Gulbis...what's going on!!

[DougEng]

Here is his old forehand:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJG00aKsvDg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lyb5iUEXTyg

Here is his new forehand:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmixYOD5q04

I find his old forehand a little cramped. I'm not sure the upper arm and shoulder pull back/rotate enough. He seems to lift/hitch the hitting shoulder up then back at the end of the backswing. His elbow stays very bent from start through to the finish of the stroke. It's cramped...very cramped...looks to be shoving the ball sometimes.

But I still don't see any clear advantage in the reworked forehand over the old one other than on perhaps slower, higher balls. That left arm "swimming" like that seems to be an unbalancing feature...just plain wrong. The right arm tries to do the opposite of what it did in the old forehand...by straightening out...still very double bend on contact, though. But he does get the more opened out backswing with his reworked forehand...perhaps more velocity...hard to tell without sitting down for an hour or two and comparing his old matches with his recent ones.

Good catch Stotty! That actually might be the advantage I'm thinking in which case the high left arm is advantageous in one way. But it clearly needs more than 2-3 videos. The analysis would need to be repeatedly in match play court level. So it may be difficult to get the data unless someone filmed a good number of his forehands during some matches. Basically the set-up is higher which allows for more aggressive play. In that case, setting the left arm allows him to create some loading effect (upwards drive) still on the high balls. The question, is really, is he doing this consistently? Previously it looks like a good number of his contact points were lower.