Hitting Stances in the Modern Forehand

Open stance in pro tennis: what does it really mean?

One of the most obvious commonalities in the modern forehand is the open stance. If you look through a few hundred forehand files in the Stroke Archive, you’ll see that around 80% of pro forehands are hit with some version of an open stance.

A common belief is that the open stance generates more power. There is also research that shows that from wide positions on the court, the recovery back toward the middle is probably shorter and faster than with a neutral stance. Because of these factors, there is a trend toward teaching open stance first, or even exclusively, to players from the beginning level up.

There is another perspective on teaching the modern game that argues that it is more effective to teach a square stance first. This viewpoint embraces the open stance, but holds that the fundamentals of turning, loading, and extending are difficult to develop working exclusively from the open stance. Typically this school also tends to emphasize more conservative grips, at least at the beginning, although this point is usually flexible as a player develops.

Is neutral stance hitting a better fundamental base?

So is…