yeah, of course. I know what I am good at and I know what I'm bad at," but please be conscious of it. And this is something that you should be taking mental inventory of heading into a match, because you need to know walking onto the court before you even swing your racket for the first time. You need to know, today, what do I have. Is my forehand my biggest weapon? Is my backhand my biggest weakness? Am I able to hit a hard flat serve but my second serve has been a little bit shaky recently. These are all things that you have to have a really good understanding of walking onto the court. And we are going to talk about why a little bit later. So that's #1. Whether you are a doubles player or a singles player, you must know your game walking onto the court. #2. You must observe your opponent or opponents very carefully during your match warm up. And the reason for that is you need to know the other side of the coin. You want to learn their strengths and their weaknesses as quickly as possible. It's information that's absolutely crucial to your success every time that you play a tennis match. And as the match starts moving through the warm up, continue to pay close attention especially during those first several games. And you guys know what I am talking about. If you have very much experience at all, you'll know that not everybody hits the ball the same way during warm up as they do during the match. And so you have to be careful for that. In fact, some players will [laughter] purposefully --I've absolutely done this. Some players will purposefully kind of hide some of their strengths or some of their weaknesses. An example of me doing that is I am left handed in case you guys are new to the show. I am a lefty and a big strength of mine is my spin serve. Specifically, I have a kind of a combination topspin and slice serve that I hit very aggressively that I use for my second serve and very often my first serve as well. Especially in doubles. And very often in college I would warm up my serve hitting all flat serves. I would not hit any spin serves. And so I would hit probably 10-15 flat serves to each player or 10-15 on each side to one player as we did our doubles warm up. And then I would come out of the gate hitting heavy spin on both serves after hitting all flat in the warm up. And that is something that I am not embarrassed to say that I did quite a bit in college. And so don't be surprised if people do that to you. I think it is a good tactical play. And so pay very close attention during the warm up, but don't take it for granted or don't assume that what you see in the warm up is what you are going to see all day on the court during the match. So you have to be really alert and really aware of what is going on on the other side of the court. That's thing # 2 under General Strategy. So #1 was know your game. #2, observe your opponents closely, because you need to know their game as well. And now #3, using those 2 pieces of information, you will build your strategy. And you can't build an effective strategy without knowing those 2 things first. And I know that a lot of you out there walk onto the court already knowing how you're going to play and it's completely regardless of what your opponent's strengths and weaknesses are. And that is definitely a mistake. And this isn't complicated. You should be thinking in simple terms. It doesn't have to be complex or tricky. In fact it shouldn't be. We are going to talk more about that. A little bit later, and I'm going to give some specific examples of tactics, or a strategy based on your strengths and your opponent's weaknesses. I'm going to talk more about that later. But the reason for knowing yourself, and for observing your opponents is so that you can effectively build a strategy. That's the whole point. Now, moving forward with the match, you know yourself, you've observed your opponents, you've built a strategy around that within the first couple of games of the match. Now continuing with the match, I have 2 general rules, and again everything I'm talking about right now, applies to both singles and doubles. General rule #1: Never change a working strategy. This is something else that you guys have probably heard a lot, and it probably sounds like old hat. Please take this seriously. Because way too often, I see recreational players, they will put together a point, a successful point and it involved 2 or 3 or 4 specific shots, put in sequence, that worked. They put together a winning pattern, and the very next point they do something completely different. Maybe even totally opposite of the point previous where they just dominated their opponents, putting together a specific pattern of shots, or a specific play. They crushed their opponents the point before, and on the next point, they'll do completely the opposite thing. And when you find a winning match-up between you and your opponents or opponent, it's important that you guys note that hammering it over and over again, is the way to go. I think that recreational players very often feel that a good tactitioner is somebody who is sneaky and kind of complicated and kind of cloak-and-dagger, kind of fancy, kind of tactics and always changing it up. Your opponent never knows what's coming next, and that's good strategy or good tactics. That's absolutely too complicated, and it's totally not necessary. Usually, a good tactic between you and your opponent, to try to beat your opponent, will be very simple. Don't get bored by that, please. I get excited when I find a weakness that pairs up well with my strength. Again, I'm a left-handed player, and so my strength from the baseline, by far, is my forehand. I love hitting my forehand cross-court because it usually goes to my opponent's back-hand, which is usually their weaker shot. I just said usually twice, so it's not always the case. A high percentage of the time, I'm playing a right-handed player, and their weaker side is their backhand. And so I make absolutely no secret of the fact, early on in the match, that most of the time I get a forehand, I'm going to be hammering my opponent's back-hand. I'm going to do it over and over and over again, until they can show me that they can either handle it, and hit right back at me with something that challenges me, or if they don't, I'm just going to do it all day until I win the match. Period. You guys should be thinking in simplistic terms when it comes to putting together a match strategy. That's under general strategy rules #1: As far as continuing the match goes never change a working strategy or a working combination of shots. Rule #2: When a strategy doesn't work, change it. Again, really simple, but something that I see players screw up a lot. They'll stick they'll kind of go down with the ship of whatever they're comfortable strategy is, without ever changing it up. The hardest part about this, is figuring out when to change something, and when to say 'Alright. This is obviously not working. We do need to change this up. It's not going to be a good day unless we do something different.' Sometimes, it'll be super obvious. Maybe you're playing a doubles match and you're serving and volleying, to begin the match with, and you're just getting beat. Your opponent is just hammering the return. Both opponents just hammering the returns of serve, low, at your feet over and over again, and you're just not making the half-volley or the low-volley. Sometimes it's going to be obvious, and you'll know. 'OK. Well I need to be a little bit more cautious here. I can't keep running into these returns, because it's not working.' You'll need to change it up. Sometimes it won't be obvious. It'll be kind of 50-50 to begin with. You win half the points using a specific tactic, and the other half, you get burned. In cases like that, you have to kind of look at the big picture, and look at the long-term. It's possible that over time, you'll kind of continue to tilt things in your favor, and you can kind of wear your opponent down. But you must be very aware. In order to make that judgment, you have to be very aware of things like your opponent's technique, and their emotions and their mental toughness. If you're trying, let's say you're playing a singles match, and you're trying to hammer your opponent's back-hand, maybe they hit the ball really hard on that side. Their technique is not fundamentally sound. It's a really low percentage shot. Once in awhile they make it, and other times they miss it, badly. Sometimes you kind of have to weather the storm a little bit, and be patient and know that in the long run, it's probably going to work out in your favor. In the meantime, don't be discouraged hitting a winner here and there. That would be a good example of a tactic not working every time, but knowing that in the long run, it's probably going to work out in your favor. Sometimes you just have to be patient and stick with it. As they get hot, they make 5 or 6 in a row, for a winner, well now it's probably time to change things up. My point is, you have to really be aware of what's going on, and you have to be paying attention. Otherwise, before you know it, the match could be over, and you'll be looking back at the match, saying 'Wow. Why did I continue to hit to that spot over and over again, when obviously, they beat me that way?' So on one hand, never change a working strategy. On the other hand, you have to know when to fold and move on to something new to try to gain the upper hand. So in review, those were the 5 general strategy musts. #1: You must know your game. #2: You must know your opponent's game through observing them. #3: Using those two pieces of information, you will build your strategy. That's the point. #4: Continuing with the match, never change a winning strategy. When a strategy doesn't work, please do change it. Don't go down with the ship. Pay close enough attention that you can tell the difference between something that's just working part of the time, and something that's obviously not going to work out for you in the long run. Before we get to the next part of my outline, I want to remind you all about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis Podcast, and that is Tennisexpress.com. You guys need strings, you need rackets, you need shoes so why not go to Tennis Express. They have really good prices. They have free shipping for orders over $75.00, and if you use the promotional code 'essential' when you check out, it will give credit to the Essential Tennis Podcast. It will show Tennis Express that you're a listener, and you appreciate their support of the show by being a sponsor. Please do that, and I appreciate their sponsorship of the podcast, very much. Alright, next up, let's get to some specifics having to do with singles and doubles and as with all other parts of my teaching, both online and in person, we're going to keep things simple here. There's only really a couple basic tactical things that you guys really have to have nailed down in order to be successful. At least at an entry level. Doubles is a little bit different. There's a lot going on in doubles which is why I created an entire product around it. Doubles Domination, which I'm reworking, by the way. I'm getting the 2.0 version of Doubles Domination ready, so let's go ahead and start things off. We'll begin with singles, first. These are specific singles strategy things that you guys need to understand, and you need to use if you want to be successful. I've just got 3 basic ones. #1: From behind the baseline, you should be hitting the ball cross-court most of the time. Period. If you're not doing this, you need to start. Simply because it's a higher percentage shot. The court is longer when you aim cross court by quite a bit. I think it's like 5 or 6 feet when you go from corner to corner, cross court, as opposed to down the line. The net is lower when you hit across the center of it. It's 6" lower in the center than it is at the net post. You're going to make more shots when hitting in that direction. The reason why we want to take the high percentage play is because most points are going to end with a mistake. Period. I don't care how good you are, if you're listening to this show, you make more errors than you force errors from your opponent, or than the winners that you hit. You definitely hit more errors than you do winners. Everybody can benefit from being a little bit higher percentage than they are right now. The exception to that would be, and I just said everybody, there is one exception. If you are a strictly defensive player, and you hit everything slow and everything to the middle of the court, of course you could benefit from learning how to attack and learning how to create some offensive opportunities and develop some weapons. That would be a great thing for you to do. For most of us, we need to work on being a little bit more steady and a little bit more consistent. It's not to say that hitting down the line is never the right thing to do. Usually, it's kind of a sucker play. You see a little bit more space between your opponent and the sideline down the line, that you've got a little bit of an opening there to hit to. Be patient. Wait until you really have an obvious hole to hit to down the line. Otherwise you should be hitting cross-court. When you do hit down the line, make sure that it's only in situations where you're in balance, you've got control, you're not reaching for the ball or you've had a hard time getting to it. Make sure that it's worth the risk. The two main situations that you'll be in when it is worth the risk is, #1: Which I already mentioned, if you're opponent is way out of position -the opposite direction- if they're out of position because the previous shot you hit a really good cross court ground stroke, and you're in balance, then down the line would be reasonable at that point. Go ahead and go for it as long as you're not aiming for the line, either the baseline or the sideline, still give yourself margin for error. At that point, go ahead and go down the line. That's a reasonable time to do it. Another time would be, if you're in balance and it's your opponent's weaker side down the line, and they have a big weakness there. I break the directionals quite often with my backhand, even though it's my weaker shot. I will very often take a steady shot, like my backhand slice, I hit a lot of slice shots in my singles play. I'm not very good at hitting top-spin relatively speaking. Relative to the people that I'm playing against, when I'm competing. I'll very often use a down the line, backhand slice, to try to get myself into a pattern where I can, on the next shot, hit a forehand and hopefully be hitting that cross-court, again to my opponent's backhand. Remember, I'm left-handed so my backhand side is on the deuce half of the court. If I hit that down the line to my opponent's add side, usually that's to their weaker shot, their backhand. Now I don't do that unless I've got a reasonably easy shot. Or at least a neutral shot. I'm not taking on-the-run defensive, stretched-out slice shots and trying to thread it down the line, and hit the line. That, I'm not doing. But when I'm in reasonable balance, and I have an opportunity there to direct the ball to my opponent's weaker side, I will absolutely do that. So that's #1 under specific singles tactics hit the ball cross court, most of the time. Please. And when you do go down the line, make sure that it's warranted. Make sure it's at the right time. Make sure you're in balance is the main thing. Alright. #2 under singles: When approaching, when you do come up to the net, you should be hitting the ball down the line most of the time. The reason for that simply is that you will keep the ball in front of you, and it's much easier to cover passing shot attempts from your opponent. That's not always the case. When hitting down the line goes to your opponent's strength, and they love hitting passing shots off that shot, then maybe you want to start changing things up and breaking that general rule and go cross court. If this is something that you haven't heard before, I urge you to go to the video section of Essentialtennis.com, and I have a video up there diagramming and showing with a point scenario. Having a point example why down the line is a better choice, and why cross court, for an approach shot in general, is a poor choice. It has to do with your positioning on the courts and being able to cover passing shots. Alright, so that's #2, when approaching, make sure you go down the line. #3: Play your strength to their weakness as much as possible. Period. If you're a righty, and you're playing another righty, then you want to hit inside-out forehands. That means assuming your strength is your forehand, and your opponent's strength is their forehand, whenever possible, you want to shift slide to your left over to your backhand side to his a forehand as much as you can, if that's your strength. You should be jockeying for position to try to hit that forehand as often as possible. You don't want to that to such an extent that you leave yourself vulnerable and open, and you're constantly way over to the left leaving yourself wide open on your forehead side. Unless your opponent just doesn't have any weapons. If they're not able to hit a winner when you leave the court open because they just don't have strong enough ground strokes, then go ahead and leave it open. Shift way to your left and just hit all forehands all day. And when you get that shot, hit it inside-out. Go back across the court, hit a cross court shot to their back hand. There you go! You've got a great pattern now. You're hitting your strength -your forehand- cross court which is a high percentage shot, to your opponent's weakness, their backhand. Now we're following all 3 of those rules and you're looking like you're in great shape. You should be trying to come up with patterns like that as often as possible. Once you find a pattern like that, don't deviate. Stick with it, and keep hammering it until either your opponent makes a big adjustment and you've got to switch things up, or until you've won the match. Keep hammering it until 1 of those 2 things happen. Period. Alright, so that's singles strategy specifics. Cross court from behind the baseline most of the time, when you're approaching down the line, most of the time. And #3: Do whatever you can to match up your strengths, versus your opponent's weaknesses. One more time I want to point out these are all generalities, OK? There's going to be situational things that might happen whether it be your strengths, your opponent's strengths, or whatever. When you match up versus different opponents, there's going to be different specific things going on. Sometimes you have to break these general rules in order to give yourself an advantage. If that's the case, go ahead and do it. Just make sure that it is the case, that you've got to break that rule in order to get the advantage, the upper hand. Otherwise, you'll find yourself making more unforced errors than necessary. OK. Lastly, last part of today's show. Doubles strategy specifics. I've got 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 6? No, 5. 5 of those. We'll try to get through these quickly here. As I mentioned earlier, doubles is just more complicated. There's more moving parts, literally. There's a lot going on. I've just got a couple of specific scenarios here. #1: If they serve in volley, if your opponents serve in volley, your focus must really be on a quality return of serve. Cross court and low most of the time. Please don't try a down the line return of serve unless the net person is just really, really active. It's a sucker play. Just like going down the line a lot in singles is a sucker play, the down the alley return of serve is a sucker play as well, in doubles. Now again, the exception to that is if you're playing against a really, really aggressive and really active net person, you need to show them that you are willing to do it, and that you are capable of going for the shot. There are situations where it's better to go down the line at least once or twice, just to try to keep that net player honest. For most of you guys, you're not going to play super-aggressive net players. So it might seem boring, but cross court as much as possible. If you can keep it low against a serve in volly-er, that would obviously be best. So that's situation #1. #2: If they serve and stay back that's a huge opportunity for you and your partner. You should be returning cross court, safely, it doesn't even have to be low unless you aren't good at getting it cross court and you're risking hitting it to the server's partner. Assuming that's not the case, go ahead and play it 2, 3 feet over the net. Keep it to the server's half of the court, and get into the net. If you guys aren't comfortable with that now, work on it. Work on your approaching game. Work on your transition game from the baseline to the net. Because when you play a team that serves and stays back, they're giving you a huge chance to take over the net, and to pressure them to be offensive and to take care of business. If you watch them serve and stay back and you return and stay back and you play full points and full sets and full matches in a 1-up, 1-back position, you are limiting yourself, tactically in the game of doubles. You need to break through that and start getting more comfortable getting up to the net. Yes, I'm talking to you. I know there's a lot of you guys out there, that are sitting there listening to this a little uncomfortable because you know I'm talking to you. Mr. person who serves and stays back and sits there on the baseline and returns and stays back. It's not always the winning strategy, but you guys need to work on it. If you never use it because you don't like half-volleys, you don't like the ball at your feet, you're not good at volleying from behind the service line, start working on those things. Please! I don't want you to be stuck your entire tennis career, playing 1-up, 1-back doubles. It's just not as fun, alright? Tactically, you're just not taking advantage of the opportunities that you have out there. Alright. I could really go off there, on a tangent in case you guys can't tell. Alright, moving on. #3: If they love to lob -this has got to be one of the top 3 complaints, for sure, that I hear from doubles players. 'They lob every point and they all hit the back of the baseline. It was terrible!' Don't be a sucker against lobbing teams. Especially if you're serving and volley and returning and volleying and you and your partner are both getting up to the net. Coming up to the net and playing "at the net" doesn't mean that you need to be standing 3' away from the net. When you're playing against a team that you know likes to lob, be smart about where you position yourself. You should be positioning yourself to anticipate the lobs that your opponents continue to hit. That might mean on the service line is your at the net position. From there, when your opponents drive, you can move forward and volley. When they lob, you can move back and hit an overhead out of the air. You should position yourself wherever you have to so that you can take the majority of shots out of the air. If that's 2' behind the service line, or 3', so be it. Don't let it bounce. Once you let that lob bounce, you're giving your opponents lots of time and you are giving them the ability to now attack and move in and take over the point. So position yourself wisely, if they do lob a lot. Know it's coming, and don't keep closing all the way into the net, over and over and watching the ball go over your head. Be smart about it, and put yourself where you can take those out of the air. Two more. If you're opponents love to poach and be active at the net, you know you must hit your ground strokes solidly all day. Or, use the lob yourself. When you've got a person who's really disruptive up there, you have to either play an offensive, aggressive ground stroke, pass them hopefully down the alley a couple of times to show them that you're not afraid of doing it, or, if you've got a good lob, go ahead and use it. When that happens, get to the net as quickly as possible. Try to beat them to the punch if you can. If you can serve and volley and get up there and not give that net player the opportunity to poach so much, that would be great. Lastly, use specific plays as often as possible in doubles. Find which specific tactics and which specific plays and which specific patterns of shots work, and then hammer them over and over and over again. A specific example of that might be a serve to one of your opponent's backhands, and then a poach, or a fake poach. Be super active up there at the net and really pressure their weaker side. Whatever you find that works, stick with it. Don't over-complicate it. Just keep hammering it until you've won the match. Don't deviate unless it's absolutely necessary. Alright. Well, great topic today. John, thank you very much for the suggestion and in review real quickly, area #1 was general strategy. Know your game. Know your opponent's game. Put those things together and never change a working strategy and change it up when you figure out it's not working. Then singles strategy specifics: From behind the baseline, most of your shots should be cross court. When approaching, most of your shots should be down the line. Play your strengths to their weaknesses as much as possible. Doubles strategy specifics: If they serve in volley, focus on your return. If they serve and stay back, take the opportunity to move in. If they lob a lot, don't be a sucker. Don't close all the way into the net over and over again. If they love to poach, hit solid ground strokes and or use the lob. And just like singles, use specific plays as often as possible once you figure out that they work. That's a broad, general, solid overview and outline of tennis tactics. These are things that you guys can bank on. You know that these are solid tactics and these are the fundamentals, the essentials, the things that you guys should be working on, be conscious of. If you want to be good at tennis, these are the types of things that are the difference between winning and losing matches. Even though they're kind of simple common things, if you can get really good at everything I've talked about today, you will be more successful. [music] [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for episode #142 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Hopefully you guys don't mind that I went a little bit over time today. It was a great topic and I enjoyed talking about it. Remember, I will send you a free pair of strings a free set of strings, Wilson's Super Spin 16 gauge, just for leaving a review on the iTunes music store of the Essential Tennis Podcast. While you're there, subscribe to it. It's the easiest way to get the show. To get those free strings, make sure to send me an email to ian@essentialtennis.com with your pasted review and your name and address so that I know where to send the strings. Alright. That does it for this week. Thanks again everybody, very much, for listening to today's show. Take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music] [silence]

Podcast #143: Adam from FuzzyYellowBalls.com talks about using digital video to improve your tennis game!

ianw — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 16:05:57 +0000

In today's show you will learn how good of a camera is necessary to analyze your own tennis technique. Also find out how to best film your strokes, get the video to your computer, edit it, and share it with your friends or tennis pro. Definitely don't miss this crash course in digital video for tennis improvement! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Announcer: Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian. [music] Ian Westermann: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by Tennisexpress.com. On today's show, I have a very special guest. It is Adam, from Fuzzy Yellow Balls.com, and we're going to talk all about using digital video to improve your tennis game. Adam's got a lot of insights about exactly how you guys can utilize video and use cameras and your computer and the internet and everything, to make your game better. So definitely listen. He give a lot of good information. Before we get to that, I just have 2 quick announcements. First of all, I want to give a shout-out to everybody who came to the Essential Tennis clinic in Palm Springs, California this past weekend. It was an awesome time and those of you who attended, thank you guys, so much. You guys were an awesome group. Really good students, good listeners, hard workers, everything that's I'm always looking for in tennis students. So I really appreciate you guys coming out. Those people were: John, from California, Shelley, from New Mexico, Zach, from Oregon, Eddie, from Utah, Dana, Brian and John, from Nebraska, and Andrew, from California. Definitely a big shout-out to you guys. Thank you guys, so much. I had a great time working with all of you this past weekend. I also want to say thank you to everybody who has been putting reviews up on iTunes for the Essential Tennis Podcast and I'll be sending out all those free sets of string in the next, probably the next week or two. Please be patient with me. I have a lot on my plate right now. I'll definitely get those free sets of string out, but lots of kind words coming onto iTunes, and I really appreciate that. Everybody who's written a review, thank you, very much. Alright, let's get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] My guest today on the Essential Tennis Podcast is Adam Sieminski. He is the technical guru, and I guess you could say brains, to a certain extent, behind the technical success of Fuzzyyellowballs.com, also known as FYB on the internet. Adam, thank you very much for spending some time with me to talk about video analysis, taping our own strokes and the strokes of other recreational players. Thanks a lot for being on the show today. Adam: Well thanks a lot for having me on, Ian. I appreciate it. I know I definitely think that there's a lot that people can learn from videotaping their own strokes. Particularly comparing their strokes to a pro. A lot of people out there have never seen themselves on video, and I think that sort of what a lot of players see in their minds-eye as they're hitting a stroke, sometimes turns out to be very different from what their strokes actually look like. You know, I think it's very valuable for people to see themselves and to be able to critique their own strokes as they see them. I think also video is just something that's very intimidating for people. It scares people. It seems complicated, they're not sure how to do it, it sound expensive, all that type of stuff. I think a lot of that is not really the case. Video is easy to do if you're willing to dive in. It's actually not very expensive, either. Ian: Wow! I think a lot of people are probably really relieved to hear you say that because there definitely seems to be a large price tag on current, modern-day, digital camcorders that at least if you have the budget for it, I think a lot of my listeners are probably happy to hear you say that. It doesn't have to be super expensive. We'll get into all those things in a couple minutes. I actually want to hit on 2 other quick things, first before we really get into the meat of everything. First of all, I want to wish you a happy birthday, Adam! Adam: Thank you! I'm 29 years old today. I'm getting up there! Which means I'm counting down until I'm 30 now, which you know, is a big step. But I'm OK. My dad called me today and said the same thing. But I'm confident in my age. I'm growing wiser over time. Ian: That's a good attitude. I'm actually going to be hitting 30 in about 7 months, so I'll let you know how it goes. I'll send you some tips. Adam: [laughter] Great! Ian: Secondly, I want to congratulate you, both you and Will, on the success you've had at Fuzzyyellowballs.com. You guys started right around the same time that I started Essential Tennis, and you guys have just blown up around the internet, and on Youtube and the video and the content that you guys are putting out is just second to none. I just want to congratulate you on how successful the site has been since you launched it. Adam: Well thank you! What a long, strange trip. It's been 3 years I guess now and when we started out we had no audience. Through hard work and some serendipitous mistakes I guess you could call them, we really found our niche, and we've been working at it ever since, so thank you. Ian: I hope you guys continue to do great and you guys really do, I really believe, put out an awesome product. When I say product, I don't even necessarily mean what you have for sale, but just the free video production stuff that you guys put out of professional strokes and recreational player strokes compared to professional strokes is a lot of good, free content. For those of you listening, it's unlikely you haven't been to Fuzzy Yellow Balls already, but if you haven't, definitely go check it out. Speaking of high quality production value, let's go ahead and start getting into the specifics of shooting good, quality video. Let's go ahead and start off with cameras. You made a statement in your introduction there, that it doesn't have to be expensive. Please expand on that, because I know a lot of my listeners are probably waiting for you to tell them what they can buy that isn't $2,000.00 that'll still do a good job in showing them what they're doing on the court. Adam: Right. Well the first thing I would say is that technology is evolving so fast right now, that people would be really surprised at the quality of camera that they can get for very cheap right now. And yes, we shoot with cameras that are very expensive, and have a lot of accessories, but that is actually not necessary to get good looking or good quality video. Let me just start with the basics. Most people nowadays, they're wondering 'OK. If I'm going to go film my strokes, where do I start?' Well, a lot of people have a camera that's built into their cell phone. A lot of cell phones nowadays can take video. Even the newer, the fancy ones can take HD video. My Moto Droid X shoots really high quality HD video. It's super easy to just bring over to the computer and upload to Youtube. But a lot of other phones, even if it's not HD quality, that's certainly a starting point. If you're just looking to see what your stroke looked like? Point your cell phone camera at yourself. That's absolutely free and it may not be a stunning looking picture, but you will get to see what your strokes look like. By the same token, a lot of people have digital still cameras. Kind of pocket sized, point and shoot digital still cameras and most of those cameras have a built-in movie mode. Those cameras will certainly have a higher quality picture. You'll get to see a little bit more with a point and shoot camera's movie mode, than you would with a cell phone camera. Let me expand on that a little bit further. One of the things that's very important to being able to capture video of your strokes that's going to help you, is being able to control the shutter speed of the camera. This is a little bit of a technical detail, but the shutter speed is the speed at which the camera takes a picture. A movie camera, or a video camera will take nearly 30 pictures per second. It plays those pictures back at 30 pictures per second and it looks like motion to you. But the key is being able to control how long the shutter of the camera stays open during each exposure. So even if the camera is shooting, say, 30 pictures per second, each exposure is not necessarily 1-30th of a second. In fact, 1-30th of a second, it would be a very blurry picture when you looked at that, especially if you're trying to capture something fast moving, like tennis If you're able to control that shutter speed, and have the shutter only open for 1-1,000th of a second instead of 1-30th of a second, then you will get a sort of more frozen look in each frame of the video, which is very important. It won't be blurry, is basically the bottom line. What I was essentially getting at, was generally with [empty] that you have over elements like the shutter speed. A cell phone camera, I don't think there's a single cell phone camera in existence, for instance, that has the ability to set the shutter speed, manually. But a lot of point and shoot kind of pocket digital cameras will have that ability. Certainly as you get more expensive cameras down the line, those will have that ability, as well. But being able to control the shutter speed is not something that is required to be able to see your strokes, but it's certainly something, it's like one of the key elements, I would say, that will allow you to get a lot more out of watching your video, when the action is actually kind of frozen in each video frame, rather than being blurred. Ian: Yeah, I know what you're talking about. I've had quite a bit of experience using flip-cams, which are pretty inexpensive HD video options. They don't have an option to control the shutter speed. Just as an example of what you're talking about, when I shoot outside in direct sunlight at 30 frames per second, it's nice and clean and crisp. Each frame is nice and frozen, as you said. But when I go inside, it becomes very blurry. Is that because it makes automatic adjustments based on how much light is available? Adam: That's exactly correct. That shutter speed adjustment is happening but the camera is controlling it. The camera tries to control the amount of light that's coming into the camera, so that the scene doesn't look blown-out, like too much light. It's called over-exposure. Too little light is called under-exposure. So the first thing that the camera will adjust is the shutter speed when it's trying to figure out how much light to let in. So generally, if you're outdoors on a very sunny day, there's a lot of light coming into the camera. So the camera can't leave the shutter open as long, or else it will be over-exposed. Generally, if you're outdoors shooting on a sunny day, a camera with an automatic shutter control will actually give you a pretty short shutter time. 1-1,000th of a second, 1-500th of a second, somewhere in there. I guess that one of the small technical details of it is why don't all cameras, whether it's a cheap camera or an expensive camera, why don't they all just have a fast shutter speed? I mean why bother with a lower shutter speed, right? Why not just freeze the action on every frame? The answer is that the human brain actually doesn't really like watching video that's shot with a very high shutter speed. To the brain, it looks like the picture is jumping, basically, if every frame is frozen. For most applications, not many people probably are shooting sports video exclusively, with their camera. So the designers of those cameras try to make the video look as good as possible if you're shooting a wedding or your kid's graduation, something of that nature. Ian: I didn't know that. That's interesting. Alright. Let's say that my listeners want to get kind of an entry-level camera that allows them to have that control over settings such as shutter speed. What kind of budget are we looking at? Or what kind of cost are we looking at to get a camera that just I guess, spend as little as possible but still have the ability to control and fine tune those settings to make it as good as possible. Adam: Well, what you were talking about, the flip HD camera, I think is right around $200.00, and that doesn't have the shutter speed control. I think the one-step up from that would be, you and I had actually talked previous today about looking at some cameras that would be good for filming tennis video, and we found, or you found, I should say, a great kind of camcorder style camera for right under $300.00, that actually would do everything that you needed including the ability to control the shutter speed. It has a very high frame rate, so it's actually kind of a slow-motion camera as well, which a lot of people will find very helpful. That camera was a Sanyo camera. S-a-n-y-o, and I can give the model name for your viewers that we had looked at before. But I'm a fan of this camera based on its features, and the fact that it's HD. That model number is V as in Victor, PC-FH 1A. If you're users type that into, say, Amazon or Google, that camera will come up. It's a very cheap camera. $300.00 is the very low end of what you would expect to pay for an [noise] HD camera that you can control the shutter speed on. That will shoot slow-motion video as well. That's a fantastic camera. Ian: I've been really happy with it. Especially for the price and it took me dozens of hours of Google searches to find that camera around where my budget was, and trying to find the features that I was looking for. But yeah, it does 1,000 frames per second at a full 10-80P video resolution, which, for $300.00 I think is outstanding. Adam: Yeah, that's amazing. The other camera that actually we have used in the past at FYB, is called the Casio Exilim Camera. I think that's spelled e-x-i- l-i-m, Exilim? That camera is more of a point and shoot kind of style of camera body. It's not a camcorder where you hold the camera on the right side of it I guess, and you look through the viewfinder in the back. It looks much more like a photographer's camera. But that camera will also shoot HD video. It will shoot up to 60 still pictures per second, which is actually a really nice feature if you want to record some high quality still pictures and get exactly the right shot. You can have that thing take 60 pictures in 1 second, it's just fantastic. It'll record HD and it'll record up to, I believe, 640 frames in a second, which is very slow motion. That camera, I think, comes in around $300.00 as well. At that low price point you actually can get a whole lot of bang for the buck, basically. There's a lot you can do with a cheap camera. Ian: Nice. Let me make a correction on something I said a second ago. The Sanyo, I said 1,000 frames per second. That's not accurate. It does 60 frames per second and full HD 10-80P resolution. That is my bad! So moving on. Let's say that we've got our camera now, at either an entry level digital video camera using our cell phone, or just maybe a flip- cam for $100 or $200 bucks, or maybe even something a little bit more customizable and a little bit higher quality. Once we have the camera and we go out to the courts, and we want to actually capture our strokes, can you please talk to my audience a little bit about what's important to capturing a video that's best for analyzing. Meaning that I guess we could talk about maybe the use of a tripod and how to frame the subjects. Tips like that. What can my listeners do to create the best quality, I guess production value, for their own videos? Adam: Sure. I'll run through a little bit of list that I have that I think is kind of important stuff that will really cause people to get a lot more out of their video. You know the first thing is, most people do simply walk out to the court. They put their cell phone camera on the bench that's right there at the net and they point it at themselves, and then they go. That's certainly fine. That's great, that first step. That's the first step. Just getting out there and getting yourself on video. Then put that up on Youtube and get people to critique it and all that kind of stuff. How do you up the quality? What are really simple ways that you can get more out of your video? The very first thing, the very, very first thing that I'm going to start with, is get yourself a tripod. And I know a lot of people out there are thinking to themselves 'Oh, a tripod is like this huge thing that I don't want to go buy for $100 bucks. I have to bring it out to the court, it's got it's own bag.'. all that kind of stuff. Just 2 things. You can go to any photography store or any store like a Best Buy, Circuit City if they still exist; I don't remember. There are very tiny tripods called baby tripods, that are 5", the legs are 5" long, and then up at the top, there's the screw that screws into the bottom of the camera. Usually, the baby tripods, you can get them and they have what's called a ball-head, which is sort of the head that sort of freely rotates around where it screws into the camera. These tripods are $10.00. I've seen them for $10.00 at a local electronics store. The reason that I just very, very highly recommend that people pick one of those up, is that when you level the camera, so the camera is not pointing up at the sky when it's supposed to be pointing at you, that makes a tremendous difference in how much you can get by looking at the video. It's so, so easy to do. $10.00 for that little tripod. Then you can actually set the camera on the bench and you can rest-assured that the camera's actually level and pointing at you properly. You definitely don't have to splurge for something super expensive. The other really cool thing that I would recommend is what's called a gorilla-pod. That's a mash-up between gorilla and tripod, I guess. It is a [inaudible] tripod that has flexible, but strong legs, basically. So you can curve the legs of the tripod or have the tripod grip onto something, basically, with the curved leg. Which is actually really great for you can latch the tripod onto the back fence of the tennis court, or onto a railing if there isn't anywhere else to set the tripod if you don't want to put it on the ground. Gorilla-pods are also really cheap. It's just something that can help you take the video to the next level by giving you a different angle, or being able to attach the camera to the back fence or something like that. That's #1. #1 step to improving your video quality? Get a tripod. Tripods are not expensive. They're $10.00, $20.00. Anything more than that, you might be wasting your money, initially. The second thing, and this is also something I see a lot is the framing of your shot. How zoomed-in or zoomed-out are you? That's another thing that scares people. A lot of people are hesitant to zoom the camera in because they fear that the camera won't capture what they're doing on the court, if they're too zoomed in. So what you see a lot of, if you look at people's tennis video on Youtube, is just the camera is fully zoomed-out from the net and the player is like, an inch high. They're tiny, tiny, tiny. It's OK to zoom in. The reason you want to zoom in is because the more zoomed-in you are on yourself, the more you're going to see of what you're doing. So I would really encourage people to play around for even 5 minutes, with their camera on zooming-in and maybe zoom-in closer than you think you might want to, to try to capture that one shot the best that you can on film. So zoom is important, and framing is important. That will actually show you a lot more when you're not a tiny little dot in the picture, and you're actually large and in charge on the screen and you can see what you're doing. That'll help people a lot, as well. I think the third thing, so we have get a tripod, don't be afraid to zoom in, and then the third thing is get the angle right. What angle do you want to shoot yourself at? Where do you want to place the camera on the court to get what you're looking at? Some people sort of just elect to, like I said, put the camera on the bench there, and then just let it shoot. That's perfectly fine. That's what you would call a three-quarters perspective, where the camera's not quite head-on facing you, and it's not quite to the side. It's kind of shooting from a three-quarter angle. That's certainly an angle that you can learn a lot from. You can see the whole stroke, etc., so that's not a bad angle. What people shouldn't be afraid to do, is play around with looking at different angles of filming yourself from. Let me give you an example. On the forehand, right, you want your contact point on your forehand to be a little bit out in front of your foot. Right? So out in front of your body. A little bit in front of your foot, ideally. A lot of players certainly have trouble rotating back toward the net, so they end up making contact with the tennis ball, in line with their body, rather than a little bit out in front of their body. Exactly how far out in front of your body you're making contact with the tennis ball at, is hard to tell from a three-quarters shot, or from a head-on shot. So what you might want to do is look directly from the side. Shoot, looking down the baseline, then you'll be able to see exactly where your contact point is, from the side perspective. That's something that a lot of people don't do. Another super useful angle is of course, the back angle. The sort of the TV angle. That lets you see the whole court. It lets you see your strokes from behind. It lets you keep track of your footwork, and sort of [noise] sorry. The back angle, from a brain perspective, helps you identify with what you're seeing. Anytime that the camera is behind someone, it's much easier for people to put the, for the viewers, to put themselves mentally, in the players shoes, if that makes sense. Sort of you're seeing from behind them. It usually makes sense to people, more so than shooting from the side or from the front. That can be a very useful angle, as well, when you're trying to figure out what you're doing right and what you're doing wrong. Ian: OK. Awesome! Good stuff. Next, I want to move on to one more main topic before we run out of time. That has to do with editing software, and actually working with the video files. So once our listeners have gone out and gotten whatever camera they're going to use and they're using their tripod, they're framing themselves correctly, they're positioning the camera in the right spot, and they've actually taken that footage, what do you recommend, Adam, as far as looking at it, past that? In other words, transferring it to the computer. Is there certain software that you recommend to be able to view video in slow-motion, or frame-by-frame, that sort of thing? What do you think? Adam: OK. I'm going to jump right into that, but there's one other thing that I wanted to mention really quick, about making your video look a little better and getting a little more from it. And that is a very simple thing that you can do. Make sure that you are frontally lit. Or that you are lit properly by the sun when you're shooting. This gets into something that in photography is called back-lighting. What you don't want to do, and I wish I could kind of draw a simple diagram, is, you want the camera to be on the same side of the player as the sun. So if the sun is in the southern sky, and you are playing, you want the camera to be pointing at the side of the player that is lit by the sun. Let me give you an example. What you wouldn't necessarily want to do or what will certainly make your footage look a lot better, is imagine if you are playing with your back to the sun. You don't want to be shooting at the front of you with the camera, because the back of you is lit by the sun, and the camera will cause you to basically completely black-out. It won't pick up any details because you are creating shadow with yourself, from the sun. If your back is to the sun, make sure that the camera is behind. If the front of you is facing the sun, then have the camera in front of you. That's not required. You can certainly shoot a shot that's back-lit. But it will definitely take your video to the next level, also, just being conscious of where the sun is when you're shooting yourself. Ian: Good stuff! You should teach a photography class, Adam. Adam: I'm thinking about it, you know. Maybe I'll set it up on the website. So let's jump into your other question. How do you edit this stuff? How do you get it onto the computer? How do you edit it? How do you look at it? Is that expensive? Certainly the video software we use is $1,000.00. You don't want to do that. You want it to be free, or very cheap. Starting with how do you get it onto the computer? Most cameras nowadays are very straight forward in that when you buy the camera, there's either software that comes with the camera in the box, or you simply just plug the camera into the computer with the USB cable. It opens up the transfer wizard, is I think what it's called on the computer when you plug the camera in. So that's very straight forward. You burn the video clips over to your computer, and gone are the days where your video was on tape, and then you had to transfer the tape to the computer. We still sometimes do that. But whether you're shooting on a cell phone camera, particularly if you're shooting on a digital still camera, if you're using it in movie mode, or if you have that Sanyo camera or the Exilim camera that we were talking about. All those cameras, you take the USB cable and plug it into your computer, exactly like you would do if you were transferring digital pictures from your still camera. It works exactly the same way. Once you get the video, you copy the video clips over to your computer. What do you do now? How do you edit them? The first question is, exactly how much editing do you actually really need to do? If you want to watch the video yourself, and you don't want to send the video up to Youtube, you actually probably don't need to do really any editing at all. You can leave the video files just as they are. What you're more looking for at that point, is the availability to go frame by frame through the video. Unfortunately, back in the day with the computers, say back in the 1990's, Windows Media Player, the free media player that was included with Windows, and is still included with Windows, they removed the ability with Windows Media Player to go frame by frame through a video. You can no longer do that. Why that removed that ability, I don't know. But the good news is, the program that I use personally, to go frame by frame through video is a program called Media Player Classic. If you Google for Media Player Classic, a whole bunch of downloads will come up. It's a perfectly safe program. It's a very small very lightweight video viewing program, that allows you to go frame by frame. Actually the Media Player Classic, it was created and was designed as a reaction to Media Player becoming too bloated, and removing the features that people really want. Like being able to go frame by frame. So that program is 100% free, very easy to use, very quick to download and you just open up your video files using that. Then the left and right arrows on your keyboard give you the ability to go one frame forward or one frame backward. Very, very simple. So that is the first thing I would recommend. If you don't even want to edit your video once you get it onto the computer, just pull it into Media Player Classic, and go frame by frame. Ian: By the way, for my Mac listeners, Quicktime does the frame by frame with the arrows, like what Adam has been describing. Adam: Exactly. That's what I was going to say. Or even if you're a PC user, you can download Quicktime as well for the PC. And if you already have Quicktime? Great. You can open up your videos in the Quicktime player. It'll do exactly the same thing. I guess I'm just partial to Media Player Classic. I love that program. So if you actually do want to edit your video, or if you want to send it up to Youtube for instance, I would recommend sticking with the free programs that are already included with your computer. If you are Windows user, there is a program called Windows Movie Maker, that's included with Windows, and it's completely free. If you are a Windows user, you can click on your start menu, and you would go to programs, and then the accessory menu, and you should find Windows Movie Maker, there. If it's not right in that main list, it might be under entertainment or multi-media, whatever the case may be. But it's in there. Or look for it on your programs menu. And if you're a Mac user, there's iMovie. I'm not a Mac user, but I imagine I-Move is pretty straight forward to find. Macs are pretty easy to navigate. So that would be the program you're looking for there. The purpose of editing a video, generally 90% probably of what people want to do when they edit a video, is clip out the dead space at the beginning. You know, pressing record on the camera and then walking out to the court and then hitting. So they want to cut out the dead space or they want to cut out bad shots, or they want to cut out the good shots so they can upload only the good shots to Youtube. Or show them to their family and friends, or their coach, I guess. Most of what people want to do is cut or crop, I guess you could say. That's very easy to do with both of those programs. With I-Movie and with Windows Movie Maker. Then of course, after you're done with the simple editing, and you can also, in those programs, you can level the video. You can rotate the video in those programs, so that if the camera wasn't quite level when you filmed, you can go in and rotate the video so that it becomes level, in the editing program. That's another big thing that I do quite a bit. And what else? So the last step, I guess, is get your video online or share your video with people. The simplest way to do it, of course, is Youtube. I highly recommend Youtube. It's so easy to use. You go to Youtube, you create an account with them, you upload your video, and Youtube handles all of the coding, basically, taking your video from whatever format your video camera shot it in, into being able to share it with everyone. That's fantastic, because once it's on Youtube, anyone in the world can critique it. You can just, if your coach want to take a look at your strokes, you can just send him a link to your Youtube video, all that kind of stuff, in an email. That's very powerful and that's something we haven't seen before. You'd be stunned at how many, if you searched for "my forehand" on Youtube, you'd be stunned at how many people's forehands are up there on Youtube, waiting to be seen. The other thing is you can certainly take your videos once, if they're edited up, and you can put them on your cell phone. So you can take them and show your friends your forehand on your cell phone, that kind of stuff too. Which is all cool. Put it on your video iPod. That's another big one. So, yeah. Tons you can do with video now. Ian: Or compare their technique to that of the Pro's on Fuzzy Yellow Balls, right? Adam: [laughter] Well thank you for leading me very promptly into that! I actually did want to mention this, and thank you for bringing me back to that. One of the really big things that people can learn a tremendous amount from, is split-screening themselves, side-by-side with a Pro. Or, watching how a Pro executes a stroke, and then comparing that to their own stroke. You know, we have a ton of clips. Well, almost 1,000 clips now, but certainly 100's of clips of Pro players from Indian Wells, hitting their shot. Like their forehand or backhand. We have people like Roger Federer or Nadal, or Tommy Haas has flawless technique. I really actually like his forehand. Or on the ladies side, we have Ivanovich and all these other top Pro's up there. You can open up a Youtube widow with the player with whatever player you want. You can look at that and then you can open up say, Media Player Classic, with your own strokes, and you can compare side by side, yourself with a Pro. It's actually very interesting because what we have found, and we have a course on this, if people haven't seen it already, I really highly recommend that people sign up for this course. It's free. It's about 45 minutes long, but we show you exactly what separates amateur players from Pro players using video. In that course, we look at 3 different amateur players. One is a very beginning player, had played about a month or two. Another guy was a little better. Then we had someone who had played in high school but was looking to improve. What we saw with all of those people, when we looked at their strokes on video and we split-screened them, side by side with a Pro player like Tommy Haas, it's actually very stunning what the differences are. And it turns out that a lot of players are doing sort of very basic things. Very basic elements. I guess we call them the fundamentals? But that I think is really where video shines, is the ability to go out and capture your own strokes and then compare them to something like the fundamentals. What are all the Pros doing the same? What am I doing or not doing when I hit a forehand or a serve or a backhand? That, I think, is very powerful. I think that's really where video shines and that's what people should be trying to do is get out there. Take a risk. Take your cell phone camera, your still camera, your cheap video camera to the court. Shoot some video of yourself, and then look at yourself side by side with a Pro. If you can get over how good their strokes look in comparison to yours, there's really a lot that you can learn from doing that. I think it's a tremendous resource for people and it's something that was not doable, or extremely hard to do even 10 years ago. Ian: So how can people access that free instructional video? Adam: If they go to Fuzzyyellowballs.com, I think we have a sign-up box that's right on the right hand side of the website. I think the website is going to be redesigned as well, pretty soon, so it might just be a big honking box right at the top of the website that says 'Sign up for our course.' You can get it there or go to our website and click on the Pro-strokes Library, right up at the top. That's where all of our Pro player footage is. There's tons of stuff in there. There's 100's of hours, probably of footage in there of Pro's hitting in slow-motion high def. It's great. And it's all free. Take a look. Ian: Awesome! Well, I know that just like myself, I know that my listeners are going to find it really obvious why Fuzzy Yellow Balls has been so successful. It's easy to tell that you're really passionate about this stuff, and really creating the best possible video experience that you guys can. Adam, I want to thank you for spending the time with me to share some of your knowledge and what you've learned about creating great quality video. And using video in general to help improve the games of tennis players. Thank you so much for everything that you've shared today. Adam: Absolutely! Thank you for thank you very much for having me on. I'm glad I got to share with your listeners. To all of your listeners, I would say good luck with your video. I can't wait to see the improvements that you've made. [inaudible] Thank you Ian. [music] [music] [music] Ian: Alright. That does it for the Essential Tennis Podcast, episode #143. Thank you very much for listening to today's show, and I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Adam from Fuzzy Yellow Balls. That does it for this week's show. I'll go ahead and wrap up. A little bit longer episode this weekend, and I hope you guys have enjoyed the extra information. Again, a thank you to Adam for spending the time with me and sharing his knowledge with us. Alright, so I will talk to you guys next week. Until then, take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music] [music] [silence]

Podcast #144: Low, short shots can be some of the toughest to handle for recreational players. Learn how to deal with them! Also find out if it’s smarter to attack a weakness over and over again.

ianw — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 16:06:16 +0000

Do you struggle hitting topspin on really low shots that are close to the net? Most people do and sometimes it's just better to play a slice or "push" type shot. Find out when this is best to do and how to do it! Also listen in on a discussion about singles tactics: should you play your opponents strength in order to attack to their weakness? Find out! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Announcer: Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you! Whether it's technique, strategy--or the mental game-- tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast: your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by TennisExpress.com. Well thank you very much for joining me on today's show. I'm excited to do today's show! I am every week, but I was just sitting here getting ready to start recording and realizing that I was getting ready to talk to thousands of people all over the world who love tennis. That's really exciting for me! I want to thank all of you listening for continuing to support the show by downloading the file, and by being listeners sending in questions. I love that the show continues to grow and improve. It's great to have all of you on board. So thank you very much for your continued support. I look forward to today's show. Hopefully it's going to help you out there get some ideas about how you can improve your own game and become a better player. That's always been the point of this show, and I hope that's shown. Alright, let's go ahead and get down to business. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] [music] Alright. Let's get started on today's episode. Our first question is coming to us from Mark in the Netherlands. Mark wrote and said: "Hi, Ian. I listened with great interest to your last 2 podcasts about handling short, weak shots. Maybe a nice follow up would be how to handle short, slow balls that are also very low, and have varying kinds of spin. I thought I was improving on handling the short balls, hitting them with top spin and all, but now I encountered an opponent that plays them very smartly. His short shots are often too low for me to hit with top spin back. " I also make many mistakes if I try back spin. This is because the balls are either too low, or they are very slow and have difficult curve to them, or they have spin and are unpredictable. What I tried in the end was to approach them as almost a volley. I hit them with a continental grip so I can lift them better. and try to push them back as far as I can. I say "push," because there is no space and time for a regular swing. I try to hit them to the back of the court most of the time, because a drop shot seems risky. What do you think of my approach? Does it make sense? Or do you have better ideas?" -- Mark. Alright, Mark. I've got 4 main things that I've outlined here that I want to get across to you that I think are going to be helpful. I'll give you my thoughts on what your approach is and how to handle this shot, which is very often a shot that recreational players struggle with. First of all. And I understand that the shot you're talking about is tricky. It's difficult. You're having a hard time getting to it and it's low by the time you get there. However, I do want to point out that top spin should always be your top choice. [laughter] I totally hear where you're coming from. I know you're talking about a shot where top spin doesn't seem like it's possible. However, it should continue to be your #1 choice if it is at all an option when you're getting these shots from your opponent. The reason why I like top spin the most for this type of shot, anything low and slow and short in general, is because it gives you margin for error while trying to attack. And that's the best of both worlds. That's what all of you should be striving to do! I know that all of you listening want to have the ability to take something low, short, slow where you're moving well into the court to get to it, and make a confident, full swing and put it in play consistently. Wouldn't that be great? [laughter] I know that a lot of you out there have fear of hitting that type of shot, because you often miss it. It's a low percentage shot. So you end up having to just push it in play. Just like what Mark is describing, the way that he's taken a continental grip and just basically pushed it in play. So the first thing I want to say to you is that top in should be your top choice. If it's at all possible. Because that top spin gives it curve back down into the court again, and it allows you to be aggressive, and not have to left up and just push it in play. Many of you listening are not good at this, and it's something that should be developed and practiced. You should be practicing this on purpose on the courts during your practice time. I spend a lot of time with my clients as I teach full-time, practicing this shot. I will give it to them over and over. Typically the way I practice it with them is I will be on the baseline and feed them a short shot. They'll move forwards, attack to one side of the court or the other. Let's say I give them a target of hitting the deuce side and they make a full swing, aim to the deuce side. I'm standing there waiting for it, and I just block it up into the air again. Slowly, softly, short. I have them repeat again and again making a full swing at that short shot. So get a ball machine or a partner that can feed to you, or is consistent enough or has enough control to hit it back to you over and over again shortly. They might not be exactly the same as this opponent you're talking about who seems to be really good at this shot as far as making it challenging by varying spins and keeping it very low. But you should just be practicing in general hitting a top spin shot from that area of the court so that you have a little more confidence when you play against this opponent. So that's Point #1 that I want to make. Top spin should be your top choice. Moving onto #2. When not possible, slice is extremely useful. I talk a lot on the podcast about how I prefer top spin whenever possible. That being said, I'm not anti-slice. It's not that I don't think back spin can be used effectively. However, when you do use slice. Let's say that the shot that you're opponent has hit you is especially low, or it has that spin that's unpredictable for you, Mark. When that happens, and you just aren't getting there in a very balanced position, slice is a great shot selection in this situation. But understand, that this shouldn't be an aggressively hit type slice. You shouldn't be trying to hit lots of back spin with a chopping motion. It should be a smooth, guided shot with a little bit of back spin on it. I think a lot of time recreational players wrongly assume that slice means you're really chopping down on the ball aggressively. Really slicing it making a lot of back spin, and that it's a shot that should be tricky or sneaky because you're putting a ton of spin on it and trying to fool your opponents with all the back spin you put on the ball. No, this should be a guided shot. Something that's consistent, very accurate, well-placed. And yes, it will have some back spin on it. But the whole point of hitting slice is not just to spin the ball. It's a style of shot that should be very easily controlled and very accurate. Again, this is a shot that you should be practicing in your practice play, Mark, so that it's in your arsenal, and it's an option that you have when you get a more difficult short shot from your opponent. So that's #2. Using the slice. And when I say slice, it's not an extreme, heavy back spin type shot. It's controlled and steady and consistent. Now moving onto #3. When slice isn't even possible. When it's just such a tough shot--you're barely reaching it--I like the approach that you are taking. You should just be pushing the ball back deep. I like your approach to keep it deep. Push it as close to the base line as possible. Hopefully you can direct it towards the weakness of your opponent would probably be a great option. When it's not an option, just keeping it down the line in general is going to be a good way to go. The reason for that is it keeps the ball in front of you, making it easier to cover passing shot attempts from your opponent. Again, to their weakness would be a great option. Keeping it deep is a great option. When you can't do either of those things, just keep it in front of you. Just push it straight ahead down the line, and you'll be in a better position to cover passing shot attempts as opposed to hitting cross court, which leaves a wide open court down the line for your opponent to try to hit their passing shot. So that's the push shot. I don't have a problem with this either. Listen, when it's an emergency, #1 priority is to just get the ball in play. And this is a shot that I have absolutely used in match play, even at a 5.0 level. It's a shot that is used on TV by the pros. When you're in a tough situation, you've just got to do what you got to do. So worst case scenario, go ahead and use the continental grip and push it deep down the line, or towards their weakness. Whichever one you think will be more effective. And lastly, Point #4 that I want to talk about relating to your question, Mark, is I want you to work on your anticipation skills. You've got to start reading these types of shots, start seeing them earlier from your opponent. You should see these low spinny shots coming from your opponent. The technique used to hit this type of shot that you're describing is completely different from trying to hit a top spin drive or a deep shot in the court. You should notice technique differences. You should notice differences in how your opponent is setting up with his body and with his racket in order to hit this low spinning shot. So I want you to start paying closer attention to how he's doing it and when he's doing it so that when it happens next you get a jump on it and you're able to get to this shot more quickly and get yourself in a better position. To be honest with you, there's not really any excuse to get beat by this shot over and over again. I don't even care how good it is, honestly. If he uses it frequently, you should see it coming after awhile. The first couple of times, fine. You're going to maybe get caught off guard by it. But after the first couple of times that he uses this shot, or any opponent uses this shot, you should start to anticipate it. You should start to see it coming, and get up to the ball quickly enough that you're able to play an offensive shot and pressure him right back. Now of course the pros use drop shots effectively here and there, but [laughter] it's only really effective when they use this type of shot sparingly. It's kind of an off-paced shot to throw their opponent off balance. Anybody who uses a short shot exclusively really should get beat! [laughter] Now if their opponent isn't good at handling short shots, then they won't get beat, and that was a good tactic for them to play and there's no shame in that. But somebody who does this on a regular basis. Mark, you should start to see it coming. I want you to practice it enough and pay close enough attention that you see it coming and you're able to handle it comfortably. That goes for the rest of you listening as well. Alright. So Mark, there you go. There's the answer to your question. Good question. Thank you very much for being a listener in the Netherlands. I appreciate it. Hopefully this answer was helpful to you! [music] [music] Before we get to our second question in today's show, I want to remind you about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis podcast. That is TennisExpress. Com, where you can go to get all of your tennis gear and equipment, and accessory needs met. Whether it be rackets, bags, strings, grips, stringing machines--whatever you need-- shoes, shirts, shorts, apparel. You name it, they're got it there. And they've got good prices. Free shipping on orders of over $75. When you do go there and you get whatever you need this week for your tennis game, please use the promotional code "essential" when you checkout. That will tell TennisExpress.com that you're a listener of the Essential Tennis podcast, and that you appreciate their support of the podcast by being a sponsor. So please go check them out. Use the promotional code "essential." I thank them very much for their support of my podcast. Let's go ahead and move on now with our second question. It comes to us from Jim in California. Jim wrote and said: "Can you discuss the trade offs between hitting predominantly to an opponent's weakness versus waiting for an opportunity to hit your attacking shot there, i.e. if an opponent has a weaker back hand, most people whill attempt to hit a majority of shots to that side. However, that means when you get a weak or at least attackable return, your shot is likely to go to your opponent's strength. Conversely, the alternative is to hit to the opponent's strength, then when you, for example, push them wide to their forehand side and get a short hand ball, you can approach weakness. Then, instead of them trying to pass you with their best shot, they have to beat you with their worst shot. What are the trade offs? How do you maximize either approach? When do you use both? On the pro level, Fed and Jokavich do this frequently." Alright. Jim, good question. It's great that you're thinking critically about shot selection and tactics. Just like what you're describing here. It's excellent that you're even aware of these types of things, and especially aware of combinations, and setting up to one side versus the other, attacking to one side versus the other, etc. Hopefully you're just as aware of these types of things during your match play as you are when you're off the court and you're typing this question to me. It's awesome that you're thinking about things like this. All of you listening should be trying to pick out patterns of play like this to use against your opponent on a regular basis, both in singles and in doubles. Even though what Jim is describing is clearly a singles tactic's question. Now a couple of things I want to talk about Jim. First of all, in my opinion, continuing to pound a weakness is the way to go. For a couple of reasons, that's definitely my choice. As we keep going here, I'll point out several reasons or other ways that... Maybe it won't be the way to go. However in general, I think continuing to play the weakness, in other words, the first example that you laid out, which was hitting to opponent's back hand over and over again, and then finally getting that short attackable shot. I think that's the way to go for a few reasons. First of all, when you do pound their weakness over and over again and you make it really obvious and you just to that side again and again, first of all, it's quite possible that you'll just out right win the point. And you won't even have to make a put away shot, or move in and attack and have to try to put the ball away, or force them to have to put the ball away. It's very possible that they'll just make errors. The more shots that you hit there, the more they will give you free points. You won't even have to worry about putting the ball away. That's Reason #1 why I think that hitting to the weaker side more is a better play. Usually. Secondly, when you continue to attack to that weak side, who says that when you do get an attackable ball that you have to go the other way anyway? [laughter] You made the assumption in your question that, "Alright. So we hit to their back hand again and again. We get the weak ball. We're just on their back. They just hit a back hand. So now we have to go to the forehand side to try to put the ball away." No! That's not the case. Why not just attack to their back hand again and make them hit yet another one? And force them to try to pass you with their weaker shot. There's nothing that says that after hitting to their back hand side and getting their short ball that you then have to hit to their forehand side. Go ahead and attack right back at it. If you know, and if it's noticeable that their forehand is much stronger than their back hand, there's no reason to make them hit it the entire match. Literally! [laughter] Go ahead and don't even let them hit it once the entire match. Wouldn't that be great? If you know that their back hand is worse, and you literally just make them hit only back hands? There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, even if it means they're not having to run back and forth at all. Go ahead and make them hit back hands all day long. Now again, [laughter] there's going to be different situations and different opponents. We'll get to that later. But in general, I think that continuing to attach the back hand is an excellent shot. I'd much rather, I'd very often rather have my opponent not running and try to hit their weakness past me as opposed to hitting their strength on the run. So I do agree with you Jim, that very often having your opponent run and hit their strength is not going to be successful for you in the long run. So I'm totally on the same page with you there! But my point is who says you have to hit over there? Just continue to attack that back hand. Now on the other side of the coin, when you hit to their strength over and over again. And we're trying to play that second series of shots that you were talking about. Hit to their strength over and over. Wait for the shot ball, and then attack over to the other side of the court to their weakness. Well the problem with that in my view is that when you do hit to their strength over and over again, there's no guarantee that you'll even get an attackable shot. If their strength, if their forehand is in fact their best shot and they love hitting it. If you continue to go there in hopes of getting a short shot to attack to their other side, to their other side, to their back hand. You might not even get one in the first place if their forehand is in fact their best shot. Now if both your forehand and your back hand are on par with their strength. If both your forehand and your backhand are just as strong, is their strongest shot their forehand, then go ahead and use this tactic. I actually think it would be fine if you can sustain a long rally with them using both your forehand and backhand side, hitting to their strength, and if you're able to work the point and not worry about them taking over the point and attacking on you, then I think this tactic is perfectly fine. However, if you have [laughter] a definite weaker side and you're planned tactic is to hit to their strength over and over again, I have a problem with that fundamentally from a tactics standpoint. Because now we're giving them opportunity after opportunity to be able to do to us what we're trying to do to them. If we take every ball and purposefully hit to their strength while it's that many chances that they have to attack to our weakness. So I don't think that's going to pay off in the long run for most of you listening. Because most of you listening are playing players that have a definite stronger side, and most of you listening also have a definite stronger side. So in my opinion, whenever you get an opportunity to blatantly hit to your opponent's weakness--especially if it's with your strength--you should be doing that, and you should be taking advantage of it. I think that purposefully going to your opponent's strength in the hopes of getting a short ball so you can then attack to your opponent's weakness is playing with fire. And I think that it's unnecessary risk when you have equal opportunity to go in either direction. Now you might not always have equal opportunity to go in either direction. Maybe you're having to hit your weakness down the line to go to their weakness. Or something like that, and it just doesn't match up well. Once in awhile you have to go to their strength, and that's perfectly fine. [laughter] Please don't think that I'm saying that literally every shot should always go to your opponent's weaker side. You should always keep in mind things like the directionals of where the highest percentage play is on the court. It's not always prudent to just hit every single shot to your opponent's weaker side, because tactically, it doesn't always make sense. I'm just trying to make my point that, in general, continuing to hit to their weakness is probably the percentage amount of times going to work out in your favor more so than trying to play their strength on purpose in hopes of being able to set up for their weaker side. Now the last thing I want to say, Jim. And this goes for all tactical discussions, and all tactical situations, period. Everything is situational. And I've briefly said several times in my discussion here, "Well it depends on this, and that's assuming that is the case," etc. Your opponent may have an incredible running forehand. I pointed that out I believe briefly. If you hit to their back hand over and over again. I'm sorry, you pointed this out originally [laughter] in your question. If you hit to their weakness over and over and then hit to their strength to try to hit it away from them, maybe that's their favorite shot is hitting on the run to their stronger side. So it may not work out. Or maybe their weakness, their weaker side, is actually pretty good when they know you're going to go there over and over again, and they're just waiting for it and in balance. I've definitely come across that situation personally, where I definitely figured out early [laughter] "Wow, I don't want to hit to my opponent's forehand. That's definitely their biggest shot." So I started hitting everything to their back hand side, and they get into a rhythm, and get into a groove, because I'm hitting everything over there. They know that it's coming there. They're getting good balance. And they have no problem just hitting a neutral rally ball back. And all of a sudden I'm having to work much harder than I was planning on. Or maybe even they like to hit a passing shot when they know it's coming to their weaker side. I'm just coming up with random examples here of why what I've talked about might not even work! [laughter] And you have to be prepared for that! You know why? Because there's never anything that always works. Ever. Against everybody. That you won't find a combination of shots for one player that will work against all other players. It's always going to be different. And that's part of the fun of tennis. It can also be frustrating, because you you go out and play really great one day playing a certain tactic, or a certain combination of shots. Then you go out the next day and think, "Man, this is awesome! I'm going to continue crushing people." You play that same pattern and you get dominated, because it plays right into the strength of your new opponent. So you have to be very aware. I was talking about this earlier in the show. Talking to Mark about those short shots. You have to be very aware in general of what your opponent is doing. What they like, what they don't like. All of these generalities all of this general information that I've give today where I've said, "In general, I like this," it's always going to be situational, and you have to be willing to change things up when certain plays are not working--because your opponent likes it! [laughter] So you want to do the opposite of whatever your opponent likes. Whatever that happens to be, you have to be willing to go along with that if you want to be as successful as possible. That's the underlying thing that supersedes everything else that I've talked about today. But Jim, to answer your question directly, in general. [laughter] Again, in general, I definitely prefer the play of going weakness, weakness, weakness and just really make them uncomfortable. Make them hit their weaker shot again and again. I will always like that play better than trying to be sneaky and say, "Alright, I'll go to your strength. Here you go!" And hope that you'll get a short ball, and then hope that you can attack over to their weaker side. Now don't get me wrong. That can be effective. But just realize that you're playing with fire a bit. You're giving your opponent some opportunities. That's the main point I wanted to make. But remember, all this is situational. So pay attention out there guys. Be very aware and put together winning tactics and winning strategy based on all of your unique opponents. Jim, thank you very much for your question. Really well thought out question. I really appreciate it. Thank you for being a listener in Las Altos Hills, CA. Good luck continuing to try to improve your game. [music] [music] Alright. That does it for Episode #144 of the Essential Tennis podcast. Before I wrap things up for today's show, I want to send a "Thank you" out to several really important people. Or at least some of my favorite people now that they've written a review on the iTunes music store. Some of you wrote really nice reviews. I really appreciate the kind words that many of you wrote. Even if you just wrote a sentence or two, I really appreciate the feedback. That helps with the podcast's rating on iTunes, so I appreciate the time that you took to write. No matter how short or long, but to those of you who wrote big paragraphs, I really appreciate it! You guys are awesome. So I want to give a shout out here. I just copied and pasted over the last 15 people on iTunes who have left reviews. JimVA, HockeyGirly, AndrewLE, Huckleberry7, BruceRodriguez, JorgeSpain, MTouche, Essex 4Duke. Here's my personal favorite: LucyWestermannIsSoCute. That's a little creepy, but that's my daughter. [laughter] I agree. She is cute. Thank you. MatthewChen, DesertTennis, BenW, 808Rich, RogerPatio it looks like, and TennisAndy. Thank you so much! Those are the last 15 people to leave reviews on iTunes. And those of you who left a review and wrote to me with your address looking for free string, I'm probably going to make all those mailings this week. What is today? The 15th. Nov. 15. So look for your free set string probably in the next week. Unless you are not in the U.S., in which case it's going to be a bit longer than that, but it will still be coming. So again, thank you so much. I appreciate it. This show has continued to get better, and continued to improve because of you the listeners. Honestly, without you listening, and giving me feedback and supporting the show, making donations, doing reviews, telling your friends about it, etc. This show would not continue to get better. So I thank all of you very much. Seriously! Thank you. That does it for this week. That's enough groveling. [laughter] Let's wrap things up. I'll talk to you guys next week. Next Mon. will be the next show. Until then, take care, and good luck with your tennis! [music]

Podcast #145: 4 Keys To Incredible Defense.

ianw — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 17:16:03 +0000

Some of the toughest shots in tennis are those that must be hit while on the run, trying to track down an offensive ball hit by your opponent. In today's episode of tennis instructions podcast you'll learn the four key areas of tennis that you need to develop in order to get as many of these types of shots back. Stop watching good shots travel past you in this tennis lesson, find out how! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian: Hi and welcome to the essential tennis podcast. Your place for free, expert, tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the essential tennis podcast is brought to you by tennisexpress.com. Thank you for joining me on today's show and we have two excellent listener questions to talk about both with having to do with being on the run and still trying to hit good shots in your tennis play. Before we get to those, I want to tell you guys about a new section of Essentialtennis.com that just went up. It's not so much a new section, just a remade section and that is the podcast section. The entire podcast section of essential tennis.com just got redone and was live as of yesterday. And I want to tell you guys a little bit about it because there are some new features that are awesome and it's going to make listening to the podcast must easier in finding podcasts much more easy as well. So four quick things-- there is now a player, a podcast player for each episode, so you guys can play it right there in the podcast section or you can do a pop out player as well. This means that you click the pop out button and it comes out away from the page. So if you are at work or where ever, and you just want to make it a separate little player off on the side, you can do that which is pretty cool. You can now leave comments for each of the episodes which I think is awesome as well. So if you guys have feedback or thoughts about each individual show, you can leave them there and I'll see those and respond to you guys. Thirdly, the transcripts for each show are now integrated into the post, so you guys will have a post for each episode. You'll have the mp3 file that you can download or listen to there or pop it out as a player, and you can download and read the transcript for each episode right there in the post as well. The transcripts were all separate before. And I think most importantly, lastly, there are now categories. Every show has been categorized -- all 145 shows. And I'm going to read through the categories real quickly-- approaching net play, beating pushers, doubles strategy, fitness and conditioning, footwork and positioning, gear and equipment, general game development, general strategy, ground-stroke technique, injuries and sports medicine, mental toughness, overhead technique, return of serve, serve and volley, serve technique, singles strategy and volley technique. Those are all different categories and under each of those categories are many shows. So you guys can now browse through the whole catalog of essential tennis podcasts, find exactly what you are looking for or exactly what you are looking for information on, and download that show about whatever piece of your game that you are trying to improve. I think that is probably the biggest improvement. And guys, there is a tonne of good information in these podcast archives. I've personally went through and categorized every show that's available-- all 145 episodes, which was a lot of work by the way. But it just made me realize how much content in there now. There are over 80 hours of shows and just about topic that you guys want to learn about. So take advantage of it. Just go check it out and see all the new features, leave some comments on shows and enjoy the new section of the site. I hope that is more functional and you guys deserve a better podcast section. So I hope that this does it for you guys. Alright, let's get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] Alright, let's go ahead and get started with our first question on today's episode of the essential tennis podcast. And it comes to us from Mallen who posted on the forums at essentialtennis.com and he is located in the UK. He wrote and said, "You see the pros getting amazing shots back when they are running at full stretch, including some distinctively different moves to those they play for more under control shots. It seems to me that the ability to play defensively and get back shots that pommel the corners, is one of those skills that distinguish the great players from the OK ones. What kind of drives can you do with a partner and or with a ball machine that will better equip you to be able to improve defensive shots like these. Additionally, what are the top tips for how to play effectively when you are on the defense? That's a really good question and I can't say that we have had a question about specifically, defensive shots-- that may be a new category in the new podcast section at essentialtennis.com. But it's a really good question and being able to play defensively, you are absolutely right-- as a big distinguisher, even among top players-- when I say top players, I mean professional players.. Being able to just get the ball back in play sometimes is all it takes and is the difference between winning and losing a match. It's not that you always have to crush the ball and hit it super aggressively, very often you need to play defensively as well. So we are going to talk about four main areas that you need to be good at in order to play good defensive tennis. And I'm really happy about this outline. I think this is going to give you guys some really really good practical information here and things that you can go and apply to your games right away. Not 100%, but start working on these things to try and improve this part of your game. So, number one, the first area that needs to be improved, to improve your defensive skills is identification. Early identification can absolutely make the difference between winning and losing points where your opponent is attacking and you are on the defense. And I have four different things that players that are good at defense are constantly watching for. These are things that might sound obvious, but all of you guys should be paying close attention to these four things because they will give you tips and keys on when a an aggressive shot is coming from your opponent. The first step to being able to play good defense is seeing that you are about to be put in a defensive position. And kind of put yourself on high alert and really be prepared to do what is necessary next to get the ball back which we'll also talk about. So the four things that you need to watch for that fall under the category of identification. Number one, your opponent's position on the court. If they are five feet behind the baseline, most of you don't have anything to worry about when your opponent is in that spot. Now if you are a 4.5 player or a 5.0 player going by the NTRP ratings guidelines which is top 5-10% of recreational players... It's possible from 5 feet behind the baseline, your opponent could attack. But most of you listening don't have to worry about that. But on the other hand, if your opponent is five feet inside the baseline, they now start to have the ability to hit a shot consistently that could hurt you or that could put you in a defensive position. And so it might seem obvious but you have to pay close attention to where your opponent is on the court and that is largely going to dictate to them whether or not they are able to attack and put you in a tough spot. Number two, your opponent's balance. Just because they are well inside the baseline, doesn't necessarily mean that they are going to be able to attack. If it's a short ball that you gave them and they are having a hard time getting to it, then more then likely, they are not going to hit a super offensive shot. And they are going to be trying to just get it back in play. So notice their balance. If they are well inside the balance but clearly off balance, meaning that they are kind of on a dead run and leaning over to get to the ball and they just don't look comfortable, there is not a whole lot to worry about. On the other hand, it's very possible that they could hit a short weak shot back if they are really struggling to get to the ball. So another reason to really pay attention to what their balance is like. If they are setup early before the ball gets to their strike zone, and they look like they are ready to go, their body is coiled, their feet are in a wide stance and they are not having to reach for the ball and they just look solid and they are ready to go with their swing... You might want to watch out for what is coming next because they are ready to hit as good as a shot as possible. Especially when you combine balance with a good court position, you probably have some stuff to worry about. Number three, your opponent's preparation with the racket, and what I mean by that is technique... if they are taking the racket back pointing up towards the sky or towards the ceiling with their body and a strong rotation then look for a top spin or a drive shot. If they are setting the racket up with the racket above the ball with a open racket face or behind the ball with a open racket face, they are getting ready to slice the ball and it's not that you can't hit a good shot with a slice... You can attack with a slice, but it's more likely that if they are setting up for a drive or a top spin shot, that they are getting ready to attack. Especially when you combine with that the two previous things-- if they are in good balance, if they are in an offensive court position and they are setting up for a top spin or drive-type shot... watch out. Combine those three things and you better be alert and prepared for a defensive situation. Lastly, number four-- you need to know your opponent's strengths and patterns. Everybody you play is going to be a little bit different, and everybody that you play has different abilities to attack in different situations. And everybody you play has different patterns-- meaning they get this shot in this position on the court. They setup in this way with their racket and usually it results in this shit. And everybody will have patterns like that. And if you can play close attention during the match to what they are doing in each of those different criteria and pay good enough attention that you notice patterns as far as what they try to do when each of those things matches up with this scenario... know what I'm saying? That can go a long, long way to identifying what is coming next and being able to play good defense. So you put all these things together, noticing your opponents' position, their balance, their preparation... You pay attention to their patterns. You put all of those things together, and you have what is known as anticipation. And you hear that word thrown out during professional matches a lot. That means basically knowing what is coming next. You are able to anticipate what shot is coming from your opponent next. And that is incredibly valuable when a defensive shot is needed next. Because if you waste a split second of time after your opponent attacks and you don't anticipate what is coming and you are being completely reactionary, the chances of you hitting a good shot back are extremely poor. And so, you need to pay close attention to all of those different things that I've just talked about and that all falls under the category of identification. So that's thing #1 when it comes to being defensive and getting these types of shots back. Alright, section number two of my outline is you have to make an objective decision to go for the ball. No subjective decisions. Let me tell you a quick story that will outline exactly what I'm talking about. When I was playing in college, one of the coaches that I had would make us do push-ups when we were playing the point out and our opponent hit a shot that landed close to the line but out and we didn't run for the ball. So in other words, our opponent hit a shot-- let's say it was me-- I stood there and I read that it was going out. I kind of knew it was going out... Let's say I landed out by a foot and I was standing there in the middle of the baseline watching it bounce. Let's say it landed on the ad side a foot wide of the court, and I was standing there watching it land out... in other words, not going for the ball... I called it out, it was out and I would have to do pushups. Why? Because what if my judgment was a little bit off on that particular shot. And what if it actually landed in and hit the line? It had more top spin then I thought it did. Maybe my opponent kind of shanked it a little bit and had more spin then I thought and it actually landed in, and I got caught just standing there watching a ball that I thought was going out, but I could've gotten there for, and it was in. Well that is a terrible mistake. That is giving away a point completely free without even trying or putting in any effort and it's not acceptable. And this is something that since college, I have absolutely tried to instill in my students and this is something that all of you listening should be trying to develop as well. And that is-- you should not be making a subjective decision based on whether or not you will go for the ball. You will make a objective decision, meaning that you will go for the ball. It doesn't matter what opinions you might have about the shot that is coming towards you... you are going to react and you are going to make some kind of move. Now here is four different times that you should not be using your brain to try to figure things out. You should not be using subjective decision making. You shouldn't be trying to form an opinion about whether or not you should go. Here are four specific circumstances where that might be the case. Number one, you think the ball is going to hit the net. Emphasis on you think. You don't know the ball is going to hit the net for sure, until it does. So if the ball hits 6 inches below the top of the net and you are not already moving for it... if you haven't already taken 2 steps forwards when the ball hits 6 inches below the top of the net, then you made a subjective decision. When it is in within that close of a distance from making it over or not, you should just automatically be moving forwards anticipating that the ball is going to be short if it does make it over. Or if it hits the net and makes it over, you should already be running. You shouldn't start running after it hits that net and is trickling over, you should already be running because you see that the ball is low and it's going ot be close to the net. And it might not make it over and so you might burn some extra calories by running two steps forwards and then it hits the net... that's fine... in fact, that's great. It's a good habit and you are going to get some more balls when you stop thinking that it's going to hit the net.. and not running.. and then you get surprised when it does make it over and you are just standing there. Number 2, when you think the ball is going to be out. That was the situation that I described using myself as an example. Number 3, you think that your partner will be able to reach it-- this is doubles. Maybe your partner is getting lobbed. You see them go back and they intend to get the ball, and they reach for it and they can't reach it. And you are standing there watching them. So they go for it, they miss it and it's a ball that if you had went right away, you probably could've got a racket on, but you are standing there watching them, assuming that they are going to be able to get it back... but they can't, it turns out. And number four, you think it's your partners shot.. This happens a lot when the ball goes down the middle and both players stand there and just turn their head and look at their partner, and the ball goes right between them and neither of them even go for it because there was an assumption there on both their parts that the other person was going to get it. That is unacceptable-- both players should be going for it immediately. And if it turned out that it is obvious as you guys are moving towards the ball that one person is going to get there first, great, that person can take it. But you both should be making an initial move. It should be an objective decision-- you will move for the ball and this is section number 2 of getting better at playing defensive types of shots. You have to move immediately. If you waste any time by thinking about it or assuming the ball is going to be out or in the net or whatever, you are going to give away points that could've been winnable if you had just gone for the ball without thinking about it.. just go for it. So that is number two. Number one was identification. Starting to play closer attention to what is coming next. Number two was making an objective decision to go for the ball no matter what. Number three, make a commitment to 100% effort. Please start doing this. I urge all of you listening. And listeners to this show, if you are listening to my voice right now, you are way more dedicated then the average tennis player. You wouldn't be listening to this. You wouldn't have taken the time and the effort to go to the internet and do a search for tennis instruction or maybe look specifically for a tennis podcast or maybe you just heard from a friend about this show... It takes some effort to go online, download it, put it on your iPod or your phone or whatever.. and then set the time aside to listen to it or play it during your commute. So just the fact that you are listening to my voice tells me that you are working harder then the average player to begin with to try to get yourself better. But those of you listening still need to make sure that you are giving an honest, 100% effort to run for the ball every time it gets hit. And in my experience, recreational players... this is probably the number one thing... this combined with the decision to just go for every ball... if you combine the decision to just go every time the ball gets hit by your opponent and you combine that with 100% effort and you really give an honest effort to go as hard as you can and as fast as you can towards the ball.... if you combine those two things, you will improve your game drastically. If you just commit to hustling and you go for every ball. And running hard, which is what point number three here is... just going 100%... it's its own skill. It's a totally separate tennis skill and the more that you do it, the better you will become at just going all out and going 100%. And certain players, even at the professional level, are just known for doing this. Certain players go all out more then others. And who is the player that you think about? When I say certain players run hard for every single ball, everybody immediately thinks about Nadal. And if you didn't, you don't watch much professional tennis. Nobody hustles harder then that guy. Nobody runs for every single ball like that guy 100% and that's part of what makes him so incredibly difficult to beat, is his work ethic and his commitment to just running for every single ball. So next time you go out to play, whether it be competition or practice, make a commitment to yourself that you will run 100% for every ball until it bounces twice. And I don't care if the ball is on the completely other side of the court.. maybe you've mis-read it and it's in a different spot in the court then you thought it was going to. I don't care if by the time it bounces twice, you are still 10 feet away and you are literally not even close and you feel dumb for running all that ways and you didn't even get close to the ball.... Just promise me that the next time that you go out, just try it once for an hour. Run for every ball until it bounces twice or until it lands out or until it hits the net or until your partner gets it and I was a little bit unsure whether or not they were going to have it.. and you ran anyway, just to cover, and make sure that somebody was going to get it. Do it every time. And number one, you are going to be more tired then you ever had before after playing tennis. And number two, you are going to put your body in better shape the more you do it, it is going to condition your body to be faster and to be stronger. And number three, you will get faster. You will condition your body to react quicker, get full speed faster, and you are going to get some more balls when you make a commitment to just run for everything 100% and not like half speed at first, and then realize it was farther then you thought. And then you end up having to just try 100% for the last couple of steps because you realize that it is farther away than you realize. No. Just go all out and if you get to the ball earlier then you thought, great. You get to setup being a little bit better balance, hopefully. If you are not used to running 100% all the time, it might throw you off-balance a little bit but as you guys continue to do it, you get better at it. And it's a skill that you can improve. Alright, and that brings me to the end of number three-- making a commitment to 100% effort. And the last section here, number four, I'm going to talk about technique having to do with getting these defensive shots back. And my whole point here is going to be, you need to do whatever it takes to put the ball in play. You should still be trying to hit the best ball possible but you need to be reasonable about it. I'll go in order here that I have... Let's talk about minor emergencies and major emergencies. A minor emergency would be your opponent has hit a good shot. You are definitely having to hustle to get to it and it's going to be some work and we're going to call it a defensive situation but it's not all out having to dive for it and stretch for it.. and even then, you aren't even sure if you are going to get to the ball, but you are going to put your racket out there, that would be a major emergency. A minor emergency, your opponent has still hit a good shot but you are able to get there relatively easily. You are still having to really bust your but to get there, but you are barely getting to the ball. You are going to get there, but it's not easy. Hopefully you guys see what I'm talking about. You should still be trying to use a driving or a top spin type swing whenever possible. And I talked about this briefly, I believe it was last week... Whenever you can, I am encouraging my students to still drive the ball and hit a solid shot, but it should be at a very percentage based speed. Meaning if your typical rally ball or neutral rally ball back and forth is like 70% of your ability to hit the ball... if 100% is hitting the ball as hard as you can and 50% is half-speed, your typical rally ball should probably be somewhere around 70% or 80%. A confident speed, definitely not as hard as you can, but more then half way. You should be hitting the ball nice and solid. In an emergency defensive type position, that should definitely come down. And I would say in a minor emergency, you should probably be hitting the ball like 50% because we just need to make sure that the ball gets in play. This is not a easy shot and it's where we want to play the highest percentage shot possible. So that means being conservative as far as the speed that you hit the ball at and you should also be aiming the ball at a high percentage target. So if you are playing singles, definitely aim cross court or just back to the middle of the court. Give yourself a high margin of error over the top of the net. So you should not be hitting a 80% swing a foot over the net down the line, when you are an emergency situation. Even if it's just a minor emergency-- that's just not smart. You are going to make a lot of mistakes that way. And the more of a defensive position that you are in, the safer of a shot you should be trying to play. Because we need to just make sure that we put the ball in play. Now let's talk about major emergencies.. this is where you have to try 100%. Maybe you even anticipated where it is going. You made an immediate move for the ball. You went 100% and you are still barely going to get there. In this kind of situation, this is where you want to use your slice which is a safer shot.. an easier technique swing just to get the ball in play. Or maybe even just open your racket face and just push it back.. not even a slice, but just play a purely defensive shot. And just push it up in the air to buy yourself some time. When it's a big time emergency, be smart and use a safer technique like this. So open the racket, use a very high percentage target... so you should be aiming 5 or 6 feet over the net to make sure it makes it over. Just aim for the middle of the court or if you can get it cross court, that would be great. That would give you some more margin for error because it's going to be a longer court going across court. Put it up in the air, make sure it gets over the net, and even if it gives your opponent an easy shot, please do it this way because we just basically want to give them another chance to screw up. Hit them another ball, challenge them to have to hit a winner to finally win the point. And force them to have to really earn it and put it away. If you go for kind of the sucker play and try to end the point yourself in a really defensive position, you might come up with an incredible shot once in a while but you are going to make more mistakes then the points that you win. And it's definitely not going to come out in your favor in the long run. The last thing I want to say before I wrap up today's show is this kind of varies a little bit based on level of play. If you are a pure beginner or moving up towards an intermediate level of play. So here in the US, the NTRP scale, it would be 2.0 or 2.5 would be beginner. And 3.0 towards 3.5 would be intermediate.. If you are somewhere in there, you need to take the advice that I just gave you. Play high percentage shots when you are in an emergency situation. Even if that means feeding it right to your opponent. Maybe even right to their strengths where they are good at putting the ball away-- they are going to miss it sometimes. And if they are not good at putting the ball away, maybe they'll even miss it a large percentage of the time. And so you'll earn those points even without hitting a great shot, but you are smart enough to just put it in play. On the other hand, if you are a 4.0 or 4.5 player-- so kinder stronger intermediate or an advanced level of player-- there comes a time when you start getting up towards those levels of play, that just giving your opponent an easy shot and saying to them here you go, try to put it away. I'm going to challenge you to finish the point and hit that winner to win the point. Once we start getting up towards 4.5, those players will have no problem with that. They will say OK and they will make it 95% of the time. Maybe they'll miss one per set or something like that. When you start getting up towards that level of play, unfortunately, even in these defensive positions, you still have to try to hit a relatively solid shot. And you still have to try to challenge your opponent even though you are in a really tough spot. And I think that a lot of times recreational players put that pressure on themselves way before they get to the level where it is actually necessary. So what I mean by that is maybe you are a 3.0 player. You are in a really defensive spot. You see your opponent in a balanced position on the court and you know that if you just put it in play, they are going to have a chance to put the next one away. And at a 3.0 level, some of you are saying 'Oh no, I can't just give it back to them -- they are going to put it away!' And you go for that down the line winner on the run and it's totally not necessary. It can be difficult to give it up and just give it to our opponents, but those of you at beginner or intermediate level, need to do it more often. If you are a 4.5 level, fine. You need to put some pressure on your opponent, even when you are on the run here, and there is not really any way around it because they are a good enough opponent that they'll have no problem putting the ball away if you give them an easy shot. So anyway, my point is, it depends on your level what you should be going for. The majority of you guys should just be trying to play a purely defensive shot. Alright, so quick overview and again Mallen in the forums, excellent topic that has made for a great discussion. Lots of good information for you guys and hopefully you've enjoyed the show. As an overview, the four main elements of being good at playing defensive shots-- #1) Identification. Paying close attention to your opponents, their tendencies, their balance, their position on the court. #2) Making an objective decision to go for the ball. Do not think about it. Do not form a opinion in your head about whether or not you will be able to get there. Or whether or not it is going to hit the net. Or whether or not your partner is going to get it-- just move. Start making a reaction immediately. Making a commitment to 100% effort on every single shot-- every shot. And finally, technique. Do whatever it takes to put the ball in play. Even if that means giving an easy shot to your opponent up until a certain level of play. So, there you go. There is some really actionable things that you guys can go and start adding to your game to help you guys improve in these situations and get better. I hoped you guys enjoy this discussion and thank you very much for being a listener in the UK. Excellent question and hopefully this is going to be helpful to you. [music] [music] [music] Alright, that does it for episode #145 of the Essential Tennis Podcast. Thank you very much for listening to today's show-- I appreciate having you as a listener no matter where you might be or when you might be listening to my voice. I appreciate your support of the show just by listening-- I really do appreciate it. Go check out the new podcast section at essentialtennis.com. I think it's a huge improvement and I hope it really makes the listening experience and just the whole process of getting the show and listening to it, I hope it makes it easier and more enjoyable. Feel free to give me some feedback if you guys enjoy it or think that there are areas that need to be improved still or any suggestions, please feel free to let me know. My email address is ian@essentialtennis.com OK, that does it for this week. Take care everybody and good luck with your tennis. [music]

Podcast #146: Hydration and Stretching

ianw — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 20:23:33 +0000

Dr. Jack joins me back on the show! Together we answer four different listener questions about sports medicine relating to tennis. The first has to do with hydration which is incredibly important to your performance. What is best to drink and how? Next we talk about stretching to avoid injuries, and lastly we discuss compression shorts and ankle braces. All great information! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Narrator: Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast-- if you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian: Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast-- your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Podcast is brought to you by TennisExpress.com. Please check them out this week by going to EssentialTennis.com slash express. Thank you very much for joining me on today's show. Before we get to our guest who is a special return guest that you guys will recognize if you guys have been listening to the show for a while. I just want to say that I've got all of those shipments of tennis string out to those of you who were kind enough to leave reviews on the iTunes music store and send me your address. I apologize that it took me a while to get to that but I shipped out quite a few-- a lot of them international as well. So I hope that you guys enjoy the string. Those of you listening in the US, you should have it this week. If you are listening to me today, which is Monday the 29th, probably in the next day or two. And international listeners, probably about a week from today or so. Again today is November 29. So thank you guys again for your support and for your kind words in the iTunes music store-- I really appreciate it. Alright, let's get to today's guest. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] My guest today is Dr. Jack. Dr. Jack, welcome back to the podcast. It's really great to have you back on the show. Dr. Jack: Thanks Ian. It's been so long. I've been very busy and I'm ecstatic to be back tonight. Ian: I'm really happy to have you-- especially because you were really one of the first outsiders to kind of reach in and contact me. Dr. Jack, for those of you have not listened to a lot of the older shows, he was one of the first sponsors of the essential tennis podcast so I always continue to appreciate that. He's been on the show many times. Dr. Jack, I just redid the podcast section and it's all done into categories now. And so if you go there and click under injuries and sports medicine, all the shows that you've done with me are all listed there. I don't know how many off the top of my head but thank you so much for how often you've been a guest on the show. Dr. Jack: My pleasure. I always saw great promise with your show when I first started listening to it and I see that it's all coming to fruition and you are doing a great job with the podcast and all of the other [inaudible] that have gone with it. I wish you all the best in your continued success. Ian: Thanks, I appreciate it. Before we get to our questions, there are a lot of new listeners on the show since the last time that I had you on, so can you please give us a brief background of yourself as a tennis player... I know you haven't been able to play much recently, but I know that you are a fan of the sport and you have definitely been a recreational player in the past and I know you hope to in the future. So give us a quick background on yourself as a player and also as a sports medicine doctor and what kind of athlete's you work with on a regular basis. Dr. Jack: Sure. I'm probably a good 4.0 player. I haven't played as much recently. I've been spending a lot of time teaching my daughter's how to play lacrosse which has been a lot of fun. I enjoy playing doubles more than singles only because of my history with being a basketball and lacrosse player-- I'm geared more to a team type of sport then individual sports. Singles is nice but I really like the camaraderie of having a teammate to play with in doubles. It's just more with my philosophy of a team game. So that would be as far as tennis. It's a great game. I live in a golf course community and I'm one of the few tennis players because I"m not a big golf fan. I just love tennis and breaking a swear more. As far as my professional credentials, I'm board certified in a family practice and sports medicine. I've been in practice for over 20 years. I take care of a women's professional soccer league team. A mens baseball team. I do some consulting work with Rutgers University. And just a lot of fun stuff with that, and as we've mentioned a few times off-air, I'm getting more involved with stem cell work for regenerative medicine which we've touched on in some past podcasts. Ian: Great. Let's get to some questions from listeners-- I'm kind of letting these stack up a little bit, hoping that you would be back on the show. Our first one has to do with hydration which I know is kind of a passion of yours and something that you enjoy speaking about and something that is really important to not only the advanced player or professional player, but definitely to recreational players as well. And this question comes to us from Justin in California. He wrote and said, "I'm a bigger guy and I sweat profusely. I often time myself drinking 1 bottle of water or Gatorade per hour of play. However, I get tired fairly easily in the hot weather and when I use the restroom when I get home, I can see that I'm still dehydrated, if you know what I mean. Also, having to drink so much during a match makes me feel sick within the first few minutes of my drinking breaks. Is there a certain way to stay hydrated longer without having to drink so much? Especially if you sweat as much as I do. Dehydration is hurting my game and having to drink so much liquid during a match is hurting my game as well. Please help." Dr. Jack: A couple of issues. First of all it's interesting that he's from California-- I imagine that is Southern California where the weather is probably nice all of the time. One of the things that happens with all of us in changes of weather is what we call acclimatization. A lot of times players when they go from a cold environment to a warm environment, if they are used to colder weather and then go and play in warmer weather, our sweat for the first couple of weeks will have more salt in it until our body acclimatizes. So that will increase your dehydration rate and risk of cramps and decreased performance. But if you are like our listener that is in one climate all year round, then that's probably not the case. He may just have a problem with losing more salt then would normally be expected. And I've had a few of these instances in the past and one of the things that is easy enough to do is take your 16oz bottle of Gatorade-- about an hour before you play and add a quarter teaspoon of salt to that Gatorade and drink that. Because the salt will help retain the fluid better. Now drinking a bottle of water or Gatorade per hour of play, I guess it depends on what size is it -- 12, 16, 24oz bottle... A 16 oz bottle may not be all that unusual to drink during the course of play. You should stay well hydrated because if you don't, obviously your performance is going to decrease. So one of the things that I would say is you could start off with water or you can drink half strength Gatorade after that [inaudible] with the pinch of salt. Or even with that, half way through the match, add a quarter teaspoon of salt to one of your mid-match drinks and that may help retain the salt and fluid in your system better and cut down on cramping and performance. And again, if it does make you feel a little naicous, the Gatorade may be too strong and you have to cut it down to half strength-- but you can still add that pinch of salt. There might just be too much sugar for your stomach to handle. Ian: I know that Gatorade-- one of the main ingredients is the sodium to begin with. How does that work exactly? Additional salt will even more-so help your body absorb the fluids that we need? Dr. Jack: Water follows salt. That's why people with high blood pressure often get water pills and why they are told not to eat a lot of salt. Because the more salt you take, the more water will follow it to try to equalize out your fluid volume. Let's say that you had a glass of water and you wanted to make ice tea. Opps, you put a little too much mix in there so you have to add more water to dilute it out. It's the same thing with your blood. You want to maintain a certain concentration of water in your blood stream. So if you have too much salt in there, the water is going to chase it in. But since you are sweating and you are losing it, adding extra salt will help you maintain it or keep it in there. Follow that? Ian: So step number one is starting an hour before match time? Dr. Jack: Right. For this individual, for someone who sweats profusely and loses a lot of fluid, throw a pinch of salt into your 16oz bottle of Gatorade and have that about an hour before and then once you start playing, have half-strength Gatorade and maybe about half way through the match, have one bottle of half-strength Gatorade that has a quarter teaspoon of salt in it to retain the fluid but not so much sugar that it might make you feel sick or noxious because it's probably the sugar load that is making you feel like that, not so much the sodium. Ian: Are there sports drinks out there-- my wife is getting on this big natural foods kick and organic etc. Obviously there is so much sugar in Gatorade just to make it taste better. Are there other options out there that don't have that big amount of sugar? Dr. Jack: Most of them do. They can't have too much sugar because once you go beyond a 6% glucose solution, then your body is going to have to dehydrate or pump water from your blood stream into your stomach to dilute it before it can be reabsorbed into your small intestine. So none of those sports drinks want to make it greater then 6% glucose solution drink. So they are all about in that range. So what I would say is, dilute it half strength with water and make your own formula really. Another thing that some people like to try is [inaudible] which is a kids drink for when kids get a little bit dehydrated. And again, you can cut that down by 50% with water also because it can be a little tough to take because it's so strong. Ian: That's funny you mention that-- I just did a clinic a couple of weeks ago in Palm Springs, California and one of the attendees was having problems cramping. He's from Nebraska, so just like you were describing, he was definitely going through the process of trying to get used to the much warmer weather then he was used to... Dr. Jack: His sweat had more salt in it, which is why he was more likely to cramp. Ian: So he started cramping up and it was odd for him. He was cramping in his calves which he said had never happened before. He tried drinking lots of water and it didn't help much. And during our lunch break, he went out and got some [inaudible] and it actually helped him quite a bit. So I've seen that work first hand. Dr. Jack: The interesting thing that you've said was [inaudible] Nebraska down to Palm Springs.. So now his sweat is higher in sodium concentration. So he's losing more salt and he's replacing his fluids with just water which is diluting his blood out even more, creating even more cramps. Ian: So the salt is super important here. Dr. Jack: Correct. Especially when you do that client change from a cold environment to a warm environment, because it takes two weeks of exercising in that warmer climate to get your salt concentrations back to where they should be and not losing too much salt. It's a two week acclimatization period. Ian: As far as ingesting sodium is concerned for the benefit of staying hydrated, I've heard an old school remedy suggested before of using pickle juice. Is that a wives tale or is that something that can work? Dr. Jack: It works if you can tolerate it. I'd rather put the pinch of salt in the Gatorade as it's much more palatable. Ian: So in review-- begin an hour before hand-- was it a teaspoon? Dr. Jack: Quarter teaspoon. And if that doesn't work, there are these special little packets of sodium and potassium supplements called Gatorlytes but the general public can't get them-- only athletic trainers and physicians can get them. So he might have to talk to his physician to get those for him so he can give them a try. Ian: Anything further on this topic? Any other tips for Justin before we move on? Dr. Jack: No. I think if he tries that, that should work out. Give us a holler back and let Ian or myself know how you made out with that and if that doesn't work, I'll see what other rabbits I can pull out of my hat for you. Ian: Great. Justin, good luck with that. Our next question comes to us from Andrew from the forums in Tennessee. He wrote and said, "Ian, can we do a podcast on stretching? Not just [inaudible] before a match, but stretching for added dexterity and injury prevention. I think this question will be great for us weekend warriors and our pulled groins and hammies. Thank you." So what do you think Dr. Jack? Do you have some stretching suggestions for injury prevention specifically? Dr. Jack: Sure. Stretching is an interesting topic because we've gone through this whole range of philosophies on stretching. It used to be that back in the 60s, [inaudible] and then we went into in the 80s the sustained stretch... the nice long, slow stretch. And there were some articles that show that that has impeded jumping performance in athletes. The amount of height that they can attain if they stretch before they jump... But there is always the concept that it helps decrease injuries which I totally believe in. And now we are into dynamic stretching which I think has been covered on some podcasts in the past, where we stretch the muscle during an activity. So in other words, you'll walk and stretch at the same time to limber up the muscles which is a great way to do that. Flash cards and videos-- and I know I've mentioned this in the past-- the Nike Spark collection that will teach you how to do a good dynamic warm-up. And it really shouldn't take you more then 5 or 10 minutes and you can do it pretty easily as you are warming up... It's kind of a warm up and a stretch at the same time and it really works wonderfully. Yes, it will in my opinion help to decrease your pulled groins and enhance [inaudible] muscles. Ian: So you mentioned specifically that a walk and a stretch at the same time. Can you go into further detail and tell us how we can do that? Dr. Jack: Sure. Let's say go cross-court. Go from the out of bounds line on doubles from one side-- walk to the out of bounds line for the doubles on the opposite side of the court. And, an example of on would be either what is called a toy soldier or a Frankenstein where as you take a step, you take your leg and kick it up to your hand with your hand extended out 90 degrees. So you'll look like a marching soldier. Your foot comes up with a high kick to touch your hand. So you stretch your hamstring as you are walking. Another would be that as you take one step forward, you pull your legs back up to touch your back-- like in your buttocks area. And that leg comes down and as you take another step, you pull your leg back up-- that would be another example. So you are walking and you are stretching at the same time. A picture is worth 1000 words and it's probably easier to just see a picture. Just do a Google for dynamic stretching and you'll get a tonne of stuff. [inaudible] has flash cards and DVDs that show you how to do this. Ian: OK. I just put dynamic stretch into YouTube and it brought back 2100 results. I'm looking at all kind of different examples here, so that is a good suggestion. I know that on past podcasts, people have sent questions about that and sent me YouTube videos on that asking about it and I know there is stuff out there. I think there is things if you archive some of the old forum questions that I've gotten, it's been directed at that with the dynamic warm-up. Dr. Jack: OK. So dynamic warm-up. Stretching and moving at the same time. Getting the blood flowing while you get those muscles lengthened out and warmed up. Anything further as far as stretching for injury prevention? Ian: It's good to do a little cardiovascular wam-up even before you do the dynamic stretching. What is nice about that is-- I learned this at a sports medicine course years ago-- think about a piece of taffy. It's cold and you hit it against the table and it will crack. But if you put it out in the warm sun and then hit it against the table, it stretches. So if you can do a little jog or get on a bike or a rowing machine-- just to get the blood flowing and get your muscles warmed up a little bit before you go and do the dynamic stretch, that works even better. Ian: OK. What do you think about something that myself and my college teammates used to do as we did kind of a box run warm-up... We would take a football out and throw it across the court back and forth. What do you think about that as far as warming up the arm and shoulder? Dr. Jack: Sure, that's great. It kind of goes along with the dynamic warm-up-- you are stretching and activating the muscles at the same time. You are utilizing muscles that you are going to use during the match. So no, I think that's great. If you don't have a football, just throw the tennis ball to each other. Ian: OK. Any final thoughts on that before we move on? Dr. Jack: No. Ian: Before we get to the last part of today's show, I want to remind my listeners about the official sponsor of the essential tennis podcast-- and that is TennisExpress.com. The best online retailer for all of your tennis needs-- rackets, bags, strings, gear, shoes etc. They've got really good prices for online gear and equipment. Free shipping for orders over $75. And to check them out, please go to essentialtennis.com slash express. which will redirect you right away to tennisexpress.com and it's going to put a little tracking code in there. I have it setup with them now so that a small percentage of all of your guys purchases come back to support the Essential Tennis Podcast which I appreciate very much. So I thank them for their support of the podcast and if you guys would be so kind to check them out and see what they've got. I would appreciate that as well. Thank you guys very much. Just two quick questions before we wrap the show up. Both of these come from Barat in California. First question I'm a little curious about myself because I don't know if it's.... "I've noticed a lot of pro players wearing cycling shorts under their regular tennis shorts. Roddick, and the Bryan brothers do this-- is this something that they do to prevent injury etc? Or is it simply a wardrobe choice? Dr. Jack: I guess it depends on the player. You are taking me back to my Andre Agassi days with denim shorts with the hot pink compression shots sewn in. So you didn't have a choice, it was all in one. Remember those? Ian: Absolutely. Dr. Jack: I'm going back to the 80s when I was a resident down in Florida. Ian: Didn't Jimmy Connors also rock the compression shorts? Dr. Jack: I think so. I like to wear them when I play tennis sometimes under my shorts just because they feel comfortable. But there are companies now that are designing compression shorts and the way that the stitching is made into the short helps to activate your muscles to contract and decrease the risk of injuries. In fact, I was talking to some of my colleagues at our Sports Performance and Rehab Center and they said that actually the compression shorts-- the one's that this company has come out with and I don't remember their name-- but they are only for women. And they show that in a box jump test, these collegiate female athletes will jump off a box and land and then jump up as high as they can and land and they look to see how much their knees become like knock-knees during this maneuver... It's one of the things that shows their risk of getting a ACL injury. The girls did it before and after putting these shorts on and without telling them what the shorts were meant to do, the majority of them improved their landing wearing the shorts where they didn't become as knock-knee'd just because of the way that the shorts activated their muscles in their thighs and hamstrings... So that was kind of cool. There definitely can be benefits to wearing the compression shorts. They will be ones that would be marketed towards activating your muscles to fire in a certain pattern to help prevent injury and maximize efficiency. But that's not going to be all your basic compression shorts. Your basic bicycle short underneath is just a fashion statement. But there are certain ones that have certain stitch patterns that can help with your muscles firing. Ian: OK. I assume that it was-- you know, when the players would sit down on the chairs and put a towel over their shorts to keep photographers from taking embarrassing pictures etc. I always kind of assumed it was that type of reason. I didn't actually know that they had specifically designed shorts for actual athletic benefit.. that's pretty cool. Dr. Jack: It is. And I think now that this is becoming more popular, I think you are going to see more and more of this over the next few years. Ian: Alright, so there you go. Something to watch out for. Last question here having to do with braces. Barat wrote and said, "Few places wear ankle braces and they seem to usually only wear it on one leg when they do have one. I think Murray used to wear it on both legs, but I'm not sure if he still does. I guess the ankle brace prevents your ankle from twisting and lateral movement of the ankle. Does this prevent your mobility to a certain extent because some players prefer it but most don't unless it is beneath their socks and not visible etc. Is it worth it for the recreational player to wear this type of brace? And does it effect one's mobility or is it just up to each player's individual comfort level. What do you think? Dr. Jack: That's a good question. I don't think anyone is going to want to wear an ankle brace unless they have a problem. They shouldn't be used [inaudible] to help prevent an ankle sprain. Because whether you talk about ankles or knees, there is no brace in the world that is as effective as preventing a sprained ankle or knee injury as good as strong muscles. So you are much better spending some time every day during exercises that will strengthen your muscles and hope with what we call [inaudible] of the muscle. And that is much more beneficial then wearing a brace to prevent. One of the easiest exercises to do is a stork stance. I'm sure I've talked about this in the past-- you stand on one leg, bend your knee a little bit, close your eyes and maintain your balance for one minute. And do that for each leg every day. And that helps tone the microfibers that go from muscles to your brain and back to your muscle to help the muscles fire more efficiently. And this exercise has been shown to both prevent ankle sprains and to help get athletes that have injured their ankle back to competition quickly when doing those exercises. It's a really nice thing to do. And usually if someone is wearing an ankle brace, it's more because they have an acute injury or they've had so many chronic ankle injuries that they are just gaining stability from that. And that may just be what their trainer, physician has recommended for them to wear. There are other things you can do, and that would lead to the whole topic of [inaudible] to help ligament damages. I'm not a big [inaudible] certainly in an acute injury, if someone is in a big tournament and they sprain their ankle a week before or several days before, they may have to wear it. But otherwise, I don't know if it's beneficial to have to continue to wear an ankle brace. Most athletes would tell you that it will affect them or their performance slightly. Most athletes don't like to wear them and I have to prod them into wearing it. And it's usually because it's an acute injury and not because it's something chronic. Ian: So definitely only used as a last line of defense. Or if they have no other choice, that's really the only reason why players should be using it. Dr. Jack: My personal philosophy is that there are other exercises and other treatments that are much more beneficial then an ankel brace. Ian: Good stuff. Any final thoughts on any of these topics Dr. Jack? We covered some good stuff-- hydration, stretching, compression shorts and ankle braces as well. Anything further on any of those topics? Dr. Jack: You know what? For the time allotted, I think we've covered some nice stuff. They were excellent questions and all very pertinent to tennis. It was very enjoyable to talk about all of them and I hope your listeners have learned a few things. Ian: I'm sure they have. As we were going through our conversation here, just for old times sake, I went back into the archives because I was curious when our first show was. So this is going to be episode 146. The first show that you were on was today Dr. Jack joins me on the show to talk about about [inaudible] and how to treat it. And that was July 7, 2008. Dr. Jack: I remember that like it was yesterday. Ian: And this is our 10th episode together. So thank you for all the time you've spent with me on the show Dr. Jack. You've provided a huge amount of resources and information for my listeners. For those of you listening who this is maybe the first time you've heard Dr. Jack, go to essentialtennis.com slash podcast and on the right, click injuries and sports medicine and you can check out all of the shows that we've done together. So again, thank you Dr. Jack. Dr. Jack: My pleasure. [music] [music] [music] Ian: Episode of 146 of the podcast. Thank you very much for your support of the show by downloading today's episode and for listening to it. Thank you to all of you who go check out tennisexpress this week at essentialtennis.com slash express. And definitely check out the new podcast page as well, with all the new categorized setups. On the right hand side of the page, all the different categories are there so you can find exactly what topics you'd like information on and download them from there. And make sure to check out iTunes as well as it's the best way to download the show on a weekly basis. OK, that does it for this week. Thanks again everybody, take care and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast #147: Will Hamilton and Yann Auzoux Introduce Tennis Rx

ianw — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 18:43:44 +0000

Will, Yann, and Ian discuss tennis instruction and becoming a better player! You will hear them talk about the "modern footwork" videos that Will and Yann put out several months ago as well as a completely new course designed to improve your entire game called "Tennis Rx". During this week only you can access a completely free video course that Will and Yann put together by going to www.essentialtennis.com/rx! Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Announcer: Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. If you love tennis, and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian : Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast, your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by Tennis Express. Please check them out by going to CentralTennis.com/express. Thank you very much for joining me on today's show. I've got two very special guests that are going to be talking with me about tennis instruction and a brand new course that they have coming out soon. Two quick things before we get to that. First of all, I want to send a shout out to Tom from New York City. He and I worked together for several hours yesterday in Baltimore at improving his game. I want to thank him for coming down to see me. It was great working with you, Tom. Secondly, I want to let you know that the Essential Tennis podcast has been chosen as a finalist for the top sports podcast of the year by PodcastAwards.com. And I'd really appreciate it if you went and voted for the Essential Tennis as the top sports podcast of the year. Just go to PodcastAwards.com and go down to Sports. Click on Essential Tennis. Fill in your name and e-mail address. And that's it! It takes literally 10 sec. and you can vote every 24 hrs. So if you have ever been helped by this show, I'd really appreciate your support by going and voting. Hopefully we can win it. That would be great. That would be a testament to the loyalty and passion for all you, the listeners of the show. So again, PodcastAwards.com. Alright, let's get down to business. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] My guests today on the Essential Tennis podcast are Will Hamilton and Jan Auzoux. Welcome to the show. It's great to have you both. Jan: Great! Thank you very much. Will: Thank for having us. Ian: So I'm really happy to have you on the show. Just about everybody who listens to my podcast I'm sure by now is familiar with both of you. Will of course is the co-founder of FuzzyYellowBalls.c om, the most popular tennis instruction site on the internet. Will, congratulations on that. Will: Oh thanks. I appreciate it. Ian: As most of you know also Jan and Will have been doing some recent work together. That's actually what we're going to talk about first once we get introductions out of the way. First I'd like you guys to speak to my audience. For those people listening who are not real familiar with both of you, I'd like you to introduce yourselves briefly, tell us about your background. Will, let's start with you. Please tell us what your background is as far as being a teacher. Also tell us about some of the recent successes of FuzzyYellowBalls.com. Will: Yeah! I mean, I'm one of those kids who's played his entire life, basically since I could hold a tennis racket. My dad got me started. I played in high school. I played in college. Taught at the Junior Tennis Champions Center in College Park, Maryland, which is a high performance training facility right outside the D.C. area. In late '06, I got the idea for FYB after bouncing around Youtube and looking at other tennis videos and seeing how many views I had. There were a couple of videos that had 55-60,000 views. I thought this might work, so in 2007 we got FYB up and rolling. I think it was Sep. 27. I have to ask Adam about that. Adam is the other half of FYB. Yeah, it's been a wild ride since then. Growing a lot of--we never expected. Right now we get over 1 million video plays a month, which is a crazy amount of viewership. Did we expect that when we started? No. But it's really taken off! Ian: [laughter] Well that amount of traffic on Youtube is definitely a testament to the quality and the breadth of information that you guys put out. FuzzyYellowBalls has been one of the very few websites that I've endorsed. I say, "Guys, you need to go check this out!" I'm very careful about who I give my endorsement to in terms of instruction. [laughter] It's my opinion there's a lot of sub-par instruction--and even wrong information--out there on the internet. As you know, just about anybody can put their stuff out there and act like they're an expert in whatever field they're trying to put information out on. But FYB has been solid all the way through. I know that's why you guys have been so successful. Will: I appreciate it. First of all, thank you for the endorsement. I really appreciate that. I think the next step is probably... I don't know. I want to get your professional opinion on this, Ian. Maybe working in some cats into our instructional videos. Because cats get a lot of views on Youtube. So like some combination of a cat playing a keyboard and tennis I think would really be viral! Ian: Maybe combination tennis instruction/ wild cat? Will: Yeah, exactly. Something like that. Ian: [laughter] Will: I think that's the next step of online instruction. Maybe you and I can figure something out with that. Ian: We should have talked about this off the air. Now somebody is definitely going to steal that idea. Will: Shoot! We got dibs, everybody. Ian: Alright. Enough of that! Let's go over to Jan now. Jan Auzoux, everybody has started to become familiar with you're teaching through the joint venture. Yourself and Will have done specifically with the foot work videos that you guys have put out in the last couple weeks and months. Jan, can you please tell my audience about yourself as well? Your background as a teacher, your background as a player. I know that you played on the tour for a period of time. Tell us a little bit about yourself. Jan: Well as you can probably tell by the accent, I'm half French and half Cameroon, so my upbringing was between both countries. I was fortunate enough to be introduced to the game of tennis thanks to a family friend, which was [inaudible] father. So that's how basically I was introduced to the game. I was good pretty quickly, mostly due to my foot work speed. [laughter] It's not a surprise that 30 yrs. later, that's basically my area of expertise. Yes, I did have a lot of fun on tour. Had a lot of injuries, so that was cut short fairly quickly. But I enjoy the game tremendously. It's a passion of mine, so I've actually been very fortunate to be able to pass that passion onto everybody else that decides to spend an hour with me on the court. I wrote a book. With Will, we've been putting this information out, and sharing it with the world. He has a passion for it, and I have a passion for it, so it was a very natural collaboration. Ian: Jan, I'm so happy that you used the word "passion" in there a couple of times. I think that's absolutely key and crucial, not only for us as tennis instructors specifically, but I think just to be a good teacher in general in whatever field. In education, tennis, or golf--or whatever you happen to teach. If you really love what you're around and you have a passion for the content and for what the information is, and you just love being around whatever the content is, I think those are by far the most successful teachers. So I'm really happy to hear you talk about that! Jan: Thank you. Ian: Alright. So next up, let's talk a little about that series you guys put out. The footwork videos. Will, what do you think made those so popular and so successful? Will: I think first of all it really boiled down to how Jan communicated that material. I actually--it's what, Dec. 6 today? I have known only about 10 months. It was at a Christmas party last year. Growing up in Washington, D.C. and then I was a political science major in college, that basically means you're good at cocktail parties, and you have no other skills whatsoever. Ian: [laughter] Will: So yeah, political science you can talk about politics essentially. So I was hanging out at this cocktail party and a mutual friend named [inaudible] said, "I know this coach named Jan that you should meet." He knew about my website and said, "You should get Jan on here. It's going to be great material!" So [inaudible] got us together for lunch. Then we filmed that series over the summer. Jan had sent me some content ahead of time for that very first video. [noise] The most important. Ian, are you still there? Ian: Yes. Can you repeat that last sentence? I cut that out. I don't know what happened. Will: We got a little [noise] Jan had sent me some content. I looked at it and I said, "This is some good stuff here. I'm interested to do a video with this guy." So we go out and we film Modern Tennis Footwork. And as soon as we get going and we're talking about the Walking Step and the Hopping Step, I just knew that this was going to be a killer series of videos. Because the content was really good. It was explained very clearly. And it's something that is easily incorporated into your game. For those of you that are subscribed to our newsletter, if you go back and find the e-mail where I said, "We've got some new." Where promoted those free videos. The subject, it's either the subject of the first line. It says: "This is one of the best videos we've ever filmed." I just knew it was going to be good. Ian: Well I'm looking at some feedback now on my forums EssentialTennis.com. That definitely seems to be the consensus. People have definitely resonated with the material. I think what I've liked most about it that you can watch the video that yourself and Jan put together. Go watch professional tennis on TV, and see them use all of different steps you talked about. It really makes sense. It's very applicable. It's instruction that people can go and implement into their game right away. It's nothing that's super complicated. And yet it's content that I don't think a lot of people have heard about before, specifically the Hop Step and the Walking Step. So I think that combination of factors has really made it very popular. Will: Absolutely. Like I said, Hopping Step, Walking Step, those are bite size pieces that you can just immediately incorporate. It's not like you're learning this new, expansive system. So not only could you see the pros doing it, but you could do it literally the next time you stepped on the tennis court. Ian: Sure. So Jan, are these specific types of steps... Can you talk to us about the types of players you're working with right now? Personally, what levels are there? Are they advanced level players? Are they just your average rec player? What types of players can benefit from this type of instruction that you guys have done together? Jan: Well, you know. We haven't discussed that yet. But I have actually coached anywhere from beginner who's never held a racket before, to high performance pro player. I helped former pro player who was Top 20 in the world. All of them essentially need their mobility to be able to perform well and be efficient on the court. At the moment, I'm coaching mostly rec adult players and high school junior players. I'm happy to say that my [laughter] high school junior players finished undefeated this season and won their league play for the 2nd time in a row. I have a lot of former pro players now that contact me from the videos that we put online thanks to Will. People flying from all over the world coming to take some instruction, and people asking me to to go to them. So we're still negotiating some of those terms! [laughter] It's been very exciting. Obviously the modern tennis footwork is applicable to every level in any way that people are comfortable playing with. Will: Jan also gives me some pointers from time to time too. Ian: [laughter] That's nice of him. Will: I need some work! Jan: He's a fast learner. Let's put it that way. [laughter] Good to work with. Ian: Well guys, congratulations on the success of those videos. Now let's move on. We're going to talk a little bit about a new project that you have been working on. I'm not going to get into it. Why don't I go ahead and pass it over to you Will, so you can give us a broad overview of exactly what kind of content and instruction you guys have been working on over the last couple of months. What is going to be a part of this instruction. What are people going to learn in a general sense? Will: There's a couple of pieces to it. We've come out with a series of course called Tennis Rx. We've called it "the prescription for your game." The big picture here is we're obviously with the medical theme. We're teaching you how to become the doctor. Which essentially means figuring out what's wrong with your game, diagnosing the problem, and then prescribing the cure. Which is something we're always done at FYB, but now we're really trying to take it to the next level. Ian, you can let me know if this sounds right to you. I think a lot of players are really dependent on their coaches to handle their improvement, and when they go onto the court and try and practice for themselves, it's somewhat unstructured. They kind of just hit around, maybe on the ball machine. That's not really reflective of how high level players are developed. When I worked at the JTCC, the Junior Tennis Champions Center at College Park, there was a very methodical process for developing the skills set necessary to play at a high level. So that's one of the components we've tried to work into this course. We've termed for growing complexity of working on your game "layering." Which we explain in great deal in the course. And the second big piece is Jan and I were sitting around right before the U.S. Open, and we were talking about this project. We were also just commenting on the pros and talking about guys like Rafa, who used to be this really defensive player, but now has become so aggressive while still keeping his. He's like a counterpart, a puncher, that has amazing offense. Ian: [laughter] Will: And we were talking about Federer, who's a very smooth player. We said, "All these guys have an identity. They're very distinctive." It's to the point where you can almost watch their strokes but not see who they are, but you know who's playing. Right? Ian: Yes, absolutely. Will: If you see a guy hit a lefty forehand and the racket finishes over his head, you say, "That's Rafael Nadal." If you see a serving vollyer with amazing hands but a unique service motion and strange ground strokes, you know that's McEnroe. We were talking about how all these guys have a very distinct identity. Then we both looked at each other and said, "Wait a second. This is something that really should be taught to any player!" How do you maximize your individual talents, abilities, and tendencies? How do you design a game around what you're good at, and ultimately develop an identity just like the pros are doing? Because if you really focus on what you're good at, you're going to end up being different from everybody else. Ultimately, that's going to make you the best player you can be. Ian: So let me throw a question out there. Either of you can take this. People who go through this course that you have been working on, how can they tell what their personality is? How can they tell what naturally should be there, their style of play? Will: I'm going to give that one to Jan, and let him talk more generally about when he... A lot of this program is designed around Jan's coaching philosophy. Jan is very good at taking players and explaining, "This is what you're good at. This is what you're bad at." So I'm going to let Jan talk about that. Maybe Jan you could talk about your own personal experiences in terms of doing that for yourself. Jan: Well, the most common way to assess what you're good at is obviously what you favor. In my case, when I picked up tennis, I used to be a soccer player. So I was very quick. I was predetermined to cover the ground in a counter puncher way. But then I figured out that I had a big serve and a big forehand, so I started to apply those qualities to the choices I made on the court. So basically when somebody's trying to assess and diagnose what works for them, the natural way to do that is see what you like to hit. Do you like to hit forehand? Do you like to hit backhand? Do you really want to be at the net? So essentially, figuring out what you like most. It starts with that. Then obviously, you have to be able to [laughter] be efficient everywhere! So it's not like if you have a great forehand you're just going to run around and hit forehands all day, because you'll play somebody who's good at isolating your backhand, and doing just that. So there are certain parts of your game that need to come up, and be good enough. They don't have to be great. You don't have to have weapons everywhere, but you certainly want to be able to protect yourself in the areas where you're the weakest. Then just apply pressure with your weapons. Will: I think a lot of players like Jan said do have a general sense of what they're good at, and what they like to do. The forehand, for example. You see a lot of rec players, "Aw man, I love my forehand! I'm just going to hit that." And that's really all they focus on, and all they work on to the detriment of the rest of their game. So it's not just a matter of isolating what you like and what you athletically are good at. It's how you go about developing that skill set in a way that ties your entire game together. I think that's the big piece that's missing there. Ian: So specifically, in the course. So then do you guys break it down into--I'm just making up a number--6 different types of players, and from there you funnel people into specific ways to work on that style of play? Will: That's actually exactly what we do. We basically have a set of player times, and then we focus on the types of techniques that are good for each type of player. Then we help you design your game plan. There's a specific thing we actually do with a lot of the footwork Jan has taught us. So maybe Jan you want to talk about footwork for the counter puncher versus the power monger, the big hitter. Jan: Bottom line, it has to do with: Where do you feel most comfortable? If you feel comfortable at the base line, and you plan on just staying back there as a counter puncher and rallying forever to overwhelm your opponent that way, you're going to have to utilize a lot of side to side movements. So you would probably find yourself using a lot of pivot steps. Not as penetrating but certainly quick for recovery. When you start to get more aggressive, and you take advantage of the short balls you generate, then you will find yourself moving inward more. At that point you probably see a lot of players utilizing the Hopping Step and the Walking Step because they're more penetrating. They're actually designed to do just that. So based on the type of player you are, you can see that there are certain footwork choices that you make. We've designed the course in a way that people can actually recognize themselves in the drill that we set, and figure out why it is important for them to utilize this particular piece of footwork over another one to be efficient. Will: Yes, so I mean that's--obviously the footwork is just one piece. We break every aspect down in terms of "If you're a counter puncher, this is what you should be trying to do with your serve." If you're a Flash Max is another type of player. This is what you'd be doing on the return. Dr. Feelgood is another one! There's all various types of techniques in terms of not just the footwork that you might emphasize, but also there's the strategy that would go into it. So it's the whole package. Ian: You guys cover stroke technique as well. Forehand, backhand serve as it relates to all those different types of players? Will: We do. We have a series of one of the... To come back to the high performance training facility when I was talking about the very methodical way of developing players, we've tried to, we have replicated that with this course with a process we call "layering." Which is basically when you're talking about any technique: serve, back hand, forehand. Let's just pretend your forehand is like driving a car. When you learn how to drive a car, you don't just get in the car, and this is the very first time you've ever driven get in the car and drive on the road. That's not safe, obviously. [laughter] So yeah. Hopefully no one listening has tried that! Ian: Do not do that. Yes. Will: So what you would do is you would go to the parking lot. You would get the car out of park. Then you would figure out how to push the gas and the brake. Then you would figure out your mirrors and learn how to turn. So it's this process of adding more and more skills and increasing the complexity of what you are doing until ultimately, operating the car is second nature. You're not even really thinking about it. When you're driving, you're thinking about what's on the road. You're thinking about the other cars. Ian, you're thinking about your--I was trying to make a Celine Dion joke. But then I butchered it, so we'll just move on. Ian: [laughter] Will: Ian, you're going to edit that part out in post. Ian: Of course I will. Yes. Will: OK, perfect. So that is how we tried to structure the development of the various strokes, is this very methodical process which adds these layers of complexity, these layers of skills. And the hidden benefit, not only going to develop your skills, but also I'm going to get Jan to talk about how this personalizes your game that's about developing identify in a second. It's also very good for identifying the errors in your game. Because if you can do maybe, let's just say the forehand requires 10 skills. I'm just pulling a number out of a hat. If you can do the first 3 skills fine, but then you hit that 4th skill and things start to break down, now you know exactly what's wrong with your stroke. You say, "This is thing I need to work on." I think a lot of rec players are sometimes at a loss. "I don't know what's wrong with my stokes. How do I fix this?" The layering process by methodically building that shot up, it's much easier to identify "Here's a problem; this is what I need to work on to keep this train rolling." And then the second part of this process is personalization. That gets back to identity, so I'm going to kick it over to Jan. Jan: That was actually quite a brilliant description of what the course is about. Again, through the process of layering, he mentioned the analogy of driving a car. That's great. When somebody steps on the tennis court, we all go through the same process. Some of us just get stuck. The first process is you want to acquire technical consistency. It's basically the reliability of your strokes, and that the technical choices you make are sound. Then you go on. You layer that. You go on to the next layer, which is acquiring shot consistency. Where you keep the ball in play using that particular technique for a little while. Then you add variety. After that variety, you want to also be able to distribution. What you notice is you are still working on that same shot, but you are adding layers to all of that. Once you have that distribution, you want to be able to add a little more power. So you go throw that process of increasing more speed. Then you want to give it a run in competition. I'm just giving you a short overview of what the course is going to be about. Then once you have all that, the way that you express the choices you make on the court personal. That's when personalization kicks in and you start to develop an identity. Because all those choices is self-expression. It's you essentially displaying the way that the game makes sense to you. That's two of the first components that the course includes. Will: And the final part I'd like to that is let's say you're going through a layered series of exercises. Ian, you're going through them just like I am. Same ones. Even though we're going through the exact same exercises, the way your game is going to end up looking is going to be different than mine, even though we have the same core set of competencies. We can both move. We can both judge the ball. We can both hit down the line or cross court. But your strokes are going to develop and look a little bit different than mine. The footwork patterns that you choose might be a little different from mine. And that's really how, one of the things we emphasize in the course is that layering leads to personalization. Personalization is a by-product of going through a layered process. I think that's important to grasp, because a lot players try and force a certain type of technique on themselves. The most typical is, "Man, I really like Andy Roddick's serve. I'm just going to try and serve like him. I'm going to have this abbreviated motion." That might not make sense based on your body type, your athletic talents, whatever. But if you go through a very structured, logical progression, then you're going to end up developing a serve that is good for the type of player you are. You don't really want to force this technique, and this process helps you develop your own technical style. Jan: I think one thing that needs to be added as well is that through the process of doing that, you prevent injuries as well. I know that when I was growing up, there were a couple of players that were very popular, and I started to try to play like them. Without having the body type [laughter] to follow the same technical demands, and I end up hurting myself. So there's an element also of safety and longevity that needs to be added to all these wonderful drills that we've designed. Ian: Well it sounds like you guys have have gone about this very intelligently. From my perspective, for two main reasons so far in what you have been talking about over the last couple of minutes. First of all, Jan I was really happy to hear that in your description of a progression of learning how to hit a stroke correctly in terms of technique, one of the last things that you mentioned. There was probably a list of 5-6 different steps or progressions. Was there. One of the last things you mentioned was "OK, now maybe we can add some power!" After this list of developing a strong foundation first. I think that a big mistake that rec players make in this information age online with so much content and information available is they go out, and they immediately try for the power first without learning how they should be hitting in terms of consistency and accuracy, repeatability, etc. It sounds like you have really hit the nail on the head there. Then secondly, Will you were talking about going out and trying to copy a profesional player. There's so much content and video out there of professional players and slow motion, etc. I think a big mistake rec players make is they go out, they see a pro they think is cool and they like how they look when they hit a certain stroke, and they go and try to carbon copy it without even knowing if it's good for them. That, Jan as you were saying, can lead to injury and Will, as you were saying, can lead to following what comes to the natural player. Both can be obviously hugely detrimental. Will: Yeah, you kind of get hypnotized. This happens to everybody regardless of level by the pros. I think what's instructive is Rafael Nadal back in 2006-2007. Here's a guy who very defensive oriented player, and had some success at Wimbledon but was losing to Federer in the final. What Rafa didn't do was say to himself, "Well Federer's the best, so now I'm going to try to play like Federer." What he said was, "I'm going to get better at what I do and that's going to end up getting me over the hump." Obviously now he's the best player in the world, and he's figured out how to serve 130 mph and add some other. He's very good at his court positioning now. But it's all his style of play. It's his identity. He hasn't tried to copy somebody else. So that's trickier to [inaudible]. If you're looking for a part of the pros to copy, copy how they develop their games. They develop it around what they're good at, not other players. It's very easy to look at someone's forehand and think, OK, that's what I need to copy, when it's actually their methodology and their mindset is a little bit more valuable. Ian: So we've now talked about layering. We've talked about personalization. I know there's a 3rd cornerstone to the course you have put together, and it has to do with tactics. Will can you introduce that and talk about it a little bit? Will: Yes. We call it "profiling." But I think Jan should be the one to talk about it. Jan is the former professional player, so he's the expert at this stuff! Ian: [laughter] Good call. Will: So I'm going to let him run with it. Jan: Well again, as I said, from my own personal development, I realized very quickly that I was not 6'4", that I was not 185 lbs. So that process of realization made me customize my game and pay attention to what was on the other side more So then just overpowering my opponent and being happy with it. So through this process of figuring out who I'm playing became that profiling concept. It's assessing who you play, what they're good at. Essentially defining the strategy that is more likely to beat them. That's what profiling is. It's: who do I play? How do I play them? How do I achieve success when I play them? Will: Yes. There's a... We've constructed a process for that called "sequencing," which is where you create the profile of your opponent, and then you sequence your shots to deconstruct their game. I think an analogy everybody will get if we bring it back to the car actually, is when you're driving, you're not thinking about operating the car. You're thinking about the other drivers and your environment. Ultimately, that's the goal you want to get to as a tennis player. You're thinking about your environment. You're thinking about the other car, your opponent. That's the essence of profiling. You're thinking about the other end of the court. You're not thinking about yourself. Jan: Absolutely. I think a lot of players have the tendency to get stuck on themselves, which is why that other element of paying attention to what's going on on the other side is critical. When I practice, it's about me and improving my skills. When I step on the tennis court and I play somebody in a match situation, it is no longer about me. If your forearm is not working, you'd better figure out very quickly how to customize a new strategy to beat that person on the other side. Because they have same issues. They too have weaknesses. They too have strength. You have to figure out what is the sequence of plays that will deconstruct and make them fail before you do. Ian: So guys, it sounds like this course that you have put together is extremely comprehensive. How much content? Is this video? Is this audio? Is it written? What amount of content are we talking about here? Will: That's a good question. I haven't added it up. It's a lot! It's all video. It's a combination of a lot of on court stuff. If you have seen the videos we've done with Jan in the past, it's a lot of similar format. Filmed a lot of it at the Legg Mason facility. 16th and Kennedy is where the Legg Mason tennis classic is played, so we filmed it on the center there, which is very cool. Then we've got a lot of indoor dry erase board. We actually have a new dry erase board, which is a straight up white dry erase board for lessons that would get a little muddy if you had a tennis court in the background. More your classroom board. It's very comprehensive in terms of hours attached to it. I don't know, but a lot. Ian: [laughter] Alright. As we start to wrap things up as far as the podcast is concerned, can you please tell us where we can find out more? Where can people go to find out more, first of all? When is this going to be available? For how long approximately is it going to be available? Because Will I know that you like to a lot of times put. You only make stuff available for a certain period of time typically. So tell us a bit about that. Will: The website is just Tennis- RX.com. That's simple to remember. But the content is of the first video in this free series we've done is up right now. We'll be releasing the other couple over the course of the next week or so. I don't have an exact time table on all these videos, but they'll be up for a couple of weeks. Like I said, they're all free. They're pretty easy to access. They cover in great detail what we've been talking about today. Ian: OK. So listeners out there of the Essential Tennis podcast, I definitely recommend you check this out. If you go to Essential Tennis.com/rx It's Essential Tennis slash the letter "R" and the letter "X" you will be taken over to Will's and Jan's site where you can check out the introductory videos they are going to be releasing over the next couple of days. The next week or so, Will? You'll be putting out some free instructional videos, right? Will: Yes. We've got a lot of content to release that covers this stuff in the next--like I said, the first one's up right now, and the next several days Jan and I are actually going in a second to go shoot some of the segments for the next few parts. Ian: OK. Just so you guys know, when you do go to that page, you're going to be asked to put in your e-mail address. Just a full disclosure there so you know what to expect. Will I know does not spam people. He's not going to give your e-mail address out to other people. You don't have to worry about that. He's a straight up guy! [laughter] I know him personally. So I definitely encourage you to go there and check it out if for no other reason just to get the free instructional videos that they're going to be releasing. There's going to be what, 3-4 of them Will full of free instruction? Will: Yes. 3 or 4. We're not buttoned up on the exact number. And yes, in terms of spending the folks some e-mails, every single e-mail has a button at the bottom where you can unsubscribe and stop hearing from us. So it literally takes one click. Ian: Yeah. So you are under absolutely no obligation as far as continuing to receive e-mails. Obviously as far as purchasing, whenever they ever release Tennis Rx, you are obviously under no obligation to purchase it either. However, I definitely suggest that you consider it. Because I know they put a ton of time and effort into this course, as you can hear. We've already gone almost 10 min. Over the normal time for the podcast. But as you guys can tell, the three of us could continue talking about these topics for a long time. These guys really know what they're talking about. I believe that Will wouldn't be offering a product unless he was really confident it would help your game. I really believe that. Will: Yes, well that's absolutely true. [laughter] Wouldn't be a very good coach otherwise! Ian: [laughter] Yeah, probably not. And Jan, I don't know you very well yet, but I'm sure since Will is working with you I can safely put you in the same boat. Jan: Well, I certainly appreciate. [laughter] You guys are obviously running a very professional system. I'm quite pleased to be part of it. Will: Jan is one of the best coaches I've ever worked with. Like I said, the best time I stepped on the court I was just like, "This is going to be good." Ian: Nice. Well Jan, hopefully you and I will have a chance to hit some time. Maybe the 3 of us could. Well we need a 4th. Adam! There you go. Will, you have to play with Adam though. Will: We're putting Adam with Jan. If we do that, then I we might have a chance, Ian. Jan: [laughter] We're looking forward to it! Ian: [laughter] Yeah, that will be fun. So go check out their pre-content here before they put out the product. You're going to get a lot of benefit just out of the free videos that Will and Jan are putting out. Again, you can check that out by going to EssentiallTennis.com/Rx. Just in interest of full disclosure, when you go to that link, I'm an affiliate here, so that means that if you through that link and you actually do end up purchasing Tennis Rx I'll receive part of that as an affiliate seller. So it's kind of a win-win! I know that Will puts out a product so it's going to help your game. And you'll help EssentialTennis.com through your purchase if you go to EssentialTennis.com/Rx. And with all of your products I'm sure that you also offer money back guarantee on this, Will? Will: Yes. 60 days. And absolutely. We rarely get refunds, but absolutely if for whatever reason someone feels they don't get the value, I want them to get a refund. Because if we're not doing our job, you shouldn't have to pay for it. Ian: Alright. So there you go. Risk free. Go check it out. At this point, I want to thank you guys for spending the time with me for the discussion. It's been great having both of you on this show. Will and Jan, good luck to both of you as you continue working together, and good luck with the release of Tennis Rx. I hope that it's very successful for both of you. Jan: Thank you very much. I really appreciate. Will: Hey, Ian. Thanks. Ian: One more thing. I almost forgot. Jan, what's the name of your book? If people want to go check out your book and check out more of your instruction, where can they pick up your book, and what's it called? Jan: [laughter] Well it's actually being published as we speak. It's going to be called "Tennis Revolution." It will be available shortly in 2011. Right now we don't have a launch pad yet, but Will and I will probably be talking very soon. Will: We'll let people know when it's out. Ian: Cool. Alright guys. Thanks again, and best of luck! Jan: Thank you. Will: Thanks. Later. [music] Ian: Alright. That does it for Episode #147 of the Essential Tennis podcast. Thank you very much joining today on this episode. I apologize. It went a little longer than normal. But hopefully you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did while I was having it with Jan and Will. As you can tell, 2 passionate people about the game of tennis, and just creating good instruction, so definitely go check out Tennis Rx. That again is at EssentialTennis.com/Rx. Also, please do me a favor. Go vote for the Essential Tennis podcast as the top sports podcast of the year. That's at PodcastAwards .com. You can vote every 24 hours. If you would do that, I'd really appreciate it. Alright. Thanks again. Take care, and good luck with your tennis! [music] [music]

Podcast #148: How To Hit On The Run!

ianw — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 18:59:57 +0000

One of the most difficult things in tennis is trying to hit while moving yourself urgently from one part of the court to another. How can we best move our feet to get to the right spot and coordinate that effort with our upper body to hit the best possible shot? Learn how on today's show! Also listen to Ian talk about using your court time wisely when your partner isn't as strong as you are. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Announcer: Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you! Whether it's technique, strategy, technique, or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast, your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by TennisExpress.com. Check them out by going to EssentialTennis.com/ Express. Thank you very much for joining me on today's episode. I'm going to be answering some great listener questions today. Before we get to that, just two quick announcements. First of all, and I talked about this briefly last week, the Essential Tennis podcast is up for the Top Sports Podcast of 2010. Please support the show by voting. You only have today and tomorrow. Today is Mon. the 13th. Tues. the 14th to cast your vote. You can vote 1 time per day 13-14. Voting closes on the 15th. You can vote for the show by going to PodcastAwards.com. Thank you all so much who have been voting. Hopefully we win! That'd be cool. Secondly, before we get to today's questions, quickly Tennis Rx, the new course that Will and Yann over at FuzzyYellowBalls are putting out, is going to be going on sale on Wed. the 15th. If you haven't already checked out the free video that they have been putting out--it's 3 videos now. Those total over 1 hr. of video instruction. Go watch those before they get taken down. They're getting taken down on Wed. So again, you have today and tomorrow, Mon. and Tues., to go watch those free instructional videos. You can check those out by going to EssentialTennis.com/ Rx. Lastly, I'm putting together a bonus for anybody who buys Rx. Again, there's no obligation to buy by going to my link. You should go just to look at the free videos. If it turns out that you're interested in the full course and you want to purchase it, that's great. I'm an affiliate for that, so part of your purchase will go to support Essential Tennis. Also, I'm offering a bonus to anybody who purchases Rx through Essential Tennis. That is a clinic with Will and myself. It's going to be held in Baltimore. It's going to be an afternoon lawn clinic, probably 5 hrs. on court and 1 hr. or so off court, socializing with food and drinks, etc. So if you want to spend 5 hrs. on court with Will and myself--and this is a totally free bonus for the first 20 people, only 20 people who purchase Rx through Essential Tennis. To be totally honest with you, I think Rx is totally worth the money anyway. I know Will has put a lot of time into it. The content is great. But even sweeten the deal that much more [laughter] and I'm really happy that Will agreed to this clinic with me, I'm going to throw in totally free for the first 20 people who purchase through Essential Tennis this afternoon clinic. I don't hvae the exact dates yet, but it's going to be a weekend, either a Sat. or a Sun. It's going to be in Baltimore, probably in Feb. or March, somewhere around there. I'll get specifics to those of you who are one of those first 20 people. So again, after Wed. Rx goes on sale. Go to EssentialTennis.com/Rx. That will take you to the purchase page. And if you do decide to purchase, you'll be asked to join that clinic with myself and Will. Again, completely free! So go check it out. Get the free videos. Maybe I'll be spending time with you and Will on the court in the next couple months. If you have any questions about the product or the clinic, send me an e-mail to Ian@essentialtennis.com. Alright. Let's go ahead and get down to business. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction! [music] [music] Alright. Let's go ahead and get started with our first question today. It comes to us from Tony. Tony wrote and said: "Hi, Ian. Recently I have realized that in order to improve my tennis significantly, my next step is to improve my ability to hit dynamic shots. Meaning combine strokes with footwork together. Although I can hit some decent shots on a ball machine, my strokes tend to fall apart when I needs a hit and run at the same time. How can I improve my ability to move around the ball and set up correctly so that my strokes don't break down?" Well Tony, that's a great question, and you're absolutely right. [laughter] There's a lot of people out there who are great at hitting good tennis shots when they're being fed to them. Or it's a comfortabl rally back and forth. Or they're hitting against a ball machine. But being able to recreate that good technique while moving dynamically around the court is really the next level. And a lot more difficult! There's a lot of skills necessary to be able to do that effectively. I'm going to talk about those. I've got a 4 part outline here. I'm going to talk about the skills necessary to hit on the run, which is going to come under 3 main headings. Then I'm also going to talk about how to improve each of those different aspects or skills needed to be able to hit effectively on the run. So skill #1that you need to be able to hit on the run effectively is footwork, specifically combinations of bigger and smaller steps. Very often the mistake that recreational players make is they only have one size of step. They only have one way of moving around the court, and that's at one speed and at one size step. It's just not very athletic. What you should be doing is using a combination of bigger and smaller steps. Large steps for your striding out at full stride is for top speed. To get from point A to point B in as short amount of time as possible. And then smaller steps are for quick acceleration and also deceleration to slow yourself down, get yourself in exactly the right spot, and to fine tune your positioning. Without those smaller steps, very often you would either over run your target and go too far or you wouldn't make it far enough because you only used longer strides. So you wouldn't accelerate very quickly to begin with, first of all. Then secondly, it's very likely that you'll stride right past exactly where you should be to hit the best possible shot. You see, in tennis on the ground strokes and overheads and volleys, there's really one specific place where the ball should be in relationship to your body so that the stroke, the technique that you're trying to use, is as comfortable as possible. It doesn't mean that you have to be in exactly that spot to hit a good shot. But wouldn't that be nice? [laughter] And it's not always going to happen. Obviously! You're going to misjudge sometimes. You're going to put yourself in the wrong place. But if you could get to exactly the right spot a couple times more per set, that's going to improve your tennis big time. And the specific pattern is basically this. As far as using the smaller steps and the bigger steps, you should be using quick little steps initially to accelerate. Think about using 1st gear on a car or on a 10 speed bike. It's the easiest gear to turn. And that's how you want to start off athletically when you know you have to really run and hustle to get to a ball. You should be starting out with small, quick little steps first. Probably your first 3 steps or so. 3-5 steps at the most. Should be quick, explosive, little steps to get your body accelerated. Then as you continue moving towards the ball--probably after your 4th or 5h step or so--you're going to want to stride out, meaning take full, long steps, which is going to help you cover the greatest amount of court possible. Then as you get close to where you know you should be, or where you think you should be! [laughter] We're going to talk about that later. You should start using the smaller steps again to gather your balance and fine tune your positioning so that you get in the best possible place on the court. If possible. Sometimes the ball is hit so far away from you that you don't have the option of using those smaller steps in the second half of your position. So you have no choice but to continue using your longer stride, at kind of your top speed, all the way to the ball. You don't have the choice of using the small adjustment steps as you approach the ball and you actually get set to make your swing. But if you have the option, or you have the ability, to you absolutely should be using the small steps again in the second half of your movement on the way to the ball to help adjust yourself. So as I mentioned earlier, I mean, all of you guys have those longer strides. Everybody knows how to take a full stride and get to whatever their top speed is now. It's not to say you can't improve your top speed, and you can't learn how to get faster. But in my experience, it's the smaller steps that recreational players need to improve, or they don't have at all. In my experience as well, the best way to train for that--there's a couple different ways--but my favorite way to work on that you don't even have to be on a tennis court do this. Is to used what's called an "agility ladder." I strongly suggest you go to Youtube .com and do a search for "agility ladder." That will bring back thousands of videos of athletes, some of them professional really high level athletes, using what's called an agility ladder. It looks like rope ladder, except usually the rungs are plastic and they're connected by rope. Not really rope. Usually a nylon type cord, I guess, between the rungs. So that creates little spaces. There's many different footwork patterns that you can practice. Most of them--well really all of them--really specifically focusing on agility, which is the use of small steps to move your body quickly and fine tune your position. So buy one of those! You can buy one of those at a major sporting goods store. Or if you go to... I haven't looked on Amazon, but probably on Amazon.com you can get it even cheaper. And go to Youtube and check out the different drills you can do to work on your footwork. Really good stuff. OK. So that's the first part of my outline. Second necessary skill to be able to hit on the run is good judgment of where the ball is going. This is something that's difficult to practice and improve aside from just playing a lot of tennis and really being focused on it. The best way to improve your positioning is cooperative rallies with another person. So for example, maybe a cross court forehand rally. You guys aren't trying to win the point. You're aiming for a specific spot on the court, and doing a rally back and forth with an emphasis on consistency and accuracy. Trying to keep as many shots in play as possible. And as you do a cooperative rally like that, aiming for a specific spot, you should focus consciously the entire rally maybe for 5-10 min. on-- not that your rally is going to last 10 min. Not that you're rally's going to last 10 min.! But however many rallies you're able to get in in 5-10 min., you should be focusing on a consistent contact point. Meaning the right distance from your body width- wise, and the right height of contact. Height-wise. I mean, be really picky about it, and move your feet well enough that you consistently hit in that same spot. You won't always be able to get to that exact spot, but you should be trying to. And just be really conscious and aware of where you're making contact. I think a lot of times recreational players do these cooperative rallies, which I condone and recommend all the time on the podcast, but they only think about their target. That's great! That's good practice. You should be doing that. Or maybe they think about technique, and they're trying to improve a certain part of their forehand or their backhand. That's great too! You should be doing that too. But I don't see a lot of recreational players rallying with an emphasis on footwork. Very often I see rec players rally and they hit the ball from the same place on the court over and over again, even though their contact point is different every shot. As you can imagine, that causes some problems. [laughter] That cuts down consistency a lot, because you can't use the same good technique over and over again if the ball is constantly in a different place. So I want you guys to do that. Cooperative rallies with an emphasis on your positioning. Pay close attention to patterns. What I mean by that is many, many, many rec players--when I say "many" more than once, listen carefully! Many rec players make the same positioning mistakes over and over again. The two most common ones that I see are over running and getting too close to the ball and being jammed up. I see a lot of players who do that over and over again on a consistent basis on either their forehand or backhand ground stroke. I also consistently see players not judge the height correctly, and the ball ends up being too high in their stroke zone or too low in their strike zone. So they don't judge the width and they overrun. They don't judge the height correctly. Usually the high ones is what I see rec players struggle with the most. And simply, they just don't back up far enough! Either because they didn't know it was going there, or they don't know any better [laughter] and they just back up to get to a better spot. So they have to make contact higher than what's comfortable, and that results in a shot that's not as good. So go out there and rally, and pay close attention to these patterns and make conscious changes. When you find out that you're consistently close, when you find out the ball is consistently too high on your backhand side, make an adjustment. Make a change. Very often that's just due to poor judgment. If you're judging the all incorrectly consistently, start trick yourself. Go back farther than you think you have to. Or give yourself more space than you think you need. Make some kind of change on purpose, consciously, to get yourself out of whatever pattern you've been in that has put you in the wrong spot to make the best stroke possible. Really important stuff! [laughter] OK. Halfway through outline here. Thirdly-- and this is the third general skill that you need to be able to hit on the run effectively. That is just general athleticism and coordination. The judgment is super important, but once you know where it's going, you also need to have the coordination and athleticism to put yourself in the right spot. Just be a good enough athlete to move your body effectively and quickly, and go to the right place. Specifically, coordinating your upper body and lower body together while on the run can really be tough. This is what Tony is talking about. I would bet that Tony is physically getting to a lot of these shots. Probably most of them. His problem is probably not the actual speed necessary to get to the ball. But where things are probably breaking down for Tony is just being able to coordinate together his efforts with his lower body along with still trying to make a good swing. That's much more difficult than people think. It's not easy. The good news is this is something that you can improve and develop. You can! You can train your body to be more coordinated. [laughter] Otherwise, there wouldn't be any hope for any of us, would there? You can do that through practice and repetition. Just be aware that it probably will take some conscious effort, and it will take a bunch of repetition--unless you're lucky enough to be really blessed athletically, which most of us are not! We've talked about this before on the show. We're all blessed in different areas. Even athletically. We all have different skills. Some people are better than us in other areas then others, so this just might not be an area that you're particularly strong in naturally. If you're not, you can still improve it. One thing that's really important is to remember to be be controlled and calm with your upper body, even if your lower body is in emergency mode. Not frantic, but just going full tilt, and you know that you've got to go full speed or you're not going to get to this ball in time. Or you're not going to get there in time to be in an ideal position with the ball. It's difficult to remember. And some of you are going to have to literally remind yourselves of this as you practice, that even when your body from the waist down is working super hard. Your legs are pumping. You're taking small steps and small steps and big steps. Or maybe just all big steps and you're barely getting to the ball. You're going 100% out towards that ball. It's very easy to have your upper body go along for the ride and get totally out of control and out of rhythm, and just swing wild. At the ball. Because that's what your legs and feet are doing, is just moving really urgently and really intensely towards the ball. You have to remember to relax your upper body, and allow it to move smoothly and freely. And you've got to remember to use good technique, s good as possible, even when your lower body is working super hard. There's no way around it. This just takes a lot of practice, or a lot of natural athleticism to be able to do this well. Don't feel bad if at first you feel really awkward when you're practicing this, and it just doesn't feel coordinated. It's difficult. If it feels natural right away, then God bless you! [laughter] You're lucky. If it doesn't feel natural right away, it's OK. You can practice it. That brings me to the final part of my talk here about hitting on the run. That is the specific practice. How can we practice this to get better? Just have a couple of thoughts here. #1 which I mentioned earlier was cooperative rallies with a strong emphasis on positioning and balance. As I mentioned before, maybe a cross court forehand rally, or down the line rally. Your forehand, your partners back hand. Aiming past the service line. Trying to hit a solid deep ground stroke, and emphasize to yourself you're consciously focusing on trying to get to the ideal spot in relationship between yourself and the ball over and over again. Just make that your focus for like half an hour. [laughter] You'll have no choice but to improve your footwork! Because you're not going to automatically put yourself in just the right spot, unless it's something you've worked on. Or again, unless it comes really naturally for you. In which case, I'm happy for you, but a lot of other people hate you! [laughter] If anything comes that naturally. So that's #1. Cooperative rallies with emphasis on positioning and balance. Then #2: feeding drills or ball machines. And put yourself on the run on purpose, or put yourself really back on the base line on purpose. Start in the middle of the base line, or even all the way on the opposite corner. Have a ball machine of a friend feed you shots completely on the other side of the court. And practice just going full speed across the base line, hoping having time to make small adjustment steps. But even if you don't, being calm with your stroke, making a good technical swing, and aiming. Make sure you have a target and go for accuracy. Do this over and over again with either ball machine or partner. Again, focusing strongly on your positioning and your balance. Just do it again and again. As my 3rd point under How to Improve These Things is it will just come down to repetition and awareness. Keep your focus on what it feels like to make the swing. Keep your focus on what exactly the position is with the ball. In relation to your body. And keep making little adjustments as you do it again and again. Put in the repetition. Be really conscious and aware of what you're doing. Be purposeful about it. And practice it! This is what high level players do. This is what a tennis pro is going to do for you if you go and take a lesson. They're going to force you to work on something you might not be great at and make you do it again and again while really being focused on whether or not you're doing it correctly. If you have enough focus, if you find a partner or a ball machine who also has enough focus to be able to do this, you can improve this part of your game. OK. So Tony, that's it, man. Again, the 4 different sections were a combination of bigger and smaller steps to move your body efficiently. That's really important. #2 good judgment of where the ball is going. I know that sounds basic, but a lot of people make judgment mistakes, and the same one over and over again. So be aware enough to figure that out and make a change. #3: general athleticism and coordination. You can improve that! And #4: you can improve those different areas through repetition and through focused practice. Hopefully that's helpful to you Tony and everybody else listening. Go get an agility ladder that will help you with those small steps. Find a partner or a ball machine who's willing to help you work on this, and you can improve it. You really can! Good luck, Tony. Hopefully you can improve this part of your game in the near future. [music] [music] Alright. Before we get to our second question, really quickly I want to remind you guys about the official sponsor of the Essential Tennis podcast. That is Tennis Express, the best online retailer you can go to when it comes to customer service and selection. Go check out what they have. Whatever you want, most likely they've got it, exactly what you're looking for. You can get free shipping for orders over $75. Go check them out by going to EssentialTennis.com/ Express. When you do that and make order, a small portion of that order goes back to supporting EssentialTennis.com. It's really a win-win! You get great selection, great pricing, great service, and you support the Essential Tennis podcast at the same time. Thank you very much for your support, and I thank Tennis Express as well for theirs. Alright. Let's go ahead and get to our second question today. It comes to us from Adam Artinez in the Bay Area, California. He's a 4.0 player. Writes and says: "Social issues aside, does playing with a much lower skilled player-- say more than a 0.5 USCA ranking, NTRP ranking--hurt my tennis game other than obviously lost practice time that could be spent with players more at my level? Are there ways to make the play more interesting or conducive to improving my game when I am in these situations?" Well Adam, really good question. [laughter] I like that you say "social issues aside," because that can definitely be part of it. Especially it you're a member member of a club, etc. But this is something that every tennis player, if you put in the work and effort to go out to local courts and try to work on your game, this situation is going to come up. It has to eventually. Because everybody is looking for somebody to practice with, and of course everybody wants somebody to practice with who's going to be the best use of their time. Which for most people, they want to hit with somebody at least at their level, if not better, to get the most bang for their buck when they're out there on the court. Now a couple of different things I want to talk about, Adam. We'll go through this relatively quickly. First off, in general I think tennis players need to be more open about who they practice with. I'm not talking about you here specifically, but I just want to talk to tennis players in general. Everybody wants time with somebody better than them. Of course! That'd be great wouldn't it? If you go out there to your local courts and somebody who is .5 NTRP better than you to always push you, always gave you a challenge, and to help you improve your game was just sitting there waiting for you to show up. [laughter] You went out and you practiced for 2 hrs. every time that you walked out with this great player. Unfortunately, that's not reality. You're always going to be surrounded by a wide variety of different abilities, different skill levels. If everybody [laughter] held out for somebody who was a little better than them to practice with, nobody would ever have a practice partner! So be open, be generous about your practice time with others. Try to subscribe to the Golden Rule. I know that sounds really corny, but if you help people out, more than likely you're going to find other people who are willing to be open and help you out as well. At least that's the general idea. [laughter] I know it doesn't always work out that way, but try to be generous with your time. More than likely, the people that you're helping out who are a little bit weaker than you--or a bunch weaker than you--are really going to appreciate it at the very least. And maybe try to help you out in the future when you need a hand. Maybe get something to feed you, etc. I'm getting a little bit ahead of myself. But in general, I just want to tell you: be generous with your time. Don't be super picky about who you practice with. Be nice. [laughter] That's #1. I'll get that out of the way. #2: When hitting with a lower level player, we're going to talk specifically about when this does happen. Because you will spend practice time with people who are just not as good as you. That's fine! And yes, you can still get benefit from that. When you are hitting with somebody who's not as good as you, what's not a good idea is to do a bunch of cooperative hitting drills. Which I advocate very strongly here on the podcast. Setting up a drill where you're hitting x shot to y target. And your partner is hitting x shot to their y target. You're trying to create a rally that's conducive to repetition and practice back and forth. One of my favorite ways for players to practice and get better. Unfortunately, this is not going to work well when there's a wide difference between the players, because the rallies are not going to last that long. When you have one player who's significantly better and another player that's weaker, the rallies are probably only going to last 2-3 shots each, because the weaker player can't handle the pace or the spin coming from the stronger player. It's not going to end up being good practice. So unfortunately, that's not going to work out well. But what can work out well, and two different things that I really think you should be focusing on, Adam. When you are working with somebody who is definitely weaker than you, keep this in mind so that you can get the most out of your time on the court. #1: Feeding drills. I alluded to this earlier. You can help each other work on specific strokes, or combinations of strokes, through feeding. You can just set up a simple feeding drill with a specific target and where one player feeds to the other player. Tries to give them specific shots to work on. Of course only one player at a time is really working on their game in this scenario, but you can trade off every 30 min., or every 15-20 min. Whatever. You can say, "OK, I'm looking to work on my forehand approach shot." So the other player feeds you forehand approach shots. You hit those for 15 min. Feeding players is alright. I've been working on my returning serve. So you hit some serves, or hit a couple of serves from the service line to help the other person work on the return serve. Whatever! You can coach each of yourselves through specific types of shots. You can really be definitely working hard on your game through this. It can definitely be a benefit to both of you. Now of course if you only have one can of balls, then this becomes not as good. You need a hopper of balls, or at least a can of balls, to make this worthwhile. So if you don't have that, then this isn't going to work out terribly well. But if you do have access to a hopper of balls, then this can still be great. The second thing that you can do when there's a difference between player levels is competitive games. At this point in the show, everybody needs to listen to me very closely. This is the second time today that I'm going to say something that everybody needs to hear and needs to listen. You need to practice closing ot and beating lower level players. I know you might think that's a waste of your time when somebody is .5 NTRP below you, or their technique is not as good, They don't look like as good of a player, so you feel like it's a waste of your time. Please don't have that attitude! I can't even tell you how many times I've seen somebody lose to a player who they think is not as strong as them because they don't look as nice on the court. Their technique is not as refined. And yet they find a way to win. And yet the player who lost will not practice with that player, because they consider them to be lesser of a player than them. Even though clearly they need to work on beating exactly this type of person, because they lost to them! Please don't have an attitude like that. Don't be a tennis snob. Please don't be like this. You can benefit even if the person is clearly not as strong as you. And even if you tend to win easily, it's good practice for your mental confidence. For your stroke confidence. If they give you weak shot after weak shot, if they tend to just push the ball back, great! How many people complain about pushers? This is an opportunity for you to work against that type of player: somebody who's not as strong as you, who's just pushing the ball in play. It's a great opportunity for you to work on your mental confidence and your stroke confidence to be able to play against somebody like this. Don't be bashful about beating them by a lot! If it does turn out that way, that's fine. Be realistic. Be honest. And play full out. If it wasn't helpful for them, then they probably won't ask you to hit with them again. And that's totally fine! You can move on to somebody else. I'm not saying be mean about it either. Be a snob the other way and say, "Yeah, I'll play with you," and then crush them. [laughter] And then laugh at them about it. That's not what I'm saying. Be gracious about giving them your time, and work on your own strokes, your own confidence, and putting away players that aren't as good as you. Because when you go and play competition, you're going to play people who are not as good as you. It's a whole separate skill, beating people who are clearly not as good as you. Many players struggle by getting nervous. Getting worried. "Ah, I can't lose to this person. They're obviously not as good as me." Then the better player starts hitting down to the level of the other player. Anybody who's played competitive tennis knows exactly what I'm talking about. You should be practicing against that type of player to get better at. Even if you consistently win 6-1, 6-0, or whatever, playing aggressively and you're feeling confident that's great. You can still get use out of this time by working on something new. You can work on technique. Maybe even work on hitting with more top spin on your forehand side and practice. And you're not confident enough yet to use it during a match that really counts, or in a match you really want to win. But again, some player who's not as strong as you, you can go ahead and cut yourself some slack. You can give away some more points. Go ahead and work on something new that you've been practicing. Or work on a new type of tactic. Maybe you don't usually like to come to the net, so against this lower level player, you can come to the net every single point! Just practice that. You can work on specific little parts of your game that you want to add into your game in general that you normally wouldn't do against a player who's as good as you or better than you. Practice that against this lower level player, even if it means giving away more games than you normally would, or even giving away a set or a match. Be humble enough and have an open enough mind to realize that you can still practice specific things, get good practice out of it, and have it be worth your while even if it needs practicing something new or something different that you're trying to learn or get better at. Alright. So Adam, that's my feedback. Good question. In review, yes, it can be beneficial. Don't be a snob. [laughter] Be a nice person. Be generous with your time. You can still find things to work on, whether it be feeding practice or competitive practice. Working on something new. Working on your confidence putting away lower level players, etc. You can always find things to work on. I encourage you to do that. Alright. Thanks very much for being a listener, Adam. I appreciate it. Take care. Good luck with this. [music] Alright. That brings Episode #148 of the Essential Tennis podcast to a close. If you're listening, thank you very much. I appreciate you being a listener of the shows. Supporting the show by downloading the file and listening. I really hope it's been helpful to you, and I've give you some things to think about and maybe some things to improve. It's always my goal here on the podcast. Sometime--or hopefully early this week--two things. You've got two pieces of homework. Go to PodcastAwards.com if it's before the 15th, Wed. Vote for the Essential Tennis podcast. I would really appreciate that. And #2: go to EssentialTennis.com/Rx if it's before Wed. Go there very quickly so you can get those free instructional videos. Over 1 hr. of instructional video. If it is Wed. or after, check out Tennis Rx, the full course for sale. Again, if you do decide to purchase, if you're one of the first 20 people, you will be eligible to spend 5 hrs. on the court with myself and Will in an exclusive clinic for Rx purchases. Again, to be able to get that offer, you have to purchase through EssentialTennis.com/Rx. Alright. That does it for today's show. Thanks everybody. Take care, and good luck with your tennis. [music] [music]

Podcast #149: Control or Power? Ian talks to Dave "The Koz" Kozlowski about which to develop in your tennis game and when.

ianw — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 15:18:11 +0000

Today I have a special guest on the Podcast: Dave “The Koz” Kozlowski. Koz has a huge passion for the game of tennis and has been around the sport his entire life. Listen to him give his thoughts on which is more important for ET listeners: power or control. How do you get control exactly? When should you add power? Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text Welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you. Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment or the mental game, tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian: Hi and welcome to the Essential Tennis Podcast. Your place for free, expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast is brought to you by TennisExpress.com. Please check them out by going to essentialtennis.com/express. Thank you very much for joining me on today's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast. I'm actually recording this on Sunday the 19th because I'm getting ready to head out the door to Baltimore Airport so that I can go up to Wisconsin and join my wife and my child Lucy. We are going to be spending a little bit over a week there visiting both our families. So I'm looking forward to that a lot and hopefully all of you guys listening to my voice are out doing similar activities as well-- visiting family and friends. It's just a great time of the year and I'd like to wish you all a merry Christmas, happy holidays. Whatever you happen to celebrate during this time of the year and I really appreciate having all of you guys as listeners. I'm very thankful for that. Today's show is going to be a rerun... I've never done this before, but I just ran out of time. Yesterday, Saturday, was a regular workday for me and getting packed and everything. I planned on recording a new show for this week but just ran out of time. So this is going to be a show that I think was a really good one. It was recorded in March of 2010. It was show #108 originally and I interviewed Koz, Dave the Koz Kozlowski and I think just a great interview. Koz just has a really apparent passion for the game so he was really fun to talk to. So I hope you guys enjoy listening to this show again or it's very possible you haven't heard it the first time. So check it out and I hope you guys enjoy it. Just one more thing before I get to that interview. I want to kind of do something a little bit special for both the holidays and for episode 150 of this show which is going to be next week, the 27th. I'd like to involve you guys in this show. I would like for you guys to call in and leave me a voicemail on the Essential Tennis hotline. Simply say your name, where you are from and some kind of holiday greeting. You can say merry Christmas, happy holidays, happy Hanukkah, you can say happy year years or whatever. Whatever holiday greeting you would like to extend to all of the Essential Tennis listeners, use that. So this should last about 5, maybe 10 seconds per person at the most. So as an example, I would say "Hey my name is Ian. I'm from Wisconsin and merry Christmas." And what I'm going to do is take all the ones that people record to me, send in to me, and put them all together and have a nice compilation from listeners hopefully from all over the world giving a seasons greeting. I think that would be kind of a special close to episode 150 right now during the holiday season. I think that would be very cool. So if you guys would like to participate in that, please give me a call. I won't be answering, I'll be letting everything go through to the voicemail and the hotline number is 484-938- 8255. Again, that's 484-938-8255. If you'd like to call in and tell us your name, where you are from and a holiday greeting and I'll make that part of the end of episode 150. I think that would be a cool thing that we can all do together. So I look forward to hearing your guys messages and putting them into the show next week. OK, let's go ahead and get down to business. Sit back, relax and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] My guest today on the Essential Tennis Podcast is Dave, the Koz, Kozlowski. Koz, welcome to the shore. Dave : Hey Ian, great to be here with you. This is exciting-- I know that you are into your third year and you've had over 100 of these Podcasts. You are on the cutting edge and you know that. So thanks for having me on and what do you want to talk about tonight? Ian : Well, let's kick things off by telling my listeners a little bit about you. I want to make sure that anyone that is not familiar with you or your background, know exactly where you are coming from and how much expertise you have in the game of tennis. So please tell my listeners a little bit about your background in journalism and broadcast and instruction. Dave : I'm a humble guy and I'm smiling as you ask me to do this but anything that sounds impressive is only because I've hung around the industry long enough and a lot of people have felt sorry for me and have been good to move which has given me a chance to move up through the ranks. But I've been teaching for, I don't want to say how many decades, but it's approaching 4 decades. I was lucky enough to get into the industry and to be one of the first 17 master pro's in the world and that came about because I was up there early for nominations and I got it before it was a lot tougher to get these days. I was very fortunate to have enough friends in the industry to vote me into USPTA national pro of the year and that was really was a credit to everyone that has helped me along the way more than it was just for me. And as I addressed the group about this award, and certainly, I was very honored and I vividly remember getting this letter-- I thought it was just a form letter from the USPTA-- but I did open it and I started reading it and all of a sudden it was hard to not finish reading it but I was so emotionally distracted that I had to start from the beginning again. I remember sharing the joy with family members and my wife and it was a very proud, joyous moment. But then a half hour later I'm on the tennis court and I'm teaching and I get that same high, that same emotional input to that so that this is as good as it gets. So as good as it was getting that award, you get it every day when you are in the teaching industry, when you are relating to somebody. You quickly find out that you're not teaching tennis to people but you're teaching people through tennis and I immediately knew that that's the award. But as I told so many 1000s of people-- this is a numbers game. And there are 1000s of guys like you but one is chosen per year so there are so many guys in the field that will have the ability and the background and the accomplishments to get it. But it's a numbers game and they may not. So when I received that award, dedicated to all the guys that were better than I am, that are not going to get this reward just because it's a numbers game. But as I have mentioned, people have been good to me and the USPTA in the year 2000 honored me as USPTA broadcaster of the year-- and I had no right getting that because I had no formal training and everything I do is hands-on, learning on the spot, trial and error. But it was a passion that came out and I thoroughly enjoyed that opportunity going to all ends of this country and also that I would never have that opportunity in meeting people. And it's a funny thing when you have a mic in your hand, all of a sudden people will talk to you. So it's been a great experience. Ian : You are a man after my own heart. You not only really enjoy the game of tennis, but you are a person who is passionate about media as well and communicating your enthusiasm to others. - And so I'm really happy to have you on the show and thanks for being here. Dave : It's my honor. It's great to be here. Ian : So, let's go ahead and get to our topic today which I think this is going to be an outstanding show and it is kind of a debate or a topic for the ages as it pertains to tennis and especially to those who listen to my show who are recreational-level players, they are club level players, people who are looking for any way that they can possibly improve their tennis game. And so often the question gets asked, what's more important? Being able to hit the ball with power or with control and it's kind of a trick question a little bit. Obviously anybody would say that they would like to have both, but often times when players are just beginning and they have to pick and choose what they are working on, I think a lot of times amateur players get faced with the question-- what should I work on first? And control versus power, I think, is kind of a conundrum. So why don't you kind of kick us off here with some initial thoughts on that question? What is your first reaction to that question? Dave : Well, my first reaction is that I first all thoroughly enjoy your audience so if they are recreation club players, I know the passion they have for the game, and they are all hungry to improve and to find ways to enjoy it more. So this is a great topic and it's an ongoing question-- power or control, what comes first. First of all to be successful, you need both. Let me share a thought here-- to be successful in any venue in life-- business, education-- you need to have a respect for the tradition before. In tennis, you need to have a tradition and a respect for the tradition of the game. But you also need to have a healthy welcome for changes in the game and in technology. However, I think that most players, in the audience that you are dealing, good recreational players, athletes, but maybe folks that are not going to make the top 1% of the professional ranks. They are better to get a foundation and to get the fundamentals first. And it's so important that they establish a base and that base consists of rhythm and it also consists of learning proper footwork and movement. In today's game where all the emphasis is on speed and power, often times, players find themselves not being able to handle routine situations. They aren't bad and the extraordinary because they are taught to turn and run and to scamper to the ball. But many times, it's just a routine shot down the middle and you need to have some motor-memory so that you produce the same shot 1000s of times-- but this doesn't happen at the club level because time doesn't allow and they are competitive and they'd rather hit 5 minutes of warm-ups and get right into match play so they never really get the shot motor-memorized. But it's so important that they try to get a shot that is repeatable and by repeatable, I mean, being able to produce a strong resemblance to the previous shot several times in a row so that it's a motor-memory type thing. And if you watch other sports like basketball and someone is working on his foul shots, he is going to stand in the same spot and not move more than 2 or 3 inches and just release 50 shots in a row. Some of the greatest golfers in the game, like Gary Claire will go out there and hit the same repeatable shot 150 times for 50 yards, just trying to get the motor-memory. Paul Azinger on the Rider Cup as a player and a coach, and I've seen him do this-- both Gary Claire and Paul Azinger were at the club where I was the tennis director and they would come in for golf exhibitions and seminars. He would take 20 balls and put them around a 2 foot area from the cup-- he would not do another thing in golf that day until he was able to sink 22 footers. Well that sounds like a piece of cake doesn't it? But they do miss, so it's the importance of getting a repeatable shot. And I think that players really need to have an idea of where the racket is finishing. I remember sitting with some legendary coaches in the game-- Ian Crikerton who was from New Zealand, a really fine college coach-- and Bill Tims, one of the legends in the game-- they really stress the importance of knowing where the racket is finishing with a repeatable-type of excursion. And we've gotten a bit away from that.. It's very tough for today's players to watch the pro's on TV because they are seeing extreme moves and it's almost as if it's extreme sports. But they are not playing extreme sports when they go out to play, they are playing routine so they need to get more familiar with routine moves. And if you watch the great players of the game, Justine Ena, who is as pure as they come on the female side and Roger Federer who is as pure as they come on the male side, they have a rhythmatic side-shuffle step. It's so important for players to know there is a [inaudible] . And a lot of times, we are taught to get there quickly, to get their early and they get there too soon and all of a sudden they have to stop the move and there is dead time and it's hard to adjust. But if you watch the great players, it's almost as if they are playing a basketball side-shuffle step guarding a man. They are taking two or three rhythmatic steps side-shuffle facing the net then turn and hit on both sides, the forehand and backhand. And I really believe if the average player can learn that rhythm, that everything starts to fall in place. And sometimes if nothing improves except just that rhythmatic footwork, the game is going to improve for them. Their shots are going to get better, their rhythm is going to get better and their arrival time is going to more accurate. They are going to find themselves being in a better strike zone to contact the ball and they are establishing a rhythm. Ian : Great stuff. One thing that really jumped out to me was you were talking about how often times amateur players can come up with an incredible shot at one point in time and miss a shot later that is completely routine and as both a teacher and a player, when I go out to play, I don't think there is anything more frustrating to me than for me myself, or one of my students to miss the easy shots, to miss the routine shots that should be repeatable or we should have a rhythm to those shots. So let's talk about how can my listeners better obtain that rhythm and you talked about basketball players practicing the free throw and you talked about golfers practicing two foot puts-- so what is the equivalent for that and especially keeping in mind the people who are listening to this show are often times not members of clubs where they are able to go and hire a professional instructor to actually run them through drills and have that expertise in person. Some of them do, but for my listeners who maybe don't have that luxury, how can they go out there and train themselves to have this repeatable follow through and this rhythm that you're talking about? Dave : I think that is a great question and it's all about motor-memory so that when the ball comes-- the big downfall in any sport-- it happens in golf, it happens in tennis when the ball is lying there in a golf swing, or the ball is coming in a tennis bounce-- when you try to do something to the ball. When you try to hit it, that's when various body parts get involved with the swing and too many body parts are being involved or the wrong body parts are too active. So the idea is to literally-- and the pros do this because they have sparring partners-- they are hitting 1000s of balls every day in a non-competitive situation so that it just becomes instinctive and it becomes motor-memorized. The best thing is to try to set a pattern and it's a proven study that a new habit will be formed after 1800 reps. So if you break that down to any month, 30 days, if you do this habit 60 times a day for 30 days, that's 1800 times, then it becomes instinctive. So when that ball is arriving on your right hand side of your forehand, you're not trying to do something to do it. You're not trying to think of what you want to do to it, it's just motor-memory. And simple motor-memory activities can be-- and I'm a strong believer that on the forehand, you really want to have more upper dominance out of the shoulder than you want to out of the hands. The hands are needed to locate the ball, to find the ball. But once you find the ball, the lower arm from the elbow to the wrist stays still and there is more movement out of the shoulder, the bigger muscle. So simply what you want to try to do and if you buy into this concept, anatomically when we stand still, there is a gap between the shoulder and the chin. The gap between the shoulder and the chin is about 6-8 inches. So on a daily basis, if you just merely take the hitting shoulder-- let's say you're right-handed-- take the right shoulder and touch the chin 60 times a day so it's automatic -- with a rack in your hand or without -- and any of these motor-memory exercises can be done in the office, on the road in a hotel, then can be done in your house where it's not needed to have a racket but you are actually getting the motor-memory of the motion taking place. 60 times a day, 30 days, your right shoulder travels and touches your chin -- that's one. The right shoulder travels and touches the chin, that's two. Another good exercise is to actually swing and as you swing, catch the racket in the left hand so that you are giving yourself a reference on extending the arm. And we're so involved with power and you'll see some of the great players finish in a bent elbow position on the forehand but before they've got there Ian, you and I know that there is a period of extension so they are extending but it's happening so quickly that the average viewer see's the quick snap of the elbow and the wrist and they feel that this is the way they hit the ball. Eventually that's the way to finish at the extraordinary and high level but leading up to that, you can't go wrong and you'll see the William's sisters go back to the roots and actually catch the racket on some of their forehand finishes. Are they doing it to correct something from their previous shots? I don't know. Are they doing it to extend out to form a good habit? I don't know that either. Whatever they are doing, they are actually practicing extension. So our listeners can 60 times let the right shoulder touch their chin at the same time they're doing that, catch the racket in the left hand. All of a sudden they are getting motor-memory on what the excursion should be taking place on the forehand. So the next time the ball comes, they are not trying to do something to it. It's automatic, motor-memory response. Ian : There is something I'd like to hit on that you talked about that really hit a cord with me... A couple minutes ago you mentioned that when amateur players see the ball coming towards them, often times they make the mistake of actually trying to do something to it. And I'd like to go back to that for a second. I first heard this concept on a golf Podcast-- I'm actually a golfer as well. Dave : I did not steal this from a golfer but I use that concept because if you try to do something to the golf ball, you are in trouble baby. Ian : Absolutely. Dave : And the average player, if you try to do something to it, you are in trouble again. Our biggest fear in tennis at the most entry level is being afraid of missing the ball when he or she swings. So the attempt is 'I'm going to make sure I don't miss that ball baby. ' Then all of a sudden, they have to make lots of adjustments and compromises to just find where the ball is because they are so inhibited about missing the ball that all of a sudden things don't flow.. They don't become a motor-memorized activity. So, just like the golfer, you really cannot try to do something to the ball and that's when things are going to break down. But I interrupted you, so finish your good thought. Ian : The instructor that I had heard talking about this and it really struck me when I heard him say it, the person who was interviewing him had asked him if you had to choose one thing that amateur golfers do poorly, what would it be that you think they should improve? And he said 'amateur golfers so often try to hit the ball instead of learning a good stroke and a good technique and simply allowing the ball to get in the way of that swing. ' And that just struck me as being so profound that amateur players often times, for instructors like you and me it's easy to pick out a lower level player because they are often times so tense and so tight. I'm curious what your thoughts are on how having a repeatable swing and having that muscle memory and having that grooved into play, goes hand in hand with being relaxed and loose and more efficient physically. Dave : Well, first of all my primary goal with anybody on the tennis court is to make sure that he or she has a good time. I never want to turn them off with too much technique, too much instruction. That's the most fun for me because for us, it's a science and I often times will ask teaching pros 'how many of you teaching pros are teaching for selfish reasons?' And everybody is a bit uncomfortable and won't raise their hand and I raise my hand and say 'well it's obvious, but we have to do it for a living. Wouldn't the world be great if we could teach everybody who wanted to play and not have to charge. But that's not the real world. How many of you are actually selfish that you actually want to learn more than your student is learning? And a few more raised their hand and I raised my hand because my goal when I go out to teach someone is to walk off that court learning as much if not more than he or she has learned so that I'm learning from them and can then pass that on to future students where I'm planning new innovative ways of doing it. - I need to get back to your question that you asked me which was what again Ian? Ian : I was curious... Dave : I had a better answer then I had a response for the question.. Ask it again if you don't mind. Ian : I was curious what your thoughts were on the relationship between amateur players trying to do something to the ball or trying to hit it too much as opposed to just having a repeatable swing-- I was curious what your thoughts were on the connection between that and being loose and relaxed and being able to be consistent. We've all seen Federer play and how easy he makes it look. It looks like his body-- he looks like some kind of dancer out there. Dave : Very smooth. Very rhythmic and there is a real cadence that he brings to tennis and he is a great model to watch and he is so effortless in all of his moves. I will answer the question that you did ask me and I think one of the key things is for them to try to minimize the body movement. And it's amazing with your golf background, you know this for a fact that some people cannot swing a golf club and retain their balance. The golf club takes the body all over the place and this happens certainly in tennis where people swing and all of sudden they lose some balance and in the process of losing their balance, they have to make adjustments or compromises with other body parts to try to get the body back in balance. Well this happens to the great players but they can control the balance and regain balance much better. One of the goals needs to be how well can you swing and actually hold your balance in place? One of the greatest all time-- and I'm not saying just tennis coaches, because this guy was touted by Sports Illustrated as being the best coach in sports. Not just tennis, in sports and his name is Welby Van Horn-- he is still alive and he's out in Palm Springs. He was the mentor of several outstanding world class players and one of them that he taught in Peurto Rico, one of them was Charlie Pasarel. And if you've ever watched him 30 years ago on three days in a row he had wins against Ash, over Laver and Emerson-- bang, bang, bang. And one of the key things with Van Horne was to try to hold the balance in place with some deliberate extension for 3 seconds. And of course I've used it for decades after hearing him say hold balance and to hold the racket in place for three seconds. One thing that I try to do with students when they are hitting to one another-- so Ian, if you and I are going out to rally and you hit the ball and it bounces and I still get it back to you and you are at the baseline and I'm at the baseline, in my mind try to hold that balance until my ball lands on your side of the court then I'll come back to a neutral position. If you get players to do this, and they can do this by themselves, and I learned my tennis on the recreation courts and we had to find ways where there is a wall so maybe there is a way. So anybody can do this with another practice partner but that's a little tough and that's another episode in itself that so many players practice for themselves but they don't practice for their sparring partner, their practice partner. If they would realize that the more they hit to this player, the more balls they get coming back and it becomes beneficial for both. But getting back to the comment is to actually hold your balance in place. One thing that I do on the forehand and most times if somebody is taking private training, I will spend two minutes working on lead-ups, ie a two handed forehand. And one of the things that I really try to emphasize is a continuous motion in two areas-- a continuous motion in the foot work and a continuous motion in the back swing. So the feet are moving and the racket is moving and we are referring to a loop right now, so they learn the rhythm about when to take it back and the speed at which to take it back, so I'll have everybody that really wants to try to improve, buy into this and spend a few minutes working on the side shuffle-step delivery and a two handed lead-up. And what it does, is it gets them closer to the ball. They've got to bring the strike zone in move and anatomically they've got to bend the knees. They've got to get lower. They find themselves coiling the shoulders then uncoiling the shoulders. And all this stuff is a pleasant lead-up to a one-handed forehand. So I'll have them do that for 2 or 3 minutes but then, I'll have them go to one hand and you'll have to listen to this closely because it sounds inane, it sounds stupid but they will hold the racket in the right hand, swing, contact the ball but the moment they contact it, let go of the right hand, catch it in the left, pull it as far out as they can with the left so they do not try to direct or guide the racket and that their shoulder doesn't get locked in-- they don't get muscular in their shoulder. Some of the best forehands they hit that day are these shots where they literally hit the ball with their right hand, grab, catch in the left hand so they are letting go of the racket. And I see this tremendously helping players in learning how to relax the arm. And it sounds silly but what they are doing is allowing their racket head to become more dominant and the racket head starts doing some work. So after they do this for a couple of minutes, then they do the same grab and catch but they retain the right hand on and all of a sudden. They have that motor-memory swing where it is the same swing repeated each time. Ian : Well guys, I want to get to at least one more question here before we run out of time. Dave : Didn't you ever hear that there were no clocks in heaven, nor are there any clocks on the tennis court. I've never looked at a clock when talking tennis. Ian : Well unfortunately, I have to watch it. I wish I didn't because I have kind of a tradition on the Podcast especially when guests are on the show, time just flies. That's how I know I've got a good guest on the show-- it's gone by incredibly fast. I've got one more question I'd love to get your thoughts on. Earlier in the show when you and I were talking, you mentioned that both control and power do have their place in tennis. And all of our time so far has been spent talking about getting a rhythm, having a repeatable swing. Getting repeatable results. So I'm curious what your thoughts are on when is it appropriate-- let's say we have an amateur, club level player, who is really starting to become a student of the game and they are working hard on their tennis. They are hitting with the wall, with practice partners. They are working hard on being consistent. When is it appropriate for this player to them start working on developing weapons and being able to hit with more power? Dave : That's a very good question and the answer that I may have to give is that it has to come quickly because they see all the speed in the game. They want to reproduce that speed. They want to certainly emulate that type of game. So that's got to be exposed quickly and I have a friend that we would discuss a lot of tennis with and he's been in the industry as long as I have and a former great coach. But he would spend a lot of time on this ball control where they would have to hit 5 or 6 balls behind the service line and that sounds like a piece of cake until some players try to do it. You've got to be able to keep the ball at will behind the service line 5 or 6 times in a row. And they would spend a lot of time working on control and trying to reproduce the same swing, the same shot. Then he would tell them at the second half of working on the forehand, and he might do this on the forehand or backhand, it doesn't matter. Now I want you with the same swing, and trying to keep the same body control, and almost the same finish, now to allow the racket head to speed up. Now, let me see how hard you can hit it. And one of the key things is that players and we have all levels of club player, some players never really develop the confidence to allow the racket head to speed up and sometimes you can ask a very simple question. Should the racket speed up or slow down as it approaches the ball? Well everyone knows that the racket should speed up but some players may not know that or appreciate that. You absolutely need to feel that as the racket gets closer to the ball, you want the racket to be speeding up. So it's a slow start, a medium pace, middle there when the racket is gaining some speed but at the end, the racket is speeding up. So I think it's important that when they warm up, they spend time on consistency and that they are also allowed to get back to the baseline and try to hit hard offensive shots. Now one thing that seems to help as well as anything is that and this sounds extraordinary and its certainly an overload principle-- you want them to not hit the ball out of bounds obviously. But you want them to get it as deep to the baseline as you can because depth allows anybody to play with better players and they can't take advantage of you as you are on neutral terms. But if one puts a towel or a target 6 feet behind the baseline, and now I tell John, 'John let's rally the ball but I want you to try to hit that ball so it lands near the towel. ' Yes, it's 6 feet out-- I know that and you know that. But that's where I want you to think where you are aiming and all of the sudden starts to speed up the racket and starts to instinctively to get the ball deeper and he hits it harder but he also aims it higher so without really programming it, now you're working on a lot of power. He's keeping the control but he's allowing the racket head to speed up and 90% of the balls do not go outside of the baseline. They fall half way between the service line and the base line and maybe a third of the way behind the mid-court that they are botched 6 feet into the baseline. So it's important to do both and the same coach that I refer to Jim Fredrica, an old friend, he would have a practice one day a week for his Michigan State team, a Big 10 school, and how many balls do you think he'd give every twosome to go out and practice that one. One ball between Ian and me. So that day, you obviously worked on some ball control. So he mixed it nicely and a lot of our players probably need to go out with 6 balls max to keep the ball in play and then they can start to speed it up and get some confidence to hit up. But they need both, no doubt about it. Although, if I had a chose between a high school kid who had power but not accuracy or consistency and a kid who kept more balls in play, if I wanted a winning record that year I'd opt to play him compared to the guy who misses more but has the power. And that's not going to motivate any of our listeners, I know that, but it tells the story. Ian : Thank you so much for spending this time with me and you're a perfect fit for this show. Your enthusiasm for the game and instruction of the game is very obvious and evident and I know my listeners are going to enjoy listening to this conversation a great deal. So thank you so much for being on the show with me. Dave : Hey I like your listeners. Let me tell your listeners something-- remember in tennis scoring love means nothing, but love of the game means everything. You keep alive your love of the game as you do and you have your tennis listeners keep their love of their game and I love you all. Thanks for having me on. Ian : People, please check out indietennis.com as that is where can catch Koz's material and he's got some audio content there you can check out and Koz, I hope that I can have you back on the show in the future. Dave : It would be my pleasure and I look forward to it. [music] [music] Ian : Alright, that does it for this week's episode of the Essential Tennis Podcast, episode #108. Thank you very much for joining me today and let's go ahead and get to the flip cam giveaway. In order to enter yourself into the draw for a free flip cam, and there is lots of other prizes to be given away as well. If you haven't checked that out yet, go to essentialtennis.com/contest and there is a list of all the prizes I'm going to be giving away including that flip cam. In order to enter, all you guys need to do is go to essentialtennis.com/flip. And you'll be taken to just a little form to fill out-- just three things, your name, your email address and whether or not you've heard the Podcast before-- that's it. And you'll be entered automatically into the drawing and a week from today, on episode #109, I will be announcing all of the winners in that contest. So good luck to you and thank you very much for listening today and for your entry. I'm looking forward to giving away all those prizes. And if this was your first time listening, I release this show every Monday-- every single Monday I put out a new episode all about improving your tennis game and tennis instruction. Check it out on iTunes, it's the number one rated tennis instruction Podcast on iTunes and you can subscribe to it there. That's definitely the easiest way to get the show every week. Alright that does it for this week. Take care everybody and good luck with your tennis. [music]

Podcast #150: Mental Toughness With Dr. Cohn

ianw — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 22:09:12 +0000

The mental game is such a make or break topic when it comes to your competitive tennis. Today I’m joined by Dr. Patick Cohn who helps me answer several listener questions about their mental game. Topics include: getting angry on court, playing in front of a crowd, and repeated double faulting. Download Transcript: Word Doc | PDF | Kindle | Text [music] Announcer: Welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast. If you love tennis and want to improve your game, this podcast is for you! Whether it's technique, strategy, equipment--or the mental game-- tennis professional Ian Westermann is here to make you a better player. And now, here's Ian! Ian Westermann: Hi, and welcome to the Essential Tennis podcast, your place for free expert tennis instruction that can truly help you improve your game. Today's episode of the Essential Tennis podcast is brought to you by TennisExpress.com. Please check them out by going to EssentialTennis.com/Express. Thank you very much for joining me on today's show during this busy holiday season. Speaking of which, I just got back in town a couple of hours ago. [laughter] It's funny. The last time I was at my home here in Maryland, I was just recording the intro for Podcast #149 before I headed out the door. And I'm sitting here right now, it's Mon. and my wife and I and Lucy just got back in town. So I'm going to be doing another recorded show here, and I'm going to be re-releasing another show that I thought was really good. because to be honest, I've just had no time to put together a completely new episode. So I apologize, but I know today's episode is going to be great, especially for those of you who have not heard it before! And if you have, it's great review anyway. Mental tennis topics, and getting tougher mentally in your tennis game is such an important thing. Today you're going to be listening to an episode, the first episode I ever did, with Dr. Cohn, who's a mental toughness expert. So I hope you enjoy today's episode My conversation with him. Two quick things before we get to that. First of all, I want to thank all of you who voted for the Essential Tennis podcast at PodcastAwards.com. Unfortunately, the Essential Tennis podcast didn't win the top award, but in watching the awards ceremony, I learned that over 3,000 shows were nominated for awards at PodcastAwards.com. That's across all of the different categories. Not 3,000 shows for sports, but 3,000 total shows, and they were all put into their correct category and then voted on from there. Only the Top 10 shows in each category were even able to be voted on. For Essential Tennis to make the Top 10, I'm really proud of that, and I thank all of you who voted to get it to that spot. The category was won by a show that ESPN produces. [laughter] So I'm not disappointed to lose to ESPN, but in the future, I would love to win that award. I know it's possible. Just in general, I want to thank you for your support. Especially to all of you who voted to try to make that happen. We'll try again next year. Lastly, before we get to my interview with Dr. Cohen, I asked you guys last week to submit a holiday greeting calling to the Essential Tennis hotline. Record your name, your location, and a holiday greeting. I've got a bunch of those, and I'm going to save those for the end of the show. So thank you who called in to record your greeting. Really cool. I enjoyed hearing from all of you. The various greetings that you extended to me and the Essential Tennis listeners was really cool to hear! So thank you all who participated and did that, and those are all going to be lined up at the end of the show. Alright. Let's get down to business. Sit back, relax, and get ready for some great tennis instruction. [music] [music] My guest with me today on the Essential Tennis podcast is Dr. Patrick Cohen. Dr. Patrick Cohen works with many nationally ranked junior players on their mental game. He is the host of the Tennis Psychology podcast, which you can find on iTunes and also on his website, which is SportsPsychology Tennis.com. Dr. Cohen, welcome to the program. Dr. Cohen: Thanks for having me, Ian! Ian: You bet! I'm always excited to have new guests on the podcast. I like talking back and forth with tennis experts. One of the most common topics that gets talked about here on the Essential Tennis podcast is the mental game. I really like talking about tennis and where the mental game fits in. I think it's an area that your average level tennis player can really see big strides and improvements to their game by getting good information about how to strengthen themselves mentally. So it's great to have you on the show. I'm looking forward to answering the questions that you have from the listeners of the show. So thanks for being here. Tell us a little bit about what you do. I know that you worked with nationally ranked juniors. Do you work with any club level or avg. level players as well? Or do you normally just interact with upper level players? Dr. Cohen: It's usually high level amateur or junior players, nationally ranked junior players for the most part that are going to hire me to work on the mental game. I want to do a little off shoot of what you talked about earlier, Ian. I think the mental game can be often neglected by players until they realize that there's a problem or a challenge. And that's unfortunate. It's unfortunate in my work that players feel like they need to be in a slump, or they have a real mental game issue. Like they've lost all their confidence, or they can't take their practice game to matches, for example, before they decide on, "Well maybe it's a mental game issue." I don't think it should be that way. I think players need to educate themselves and learn more and more as their game improves. They need to learn more and more, and educate themselves about the mental game. To me, the mental game is like physical training. The most physical training you do to improve your fitness, it's similar with the mental game. The more you do mental training, the better you're going to get with your mental game. That's how I want players to perceive the mental game. It's not about solving problems all the time. It's about just getting better. Ian: I totally agree with several points that you made. First of all, your avg. level club player probably considers the mental side of the game something that's not terribly important. I think you're right. Most players probably wait until there's a big problem before they start to address it. Which is a shame! Because if you're mentally tough, that can really be a huge advantage out there on the court, since you and your opponent are both out there on your own. You don't have a coach; you don't have a teammate unless it's doubles; and you've got to coach yourself through the mental challenges and struggles. That's why I love having guys like you on the podcast. As far as building up your strength or your toughness mentally, I've had another mental tennis expert on the show a couple of times who refers to that as "mental muscle." I like that phrase a lot. But you're right. It's like practice in any other part of the game. It's something that listeners of this issue, and any player, can get stronger at. So thanks very much for being here. Let's go ahead and start getting into the questions here. I posted on the forums at EssentialTennis.com and asked for topic suggestions. The Dr. and I are going to be answering several of these questions. Maybe 3-4. We'll see how many we have time for. Typically, time runs over [laughter] and I don't get to as much as I want to. But our first one is a question from Brian Mark, who comes to us from Nebraska. He wrote and asked: "How about letting go of double faults and preparing to hit the next serve? It seems that once I hit one, I start to worry about the next one and create self-fulfilling prophecies. Then nights like tonight I only hit one in a set and wonder why I don't always do that. Seems like tournaments bring out the worst in my serve." Brian said he had 23 double faults last weekend in a match, which definitely makes it tough to win! [laughter] Thank you for posting that question. Dr. Cohen, what do you think? What is the best way for players to let go of a let down? Obviously we don't want to double fault, and it's 3 points. How do we let go of the disappointment of giving away something like that? Dr. Cohen: Well Brian described it as a self-fulfilling prophecy, and not everybody might understand that Ian, so maybe I should start from there. When a player makes a double fault and they engage in this "Here I go again" thinking, "Here I go again double faulting the match away" [laughter] then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. You start to think that, "I'm going to double fault again," or "It's just one of those nights where I'm into that double fault mode." That's what a self-fulfilling prophecy is. You talk yourself into it, and now you think you're double faulting a lot during the match. And it just... Double faults turn into more double faults. That's what a self-fulfilling prophecy is, OK? They have to be obviously careful with that. I can speak to that. But I think what's happening in Brian's case is he's making what's called the "generalization." It's related to the self-fulfilling prophecy. A generalization is: if I start the match early with double faults, I'm going to continue making double faults. In other words, he generalizes based upon past matches that if he starts with making double faults that it's going to continue for him. That's a really dangerous mindset, that generalization. So maybe the first step is he's got to be very careful about the "Here we go again" and making those generalizations about the double faults. With that said, I also think what happens, based upon my experience working with players, is when they double fault, they get it into their head that they don't want to do it again. Right? Meaning now they're protecting the double fault. They'll want to make more double faults. "What am I focused on right now? I'm focused on not double faulting again!" That's one of the worst focuses you can have when you're serving is to get up to the line and think, "I don't want to have another double fault!" [laughter] Now you're only focused on the double fault. That's really a bad mindset to be in. The goal needs to be obviously to not focus on the negative, and not focus on what you don't want to do in that situation. The goal needs to be to focus on the ingredient that's going to help you hit a good serve. What do I mean by that? The ingredients of hitting a good serve has to do with having a plan. What type of serve you're going to hit if you've got different options. If you can hit that kicker serve, or hit that flat serve. If you have those different options. What's the target based upon what's working? You're going to go out wide down the line. What's working for you and what is your target? I call that the planning stage. Then you want to go ahead and visualize or feel a good serve, or experience yourself hitting a good serve. Whatever that means for you. It could be visualizing the trajectory. It could be just feeling solid contact. Whatever works for you! It's very individual for each player. Then you're going to go through the rest of your routine at the line where you're bouncing the ball, you're trying to create a rhythm, and then you're focusing on the target, for example. So that's what I mean in a general sense, that's what I mean by the "ingredients of a good serve." You cannot focus on the ingredients of a good serve if you're afraid of double faulting the match away. If you're afraid of missing the service box on your second serve, for example. You have to be very disciplined with your mind and be able to focus on the ingredients that are going to help you hit a serve. As soon as you get defensive and you're protecting the double fault, you're basically done. Ian: I really like the process that you laid out. The ingredients that you gave us there, a recipe for success. What I like so much about it Patrick, is that you're giving us so many positive things that should be focused on: the target, the process, feeling or thinking about making good contact, going into that whole planning phase. Every part of it was a positive thought or a positive emotion was attached to it. As opposed to what Brian is saying, as you said the "Here we go again" type thing, which is clearly negative. And once that prophecy is fulfilled once, obviously the tendency is to go in that downward spiral and continue to repeat that again and again. Emotionally the person gets more and more negative. But what I love about what you're talking about is these are all positive thoughts; all positive emotions. Top level athletes are continuously optimistic. There's never a thought in their mind--well there is sometimes, but the vast majority of their thoughts are: "I'm going to make this shot. I'm going to hit my target. I'm going to hit a good shot." The inner dialog is so positive and intense! So what I'm hearing you say is Brian has got to reverse his inner dialog. It's got to be more positive, more optimistic, and hopefully the results will follow. Is that correct? Dr. Cohen: Absolutely. There's always two sides to the coin, as you talked about. There's the players that go out there and try to avoid failure. Avoid missing shots. Avoid missing the easy volley or the routine shot. Avoid the double fault. Which is very easy to get sucked into. As opposed to there's the players that strive for success, and are always focused on what they want to do to execute that shot. And that's where you need to be throughout the match. It doesn't matter whether we're talking about the service. It's any shot that you're hitting. I shouldn't say, "You can never." You could certainly play that way, but it's not going to be a way to play your best tennis if you're focused on what not to do and avoiding errors. Ian: Yes. That's the classic. Playing not to lose instead of playing to win. The best athletes and competitors in the world are constantly playing to win. They're playing towards their best shots, and that's usually what happens for them. [laughter] As opposed to the opposite. Good stuff. Anything else on that topic, Patrick, before we move onto our next question? Dr. Cohen: Certainly you have to have confidence in your ability to hit the serve. If you can in practice minimize those double faults, and if you increase your first serve percentage, that's going to go a long way too, because then you don't have some of the challenges with worrying about having to get that second serve in because you have a better serve percentage. So for Brian a good goal might be to go our there and focus on a strong first serve percentage rather than minimizing doubles. Ian: Sure. Alright, good stuff. Now let's go on to our next question, and that is going to be from Beebee, who lives in North Carolina. She wrote and said: "I've been fascinated with crowd mentality. By this I mean how a person plays when a crowd is watching. The pros usually use this to their advantage playing to the crowd for show while rec players have a tendency to break down of crowds. It may be good to discuss the difference in their mentality towards crowds, and how a player can change their mentality if a crowd emerges at a match." What do you think, Dr. Cohen? Dr. Cohen: Yes, it's a very intuitive question here, because there is definitely from a professional standpoint the home, what I call the "home court advantage," where they'll use that crowd to their advantage to give them intensity, to give them adrenaline to help m focus even better. I think the best players in the world are able to go deeper into their bubble, deeper into their cocoon, when they have people there cheering them on. It seems counter-intuitive to think that way, that you have more people watching you that are for you and the player can go deeper into the zone, but I think that's what the great players are doing. Now on the other hand, for amateurs, I think their focus is more a concept that I call "social approval." Alright? That's a real broad concept in my work, but basically it says that the player has concerns about what others think. [laughter] So in Bee Bee's case, it's not the crowd mentality. It's about the player's mentality about the crowd. We can go back about worrying about fear of failure and striving to avoid failure. It can be similar from this perspective. Well, you can look at it two sides of the coin here as well. The player that has this fear of embarrassing him or herself is not going to play well when there's bigger crowds. Because that means there's more at stack for that player. There's more at stake, because there's more chance for embarrassment if the player doesn't play well. On the other end of the coin, some players want badly to look good. They want respect. It all falls under the category of social approval. They want to be liked. They want others to see them as good players. So now that player, although focusing on something that's more positive, feels the pressure or feels the need to-- I don't want to say "show off." That's pretty strong. But to show off that person's talents.. And however they do that. It could be winning, or it could just be hitting great shots. But in either case, if you're focus is on what the crowd may be thinking or what persons in the crowd may be thinking about your game, then you're not completely focused on your tennis. You're either worried about embarrassing yourself, or you're concerned that you're showing off your talents in a positive light. In either case it's not going to help you focus on the match, because it becomes pressure and it becomes expectation. So I think the root here Ian, for me is players that focus too much on what others think about their game, we call "social approval" in my work. Ian: OK. That's really interesting. [laughter] We're talking about things now; the social approval that you're talking about, we're getting into some pretty deep psychological responses and desires and wants. It's interesting to me how those things actually get connected so deeply to a sport, like tennis. I've got a follow-up question for you. I'm curious what your response would be to this. So we're talking about the amateur player, and how they become concerned with what the other spectators think of them. "Are they going to think I'm a good player or a bad player wanting to show off?" like you said. Or maybe being nervous. How is it then that professional players oftentimes can feed off that? Feed off of the crowd and actually raise their level. What's the mental or emotional difference between a player who can actually take a crowd setting and elevate their game and somebody who typically chokes in a situation like that? Dr. Cohen: They don't have that need or that concern, I think, of that social approval. I think they've learned that, "Hey, you know what? The only thing that matters is me and my opponent in the court." So part of their mentality isn't focused on `what the crowd is thinking. Like for example, I worked with a junior player that said 40% of her focus is on what her parents and other parents are thinking about her game! [laughter] That's not going to cut it. At the professional level, they don't have this huge concern or this need and worry about what people are thinking. Their only concerned with what's going on on the court. Now when they have that home court advantage, or when there's a lot of people watching, like I said earlier Ian, I think it drives them further into the zone. It drives them further into what they need to focus on to perform their best. Because they know in order for them to perform their best, they need to focus on a specific set of performance cues. The performance cues that are going to help them execute good shots. So to me when they have a home court advantage or when there's a lot of people watching them center court at Wimbledon, for example, they're able to narrow their focus even more on what's important to execute good shots. That's really I think what separates your good amateurs from your top level professionals. Ian: OK. Great stuff! Thanks for answering that question. Let's move on to our third one. I'd like to try to get to two more, but we may run out of time. Our next question comes from Sally in Washington state. She wrote and said: "A subject I'd love to hear discussed is the inner drive to win. The importance of someone knowing someone believes in you; the power of your inner will, and confidence in having that attitude in check before you step out onto the court." Can you talk a little bit about that? The importance of believing in yourself and having confidence in yourself that you can perform well going onto the competitive court. Dr. Cohen: It's critical. It's probably the #1 thing that your listeners have to harness is that inner confidence; that inner belief. The biggest mistake that I see players make is they wait until they get into the match to decide how confident they're going to be. We call that "leaving confidence up to chance." In other words, if they have a poor warm up prior to the match, then they'll struggle with confidence early in the match. Or if they drop a couple of games early in the match, then they'll struggle with confidence, because they're waiting for their game to arrive before they can feel confident. That's the best mistake I think. From my perspective, athletes in general need to be more pro-active with their confidence. Need to take responsibility instead of be reactive. Being reactive means, "Aw, my shots didn't feel great in warm up, so I guess I'm not going to play great today." That's reactive. I prefer my students to be pro-active in that they try to harness and take confidence into the first point of the first set. The first game. That's critical, I think, to give yourself a better chance of playing better early on. Then momentum-- you can get momentum from that, which is another concept in and of itself--it's related to confidence. If I can get momentum, then I've got a lot of confidence going on. Because as you know, we could talk about that in another show. That's a huge topic I think. From a mental perspective is how to harness the momentum, or how to keep the momentum, or how to get the momentum if you don't have it. But being proactive with your confidence means that you're going to remember that confidence isn't about the last shot you hit, or the 10 min. warm up you had before the match. Confidence is a long term project. If you've been playing and practicing for 6 years, that's how long you've been working on your confidence. You always have to remember that confidence needs to be something that's long term and enduring, and not be on the confidence roller coaster depending upon your perception of the last shot or the last game of the match. That's not true confidence. If you're losing confidence early in the match very quickly, then there's a good indication that you don't have the true confidence that you need. Ian: Good stuff. Tell me if I'm wrong here, but I would have to assume then that this is very closely tied to the first question we talked about where Brian was having problems double faulting, and having pessimistic thoughts or negative attitude in a self-fulfilling type of thing. I would have to assume then Dr. Cohen, that building that long term confidence is probably closely tied in with having positive thoughts, and picking your target and having the process or the ingredients you were talking about. How closely tied in are those two concepts? Dr. Cohen: I would say they're very closely tied in, because when Brian gets in the match, in the back of his mind he's going, "Who's going to show up today?" [laughter] "Server #1 or Server #2?" And that's the start of the doubting process. You're opening up the door for the doubt at that point. Now he's not sure. Confidence-wise, he's not sure who's going to show up for the match. Server #1 or Server #2. That makes it difficult for him to have full confidence in the match. So I do believe being more proactive with his confidence--not assuming that he's going to serve great, but having confidence in a serve prior to the match is going to go a long way. Ian: Nice. Thanks for tying those two things together. I want to get to one more question real quickly before we wrap things up. I want to get to this, because it's a question that's near and dear to my own heart. [laughter] When it comes to competition in general. Not even just in tennis! Sally and Brian both touched on this briefly. Brian said: "A few missed shots, and my dad is down on himself badly. Especially missed overheads. Any suggestions for correcting that?" missed shots especially bothersome to him." Sally said: "I'm still fascinated with the pressure that comes along in real match situations. Does anyone ever feel pressure to be perfect?" You talked just for a couple minutes Dr. Cohen, about maybe those of us who are perfectionists by nature, how can we deal with missing shots or missing easy shots? How can we keep from getting down on ourselves and angry, and falling into a downward emotional spiral? Dr. Cohen: Well, if we had about 2 hrs. I could cover this topic! [laughter] Because this is a huge one in my work. I actually created a program called the Parent's Top Dilemma, which was about perfectionism in youth sports and kids in sports, because it's so rampant! It's even worse when you look at sports like when you go to skating or gymnastics or dance. Where people are judged on their performance, it gets even worse in those type of sports. But it is very relevant in tennis as well. The quick answer to that is... There's so much involved with perfectionism. The quick answer is--well there's two answers. One is the expectations that perfectionists have. Perfectionists go in the match thinking they can't miss shots, or they can't miss hit shots. That they can't double fault so they have very strict expectations about how they should perform. They pretty much look back on their peak performance or their best performance in practice, and they think they should perform that way every single time. So when they don't perform those expectations, then the lost it. They lose confidence, and obviously they lose emotional control and get angry and frustrated. So the quick answer is: You have to manage your expectations going in. The other quick answer is: You have to be much more accepting of yourself in general when you do make mistakes. Which ties in to what I said about expectations. Being accepting means, "I'm not perfect. I'm human. I'm going to make mistakes! It's not going to help me to dwell on those mistakes or beat myself up about those mistakes. But it will help me to learn and to get better as a player and know that mistakes will help me grow." So it's very critical for them to let go of the mistake, be more accepting, and take more of a learning approach and a growth approach from their mistakes so they can get better rather than just emotionally frustrated with what they're doing. Ian: Yes. [laughter] Speaking from experience, it can be very difficult to actually accept that something positive can come from missing. Or losing. Or something that typically has a negative connotation to it in general. And even more so with somebody who has a perfectionist nature. I've actually written a blog about that, about accepting your losses or your misses and learning from it. That can be really hard to do! It's difficult for people like myself to be positive [laughter] when negative things happen on the court. But you know what? I guess me saying that it's negative to miss or negative to lose, I bet that's probably just a product of my nature right there to begin with, isn't it? Just the very fact that I'm saying it's a bad thing to miss. That's just part of the game, isn't it? Dr. Cohen: It is. You have to look at it from a learning perspective. As a matter of fact, I devoted two sessions in my audio program to that one session on letting go of errors, and another session on how to deal with the perfectionism as well. As you know, Ian, I produced a program just for tennis players called Tennis Confidence: Mental Toughness for Tournament Players. Those two things are so important about managing the perfectionism and learning how to stay composed after errors. If you don't have those elements, it's very difficult to play your best. Ian: I agree! [laughter] I know how that goes. Let's wrap things up. Dr. Cohen, I really appreciate you coming on the podcast. Thank you very much for your time and for the effort that you put into answering the questions today. Everybody listening, I encourage you to check out Dr. Cohen's podcast. Again, it's the Tennis Psychology podcast. Go subscribe to it on iTunes. Check out his website at SportsPsychologyTennis.com. Patrick, thank you for joining me. I appreciate your time. And I look forward to hearing more of your shows. Dr. Cohen: Great. Thanks for having me on, Ian! [music] [music] Ian: Alright. That does it for Episode #150 of the Essential Tennis podcast. Let's go ahead and get to those holiday greetings. Just a couple minutes of those. Several you called in and participated by saying "Hi," and giving a general holiday greeting of your choice. It was great to hear from all of you. Thank you very much for your participation if you called in. It's definitely something that I'd like to do again in the future. I think it's cool to interact with you guys and get feedback just in general, whether it be the questions or general suggestions for the show, or little things like this. It's really cool to hear from the listeners of the show. I definitely look forward to doing more things like this in the future! Without further ado, I'm going to go ahead and get to that. That will close off the show. I want to say a really warm and Happy New Year to all of you listening. Thank you for being a listener of this show. I look forward to producing another full year of the Essential Tennis podcast. I truly hope that it helps all of you continue to improve your tennis game. That's always been my goal for the show, and will continue to be. So thank you all for your support as I continue to do it. [music] [music] [music] Caller #1: Hi Essential Tennis podcast listeners! This is Ben from New York. I would like to wish everyone a Happy, Healthy, Safe Holiday. For those of you I would like to say: [inaudible] OK! See you later! Bye. Caller #2: Shalom! This is Gary [inaudible] from Havertown, Pennsylvania, USA. Season's Greetings, Happy Holidays, and all the best in the New Year! Caller #3: Hi, Ian. This is Carlotta from New Jersey. I wanted to extend to you and all of your listeners a Happy Holiday. Congratulations on the new edition to your family! Caller #4: Hi, Ian. This is David Goldman, originally from Southern California, but calling you from Jerusalem, Israel. I'm a huge fan of your show, and want your show to succeed and continue. I really appreciate you. I want to with you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! All the best. Bye. Caller #5: Hi! This is Jay from western Massachusetts. Holiday Greetings to everyone. Caller #6: Hi. This is Anthony from Atlanta, Georgia. I just wanted to wish the Essential Tennis family a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Play well and have fun! Caller #7: Hi, this is Andrew wishing you Holiday Greetings from San Francisco, and hopefully 2011 will be essential on and off the court. Enjoy! Bye. Caller #8: This is Andrew Webster from Salem, Oregon. Peace on Earth, and goodwill to all. Caller #9: Hi, this is John in real life from Santa Cruz, California. I just wanted to wish Ian, Royce, and everyone in [inaudible] a Merry everything! Thank you all for making it fun for me not just to learn the game of tennis, but to truly enjoy it. Happy Holidays! Caller #10: Hi, this is ZZ Carls wishing everybody and their family Happy Holidays! I hope you've had a great tennis year and you're looking forward to a great tennis year in 2011, whether it be your game or the professional game. Have a good one! Caller #11: Hey! This is John M. calling from Fort Worth, TX. I want to wish everyone Happy Holidays. I'd like to congratulate Ian on his 150th podcast. Caller #12: Hi, this is [inaudible] from the great state of Utah wishing you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! [music] [music] [music] Ian: Take care, and good luck with your tennis. Happy New Year's to you and yours! [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music]