Tennis Tip Reminders

Here are some quick tips about the opposites that occur in tennis …

The first opposite is the shorter the groundstroke swing, the longer the shot will go, generally out. When the swing is cut short, there is very little topspin on the ball and the racquet face is still open causing a long floating shot. There are three main parts to any groundstroke, backswing, contact and follow through-in order of importance the follow through comes first. When the swing continues through and up after contact the ball stays on the face of the racquet longer creating topspin on the ball, which is the controlling factor on your shots. So, finish your swing over the shoulder.

The second opposite … if you stand up too soon on groundstrokes, the shot will go down into the net. You want the ball to contact the face of your racquet from the center, or sweet spot, to just above on the top half. This allows for the ball to cover more strings generating topspin, by standing up too soon you also pull up the head of the racquet so that your contact is made on the bottom half of the face resulting in net shots. So, maintain a slight knee bend until contact and then come up.

Another opposite occurs on serves and overheads, if the shots are too long, you have hit the ball too low. On shots above the head, the lower contact is made, the farther the ball will travel. The racquet face will come over the ball when the arm is at full extension. If the arm is not extended, the face of the racquet remains open at contact thus sending the shot out.

The two-hand backhand opposite is the power that comes from the opposite hand. If you are right-handed and have a two-hand backhand, the left hand does most of the hitting, snapping up and finishing over the shoulder just like your forehand should be doing. Think of the shot as a left-handed forehand.

All shots that are hit low to high should have a loose wrist so you can snap or roll the wrist up the backside of the ball for power and topspin. The opposite here is that all high to low shots (slices and volleys) are struck with an extremely firm wrist.