Your Strokes: “Shroud” Forehand

A compact backswing, but what about those other "modern" elements--his extreme stance and wrap? Over the years I've mentioned a few times that I like to "participate" on the TennisWarehouse message boards. By that I mean I have gotten into some epic fights. And given some free explanations of Tennisplayer insights. And had chances to interact with passionate tennis players and coaches worldwide. One topic has been predominant. The dreaded, so-called Modern Forehand. I first encountered Shroud (his message board identity) in one of those forehand discussions about "lag and snap," a current buzz phrase that has mesmerized unsuspecting tennis wonks worldwide. For more on Lag and Snap and it's relation to reality see John Craig's article Click Here. For my take on Lag and Snap among several other imaginary "modern forehand" concepts Click Here. To summarize the message board discussion with Shroud: he had spent a long time working on compacting his backswing and getting his racket in position to "lag and snap," but with mixed results and a lot of confusion and frustration. Is a so-called pure ATP backswing what matters most? I told him that I thought if he could work through 2 key model positions in...