A New Year's Serve

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Reverse Rotation Serves

If your serve hesitates in trophy position, you are a non-subscriber to palm down natural loop old fashion Braden-advocated whirligigged serves.

More power to you. The effective racket work in your serve only starts from the trophy but your bod will have been hard at work for some time.

You are going to put more vertical force into your serve than someone following the whirligig route.

(Although a truly great server might find some unique way of doing both.)

Those of us with limited range at rear end of external axle-like twist of upper arm in its socket, however, still have a long runway available to us if we are not averse to calling a curved runway a car race track.

By combining bod wind with a bit of arm bend and residual arm wind and have all this happen at beginning of toss one can facilitate a natural palm down spaghetti arm loop that is faster than ego-driven persons can devise.

You literally let go of yourself.

The shoulders meanwhile turn forward from turning backward with no transition.

Half and half as part of the toss is my humble recommendation to all rotorded servers, to all players with one or more knee replacements as well..

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Report

An interesting self-feed came out of #4205 when I combined all sentiments there with the notion of narrower base hence more vertical energy.

In old models for a well-struck ball, e.g., Welby Van Horn, a distinct ingredient is "aeronautical banking" (AB).

I definitely use aeronautical banking in my McEnrueful, the forehand of mine the experts most like.

But what is the AB function in that or any basically flat shot no matter the grip?

To press against the ball, I contend, to build a power vector low, hard and fast over the net. The shoulder, which already is twisting through on a horizontal plane also rises on a diagonal thus adding to the total power of the press.

By claiming narrow base as a positive however I do not refer to distance the feet are apart (they can be far apart) but rather to an imaginary frame formed by the end places where racket goes down and comes up.

That is the narrowness to which I refer.

And when one starts to swing like this one notices right away a new ease in producing high trajectory balls.

Not to mention a changed function for AB.

No longer does AB apply horizontal pressure on the ball as much as add to the racket head speed of the wiping racket.

Yes! Teaching pros and other experts will sometime suggest that vertical bod movement can add to the force of one's vertical wipe.

I've heard that sentiment more than once but not from persons who believe one should carefully distinguish arm lift (relatively weak) from bod lift (stronger).

Besides, wipe lift does not combine well with arm lift. Better one or the other than both, in which dual case the arm is simply trying to do too much.

When bod alone provides the extra lift, the arm can-- more Zenlike-- use ISR (internal shoulder rotation) to wipe.

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For Better Axis Control in a Forehand

Start by studying how and when Roger does his axis change. Lewit: Roger stares down the slope of his shoulder and arm as he makes contact with the ball.

A slope? So how did the slope happen? Is Roger as beautifully upright as the sycophantic claims would have him? Or beautifully bent like a golfer from the hips? Or both at different parts of the same stroke?

Keep your butt away from the ball. I will, I will. But how can it all best happen?

I studied Roger (https://www.tennisplayer.net/members...1%20500fps.mp4). Now it's time not to study Roger. But to pursue same goal.

One can say this: Bend a little, not a lot. Bend a lot and you lose balance. Your eyes would move too much as well.

So, stay level for first half of the backswing. Establish slope in the second half. The whole apparatus of upper bod and racket can be continuing back.

The bucket of a steam shovel can be lowering even as it turns back.

If you maximize point across in lieu of keeping opposite hand on racket, you can:

1) During first half of backswing keep the point-across level.

2) In second half of the backswing let shoulder take the point-across up.

Point arm shoulder going up means that hit arm shoulder is going down.

But upper body needs to tilt a small bit at the same time (second half of the backswing).

Bite the side fence.

Stare at contact point after the ball is gone like Roger or Steffi-- I wonder if the boy Federer camp got the idea from her? Or maybe somebody in somebody's family was a golfer?

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"Stretch-Shorten Cycle" is Elaborate Language for a Spring that Pulls

One can hate it for its fanciness while loving it for its attempt to deliver detail of crucial bio-mechanics in three words only.

I myself use the word "spring" to refer not to a virgin spring in a forest but rather to the spring in a toy or medieval catapult.

Players who sacrificed smoothness for too many springs in their forehand probably became addicted along the way to the catnip of Nadal-like ball rotation achievable solely by Nadal and a few others (with the others not good enough to play on the tour). I notice a forum member called "morespin." A great guy no doubt but a bad name unless he was thinking of underspin, sidespin or both.

I'm contemplating arm spring right now, the type that occurs when one turns down one's racket tip instead of leaving it where it was or turning it up.

Baseball comes to mind-- the sidearm reliever, the shortstop who throws from his shoelaces all the way to first base.

What might happen if I situate such arm spring at a late place in my stroke? Can I then get what I want without sacrificing smoothness and the versatility of a strong eastern grip?

Will try level take back to meld into a turning down of the racket with arm still coiled.

Well, if arm is still coiled, then what besides ISR takes racket down? A lowering of the shoulder through a change in the rotational axis.

Then, as shoulders seamlessly reverse, a full mondo that includes zingy extension from the elbow can put strings on ball at the precise moment one's wipe begins.

Mondo and wipe, mondo and wipe. Time to acknowledge how close and tightly related they are.

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Had a second pickup hit in two days. Unusual in these parts. Happened more often in Winston-Salem.

Hit with an elderly gentleman who spends his winters playing on clay in Florida. Found that unwanted underspin was creeping into some of my forehands. May take some of the recent innovations and apply them to lower register shots. I'm a tall guy after all. Why should I want the racket high so much of the time?

So I'm trying forehands right now that take racket back level then drop it but with arm still bent. I want my extension from the elbow to be active and part of the immediately forward bod action that takes racket to its wiping point.

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From Wait Position Slightly Cheated to Left (which helps all backhands):

Point across with opposite hand to start all forehands.

But keep the forehand backswings as connected as possible.

"How can you say that, Escher, you who eschew keeping hand on the racket, you who are always messing around with your pronouns?"

You're just another voice, Escher, almost but not quite tired of being Bottle. (For as the Chicago journalist Richard Woodley once pointed out, "Bot is what you got.")

A tennis player can stay solid if he knows how, just has to say, "Look, ma, no hand."

Exception to the rule is a cast net forehand, flat with no wipe.

That one starts with a slight raise of racket tip, which is compromise to the rule.

You (I) might just as well eschew all evolution of backhand and start with racket tip up in wait position the old Ed Faulkner way.

Then all one has to do is turn one's bod, drop the racket and let the shots fly from either side.

Won't do it because I don't like the backhands it produces.

So I compromise by lifting racket tip. From there however, once tip is up, I take the racket back perfectly level until the transverse stomach muscles are ready to spring.

And now, compromised, enjoy my evil state by trying to launch topspin shots as well. Do they work? Possibly. But if not, go with Plan B, which is no raising of racket tip except from bod.

This as I see it is the beginning of a bolo punch.

The model is Myshkin Dudivanovitch (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBVgDc8TXnk).

First half of solid backswing is level as if one is a beginning baseball player. Second half creates lift through a change of axis as if one now wishes to play golf.

The hand is ready to curve down and crunch into the opponent's midsection.

The racket mondoes and wipes.

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L'anamour

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjpDtcHS7Sg

Lyrics

Aucun Boeing sur mon transit
Aucun bateau sous mon transat
Je cherche en vain la porte exacte
Je cherche en vain le mot exit

Je chante pour les transistors
Ce récit de l’étrange histoire
De tes anamours transitoires
De Belle au Bois Dormant qui dort

Je t’aime et je crains
De m’égarer
Et je sème des grains
De pavot sur les pavés
De l’anamour

Tu sais ces photos de l’Asie
Que j’ai prises à deux cents Asa
Maintenant que tu n’es pas là
Leurs couleurs vives ont pâli

J’ai cru entendre les hélices
D’un quadrimoteur mais hélas
C’est un ventilateur qui passe
Au ciel du poste de police

Je t’aime et je crains
De m’égarer
Et je sème des grains
De pavot sur les pavés
De l’anamour

Je t’aime et je crains
De m’égarer
Et je sème des grains
De pavot sur les pavés
De l’anamour

Songwriter: Serge Gainsbourg
L'Anamour lyrics © EMI Music Publishing

Nonlove

No Boeing on my path
No boat on my course
I look in vain for the right door
I look in vain for the word exit

For the transistors I sing
This strange story
About your transitory nonloves
About Sleeping Beauty who sleeps

I love you and I fear
Of going astray
And I sow the seeds
Of poppies on the cobblestones
Of nonlove

You know those photos from Asia
That I took for two hundred ASA
Now that you are not here
Their bright colors are faded

I thought I heard the turbines
Of a four engined plane but alas
It's a fan that moves
In the police station's sky

I love you and I fear
Of going astray
And I sow the seeds
Of poppies on the cobblestones
Of nonlove

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_pHxJL3EIE

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Present Orchestration Eschewed and Edited through a Hit with a Former Number Five at Clemson: The Sort of Thing that Should Happen More Often.

An auto worker who saw my self-feed made the long trek around all of the courts to come to my side of the fence.

He wanted to start with some half-court but I had been watching him work on his serve-- for a very long time-- and wanted to try and return it. No problem.

Such a level of ease in his ground strokes compared to what I usually see.

About 60 years old. Will introduce me to the very best seniors in the area.

Like the other superior players I occasionally play with, he liked my McEnrueful the best.

They don't say, "Oh, it looks like a John McEnroe forehand, a shot I've never liked."

They just react to the placements it enables.

Still, I hit it best when I rely on it sparingly.

Gone now is the bolo flat.

Bolo topspin is alive and well.

Early raise of racket tip is about to reprise.

Will then have two basic ways of hitting topspin-- from bottom and top.

Older cast net flat will make its reprise too.

McEnrueful flat however looks to be the staple flat.

Dick Milford told me that his father, an orthopedic surgeon, was the sports doctor at Clemson University for decades and played tennis until he was my age.

He told me to be careful.

I'll have to if I want to make it to the nineties like my friend Ken Hunt.

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Add Disguise to Flat Bolo Topspin Bolo Distinction

Disguise ought to be the last item in sensible tennis stroke design.

Put another way, the addition of disguise should signal the end of any design series.

Unfortunately however design is eternal, i.e., never ceases.

Say something is finished and it isn't.

Put still another way, sensibleness in design seldom happens. Nor should one try to make it happen.

Make a situation instead where you can connect dots in unexpected ways preferably in your sleep.

We left things yesterday with our pair of bolos marching toward levelness of backswing, took this idea to court and adjudicated that it was wise.

That early Sunday morning self-feed was marked by exceptionally good energy caused by lack of breakfast.

My favorite tennis model in these parts is Ken Hunt, 90, who eats two apples.

But despite the excellence of the self-feed, I had to reflect later that levelness of backswing could work for a flat shot too.

One could roll tip up at beginning of the bolo which doesn't start until near end of shoulders winding back.

Now you've got level backswing for both bolos starting with one inch of independent hand travel.

And two different ways of creating the last instant rise that makes a bolo punch so much fun.

1) Flat: Roll tip up but not far which would lower elbow. I see this move as a reversion to the classical saw of keeping racket cocked above wrist.

2) Topspin: Raise shoulder without altering hand.

Furthermore: Draw energy from gut by keeping lower body somewhat firm. Save Kentucky Fried Chicken (kinetic chain theory) for a McEnrueful.

1) Flat: Continue to stand straight and drive racket in a cast net swing along a level path with terrific extension.

2) Topspin: Alter everything to golf down before you wipe up again with terrific extension.

Point across in both cases, lifting hand then to same height (two inches up for topspin, one inch up for flat).

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBVgDc8TXnk

I see now that Senor Dude does indeed take up his hitting hand with his hitting shoulder, but unlike me at self-feed today doesn't worry about his front hand and lets it go down naturally since it's attached to his descending front shoulder. (Is therefore likely to catch one in the puss?)

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Bolo

This forehand design series proceeds.

Levelness is taking over.

Hand leads the backward turn by one inch (horizontal).

Hand leads the forward turn by one inch (vertical). But not the same hand. The other hand!

Well, both hands go up an inch but in two different ways.

The front hand goes up independent.

The rear hand goes up because the rear shoulder goes up.

The hands are still level now but an inch higher.

Bolo.

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Haven't Tried these Bolos Yet

Flat shot raises tip a little at start.

Topspin shot leaves tip at level where it is at start.

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Needed: Organic Cue for Lifting Hand One Inch in Bolo Punch Forehand

That moment when forward and backward rotations are in balance, viz., the shoulders are trying to go forward while still going back.

Will it help to start hand marginally before shoulders now that 95 per cent of backswing is level? Possibly.

With this symmetry: One inch of horizontal hand travel to start backswing. One inch of vertical hand travel to start foreswing.

Guess as to why backhand was able to gel: Because all attention was going to forehand.

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A One-inch Rise of Hand in Last Phase of Backswing

See it in my model video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBVgDc8TXnk)? Just as the dude turns his shoulders back an extra bit? Surely this is what gives his bolo punch half of its magnificent feel.

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Propose and Renounce: Anabolism and Catabolism

I'm lucky to dwell in a place where there is much tennis to be had.

Or should I say enough tennis for good integration of my self-feed experiments into competitive play.

Last night was the last of the Friday night tennis "socials" at Eastside Tennis (indoors) in Detroit-- the last until next Fall.

These socials or mixers with their preliminary anti-intellectual drill took me up one level thanks to significant improvement in my one-hand backhand.

Catabolism is taking the body down while anabolism is taking the backhand up.

The significant backhand improvement most came from gzhpcu's forum suggestion of looking at a book, FUNDAMENTALS OF TENNIS by Stanley Plagenhoef.

Plagenhoef's backhand section caused me to adopt a more modest backswing, not so high, to don an elbow corset with both elbows protruding more, to become perfectly clear in my own mind about how I wanted to "turn the corner" with pro-active arm extension melding into smooth arm roll which starts I think just before the arm is completely straight. Next to apply Geoffrey Williams' advocacy of committed, speedy forward hips turn to seemingly obliterate all such arm work without actually doing so. And stop the bod with shoulders parallel to the sideline so that the racket double-ends from there on.

The forehand (on the other hand) decided last night to be catabolic, to join the bod in going downhill.

Close linkage of shoulder rotations is fine, but the racket loop I chose was too intricate and slowed me down so that I couldn't keep up with the club's hard hitters.

Perhaps the racket tip has to go up as I was doing before though a very small amount.

Cast net forehands to be restored first. Then same shot with more topspin. The difference could be as simple as golfing the shoulders a little instead of bringing them horizontally around.

Cast net: no wipe. Golfier: wipe.

Listen, though, Mr. Escher. If you got slight lift of racket tip to work last week and lowering of racket tip to partially work this week, why not try no change of racket tip level at all?

In the backswing of course.

Deciding to keep racket tip where it started could be the best decision made today. Subtraction is a form of addition that often works better in tennis than just addition itself.

And wait position with racket cheated to left means that backward turn of the bod will point one's tip at the net.